Authors: Priscilla Masters
Sara and John turned up late, saying their babysitter had been delayed. Sara looked like an ice queen that night, in a sparkling, long, pale blue evening dress. She had pinned her long, blonde hair up and dressed it in curls. She wore drop pearl earrings and silver shoes. She greeted Richard with a warm embrace, kissing his cheek and laughing. The truth was that my older sister had a penchant for Richard and never stopped telling me how lucky I was to have such a life. John, her husband, paid me some compliment about my appearance and my dress and we all toasted each other in dry champagne.
At some point during the early part of the evening Richard and Michael must have slipped away from the library because I missed them. I wandered off to find them and found the dining-room door closed. I pushed it open.
They were facing each other, Richard frowning, Michael obviously angry. I caught only one phrase. ‘Does Susie know?’
I interrupted lightly. ‘Does Susie know what?’
Neither of them spoke and I spoke again. ‘Does Susie know what?’
Michael shot a swift glance at his father, licked dry lips and said nothing. I searched Richard’s face and knew, whatever it was, he didn’t want me to know and he wasn’t going to tell me. ‘Nothing,’ he said shortly. ‘It’s to do with the business. Come along now. It’s time to go. Jenkins will have the car round.’
I could have let it spoil the evening but I didn’t. I pushed the incident from my mind.
Oh yes. Hall o’th’Wood was a house of uneasy secrets that night as well as a house of celebration.
The faithful Jenkins drove us to the restaurant, Churches Mansion in Nantwich, another Cheshire black-and-white house, almost as beautiful as our own. The two other cars followed behind. Aunt Eleanor travelled with Sara, and Michael drove Linda, leaving Richard and myself in the Rolls.
The maître d’hôtel was sweating as we arrived, nervous as we entered, rubbing his palms together. I felt some sympathy for him. Richard could be an exacting client. I had heard him on the phone, ordering the meal, the room, directing the wine and stipulating the seating arrangements – almost, I had thought at the time, as though he was organising a second wedding. He had
made no bones about it that tonight was to be – perfect. Special and memorable. But this was an added burden on an already agitated restaurateur.
I sat next to Richard at the head of the table, Sara on the other side. My sister missed no opportunity of flirting outrageously with my husband. She called him dangerous and sexy until I pointed out that she was confusing my husband with James Bond. It made no difference. Sara was drinking a lot of wine that night. John was driving and more than once Richard fended off her kisses. I knew that underneath his stiffness he actually enjoyed her attention. I watched her, feeling the strongest affection for my normally prim sister. We could be a close family, I reflected, if an unconventional one – sister, aunt, husband, stepson, his girlfriend. Since my marriage we had spent all our Christmases and New Years together at Hall o’th’Wood and many, many weekends, birthdays and dinners. Hall o’th’Wood was a house built for entertaining. For a family.
Dreaming, I brushed my stomach with my fingers and when I looked down the long table I caught my Aunt Eleanor’s eye and smiled at her, sharing our secret.
Next Christmas, I thought, would be the most special of all because it would be complete. I would have my son in my arms.
How dangerous are dreams.
We had smoked salmon and asparagus for starters and the main meal was just being brought – chicken in soured-cream sauce – when I heard my aunt discussing a
case which had made the headlines recently. She had a very clear voice and her words dropped into one of those lulls in the conversation. ‘They can’t hang him, surely?’
We all knew what she was talking about. It was a case of a British drugs smuggler in the Far East who had been sentenced to hang. As an example, surely, to other would-be drugs traffickers. John and Sara started to join in the discussion. I turned my head to the side and looked at Richard. His face was grey, his breath loud rasps, his eyes unfocused. He was about to drop onto the table.
‘Richard,’ I said. He tried to stand up and collapsed, in a heap, on the floor.
I bent over him. He gripped my hand. ‘Get me home, Susie,’ he said hoarsely. ‘Take me home.’
My instinct was to call an ambulance but Richard gripped my wrist. ‘Home,’ he said again, struggling to sit up. ‘I’ll be all right if I can only get back.’
I summoned Jenkins and left the others to their meal, knowing the evening was ruined. Richard and I returned to Hall o’th’Wood.
I called a doctor as soon as we arrived home. The trouble was that Richard’s doctor was an old school pal, Doctor Irving Combermere, a plump, ex-public schoolboy who was in private practice in Nantwich. I had met him on a number of occasions and had disliked him intensely from the first time he had patted my bottom and told me that ‘Oliver’ and he wanted a bit of boy-talk. Oddly enough, although he often made what were probably meant to be flattering comments about me, I had the instinct that my feelings were reciprocated. Fully. Combermere had a patronising attitude to women that I couldn’t stand. But Richard insisted he would see no other doctor.
Combermere was red-faced, overweight and a letch; it was nearly midnight when I opened the door to him and told him that Richard had collapsed at the restaurant. His eyes lingered on my low-cut dress (I hadn’t bothered to change). He raised his eyebrows and went straight upstairs, I beside him, but halfway up he stopped me
short. ‘Absolutely not,’ he said. ‘I shall see the patient alone, if you don’t mind.’
I kept my temper – and my dignity. ‘I’m his wife,’ I said. ‘I have a right to—’
‘I’ll see the patient alone,’ he repeated.
I argued. ‘Shall we ask Richard?’
As I had half expected Richard agreed with Combermere and banished me from the bedroom. He wanted to speak to his ‘old mate’ alone, he said, so I was left, like an expectant father, to wait downstairs with Maria who kept wringing her hands and saying that she’d known he’d been doing too much lately.
She gripped my hand. ‘All that worry,’ she said. ‘Not good for him.’
So I had her to comfort as well.
Fifteen minutes later I heard Combermere’s heavy footsteps descending the staircase and came out into the hall to meet him.
‘As I thought,’ he said. ‘It’s nothing. Nothing wrong with the old chap at all. Just a heavy meal plus a couple of drinks. Indigestion. Oh – and I’ve told him he should really stop those cigars.’
I didn’t believe him. ‘Is that all?’ I started to describe the episode to him but he stopped me with the usual pat on my bottom.
‘Absolutely, Susie.’ He leered at me. ‘If you want my opinion I think it’s having a nice young filly like you in the stable. Not good for we older men, you know.’
You have to hand it to Combermere. He really knew how to rile me. And to put me off the scent.
I watched him go with a feeling of fury mixed with anxiety. He was lying. But whether through his own misguided sense of confidentiality, or on Richard’s instruction, I didn’t know. And I had no way of finding out either. If Richard was determined to shut me out what could I do? Nothing? I climbed the staircase and entered the bedroom, told him he wasn’t to stir for the whole of the next day and ignored his protestations.
‘Punishment,’ I said lightly, ‘for spoiling our wedding anniversary dinner.’
We did spend the following day quietly, at home. Richard slept for much of the time and I watched as he gradually returned to the man I knew.
Once, when I was trying to tiptoe away, thinking he was asleep, he opened his eyes and I found him staring at me.
‘Perhaps I did a selfish thing,’ he said.
I stared at him.
‘Marrying you.’
I shook my head. I would have none of it.
But he turned his head on the pillow. ‘I knew our life together would not be uncomplicated,’ he said. ‘Susie, I’m so sorry.’
I lay across him then and put my head on his shoulder. We lay like that for a long time without speaking. There seemed nothing to say.
Three weeks later we flew to Hong Kong.
It was not my sort of place. I knew that as soon as I set foot inside the airport terminal. Modern, brisk, crowded. Humid and hot. Noisy for twenty-four hours a day. It was a climate to sweat in.
We checked into a hotel which had all the character of the Tardis and the next morning a car arrived to take me across the harbour to Kowloon and one of the warehouses or godowns, as they called them, where the Chinese porcelain was being held.
The political situation in China then meant that ancient pieces of porcelain were being destroyed by the people, my driver explained. So, ‘Bobby’ Liu told me that smuggling pieces of Ming or T’ang out of the People’s Republic was a ‘good thing’.
‘Otherwise’, he continued, ‘there will be nothing left of our heritage. It will all be destroyed. You are helping the China of the future, Mrs Oliver.’
I didn’t realise how much or what it would cost me.
Bobby Liu leant back in his driver’s seat to speak more to me. ‘Terrible things are happening in China today,’ he said. ‘We hear rumours, speak to people and we don’t like what we hear. It seems to me, Mrs Oliver, that someone needs to take action.’
It is typical of the Chinese that even here, in Hong Kong, under British rule, Bobby Liu would not specify either what action should be taken and by whom.
The warehouse was an interesting building in traditional Chinese style, bustling with helpful porters
trotting around with sometimes huge burdens. In the corner were shelves of Chinese porcelain. I knew little about the delights of the T’ang and Ming, Song or Kangxi periods but I could work it out. The Chinese potters had thoughtfully provided symbols to give the uneducated an idea of precise dates for their pieces. In fact as I warmed to my subject I discovered that absorption which always took me unawares. The thrill of the chase to a huntsman, the throw of a dice to a gambler, the thrill of discovery to a ceramics dealer. So for the next few days I spent my time checking up on pieces, cataloguing them and doing some rough valuations but I could not help wondering why it was that they had selected me. English pottery was my subject and surely there were plenty of experts over here on Oriental porcelain. It was all a puzzle. Each evening I supervised as the pieces were packed in sawdust, put into tea chests, labelled and transported to the airfreight terminal. We were to accompany them to Heathrow from where they would be picked up and transported to the collector, who, we understood, lived in Surrey. Payment was arranged for the other end.
There were odd little factors which I did not then understand. Richard seemed so eager for me to complete the transaction when he usually showed little more than a passing interest in my work. I could not understand his accompanying me here either. Hong Kong was not his sort of place any more than it was mine and he had little to do during the day. He told me he met various businessmen but he appeared deliberately vague and
usually when I returned home he would be in our hotel room. I noticed that none of his business acquaintances rang him; neither did I meet any of them.
But he seemed anxious for the trip to be successful and for the deal to be completed.
I returned one evening to find him lying on the bed, his hands behind his head, staring moodily up at the ceiling. I stood in the doorway and watched him for a moment, wondering what was going on in his mind. He turned his head.
‘Michael’s just rung.’
‘Oh?’
‘He’s got engaged.’
‘Wonderful,’ I enthused. ‘I liked her.’ I looked at Richard. He was looking very disgruntled.
‘See,’ I teased, sitting down beside him on the bed, ‘I told you so.’ I kissed him. ‘You mark my words,’ I said, watching for his reaction. ‘You’ll be a grandfather before long. So,’ I stroked his forehead to iron out the scowl. ‘How will you feel about that, my darling?’
His eyes looked suddenly forlorn. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘How will you feel about being married to a grandfather?’
I lay down then beside him. ‘I think I’ll feel pretty good,’ I answered.
He touched me then, knowing I would respond and we both drew breath.
‘Dinner can wait,’ he murmured.
It was a strange evening. In a foreign city we made love, toasted Michael and Linda and finally ate, not in one of the smart hotels but in a little café which cooked our food quickly over an open flame.
Finally all the crates were hammered down and I supervised the last one’s transport to the airfreight terminal. We checked out of the hotel and Bobby Liu waited to pick us up. I felt quite sad at saying goodbye to my cheerful Chinese driver but he pressed my hand in a quick gesture. ‘You are helping Chinese people more than you know,’ he said. ‘We salute you and thank you.’
I didn’t understand any of it – then.
We spent the usual time in the first-class lounge, browsing through the newspapers. There were strikes in the public sector. Ted Heath was ‘negotiating’. I was anticipating seeing Jenkins waiting for us at the terminal at Heathrow, supervising the handover of the crates, accepting our money for the job and returning to Hall o’th’Wood.
Finally our flight was called and we settled down into the aeroplane.
I remember I asked Richard whether he had got bored in those few days in the Far East and he answered no, that he’d enjoyed the break from normal life, and that he was looking forward to consolidating his business interests over there.
I settled back in my seat. Not quite satisfied.
We were both quiet for most of the flight, saying little. In all our lives we were never so silent as in those final
strange hours returning from Hong Kong. I was suspended in a dreamworld which lay over the real universe, unconnected with any country we might happen to be passing over. In this sky-world Richard and I watched our son playing in the knot garden at Hall o’th’Wood, finally banishing the tragic ghost of Rebekah Grindall. The sun shone down on the crooked walls, the leaden panes of glass throwing the reflections this way and that. Maria was standing at the window, watching over us. I remember putting my hands out to touch this dreamworld, wanting to enter now, this very minute. Hall o’th’Wood could keep its secrets, I bargained, as long as I could live my dream.
As our descent began Richard grew agitated. He checked our passports three or four times, kept pulling at his seat belt, tightening it up. As we taxied towards the terminal I watched him grow even more anxious and put my hand in his. ‘What’s the matter?’ I said.
‘Nothing.’ I knew it was a lie. ‘I just hope Jenkins is there. That’s all.’
I tried to reassure him. ‘Of course he’ll be there,’ I said, ‘standing at the barrier waiting to take us home. We’ll be home soon,’ I said. ‘Back in Hall o’th’Wood with Maria and Jenkins and we’ll see Michael tomorrow and congratulate him. We’ll organise an engagement supper for the happy couple.’
Two happy couples, I thought, I shall take that opportunity to announce our child to our families.
He closed his eyes.
I watched him and worried again about his health, what he was hiding from me. I worried too about my child. I wanted to feel it move. But, of course, it was too early. Richard gripped my hand and I left it there. I take comfort from this.
As soon as they opened the hatch doors we knew something was wrong.
There was an armed guard to greet us as we left the plane and at the terminal two men came towards us. They were plainly dressed, of insignificant appearance, and in this there was something ominous about them. ‘Mrs Oliver?’ It sounded like an arrest.
‘Mr Oliver. Would you come with us please?’
Officialdom is at its most threatening when it is at its most polite. Then you know.
We walked with them along the terminal corridor. I glanced at Richard and read something terrible in his eyes. ‘Susie,’ he said urgently. ‘Susie.’
He dropped to the floor like a stone.
I watched him go with a sense of unreality because at the same time I felt a suffocating panic and a sharp cramp in my stomach. Not my stomach. My womb.
I saw one of the men bend over Richard, shout to his companions, thump his chest, blow into his mouth. I struggled to stand up. But in the end I dropped too.
Medics, police, all the dignity and organisation that is this country descended on us. I was aware of little except a voice which was insistent. ‘Where is the pain?’
‘Where is the pain?’
Other voices spoke to me. A woman this time. ‘Mrs Oliver. I’m sorry. I have bad news.’
I lost consciousness and did not find a lucid mind again until…
The cases had been full of porcelain – yes. But they had also contained ‘sensitive’ Chinese documents designed to bring down the Mao government. I had never seen the letters which had been written by Madam Mao or Jiang Qing, as she had been then, denouncing the Communist Party. I knew nothing of this but it lit a diplomatic row. I became the sacrificial lamb to peace – of a sort – between the two countries. The lawyers could argue that I had been an innocent victim but it wasn’t going to wash with anyone; least of all me.
How could I ever have thought that the hundreds of thousands of pounds Hall o’th’Wood needed in repairs could be supplied by one trip to China bringing back porcelain? Oh no, this had had money behind it. Money poured in by anyone who wanted to see Mao and the Communist government toppled. As is usual with me I had believed my own version of events, only what I wanted to believe.
They were more cynical. I was, after all, a well-known antiques dealer with a flourishing international business. It didn’t take a great stretch of the imagination to picture me dealing in secret letters as well as Chinese porcelain. In the end no one really cared. They couldn’t even decide what to charge me with – this Foreign Office hot potato.
Stolen goods? Where was the proof? But once China got wind of the story they insisted I be dealt with. In the end, almost apologetically, I was sent to prison with the trumped-up charge of endangering state security.
In fact I had lost all, my child and my husband in the same hour, my freedom and my future, because in those dreadful days doctors told me that I never would bear a child.
I faced a long court case and a prison sentence. I buried my husband flanked by two prison officers. My charmed life was over.
Now the nightmares began.