Eloise (2 page)

Dear, strong Chris. Of course he was anxious about my reaction to Eloise’s death. He had seen me hyperventilating with panic, crippled by near insanity. Damn it, I thought, I don’t want this horror all over again. Chris was right; I had to avoid all the negative emotions that had plunged me into clinical depression in the past. We’d go back to London tomorrow, I decided, although we had planned to see Eloise’s husband – widower, I suppose I would have to call him now – Ted, and their little girls. We’d gone to their house – Eloise’s house – this afternoon because I’d felt strong enough
to cope with what I knew would be an emotionally charged encounter, but they weren’t there. Now I felt guilty for thinking I couldn’t face them, but I knew had to get away from the Cornwall I loved, the Cornwall that sparkled with clear green mornings whatever the season, as it had today. There were butterflies on the cliff path as early as Boxing Day and the daffodils in our meadow came out in November, and stayed golden and full of hope no matter how harsh the winter. The sea gleamed blue in the sunlight, and on rainy days its sullen pewter gloom was thrillingly brightened by crashing white surf that made my heart sing and my head clear of everything except the brilliant beauty of this wondrous place.

Cornwall filled me with peace and happiness. It had been my refuge for over twenty years, my sanctuary, and we’d planned this break long before Ellie’s death, looking forward to time on our own with the boys away at their universities and our daughter on her school’s ski trip. But now here, where Eloise had died, I was obsessed with death and gloom again. Worst of all, somehow I could feel Eloise pulling at me, filling me with dark thoughts, fear and foreboding.

Chris slept quietly beside me and I wrapped my arms round his warm, solid body. I would apologise for my irrita tion when we woke, tell him that we would go home.

*

In the morning, Chris was sweetly accepting of my apology, clearly feeling that it marked an upturn in my spirits. So much so that after breakfast he asked me if I still wanted to go back to London, glancing wistfully out of the window at the brilliant blue sky. It was raining at home, so the weather report had said, my night terrors were almost gone and it was a beautiful day.

‘We could go to the beach at Polkerris,’ he said. ‘It seems a shame to waste a day like this and drive back to pouring rain.’

It did. Anyway, I could do with some sun and sea air to chase away the last night-time horrors. I looked at Chris and nodded. He grinned and kissed the top of my head. Outside in the garden the glorious salty tang of the sea helped revive my spirits and I wondered if Talland Beach Café was open. The season didn’t really start until Easter but sometimes the young couple who ran it would open up before that if the weather was exceptionally good and it was a weekend. We’d stroll down in the afternoon for a cup of tea, I thought. Meanwhile we’d have lunch at Polkerris or Fowey.

We reached Bodinnick in twenty minutes and waited for the ferry. There were only two other cars in the queue, but in summer the lane was often packed with families waiting to cross to Fowey. I never minded waiting because I could look at the striking house by the water’s edge and daydream
about Daphne du Maurier. Painted white, with window and door frames picked out in vivid indigo, this was Ferryside, Daphne’s beloved first home in Cornwall. Eloise and I were both passionate about du Maurier. Every year we would go together to the literary festival held in Fowey in honour of Cornwall’s greatest novelist. This year, I realised sadly, I would have to go on my own.

The crossing took five minutes. We drove off the boat, turned right past the car park and instead of taking the left hand turn to Fowey we carried on until the road sign indicated Polkerris beach and Menabilly.

Ah … Menabilly. The Holy Grail of anyone who seeks to understand and emulate the extraordinary talent and vision of Daphne du Maurier. Those of us who have been enslaved by her stories set in Cornwall know how her obsession with Menabilly, the house in which she wrote her most marvellous novel of all,
Rebecca
, still enchants and draws us. Ellie and I would sometimes walk down the lane and try to catch a glimpse of the old farmhouse, but it’s so secluded and remote that it’s impossible to see through the impenetrable thicket of trees surrounding the property.

Reaching Polkerris we had a choice of eating at The Rashleigh Inn, a very pleasant pub with lovely views of the sea, or at Sam’s on the Beach, a truly great little bistro with a good fishy menu.

Today we chose Sam’s, a converted nineteenth century lifeboat house, utterly unpretentious, all wood and glass, right on the glorious beach which in February was mostly populated with dogs and young children enjoying a fabulous sunny Saturday with their mums and dads.

We ordered prawns and scallops and watched the little ones on the sands outside, marvelling at their simple happiness with bucket and spade.

We had to talk, of course, about Eloise and, more particularly, about Ted and the twins. We hadn’t seen them since the funeral but I really didn’t want to just yet, not after last night’s nightmare. We would call later and perhaps visit them tomorrow.

‘We ought to see Juliana as well,’ I told Chris. ‘She’s in the most awful state about Eloise – I called her last week and she simply couldn’t speak. She just wasn’t prepared for it.’

‘Are you kidding, Cathy? Of course she was prepared. Juliana knew her daughter was terminal for the last couple of years.’

‘Yes, but Ellie was doing so well just before the end. I know Juliana thought she had rallied, and her doctors thought so too. They told Ted and Juliana that she had maybe as much as a year; certainly another six months.’

‘That was all speculative.’

‘Obviously, as things have turned out. But Chris, of course Juliana’s very shocked, and I want to see her. I’ll call her now.’

‘Honey, could you please leave it for today? I really, really want a quiet evening with just
you
. We could have some tea at Talland Bay and then head home, light a fire, and watch TV. We can have a couple of glasses of wine, and just relax. I think we both need that, and it won’t happen if you get obsessed with Eloise again, as you did yesterday.’

I felt mutinous, but only for a moment. Chris had been wonderful when I was ill and I owed him some uncomplicated pleasure. I smiled and squeezed his hand. Tomorrow I would deal with Juliana, Ted, and those poor, motherless little girls, Rose and Violet. Tonight I would just try to make my husband happy.

On Sunday morning I called Juliana – and she sounded desperate.

‘Cathy, I’m so very glad you called. Can I see you? I’m in a bit of a state here. I’m really sorry to bother you but – well, things aren’t right.’

‘Of course. I’ll come straight away. Do you want anything?’

‘Oh God, Cathy. I want my darling daughter, and I want her daughters too.’

‘I know, I know,’ I said, aching with sympathy for her. ‘I’ll come. I’ll be at Roseland in an hour.’

*

I don’t drive. Well, I do – I finally passed my test after six attempts and felt too embarrassed to be triumphant. But it was all such a strain that I never really enjoyed it and always had the feeling that I was two steps away from a fatal accident.

Because of that, I now leave it to Chris, who loves driving; one of the many areas of our life together which I cede to him because I have so little confidence in myself; part of the catastrophic breakdown in my mind from which I was supposedly recovering. When I was ill, I became agoraphobic. I was terrified of leaving the house, and I hated meeting new people. I was much better now, but I still had no faith in my ability to drive. I have a little VW Beetle convertible that we keep in Cornwall, but I only drove it once last year, after my breakdown. Within yards of leaving the cottage to do some shopping, I hit an enormous boulder on the left-hand side of the road. I wasn’t hurt and the only damage was a blown tyre, but that, as far as I was concerned, was that. Total failure. Despite all of Chris’s encouragement, I refused to take the wheel again, even though he took a sledgehammer to the offending rock and smashed it to bits.

So the little cream Beetle sat forlornly on our Cornish driveway like a neglected pet: utterly sweet and begging to be taken out for a walk – or rather a spin. And hardly ever rewarded but for an occasional impulsive trip to the pub, on
days so sunny it was irresistible not to drive with the roof down; but every time Chris or one of the boys was firmly at the wheel.

So it was Chris who drove me to see Juliana, and when we arrived he said he’d take a walk around the grounds, sure that Ellie’s mother would prefer to talk to me alone. The gardens were magnificent, National Trust owned and cared for, so it wasn’t exactly a sacrifice. Actually, it was a total treat.

Roseland Hall is a grand old manor house, built in the mid-seventeenth century, overlooking the lower part of the beautiful River Fowey. It’s open to the public and is no longer the private domain of the Trelawneys, the great, ancient Cornish family to which it originally belonged.

Eloise had often shown me round it. She especially loved inveigling the curator to let us in late at night, when its ghostly grandeur easily persuaded us that it was haunted, as was its reputation. It’s a remarkable house, astonishingly almost as cosy as it’s grand, lit with exquisite French crystal chandeliers, and with a magnificent Long Gallery hung with the finest tapestries and paintings.

For any family, it would be a tragedy to leave such a house behind. But sadly, Juliana, the last Lady Trelawney, no longer lived there.

For generations, Eloise had confided to me, the Trelawneys had had problems with fertility and gradually, but
inexorably, the line dwindled. Sir Charles, Eloise’s father, the last baronet, was the only child of his generation, as his father and grandfather had been of theirs. He had no brothers, no sisters, no cousins. When he married the beautiful Juliana, a well-bred Cornish girl from an old, landed family, he had high hopes of producing a son and heir. And, after five years of increasingly desperate attempts to conceive, Juliana at last fell pregnant. When Eloise was born, Charles tried hard to hide his disappointment, but Juliana knew she had failed him. She never got pregnant again, and they never talked about it. She was afraid to plumb the depths of his despair. Juliana, though, adored her little daughter, and increasingly resented her husband’s indifference to their child. She also suspected that her inability to produce more children was not her fault, but his. Her own family had no problems with fecundity.

Still, there was nothing to be done about it. Charles was so gloomy about Trelawneys no longer living on the estate that his wife knew to press him on the matter would open deep, irreconcilable wounds, wounds that could destroy their marriage, so she kept her peace.

Charles became increasingly maudlin about the future of the big house. He had a great deal of money, but the estate was a constant drain on his resources. And for what? There was no dynasty here, no reason to invest in his ancient
family’s future because there would be no future Trelawneys. If Eloise married, she would take her husband’s name. And he sensed Juliana’s heart was not in it. Charles was right. She was not enthusiastic about being forever responsible for an enormous stately pile, with all the sacrifices, discipline and hard work it required, and she had absolutely no wish to burden Eloise with the responsibility of maintaining an anachronism that had outlived its usefulness. She vowed to herself that if her husband died before her, she would give the house to the National Trust.

And that’s exactly what she had done. Ellie told me it was the best decision her mother ever made.

I knocked at Juliana’s door. Since Charles’s death, she had lived in a very beautiful old farmhouse in the grounds of Roseland Hall. I always felt a bit intimidated by its utterly perfect, though slightly shabby, patrician décor. But, to be honest, that was only my own inverted snobbery kicking in. And Juliana did not deserve that. She was so warm, so utterly enveloping, that her aristocratic background, her upper-class vowels, her complete confidence in her own being and her place in one of the most ancient and romantic families of distinguished Cornish aristocracy made you
want to be close to her, to be involved with the rich tap estry of her days.