Peter and his wife were sitting on the small terrace which he had made between the house and the long back lawn. When she came back from France Marianne had insisted on buying a long pink-and-orange swing seat with a striped awning and flowery cushions. Peter had thought it a foolish and frivolous purchase, but now he was not so sure. They had used it all through the autumn and he guessed that it would be brought out again in the spring. It smiled at them as they worked around the house, and beckoned. Come out and laze, it said, and quite often in the past eight weeks since they had returned from France, Peter and Marianne had answered the call. Tea on the terrace, which had been a dream rather than a reality, was now taken out here whenever the weather was fine, and Tess and Janet spent time out here too, swinging and chatting, knowing they were tolerated outside whereas, within doors, Marianne would have complained every time they laughed.
So now Marianne lounged back against the cushions, swinging the seat with one foot whilst Peter sat and frowned into space. Finally he jerked his head at the sailing dinghies and spoke.
‘She’s changed. We were away ten days, almost no time, yet when we came home she was different. Look at her now!’
‘She’s the cat’s mother,’ Marianne said amiably. ‘Do you refer to Cherie, or to Tess?’
Peter raised his eyes to heaven. ‘Is Cherie sailing out there? Did Cherie stay in England for ten days whilst we swanned off to France? Has she changed?’
‘Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit,’ Marianne informed him. ‘Do I take it, then, that you mean Tess has changed? I’ve not noticed.’
‘No. You wouldn’t. You don’t notice Tess much at all, do you, Marianne?’
‘Not much,’ Marianne admitted, and Peter was unable to stop a small grin playing about his mouth. One of the things he continued to love about Marianne – and they were getting fewer every day – was her ability to speak the whole truth even when it did her no credit. ‘But still waters run deep, and Tess doesn’t tell me much. Besides, she’s almost a woman. I do not like women.’
‘You didn’t like her when she was only a kid,’ Peter started to stay, then stopped, shaking his head at himself. No point in stating the obvious and besides, Tess was clearly a kid no longer. She was a very attractive young woman, young men were beginning to buzz round her like bees round a honeypot, and Peter did not like it. He particularly did not like Ashley Knox and that was strange, because Ashley was, he supposed, the type of young man most parents would encourage gladly. He was at university studying law, his father was a prominent and successful lawyer with a very large firm indeed, and Ashley’s sister was one of Tess’s closest school friends.
So why don’t I like him? Peter mused, staring across at the little sails outlined against the sun-silvered Broad until his eyes watered. Why don’t I trust him? Why do I have to fight a horrible urge to tell him to get his filthy paws off my darling girl and leave her for someone more worthy?
‘You don’t like the Knox boy,’ Marianne said, and Peter stared at her, convinced for a moment that she had read his mind. ‘So why should you expect me to like Tess? You’re jealous, and so am I.’
‘Jealous? Me? Of my own
daughter
? That’s a very unpleasant suggestion, Marianne. Very unpleasant and totally untrue. I simply don’t trust young Knox to – to do the right thing by her.’
‘He’s a delicious young man and she’s lucky to have caught his interest,’ Marianne said flatly. ‘I take it they’re sailing this afternoon?’
‘Yes. Practising. He’s running her over to Oulton tomorrow to compete in some race or other.’ Peter yawned and stretched, then leaned forward to peer into the teapot on the low white table by his knees. ‘I wonder if this will run to another cup?’
He tested the pot, but it was cool, so he got to his feet and headed for the kitchen. ‘Just going to make new tea,’ he called over his shoulder. ‘Shan’t be a mo.’
Inside, busying himself with filling the kettle, he could have kicked himself for mentioning Tess. It brought out the bitch in Marianne, there was no doubt of that. And no one, seeing them together, could help making comparisons. Tess with her clear, pale skin, the gleam of health on her hair, the perfect teeth, the slender, long-legged figure. And Marianne. She was growing plump, rather. saggy, her skin showing big pores around nose and chin, lines which came from her frequent bouts of peevishness running horizontally across her forehead, vertically between nose and mouth.
Yet I still love a good many things about her, Peter reminded himself. She can be loving, generous, amusing . . .
But not to Tess. Never to Tess.
He put the half-filled kettle over the hob and went and stood by the window, his original worry returning. They had gone off to France leaving a sweet-tempered, pretty young girl. They had returned to find a rather remote young woman. For the first week, she had kept looking at him whenever she thought he wasn’t looking at her. Speculatively. What was worse, when he became worried and went to her room, sat on the end of her bed, reached for her hands to ask her what was the matter, she had snatched them away as if he was poison and coloured hotly.
‘Don’t,’ she had mumbled. ‘I’m not a baby any more. I’m all right, I can deal with Marianne.’
For once, he hadn’t been going to ask her to ‘deal with Marianne’. He had said quietly, ‘Sweetheart, what’s wrong?’ and quite uncharacteristically she had burst into tears and repeated, in a muffled voice, that he must leave her alone.
Her grief was noisy and he was afraid Marianne might march in and make things worse, make a scene, shout, scream, have hysterics. She had done all of those things in her time, especially if she thought Peter was paying too much attention to his elder daughter, and he felt, instinctively, that Tess couldn’t cope with that now no matter how grown-up and capable she felt herself to be. So he had patted her timidly on the shoulder, tried to ignore her growl of ‘Don’t
pat
me, I’m not a
dog
,’ and left her.
Later, he had returned to the subject; outside this time, when the two of them were picking apples in the orchard, with one up the tree and the other on the ground to receive the fruit. It had been gusty, sunny, a wonderful day for apple picking, and they had both been in a friendly, relaxed mood.
‘Tess, love, you’ve not been quite yourself since we got home from France,’ Peter had said, as he took the ripe fruit from her hands and placed it tenderly in the big wheeled wicker basket. ‘Did anything happen whilst we were away?’
She had shrugged carelessly, but avoided his eyes. ‘No. I don’t think so. I enjoyed myself tremendously though – the Knoxes were awfully kind to me.’
‘Good, good. You must ask Freddy to come and stay here for a week or so then. In the spring, perhaps.’
‘I will. Oh . . . one thing did happen, Daddy.’
She handed him down a huge, rosy-cheeked cooker. Play it cool, old man, or she’ll never confide in you again, he commanded himself, whilst awful possibilities reared their ugly heads. Was she going to tell him someone had made a pass at her? That she had been . . . hurt, or interfered with in some way? But he kept his voice level, friendly, did not allow it to rise in panic.
‘Oh? What was that, love?’
‘I wanted to contact Andy – you know, Herbert Anderson – so I rang Lady Salter to get details, and she told me Andy’s off with a crowd of friends touring India in a bullock cart. She said they’re returning via the Middle East and wouldn’t be near a telephone for six months. Isn’t he lucky, Daddy? But I wish he’d told me. I really do miss Andy.’
The relief was so great he would have sworn it was tangible, a physical thing. It brought a big, foolish smile to his face, a sparkle, he was sure, to his eyes. He beamed up at her. ‘You never know what you’ll be doing, pet, once you’ve taken your Higher, next year. I suppose Andy’s having a year off before going into one of the embassies, like his father. Would you think?’
‘I don’t know, Lady S didn’t say.’ She sighed. ‘I do miss him,’ she repeated.
Afterwards, of course, there were moments when Peter wondered whether she had simply told him about Andy’s great adventure to put him off the scent, so that he would stop worrying about the change in her. But gradually he was beginning to accept that his open-faced, trustful little daughter had gone for good. In her place was a watchful, guarded stranger. Oh, he loved the stranger, admired the unusual beauty which was beginning to blossom (so like, so very like, Leonora!), but there were times when he would have given almost everything he possessed to have his little girl back.
The kettle boiled and Peter made fresh tea and carried the pot out to where Marianne lounged on the swing-seat. He poured tea into two cups, added milk, handed one to his wife who took it with a murmur of thanks, sipped, then put the cup down and lay back again. Presently, her breathing steadied and deepened. She slept.
Peter got up, careful not to jerk the seat, and made his way across the wide lawn, through the trees and down to where the Broad began with a gradual marshiness, then tall reeds, then the deepening water. The boats were returning to the staithe now, their practice presumably over for the day. He could pick out his daughter’s dark head anywhere . . . he grinned to himself as that puppy helped her out of the boat and tried to hug her and got shoved sharply away. Good for you, old girl, he thought approvingly. Don’t let the little bugger get too close. I know what boys are like – I should do, I was one, a million years ago.
It made him remember, that little cameo of a scene, the lithe and lovely girl stepping out of the boat, pushing the handsome boy aside, turning back to the boat, gathering up an armful of possessions . . .
Leonora. She had died young so she would always be young to him. Unforgettable, unforgotten, a lass unparallel’d. Who had said that – a lass unparallel’d? The first words were from Rupert Brook’s poem about the Old Vicarage, Grantchester . . . the next bit? Not me, I’m not clever enough, Peter thought humbly. Shakespeare, probably. He seemed to say most things well. And that just about put Leonora in a nutshell – a lass unparallel’d. God, he had loved her! He could still remember the twist of pain in his gut, the ache which was so bad that he could scarcely sleep or eat, when someone had told him she’d taken a shine to Ziggy Freeman, was going with him.
Though there were worse pains; unrequited love had been an agony for a young and impressionable boy in his late teens, but losing her to death! To see all that brightness and beauty brought to nought, to know they would never touch, kiss, laugh together again! He dared not think of it lest he resurrect the terrible emptiness of those first few months, the moments when he, too, hovered on the brink, knowing that nothing would ever compare with what he and Leonora had had.
The child had kept him going, of course. But all that came later. It had started when beautiful Leonora had fallen in love with Ziggy Freeman. She was the loveliest girl, Ziggy the handsomest, most eligible young man in their circle. They had been so exultantly happy and so right for each other, so deeply, dramatically in love. So Leonora and Ziggy made their plans, but never had a chance to carry them out; tragedy struck. Ziggy, hurrying back to Norwich after a successful job application and riding his motor cycle too fast on a wet road surface, skidded on a sharp bend, fought to control his machine, and met an oak tree head on. Poor Ziggy, tall, flamboyant, head over heels in love with Leonora, full of enthusiasm for his new, well-paid job. He should have taken her up the aisle, bought her a little house, spent a happy lifetime with her. Instead, he gasped out his life alone on a wet, cloud-reflecting road whilst blood pumped steadily out of a great hole in his neck.
Leonora’s parents had disapproved of Ziggy so their daughter had moved into the city, into a bedsit, so that they could see one another without constant arguments, but she came back to the village for the funeral. Peter saw her in a back pew, crying as a child cries, with gulps and sobs and big tears, totally bereft. And when the service was over and the congregation had gone their separate ways he had followed her to the bus stop on the turnpike and reminded her that he had always loved her, that nothing would give him more pleasure than to be allowed to take care of her.
‘I love you, Leo and I’d make sure you were never lonely,’ he had told her tenderly, holding her small hands in his and looking earnestly down into her tear-drenched countenance. ‘I can’t ever take Ziggy’s place I know, but we could have a good life, sweetheart. I promise you that.’
He had done his best. He had never faltered in his love for her, he had quite simply adored their little girl, but he had never known, for certain, how Leonora felt about him. Oh, he thought she loved him, but he had learned that there are many degrees of love. The wild passion of first love which she had known with Ziggy would never – could never – be repeated. Was what they had enough? He had thought it was until that dreadful telephone call, the maid’s voice, distraught, almost inaudible through her sobs.
‘Come at once, sir . . . there’s been an accident!’
He had known, then. Oh, not that she was dead, but that she must be badly hurt. If it had been the child Leonora would have telephoned herself. He had driven like a madman, arriving home in Walcott to be told first that she was lost at sea, that the little boat had overturned . . . then that they had found her body.
The sea had been rough, the wind strong, but not enough to capsize a boat, surely? Leonora had been fit and well, not a brilliant oarswoman, perhaps, but someone had seen her rowing steadily along the coast. An old man, up on the cliffs poaching rabbits, claimed he had seen her stand up in the boat, then jump into the water. Deliberately. So the old parson had only agreed to bury her in the churchyard if she was away from the other graves. Down near the trees, where no one ever went.
He hadn’t cared. Wherever that bright and beautiful spirit had gone, it didn’t linger in a graveyard, mourning her separation from the other dead. Besides, he had other worries. His failure to make her happy paled into insignificance beside the bringing up of their little girl, how he should behave now that he was on his own, whether it would be right to leave their home, move on to where they weren’t known . . . these things occupied him, kept him from despair.