Authors: Fiona McIntosh
They’d done more than smile now, she thought humourlessly, as she folded back up the letter. Her lack of humour deepened in the silence of her room. Distantly, if she concentrated hard, she could hear the clangour of plates somewhere in the depths of the hotel and possibly the sound was travelling via fireplaces, elevator shafts, even the stairwells. And then even that vague sound was gone, overwhelmed now by a fresh, urgent one that echoed loudly it seemed in her ears and throbbed in her throat as her heart pounded out the escalating fear of understanding that she was now an aide to a spy. What lay ahead for her? For Rafe? What new danger was she moving towards?
Swallowing her fear, she made herself return to the moment and Room 19 where still her life was safe and the scent of Rafe clung to her. Stella glanced at her watch. It was only nearing seven-thirty. She felt physically exhausted but still couldn’t sleep because her mind was moving around in what felt like jagged leaps. She paced the room a few times, her mind blank but her emotions somehow comforted by movement. Finally, she forced herself to sit at the room’s desk, found its stationery embossed with gold lettering, and began to write to Carys and Rory. She needed to explain why that calendar they were counting down would need to be adjusted but that when she came back it wouldn’t be just for a visit. It would be for keeps.
The ship had left New York in the last throes of its winter, or so Stella learned from Grace, whose inquisitive way had discovered a wealth of random facts including that this was the RMS
Aquitania
’s first voyage as a cruise vessel, that it was known as ‘the ship beautiful’, and that it had collided with another in thick fog during the war years.
‘Hmm, that’s reassuring, Grace,’ she remarked as they leaned over the deck railing and Stella sighed with pleasure at the sight of the vast expanse of ocean.
‘There are three classes on this ship. Did you know that, Stella?’ her charge lisped.
‘I do,’ she admitted.
‘This is first, where the rich people are,’ Grace continued unselfconsciously as Stella blinked, glad to be accommodated in second class because the kind of person walking around on deck here reminded her too much of Beatrice and Georgina. ‘Why aren’t you here with us?’
‘Well, Grace, your father employs me. Therefore I am seen as staff. He could have thrown me into tourist class – that’s third class to you. Instead, he has kindly given me a wonderful cabin in second class as a special concession and one that I’m extremely comfortable with.’
‘You’re luckier than me then because I have to share mine with Georgina.’
‘Oh, I’m sure you’ll manage,’ Stella teased.
She had deliberately kept her distance from the family as best she could, although she’d been on hand to help Grace with her packing as neither of the elder people in her life cared enough other than to say Mrs Boyd would take care of it. Mrs Boyd backed off when Stella became involved and Stella was delighted simply to be around her happy charge again who was no longer as fatigued and the dull headaches she mentioned had begun to lessen in frequency. Rafe had kept his promise and not appeared at Harp’s End to her knowledge in that final week and true to his word had all but ignored her quayside before boarding ship. It had been up to her to gather all that he needed for his disguise and she had taken her role seriously of assembling his ‘kit’ for Kew Gardens, from his sample jars to his microscope. She had even tossed in his notebook from a previous visit to Africa and the Levant.
He’d warned her, of course, about his intended aloofness but seeing him again after that intimate farewell in a shop doorway hadn’t stopped her heart from drumming faster, or indeed hurting harder to watch him take Beatrice’s arm with such easy affection to escort her up the gangway. Only Grace had bothered to take Stella’s hand but she’d lagged, told the youngster to go ahead with her sneering sister, as Stella realised she had been likely left to ensure that the ship’s purser had the family’s expansive series of trunks brought on board, unpacked and stored away.
When she also had been shown to her cabin by a kindly steward, Stella was silently amazed by the grandeur on board, and for a couple of hours as she explored her new home for the forthcoming weeks she put Rafe aside in her thoughts. She sighed in astonishment at this floating hotel that would carry them off to foreign lands in sumptuous splendour. It included its own cinema and theatre and heavy deep-pink velvet curtains with a resplendent golden fringe for the stage. There were tennis decks and garden lounges, swimming pools and writing salons. The second-class public rooms felt like she’d wandered into an enormous stately mansion with a dining room of mahogany Hepplewhite furniture that could have been borrowed from the pages of F Scott Fitzgerald’s novel
The Great Gatsby
. She had read it twice now and was convinced it echoed the decadence and boredom of the Ainsworth women, who struck Stella as being as lifeless as the characters who were hot and weary during that summer of 1922 on Long Island.
Days had passed with her dining mainly with Grace, frankly glad to be ignored by the Ainsworths because as much as she wanted to spend time with Rafe, she didn’t want to be an observer while Beatrice hung off his arm, or Georgina oozed her fake charm. Then again, he was behaving in the same manner to both of them. What a horrid triangle; what a terrible life for him to live such lies. It soothed her to sleep to know that perhaps she was the reason that his life would change for the better because he would live it openly, honestly and as Rafe Ainsworth. She’d glimpsed him daily from a distance, leaning over the deck, staring out to sea. He never looked down to the decks below; never searched her out, eyes always on the horizon and yet she was convinced he appeared most early evenings to watch the sun set simply to remind her he was there and thinking of her. She sensed he knew she was looking for him as the dying day lit his face with a burnished bronze. And the horizon represented them . . . she the sea, him the sky, meeting as the sun slid away and —
‘Shall we play quoits?’ Grace said, meandering into her thoughts.
‘We already have this morning.’ She knew she sounded distracted but they’d been twelve days at sea on this most beautiful of ships that had seduced her mood from glum to borderline cheerful. How could she not be uplifted, as the weather of the Mediterranean had warmed her, the shimmering ultramarine of its waters had brightened her spirits and she was delighted to note that not even Georgina’s regular barbs could puncture her sense of optimism. A future with Rafe in some shape formed the basis of her daydream. She missed him; he’d been absent for two sunsets and she was trying not to read anything too sinister into that.
‘How about hopscotch, then?’
‘If you’d like.’
Grace tugged her arm. ‘You sound far away, Stella.’
She looked at the youngster already glowing healthily from the time she’d spent playing on deck. ‘And you sound so busy!’ She tweaked Grace’s lightly freckled nose and sighed dramatically at how untidy her hair already looked. ‘Your mother is going to accuse me of letting you run around this ship looking like an urchin.’
Grace grinned. ‘Daddy will tell her not to nag. I heard him saying to Mummy that it was good for me.’
‘It is. Now that you mention him . . . gosh, I forget he’s on board sometimes,’ Stella fibbed. ‘I haven’t seen your father for a few days,’ she continued, trying desperately not to make it sound like a question.
The girl shrugged and began swinging around one of the nearby poles. ‘I haven’t either. Mummy said he hasn’t been on the ship for a day or two.’
‘Oh!’ Alarm trilled through her. ‘Wasn’t this supposed to be a family holiday?’
Grace leaned back as she revolved slowly around the pole. ‘He got off in Lisbane. At least I think that’s what she said.’
‘Lisbon. It’s the capital of Portugal. Got off?’ She tempered her surprised tone. ‘I mean, we all did, didn’t we, but you’re saying he didn’t get back on?’
Grace was swinging with her head tilted as far back as she could without toppling, grinning at the cloudless dome of sky above. ‘Yes,’ she lisped.
‘Grace, stop a moment.’ The child slowed obediently, and Stella could see she was dizzy. ‘Careful, you’ll get sick.’
‘Like you?’
‘Yes, but I just didn’t feel well yesterday.’
‘Mummy says you should have your sea legs by now after nearly two weeks on the ship.’
‘Does she? I’m glad she doesn’t feel this way.’
‘Are you any better?’
‘Much,’ she lied, deciding that the sea was not her friend and she would never agree to sail again. The nausea had erupted once more, which was another reason she was out here sucking in sharply fresh air to keep the dull ill feeling at bay. ‘So have we just left your father behind?’
Grace was looping slowly again, gradually sliding lower, distracted but not so entirely lost to her amusement that she couldn’t answer. ‘No, I think he got back on board this morning. I just haven’t seen him.’
‘I wonder where?’ She made it sound as casually innocent a remark as possible.
Grace giggled. ‘It sounded like Mummy said Sardine.’
Stella had to smile. ‘Sardinia . . . ?’
‘Yes, that’s it. Where is Palestine? I heard someone say we were going there too.’
‘It’s known as the Holy Land – you’ve been to Sunday School, Grace, so you’d know of places called Judah, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Jericho —’
‘Nazareth?’ Grace asked, beaming.
Stella smiled. ‘Correct.’
‘Before or after the Suez Canal?’
‘Oh, bravo, Grace. You were paying attention to the cruise lecture. Well, we’ll call into Alexandria. Do you remember where that is?’
Grace looked back with a sheepish expression, then frowned and shook her head.
‘It’s Egypt, where the Pharaohs once ruled.’
‘Ooh, the mummies,’ Grace said, wide-eyed and intrigued.
‘Yes. Alexandria is the port city named after . . .’
‘Er, Alexander the Great!’
‘Nothing wrong with your memory, Grace. Very beautiful city, I’m told. Then we visit Cairo.’
‘The capital city of Eygpt?’ Grace offered hopefully.
‘Good!’ Stella gave a light clap. ‘I’m so impressed with you.’
‘Will I ride a camel in Cairo?’
‘Oh, I hope so. I hope we both shall, all the way to the pyramids, and after that we sail down the amazing Suez Canal, enter the Red Sea and then we shall sail to exotic Aqaba, which, to answer your question, brings us into Jordan, and after that, Palestine. But first we have North Africa. Shall we go through the cities?’
‘I’m bored, Stella.’
She laughed. ‘Or just honest?’
‘Can I get some ice-cream?’
‘I don’t see why not. You know where to go?’ Grace was already leaving her. ‘I’ll wait here,’ she called to the girl’s back, knowing she would return in minutes as it was nearing two in the afternoon and ice-creams were usually offered on the deck directly above where she stood now.
Stella sighed again, revelling in the warmth that kissed her bare arms. England had warmed up too, they’d been assured by ship staff and various announcements. It sounded like summer had arrived with passion. She’d tied her hair up and was in a thin frock, one that Beatrice had offered her amongst various other items that she apparently no longer needed or wanted. Her employer had rolled her eyes to learn that she only had a handful of dresses from her Brighton trip and as Stella had lovingly packed her new summer wardrobe into a trunk, Mrs Boyd had arrived, holding coat hangers and another seven or eight outfits.
‘They’re yours if you want them. Mrs Ainsworth says they’re not needed any more,’ Boyd assured in her ever-prevailing mood of disapproval.
‘Oh, my, thank you.’
‘Don’t thank me,’ the housekeeper had said. ‘I think you’re very lucky to be given any of this.’ She’d waved a hand to encompass the dresses, the room, the lifestyle, presumably – perhaps even the blessing that Stella was permitted to breathe air within such close proximity to the Ainsworths. However, Stella had taken the clothes with good grace, realising it would be churlish not to, and had been delighted by the range. Some were a little loose but nothing that a strategically placed belt couldn’t fix.
The one she wore today was a pale-blue sailor dress, made in Paris, according to its label, and looked to be near new with a panel in its front that buttoned up either side of the wide, square collar, trimmed with white. She wore it with flat, off-white brogues that had come with her packages from the spree at Hanningtons. She still wondered how Rafe had organised all that so quickly. The slightly musty smell of the storage of Beatrice’s dress had been blown away by today’s soft breeze. If not, then the dab of Stella’s mother’s French perfume had hopefully chased out any stubborn lingering odour.
Someone arrived to stand next to her. She glanced right and her heart dipped. ‘Afternoon, Georgina.’
‘Hello, Stella. Are you avoiding us?’
‘No.’ She could be churlish and mention the lack of invitation but good manners took over. ‘I’m here to help your father, not teach you girls, and he doesn’t need any assistance right now.’
‘How’s second class?’ Georgina wondered.
‘Well, your parents have ensured I am accommodated magnificently.’ She smiled. ‘Thank you for asking.’
She hoped Georgina would tire of the sugary banter but it appeared not. ‘You look especially pretty today, Stella.’
‘Thank you,’ she replied, wondering where this might take them.
‘The only reason I spotted you from above was because I recognised it,’ she said, glancing up and down at Stella’s dress. ‘I wore that to the Yacht Race at Cowes a couple of years ago. It’s so very summer ’31, but how nice that you’re happy to wear a hand-me-down.’
‘This is yours?’ Somehow her voice remained even but the query betrayed her.
‘Used to be. Wouldn’t be caught dead in it now.’
‘Your mother gave it to me. I thought it was new, something she didn’t want.’
Georgina shrugged. ‘I’m not suggesting you stole it, Stella, although speaking of thieving, we haven’t explored our previous conversation yet, have we?’
Fear crawled up her spine now. ‘Which conversation is that?’
‘The one about you and my father.’
Stella frowned back at Georgina, today dressed immaculately in a pale pink summer skirt and crisp white shirt with rosebuds around the sleeves. She looked so sweet and pretty it offended her to know how Georgina could beguile the unsuspecting.
‘About the affair you are having with him,’ Georgina said airily with a smile.
‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Nausea simmered in her belly and began clambering to her throat. ‘Forgive me, I don’t feel terribly well again.’
‘Take a lot of deep breaths,’ Georgina replied in a careless tone. ‘I’m not ready to let you leave. I want to discuss whether you do harbour feelings for my father that could be regarded as unprofes-sional.’
‘I have nothing to say to you about that.’
‘Guilty conscience?’
‘No. I simply will not lend any weight to your intention to cause trouble by discussing such a thing.’
‘And yet you sound unnerved.’ Georgina stretched her arms languidly. ‘You do sound guilty to me.’
‘Do I? I rather hoped I sounded angry, or perhaps disgusted.’
Georgina chuckled. ‘What on earth do you see in him?’
‘I don’t know why you’d ask me. Instead ask Grace what she sees in her father. Ask your mother what she sees in her husband.’
‘But I am asking you, Stella. Grace possesses blind, childish love. My mother is strategic, although I won’t deny her affection for him baffles me most of the time.’