The Novel in the Viola (24 page)

I shifted on the floor. ‘We are all supposed to be in New York. It isn’t supposed to happen this way.’

The vision of my mother was unchanged: the same tiny crease between her eyes, same half-smile.

‘I hope the novel in the viola is about you and me and Margot. Only in the book we’ll be much more glamorous. I’ll be thinner and two inches taller. Margot will be just the same. Julian will sport a twirling moustache and you will wear ankle boots and smoke cigarillos. And Kit—’

‘But we don’t know Kit,’ said Julian.

No, you don’t, I thought and the mirage vanished like mist in sunshine. I would have to be up in a few hours to light the fires and clean the house. I struggled to my feet, and began to pace up and down the drawing room, trying to exhaust myself so that I could sleep. Perhaps I should start to clean now – then at least some of it would be done in the morning. I fished a handkerchief out of my pyjama pocket and started to dab at the picture frames. I worked my way round the mantelpiece, wafting the cloth at the miniature portraits, frocked ladies with high collars and lace caps, men in wigs and regimentals, a wide-eyed beauty with dazzling décolletage, her powdered wig set with pearls. I moved to the Turner seascape, ready to flick dust from its gilt edges, but the painting was gone. I blinked, and rubbed my eyes. Was it always here? I ached with tiredness and my mind felt doughy and unclear. Yes. The Turner hung on this wall, far enough away from the fire that it didn’t get smoke damage, and out of the sunlight that streamed in through the southerly windows. Without a doubt, the painting had gone.

I sat on a baize sofa and stared at the empty wall. It wasn’t like the bare walls in our Vienna apartment, when I thought of those I raged with unhappiness. This was different. Hope nudged inside me. The painting wasn’t lost or stolen or re-hung in another part of the house. Mr Rivers had sold it. He was going to help us. Anna and Julian were coming to Tyneford.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Miss Landau

At six o’clock the following morning, I slipped into Kit’s bedroom. It was warm enough that the gentlemen no longer had fires lit in their rooms – ladies such as Diana and Juno would insist upon them in blazing June. I was quite safe, but I locked the door just to be certain. The room held a sharp scent of sweat and cigarettes. Kit sprawled in the large white bed, a foot poking out from beneath the blankets, his blond head half hidden beneath a pile of pillows. I listened for a moment to the rhythmic sounds of his breath and tiptoed across to the window and peeked out across the striped lawn towards the hill. An early morning haar rolled down the valley, thick as smoke. The sun glowed through, a gold coin in a shroud. With a flick, I flung open the curtains wide and bright light spilt into the room, shining on the figure in the bed. I stepped back from the window, in case Mr Wrexham or anyone should happen to be walking in the gardens.

‘Kit.’

He didn’t stir.

‘Kit.’

Nothing.

I sat on the bed, and reached out to touch a bare arm lightly dusted with pale hair. My fingertips brushed warm skin. ‘Kit.’ A hand clasped my wrist and drew me onto the bed.

‘Fancy meeting you here,’ said Kit, suddenly wide awake. He pulled me closer. ‘This isn’t very wise, you know. If I decided to be wicked, you couldn’t really object.’

He scrutinised me for a moment and then yawned. ‘Don’t suppose you brought tea and aspirin by any chance?’

I ignored him and tried to sit up but he kept a firm grasp on my wrist and I was forced to turn my head, so that I was lying beside him, his face only an inch from mine.

‘Kit. Tell me it’s true. That Mr Rivers has sold the painting. That he’s really going to help Anna and Julian.’

He released me, and propped himself up on the pillows and stared out over the green lawns.

‘Well, it’s not been sold yet. He wanted to make sure I didn’t mind. My inheritance and what-not.’

‘And do you mind?’

Kit didn’t answer. He bent over me and kissed me on the lips, his fingers curving around the back of my neck, pulling me into him. And suddenly I wasn’t thinking about Anna or Julian, only Kit. He bit my lip and I cried out, although it did not hurt. He smiled down at me.

‘I love you, you know. I suppose I oughtn’t. I ought to love Diana or one of those girls who’s frightfully dull and frightfully rich. But I don’t. I love you.’

I stared at him. No one apart from my mother had ever said those words to me. And I had always imagined that when somebody did, the words would be spoken in German, not English. To my ear, they sounded new. I’d never been to an English cinema and I never listened to Mrs Ellsworth’s love-struck plays on the wireless. I’d read Kit’s romance novels, but I’d never heard the words said aloud. The first time was when he said them to me.

‘We’ll get them here, I promise you, Elise,’ he whispered. ‘If I have to go to Austria myself and carry their bags, I will get them to Tyneford.’

He gazed down at me, blue eyes wide and guileless as a child. He was so certain and whenever I looked at him, I was certain too. I slid my hands into his golden hair and kissed him.

‘I love you.’

I tried the words in English. They tasted strangely exotic in my mouth, and yet, in a way, detached from their meaning. I tried again in German.

‘
I love you.
’

Kit laughed, a throaty chuckle. ‘Say that again. I like it.’

Before I could, the door handle rattled.

‘Mr Kit, sir. Would you be so good as to unlock this door?’ called Mr Wrexham.

I sat up in horror, bumping Kit on the forehead in my haste.

‘He knows I am here,’ I hissed, springing off the bed.

Kit shrugged and reached for his silver cigarette case. ‘Probably. Wrexham knows everything. Damn fine butler. Old school.’

He swung his legs out of bed and jumped up, grabbing a dressing gown from the back of the door. He glanced round to check where I was and seeing me lurking by the window smoothing my apron, he opened the door.

‘Morning, Wrexham. Ah excellent, you brought tea. And aspirin, you really are a champ.’

The butler stepped into the room, holding out a tea tray, and stopped dead when he saw me. Kit, apparently unconcerned, helped himself to the packet of aspirin, swallowing the pills dry. Mr Wrexham’s face turned as grey as a winter’s sky and he studied me without blinking.

‘May I enquire as to Elise’s presence?’ he asked, recovering himself sufficiently to place the tray on the bedside table and pour Kit a cup of tea.

Kit took a noisy gulp. ‘Yes. Well, if I’m honest, I woke up to find her here. Lovely surprise. Touch irregular, I know. But don’t worry,’ he added, seeing the old butler blanch. ‘Nothing untoward happened. Well, nothing too untoward,’ he concluded with a wicked smile in my direction.

I gave a short cry, and covered my mouth, turning to face the window. I did not wish to see Mr Wrexham’s expression.

‘Oh, it’s all right, Wrexham,’ said Kit. ‘I love her, you know.’

‘Perhaps, Mr Kit, you would be good enough to inform your father of this fact.’

The butler bent to scoop up a stray pillow and a fallen magazine from the bedroom floor. Kit crossed the room and settled into the battered armchair beside the window, looking slightly troubled for the first time since Mr Wrexham’s interruption.

‘Yes. Yes, I suppose I must.’

He shifted in his chair.

‘Think I shall dress first, though.’

‘Very good sir. Shall I draw you a bath?’

‘Yes. Excellent.’

During this exchange, I had remained at the window, a few feet from Kit’s chair. I was elated and mortified all at the same time. I wanted to cry, whether from joy or humiliation, I was not quite sure. It was clear that Mr Wrexham was not going anywhere, and so I decided that mostly I wanted to leave the room.

‘I must clean downstairs,’ I said. I did not think Kit would try to kiss me in front of the old butler, but I could not be sure. I could feel both men watching me as I fled, and was glad that I could see neither of their faces.

I avoided the breakfast room, not wanting to encounter either Mr Rivers or his guests, certain that the entire household must suspect something was afoot. I dusted the netsuke in the drawing room, taking them out of their glass cabinet and cleaning each piece in warm water before drying it and returning it to the appropriate shelf with shaking fingers. They were ugly things: grey ivory rats crawled over one another, tails knotted; fat warriors smirked. I washed the skirting boards with soap solution, and rubbed the dado rails with beeswax. I needed to keep busy; I couldn’t stay still. When I thought about Kit, my fingers fluttered to my throat. I smiled. Perhaps I ought to worry about my possible dismissal and yet I was happy and untouchable. He kissed me. He loved me. Would we get married? I’d read all the romance novels stashed in the guest bedrooms, from
Lady Rose and Mrs Memmary
to the intriguing
Miss Buncle’s Book
and the more troubling
Cheerful Weather for the Wedding,
but all the novels stopped at the crucial point: the wedding itself, and what came after remained terribly intriguing. I wished Margot were here to talk to. The information Poppy and I had shared now seemed rather inadequate and I suspected that no books on Mr Rivers’ shelves could offer practical assistance. My sister was not coy, and I knew she would deliver without a blush any information I required, between languorous pulls on her cigarette. I pictured her, sprawled upon the bed in the blue room in her elegant underwear, eating rose creams and offering advice on married life while surrounded by a haze of smoke. I would write to her, demanding detailed factual advice by return, but I did not want the cold page, I wanted her.

I tried to imagine Kit and me taking tea together on the terrace in summer, the climbing roses filling the air with their pervasive scent, as we discussed the unconscionably warm weather or perhaps the cricket. I giggled. Next, I imagined not leaving the room when he took his bath and sitting on the edge of the tub as I did with Margot – only this wasn’t the same at all. I saw Kit lazing, naked, and smiling at me through the steam. What would I wear for such an occasion? A dressing gown? My underthings? Nothing at all? My cheeks flushed and I bit my lip. Yes, I decided, I could marry him very well.

Kit found me as I was sluicing the back steps by the stable yard. I was so busy scraping at the green moss on the stone that he was forced to shout.

‘There you are. I’ve been looking for you all over.’

I stood up and brushed myself down, conscious of the layer of black-green slime beneath my fingernails.

‘Come for a walk.’

I cast a guilty look at the bucket of filthy water and the half-cleaned steps.

‘Oh, leave it. Do it later,’ snapped Kit, grabbing hold of my wet hand and hurrying me out of the yard and along the path leading up the hillside. We didn’t speak for a minute or two, breathless as we climbed the steep hill, slip-sliding over the damp ground. Fragile violets grew amongst the tangled grass stems, the first I had seen that spring, and I tried not to crush them underfoot. Kit walked swiftly, and I was soon panting to keep up, feeling my forehead moisten with sweat. As we reached the summit he slowed.

‘Well, I spoke to him.’

I leant against the dry-stone wall criss-crossing the top of the hill. White clouds buffeted across the grey-blue sky. Kit came and stood beside me, a strand of damp hair sticking to his brow.

‘What did he say?’

Kit shifted. ‘Well. I sort of marched in there. Into the library. And I said “I love Elise”. And he looked up at me and he said, “I know”.’

‘“I know”?’

‘Yes. It’s funny – I’ve only known myself since yesterday. I was almost sure when I left. And while I was away, I kept thinking about you. I’d be trying to do other things – dinner with the chaps, a game of tennis – and there you were. I started to wonder if I was in love. Then when I came back and you hurled yourself at me, beside the motorcar, I was certain.’

‘I didn’t hurl myself.’

‘Oh yes. I’m pretty sure you did.’

I swatted him, half in anger and half in jest, and he caught my arm, tugging me against him. I smiled, snug in his arms, and thought, so this is happiness.

‘And you smoked my cigarettes. I found one that was half spent. It smelt of you.’

Letting me go, Kit heaved himself onto the wall and helped me scramble up so that I perched beside him, our legs dangling. He gazed out towards the sea. It rippled in the distance, waves rushing the beach.

‘It was odd. Father didn’t want to know much about me. Already knew all about my grand passion. He was much more interested in you.’

‘In me? Whatever for.’

‘He wanted to know if you loved me. Asked me several times, if I was quite sure. He seemed rather anxious about it all. No.’ Kit paused, searching the pale sky for the words. ‘That’s not right. Sad. He was sad.’

‘Oh.’

I supposed Mr Rivers must be disappointed in Kit loving me. It couldn’t be terribly good for his reputation. He probably wanted Kit to fall in love with a Diana or Juno or Lady Henrietta. Somebody with no chin and a large fortune and a wardrobe full of mink stoles. And a neat entry in the baptismal register of Some-shire.

We sat and listened to the birds, the swooping song of the skylarks, the chatter of the rock pipits as they parachuted to earth and the yaffle of a green woodpecker. The gorse dotted across the hillside was coated in sticky yellow flowers smelling sweetly of coconut. Kit was silent for a moment, then he fidgeted beside me, and said quietly, ‘He doesn’t want us to be engaged. Not yet.’

‘Oh.’

My stomach twisted with uncertainty.

Kit smiled. ‘Don’t look so worried. He just wants us to wait.’

‘Why?’

I found out many years later exactly what passed in the library between the two men. But on that spring morning in 1939, Kit described only part of their conversation, concealing what was said later. Over time I have pictured the conversation so often that sometimes I have to remind myself that I was not actually there and it is not a memory.