The Winter Folly (27 page)

Come on
, she said to herself.
This is a house with over a hundred rooms! I should be able to find somewhere to put a trunk.

In the still of the afternoon, she decided to go to bits of the house she’d not yet become familiar with. She knew the downstairs fairly well – the grand hall, the state reception
rooms that were left untouched most of the time except by cleaners, and the library and the salons. Despite the tour she’d had when she first arrived, she knew very little about the rest of
the house except for the main bedrooms and the attics. Over the back of the building were the servants’ bedrooms, little white-painted rooms still with iron bedsteads and shabby old
furniture, and over the east wing was the old nursery floor. She found herself going there first, opening the old oak door that shut it firmly off from the grown-up part of house, so that there was
a definite divide between the civilised adults and the children, as though they were in training for the time when they would be allowed to cross that divide and behave appropriately on the other
side.

The nursery wing had evidently not been altered for many years, and its layout was reminiscent of an Edwardian attitude to childrearing. There was a bedroom that was probably meant for Nanny, a
large and imposing room with flowered wallpaper and pictures on the walls of country landscapes and flowers. Two smaller bedrooms, bare but with religious tracts hanging on the walls, were most
likely meant for nursery maids. And then a bathroom and a small nursery kitchen where meals could be prepared without the need for bothering the cook downstairs, who was no doubt run ragged
preparing those extraordinary dinner parties Delilah had read about in the visitors’ book. The little kitchen was a period piece in itself, with pantry cupboards, an iron sink and an ancient
cooker with two gas rings and a small oven. Delilah resisted the urge to look in the cupboards and moved on.

Next was the night nursery: a large room with two beds in it, two armchairs in front of a fireplace and a bookcase with some children’s books still in it. Bedside tables with lamps on top,
chests of drawers and a wardrobe completed the room.

Delilah gazed around, imagining John up here as a boy, tucked into one of those beds, falling asleep as the fire flickered and Nanny sat in one of the armchairs mending holes in socks. Would
that have been how it was? Would he have felt safe and secure up here, so far from his parents, a tiny island of smallness in this vast house? And how would Alex have felt, with her son shut away
behind that thick heavy door?

She could picture Alex walking through the door and into the nursery, her face bright with the anticipation of seeing John. ‘Hello, Nanny,’ she’d say, ‘is my boy
around?’ and John would come racing into her arms. This part of the house was probably the warmest and most welcoming of all. Perhaps Alex spent as much time here as she could, away from the
huge cold state rooms below, luxuriating in the cosiness of the nursery and the pleasure of being close to John.

But then she left him . . .

The cosiness she’d imagined vanished and she was standing in the cold gloom once more. Would the nursery ever come alive again? she wondered. Would a child of hers ever play up here, or
snuggle down under blankets with the curtains pulled tight against the night outside? It felt odd, almost painful, to imagine it. The place seemed to intensify her sense of emptiness within as well
as without. She left it quickly.

Next door was the day nursery. A playroom, estate agents would call it now. It was large and light with windows that looked out over the park, and a huge rocking horse stood by the windows, his
legs stretched out in a gallop but his real horsehair mane lying flat against his painted neck. Bookshelves stretched from the floor to the ceiling on either side of the fireplace, still full of
books – worn paperbacks and hardbacks of all kinds. There was a big cupboard at the back of the room where she assumed that toys had been stored, so she walked over and opened it. She
expected to see mountains of vintage toys but was startled to find that it was empty, its broad shelves bare but for lining paper, some desiccated moth corpses and the occasional dead fly lying on
its back with bent legs.

Where are all the toys?
she wondered.

Perhaps they’d been taken to the attics. But how strange to leave the books and the rocking horse and everything else, and take the toys away.

Then it occurred to her that this cupboard would be the perfect place to put the trunk of Alex’s clothes. It would be a tight fit but it should just be able to slide beneath the bottom
shelf and sit there snugly until needed. She was pleased. She’d found an excellent hiding place – not
hiding,
that sounded too deceitful – a
storage
place for
the trunk which meant that John would not be distressed by accidentally stumbling on it. The question now was how she would get the trunk here. It was hardly something she could do on her own and
she couldn’t ask John. It felt wrong to get Erryl to participate in something that was in effect going against his master’s orders.

There was only one person she could ask.

‘I’m delighted to help. Where do you want me?’ Ben smiled at her keenly, washing his hands in the kitchen sink. The water churned and bubbled around his large
square palms.

Delilah gave him a grateful look. ‘Thanks so much, you’re very kind. I don’t want to drag you away from your irrigation masterpiece for long. I just need some help taking an
old trunk up from one of the guest rooms to the nursery. It’s easier than the attics and we might need the guest room.’

‘Really?’ Ben looked surprised. There were plenty of guest rooms in usable condition.

‘That is – I’m thinking of redecorating it. So I don’t want it turned into a store room as well.’

He shrugged. ‘Fair enough. Lead on.’

They went into the main house together and she led the way to the white and gold room where the trunk had been left since Susie’s visit.

‘You’re right, it could do with a freshen up,’ Ben said, wrinkling his nose in distaste as they went in. ‘I bet you’d make it brilliant, though.’

‘Thanks,’ she said, feeling a little uncomfortable about her lie. She would have to embark on cleaning it now, just to feel at ease with her conscience. ‘The trunk’s all
closed up. We only have to carry it over to the east wing.’

‘No problemo.’ Ben marched over, stretched his arms wide to grasp a handle on either side and picked up the whole trunk by himself. His biceps bulged with the effort.

‘I was going to take one side,’ Delilah exclaimed, laughing. ‘You’re not supposed to do it all.’

‘It’s fine. Just tell me where to take it.’

She led him along the main corridor. He staggered slightly with the awkwardness of holding the trunk but the weight was obviously no problem and he followed her through the oak door and into the
nursery wing.

‘I remember this bit of the house,’ he said as they entered. ‘I got sent up here to play a few times with my sisters. We didn’t like it much. There was nothing to play
with.’

‘Do you mean in here?’ Delilah opened the door to the day nursery where the horse was still frozen mid-gallop, his wooden teeth clamped down over his brass bit.

‘Yep.’ Ben followed her in. ‘Where do you want this?’

‘Over here.’ She went over to the cupboard and opened the door. ‘I thought it could sit nicely under this shelf.’

He settled the trunk down with evident relief and pushed it backwards under the shelf. When he’d pushed it back as far as it would go, it was still proud of the shelf which meant that the
door wouldn’t shut.

‘Oh, it doesn’t fit,’ Delilah said, disappointed. She’d thought the space was perfect.

‘Hold on. It doesn’t fit because there’s something stopping it from reaching the back wall. Let’s see.’ Ben pulled the trunk out again, got down on his knees and
bent over so that he could peer under the shelf. ‘Here we are. I was right. There’s something there.’

He reached out a long arm and pulled out an object. Delilah saw a flash of pink and cream and gold.

‘What is it?’ she asked.

‘A doll,’ he said, holding it up. ‘A Barbie doll, by the look of it.’

‘Is it Barbie?’ Delilah asked, frowning. ‘It looks more like a Sindy. She’s got a round face and rather a sweet look.’

‘Not my area of expertise, I’m afraid.’ Ben shrugged apologetically. ‘You’ll know more than me.’

She took the doll from him and inspected it. It was a classic pink plastic figure, with a mass of dusty gold nylon hair, painted round eyes and a rosy pout, cheeks that had been slightly greyed
with dirt, and limbs that moved at the shoulders and hips but nowhere else. This one was supposed to be a ballet dancer, as she wore a shiny pink leotard and a netting tutu with streamers of dust
on it, and on her feet were moulded ballet slippers that could not be taken off.

‘I wonder what it was doing there,’ Delilah said. ‘Would someone have given John a toy like this?’

‘Doubt it. He got bikes and Meccano, I should think. I don’t think he was the kind of boy to want dolls.’

‘No.’ She frowned, turning the doll over as she examined it. ‘I don’t either. But this doll is too new to belong to the generation before, isn’t it? I mean –
she’s relatively new. When were Barbies made? Or Sindys, come to that?’

‘Dunno. The fifties? The sixties?’

A thought occurred to her. ‘But could it belong to one of your sisters? You said you used to play up here.’

Ben nodded, his expression thoughtful. ‘That’s right. I suppose it’s possible. But I don’t remember either of them having a ballerina doll like that. My parents were
terrible old fogeys. The girls got rag dolls and handmade dolls’ houses and that sort of thing. They didn’t much like plastic. But it’s possible. It could have been a
gift.’

‘Yes,’ Delilah said. ‘That would explain it.’

‘I’ll ask the girls when I think of it. We speak on the phone occasionally but they’re both so busy with their London lives, they don’t visit much.’

‘That would be great, thanks.’ She turned her attention from the doll. ‘Shall we see if the trunk fits now?’

Ben pushed it back and it slid nicely into place, exactly filling the available space.

‘Thanks so much, Ben, I really appreciate it,’ she said happily. ‘I couldn’t have done it without you.’

She looked down and caught an expression of tenderness on his face. ‘You’re very welcome,’ he said softly, and she smiled back. They were so comfortable together.

‘Shall we go downstairs?’

‘Sure.’ He got to his feet. ‘I need to get back to work.’

They headed back towards the main part of the house, Delilah still clutching the doll in her hand. She would put her somewhere safe, and then do some research.

1965

Sandy and his friends stayed for almost a week and the night before their promised departure, there was another party. In fact, Alexandra thought with exhaustion, there seemed
to have been endless little parties since they’d arrived. The easy rhythm of her life with Nicky had changed into one of extremely late nights and days that began at lunchtime with groans and
demands for strong coffee. By late afternoon people had recovered sufficiently to begin again, perhaps with a tour of the cellars to select the wines for that evening. Then Patsy would begin making
her cocktails and someone else would start the gramophone up or tune the radio to whatever station they could pick up from abroad, searching for decent music to listen to. After that, they were on
their way to another drunken evening of smoking and dancing until the early hours.

But she found it kept her mind off the darkness swirling at the back of it, and all the pain she was stubbornly trying to ignore. Late nights, glasses of wine and, afterwards, the warmth and
comfort of Nicky’s arms helped her to disconnect from the disruptive, disturbing voices in her head.

Mrs Spencer, who had not so far shown much interest in Alexandra and only treated her with the minimum of politeness, took her aside to say, ‘Miss Crewe, can you please tell his lordship
that all these late nights are not fair on the staff? Without a regular dinner hour, they don’t know whether they’re coming or going, and his friends are asking for anything they fancy
whenever they feel like it! Last night, one of the young men woke up Tilly and told her to make him a sandwich – and it was after midnight! We can’t be expected to put up with
that.’

‘No, Mrs Spencer. I will certainly tell him how you all feel,’ she said dutifully, and obediently relayed the news to Nicky who looked a little shamefaced.

‘The guys don’t understand,’ he said, ‘they think it’s like some kind of hotel. I’ll explain. But they’re leaving tomorrow. This will be our last big
night, and then we’ll all recuperate for a bit.’

Alexandra knew that while she’d welcomed the life that had been breathed into the house, she wouldn’t be sorry to have Nicky to herself again so that they could settle into their old
routine. Perhaps she could even open her heart to him about what she was suffering. She was sure that he had no idea. She’d succeeded in making him believe that the revelation about her
mother’s death was something she had simply accepted and fled away, just as she’d managed to pretend that she didn’t care much about her father’s rejection. She hoped she
would be able to keep it that way, and eventually it would all become as easy to bear as she made it look.

The last night party followed the familiar pattern, except that Nicky had decreed a big dinner in the dining room with the family silver brought out to give the art crowd a little taste of how
things were done at the fort on special occasions. The table gleamed in the light from curved silver candelabra and the crystal sparkled as the cellar’s best wines were poured into it.

‘This is impressive, Nicky, old man,’ Sandy said, taking a gulp of his claret. ‘You’ve treated us very well, hasn’t he, chaps?’

There was a general chorus of appreciation, and Alexandra noticed that Patsy had seated herself next to Nicky and was fluttering her heavily made-up eyelids at him. She felt a small stab of
jealousy but it was nothing she couldn’t control. All week Patsy had been her usual flirtatious self, but she had appeared to respect that Alexandra was Nicky’s girl now. Perhaps, on
the last night, she was willing to chance her arm with the owner of Fort Stirling, but Alexandra was not afraid, even if she didn’t like Patsy’s style very much. She knew that Nicky
loved her.