Drop of the Dice Page 3

  The sun was setting. It had almost disappeared. It had been a dark and cloudy day and there was rain about. It was growing dark rapidly. We came to the wood. I had a strange feeling that I had been there before; then I guessed it was the place where Hessenfield had stopped this very coach all those years ago.

  We turned into the wood and had not gone very far when two figures stepped out. They rode along by the window and I saw one of them clearly. He was masked and carried a gun.

  Highwaymen! The place was notorious for them. My immediate thought was: It’s not Hessenfield. This is a real one. Hessenfield is dead.

  Gregory had seen. He was reaching for the blunderbuss under our seat. Harriet took my hand and gripped it tightly. Merry was shouting something. He had whipped up the horses and we were swaying from one side of the coach to the other as the horses galloped through the wood.

  Benjie took out the sword which was kept in the coach for such an emergency as this.

  ‘Merry seems to think we can outride them,’ muttered Gregory.

  ‘Best thing if we can,’ replied Benjie. He was looking at Harriet and me and I knew he meant he did not want a fight which might put us in danger.

  The coach rattled on. We were swaying furiously—and then suddenly it happened. I was thrown up in my seat. I remember hitting the top of the coach which seemed to rise as high as the trees.

  I heard Harriet whisper: ‘Oh God help us.’

  And then I was enveloped in darkness.

  When I regained consciousness I was in a strange bed and Damaris was on one side of it, Jeremy on the other.

  I heard Damaris say: ‘I think she’s awake now.’

  I opened my eyes and said: ‘We were in the coach…’ as memory flooded back.

  ‘Yes, darling. You’re safe now.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘There was an accident… but don’t worry about that now.’

  ‘Where am I?’

  ‘We’re in the Boar’s Head. We are going home very soon now. As soon as you are well enough to travel.’

  ‘Are you staying here, then?’

  ‘Yes, and we shall be here until we take you back.’

  It was one of those occasions when I could feel happy to be wrapped in such loving care.

  I recovered rapidly. I had a broken leg, it seemed, and many bruises.

  ‘Young bones mend quickly,’ they said.

  I was at the Boar’s Head for another two days and gradually the news was broken to me. The coach would never be on the road again. The horses had been so badly injured that they had had to be shot.

  ‘It was the best way,’ Damaris told me with a catch in her voice. She loved all animals.

  ‘It was the highwaymen,’ I said. ‘Were they real highwaymen?’

  ‘Yes,’ answered Damaris. ‘They made off. They did not stay when it happened. It was because of them. It was their fault. Merry and Keller whipped up the horses hoping to escape the robbers. They didn’t see the fallen tree-trunk. That was how it happened.’

  ‘Are Benjie and Harriet and Gregory here at the inn?’

  There was a silence and a sudden fear came to me.

  ‘Clarissa,’ said Damaris slowly, ‘it was a very bad accident. You were lucky. Benjie was lucky…’

  ‘What do you mean?’ I asked faintly.

  Damaris looked at Jeremy and he nodded. He meant: Tell her. There is no point in holding back the truth.

  ‘Harriet and Gregory… were killed, Clarissa.’

  I was silent. I did not know what to say. I was numbed. Here was death again. It sprang up and took people when you least expected it. My beautiful parents… dead. Dear kind Gregory… beautiful Harriet with the blue eyes and curly black hair… dead.

  I stammered: ‘I shan’t see them any more.’

  I just wanted to close my eyes and go to sleep and forget.

  They left me. I heard them whispering outside my door.

  ‘Perhaps we shouldn’t have told her. She’s only a child.’

  ‘No,’ answered Jeremy. ‘She’s got to grow up. She’s got to learn what life is.’

  So I lay thinking and remembering those who had been so intensely alive—my mother, my father and Harriet… now dead… filled with sorrow.

  I felt I was no longer a child on that day. Yet it was true that young bones healed quickly and young bodies could withstand such shocks and throw off the physical effects.

  Poor Benjie! He looked like a ghost. How cruel life was to Benjie, who was so good, and I was sure had never harmed anyone in the whole of his life… yet he had lost my mother to Hessenfield; he had lost me to Damaris; and now he had lost his parents, whom I knew he had loved with that rare, tender, selfless emotion which only people like Benjie are capable of giving.

  He came back with us to Eversleigh. Damaris and Jeremy insisted that he should.

  Jeremy carried me into Enderby Hall and Smith and Damon were waiting to greet me. Smith’s face was wrinkled up with pleasure to see me safe so that the rivers in his face seemed more deeply embedded than ever, and Damon kept jumping up and making odd little whinnying noises to show how pleased he was that I was back.

  Jeremy carried me up and downstairs every day until my bones healed; and Arabella, Carleton and Leigh were always coming to see me.

  Arabella was very sad about Harriet.

  ‘She was an adventuress,’ she said, ‘but there was no one else quite like her. She has been in my life for a very long time. I feel that “I have lost part of myself.’

  They wanted Benjie to stay but he had the estate to look after. He would be better working, he said.

  He did not ask me to come to Eyot Abbas to see him, and I knew it was because he felt it would be too sad a place for me without Harriet.

  I made up my mind that I would go often. I would do my best to comfort Benjie.

  A VISITOR FROM FRANCE

  IT WAS ABOUT A year after the accident when it was decided that my education must be attended to and it was arranged that I should have a governess.

  Grandmother Priscilla set about the task of finding one. Recommendations were always the best way, she decided, and when the Eversleigh rector, who knew we were looking for someone, rode over to the Dower House to tell my grandmother that he knew of the very person for the post, she was delighted.

  Anita Harley came for an interview in due course and was immediately approved.

  She was about thirty years of age, an impoverished parson’s daughter who had looked after her father until his death, on which occasion she had found it necessary to earn a living. She was well-educated; her father had given lessons to the local aristocracy in which Anita had shared, and as her aptitude for learning far outstripped that of her fellow students, she had, at the age of twenty-two, assisted her father in teaching local children, so she was well experienced to have charge of my education.

  I liked her. She was dignified without being pompous and her learning sat lightly upon her; she had a pleasant sense of fun; she enjoyed teaching English and history and was not so keen on mathematics—so our tastes coincided. She also had some French and we could read stories together in that language. My accent was better than hers for I had chattered away like a native to servants at the hôtel, and as I had learned it when I was also learning my native English, my intonation as well as accent was entirely French.

  We were very happy together. We rode, played chess and conversed constantly; she was indeed a happy addition to our household.

  Damaris was delighted.

  ‘She’ll teach you more than I ever could,’ she said.

  Anita was treated like a member of the family. She dined with us and accompanied us when we visited the Dower House or Eversleigh Court.

  ‘A thoroughly charming girl,’ was Arabella’s comment.

  ‘So good for the child,’ added Priscilla.

  ‘The child’ by this time was growing up, learning fast. I knew of my origins; I had heard myself referred to as precocious and the
servants who came from Eversleigh Court whispered together that I was a ‘Regular One’ and it would not take a gipsy with a crystal ball to see that I was going to turn out just like my mother.

  I kept up my intention to visit Benjie often. Damaris approved of what she called my thoughtfulness. She said that she would have to come with me for she would never have a moment’s peace thinking of me on the roads after what had happened.

  We went to Eyot Abbas and we always made sure that we passed through Wokey’s Wood, which was the scene of the accident, in daylight; and there was always a well-armed party with us. I enjoyed the adventure of going through those woods, though my memories of Hessenfield were now overshadowed by what had happened, and I would think sadly not only of my exciting father but of dear Harriet and Gregory as well.

  Anita accompanied us, for Damaris thought I should continue with lessons. I was glad to have her, for we had become great friends. Alas, Eyot Abbas seemed quite different without Harriet and it was depressing because there was evidence of her all over the house.

  Damaris said that Benjie should change everything. It was always wise to do so when something had happened which was best forgotten. She looked very serious when she said that and I thought of the bedroom at Enderby.

  ‘Perhaps we can advise him,’ said Damaris. ‘You might have some suggestions, Anita.’

  Anita had proved herself to be very good with flower arranging and matching colours. She told me she had longed to be able to furnish the old rectory where she had lived, but there had never been enough money to do it.

  So we went to Eyot Abbas and Benjie was delighted to see us—especially me—but oh, how sad he was.

  He did say that he was almost glad his father had gone with his mother because he would have been so utterly desolate without her. Benjie implied that he was utterly desolate himself.

  ‘You must do everything you can to cheer him,’ Damaris had said to me. ‘You can do more than anyone.’

  ‘Perhaps I should go and live with him,’ I had said.

  Damaris had looked at me steadily. ‘Is that… what you want?’ she asked.

  I flung my arms about her neck then. ‘No… no. It is you I want to be with.’

  She had been tremendously relieved and I couldn’t help thinking how important I was. Then it occurred to me that all these people wanted me as a sort of substitute—Damaris because she had no child and poor Jeremy had his moods; Benjie because he had lost Carlotta and now his parents. I was flattered in a way but I had to face the fact that I was wanted because what all of them really wanted was someone else. I was becoming introspective. It might be due to my talks with Anita.

  We rode a good deal—Anita, Benjie and I. Damaris accompanied us sometimes but she grew tired if she was too long in the saddle, so the three of us went alone. I think Benjie was happier on those rides than at any other time. He was interested in forestry and taught me a great deal. Anita was quite knowledgeable on the subject already. I started to distinguish the different species and Benjie waxed enthusiastic about the oaks, which were truly magnificent.

  ‘It’s a real English tree,’ he said. ‘It has been here since history began. Did you know that the Druids had a very special respect for it? They used to perform their religious rites under it and courts of justice were held beneath its branches.’

  ‘I believe,’ said Anita, ‘that some of these trees live for two thousand years.’

  ‘That’s so,’ answered Benjie. ‘And our ships are made from the rough timber of these trees. Hearts of oak, they say our ships have.’

  I was sure that while he talked of the trees he loved he forgot his sorrow.

  Anita wondered why the willow wept and told us that the aspen shivered because from its wood Christ’s cross had been made and it had never been able to rest in peace since. She talked of the mistletoe, which was the only tree which had not promised not to harm Baldur, the most beautiful of all the Northern Gods, so that the mischievous Loki had been able to slay him with it.

  ‘I can see, Miss Harley,’ said Benjie, ‘that you have a romantic approach to nature.’

  ‘And I can see no harm in that replied Anita.

  Benjie laughed, I think for the first time since the accident.

  We stopped at inns and drank cider and ate hot bread with ripe cheeses, and pies straight from the oven. Benjie talked about the estate, which was his sole responsibility now. I could see that he was seeking something which would absorb his interest and help him to get over his bereavement.

  I talked about him to Anita.

  ‘He’s different from Jeremy,’ I said. ‘Jeremy nurses his troubles and although he is happy about being married to Damaris, it isn’t enough to make him forget that he was wounded in the war.’

  ‘The pain is always there to remind him of that,’ replied Anita.

  ‘Yes, whereas Benjie’s pain is in remembering and seeing the rooms where they used to live. People can get away from things like that. Whereas Jeremy can’t get away from the pain in his leg. It’s always there.’

  I thought then that we ought to get back because poor Jeremy would be very unhappy without Damaris. I wanted to see him, to give him the comfort my presence brought to him. I knew it did, for I often saw him look at me, remembering, I was sure, his adventure with Damaris when they had brought me out of Jeanne’s cellar. Damaris could never have done that without his help and every time Jeremy remembered that it lifted his spirits.

  ‘Benjie,’ I said, ‘why don’t you come back to Enderby with us?’

  ‘I would enjoy coming,’ he replied, ‘but you see, there is the estate.’ I knew he meant it was no use to run away. He had to stay and face his lonely life.

  We went back and arrived at the end of September when the leaves were turning to bronze and the fruit was ripening on the trees. Anita and I went to the orchards and climbed ladders to gather it while Smith helped us load the barrows and Damon sat watching us with his head on one side, bounding about now and then to show his joy because we were all together.

  Priscilla came over and she and Damaris made jam and preserves. It was a normal autumn apart from the lingering sadness. Arabella missed Harriet so much, which was strange because she had often been sharp with her in their encounters and I had always had the impression that there was a great deal she resented about Harriet.

  Even Great-Grandfather Carleton seemed to regret her loss and he had always openly disliked her. As for Priscilla, she was very sad. I learned later how Harriet had helped her when Carlotta was born.

  ‘We all have to go in time,’ said Arabella. ‘Sooner or later, and sooner for some of us.’

  Damaris hated to hear her talk like that. She said it was nonsense and she was going to see that her grandmother lived as long as Methuselah.

  Another year passed. I was now ten years old and there was a great deal of talk about the armistice which was going to put an end to the war.

  Priscilla said it was about time too. Why we should concern ourselves with who sat on the throne of Spain was past her understanding.

  Great-Grandfather Carleton just looked at her and, shaking his head, uttered his favourite condemnation, which was: ‘Women!’

  ‘If they really come to peace,’ said Damaris, ‘there will be free traffic between England and France.’ She looked at Jeremy. ‘I should like to go to Paris. I’d like to retrace our footsteps.’

  ‘A sentimental journey,’ said Jeremy, smiling at her in the way I loved to see him smile. I knew that the pain wasn’t troubling him when he looked like that and he was rather pleased with life temporarily and not resentful at all.

  ‘I wonder what became of Jeanne,’ mused Damaris. ‘I hope she was all right.’

  ‘She’s the sort who can look after herself,’ Jeremy reminded her.

  ‘Oh yes. I shall never forget how she looked after Clarissa.’

  ‘I am not likely to either,’ replied Jeremy.

  Damaris was very happy. She was pregnant again. ‘This
time,’ she said, ‘I shall take the utmost care.’

  The doctor said she must rest a good deal and remember that her health had never been quite what it should have been ever since she had had fever years ago; and childbearing was an arduous matter even for the healthy.

  Damaris was radiant. So was Jeremy. The shadows were lifting. This baby was of the greatest importance. If they could have a baby my responsibility towards them would be lifted. Strange, that I should come to think of it as a responsibility, but I did, for I now knew that the journey to France to bring me home had been the beginning of a new relationship between them. Before that they had been two unhappy people. I was glad to have played such a part in their lives—but the deep responsibility which I felt towards them seemed to grow with every passing day. Now I felt I must look after Benjie too, for long ago I had left him—not that I had had any choice in the matter, but if I had I should have gone willingly with Hessenfield; and thus I had deprived Benjie of a daughter.

  Christmas was at hand. Arabella insisted that we should all go to Eversleigh Court. Benjie must come, she said, and he promised to do so.

  Damaris said we must do all we could to cheer him, for Christmas was a time when those who were lost were remembered with particular poignancy. I sensed that everyone was a little too bright, trying to pretend that this was going to be a Christmas like any other.

  Anita and I went into the woods to gather holly and ivy. We hunted for mistletoe and even Smith helped bring in the Yule log. Dear old Damon seemed to be extra excited about it. He had his dear ones safe—that was Jeremy, Damaris, Smith and myself—and as long as we were there he was happy.

  Arabella said we must stay at the Court and not think of going home until Twelfth Night, even though we were so close, and that applied to Priscilla and Leigh also.

  We had decorated Enderby Hall even though we were not going to be there. I heard one of the maids say: ‘What’ll the ghosts think, I wonder?’

  ‘They won’t like it’, prophesied another.

  They would not believe that there was not something malevolent lurking in Enderby.

  ‘It’s a shame to leave it,’ I said to Damaris. ‘It looks so lovely.’