Despite his best intentions he had betrayed himself, for there was a suspicious note to Lucy’s voice when she said, ‘Why do you ask?’
‘From what I’ve read, the Magenta Brotherhood were a tight-knit group. They shared their ideas and influences, their secrets, their houses, even their models. Both Edward and Thurston Holmes painted Diana Barker, and all three of them painted Adele Winterson. But Lily Millington appears only in Edward’s paintings. It struck me as unusual and I wondered why. I could only think of two possibilities: either the others hadn’t wished to paint her, or Edward had objected to sharing.’
Taking her cane, Lucy stood and slowly crossed the rug to stop near the window overlooking the street. Light was still filtering in through the glass, but it had shifted since Leonard arrived and her profile was now in shadow. ‘That intersection up there where the lanes meet is called the crossroads. A medieval cross used to stand at its centre. It was lost during the Reformation, when Elizabeth’s men stormed through the region, destroying the trappings of Catholicism, the churches and the religious art – the priests, too, when they could catch them. Now only the base of the cross remains. And its name, of course, passed through time. It is remarkable, is it not, Mr Gilbert, that a name, a simple word, is all that remains of such traumatic historical events. Things that happened right here to real people at another point in time. I think about the past every time I walk through the crossroads. I think about the church, and the priests who hid, and the soldiers who came to find and kill them. I think about guilt and forgiveness. Do you ever concern yourself with such matters?’
She was being evasive, avoiding his question about Lily Millington. Yet not for the first time, Leonard had the sneaking sense that she could somehow see inside him. ‘Sometimes,’ he said. The word stuck in his throat and he coughed to clear it.
‘Yes, I should imagine one would, having been to war. I don’t usually go in for advice-giving, Mr Gilbert, but I have lived a long time and I have learned that one must forgive oneself the past or else the journey into the future becomes unbearable.’
Leonard felt a wash of shame-tinged surprise. It was a lucky guess, that’s all. She didn’t know his past. As she’d said, most men who had been to war had seen and done things that they would just as soon forget. He refused to let himself be thrown. Nonetheless, his voice was shakier than he’d have liked when he continued: ‘I have an extract from a letter that Edward wrote to your cousin Hamish in August 1861. I wonder if I could read it to you, Miss Radcliffe?’
She did not turn back towards him, but neither did she try to stop him. Leonard began to read. ‘“I have found her, a woman of such striking beauty that my hand aches to put pen to paper. I long to capture all that I see and feel when I look upon her face, and yet at once I cannot bear to start. For how can I hope to do her justice? There is a nobility to her bearing, not of birth perhaps but of nature. She does not primp and appeal; indeed, it is her very openness, the way she has of meeting one’s attention rather than averting her eyes. There is a sureness – a pride even – to the set of her lips, that is breathtaking. She is breathtaking. Now that I have seen her, anyone else would be an imposter. She is truth; truth is beauty; and beauty is divine.”’
‘Yes,’ she said softly. ‘That’s Edward. I would know his voice anywhere.’ She turned and came slowly back to her chair to sit down, and Leonard was surprised to notice a sheen of moisture on her cheeks. ‘I remember the night that he met her. He had been at the theatre and he came home in a daze. We all knew something was afoot. He told us everything in a rush, and then he went straight to his studio in the garden and started to sketch. He worked compulsively and did not stop for days. He didn’t eat or sleep or speak to anyone. He filled pages and pages of his notebook with her image.’
‘He was in love with her.’
‘I was going to tell you, Mr Gilbert, that my brother was an obsessive person. That he always behaved that way when he met a new model, or discovered a new technique, or had a new idea. And it would have been true.’ Her hand fluttered onto the armrest of the chair. ‘And false. For it was different with Lily Millington, and everyone could see it from the start. I could see it, Thurston saw it, and poor old Fanny Brown saw it, too. Edward loved Lily Millington with a madness that boded ill, and that summer, here at Birchwood, it all came to a head.’
‘So, Lily Millington was here. I thought she must have been, but there’s no mention of her. Not in anyone’s letters or diaries, and not in the newspapers either.’
‘Have you read the police reports, Mr Gilbert? I expect they keep such things.’
‘Are you saying that they’ll tell a different story?’
‘Mr Gilbert, my dear man, you were a soldier in the Great War. You know better than most that the account served up by the papers for public consumption often bears little relation to the truth. Fanny’s father was a powerful man. He was very keen that there should be no suggestion in the press that his daughter had been supplanted in Edward’s affections.’
Connections were lighting up in Leonard’s mind. Edward had loved Lily Millington. It wasn’t the death of Frances Brown that broke his heart and sent him spiralling out of control; it was the loss of Lily. But what had happened to her? ‘If she and Edward were in love, why did he end up alone? How did he lose her?’ Lucy had suggested that the police reports would refer specifically to Lily Millington’s presence at Birchwood Manor on the night of the robbery and murder … Suddenly Leonard realised: ‘Lily Millington was involved in the robbery. She betrayed him – that’s what drove Edward mad.’
A dark look came upon Lucy’s face and Leonard was immediately doused with regret. In the moment of comprehension, he had forgotten that it was her brother they were discussing. He had sounded almost gleeful. ‘Miss Radcliffe, I’m sorry,’ he said, ‘how insensitive of me.’
‘Not at all. But I am growing tired, Mr Gilbert.’
Leonard glanced at the clock and saw, with a sinking heart, that he had overstayed his invitation. ‘Of course. I won’t take up any more of your time. I’ll seek out the police reports as you suggest. I’m certain they’ll shed further light upon the subject.’
‘There are very few certainties in this world, Mr Gilbert, but I will tell you something I know: the truth depends on who it is that’s telling the story.’
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
As he strolled back through the village, along the quiet road with its ragged verge, Leonard pondered Lucy Radcliffe. He was confident that he had never met a woman – another person – quite like her. It was clear that she was very bright. Age had not dimmed her fascination for all areas of intellectual enquiry; her interests were wide and varied; her ability to retain and process complex information evidently remarkable. She had been wry, too, and self-critical. He had liked her.