“Mama,” I called, breathless from the door. “We are to be married.”
She got up, a look of panic quickly turning into a smile as Henry came in beside me. “Oh! That’s good!” she said, rushing to open a window and letting in a fresh breeze. She took a great breath of air, then turned and came over to give Henry a kiss on the cheek. “I’m so very pleased.” She looked me straight in the eyes, only seven or eight inches from mine, and her mouth said, “I’m sure you’ll be the talk of the village,” but her eyes looked as if they were about to be crushed by a ton of black, heavy coal. I know she’s never been happy with Daddy, was forced to marry him for the sake of her family. The weight of all those years was packed into that look. She wanted me to do the right thing, but she couldn’t help but think of herself, the loveless, persecuted life she’d led.
She looked back round to Silvie, her new protégée, and then she said to Henry, “You must go straightaway and tell your mother. She’ll be furious if she finds out she wasn’t the first to know! Venetia, you must stay here and discuss plans.”
“You’re right, she’ll be livid. You know how she is!” he chortled in his good-humored way, and I found myself already disliking him. “So, my darling.” He took my hand again. “I’ll bid you good-bye and come again this afternoon. Maybe we can go for a long walk together and make some plans, the wedding, the honeymoon.” His eyes sparkled, darting uncontrollably over my body.
He disappeared with alacrity, and we stood in silence listening to his footsteps down the marble stairs, echoing through the hallway, and then the massive dull clunk of the front door being slammed. Then silence.
I crumpled. Mama helped me to the nursing chair, and Silvie was sent out to get some tea.
“I had to do it, Mama,” I whimpered. “You know I did.”
She didn’t say anything, just a long, quiet “Shhhhhh,” as if she had learned that the troubles of the world could be absorbed and deafened by slow, steady wishfulness, and I suddenly understood that she’d been silencing the noise for the past twenty years.
Silvie returned with some tea, and we sipped quietly, talking about how things were going to be. Weddings happen with great pace these days, which one must see as a blessing under the circumstances, although we exchanged withering looks at the prospect that it might even be as soon as next week.
“Of course, you may wish to, well, consummate the marriage before the event, so to speak,” Mama said in a bit of a hurry, rather embarrassed. I must have looked at her as if she’d lost her mind, as she quickly added, “So that he doesn’t doubt the parentage of the baby.” She smiled at Silvie, who was looking especially alert, and I couldn’t believe that either of them was keeping up the ridiculous charade that Silvie doesn’t know exactly what’s going on, and how it had come about.
After a while I dragged myself out of the comfort of the nursery and headed down to my room, where you find me now. My mind is going round in circles: Why am I here, what was I thinking, why is this the best choice, surely there are alternatives, and where is he? Where is Alastair? Doesn’t he hear my pain expanding exponentially through the universe, covering multitudes of galaxies with a never-ending scream?
Where is he?
I sat at my dressing table and took out the pendant, wishing on it that he would arrive, like a knight in shining armor, and whisk me away. Or that I would wake up and find it was all a horrid dream, happening to a different Venetia, on a different planet, somewhere high, high above us in the brutal, dispassionate universe.
I will write soon.
Much love,
Venetia
LITCHFIELD HOSPITAL,
LITCHFIELD,
KENT.
Thursday, 8th August, 1940
Dear Clara,
What a day! First of all, the stupid boy came in to tell me he lost my money. I cannot believe I entrusted my fortune to such an incompetent idiot. He found it, took it to his hut, and then someone ruddy well stole it. He thinks it was Ralph Gibbs, so I’ll be having words with him when I’m out of this place.