“By the river on the picnic to Box Hill. You said if I helped you find Venetia you’d marry me.”
“Did I really? What a dreadful thing to say. I’m so sorry, Kitty. It must have been a misunderstanding, or a joke, or, well, something.” He spread out his hands, and a short, embarrassed laugh escaped him. “But now you’ll be my sister, and I’ll be your brother, and that’ll be even better than being married, won’t it?”
“No, it won’t,” I shouted. “I don’t want you to be my stupid brother, even if you do end up marrying my sister, which I doubt very much.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s pregnant with Slater’s baby,” I yelled into his face, spit flying out of my mouth with every word. He took a step back, his face empty, looking at me.
“Now, Kitty, you shouldn’t joke about things like that.”
“Just go and ask her. She’s in love with him. She wants his child. But he’s disappeared. So she has to take you instead.”
His shoulders fell forward, and his eyes grew hollow, and like a mirror of horror, I saw my utter distress pass from me to him, coursing out of me like a thick jet of yellow and black and surging into his body with a flood of rage and despair. He sat back on the grassy bank, his knees up before him, and his head in his hands, murmuring something to himself. I stood and watched him for a while, my hero deflating before my eyes, and I began to sense the enormity of what I had just done.
“Go away, Kitty,” he said, quietly, calmly, not looking up at me.
“Henry, I’m sorry, I—”
“I’ll say thank you for telling me, and now leave.” He raised his head, his eyes suddenly angry and wild.
“But, Henry—”
“Stay away from me,” he snarled under his breath, getting up and standing above me. “If I told you what I’d like to do with you right now, you’d wish you’d never met me. Now go. Leave.” He was shouting, threatening. I could never imagine he could be like this, his beautiful blue eyes turning black like a fury of snakes.
I grabbed hold of Amadeus’s reins and ran, sobs heaving uncontrollably from my mouth, feeling like the end of the world had truly come.
Once I was back in the dark, shadowy, stable, I laid an old horse blanket on the floor in the corner and curled up on it as tight as a shell. I stayed there sobbing, Amadeus nudging me with his soft nose in sympathy.
Why had I done this? Why had he done this?
A few hours later, I heard the sound of a small voice behind me. It was Silvie peering into the shadows.
“What do you want?” I demanded.
“I have sandwiches,” she said in her quiet voice.
“Put them on the bench outside.”
“Everyone is looking for you,” she said.
I didn’t say anything, just let the words flow in and be absorbed. Of course Daddy will be furious. He wanted Venetia to marry Henry. It had all fit into place. Venetia staying in bed. Daddy trying to talk to her. Mama trying to negotiate. Venetia changing her mind about Henry and agreeing to marry him. Mama weeping late into the night. And next? Daddy will surely kill me, if Venetia doesn’t get to me first.
“Thank you for the sandwiches,” I said quietly to Silvie, remembering she was now my only ally. She backed away into the dusk, unsure whether I was a wise choice of friend.
It was night before I went back to the house, cold and hungry, shivering with fear. The pantry door was left unlocked for me, and someone had left a roll in the bread bin. I scooped it up and crept up the back stairs into my bedroom, which is where you find me now, dear diary. The house is in silence. I had anticipated the family waiting for me, everyone shouting, everyone crying. But this, this stillness, is somehow more disturbing.
I think that tonight, when it’s past midnight and everyone is asleep, I shall pack a few things together, and vanish.
CHILBURY MANOR,
CHILBURY,
KENT.
Thursday, 8th August, 1940
Dear Angela,
I write again, this time to tell you that the engagement is dramatically off. I can only thank God for a narrow escape—how was I to know that Henry Brampton-Boyd could be such a monster? I feel numb and exhausted, and the whole business has given me a fever. I am to stay in bed, which I confess I am more than happy to do.
It was with mixed feelings that I heard his arrival early afternoon. He hadn’t been due to come back until late afternoon—Mama had insisted that I needed to rest, and I was looking forward to a chance to recover from the whole ordeal. But abruptly, at around one, I heard the bell pull hard, and then again, and the sound of raised voices rang through the hallway, my name being called, shouted.