I have spent nearly nine years of my life yearning only for her smile, but today I could not stand it.
I watched her, playing as she does for hours with the painted boards, and unleashed the wicked torrent of my thoughts. I thought that I should be happy today, were it not for her and her gypsy friend. I should be on my way into the service of the Queen herself but Hetta was the reason – the only reason – that no one else in The Bridge smiled today.
‘How can you?’ I burst out. ‘How dare you smile and prance like that? You know what has happened.’
She cocked her head at one of the companions, as if it had spoken. Then she went on playing.
My rage mounted. God forgive me, I know it was wrong, I know she is only a child. But I could not help myself. ‘Listen to me! Do you not understand what this means for us?’
She should do. But it seems she does not fully comprehend. Perhaps she cannot.
‘Merripen!’ I cried, pushed to the end of my endurance. ‘Your friend Merripen has done this to us!’
The smile dropped from her face, quick as a curtain falling.
‘He has killed the Queen’s horse,’ I said, ‘because we moved his people off the common. He has made your father most unhappy.’
She glanced at the nearest companion and then at me.
‘You made me employ that heathen and now he has ruined us, ruined us for good!’
I could not read her expression. She opened her mouth and, for one wild moment, I thought she was actually going to speak. Then she ran from me.
I heard her feet pattering on the stairs as fast as rain, as fast as my tears fell. I slid down into my chair, feeling like a knave.
Hetta was the only one left who did not hate me. And now I have pushed her away.
Somewhere in the distance, thunder booms. I do not know how long I have sat here rueing my fate, begging for the strength to go on. But the storm must have nudged closer, for the light has clouded and the hall has fallen into a bruised, grey-yellow murk. Drops of rain hit the window. A companion, the sweeper, watches me.
Her gaze has become shameful, degrading; as if she knows every secret of my soul.
I have ordered them returned to Mr Samuels first thing in the morning. All of the fine objects, returned. I cannot stand to have his treasure in my house any longer. I hate every piece of it.
A very curious thing happened today. My cart rumbled back from Torbury St Jude with my servants, but the goods were still tied down.
‘What is this?’ I barked. ‘I told you to leave these with Mr Samuels.’
‘I know,’ said our man Mark, ‘and I’m sorry, mistress, but it weren’t there.’
I looked at Jane. ‘What does he mean? Did Mr Samuels refuse to take delivery?’
‘No,’ she said shakily. ‘No, not that.’ Lines of confusion furrowed her brow. ‘The shop – it wasn’t there.’
How could that be? A shop so full and well stocked only last June!
‘What? Is the shop vacant?’
‘No, mistress.’ Her voice was high now, close to tears. ‘It was not there. The shop. We must have driven up and down a dozen times but I swear . . . It’s as if it never existed.’
I could only gape at her. The beef-witted girl! I never heard anything like it. She went into the shop with me herself. Shops do not simply disappear!
Perhaps she is ill; there is certainly something amiss about her, for she has been all aquiver since they returned.
I must go into town to settle the business myself, and soon. Until then I am stuck with our misbegotten companions. I cover their faces with sheets but I know they are there, watching. As if they know what has happened. As if it amuses them.
THE BRIDGE, 1866
‘My diamonds. Where are my diamonds?’ Elsie raked through her jewellery box, scattering chains and pearls across the dressing table.
‘Elsie.’ Jolyon sounded tired. He slouched against the bedpost. ‘Leave that. You must rest.’
‘But I cannot find my diamonds.’
‘They will turn up.’
‘Rupert wanted me to have them.’ She dug faster. She had lost Rupert. She had lost the baby. She would not lose the diamonds too.
‘Elsie.’
‘I am not being hysterical, Jo. Rupert heard it too. He wrote me a letter but I can’t—’ She shuffled through the belongings strewn over her dressing table. No one had cleaned it during her illness. The surface was coated in that coarse, beige dust. ‘I cannot find it right now.’
‘You need to calm down. This is not you speaking. You have been very ill.’
Ill. A laughably inadequate word. ‘This is not a nervous disorder. The wood inside me! And Sarah saw the companions,’ she whispered. ‘She saw them too.’
‘This is not like you, Elsie. You are no neurotic girl.’
‘Then why don’t you pay me the courtesy of believing me?’ Without warning, she burst into tears.
Jolyon came to her side at the dressing table and placed a hand on her shoulder, bringing with him his familiar scent of bay leaves and lime. His fingers trembled on her collarbone. Of course, he was not used to seeing her cry. All these years she had hidden her sorrow from him, held herself tight, strong. But now a chamber inside her had unlocked and she could not seal it up again.
‘What you are asking me to accept, dearest . . . It is impossible. You see that, do you not?’
It was all very well for him. His pressed suit, his necktie and shining shoes proclaimed his place in a world of order and sense, figures and business. He did not know what it was to ferment out here with a malicious, nameless fear.
‘I am not blaming you,’ Jolyon went on. ‘I do not think you made it up. Poor, dear heart, you have been cruelly deceived.’
She stared at him. ‘How do you mean, deceived?’
‘Consider it. Could a person butcher a cow and deliver it to your door without any witnesses? Someone must have seen something. Did Peters not notice Beatrice was missing? What about the gardeners? And where were the maids, all that time? Why did they not answer the door?’
‘You do not think . . .’
A thought was forming, drawing memories together as a poultice draws filth. The maids.
He removed his hand from her shoulder and ran it through his hair. ‘To be honest with you, I think the maids were playing a joke. Perhaps they did not mean for it to go this far.’
‘No . . . they would not.’
‘You got rid of all the servants at the factory after Ma died,’ he said gently. ‘You are not used to managing such people. It would be quite simple for the maids to move things, keep spare dummy boards hidden. Write in the dust. Consider. They could have orchestrated every move.’
It was too horrible to believe. ‘But . . . why?’
He shrugged. ‘They resent you. Your very presence in the house. Once their work was easy and slapdash. Now, with a mistress, and the prospect of a baby . . . No doubt they thought it amusing at first, but they have overstepped the mark.’