Виктория Холт - Beyond the blue Mountains

Goodbye, Gunnar. Perhaps we had better not see each other alone ... again.”

He stood up, and she ran to him; she kissed him wildly.

"Goodbye, Gunnar. Goodbye!”

He was trembling; he. the strong man, the master.

In the toilet-room Carolan took off the black dress and put on a green one. Her eyes blazed in her pale face. She surveyed herself. Oh, yes! Margery had noticed all right. In the green dress it was obvious. She knocked.

"Come in," said Lucille.

She was sitting up in bed, a wrap round her. She always retired early these days. She had grown from a delicate woman to a semi-invalid since Carolan had been ministering to her.

"I have come to draw the curtains and light the candles," said Carolan.

She stood, the taper in her hand, willing the woman to look at her.

"Carolan," said Lucille, 'you look strange. Have you been crying?”

"The shawl is slipping from your shoulders," said Carolan.

"It would not do to catch cold.”

"You are very good to me, Carolan.”

"No, no, it is you who are good to me.”

"I? Good? No, Carolan. Sometimes, particularly lately, I think of what a wicked woman I am.”

"You must not take it to heart, you know. There must have been many women who have done__that.”

"What, Carolan?”

"I am sorry. It is nothing. You must not worry. You know Doctor Martin says the last thing you must do is worry.”

"It has occurred to me, Carolan, that in a way... it is murder. It is only a matter of months ... and then it would have been murder. The baby was alive ...”

"Please do not let us discuss it it worries you so.”

"No, do not let us talk of it. I have dreams about it. Carolan.”

"It is worrying by day that makes you dream at night. No! You must forget it. He will never have his children, but what is to be, will be, and so many of us have to go without what we desire most in this world. It is time you had your pills. Did you have another dose this morning?”

"Oh, Carolan ...”

"But in the morning!”

"I had such dreadful dreams, Carolan. I dreamed that it was alive... a real baby ... and that I had killed it, and they found out and took me to the gallows. And he was there. He looked terrible. He kept saying ... Murder! I could not sleep after that, and I was so tired in the morning. I longed to sleep ... it is such a deep, dreamless sleep, Carolan ... soothing and caressing.”

"But," said Carolan slowly, 'it makes you feel that you want to stay like that for ever, and that is dangerous.”

"It is just like that, Carolan.”

"Sometimes I think you may not resist the temptation to stay there forever ...”

Lucille laughed.

"Is it not strange that that comfort should be there in a bottle?”

"Very strange.”

"You look different tonight, Carolan. Is it because you have changed into the green dress? It looks gayer on you than it did on me. But it is too tight for you, my dear. I must find something else for you; you have been so good to me.”

Carolan laid her hands across her breasts. She looked wide-eyed at Lucille.

"What is it, Carolan?”

"Nothing ... oh, nothing.”

"I thought for the moment that something was wrong. I... I have had that feeling for some time. I thought you seemed absent-minded, and ... you were always so reliable. If there is anything I could do to help you ... But perhaps it is my imagination, for I thought the master seemed strange lately.”

"Strange ?" said Carolan.

"The master strange ?”

"He looks at me strangely. It is nothing. I have such a vivid imagination; I am so sensitive. He asks after my health more than he did. Perhaps he wants children again.”

Carolan leaned over the bed.

"And if he did ...?”

Lucille shivered.

"I should die. I know I should. I could not bear it. Perhaps I could arrange to go home; but the journey! I should die, Carolan. Sometimes I get the idea that my end is not far off, that I deserve to die ...”

"Because you killed your baby? You must get such ridiculous nonsense out of your head. To have a baby is a wonderful experience ... for a woman in your position.”

Surely she must see now. But she was utterly selfish; she saw life from one angle only--life as lived by Lucille Masterman.

Carolan turned away, her lips trembling. Had Lucille sufficient insight to grasp the situation? An ailing wife, a beautiful girl, a man who wanted children it was an old enough story. But Lucille was wrapped about with her own selfish needs her pills, her comforts, her pains.

Lucille's eyes were glassy; the drug robbed her of strong emotions; strength was slowly seeping out of her body. Sleep she wanted ... sleep, eternal sleep. She wanted it for herself, and Carolan and Gunnar wanted it for her.

"Read to me, Carolan," said Lucille.

Carolan opened the Bible. Her eyes were burning, her hands trembling.

' "Now Sarah Abram's wife bare him no children: and she had an handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar...”

There was no sound in the room but that of Carolan's voice, very clear, high-pitched with emotion.

Suddenly Lucille cried out: "Stop! Stop! No more! I wish to hear no more.”

Carolan put down the book and went to her. Lucille looked into her face and their eyes held each other's, Carolan's commanding, Lucille's submissive.

Carolan said softly: "You must not blame yourself. You were ill, and illness weakens the spirit. You did him a great wrong, but it is done with. Live... and bear him more children.”

"I could not, Carolan. You do not know how weak I have become. If I was weak before, I am doubly so now.”

"You must live. You must bear him many children, for that is what he wants, and that is the way you must expiate your sin.”

"My sin... Carolan!”

The murder of his child ...”

"I am too ill, Carolan.”

 "Remember," said Carolan, and her voice was commanding," 'no more drug tonight! You would need a double dose for it to be effective tonight, for you have taken one dose already today.”

"Carolan, are you going to leave me now?”

"I am going to leave you to sleep.”

"I cannot sleep.”

"You must. Try to calm yourself. You need sleep.”

"But I cannot sleep ... without...”

"Goodnight," said Carolan.

"Remember what I said. Goodnight.”

Carolan went to her room, and lay on her bed. staring at the ceiling.

She was exhausted.

Katharine Masterman awakened early that December day, but the sunshine was already streaming into her bedroom. She experienced a disappointment, for as soon as she was fully awake she remembered that Christmas Day was still three weeks off, and realized that she had only dreamed that it was Christmas Day, and that she was at the breakfast table looking at the presents piled high beside her plate. Three weeks to go I It might as well have been three years, for three weeks is an age when one is ten years old.

She threw aside her mosquito net, and got out of bed. This was her own room, right at the top of the house where the nurseries were. From her window she could see the dazzling sea, and cockatoos and parakeets, white and so brilliantly coloured that it was sheer pleasure to watch them. She stood there, watching them now, and forgot her dream in her desire to fly as they could. She spread out her arms and swooped about the room, uttering cries of delight, until the exertion made her so hot that she remembered the boys in the next room. In a moment she would have them running in, swooping about her room crying: "I'm a cockatoo!

I can fly fastest!" They always imitated her; they were so very young.

James was eight, Martin six and a half, and little Edward just four.

She felt superior in wisdom; ten was so very much older than even James, and she had heard Margery say that girls grow up quicker than boys.

She sat down on her bed, swinging her legs to and fro, wondering what she would do today. It must be a special day because she had dreamed it was Christmas. No day of course could be like Christmas Day, but it could be made exciting. But how?

She was tall for her age, rather thin, with blue-green eyes and a little more red in her hair than Carolan had had at her age; she had a quiet introspective air, reminiscent of her father, and her mouth was like his too. She drove the entire household to distraction with her capacity for asking questions. Where? Why? What...? Almost every sentence she spoke began like that. She would sit quietly watching people, seeing behind them the background of all they had told her over a number of years, all skilfully fitted together by herself until it made a complete picture. At some time they had all felt a little uncomfortable before the candid scrutiny of those calm blue-green eyes.

She would pull them up sharply over any small divergence from a previous story.

"Oh, but before, you said ..." It was disconcerting. But they loved her; she was the favourite of all the children, although James was the eldest son, and Martin and Edward were boys, and people wanted boys.

She knew though, by the way Mamma looked at her and Papa looked at her, and the way Margery said: "Now, what do you want in my kitchen?" that they loved her best of all.

It was good to be loved; it gave one such a sense of happy security.

Papa took her out to the stations with him sometimes; she would ride beside him in her neat outfit, and when they met people, who always had something to say to her, Papa got quite pink as though he liked very much hearing them say what a fine girl she was becoming.