“No,” went on Lilias, “I’m not much of a help in the house. My father calls Jane and me his Mary and Martha.”

“I daresay you have your uses.”

“I shop and help with the local good works … bazaars and so on … everything that goes with the routine of a country vicarage.”

“Which is very important, I’ve no doubt.”

“Well, I suppose I could say I am of some use.”

“What strikes me so forcibly about the place is the peace of it.”

“I’m glad you find it so. It’s what you need.”

“Oh, how I wish that I had come in different circumstances! But it’s no use wishing you can change what’s gone before.”

“No good at all. But it is going to get better. We’re going to put the past behind us. We both have to do that. We’re just going to forget it all happened. It’s the only way.”

“But can we?”

“We can try. Now, I am going to leave you to wash and change if you want to. Can you find your way down?”

“I’m sure I can.”

She was gone and I was alone. I washed and changed. I felt elated. I knew I had been right to come here.

As THE DAYS PASSED I became more sure of this. I had slipped into a new identity and was no longer startled when I heard myself addressed as Diana. I was caught up in a new way of life. I was becoming very friendly with Jane who was quite different from Lilias. Jane was no dreamer; she was practical in the extreme which was very necessary in running the vicarage household on what I imagined was by no means a large stipend.

I wanted to contribute to the household expenses, but my hints that I should do so were so firmly brushed aside that it was difficult to pursue the matter. Jane and Daisy put their heads together so skillfully that there was no sign of any deprivation. Meals were simple but wholesome. Daisy had taught Jane to cook long ago and she had taken to it, as Daisy said, like a fish to water.

Lilias lacked an interest in domestic affairs. She and Alice had been “the clever ones.” Alice was now making use of her skills while alas Lilias, because of that unfortunate incident, was unable to do so.

The vicar was very much as I had expected him to be, due to Lilias’ description. He was one of the most contented people I had ever met. He was completely unselfish and his life seemed to have been given over to the service of others. He was a little absent-minded, but between his daughters and Daisy he was taken good care of. He was greatly loved by all with whom he came into contact and his little foibles were looked upon with the greatest indulgence. He was indeed a very happy man. I thought how lucky Lilias was to be his daughter, which sent my thoughts back to my own father; I recalled his anger over my friendship with Jamie and his outraged dismissal of Kitty and how Zillah had crept into his bedroom at night.

But I must not think of my father—nor of Jamie. Jamie had failed me. His love had not been strong enough to stand up to trouble and at the first sign of it he had crept away.

That had hurt me deeply. But I supposed it was the terrible nature of what had followed which had helped to subdue the bitterness of that particular blow.

On my first day I heard that Major Jennings, who ran the riding stables, was a great friend of the vicarage family. He knew that Lilias liked to ride and could not afford to, so he had asked her if, as a favour to him, she would help with the exercising of his horses. Lilias had accepted the offer with the greatest alacrity. Therefore she rode a good deal.

“I go over to help with the grooming and clean out the stables,” she said. “I enjoy being with horses. Sometimes, if they are hard-pressed I give people lessons. It’s a wonderful opportunity. How would you like to ride?”

“I’m not a rider, but I did have a few lessons in Scotland, so I’m not exactly a novice.”

“Well, here’s your opportunity.”

“What a good idea! I could pay for my lessons and you, Lilias, could teach me.”

Lilias looked disturbed, so I explained hastily: “It’s all right. My father left me some money. I have a small income so I am not exactly poor. The house and the bulk of his fortune went to Zillah.”

Lilias was thoughtful: “It all happened so quickly. It seems odd. It’s not so very long since I was there. She came … and almost immediately she married your father. It’s almost as though it were arranged.” She hesitated, staring into space. “I’m talking nonsense,” she went on. “Let’s go to the Jennings’ this morning and see what can be arranged about the riding. You’ll like them. Besides the major there are Mrs. Jennings and Florence, their daughter. They all work with the horses.”

“Tell me about the other neighbours.”

“Well, there’s the manor.”

“I remember your telling me about that. It’s where the squire lives … and the young man you were going to marry.”

“Yes. Charles … Charles Merrimen.”

“Is he still there?”

“Oh yes, he’s there. I go and see him quite often. He’s in a wheelchair most of the time. He’s such a fine man.”

“Shall I meet him?”

“Of course. And then there are the Ellingtons at Lakemere House. They are the important family here. They are the rich ones, the benefactors of the village. It was to them that Kitty went. Oh! I’d forgotten Kitty. Just in case you meet her she’ll have to be prepared, won’t she? We don’t want her blurting out …”

It was as though a cloud had settled about us. The euphoria was slipping away. Was it always going to be like that? Should I constantly be wondering whether someone was going to recognise me?

Nanny Grant’s voice came back to me over the years:

Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practise to deceive.

NEVERTHELESS the harmony of the vicarage was bringing back to me a sense of security. I would wake with a feeling of anticipation, wondering what the day would bring.

I would stand by the window looking out over the graveyard. Those ancient tombstones might have looked eerie in moonlight, but somehow they conveyed a sense of peace; the troubles of those who lay beneath them were over. Friendly ghosts indeed.

Lilias’ company had a further healing effect. I could open my heart to her; and how good it was to share my troubled thoughts! I could tell her how hurt I had been by Jamie’s desertion.

“It was just as well,” was her verdict. “If he failed you when you most needed him, he would not have been the partner with whom you could have gone happily through life. He might have cared for you … a little; but he cared more for himself. Better not to marry than marry the wrong one. You were young, inexperienced and lonely; you had lost your mother; you and I had parted; your father had remarried and you were not sure of your stepmother. I believe you were ready to fall in love. In love with love, as they say. And that’s not so hard to get over as the real thing.”

Yes, she was indeed comforting.

Then there was the riding. Major Jennings was a hearty middle-aged man, bronzed through service in India; when he came home he had settled down to run his stables with the help of his wife and daughter. Both Mrs. and Miss Jennings were brisk and jolly people; they were surrounded by dogs—four at least, but they were large and intrusive and made their presence felt.

The first time I met the family we were taken into a comfortable but rather shabby room, on the walls of which hung several pictures of horses, and given tea by Mrs. Jennings. Miss Florence Jennings came in while we were having it. She was a tall young woman of about thirty, I imagine, with abundant reddish hair and a crop of freckles. She was in a riding habit. I was to discover that she spent most of her days garbed thus.

“This is Florence, my daughter,” said Mrs. Jennings. “Horses are a passion with us, and Florence, if anything, is more besotted than the rest of us over the four-legged darlings, aren’t you, Flo?”

Florence admitted that she was.

There were a great many brass and carved wooden ornaments in the room as well as two Benares tables—all obviously from India. They seemed to have brought a flavour of that country into their home.

The dogs came in to inspect us, one fawning, one curious and the other two inclined to be suspicious.

“That’s enough, Tiffin. You, too, Rajah. These are good friends.”

The dogs immediately drew back at the sound of the voice of authority.

Both Mrs. Jennings and Florence were interested to hear that I intended to ride and so far had only had a few lessons.

“You’ll soon be a rider,” Florence assured me. “I sense it. Long practise, you know. Don’t let your mount know you’re nervous. That’s when they play up. Let them know you’re in charge … right from the start. Pet them a little, and they are yours.”

Lilias said she thought it would be a good idea if she gave the lessons, at which Mrs. Jennings slapped her thigh and said that would be just the ticket.

The outcome was that I was instructed by Lilias and after three or four days of discomfort, I was well on the way to becoming a horsewoman.

Lilias took me to the manor and there I met Charles Merrimen. I liked him from the beginning. There was something almost saintly in his acceptance of his disability and there was clearly a bond of deep affection between him and Lilias. His father, the squire, was a rather taciturn and dignified man and the family had lived in the manor for centuries. There were Charles’ elder brother David, his wife and two sons, but it was Charles who was of special interest to me for he might so easily have married Lilias and then she and I would never have met. That made me ponder on the strangeness of chance.