Chapter 4
Cecilia
THERE IS A WINDOW at the turn in the stairs of the Gate House that overlooks the Heath; in it is set a seat, and here Cecilia makes her home.
Leo stays out at the office and comes home late.
Cecilia takes a tray of soup or mutton chops in the parlour.
The servants come to her with the small decisions that are to be made about the house, what preparations she would have them begin for Christmas, and she gives answers as best she can.
There is no deference to her, and she commands no authority.
It is all like a game, the cook and maid humouring her as though she is a girl playing with her teacups and dolls.
Cecilia is happier to shrink away from the questions, to pad up to the window seat and sit, watching the wash of the wind through the treetops.
leave the world unseen
fade away into the forest dim
There are no new letters from Odette, so she takes the volumes of Keats and Coleridge, Malory and Tennyson, and runs her fingers over the soft pages, the words that have been their secret communication.
There have been no letters from anyone else either.
She has no family other than Leo, no friends other than Odette.
She has no hobbies, no skills. She doesn’t even write poetry – she only reads it.
She consumes, and makes nothing – she offers nothing.
There is nowhere to go and nothing to do and so little in herself to fall back on.
She has not quite understood it until now, how friendless she is.
Perhaps her mother was right; she has built her life to orbit Odette’s sun alone, but she cannot find it in herself to regret it.
She does not cry. It is all beyond that now. She would be crying every moment of the day if she were to start, and it is easier simply to run into her mind, leave her body, her life, the world to one side like worn clothes.
She misses bodies. Odette’s warm and vital against hers. Her mother’s frightening and comforting in turn. Bodies are real. Her thoughts – it all unravels.
to think is to be full of sorrow
She should not have written to Odette in the way she did.
It was a moment of anger, confusion, when the world rushed in and pressed against her with clammy hands, steaming winter breath – Odette betrayed her, left her, and she cannot understand it still.
How is it they have ended here? How is this where they find themselves?
She must write again.
That rouses her at last.
She must write to Odette and tell her to come back as soon as she can. That she forgives her. God, she has done nothing but tell Odette she loves her, and it hardly changed a thing, but maybe this time – this time, she will hear it.
She has no address for her. There is little she remembers about Odette’s departure – something about the Continent, a rest cure.
Now, it seems imperative to know.
Claudine has won. There is nothing to fight anymore.
Odette will come home, and maybe – she doesn’t know how – but maybe, they can find each other again.
If they cannot, then Cecilia will be utterly alone.
She will be as good as dead.
She walks across the road to Odette’s house – Claudine’s house – through the mizzling rain and to the doorway under the portico. The pull of the bell and the long wait.
She will only be here briefly. It can be lightly done. She does not need to show her soft underbelly.
A maid answers whom Cecilia does not recognise. How strange. She has known all the staff at the London residence and Herne House for years.
A memory of her mother’s words comes to her: a new wife will want a clean house. She hated her mother for her disloyalty to Lydia and Odette, but now Cecilia can see that Penelope understood more of the truth of the world than Cecilia was willing to admit.
‘Is – Mrs Fairfax-Waugh at home?’ Cecilia corrects herself at the last moment. She cannot call her Claudine in front of this stranger – and she has not been Miss Hutton for many months. It is not an adjustment that comes easy.
The maid regards her blankly. ‘May I take a card, miss?’
‘Oh. No, I don’t have one on me.’ Cecilia stands there, with no coat, no hat, shivering in the wind that banks off the Heath. She has done this a hundred times – a thousand – the Hampstead house as much her home as the Gate House. ‘Will you tell her it is Cecilia – Cecilia Moore. I am known.’
That is not true though, is it, not anymore. She is not Cecilia Moore but Cecilia Hart.
She is not known.
The maid looks sceptical, and Cecilia is flushed with humiliation. What does she think of her? That she is attempting some elaborate begging scheme? That she is a pathetic hanger-on come to beg a favour?
She laughs again, as she did with Leo.
After all, that is exactly what she is.
It is an embarrassing relief when the maid shows her in, and after a short while, Claudine joins her where she sits in the drawing room. She leans down to kiss Cecilia’s cheeks in a gesture that seems directly copied from Lydia; it fits unnaturally with her stiff posture.
‘Cecilia, what a surprise.’
Claudine does not sit. There is no offer of tea.
‘I apologise. I should not have come without warning.’
‘Don’t be silly – you are always welcome here,’ says Claudine, but there is no trace of warmth behind the words. ‘How can we help?’
Cecilia does not know if she should stand, too, or if that would be too strange. Is it stranger to stay sitting with Claudine looking down at her like she is a child in a schoolroom?
Oh God – should she mention the governess position? No – no – she cannot bear it. She will not.
‘I came to see if you had a forwarding address for Odette. I would like to write to her more fully.’
Claudine’s expression sours. ‘You needn’t worry about her at a time like this. Think of your own situation. I am sure there must be much for you to consider.’
Cecilia ignores the bait. ‘Only, I would like to ask her when she will come home?’
There is a flicker of irritation. ‘Did George not speak to you?’
‘No.’
Claudine sighs. ‘I will have to tell you plainly, and I’m afraid this will upset you, but I can assure you this causes George and me far more distress than you. Odette will not be coming back. Not for some time.’
A flush of panic moves through Cecilia. ‘I don’t understand. Why not?’
‘Odette is not well. That is abundantly clear. Her father and I came to the difficult decision that she would be better cared for somewhere that can fully meet her needs.’
‘Do you mean a—’
‘It is not the kind of place you are imagining. It is for the best. The girl is not stable, she could not control herself.’
The panic rises and rises, so huge and featureless and monolithic that Cecilia cannot see its edges. It is as though she is lost within it, swallowed up whole like an insect moving through a blank sky.
‘I see,’ she says, and she does not know where the words have come from.
Odette is gone. Odette is gone.
The world is split open. Her mother’s death struck the blow that cracked the ice, and now Odette’s departure has splintered it all into drifting fragments.
‘Did she want to go?’
Claudine laughs stiffly. ‘What a strange question.’
‘Please. Tell me where Odette is,’ urges Cecilia. ‘I promise I will take her somewhere else, somewhere far away, you needn’t send her to a – a—’ The word is too terrifying to speak. ‘I will make sure we never bother you again.’
‘I would suggest you take a moment to gather yourself,’ says Claudine, expression carefully schooled into neutrality.
‘No – I don’t think I will.’ It is unlike her. But what would it be to be like herself now? Who is she? ‘Tell me where Odette is.’
Claudine ignores her. ‘Now, your brother has spoken to me of your situation, and I would be more than happy to write to a few of my acquaintances to find you a position.’
Odette was right. That is the only solution to this. Odette was right about Claudine and Lydia, so Claudine has exiled her. Cecilia laughs again. Of course she was right. She knew everything, and such knowledge drove her from her mind.
‘You killed her, didn’t you?’ she says abruptly. ‘Aunt Lydia. Odette worked it out.’
It is not bravery. It is only that nothing matters much anymore.
Claudine smiles. ‘That poor, mad girl.’ She leans forwards and wraps one hand around Cecilia’s wrist as though in a gesture of comfort, but her nails dig into the delicate skin. ‘No one believes her, you know. And no one will believe you.’
There is no point in hiding.
It is as Claudine said: no one will believe her. None of this is really happening. Claudine will magic it away.
So she says, ‘You knew Leo and I were illegitimate, didn’t you? That is how you blackmailed Mother to spy on Lydia and Odette. And now you use it to drive me and Leo out. We are the last ones you need to get rid of, and then you will have everything you wanted.’
It is the wrong play. Claudine bursts into anger, like a sail billowing in the wind. It is as sharp a sea change as a crack of thunder.
‘A girl in your position shouldn’t stamp on spring ice.
Your mother was a useful idiot, but you are simply an idiot.
Do not think I care for your fate, nor that of your brother.
No one cared about my fate. Your mother called herself my friend once, but she proved the word hollow.
Neither she nor Lydia knew what true friendship was, what loyalty meant.
No wonder there was no one to mourn either of them, save their brattish daughters. ’
Cecilia sucks in a breath in shock. There, the curtain drawn back.
There is no one now who stands between Cecilia and Claudine, not her mother, not Odette. She is unprotected. Claudine knows she has won.