Chapter 39 Old Deeds
Old Deeds
‘Since you got here, Evie, and revealed our relationship through Lewis Madoc and what you were researching, I feared you would find out that Arwen had helped paint some of Caradoc’s work.
What he’d done didn’t seem too bad, since I’d no idea he’d actually appropriated some of her paintings as his own! ’
She paused. ‘But I was more worried that you would dig out something else entirely.’ She got up. ‘Wait a moment, while I fetch something from my desk.’
She went out and we waited in silence until she returned with a large brown envelope in her hand, from which, after she’d sat down again next to Timon, she drew a smaller manila envelope.
‘This is a document and covering letter written by my grandfather, Hugh Caradoc-Jones, for his son, Ceri. My step-grandmother, Rose, was very keen on the idea that all written evidence of family history should be kept, whatever unwholesome light they shone on the family. I was in two minds whether to give it to you, Rhys,’ she said to him, ‘since you are like a son to us and will be head of the family one day, but now, since it turns out that Ginny is so closely related and you are marrying, you ought to know about it.’
‘Curiouser and curiouser,’ said Evie with a Cheshire Cat grin. ‘I can hardly wait! Can it possibly be any worse than what has come before?’
‘You can decide for yourself,’ Nerys said, pulling out some sheets of folded notepaper from the smaller envelope.
‘This is the covering letter Hugh wrote when he got the original document back from the solicitors, where it had been deposited, after Rose persuaded him to leave it for Ceri to read when he came of age. I’ve never typed it up, so perhaps Rhys, who has done more public speaking than I have, could read it aloud for us?
And then the document itself, which is rather longer. ’
‘OK,’ he agreed, taking the letter and opening it. ‘If you’re quite sure you want to reveal whatever is in there, Nerys?’
She nodded.
‘Right, then,’ he said, and began to read in his wonderfully deep and mellow voice, so familiar from his poetry readings on the radio, which I’d never been able to resist listening to in the past, however I’d felt about him.
Triskelion
5 May 1924
My dear son,
If I am not able to put the enclosed document into your hands myself by the time you reach your majority, I do beg you to read this letter first, for I hope it will lessen the blow of the revelations it contains.
Before my second marriage, to your stepmother, Rose, I showed her the deposition, which I had taken back from the solicitor after your mother’s tragic early death in 1921.
It was Rose who persuaded me not to destroy the document, for she believed that all the facts surrounding the events of the evening when your grandfather, Cosmo Caradoc, died, should be set down and kept within the family.
On consideration, I believe she is right, even though it does not show either myself or your grandfather in a good light. I deeply regret the part I played in what happened and only hope you will not think too badly of your father.
But of course, while I deeply regret the means I used to persuade your mother to marry me, which led to my making the enclosed deposition, I cannot entirely regret my past actions, for you, my beloved Ceri, would not otherwise exist!
You are a constant delight to myself and to Rose, who loves you as she would her own son.
As to your mother, do not judge her too harshly. I have come to see that her father did not really care for her and I fell in love with her beauty and the sweetness of disposition I imagined went with it.
As you are already aware, she was killed in a train accident in the South of France, but what you do not know is that she had eloped with her lover.
I would have offered her her freedom, so they could marry, had I known of it beforehand – she had been staying with an old schoolfriend in London when she met this man – but, poor creature, the Fates seem to have been against her happiness.
I think her more sinned against than sinning, and Rose agrees with me.
With my second marriage, I feel I have more happiness than I deserve, for with Rose I have found the true meaning of love and the perfect amity of two minds meeting as one.
You probably know the story by now of how, after the vicar, Mr Trimble’s, sudden death, he left his three daughters, Lily, Rose and Daisy, in very straitened circumstances.
Lily, already considered as one of the family by the Prynnes, went to live at Castle Newydd as companion and now beloved aunt to Mark and Lesley Prynne’s children, while her younger sisters, Rose and Daisy, moved to the lodge by the rear drive to the castle.
Rose very enterprisingly showed me her drawings and embroideries of legends and fairy tales and asked me to give her employment at the pottery, which I did – and a great asset she has been both in her design work and in helping me run the business.
Daisy, too, proved an enterprising girl, for she is determined to become a crime writer, and to this end, hearing that a famous female author she much admired was holidaying in Harlech, managed to go there and introduce herself to the lady, seeking employment as her assistant – and succeeding!
I suspect she will learn much and eventually forge her own career, for a more determined girl I never met.
But you will, I hope, have grown up knowing and respecting your stepmother and aunts, and realize how undeserving I felt when Rose forgave me for my past actions when I confessed all to her, and she agreed to marry me.
I don’t believe, and nor does Rose, that the sins of the father – or even grandfather – are visited on their children, so I fondly hope that you, my dearest son, have a long and happy life, free from regrets.
Your loving father,
Hugh Caradoc-Jones
Rhys folded the paper with a crackle and looked up. ‘I’d always thought of Triskelion and Seren Bach as a tranquil, magical place,’ he said. ‘Yet in the past there has been all this tragedy.’
‘There’s even more to come,’ said Nerys grimly. ‘Knowing some of what happened in the past has never spoiled it for me, and my parents were very happy here, too. But you’d better read the rest of it.’
She took back the letter and handed him a much bulkier document from the large envelope.
‘Hugh describes the events of that summer in 1919,’ said Nerys, ‘so some of it will be familiar from Arwen’s letters, although, since Hugh wasn’t aware of all the true facts, it’s not entirely accurate.’
Rhys began to read again, and the only sound, other than his deep voice, was the crackling of the stiff paper.
Deposition of Hugh Caradoc-Jones
Triskelion
18 November 1919
To whom it may concern:
I have deposited this document, with my solicitor, to be opened in the event of my sudden death, because of the dreadful suspicion that my wife may be attempting to do away with me.
Rhys glanced up, looking startled, then resumed.
Certain incidents that have occurred since my recent marriage have unnerved me.
There have been a series of seemingly small accidents that yet might have had fatal consequences.
The first was the loosened carpet at the top of the main staircase at Triskelion, which would have precipitated me down the stairs headlong, had I not managed to grab the handrail in time.
Then there were the periods of severe gastric upsets I suffered until eventually it occurred to me that they only followed my eating something I am partial to, but which neither my wife nor her companion, Mrs Fry, cared for.
I hope my fears are groundless, although if not, some might say that I have brought this on my own head due to the means I used to persuade Beatrice Caradoc to marry me after her father died on the evening of 1 August this year.
It is a description of what happened on that fatal night at Triskelion, the home of Cosmo Caradoc, my old friend and a renowned artist, that I wish to set out here, but first I must briefly touch upon the circumstances that led up to what happened.
A widower, Caradoc lived at Triskelion with his daughter, Beatrice, then a young woman of nearly twenty, and an elderly relative, Mrs Maude Fry.
A recent addition to the household was Miss Arwen Madoc, the daughter of Cosmo’s cousin who, on his death, had left her to his guardianship.
I had been a close friend of Caradoc’s since our schooldays – indeed, as he grew more reclusive every year, his only friend – and I had bought a nearby property just before the war.
Recently we had gone into business together, setting up Triskelion Art Porcelain in the former stables and coach house.
Unknown to anyone else, including his daughter, he had lost most of his capital in unfortunate speculations and invested most of what little remained in our joint enterprise, which he hoped would restore his fortune.
While his paintings were much in demand and fetched good prices, so that he could continue to maintain the household, yet he also had a secret worry on this score: he was suffering from an incurable and progressive eye disorder that would eventually prevent him from painting.
However, the recent arrival of Miss Madoc had given him some hope on this latter score as well as causing quite a change in my old friend, who quickly became very fond of her – and, it seemed, she of him.
While only eighteen, she had already studied at the Slade School of Art in London for two years and was determined to make her way as an artist. However, Caradoc had vetoed her plan to live and work with a friend in Cornwall and insisted she come to live under his own roof.
Caradoc knew that Miss Madoc had assisted her father, a portrait painter, with his work when a tremor in his hands made it difficult for him to pursue his career, and that she was a good copyist, so that he hoped she might be able to help him to continue his work in a like manner.
I saw nothing wrong with this plan. After all, the old masters had employed assistants in their studios to work on the less important parts of their masterpieces.
While she was of an independent and headstrong nature, Miss Madoc seemed to settle down – as well she might, for Caradoc allowed her the use of his studio and his experience, so that she could continue her studies.
They spent many hours working together, either out sketching or in the studio, where, as well as painting in her own manner, she also, at Caradoc’s request, showed herself capable of producing work in his style, although she seemed increasingly reluctant to do so.
As I have said, she was of an independent and headstrong nature, but in her first weeks at Triskelion, her admiration for Caradoc as an artist made her glad of his advice and opinion on her own work, which was very lively and freely painted.
She also appeared to enjoy his company, for he was a changed man when with her.
It soon became apparent to me that my friend had fallen in love with Miss Madoc and I noticed that he became increasingly jealous if she spoke to young men, most especially artists in the colony that had grown up in nearby St Melangell.
I tactfully tried to point out to him that Miss Madoc was a very modern young lady, used to mixing in artistic circles and probably missing friends of her own age, for she had little in common with Bea. He fired up at once and said it was no such thing.
He appeared convinced she reciprocated his feelings, even though she liked to tease him by flouting his orders and also by continuing to demand she be allowed to go and live in Cornwall with her friends.
I was doubtful about this, but since Caradoc was a handsome, well-set-up man who appeared much younger than his forty years I thought it might be so.
I could not say much about the disparity in their ages, either, for he knew very well that I had fallen hopelessly in love with Bea the moment I set eyes on her after she left school.
She was so very pretty and I attributed all the virtues to her that I assumed went with such beauty, despite her occasional sulkiness and ill temper.
I put this down to her father’s refusing to let her come out in London under the aegis of a friend’s mother.
Since no one other than myself knew this was due to the expense it would cost, it made her very bitter.
Nor did he take seriously a boy-and-girl attachment formed with the younger son of a nearby family when he was home on leave. In that, he was right, for the young man returned only to become engaged to someone else.
This gave me a little hope that Bea might look more kindly on me, especially since her father had begun to drop hints about a future marriage with Miss Madoc, which would have put her nose quite out of joint.
At about this time, Miss Madoc seemed to me increasingly unhappy and distant in her manner to Caradoc, as if trying to hold him at arm’s length, but he did not take this seriously, assuring me that although she played hot and cold with him, she would be happy enough to accept his proposal when the right time came to make it.
As Rhys paused, Evie said, ‘Typical male self-delusion in the face of all evidence!’
‘Well, don’t condemn us all, dear lady,’ said Noel.
‘No, that’s true, you aren’t all tarred with the same brush,’ she conceded. ‘Go on, Rhys, I can hardly wait for the rest!’