Chapter Thirty-Six
CHAPTER
THIRTY - SIX
Violet had woken ridiculously early that morning, her sleep broken by her constant, see-sawing thoughts about Henry. She was opening the curtains when she saw a car drive up and Felicity almost fall out of it. Violet was down the stairs before she remembered she was only wearing her pyjamas.
‘Violet!’ Oliver seemed very relieved. ‘Can you look after Felicity? I’ve got to return the car. It’ll take me forever to get the mud out of it. Here, Felicity, I want you to have these.’ He gave her his finds bag which somehow had stayed attached to his waist throughout the catastrophe of the morning. ‘I’ll be in touch very soon, I promise.’
‘Please don’t bother,’ said Felicity calmly. ‘After this morning I never want to see you again.’
She only noticed that she had accepted his finds bag when it was too late to throw it back at him. She was still holding it when she walked through the front door that Violet had left ajar.
‘Come up with me. You can’t go into your house in that state. It’s like when we first met Oliver, isn’t it? After he’d fallen in the mud.’ Then she realised it was anything but like the time when they first met Oliver.
‘I never want to hear his name again,’ said Felicity, handing her the finds bag without explanation.
‘OK,’ said Violet, realising that there was much more to Felicity’s condition than a row about a simple fall in a patch of mud. Violet put down the bag, not wanting to hold on to anything muddy.
‘He very nearly drowned us both. I thought we were going to die.’
‘Oh God, how awful!’ Violet paused and looked at Felicity properly; she wasn’t wearing anything on her feet except socks. ‘If you don’t mind, I think it would be better if you got mostly undressed here.’
Between them, they dragged off Felicity’s sodden clothes. Soon they were in a pile, oozing mud on to the floor, and she added, ‘Maybe we’ll just put them in this cupboard here. It’s only got some brooms and things in it. We can collect them later. Although, frankly, I’m not sure they’ll be wearable again.’
‘My favourite jeans,’ wailed Felicity. ‘I don’t mind about the tweed jacket, because it will always remind me of Oliver and that hideous Christmas, but those were my first pair of jeans. I’ve had them since I was sixteen. They made me feel like a proper teenager.’
Violet considered. ‘We could take them to the launderette, wash them several times.’ She picked up the finds bag between finger and thumb and threw it on top of the clothes.
Felicity wasn’t listening. ‘And I left my leather boots in his friend’s car! I’ll never see them again.’
‘Let’s get you upstairs and into the bath. You’ll feel better when you’re not so muddy and cold. We’ll go shopping together and get new boots.’ She didn’t add that Oliver might bring the boots back because it was far too soon to mention his name. Besides, it wasn’t the boots Felicity was upset about.
‘Thank God Athene has a thing about hot water,’ Violet went on. ‘There are always gallons of it and it’s really hot. We never had enough hot water at home.’
‘Nor did we, at the chateau. It’s funny, isn’t it? The grander a house looks, the more uncomfortable it’s likely to be.’ Felicity looked wistful. ‘I do wish I was there now.’
‘I’ll make us breakfast. Food always makes you feel better.’
Felicity emerged a little while later. Her hair was wrapped in a towel, and she was wearing Athene’s elaborate dressing gown. Violet thought she looked like a film star.
‘I’ve done my best to clean the bath,’ she said, ‘but it’s still pretty muddy. I’ll get you some more scent and things. I used rather a lot. I didn’t want to smell of “eau de Thames” so I had to disguise it with something strong.’
‘That’s my godmother’s,’ said Violet. ‘And it’s certainly strong! Lovely though. Now, I’ve got eggs, toast, butter, jam or Marmite. Can I suggest scrambled eggs with Marmite on the toast?’
Felicity smiled ruefully. ‘Not very long ago I thought I was going to drown and definitely didn’t want to, then I thought I was so miserable I wanted to die, and now I’m starving hungry. Still sad, though.’
‘First love is always tough, in my limited experience,’ said Violet, putting slices of bread under the grill.
‘I suppose everyone’s experience of first love is limited,’ said Felicity. ‘You can’t have it more than once.’
‘Although to be honest, second love is pretty rotten, too.’
‘Henry.’
‘Yup.’ Violet broke eggs into a bowl. ‘The strange thing is, Miss Wynter, who I work for now, has found out all about him. I didn’t even tell her his name, but she knows about his academic record, that he’s interested in a lost palace, that he’s on a lecture tour in America, everything. She worked it all out.’
Felicity was obviously impressed. ‘Is she a witch? She sounds like a witch.’
Violet smiled. ‘Not at all. She’s just very clever. I think she must have been a codebreaker during the war.’ The eggs sizzled as they went into the melted butter.
‘It is spooky, you must admit.’
‘A bit. And it’s given me a problem.’
‘Why? Do you feel obliged to leave that job, too?’
‘No. At least, not at the moment. But she told me Henry is being considered for a job at Oxford, as a don. She’s more or less said it’s up to me as to whether he finds out about it, so he can apply properly. I can’t believe that’s really how things work at Oxford, but what do I know?’
‘What are you going to do?’
Violet shrugged. ‘I shouldn’t be bothering you with all this. You’re got a broken heart to cope with.’
‘It’s good to be able to forget about it for a few moments.’
‘If you’re sure …? I’m worried that if I make sure Henry knows about the job it’ll look as if I thought he liked me and that I am trying to get him back to England. Not that him being in England will change anything. If he’s in love with this Dr Saunders, he still won’t drop her for me.’
‘No. But if you don’t tell him, he might be missing the opportunity he’s wanted all his life. Or is he totally taken up with his shop?’
‘He inherited his shop.’ Violet rescued the toast just before it burned. ‘I don’t think he is committed to it, or he’d spend more time there.’
‘Then tell him about the job – or let others tell him. If he wants it, he’ll come back and apply, and if he doesn’t, he’ll carry on with his lecture tour.’
Violet took the pan off the heat and started buttering the toast.
‘The thing is,’ she said, adding a smear of Marmite to the melting butter. ‘Academics have to have published a certain amount of work to get the good jobs and he hasn’t done quite enough. If he could finish his book about the lost palace, that could really help. And now I feel guilty because I kept back a file which may contain some of the information that he needs.’
Felicity shrugged. ‘What’s in the file?’
Violet paused. ‘Bits and pieces that didn’t fit anywhere else but seemed to me should be together. They may or may not be significant. I was being childish, holding it back. I just didn’t want to turn everything over to that woman.’ She piled the scrambled egg on to the toast, relieved she didn’t have to look at Felicity while she confessed her pathetic behaviour.
‘Dr Saunders?’
Violet nodded.
‘You know, my stepmother would say if you want him, you should fight for him.’
‘From what you’ve told me about her, your stepmother is as fearless and kind as she is beautiful. I’m not.’
Felicity frowned. ‘You’re very attractive. And although you’re thirty – the English are so obsessed with age – you have plenty of time for the right man to find you. Is this Dr Saunders so wonderful?’
Violet thought about her. Was she wonderful? ‘She’s about my age, it’s true. And she’s gorgeous.’
‘So are you,’ Felicity repeated.
‘But she has so much in common with Henry. They work together. She is part of his world.’
‘You were part of his world too! At the bookshop! You organised his papers—’
‘Yes, but I couldn’t make useful comments about them. I’m not educated in the way she is.’
‘Really, Violet, you are making it very easy for this woman to just take the man you want. From what you told me about what happened at Christmas, he’s yours. You should have him.’
Violet laughed. ‘I know you’re young, but you’re very knowing. It must be the French part of you.’
‘ Pas du tout! I learnt that all from my English stepmother. My father was always surrounded by sophisticated French women who were part of his world. But it was Alexandra, the English nanny, who got him!’ She sighed. ‘I was so relieved! I hated her when she first came – I was far too old for such things – but she understood what it was like to be looked after by inappropriate people.’
She sounded wistful, thought Violet. She wanted to go home. ‘How much longer before you finish your course, Felicity?’
Felicity looked surprised. ‘Didn’t I tell you? We finish next week, with our exams.’ She paused. ‘I hope I pass.’
‘Do you think you will?’
Felicity considered. ‘I have worked much harder since the New Year. I think I have a chance.’
‘Then I’m sure you will,’ said Violet.
Felicity nodded. ‘If we pass, and if we’re lucky, we’ll be given introductions to nice places to work. And when I say “nice”, I mean—’
‘I know exactly what you mean,’ said Violet. ‘How would Lucinda greet the suggestion that you just finished the course and then went home?’
‘I don’t know. A little while ago I would have wanted to stay in London as long as I could, to be near Oliver. But now? I’d quite like to see my dreadful little brothers and cuddle the animals.’
‘Why don’t you talk to her about it? See what she thinks?’
‘I will. It’s a good idea. But what about you? Without me here to make sure you don’t do anything stupid, will you rush off home too, and not give Henry a chance to claim you?’
‘I don’t think he wants to claim me. He hasn’t been in touch since he went away.’
‘A whole week away! Shameful!’
This made Violet laugh. ‘It’s longer than that!’
‘Has he got your telephone number? Your address?’
‘No,’ said Violet, a little sheepishly. ‘I asked my father – via Jenny – and the office manager at the shop not to tell him if he asked.’
‘Well then!’
‘I told you I thought that second love was awful too. Sometimes I think I don’t ever want to see him again, it would be too embarrassing. But then the thought of not ever seeing him is heart-breaking.’
‘I don’t feel like that about Oliver. I genuinely never want to see him again. His carelessness not looking at the water levels could have killed us! We could have drowned in Thames mud.’
‘He obviously behaved very foolishly.’
‘He got caught up in what he was doing. He told me that was a danger.’
‘Look, why don’t you go downstairs and get dressed? If you want to, we could go to the cinema later.’
‘That’s a good idea,’ said Felicity, obviously relieved at the thought of not thinking about Oliver for a couple of hours. Although Violet knew perfectly well, no film would stop her doing that.