“No? It’s got letters on it.” The tramp held it out. “I know writing, though I’m no scholar.”
Surprised, she took it from his wet fingers. It was the same card, but the words were vivid in neat pen strokes.
I FEEL I OWE YOUR FAMILY SOME RECOMPENSE.
PLEASE COME AND SEE ME AT THE HALL.
AZRAEL
The tramp took out a bitten pipe and lit it. “Good news?” he asked slyly.
She stared at him in utter astonishment.
four
That night she said to Martha, “What’s recompense?”
“Lord.” Martha took a pin out of her mouth and pushed it into the seam she was straightening. “You’re the book learned one, Sarah. Some sort of debt. Paying back, like. Pence is money, isn’t it?”
Sarah nodded. A hoarse call from the next room made her lift her head; she went to stand, but Martha dumped the sewing in her lap.
“I’ll go. Better for him not to see that, eh?” As she went out Sarah flexed the bandaged hand gloomily. She’d take it off when she went in to see him. Otherwise he’d have one of his rages. She put Martha’s sewing aside, got down on the sooty rag rug with its burned holes, and carefully put two more pieces of the precious sea-coal on the fire. For a moment she stayed there, in the meager warmth, watching the yellow flames spurt.
At Darkwater Hall when she was little, there must have been fires in every room, great roaring blazes. Sometimes she tried to remember it, but it was too long ago. There was a dream she had sometimes of a dining room, sumptuous with chandeliers and cut glass and candles, the tables heavy with food. Was that just imagination? Or had it been real?
After a while she took the white card out and read it again.
COME AND SEE ME AT THE HALL.
Behind her the October gale rattled the bushes; they tapped on the window like fingers, as if the wet ghosts of the drowned had climbed the cliff path a few weeks early. She shivered, and crumpled the card. Then she dropped it into the fire and watched it curl. Blue flame burst from one corner. It crinkled into black tissue, and was gone.
The words had not been on it when he gave it to her.
She was certain of that.
Martha came back and gathered up the sewing. She looked worried. “I’m right glad the doctor’s due tomorrow.” She glanced over the deft needle. “We’ll need to pay him, Sarah. There’s only a half crown in the tin. Will Mrs. Hubbard pay you this week?”
The anxiety was clear under her voice.
Sarah went cold. The panic she’d kept down all day bubbled up; she wanted to blurt it all out, that there wouldn’t be any more money, that she’d thrown it all away in one stupid burst of anger. Instead she muttered, “I expect so.”
To cover it, she got up and crossed to the window. Moving the nailed rag of curtain, she let the wind gust into her face through the gaps in the frame. Reflected in the firelight she watched Martha sewing, a big, comfortable woman, pregnant again, almost slatternly, her long hair carelessly pinned.
“Can I ask you something?”
Martha looked up, surprised. “If it’s proper.”
“When I was a baby. When we lived in the Hall . . .”
Martha sighed. “You know I can’t talk about that. The master won’t have it mentioned.”
“I just want to know!” Exasperated, Sarah turned. “Nobody ever talks about it. I just want to know how it was! Did I have a big nursery? With a doll’s house and rocking chair?”
Martha looked uncomfortable. She bit the thread.
“Were there chandeliers, like crystal, all down the stairs?”
“I can’t talk of it. You know I can’t.”
“And didn’t you used to call me Miss Sarah?” The shock made Martha stab her finger. With a hiss she sucked it, dropping the needle. When she looked up she was flushed.
“Of course I did. You were the master’s daughter.”
“I still am.”
“Things have changed since then.” Martha took her handkerchief out and wrapped it tightly around her finger. Finally she said, “Don’t make your father’s mistake, Sarah. Don’t cling on to the old ways, thinking one day they’ll come back. They won’t. There’s no house, no money. You’re someone else now, as poor and downtrodden as the rest of us.”
“No!” Angrily Sarah turned her back. “I’m still a Trevelyan. So is Papa. We don’t belong here.”
Martha sucked the thread and pushed it through the needle’s eye. “The Trevelyans are finished,” she said firmly. “And most people round here are only too glad.”
She tried everything. The old fishwives at the harbor laughed in her face, and the stinking piles of fish scales made her feel sick. At the factory with its smoking furnaces and dark gates she had to wait an hour before the foreman gave one look at her and said: “No. Get lost.”
She went for service jobs in two houses; in both she had to wait hours before being turned away.
The money was all gone. Her father’s cough was worse. He asked for white bread, medicine, a tot of brandy, peevishly demanding how he was supposed to exist like this. By Thursday the stock of sea-coal was used up.
“We’ll burn seaweed tomorrow,” Martha said grimly, brushing the dust up and sprinkling it on the fire.
The last, lowest humiliation was to go before the Poor Committee. She’d die first, she told herself, but she went, and then couldn’t bring herself to go in, running away from the door, hot with shame.
There was nothing else to do and no one else to go to. And she was scared. So when Friday came, finally, bitterly, she wrapped the moth-eaten shawl around her shoulders and set off for Darkwater Hall.
The drive was over a mile long and deeply rutted. She trudged up it wearily, avoiding the puddles. Overhead, the trees met in a tangle of stark bare twigs, and on each side the neglected undergrowth of yew and hazel and rowan grew so thick that in places it almost closed the track. The afternoon was bleak. In the bare elms jackdaws karked.
She was cold and uneasy. What sort of recompense was he thinking of ? A job? She frowned. If he thought she’d be some skivvy in a house that should have been her own . . . Then she stumbled, and kicked the stone angrily. If he did, she had no choice.
The Hall rose up before her, its windows lightless. It was a huge building of some granite that was almost black, with awkward clusters of turrets and gables and under them a plainer, older facade. There were strange tales about the house. Not far off the river Darkwater disappeared underground; the country people said it ran under the very depths of the Hall, a roaring underground flood plunging down through some vast chasm into the depths of the earth. The river certainly went somewhere. Only a trickle ran onto the beach.
By the time she had crunched up the carriage sweep, the sleet had begun to fall, faint and hissing. Behind her a glimmer of red lit the sky. She was soaked and hungry, hair plastered to her head; as she came under the front porch the gargoyles and monstrous griffins stared down, wide-eyed.
“Yes,” she snapped at them. “The Trevelyans are back.” She should go around to the servants’ entrance, but she wouldn’t. Half daring, half annoyed, she climbed the steps and pulled the bell.
It clanked.
Feeling small, she waited.
In the stained-glass windows the coat of arms of her family was dim in the gathering gloom. Falling leaves pattered on the stones. Beyond that the twilight was silent; so silent that a fox loped around the corner of the porch and peered at her with shrewd eyes. For a moment she wanted desperately to turn and run, down the drive, home, but there was nothing to run to but misery. Besides, it was too late.
Someone was unbolting the door.
The rattle made the fox slink into the bushes. Sarah turned, lifting her chin.
A small manservant opened the door. His shoulder
s were stooped, his hair lank and greasy. “What?” he said brusquely.
Sarah drew herself up. “I’m here to see Lord Azrael. My name is Sarah Trevelyan.”
The man shrugged. “’Imself’s choosy who ’e sees. Got an appointment ’ave you?”
“He asked me to come.” She wished she hadn’t burned the card. It would have been good to flourish it in his face.
The man cocked his head slightly, as if listening to a voice she couldn’t hear. Then he sighed and stepped back. “Get yerself in.”
She walked up the steps into an octagonal hall. It was floored with black-and-white tiles, and she recognized the smell of it at once. It surged back at her from an immense distance, out of years of forgetfulness. Damp rooms, polish, cedarwood, the pressed petals of a hundred lost summers. As she breathed it in, tears pricked her eyes, sudden and hot. She blinked them away in astonishment.
“Sit yerself down.” The servant indicated a chair with a grumpy wave. “I’ll see if ’is lordship’s ’ome.” He crossed the hall, opened double doors and went through, closing them with both hands, giving her a shrewd, sardonic look. It reminded her of the fox. Standing there, her skirt dripping into a pool, she knew for the first time just how far her family had fallen. Martha’s cottage could fit twice into just this hall. The price of one of the paintings would feed the village for weeks. She looked up at their faces; men and women, stiff in gorgeous robes, gazing at her haughtily as if she were something far beneath them. The Trevelyans. Hard as nails.
She didn’t sit. She would stain the striped yellow chair. Even that seemed a precious thing, amazingly clean. There was a row of sculptures; she wandered along, looking at them. Roman. Or Greek. She wasn’t sure. And how could one man live here on his own? With all his tenants crammed into squalid cottages like Martha’s? It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. And yet she envied him.
The door to her right opened; the servant came through like a shadow.
“Aren’t you the lucky one?” he said nastily. He scraped a match and lit a tall candle in a silver stick. “Come up, ’e says. As if I ’aven’t better things to do.”
He led her down a corridor to a great wooden staircase, its wide steps carpeted with softest wool. Her feet sank into luxury. Above were masses of clustering shapes that hung from the ceiling in the dimness, the vast chandeliers of her dreams. Drafts clinked their crystals; she felt their weight above her as she followed the small bent back, seeing the dandruff on his greasy collar.
The candle flickered along a landing, through a door and a lobby lined with blue-and-white vases, to a wooden double door. The servant glanced at her and then knocked.
Someone murmured from inside.
The manservant opened the door. “’Ere she is. Beats me what you want with ’er.”
Surprised, Sarah stared at him. Then she straightened her soaked shawl and walked in.
Red light blinded her. It was streaming in through the high windows, a fiery glow like a vast furnace. For a second she almost felt it was burning her face, its heat roaring and crackling in the room. And then she saw that the great salon faced west, and far out there over the sea the sun was setting, smoldering like a hot coal.
A fire burned in the grate. Sitting in a long chair by the window, his leg propped on a footstool and a black cat curled peacefully in his lap, was Lord Azrael. As he turned his head, his dark face was lit by the flames.
“Sarah!” He stood, the cat jumping down with a mew of discontent. “I’m so glad. I’ve been waiting for you to come.”
She stared at him. “How did you know I would?”
“I knew, Sarah. I’ve known for years.”
“Years?” she whispered.
“Oh yes.” He smiled, a lopsided smile of shy pleasure. “Years.”
five
“Take that shawl, Scrab, and get it dried. And bring up tea, for both of us.” He turned to her, suddenly concerned. “Did anyone come with you?”
“No,” she muttered. The man Scrab was taking the shawl from her shoulders in obvious disgust. She saw how frayed and dirty it was. Embarrassment burned her like the fire glow. What was she doing here?
“Sit here, please.” Azrael placed a chair near the fire and another for himself. He waited politely for her, so she perched on its extreme edge, but the cushions were soft and forced her to lean back.
He sat too, the cat jumping up onto his knees. His long hands fondled its fur. There was a slight, awkward silence. The fire snapped noisily, the logs fizzing and spluttering.
She should be in the kitchens. Far below with some greasy cook yelling at her. Perhaps the doubt showed in her face, because he smiled; a dark, sideways smile. She felt annoyed.
“What did you mean, you’ve expected me for years?” she asked hotly.
Lord Azrael rubbed the cat’s back. It arched, purring. Instead of answering he said quietly, “You must hate me.”
It startled her. She wanted to say yes, but it wouldn’t have been true. “I want to.”
“But you don’t?”
“I don’t know you.”
“But I have your estate. All of it. You must feel bitter; the way you have to live now . . .”
“All right.” She shrugged. “But it’s my grandfather, if it’s anyone. I don’t understand how he could be so stupid! Nobody’s ever explained to me how it happened. About your father and him.”
Azrael smoothed the cat’s ears. Then he glanced at her, his dark clipped beard catching the fire-glints. “It wasn’t my father who won the house. It was me.”
She stared, amazed. “You! But it was fifteen years ago. You don’t look . . .” Confused, she stopped.
“Old enough? Thank you, Sarah. But it was me. Has no one really ever told you?”
“I’m not allowed to ask. It drives Papa into one of his fits.”
“Then I’ll tell you. I think that’s only fair.” He pushed the cat down. It sat on the tasseled hearthrug and began to lick itself.
Azrael put the tips of his fingers together. “You never really knew your grandfather. Such a proud man. Old Squire Trevelyan, they called him, and he could recite every one of his ancestors back to Doomsday. Often did, when he was drunk. A loud, roaring, boasting, relentless man. If his tenants couldn’t pay he turned them out. He had no mercy. He once shot a man who’d caught a rabbit on his land. Eight children, and one rabbit to feed them. Shot him dead, Sarah. It’s said the young widow stood up in church and prayed the devil would come for his soul. Like all your family—forgive me—he was heartily despised.”
It wasn’t such a shock. She’d guessed most of it.
Azrael stared into the flames. “One night, it happened that we were both among a shooting party of gentlemen, and the weather drove us indoors, to an inn called the Black Dog, far out on Bodmin Moor. He had drunk too much. All night we played cards. The others in the group gradually dropped out of the game, until only we two were left. I was winning; my luck was good that night, and I was young and thought it was a fine thing. Finally, the squire ran out of money. I told him the game was over.
“What a rage he flew into! Swearing and throwing over tables and threatening all of us with death and hell until the innkeeper begged me to play on. I wasn’t averse. I thought he deserved a lesson.
“First, he bet his horse, and lost it. Then all his horses. Then a farm, his hounds, his fishing rights, his mine. He was desperate by then, face red and contorted with fury. I stood up, but he grabbed my arm and drew a pistol, cocking it and pointing it at my head. For a while I thought he’d murder me on the spot; his cronies were all around him and we were far out on the moor. ‘This time,’ he snarled ‘we bet everything. Winner takes all. Everything we own, estate, house, life, soul. On the turn of a card.’”
He glanced at her. “You think I should have refused.”
“Of course I do!”
“Yes. But remember, the gamble was the same for both of us. Either could have lost everything—I had large estates myself. I was intrigued, and really too scared to refuse. And . . .” Azrael shrugged ruefully. “I was sorry for him. Ruin was staring him in the face. He wanted one more chance. So, I agreed.”
For a moment there was silence in the room, the only sound the tiny rasp of the cat’s tongue on its fur.
Then Azrael said, “The innkeeper brought a clean deck of cards. He shuffled them. Your grandfather was to draw first. All around us the drinkers and packmen and poachers crowded close, the air stifling with cheap tobacco and the fumes of smuggled brandy. His hand shook; he swore a terrible oath, and cut the pack. ‘Let the devil take me and all mine to hell,’ he yelled, ‘if I fail in this.’ Then he turned the card. It was the King of Diamonds.
“Of course, he thought he had won. The crowd roared, clapping and whistling. He pushed the pack toward me, with such a triumph on his face, and by God, Sarah, if I could have turned tail and fled at that moment I would have done it. But a wager is a wager. I reached out, and turned a card.”
“What did you get?” she whispered, knowing already.
Firelight flickered on his face. Quietly he said, “The Ace of Spades.”
With a creak that made her jump, the door opened. Scrab backed in with a large tray, laid it down on the table, and put a kettle on a small stand near the fire. He was muttering peevishly.
“What’s the matter?” Azrael asked.
“Naught you’d care for,” the man said sourly.
Azrael smiled at Sarah. “Really,” he whispered, “he’s got a heart of gold.”
Scrab spat into the fire, and arranged the teacups noisily. They were porcelain, Sarah noticed, incredibly fragile. Azrael sat back, watching; quickly she glanced around the dim room, seeing its marble tables, sculptures, the piano on its dais. The warm glow of the sunset had waned; now Scrab touched a taper to the fire and went around lighting candles, tall white expensive candles in silver holders. Sarah thought of Martha’s scrapings of rushlights and frowned. Heavy red curtains swished shut across the windows, closing out the wet evening. The room was perfect. It enclosed her in warmth and security, like a womb.