He knew instinctively that she wasn’t talking about her sister. “I suppose you can’t get away for dinner.”
“I can’t leave her alone with them. God only knows when Harry’s coming home. He’s staying for formal dinner at Emmanuel tonight. He may sleep there as well. He’s done that already four nights this past week.”
“Will you phone me at the college if he comes home?”
“He won’t—”
“Will you phone?”
“Oh, Tommy.”
He felt a sudden, overpowering surge of hopelessness which prompted him to say, “I volunteered for this case, Helen. When I knew it was Cambridge.”
As soon as the words were out, he despised himself. He was resorting to the worst form of emotional blackmail. It was manipulative, dishonest, and unworthy of them both. She didn’t respond. In the shadows of the hallway, she was darkness and light. The glossy unbroken curve of hair to her shoulders, the cream of her skin. He reached out, caressed the line of her jaw. She came into the shelter of his overcoat. He felt her arms slip warmly round him. He rested his cheek on the top of her head.
“Christian said he likes you because you smell good,” he whispered.
Against his chest, he could feel her smile. “Did he?”
“Yes.” He let himself hold her for a moment longer before he pressed his lips to the top of her head. “Christian was right,” he said and released her. He opened the front door.
“Tommy.” She crossed her arms in front of her. He said nothing, waiting, willing her to take some sort of first step.
“I’ll phone,” she said. “If Harry turns up.”
“I love you, Helen.” He walked to his car.
Lady Helen returned to the kitchen. For the first time in the nine days that she had been in Cambridge, she looked at the room dispassionately, seeing it as an outside observer would see it. Dissolution, it declared.
Despite the fact that she had scrubbed it herself only three days ago, the yellow linoleum floor was once again grimy, patched with spilled food and drink from the children’s meals. The walls looked greasy, with grey handprints smeared like directional indicators against the paint. Work tops acted as storage space for anything that couldn’t be fitted anywhere else. A stack of unopened mail, a wooden bowl of apples and browning bananas, half a dozen newspapers, a plastic jar of kitchen utensils and brushes, and a children’s colouring book and crayons shared the area with a wine rack, an electric mixer, a toaster, and a shelf of dusty books. Beneath the burners on the cooker, the remains of boil-overs lay like sour slop, and cobwebs collected on three empty wicker baskets atop the refrigerator.
Lady Helen wondered what Lynley must have thought, seeing all this. It was quite a change from the only other time he had been in Bulstrode Gardens for a quiet summer dinner in the back garden, preceded by drinks on a lovely terrace that had since been turned into a sandbox and play area now choked with toys. Her sister and Harry Rodger had been live-in lovers then, consumed with each other and fueled by the delights of early love. They were virtually oblivious of everything else. They exchanged meaningful glances and knowing smiles; they touched each other fondly at the slightest excuse; they fed each other small morsels of food and shared a drink. They had their own lives by day—Harry lecturing at the University and Pen working for the Fitzwilliam Museum—but by night they were one.
Their devotion to each other had seemed excessive and embarrassing to Lady Helen at the time, too cloying to be in particularly good taste. But now she questioned the nature of her own reaction to such an overt display of love. And she admitted the fact that she would rather see her sister and Harry Rodger clinging and cooing than witness what they had come to over the birth of their third child.
Christian was still noisily addressing himself to his tea. His toast fingers had become dive bombers, and with accompanying sound effects which he supplied at maximum volume, he was flying them gustily into his plate. Eggs, tomatoes, and cheese dripped down the front of his playsuit. His sister had only picked at her own meal. At the moment, she was sitting motionless in her chair with a Cabbage Patch doll laid across her lap. She was studying it pensively, but she did not touch it.
Lady Helen knelt by Perdita’s chair as Christian shouted, “Ka-boom! Ka-plowy!” Eggs splashed across the table. Perdita blinked as a bit of tomato hit her on the cheek.
“Enough, Christian,” Lady Helen said, taking his plate from him. He was her nephew. She was supposed to love him and under most circumstances she could say that she did. But after nine days, her patience was at its lowest ebb, and if she’d ever had compassion for the unspoken fears that underlay his behaviour, she found that she couldn’t summon it at the moment. He opened his mouth for a howl of protest. She reached across the table and covered it with her hand. “Enough. You’re being a wicked little boy. Stop this right now.”
That beloved Auntie Leen would speak to him in such a manner seemed to surprise Christian momentarily into cooperation. But only for a moment. He said, “Mummy!” and his eyes filled with tears.
Without the slightest qualm, Lady Helen seized the advantage. “Yes. Mummy. She’s trying to rest, but you’re not making it very easy for her, are you?” He fell silent and she turned to his sister. “Won’t you eat something, Perdita?”
The little girl kept her eyes on her doll which lay inertly across her lap, with cheeks shaped like marbles and a placid smile on her lips. The appropriate picture of infancy and childhood, Lady Helen thought. She said to Christian, “I’m going up to check on Mummy and the baby. Will you keep Perdita company for me?”
Christian eyed his sister’s plate. “She din’t eat,” he said.
“Perhaps you can persuade her to have a bit.”
She left them together and went to her sister. In the upper corridor, the house was quiet, and at the top of the stairs she took a moment to lean her forehead against the cold pane of a window. She thought of Lynley and his unexpected appearance in Cambridge. She had a fairly good idea of what his presence presaged.
It had been nearly ten months since he had made the wild drive to Skye in order to find her, nearly ten months since the icy day in January when he had asked her to marry him, nearly ten months since she had refused. He had not asked her again, and in the intervening time they had somehow reached an unspoken agreement to try to retreat to the easy companionship which they once had shared. It was a retreat that brought little satisfaction to either of them, however, for in asking her to marry him, Lynley had crossed an undefined boundary, altering their relationship in ways neither of them could have possibly foreseen. Now they found themselves in an uncertain limbo in which they had to face the fact that while they could call themselves friends for the rest of their lives if they chose to do so, the reality was that friendship had ended between them the moment Lynley took the alchemical risk of changing it into love.
Their every meeting since January—no matter how innocent or superfluous or casual—had been subtly coloured by the fact that he had asked her to marry him. And because they had not spoken of it again, the subject seemed to lie like quicksand between them. One wrong step and she knew she’d go under, caught in the suffocating mire of attempting to explain to him that which would hurt him more than she could bear.
Lady Helen sighed and pulled back her shoulders. Her neck felt sore. The cold window had made her forehead feel damp. She was tired to the bone.
At the end of the corridor, her sister’s bedroom door was closed, and she tapped on it quietly before letting herself in. She didn’t bother to wait for Penelope to answer her knocking. Nine days with her sister had taught her that she would not do so.
The windows were closed against the nighttime fog and cold air, and an electric fire in addition to the radiator made the room claustrophobic. Between the closed windows sat her sister’s king-size bed, and, looking ashen-faced even in the soft light of the bedside table, Penelope lay holding the infant to her swollen breast. Even when Lady Helen said her
name, she kept her head tilted back against the headboard, her eyes squeezed shut, her lips pressed into a scar line of pain. Her face was sheened with sweat which was forming rivulets that ran from her temples to her jaws, then dripped and formed new rivulets on her bare chest. As Lady Helen watched, a single inordinately heavy tear trickled down her sister’s cheek. She didn’t wipe it away. Nor did she open her eyes.
Not for the first time, Lady Helen felt the frustration of her own uselessness. She had seen the condition of her sister’s breasts, with their cracked and bleeding nipples; she had heard her sister cry out as she expressed the milk. Yet she knew Penelope well enough to know that nothing she might say could make a difference to her once she was bent upon a course of action. She would breast-feed this baby until its sixth month, no matter the pain or the cost. Motherhood had become a fine point of honour, a position from which she would never retreat.
Lady Helen approached the bed and looked at the baby, noticing for the first time that Pen wasn’t holding her. Rather, she had placed the infant on a pillow and it was this which she held, pressing the baby’s face to her breast. The baby sucked. Soundlessly, Pen continued to weep.
She hadn’t been out of the room all day. Yesterday, she had managed ten listless minutes in the sitting room with the twins squabbling at her feet while Lady Helen changed the sheets on her bed. But today she had remained behind the closed door, stirring herself only when Lady Helen brought the baby to be fed. Sometimes she read. Sometimes she sat in a chair by the window. Most of the time she wept.
Although the baby was now a month old, neither Pen nor her husband had yet named the child, referring to it as the baby, she, or her. It was as if not naming the baby made her presence in their lives a less permanent feature. If she didn’t have a name, she didn’t really exist. If she didn’t exist, they hadn’t created her. If they hadn’t created her, they didn’t have to examine the fact that whatever love, lust, or devotion moved her making seemed to have disappeared between them.
Fist curled, the infant gave over sucking. Her chin was wet with a thin greenish film of mother’s milk. Releasing a fractured breath, Pen pushed the pillow away from her breast, and Lady Helen raised the baby to her own shoulder.
“I heard the door.” Pen’s voice was weary and strained. She did not open her eyes. Her hair—dark like her children’s—lay in a limp mass pressed to her skull. “Harry?”
“No. It was Tommy. He’s here on a case.”
Her sister’s eyes opened. “Tommy Lynley? What did he want here?”
Lady Helen patted the baby’s warm back. “To say hello, I suppose.” She walked to the window. Pen shifted in bed. Lady Helen knew she was watching her.
“How did he know where to find you?”
“I told him, of course.”
“Why? No, don’t answer. You wanted him to come, didn’t you?” The question had the ring of an accusation. Lady Helen turned from the window where the fog was pressing like a monstrous, wet cobweb against the glass. Before she could answer, her sister continued. “I don’t blame you, Helen. You want to get out of here. You want to get back to London. Who wouldn’t?”
“That’s not true.”
“Your flat and your life and the silence. God oh God, I miss the silence most of all. And being alone. And having time to myself. And privacy.” Pen began to weep. She fumbled among creams and unguents on the bedside table for a box of tissues. “I’m sorry. I’m a mess. I’m no good for anyone.”
“Don’t say that. Please. You know it isn’t true.”
“Look at me. Just please look at me, Helen. I’m good for nothing. I’m just a baby machine. I can’t even be a proper mother to my children. I’m a ruin. I’m a slug.”
“It’s depression, Pen. You do see that, don’t you? You went through this when the twins were born, and if you remember—”
“I didn’t! I was fine. Perfectly. Completely.”
“You’ve forgotten how it was. You’ve put it behind you. As you’ll do with this.”
Pen turned her head away. Her body heaved with a sob. “Harry’s staying at Emmanuel again, isn’t he?” She flashed a wet face in her sister’s direction. “Never mind. Don’t answer. I know he is.”
It was the closest thing to an opening Pen had given her in nine days. Lady Helen took it at once, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “What’s happening here, Pen?”
“He’s got what he wants. Why hang about to examine the damage?”
“Got…? I don’t understand. Is there another woman?”
Pen laughed bitterly, choked back a sob, and then deftly changed the subject. “You know why he’s come up from London, Helen. Don’t pretend you’re naive. You know what he wants, and he intends to get it. That’s the real Lynley spirit. Charge right towards the goal.”
Lady Helen didn’t reply. She laid Pen’s daughter on her back on the bed, feeling warmed by the baby’s fist-waving, leg-kicking grin. She wrapped the tiny fingers round one of her own and bent to kiss them. What a miracle she was. Ten fingers, ten toes, sweet miniature nails.
“He’s here for more reasons than to solve some little murder and you ought to be ready to head him off.”
“That’s all in the past.”
“Don’t be such a fool.” Her sister leaned forward, grabbed onto her wrist. “Listen to me, Helen. You’ve got it all right now. Don’t throw it away because of a man. Get him out of your life. He wants you. He means to have you. He’ll never give it up unless you spell it out for him. So do it.”
Lady Helen smiled in what she hoped was a loving fashion. She covered her sister’s hand with her own. “Pen. Darling. We aren’t play-acting at Tess of the D’Urbervilles. Tommy isn’t in hot pursuit of my virtue. And even if he were, I’m afraid he’s about—” She laughed lightly. “Let me try to remember…Yes, he’s just about fifteen years too late. Fifteen years exactly on Christmas Eve. Shall I tell you about it?”
Her sister pulled away. “This isn’t a joke!”
Lady Helen watched, feeling surprised and helpless, as Pen’s eyes filled again. “Pen—”
“No! You’re living in a dream world. Roses and champagne and cool satin sheets. Sweet little babies delivered by the stork. Adoring children sitting on mama’s knee. Nothing smelly or unpleasant or painful or disgusting. Well, take a good look round here if you mean to get married.”
“Tommy hasn’t come to Cambridge to ask me to marry him.”
“Take a good long look. Because life’s rotten, Helen. It’s filthy and lousy. It’s just a way to die. But you don’t think of that. You don’t think of anything.”
“You’re not being fair.”
“Oh, I dare say you think about screwing him, though. That’s what you hoped for when you saw him tonight. I don’t blame you. How could I? He’s supposed to be quite the performer in bed. I know at least a dozen women in London who’ll be only too happy to attest to that. So do what you want. Screw him. Marry him. I only hope you’re not so stupid as to think he’d be faithful to you. Or your marriage. Or to anything, in fact.”
“We’re only friends, Pen. That’s the beginning and end of it.”
“Maybe you just want the houses and cars and servants and money. And the title, of course. We mustn’t forget that. Countess of Asherton. What a brilliant match. At least one of us will end up making Daddy proud.” She turned on her side and switched out the light on the bedside table. “I’m going to sleep now. Put the baby to bed.”
“Pen.”
“No. I’m going to sleep.”
4
“It was always clear that Elena Weaver had the potential for a first,” Terence Cuff said to Lynley. “But I suppose we say that about most undergraduates, don’t we? What would they be doing here if they didn’t have the potential to take firsts in their subjects?”
“What was hers?”
“English.”
Cuff poured two sherries and handed one to Lynley. He nodded towards three over-stuffed chairs that were grou
ped round a gateleg table to the right of the library’s fireplace, a two-tiered demonstration of one of the more flamboyant aspects of late Elizabethan architecture, decorated with marble caryatids, Corinthian columns, and the coat of arms of Vincent Amberlane, Lord Brasdown, the college founder.
Before coming to the lodge, Lynley had taken a solitary evening stroll through the seven courts that comprised the western two-thirds of St. Stephen’s College, pausing in the fellows’ garden where a terrace overlooked the River Cam. He was a lover of architecture. He took pleasure in the evidence of each period’s individual caprice. And while he had always found Cambridge itself to be a rich source of architectural whimsies—from Trinity Great Court’s fountain to Queens’ Mathematical Bridge—St. Stephen’s College, he discovered, merited special attention. It spanned five hundred years of design, from the sixteenth-century Principal Court, with its buildings of red brick and freestone quoins, to the twentieth-century, triangular North Court, where the junior combination room, the bar, a lecture hall, and the buttery were contained in a series of sliding glass panels framed by Brazilian mahogany. St. Stephen’s was one of the largest colleges in the University, “bound by the Trinities” as University brochures described it, with Trinity College to its north, Trinity Hall to its south, and Trinity Lane bisecting its west and east sections. Only the river running along its western boundary kept the college from being entirely hemmed in.
The Master’s Lodge sat at the southwest end of the college grounds, abutting Garret Hostel Lane and facing the River Cam. Its construction dated from the 1600’s, and like its predecessors in Principal Court, it had escaped the ashlar refacing that had been so popular in Cambridge in the eighteenth century. Thus, it maintained its original brick exterior and contrasting stone quoins. And like much of the architecture of the period, it was a happy combination of classical and Gothic details. Its perfect balance spoke of the influence of classical design. Two bay windows jutted out on either side of the front door, while a row of dormer windows topped by semi-circular pediments rose from a pitched slate roof. A lingering love of the Gothic showed itself in that roof’s crenellation, in the pointed arch that comprised the building’s entry, and in the fan vaulting of that entry’s ceiling. It was here that Lynley came to keep his appointment with Terence Cuff, Master of St. Stephen’s and a graduate of Exeter College, Oxford, where Lynley himself had been a student.