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Summer Of The Raven - Сара Крейвен - Читать любовный роман онлайн в женской библиотеке LadyLib.Net
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Крейвен Сара
Summer Of The Raven
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CHAPTER TWO
THE motorway was far behind them, and the towering fells had closed in as if they were entering some secret citadel. Antonia was driving and Rowan sat beside her, the map open on her knee, although they hadn’t needed it so far as everything was so well signposted.
Rowan had never been to the Lake District before, and she supposed she could hardly be seeing it for the first time under better conditions. The soft blue April day was warm and the sun sparkled everywhere—on the grey-blue slate that faced the houses, on the rippling water, on the last traces of snow in the sheltered hollows of the fells, and on the masses of daffodils blooming wherever the eye could see.
She had read Wordsworth’s poem, of course, but she had never expected to see it brought to life with quite such extravagance. She felt she wanted to laugh out loud with the sheer unexpected gaiety of it all, and the mood of depression which had been gripping her lately lifted perceptibly.
All she needed now was someone to share it with, but Antonia had already made it patently clear that the rugged beauty of their surroundings had not the slightest appeal as far as she was concerned. Nor was she suited with the narrowness of the road they were now travelling on, or the frequency of its bends. She had grumbled constantly since leaving the motorway, and Rowan felt wryly that her attitude augured ill for what lay ahead of them.
It had been a difficult few weeks. Rowan had informed the college principal that she would not be returning after the Easter break, and he had not been pleased at the news. He had tried hard to persuade her to stay on and complete her course, but she had merely said that her family circumstances made it impossible at the moment, and left him to draw his own conclusions.
Rowan had not seen Carne Maitland again, although she had no doubt that he had visited the flat in her absence. There was occasionally the faint aroma of cigar smoke in the air when she returned. From odd remarks that Antonia let fall, she guessed that he had been as good as his word in settling her debts at cards, yet her stepmother seemed to have very little notion of what was going to be demanded of her in return. When Rowan asked the size of the house they were going to, and if any local help was employed, Antonia appeared vague to the point of indifference.
‘But you must have some idea,’ Rowan said at last. ‘Do you know whether you’re expected to cook as well as organise the housework?’
Antonia shrugged. ‘I haven’t the least idea. I’ll worry about that when it happens.’
‘But you can’t cook,’ Rowan pointed out. ‘The whole thing is utterly ludicrous! Does your cousin realise this?’
‘I don’t know whether he does or not.’ Antonia sounded bored. ‘This was his idea, not mine, if you remember. Anyway, if dreary old Sybilla has managed all this time, I’m sure we can.’
‘We?’ Rowan raised her eyebrows. ‘Just leave me out of the reckoning, Antonia. I’m going to Ravensmere strictly under protest, to safeguard your income from the estate.’
Antonia smiled lazily and leaned across to pat her cheek. ‘I know, sweetie, but all the same, you wouldn’t leave me in the lurch. And you can hardly live under Carne’s roof without doing something to earn your bed and board. By the way—–’ she reached for her handbag and fumbled in it, ‘this is for you.’
It was a cheque, and when Rowan looked at the amount it was made out for and the uncompromising signature at the bottom, she felt her brain reel.
‘What’s this for?’ she demanded huskily.
‘To enable you to do some shopping,’ Antonia said calmly. ‘Carne will be doing quite a lot of entertaining, I imagine, and he won’t want you to be lurking round in corners looking as if you’ve been dressed by War on Want.’
Rowan’s face was burning. ‘I see.’
For a moment she looked as if she was going to crumple the cheque up in her hand, and Antonia, alarmed, reached forward and snatched it away.
‘Don’t be stupid,’ she said sharply. ‘Not even you can pretend it isn’t nice to have something to spend on yourself. You can’t spend the rest of your life in jeans and sweaters. Get your hair done. Find someone to do a rescue job on those nails.’
‘Look my age, you mean?’ Rowan enquired ironically, and Antonia had the grace to look embarrassed.
‘Not exactly,’ she said shortly. ‘But you could try and get away from this waif and stray image. For heaven’s sake, Rowan, there must be something you want to buy for yourself!’
And there was, of course, though Rowan doubted whether the sturdy portable typewriter in its carrying case was exactly what the donor of the cheque had intended. She had expected a further tussle with Antonia too, but her stepmother seemed to have retreated into some private world of discontent, and would hardly have noticed, Rowan thought, if she had shaved her head and painted her skin with woad.
Antonia offered no explanation for her glumness, but Rowan suspected the fact that they were travelling to Ravensmere without Carne Maitland’s personal escort might have something to do with it. The estate car they were travelling in was a new one, and had been bought for Antonia’s use, although she did not seem particularly impressed by the fact. Rowan guessed she would have preferred to travel in the sleek sports model she had glimpsed at the flat that first evening. She was thankful that they had been given something less powerful. Antonia was not a bad driver, but she was inclined to be reckless and impatient when conditions did not suit her, and Rowan grimaced inwardly as she contemplated what these latter stages of their journey could have been like.
‘Well, here’s Ravensmere at last,’ Antonia commented petulantly. ‘What a dead and alive hole! How much farther now, for heaven’s sake?’
Rowan shrugged. ‘Your guess is as good as mine.’
She thought Ravensmere was an attractive village. It was very small—a few houses built of the inevitable slate, a pub with shuttered windows and creeper-hung walls, and a combined village store and post office—but it was clean and well kept and the cottage gardens burgeoned with spring flowers.
Rowan leaned forward and stared around her. ‘Is your cousin’s house actually in the village?’ She felt a twinge of nervousness assail her at the knowledge that they had nearly arrived at their destination. The palms of her hands felt damp and she wiped them surreptitiously on her denim-clad thighs. She wished very much that she was safely back in London, and that she had ignored all Antonia’s pleas and arguments. Oh, why had she ever agreed to come all this way to take part in what amounted to little more than a charade? And at the same moment it occurred to her that she knew exactly why and she felt a sudden warmth invade her body that had nothing to do with the spring sunlight. Fool, she castigated herself silently.
‘The house is called Raven’s Crag,’ Antonia was saying impatiently. ‘Wind your window down and ask someone. It’s getting late and I don’t want to be driving around in these mountains once the sun has gone down.’
There didn’t seem to be anyone about that they could ask, and eventually Antonia stopped outside the shop, and told Rowan brusquely to enquire there. ‘And get me some cigarettes while you’re about it,’ she added.
The shop was small, but its proprietor had clearly decided not to let that stand in his way. Rowan thought she had never seen such a wide range of goods or so many different brand names. Every surface, every nook and cranny carried its full complement, and even the grille over the Post Office counter in the corner was plastered with posters and notices.
There was a young girl wearing a white overall behind the counter, transferring toffee bars from a box on to a plastic display tray, and she smiled when she saw Rowan. ‘Yes, please?’
In spite of the range, they didn’t have the exact brand of cigarettes that Antonia wanted, so Rowan bought the next best thing, knowing that she would be faced with more complaints when she returned to the car. Then she asked where Raven’s Crag was.
There was open curiosity in the girl’s eyes as she studied Rowan. ‘You mean Mr Maitland’s house? You want to take the back road, and bear to the right. It’s a good climb, mind.’
The shop bell tinkled behind Rowan as she closed the door and walked back to the car. Something made her turn and look over her shoulder and she saw that the girl was peering through the crowded window watching her go, and that an older woman had joined her.
Rowan frowned slightly. It was true that Ravensmere was off the beaten tourist track, but surely the local inhabitants weren’t so unused to the sight of strangers? She had intended to mention it to Antonia as she got back into the car, but the fuss her stepmother kicked up over the cigarettes drove it out of her mind.
‘God, what a dump!’ Antonia stormed, putting the car in gear with a hideous screech. ‘It wouldn’t take much for me to turn right round and go back to London!’
‘Well, why don’t we?’ Rowan said quickly. ‘This is never going to work, Antonia, and you know it. You’ve never had to look after a house in your life. Someone else has always done it for you.’
Antonia swung the car on to the back road with a frank disregard for its tyres. ‘No, my dear simpleton, we’re staying. My clever Cousin Carne may have the upper hand at the moment, but that won’t last for ever.’ She gave a small provocative smile. ‘From housekeeper to lady of the house isn’t that great a step.’
‘You intend to marry him?’ Rowan asked dazedly.
Antonia shrugged. ‘I haven’t been able to work out yet whether he’s the marrying kind. But it makes very little difference these days. And there’s always been a—rapport between Carne and me. There are too many other distractions in London, but up here in the back of beyond he shouldn’t be too difficult to manipulate.’
‘I see,’ Rowan managed.
Antonia shot her a sideways glance. ‘I hope you do, sweetie. I’m sure you’ll know when and how to be diplomatic, and I’m relying on you to keep Sybilla out of the way too.’
The gradient was increasing sharply all the time, and there were frequent bends, so Antonia had to concentrate all her attention on her driving while Rowan sat silently beside her. So much, she told herself wryly, for being tempted into the realms of fantasy. From now on she would reserve her romantic dreams for her stories where they belonged.
What had she been hoping for anyway? A scene like something from an old Hollywood film where Carne would have seen behind the façade of the skinny sixteen-year-old and murmured, ‘My God, but you’re beautiful?’ And even if he had done, what then? She might be three years older than he had been led to believe, but even so she was a lifetime behind him in experience and sophistication. When he wanted a woman, it was obvious that his choice would be someone like Antonia, voluptuous and more than capable of catering to all of a man’s needs. Well, not quite all. Rowan’s sense of the ridiculous came to her rescue. Antonia couldn’t keep house or cook, but what would that matter in the light of her other eminently desirable attributes? She had called herself a fool, but she was worse than a fool, she was pitiful. And here she was in a situation where she was going to be hurt—a situation entirely of her own making. She could have stood out against Antonia. After all, if her stepmother’s plans came to fruition she would be in no need of the allowance from the Winslow estate. And Rowan herself could have found a grant to support her through her degree course. Other students survived; she could have been one of them. And now she had burned her boats behind her, it seemed. Once this strange summer was over she would have to pick up the threads of her life and Start over again. It was a bleak prospect, and it was no comfort to realise that she had brought it all upon herself.
‘What a road!’ Antonia’s derisive comment focussed her attention on the immediate present. ‘It’s more like a track. And do you see that notice?’
Rowan did indeed. It informed travellers quite unequivocally that the road was unsuitable for traffic in winter conditions.
Antonia shuddered. ‘Thank God I intend to be well away from here before the winter!’
‘But you said …’
‘None of my plans include settling down in this backwater,’ Antonia said dismissively. ‘Why, Carne doesn’t even spend that much time here himself.’ She changed down again. ‘Where the devil is this house?’
‘It’s right ahead of us,’ Rowan said almost laconically. No other house, she supposed, would have six-foot stone gateposts each surmounted by a carved stone raven.
Antonia turned the car cautiously into the gateway and up a steep gravelled drive, bordered on each side by a rocky wall supporting a mass of rhododendron bushes just coming into bud.
They seemed to be literally on the side of the mountain and still climbing, and as they turned the last curving bend, it was obvious why. Raven’s Crag seemed to have been built as an extension of the rock itself. It was starkly modern in concept and yet seemed to blend in better with its surroundings than a more traditional design might have done.
Above them, a large stone platform jutted out, supporting a covered terrace with glass roof and walls, with a view, Rowan realised, of the whole valley beneath. Beside this, a flight of stone steps led upwards to an entrance at present hidden from view at the side of the house. Below the terrace, and facing them, a row of wide workmanlike doors concealed garages and stores.
‘What a marvellous place!’ Rowan got out and stood drinking in her surroundings.
‘For mountain goats,’ Antonia said sourly as she joined her. ‘I hope there’s someone to carry our cases up those steps.’
Rowan looked about her. ‘There doesn’t seem to be anyone about at all,’ she said doubtfully. ‘Shall I go up and ring?’
Antonia leaned back against the car and lit one of the despised cigarettes.
‘What a splendid idea,’ she approved rather mockingly. ‘I can see you’re going to be a tower of strength, my dear.’
Rowan went up the steps two at a time, glad of the opportunity to stretch her legs after the hours of travelling. At the top, a massive door confronted her. There didn’t seem to be a bell, but there was a massive wrought iron door-knocker in the shape of a raven’s beaked head and Rowan used it without hesitation. The noise seemed to echo and re-echo through the house, and was followed by a long and deep silence.
It seemed an eternity before Rowan heard a shuffling footstep approaching. The door swung open and she was confronted by a small slender woman with very white hair. Her face was lined and she leaned heavily on a stick, but her eyes were blue and clear.
‘The door,’ she said in a quiet precise voice, ‘was not locked. You were expected.’ She looked Rowan up and down, missing nothing from the brown hair parted in the middle today and tied into two bunches to the denim-clad legs. ‘You must be the child Rowan,’ she commented. ‘Where is Antonia? Why is she not with you?’
‘She’s down by the garages. We were wondering whether there was anyone to help with the luggage,’ Rowan said rather helplessly.
The woman raised her eyebrows. ‘There’s myself.’
‘That isn’t exactly what I meant,’ Rowan said uncomfortably.
‘Then I’m afraid you must manage as best you can,’ the other one said with finality. ‘There’s no one else. Now you must forgive me if I don’t await your return, but I find it difficult to stand for any length of time. I shall be in the drawing room—the door on the right. Perhaps you and Antonia would care to join me for tea.’ She gave Rowan a cool rather remote smile and limped away.
Rowan returned back down the steps rather more slowly. Antonia looked up as she approached and threw away her half-smoked cigarette with an impatient gesture.
‘You’ve taken your time,’ she said. ‘Where is everyone?’
Rowan lifted one shoulder. ‘There’s no one—except for an elderly woman who I gather is Sybilla.’
‘No one at all?’ Antonia’s lips parted disbelievingly. ‘But where’s Carne? He must be around somewhere.’
Rowan turned towards the boot of the car.’ Apparently not,’ she said shortly. ‘If you’ll give me the keys I’ll start getting the stuff out. There’s some tea waiting for us.’
‘Tea?’ Antonia gave a strident laugh. ‘I’ll need something stronger than tea after a day like this!’
She picked the smallest case and started up the steps with it, leaving Rowan to follow with the rest of the luggage as best she could. Rowan was panting by the time she reached the top again. The front door was standing open and she walked through and dumped the cases and the typewriter down on the gleaming honey-coloured parquet floor with a feeling of relief.
She straightened herself, moving her shoulders ruefully, and took stock of her surroundings. It was a large square hall, and very light. When she looked up, Rowan realised that she could see right up to the roof of the house, which at this point seemed to consist of a massive skylight. The upper floors were reached by a wrought iron spiral staircase. A table stood against one wall, its antique surface glimmering with polish and reflecting back the lines and colours of the great pottery bowl filled with spring flowers that it bore. This and an old oak settle standing beside the stone fireplace which, though empty now, was obviously used to complement the central heating, was the only furniture.
The door on the right that the elderly woman had referred to was standing ajar, and feeling rather selfconscious, Rowan walked across and pushed it open. Again, her most immediate impression was one of space and light. One entire wall of the drawing room was glass—enormous sliding doors giving way to the terrace. The floor was covered by a magnificent Persian rug, and seating was provided by three luxuriously padded tweed-covered sofas in shades of cream and oatmeal and placed to form a large square with the fireplace. A small table had been set in front of one of them and a tray with a teapot and delicate-looking cups and saucers had been placed on it. Antonia was lounging on one of the adjoining sofas, her face set in discontented lines.
‘Oh, there you are,’ she said ungraciously. ‘I hope you want some of this tea. I’m already in Sybilla’s black books because I asked for a gin and tonic instead.’
‘She walks very badly.’ Rowan came forward and sat down wearily. ‘Couldn’t you have fetched it yourself?’
Antonia gave her a surprised look as she lit another cigarette. ‘Yes—if I knew where dear Cousin Carne kept his booze. I did enquire, as a matter of fact, but it appears to be a closely guarded secret. One of a number as far as I can gather.’
‘What do you mean?’ Rowan lifted the teapot and poured herself some of the fragrant brew, adding a slice of lemon.
Antonia gave a slight shrug. ‘Sybilla’s being very odd—although heaven knows I should have expected that. But when I asked her about staff—because no one will ever convince me that she’s solely responsible for all this spit and polish—she became extremely cagey and pretended that she didn’t know what I meant.’ She leaned forward and irritably tapped a breath of ash from her cigarette into the enormous carved stone ashtray on the table. ‘I only hope she means to be co-operative. This whole business is quite hellish enough without having to battle with her all the time.’
‘Oh, do hush!’ Rowan felt most uncomfortable. ‘She’ll hear you.’
‘Probably. But I can assure you that nothing I’ve said will come as any great surprise to her. We never got on, not even when I was a child.’ Antonia gave a faintly satisfied smile. ‘Frankly, she’s never approved of me wholly.’
The sound of Sybilla’s stick tapping on the parquet was clearly heard and Antonia relapsed into silence. Rowan jumped up as the older woman entered.
‘Let me take that for you.’ She reached for the tray that Sybilla was carrying with some difficulty.
‘Thank you, child.’ Sybilla looked quite through her. ‘But I’m not yet in my dotage.’ She set the tray down in front of Antonia and directed a quelling glance at her. ‘When you’ve finished your refreshment, I’ll show you the house.’
Rowan sat down again, feeling rather limp. It was clear that as far as Sybilla was concerned, they were not welcome. Could it be that she felt they were depriving her of a home, she wondered?
Yet Sybilla’s own words soon disabused her of this notion. ‘No doubt it will take you a day or two to become familiar with the layout of the house,’ she was saying. ‘You’ll find it’s been designed to take advantage of the light wherever possible. On the first floor there’s a central gallery and two wings opening from it. You and Rowan will occupy rooms in the East Wing, and share a bathroom. Carne’s rooms are in the West Wing, and his studio is directly above them. That’s one area where your services are not required. Carne looks after the studio himself, and no one else enters it without his express invitation. When he’s not here, it’s kept locked.’
‘And the remaining rooms?’ Antonia drew deeply on her cigarette.
‘Guest rooms and bathrooms. Carne entertains widely, as I expect he has mentioned to you.’
‘He hasn’t mentioned very much at all. And while we’re on the subject of Carne, where is he? I was expecting him to be here to meet us.’
‘Carne is in Barbados,’ Sybilla said blightingly. ‘And even if he were not, I doubt very much whether he would concern himself in staffing matters. I understood the position had been made clear to you.’
There were two bright spots of colour glowing in Antonia’s face. ‘Oh, it’s clear enough,’ she said. ‘You may choose to consider yourself as staff here, Sybilla, but I don’t. I’ve come here because it happens to suit us both for the time being. If it amuses Carne to pretend to you that I’m only the housekeeper, then I’ll play along for a while. Why not? But please don’t imagine you have to remain to oversee my efforts. I’m sure that’s the last thing either of us want.’
‘I have no intention of being any kind of overseer,’ Sybilla said. ‘But I’m afraid you’ve been misled about my continuing presence in this house. I have a small self-contained flat at the rear of the ground floor. This is my home and will always remain so. But you need have no fears—I value my privacy and have no intention of undertaking any supervisory role where you are concerned.’
Antonia ground her cigarette butt savagely into the ashtray. ‘How utterly delightful.’ Her voice was brittle. ‘It’s a deal, then, Sybilla. You keep out of my way, and I promise to keep out of yours.’
‘Just as you wish.’ Sybilla turned to Rowan. ‘Would you like some tea, child? I’m afraid this hasn’t been much of a welcome for you, after your long journey. There are some freshly baked scones in the kitchen if you would like to fetch them.’
Rowan moistened dry lips with the tip of her tongue. ‘I’m not hungry, thank you, but another cup of tea would be lovely.’ As Sybilla poured the tea, she searched frantically for another topic of conversation. ‘We—we came through the village. It’s very pretty.’
‘It is,’ Sybilla agreed as she handed her the cup. ‘It’s also very quiet, and this house is very remote. What will you find to do with yourself all day long? I understand you’re sixteen. Should arrangements be made for you to continue your schooling?’
Rowan felt herself crimson, and managed to stop herself shooting a recriminatory glance at Antonia.
‘I’m nearly seventeen, actually,’ she said improvising desperately, ‘I’ve left school.’
‘Did you sit the public examination?’
‘Yes. I passed in nine subjects.’
‘I see. Yet you didn’t feel it was worthwhile continuing with some form of further education. That seems a pity.’ There was a reproving note in Sybilla’s voice. She turned to Antonia. ‘Could you not have persuaded the child to continue with her training.’
‘Oh, Rowan does as she wants. She was never terribly devoted to school, were you, sweetie?’ Antonia lit another cigarette, her face bland as she looked at Rowan.
Rowan said grimly, ‘No, never,’ and took another sip of tea to fortify herself.
‘But you really don’t have to worry about her, either, Sybilla. She’ll keep herself occupied somehow. Youngsters these days always seem to be busy doing comparatively nothing.’
‘Hmm.’ Sybilla’s back was rigid with disapproval. ‘Then I daresay she’ll be able to help you with the housework. I presume she’s capable of that at least. Now, I’d better show you to your rooms.’
Rowan hastily swallowed the remainder of her tea and rose as Sybilla struggled to her feet. She would have liked to have proffered some assistance, but realised the kind of rebuff she was risking.
The rooms turned out to be the best part of the day. Rowan found hers quite charming with its green and white sprigged wallpaper, and the plain dark green cover on the continental quilt. Curtains in paler green hung at the window, which looked out over the valley, and the glint of water in the distance. With its white-painted furniture, it was very much a young girl’s room, not unlike the one she had occupied in Surrey, and Rowan felt a pang of nostalgia as she looked around her.
Antonia’s room was an altogether more opulent affair in brown and gold, and she was standing looking round her in evident satisfaction when Rowan came in search of her.
‘Carne doesn’t stint himself,’ she remarked.
‘No.’ Rowan came straight to the point. ‘What’s the idea of giving Sybilla the impression that I’m some kind of slob?’
Antonia shrugged casually. ‘If she disapproves of you, then she’s less likely to start asking awkward questions, and I thought you’d prefer that. She can be like the Grand Inquisitor when she gets going. That’s one of the things I’ve always disliked about her.’
Rowan gave her a long look. ‘I don’t mind her questions. I’ve got nothing to hide. The three years discrepancy in my age was your idea, not mine, although I’ll never understand what possessed you to say such a thing.’
‘Can’t you?’ Antonia sat down on her silk-covered dressing stool and took her lipstick out of her bag. She began to outline the full curves of her mouth with elaborate care. ‘It’s quite simple really. I’ve been saddled with this stepmother bit, but I don’t have to like it. And while a child is one thing, a grown woman’s quite another. Besides, Carne doesn’t know everything about the terms of Vic’s will. I had to tell him you were in my care. He wouldn’t have swallowed that if I’d told him your correct age—so—–’ she shrugged again.
Rowan said softly, ‘Just as long as we’re not still here in two years’ time when I become twenty-one, because then I shall be off, Antonia, and you’ll have to tell your Cousin Carne any story you please.’
‘Don’t worry, darling.’ Antonia replaced the lipstick in its gold case. ‘If I’m still here in two years’ time, it will be because I’m Carne’s wife, and you’ll be free to go, just as soon as that joyous day arrives.’
‘Then I have a vested interest in making sure it does arrive,’ Rowan said bitterly. ‘You can count on my support, Antonia.’
‘I’m delighted to hear it. It seems there’s cold chicken and a salad waiting for us in the refrigerator this evening, but from tomorrow we’re on our own—literally. Just before Sybilla left me, she informed me that no other help is kept. It seems there used to be, but now there isn’t—illness in the family or some such thing. So we have this great barracks of a house to look after between us, honey child.’ A glint of rare humour appeared in Antonia’s eyes. ‘I’m beginning to think bankruptcy might have been easier after all.’
Perhaps it might at that, Rowan thought soberly as she went back to her own room. Antonia seemed confident that she could ultimately wind Carne Maitland round her little finger, but he was calling all the shots at the moment. Her heart sank. All the cleaning, and the cooking as well! There would be no end to it, and she did not even dare contemplate what would happen if the guest rooms Sybilla had mentioned began to fill up.
That blasted boutique, she thought crossly. I wonder how much money Antonia owes him altogether? Surely she could have repaid him in some other way than this. I’ve a feeling he’s going to expect his pound of flesh and some over.
Rowan saw no reason to change her opinion as the first fortnight at Raven’s Crag pursued its tedious way. The house was as labour-saving as the ingenuity of twentieth-century man could make it, but it was large, with vast expanses of glass and pale surfaces which needed constant attention. Antonia’s constant grumbling did not help either, and nor, for that matter did Antonia herself for much of the time. She talked a lot about how much there was to do, and she was quick to notice if any thing had been overlooked, but her activities were largely confined to a little desultory dusting and flower arranging in between sporadic visits to Keswick, the nearest large town to Ravensmere.
One of the more obvious disadvantages of the deception over Rowan’s age was that she was unable to drive the car, even though she had passed her driving test while she was in the Sixth Form. She had assumed, of course, in the circumstances that she would accompany Antonia on her visits to Keswick, but this was far from being the case. There always seemed more perfectly good reason why her stepmother preferred to go alone. Rowan was disappointed. She would have liked to have a look round Keswick, and seize the opportunity of buying some fresh food while she was there too. Antonia seemed hellbent on filling the large freezer in the walk-in pantry which led off the kitchen with convenience foods, and she ignored Rowan’s protests.
‘I don’t intend to do any more cooking than I have to,’ she declared disdainfully.
Rowan could have replied that Antonia did the minimum as it was, but she bit back the reply. It would only lead to a quarrel, after which Antonia would sulk, and as they had no company but each other that would be a disaster.
Sybilla had kept her word about not intruding upon them. Indeed, she kept almost religiously out of the way, which made Rowan feel uncomfortable. She doubted whether Sybilla had confined herself so rigorously to her own quarters prior to their arrival on the scene. And after all, this was her home.
But it will never be mine, Rowan thought sometimes as she prowled restlessly through the immaculate rooms, waiting for Antonia to come back from one of her shopping expeditions. I’m only here for a few months, just passing through.
Sometimes she was tempted to go and knock on Sybilla’s door and ask if she could talk to her, but she had the uneasy feeling she would not be very welcome. She had encountered Sybilla a few times in the garden, and the older woman’s greeting, although courteous, had been distant. Rowan knew why, of course. Antonia’s careless words had done their work well, and she had to bear the burden of Sybilla’s unspoken disapproval as a consequence.
Rowan supposed she was a fool to allow it to matter. Sybilla was a complete stranger, not even a relation, so her opinion shouldn’t really bear any weight, and yet the realisation that Sybilla regarded her as an awkward teenager, even a drop-out, was oddly hurtful, and at the same time it was part of the ring of deceit which Antonia had deliberately enclosed her in.
Again she asked herself, why? She had always known that Antonia was touchy about her age, and had never liked being saddled with an adolescent stepdaughter, but she had never dreamed that she was prepared to go to such lengths to preserve her image of eternal youth. If it was as simple as that, Rowan thought, but what other explanation could there be? She was under no illusion that physically she could be any threat to Antonia’s plans for her future.
The future. Whenever she thought of that, a small sick feeling began to well up in Rowan. If everything worked out for Antonia eventually, Rowan would be quite alone in the world, her last tenuous links with the happier past severed totally, and it was a daunting prospect even for someone older and more mature than Rowan. She had always been sheltered in a way, she supposed. Her father’s money had taken care of every thing for most of her life, and then there had been boarding school. Perhaps Victor Winslow had thought he was extending that protection until his only daughter was safely launched on adult life. Maybe he had even imagined that his wife and daughter would draw together in mutual need after the sorrow of his death. Looking back, Rowan thought ruefully that her father had never been one to take a very practical view of relationships. Antonia had been coldly furious when she heard the terms of the will, but although she had recovered herself swiftly, Rowan had never been left in any doubt that she was simply making the best of things. Antonia had always made the best of things, or at least the best for Antonia. That was really why they were here. After all, her stepmother could have got a job of some kind and arranged to repay Carne any money that was owing to him out of her earnings, but instead she had chosen what she hoped would be a softer option. Rowan could only hope for Antonia’s sake that she had chosen correctly. She couldn’t imagine Carne Maitland being soft in any way.
And certainly he had upset all Antonia’s preconceptions by absenting himself without a word. Rowan knew what her stepmother had been daily expecting a letter, or even a card, but the postman’s visit brought only mail addressed to Carne, and the usual bills and circulars. The telephone remained silent too, although occasionally they heard the sound of a distant bell ringing, and guessed that Sybilla had her own private telephone in the flat. But if Carne was among her unknown callers, then there were no messages for the newcomers in his house, and Antonia was becoming increasingly restive. She had evidently been expecting a very different reception.
Perhaps Antonia had made a mistake when she had regarded Carne as the young man who had once been in love with her. Had she forgotten how people could change? Rowan could not imagine Carne as any woman’s slave. She remembered the cool, silver eyes, and the small scar which twisted his mouth when he smiled. He was no one’s idea of a lovesick swain, she thought wryly. He was hard and sexy and diabolically attractive, and he would take anything and everything life had to offer with both hands.
Rowan thought suddenly, ‘I was mad to come here. I should have stayed in London and shared a bed-sitter with someone. I’d have managed somehow. I could have worked as a waitress in the evening and studied during the day. I could have done something. But I’m no better than Antonia. I decided to come here too for all the wrong reasons, and now I have to live with it, and perhaps I should be glad that Antonia has told him I’m only a child, whatever her motives were.’
Her discomfiting reverie was interrupted by the arrival of Antonia herself, elegant in an Italian hand-knitted two-piece, a reminder of the boutique’s heyday.
‘I’m going into Keswick to do some shopping,’ she announced. ‘Is there anything you want?’
‘Into Keswick again?’ Rowan felt impelled to remonstrate. ‘But I thought you’d done the shopping on Tuesday when you went in to cash the housekeeping cheque. And we were supposed to be tackling the bedrooms today.’
‘All right, so I’m going to have my hair done,’ Antonia said petulantly. ‘You don’t grudge me that little luxury, I hope.’
Rowan held on to her patience. ‘I hope I don’t grudge you anything. I’ve certainly no right to do so.’
‘Then what’s the argument?’
‘There isn’t one,’ Rowan said defeatedly. ‘I’ll do the bedrooms. You don’t have to worry about them.’
Antonia shrugged. ‘I shan’t, sweetie. The last thing I try to think about is this benighted hole, believe me.’
‘Don’t you like the house?’ In spite of herself Rowan was curious.
‘If it were elsewhere, it might be tolerable. But I don’t like being perched halfway up a mountain, and I certainly don’t care for the climate. Do you realise that it’s rained every day that we’ve been here?’
‘I suppose it has, but everything’s so green and beautiful here. And we’ve had a lot of sunshine as well.’
‘You sound as if you’re trying to sell me the place.’ Antonia checked through the contents of her handbag, looking slightly amused. ‘It won’t work, you know. When Carne and I are married, I shall persuade him to sell this place and move to somewhere more civilised and accessible. God knows what possessed him to buy this site, when he could have lived anywhere.’
Rowan thought of the morning sun touching the remaining patches of snow on the crowding fells with pink and gold. She thought of the glimpse of turquoise which was Ravensmere far below them, and the moist cool scent of the garden where plants were showing green spikes through the rich dark earth, and she thought she could understand why anyone would choose to live here.
But not Antonia, of course, who thought anywhere more than a taxi ride from Harrods was the beginnings of outer darkness. And possibly not Carne Maitland either. The house had an untouched, unlived-in air about it, for all its shining luxury, as if its worldly, sophisticated owner had thought better of the whim which had brought it into being.
She heard Antonia’s car drive away, and with a sigh went along to the utility room which opened off the kitchen to fetch dusters and polish and the vacuum cleaner before commencing her onslaught on the bedrooms. It was a day when the outdoors beckoned. Early rain had given way to puffs of white cloud scudding across a pale blue sky, and although Rowan knew perfectly well that the weather could change in a moment with mist and heavy cloud coming down like a blanket, she wished she was out somewhere on a hillside lifting her face to the soft wind.
She began on their own rooms. Hers was relatively tidy, except for the small table which she had moved under the window and which held her typewriter and papers. She had started another story, and for her the creative process demanded a kind of organised chaos in the immediate environment.
She remade the bed, shaking up the quilt with deft flicks of her wrist, and changed the fitted sheets with their matching pillowcase for another set brought from the first floor linen room, where all the bedding, towels and table linen needed for the household were kept.
Antonia’s room was a different story, and Rowan gave a soundless sigh as she looked about her. Cosmetics, many with their tops and fids off, were strewn across the vanitory unit, which was coated with a faint film of spilled powder. Soiled tights and undies were draped across the dressing stool and the bedroom floor, and the dress Antonia had worn the previous evening was flung in a crumpled heap across the bed.
She thought, ‘I hope Carne Maitland can afford a lady’s maid for her, because she surely needs one!’
She was hot, sticky and cross by the time she had restored order, and was ready to move on to the guestrooms. These fortunately only needed a light dusting, and she opened the windows to let in some of the spring sun and air and get rid of the unused smell. She would take her lunch into the garden, she thought, and find a patch of sunlight to sit in. She wasn’t sure exactly how much of the land belonged to the house, and much of the garden was overgrown and in need of attention. It needs someone to live here and care about it, just like the house, she thought sadly.
She took her crispbread and lettuce and cottage cheese and found a flat stone under a tree which seemed dry and moderately sheltered. The April wind still held a nip, reminding her that there was still snow on the surrounding hills, and could be more, even this late in a golden spring. When she had finished her brief meal, she leaned back against the tree and let the sun warm her face. She felt wearied by her rather tedious morning’s work, and disinclined to start again, especially as her next port of call was Carne Maitland’s luxurious suite of rooms in the other wing of the house. Today was a day for working in the garden, she thought, for cutting back briars, and uprooting nettles and dandelions and dockweeds, and pulling away handfuls of the goosegrass which seemed to be encroaching everywhere under the roses and shrubs. Not that she knew a great deal about gardening. The garden of the cottage in Surrey had been very different from this one, with herbaceous borders alive with colour, and smooth lawns to the front and rear, and Mr Pettigrew from the village to look after it.
There was nothing smooth or ironed out about the garden at Raven’s Crag. Apart from the clumps of ubiquitous daffodils, any colour was planned for later in the season, and the general effect was bleak and rather stark like its surroundings. You couldn’t transplant the pretty traditional cottagey flowers they had grown in Surrey to this place, Rowan thought, but you could create a setting for the house which would be equally satisfying. But at the moment, the wilderness seemed to be taking over again.
She brushed the crumbs from her jeans and rose reluctantly. She probably didn’t need to clean Carne’s rooms. No one had so much as set foot in them since she had cleaned them last time, nor would do until she cleaned them next time, but she was determined that Carne Maitland should have no cause for complaint whenever he chose to honour them with his presence.
The door from the corridor led straight into a dressing room, and his bathroom and bedroom both opened off from this. It was a reasonably sized room, with one wall entirely occupied by fitted wardrobes and drawers, yet he didn’t have a lot of clothes, because she had looked. What there were, of course, were gorgeous—silk shirts and cashmere sweaters, and a leather coat as soft and supple as velvet. There were few toiletries in the bathroom, but those few were expensive and Rowan, sampling them out of curiosity the first time she had cleaned the bathroom, approved his taste.
The bedroom was something else again, with a carpet so thick that her feet sank into it as she walked across the room, and a king-sized bed, which was invariably made up with brown silk sheets. When they had first inspected the room Rowan had seen Antonia give the bed a long look, before she turned away without comment, and Rowan herself had felt hot with inexplicable embarrassment. Antonia, of course, was used to a bedroom of her own, and not merely since becoming a widow; however, Rowan doubted whether she would find the man she had chosen to be her second husband as mildly acquiescent to this as her first had been. There was a narrow divan in the dressing room, but Rowan could not imagine Carne Maitland being tamely dismissed there. Besides, a bed the size of the one in the master bedroom was for sharing, not for solitude.
There were blankets on this bed, instead of the duvets used in all the other rooms, and a dark brown satin quilted cover, all very restrained and masculine. The bed faced the windows which reached from floor to ceiling, giving a panoramic view over the valley to the fells beyond.
The sunsets would be fantastic, Rowan thought, and grinned to herself, in self-mockery. Anyone using this bed that early in the evening would probably not be staring at the sunsets, unless they’d used the ploy ‘Come and see my sunset’ instead of ‘Come and see my etchings’. Carne, she decided, could probably use either line and make it a winner. Probably had, as well, and very likely was at this very minute, whatever time it was in Barbados.
There was a full-length mirror on the wall, and she gave its surface a brisk rub with a clean duster, viewing herself with detachment as she did so, and deciding that she looked totally out of place in this room with her faded jeans and elderly sweater shirt with the sleeves pushed up. A satin dressing gown is what I need, she thought, the corners of her mouth lifting in derision, one that fastens at the waist and nowhere else, in a colour to harmonise with the dusters. She gave the mirror’s frame a final, cheerful flick and turned away, moving her shoulders wearily. She had worked hard, and she was tired. She deserved a shower and a rest before Antonia returned and it was time to start preparing the evening meal. She pushed the sandals off her aching feet and walked across the carpet relishing its softness. She leaned across the bed, straightening its already immaculate cover, testing the firmness of the mattress with a tentative hand. Then she said, ‘Oh, to hell with it!’ and jumped into the middle of the bed as she had been longing to do since she first entered the room. Forbidden ecstasy, she thought, bouncing up and down on other people’s beds, and how many years was it since she’d done so? She had been seven and not enjoying a stiff tea-party at Sally Armitage’s, until, when tea was over, she and Sally had discovered that the double bed in Mrs Armitage’s bedroom made a superb trampoline, and they’d bounced and leapt with undiminished energy until the arrival of a scandalised nanny had put a premature end to their game. A childhood incident she had not even given a moment’s thought to until now. And the Armitages’ bed had not been nearly as wide and opulent as this one. That’s what this house needs, she thought. It needs children, to fill up the empty rooms and climb the trees in the garden, and even bounce on the beds. But it wouldn’t get them. Even if Antonia was willing to have a child, which Rowan doubted, she couldn’t imagine Carne Maitland opting for that sort of family life.
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