Читать книгу The Frozen Lake: A gripping novel of family and wartime secrets - Elizabeth Edmondson - Страница 16

Where was Perdita?

There were so many girls in the vast nave of York Minster, rows and rows of grey flannel overcoats, a sea of grey hats, each with its purple band. True, they weren’t identical, they came in many different heights and sizes, but then, at that age, girls shot up so, his sister could be inches taller by now.

Craning his neck in his efforts to scan the congregation, he lost his place in the hymn sheet, earning a scornful look from the tall woman in a sensible felt hat who was sitting in the seat next to him as he came in several ‘Noels’ too late. Lord, these were the same carols he’d sung at his school a thousand years ago, did nothing ever change? The carol ended, an invisible choir sang some incomprehensible verses in mediaeval English, a woman with rigid grey hair and a tight mouth, wearing a Cambridge MA gown, ascended the pulpit and began to read the story of the Annunciation.

The service wound to a close, the jolly-looking bishop in gold and pink raised his crook to give the blessing, the organist crashed into the opening chords of Adeste fideles, and the stately procession of senior and lesser clergy, headmistress, servers and choir made its way down the central aisle.

There was Perdita. One of the choir, wearing a white surplice that looked too short for her, her dark brown hair scraped back from her face in a pair of straggling plaits, her face pale and unrevealing as she sang the soaring final descant. He turned his head to watch the retreating backs of the choir. How quickly could he make a getaway? He stuffed the order of service into the rack at the back of the seat in front of him, beside the hymnal and the prayer book, and began to edge his way past his more devout neighbours who were kneeling or sitting with bowed heads in attitudes of prayer.

Dark-overcoated fathers looked at him with scorn, disapproval of his brown tweed overcoat and corduroy trousers written all over their faces. Their wives screwed up their mouths and made little mutterings of dismay at his unmannerly attempts to escape. Then he was at the end of the row and in the aisle, free to make a dash for the action end of the cathedral before he was completely swamped in the wave of schoolgirls pouring out of the front rows.

Polished brown shoes of every size trod on his feet, hockey-trained muscles shoved him out of the way, firm elbows dug into his sides; what a relief to reach a place of safety in front of the choir screen and tuck himself in beside a huge urn of festive greenery. He had kept an eye on the choir as it disappeared into the far reaches of the north aisle; surely all the girls from the choir would pass this way sooner or later.

They did, looking like chesspieces in their purple cassocks, with white surplices now draped over arms or shoulders.

‘Edwin, oh, good, I am so pleased to see you. I wasn’t sure if anyone was coming for me.’ Perdita gestured to her cassock and surplice. ‘I have to put these in the hamper and get my coat and hat. Will you wait here?’

‘I shan’t budge,’ he said. ‘I never saw so many girls in my life, they’re terrifying.’

She smiled her wide smile at him and bounded away.

A giant grey crocodile was forming in the south aisle, with gowned mistresses running up and down like sheepdogs, lining the girls up in pairs and rounding up stragglers. ‘Come along, girls, we have a train to catch. Fiona, put your hat straight. Mathilda, where are your gloves? Deirdre, how many times do I have to tell you not to stand on one leg?’

‘My stockings make me itch,’ said the unfortunate Deirdre, who had been rubbing her shin violently with the edge of her sensible brown leather shoe.

‘Deirdre! Mentioning underwear in public, whatever are you thinking of?’

His breath was visible in the cold air; it hadn’t seemed so very cold at first, but the chill had struck up through the ancient stones, and now his feet were growing numb. His nose was no doubt pink; the parents and girls milling around him nearly all had glowing noses and cheeks.

However warm the overcoats and furs, nothing could subdue the arctic chill of York Minster on a December day. The weather had been unusually bitter, even for the north of England, but he could never remember a time when he had been in the Minster and not felt cold.

Cold as charity. The words mocked him as he looked down the immense length of the nave to where the great west doors stood open and the congregation streamed out into the pale wintry sunlight. Then Perdita was beside him. ‘I’m glad you came to collect me, it’s a gruesome journey by train. Five hours in a stuffy compartment, or sitting on freezing platforms, and I hate having to change trains here, there and everywhere.’

Another of the iron-grey regiment of teachers – grey as to hair and expression rather than in what she wore – was bearing down on them. ‘Perdita Richardson!’

Perdita hastily unwound her arm from his. ‘This is my brother, Edwin, Miss Hartness.’

Eyes sharp with disbelief raked him from head to toe. ‘He looks very old to be your brother.’

He was amused. ‘I think my grandmother let you know I would be coming.’

‘The headmistress received a telegram from Lady Richardson to that effect, I believe. We don’t usually let our girls leave with their brothers. You girls without parents do make difficulties for the school.’

He turned to Perdita. ‘Do you have any luggage?’

The mistress answered for her. ‘The girls’ trunks and boxes were sent by railway two days ago. Perdita has an overnight case.’

Miss Hartness still looked suspicious; did she think he was a fraudster planning to abduct the girl? He was fond of his sister, but the woman should realize that if he had such intentions, he’d pick a dazzler, not a gawky girl like Perdita.

The woman was still talking. ‘Now, I really do think …’

He was spared her probably unflattering thoughts, since at that moment a bird-like figure, elegantly clad in a scarlet coat with a modish hat perched on her sleek head, darted out of the throng. ‘Edwin, darling, are you here to pick up Perdita? This is my Grace, only a baby, her first term at the Ladies College, isn’t it, darling?’

A diminutive girl with her fair hair tied in two tight plaits looked up at her mother with calm grey eyes. ‘Oh, Mummy, don’t call me a baby.’

Edwin kissed the woman, shook hands with the solemn child, who gave him a cool look and then skipped aside to talk to a friend.

‘Hello, Lucy,’ he said. ‘Is Rollo with you?’

‘He’s gone to see where Watkins has got to, it’s always such a mêlée here after the end of term service.’ She leant up to peck him on the cheek. ‘Lovely to see you, darling, they say the lake may freeze from shore to shore, if so, nothing will stop us coming over after New Year. Give my love to Caroline and Henry, won’t you? Goodbye, Perdita, have a wonderful Christmas, of course you will, Christmas is always heaven at Wyncrag.’

Miss Hartness’s expression lost some of its suspicious edge, although her mouth was still set in a tight line. ‘You know Mrs Lambert, I see.’

‘She’s a cousin.’ He could tell that although the mistress was pleased to have a positive identification for him as the genuine article and not a brotherly impostor, she didn’t altogether approve of the vivacious and elegant Lucy Lambert.

‘Very well, Perdita,’ said Miss Hartness. ‘You may go.’

‘Merry Christmas, Miss Hartness.’

He urged Perdita along, as she called out farewells and seasonal good wishes to friends and teachers. ‘Buck up, old girl. We’ve a long drive back to Westmoreland.’

‘Is it true?’ she asked. ‘Is the lake frozen?’

‘Not yet, but Riggs says the frost will hold, and if it does, the lake should freeze from north to south and east to west.’

‘Freeze over completely? I do hope it does, I long for it, every year, but it never happens. Will I be able to skate across to the island?’

‘Certainly you will, and from one end to the other if it freezes as hard as it did last time.’

‘When was that?’

‘The winter before you were born.’ He took her arm again. ‘It seems a long time ago, and here you are, a young lady.’

‘Just a schoolgirl. Not a young lady, sadly.’

‘Why not a young lady?’ They had reached the west door and were out in the cold air. There was the unmistakable smell of coal fires; the jumble of houses along Stonegate and Petergate each had a column of smoke rising into a cloudless sky.

‘It’s all right for schoolgirls to look like I do. For young ladies, it’s hopeless.’

He caught the note of despair behind her even tones.

‘You look very nice to me, old thing.’

‘You’re my brother, you’re used to me. But anyone else would just think, awkward, overgrown schoolgirl.’

‘Who else?’

‘Oh, everyone,’ said Perdita. She changed the subject. ‘Where have you parked the car?’

‘In St Helen’s Square. Not far. Where’s your overnight case?’

‘Our suitcases are all lined up on the pavement beside the motor coaches, over there. Where shall we lunch?’

‘I thought we’d stop at the Fox and Hounds. They do a decent meal there, and I expect you’re hungry.’

They drove north through Boroughbridge and on to the Great North Road. It was cold inside Edwin’s car, and white puffy clouds began to drift across the sky as the easterly wind strengthened.

‘Plenty of snow on the ground already.’ Perdita was glad of the rug that Edwin had tucked around her. She huffed on her fingers to warm them. ‘Is the road clear?’

‘It was yesterday, and it hasn’t snowed seriously for two or three days.’

‘Did you take any photographs on the way?’

‘A few. The light was very strange in the early afternoon, just before dusk. Very clear, good contrasts.’

They sat at a table in front of a roaring log fire at the inn and ate hearty platefuls of ham and leek pie. They were the only customers apart from a couple of local shepherds, and the landlord, a burly man with bushy eyebrows, had time to chat. ‘Blowing up for a bit of a storm, I reckon. Best not linger if you’ve far to go.’

‘Westmoreland,’ said Perdita, scraping the last spoonful of custard from her pudding plate.

Edwin got up from the table, pulling it out so that Perdita could get past. He settled the bill and they bid the landlord and his customers a cheerful goodbye before going out to face the blast of the wind, now blowing from the north-east. It sent flurries of snow dancing around the yard of the inn as Edwin opened the car door for Perdita. He wiped the settling flakes from the windscreen and the small rear window before getting in and coaxing the car back into life.

After a few miles, the skies lightened, and the snow petered out, leaving paths of smooth, unbroken whiteness among the boulders and rocky places. Where the snow lay sparsely, the tough moorland sheep, fleeces thick with ice and snow, searched for tufts to tear away and chew briskly as they eyed the car driving past on the narrow, winding road. There were few other vehicles. They passed a farm cart, the big shire horse placing his huge hooves with care on the uneven surface, his back protected from snow by an old blanket the carter had thrown over him. The driver sat under a battered felt hat, shoulders hunched against the cold, reins bunched in a mittened hand. He gave them a slow salute as he pulled to one side to let them through. A post van came the other way, acknowledging the presence of other people in this desolate place with a cheery hoot of his horn.

Perdita was stiff and very cold by the time they reached Sedburgh, and thankful when her brother suggested they might stop. ‘We can stretch our legs a bit.’

‘You mean you want to take some photographs,’ she said. She scrambled out of the car and stood stamping her feet as she blew on numb fingers.

‘Just the street here, with the dusk coming on, and lights showing in the windows.’

‘A long exposure job,’ said Perdita, who liked to help her brother with his work. ‘Have you got a tripod in the car?’

‘On the back seat.’

The locals went to and fro about their business with hardly a second glance at him as he set up his apparatus. One or two stopped to greet him, and the vicar halted his striding steps for a few minutes’ chat. ‘You’ll need chains further on,’ he said as he went on his way.

Perdita didn’t ask if Edwin had chains. Born and bred in the north, she took cold winters and blocked passes for granted; any driver who ventured out at this time of year without a set of chains tucked away inside the boot was asking for trouble. Edwin would have a shovel, too, and a powerful torch tucked into a pair of gumboots thrust down behind the driver’s seat.

Perdita craned her neck to catch a view of the sky from the car window. It was clear now, and the first stars were out. The car’s powerful lamps cast long beams on to the freezing surface of the road. As the road climbed again, the snow lay more thickly, and they stopped the car to put on chains. From then on it was a snail’s pace journey, snow giving way to stretches of treacherous ice, other icy patches covered by a concealing cover of windblown snow.

‘Grandmama will be cross,’ said Perdita, peering at her wristwatch. ‘We’ll barely be home by eight o’clock.’

‘Late running service in the Minster, heavy snow on the way,’ Edwin said.

‘And no stopping here and there to take photographs. Don’t worry, I shan’t say anything. She’ll blame me, in any case, if we’re late; she always does. Could we have had a puncture?’

‘I did, on the way to York.’

‘There you are, then.’

‘And dinner on the dot or no dinner, I’m not doing anything until I’ve had a hot bath.’

‘You’ll have not to potter,’ warned Perdita, as they finally turned in through the gates of the drive that wound up to the front of the house. She was never sure whether this was the way she liked the house best, a shadowy, gaunt shape, with its improbable crenellations and towers outlined against a starry sky, lights shining out from a few of the large stone windows. Mostly, they were dark, with heavy curtains within keeping the light in and the cold out. A daytime arrival had its own, different charm, revealing the vast array of arches and the ornate details of carving on door and window surrounds. Sir Henry’s grandfather had built the house to his own design after a lengthy visit to the continent, where the Renaissance palaces and Bavarian castles had impressed him equally.

The front door was opening as they drew up, light spilled out on to the broad stone steps and Rokeby came down with stately tread to help Perdita out of the car.

Perdita greeted the butler with enthusiasm. ‘Hello, Rokeby.’

‘Welcome back, Miss Perdita.’

‘I’ll just take her around to the stables,’ Edwin said. ‘Get someone to come out for the suitcases and things, will you, Rokeby?’

The butler bowed, and escorted Perdita into the hall. A fire was lit at one end in an enormous fireplace, and the wall lamps, huge nineteenth-century mediaeval torches, threw light on to the upper part of the walls, where antlered heads twinkled with tinsel and tiny bells.

‘Aunt Trudie’s been at work,’ said Perdita, looking around her. ‘Cheers those gruesome old heads up a bit, don’t you think?’

‘Miss Trudie has achieved a very festive touch,’ said Rokeby, his lips sealed on the subject of the chaos that eccentric lady had caused while touched by the Christmas spirit. Great branches of firs and prickly bundles of holly had been deposited in the Herb Room, a vast, stone-flagged room off the kitchen where the dogs were fed and any untidy work was done on the worn wooden table that ran down its centre. The gardener and his two assistants had been pressed into service; one of the maids, who had deft fingers, had been summoned from dusting duties to make paper flowers; Eckersley had been sent in the large car to buy all kinds of gaudy delights from the nearest Woolworth’s, and even he, Rokeby, had been instructed to make good use of his unusual height and climb up and down ladders to affix garlands and streamers in various inaccessible places.

‘Everyone has gone up to dress,’ he told Perdita. ‘Your trunk has not yet arrived, I dare say the weather has caused some delays.’

‘Oh, I’ll find something. I’d better get a move on, though, I don’t want Grandmama in a temper on my first night home.’

‘No,’ agreed Rokeby, with feeling. ‘Miss Alix is upstairs, she arrived a little while ago and went straight up.’

Perdita’s face lit up. ‘She’s here?’ She made for the stairs and started up them, two at a time.