The Distant Kingdom Page 33

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Marcus, who was waiting for her in the hall, trying not to resent her absence, realized at once that something had happened to help her. The sound of her step was lighter, her breath quicker, and her voice no longer dragged. He almost thought there was a smile in it as he felt her kneel by his chair and heard her say:

  ‘Marcus? Have you been back long? I hope you haven’t been waiting for me.’

  He put out a hand to touch her face, and Charles, who was standing behind her, had to clench his fists to stop himself reaching out to push that trembling hand away. He had never forgotten – could never forget – the sight of Perdita’s face when she had discovered her husband’s homosexuality. It seemed outrageous that this man who had rejected her so painfully should touch her now.

  Marcus sensed him standing there, or deduced his presence from the small sounds he made, and said:

  ‘Byrd? That was good of you. Thank you for taking her out for me.’

  It took a supreme effort for Charles to say only:

  ‘Not at all. I enjoyed it.’ But he could not watch them any more and, thanking Perdita for her company, he walked away to his room, resolving to move out of Whitney House as soon as he could.

  He had leased his old bungalow when he first arrived at Simla but had yielded to Edward’s pressing invitation to stay at Whitney House. They had been glad of each other’s company, and Charles had come to have enormous admiration for his host, but now he would have to go.

  When he announced the decision at dinner that evening, he could not but be glad of the sudden shock on Perdita’s face, but when Edward urged him to stay, he said, keeping his eyes on her face:

  ‘It’s very good of you, sir, but I think I ought to move back to the bungalow. For one thing, it might make me do more work.’

  ‘Of course, Charles; whatever you wish. But I hope you will continue to look on this house as your home and not desert us completely.’

  ‘I could never do that,’ he answered, looking away from Perdita to her father. ‘You have been so good to me, sir, I can never thank you enough.’

  ‘Nonsense. I was glad to have you here,’ said Edward, wondering very much what had happened that afternoon. It was clear, even in Perdita’s current state, that whatever she felt or did not feel for her husband, she loved Charles Byrd. In spite of that, Edward did not think she would ever leave Beaminster, and he would have been disturbed if she had.

  He had been furiously angry when he had discovered from Charles Byrd the truth about her husband’s friendship with James Thurleigh, but in the face of Beaminster’s appalling injuries, the anger had died. Looking at him now, Edward wondered how he could have been so unaware of his son-in-law’s true nature. It seemed so obvious and explained so many things that had puzzled him – Beaminster’s very presence in India with a commission in a dull, middle-class regiment, his choice of so unlikely a wife, his mother’s extraordinary acquiescence in that choice – and he cursed himself for his blindness.

  He looked carefully at his daughter and thought that her face was at last beginning to come alive again. Blessing Charles Byrd silently, he believed she might now be able to overcome whatever it was that troubled her so much.

  But that night he heard her crying in her room. Seizing his dressing gown, he went quickly in to her, and, standing by her bed, said gently:

  ‘Perdita, is there anything I can do to help?’

  She sat up, blew her nose and apologized.

  ‘No, Papa. I am sorry I disturbed you. It is perfectly stupid to weep like this now, but I can’t stop.’

  ‘The war must have been very frightening indeed, and I can understand that it will take you time to forget; but it is over now. Nothing like it will ever happen to you again. You are safe now. I promise you that, my dearest child.’

  ‘Papa, I wish I were a child again. Then you could change my fears with a word like that. But there isn’t anything you could say that would alter what happened in Afghanistan. When I become more accustomed to the memory of it all, I shall be better.’

  He thought that, in spite of what she said and her thirty-two years, she looked very childish in her white frilled nightgown with her hair hanging in thick plaits on either side of her face. But she was far too pale and there were enormous dark circles under her big eyes. He kissed her brow and she smiled at him with some of the old sweetness.

  ‘I am glad you were here for us to come home to. I don’t think I could have gone on alone for much longer.’

  He let her go and put one strong, square hand under her chin.

  ‘Perdita, I think you could do anything at all. It is clear from what Beaminster has told me that without you he and the children would have died.’

  Her swollen eyelids dropped and she said wistfully:

  ‘Has he said anything to you of James Thurleigh?’

  ‘Only that he died in a rockfall on the road to Jellalabad. It must have been horrible for you to find him like that,’ he said, thinking that perhaps that was what worried her so. ‘And Marcus must be sad to have lost so old a friend. But you must not look so tragic. Perdita. Your safety and Charlie’s will more than make up for that.’

  She looked at him in surprise. It seemed amazing that he should not have known

  ‘But he loved him. Marcus only married me so that he could stay in India with James Thurleigh.’

  Edward seized the opportunity to try to repair some of the damage her husband must have done to her:

  ‘Young men, especially soldiers out here, often have such sentimental friendships. They believe that they would die for each other as gladly as they would die for England. They think that no warmer passion could possibly exist than the comradeship between them. But the day almost always comes when they discover what it is like to love a woman.’

  Perdita shook her head.

  ‘Not Marcus. He loved James.’

  ‘As much as Charles Byrd loves you?’

  ‘I don’t know, I didn’t know you knew. Yes, I think so. I don’t know,’ she repeated, confused and anxious.

  ‘Well, don’t worry about it now. You and the children and Marcus are all alive and that is what matters most. Try to sleep now.’

  The next morning, Perdita spent an hour with the children before the adults’breakfast was served in a small room off the hall. When she got there she found both Edward and Marcus waiting for her, and she hurried to hand her husband a cup of tea, guiding his fingers into the handle. He thanked her and asked:

  ‘Did you sleep well, my dear?’

  ‘Not very, Marcus. I seem to remember too much. You?’

  ‘Better than before, I think,’ he said with a little smile, ‘though it often seems hard to believe that we won’t wake up on a cold mud floor with that dreadful jar in the corner.’ His smile broadened and she thought he looked genuinely amused.

  ‘I suppose in the end we may be able to laugh at a lot of it.’

  ‘If we don’t, we shall never be able to forget the rest.’

  ‘That sounds very sane, Marcus. And very brave. Oh, I am sorry, I’ll do that.’ She leaned forward to take his cup and refilled it. When he had finished that and eaten most of a thin piece of bread and butter, he sat back. Perdita put down her own cup.

  ‘What would you like to do today, Marcus?’

  ‘Your father has to go down to Sabathoo for a couple of days and has invited me to go with him. I think I should like to go if you have no objection.’

  ‘I? Good heavens no. When do you expect to return?’

  ‘Probably in about three days’time,’ answered her father. ‘Would you care to come with us? The children would be quite happy with the servants and Byrd could keep an eye on things if you would like to come.’

  ‘I think not, thank you. I need to spend more time with the children. And in any case, Charles is moving into his own house today, isn’t he?’

  ‘So he is. Well, that’s probably just as well if you’re going to stay here without us.�
�� He turned to Marcus. ‘Shall you be ready to go in about an hour, Beaminster? I’d like to get there while it’s still light.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  They both left the breakfast room, and when she was alone Perdita made herself eat a small piece of buttered bread. It tasted like raw cotton and she found it very hard to swallow, but she gradually choked it down and finished her tea. Then she went down the passage towards the day nursery at the back of the house.

  Passing the library, she glanced through the open door to see Charles sorting his books and papers into a vast box. She thought him oblivious of everything but his packing, but as she stood in the doorway he lifted his head and smiled at her. When she smiled back, he got up from the table and came out into the passage to her.

  ‘Will you ride with me again today, Perdita?’

  ‘I meant to spend the day with the children. I have neglected them in seeing to Marcus.’

  ‘Nonsense,’ he said robustly, ‘they are happy enough with their ayahs, and you must have time to yourself occasionally. Let me take care of you for a while. Ride with me this afternoon? If we leave directly after tiffin, we’ll avoid everyone else.’

  Remembering what he had given her the day before, she could not resist the temptation and so she nodded.

  ‘Good. I’ll order the ponies for three o’clock. It will be very stuffy, but that will be better than riding in a crowd.’

  ‘Thank you, Charles,’ she said and went on to find the children, who greeted her with demands for stories and favourite games.

  As she played with them she was pleased to see how much they at least had recovered. Their faces had already filled out again, and she thought that they must be beginning to forget. But when at last she picked herself up off the floor to leave the nursery, Charlie clung to her legs and Annie wept.

  Perdita could not bring herself to leave them like that, and so she sent one of the servants with a message to Charles and ordered her tiffin to be served in the nursery with the children’s.

  They were all three settling down at the round table in the big bow window, when Charles appeared at the door of the nursery. Perdita saw him and said at once:

  ‘Charles, I can’t leave them. I’m sorry.’ She was relieved when he smiled.

  ‘I know. But will you let me eat with you here instead?’

  ‘Of course,’ she answered and sent one of the servants for another chair.

  Charles sat down beside her and proceeded to entertain the two children with wildly apocryphal tales of his adventures around the world. Perdita listened in growing amusement and watched the two children’s faces light up with interest and excitement. During one interval, she said:

  ‘Charles, it is easy to see you’re part of a large family. I haven’t seen these two so well entertained before. Don’t you miss your brothers – and your mother?’

  ‘Occasionally. But the gap they left was filled when …’ He stopped, remembering the hovering servants.

  ‘What’s a gap. Uncle Charles?’ asked Annie, interested.

  ‘An empty space, Annie. Like the space that is left when someone you like very much is far away.’

  ‘So will there be a gap here when you go to your house.’

  ‘I hope so. Will you miss me?’

  ‘Oh, yes, even Mama doesn’t tell stories like yours.’

  They both laughed, and, Charles said:

  ‘Perhaps Mama will bring you to my house so that I can tell you some more. I hoped that she would come and see it today, to help me arrange all the things I have bought for it, but she says …’

  Charlie interrupted truculently:

  ‘Mama is going to take us riding this afternoon.’

  ‘Couldn’t we all go together?’ suggested Charles, thinking that if Simla became accustomed to the sight of him with her children, there might be less scandal if he were seen alone with her.

  The children considered and then agreed, and later they all went to Annandale, where they were quickly accosted and questioned about their experiences. This time, Perdita parried the curiosity better, and when the questions became more than she could bear turned them aside by speaking of all the thousands who had died. Her questioners were always shamed into silence by that.

  Charles watched her and started to think that in spite of having to share her the afternoon was not quite wasted: every step she took back into ordinary life was helping her. But once she turned to him in desperation and he saw what the effort was costing. Quickly he rounded up the children and took them all home.

  The next day was better. Charles called at Whitney House and persuaded Perdita to ride with him without the children, and although the lowering sky presaged rain, she agreed to go up to the small empty meadow of their first ride together.

  She was silent as they rode past the last houses, and hoping to bring some relaxation to her drawn face, Charles said:

  ‘I really like your father.’ She turned to him, quickly smiling.

  ‘So do I. I’m glad that you had a chance to know him.’

  ‘He is very generous, isn’t he? And very good company. When I arrived here, incoherent with anxiety for you, I don’t know how I’d have carried on without him.’

  ‘Charles,’ she said in a questioning tone.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Why did you stay and wait for us? After what you said at Baba’s tomb, I thought I should never see you again.’

  ‘I know. And I meant to stay away, but when I heard what had happened, I couldn’t.’ He said nothing more until they turned off the road up to their valley. Then he went on: ‘It seemed to me then that I ought either to have forced you to leave with me, or stayed with you. I knew how frightened you were. I think I even knew that some terrible catastrophe was going to overtake the army. But I was so damnably jealous of Beaminster that I left you to face it all alone.’

  ‘Oh, Charles.’

  ‘When the news began to trickle through – when we heard of the deaths, and the shocking, stupid, wicked shambles of it all, I began to feel as though I had murdered you myself.’

  The sudden jerk of her hands pulled her pony to a halt; surprised, Charles stopped too and backed his animal until it stood beside hers.

  ‘What is it, Perdita?’

  For some reason his words had made her think that the chasm was not quite as deep or as wide as she had thought. Gathering up her courage and her faith in his feelings for her, she turned to say:

  ‘I did murder someone.’

  He was so surprised that he stared at her, mute and unmoving. But she kept her eyes on his and then said deliberately:

  ‘I killed three men, Charles.’

  ‘You went through a war. Men are always killed in war.’ He dismounted and came to stand at her stirrup, looking up at her. ‘It isn’t murder in wartime, Perdita.’

  She put one of her hands down to take his and said:

  ‘One of them was.’

  ‘Come and tell me about it,’ he said, leading her pony and his own up the last few yards into the small, green valley. ‘Tell me about the other two first.’

  ‘One was the Afghan who put out Marcus’s eyes. He was only a boy, Charles, and I killed him.’

  ‘How?’ Somehow it seemed important now to make her tell him everything, any details she remembered.

  ‘He had a knife and I took it from him and stabbed him, again and again.’ Her voice was dully neutral and her eyes were blank. His first reaction was horror that she should have had to do anything so terrible; his second, admiration that she had done it.

  ‘He was your enemy; he had just blinded your husband. Surely his death doesn’t torment you?’

  ‘Not really, although he was only a child.’

  ‘And the other? Who was he?’

  ‘James Thurleigh.’

  Completely astonished, Charles protested:

  ‘But he was killed in a landslide after an earthquake. Your husband told me so.’

  ‘It didn’t kill him; only broke
his back and trapped him. We couldn’t have moved him and he asked me to do it. I am still glad for him that I did, but I can’t forget that he was Marcus’s dearest friend and that I killed him. I cant look at Marcus without remembering that and asking myself what he would say if he knew.’

  ‘It must have taken great courage, Perdita,’ said Charles quietly ‘and if Marcus knew, he would be grateful.’

  She turned on him suddenly:

  ‘Don’t tell him. Promise me you won’t tell him. He mustn’t know.’

  ‘Hush, hush. Of course I won’t tell him. And the third?’

  She had just begun to tell him about Lieutenant Flecker when the first of the rain began to fall, but she hardly noticed it. Charles did, but he was too relieved to hear her speak at last of the things that troubled her so badly to mind getting wet. He listened to her account of the rape of her groom’s sister and its sequel, and when she was silent again, he said without moving:

  ‘Perdita, that was not murder either. You could not have known what the girl’s family would do and you cannot be responsible for their barbarism.’

  ‘But it was only because of his death that we are alive now. I bought my life with his death.’

  ‘Not knowingly. Oh, my lovely, lovely one, you must not torture yourself for that. Come, you must be wet through; let me take you back now.’

  She looked upwards, vaguely, as though only just aware of the rain that had been pouring down and soaking through their clothes. She brushed her hand across her eyes and got up. She hardly noticed how the dark blue skirt of her habit clung to her legs; she had been so much wetter and colder that this seemed to be nothing. But Charles noticed.

  ‘Perdita, you will catch a most dreadful chill. Will you come to the bungalow to dry off? I’ll take you home later.’

  ‘All right,’ she said, too exhausted by the effort of speaking of what was on her mind to think of anything else.

  They rode in silence back to the town, and up to his little bungalow. The storm had kept everyone else indoors and so they met no one on the way. When they reached the house, he said:

  ‘I’m afraid it’s in a shocking mess. The servants have not arrived yet and I’ve only half unpacked.’