Brunswick Gardens (28 page)

“More so!” Tryphena said instantly, stopping and turning where she stood so she faced Charlotte. “But it is only a tiny beginning. There are far greater freedoms we cannot legislate for. Freedom from the convention of ideas, from other people deciding what we shall want, what we shall think, even what will make us happy.” Her voice was rising and sharp with emotion. She stood in the sunlight stiff with anger, her black dress pulling across her shoulders. “It is the whole patriarchal order of society which oppresses us. If we are to be free to use our intellectual and creative abilities, and not merely our physical ones, then we must be freed from the rigid ties of the past and the moral and financial dependence we have suffered for centuries.”

Charlotte had seldom felt shackled or dependent, but she was honest enough to know that few women had marriages as satisfying as hers, or that granted them as much freedom. Because of the difference in their social background, she and Pitt were more equal partners than most. Because of Pitt’s toleration of her either helping or meddling with his cases, depending upon one’s point of view, she had a variety and interest in her life, and a fulfillment of far more sides of her nature than domesticity alone could have given. Even Emily, with her money and position,
was frequently bored by the narrowness of her acquaintances and limitations, the sameness of one day to another.

“I think we shall change things only a small step at a time,” she said diplomatically and realistically. “But we can ill afford to lose people like Miss Bellwood, if she was all I hear.”

“She was far more!” Tryphena responded quickly. “She not only had a vision, she had the courage to live it through, no matter what the cost. And it could cost dearly.” The impatience and the contempt crept back into her face, and she started to walk across the grass, not with any direction but simply for the release of movement. “But that is the courage to face life, isn’t it? To grasp hold of it and cling to it even if at times it stabs you to the soul.”

“You mean her death?” Charlotte kept up with her.

Tryphena turned away, a shadow over her face. “No, I mean life itself, the living of it. She had the bravest heart of anyone I know, but those who love passionately can be hurt in ways lesser people cannot even imagine by those who are unworthy of them.” She jerked her body angrily, as if thinking of the people and the lives behind them, and dismissing their feelings as superficial.

Charlotte wanted intensely to say the right thing. She must not anger Tryphena, nor allow her curiosity to betray itself. Had Tryphena known Unity had been with child? She must say something intelligent, sympathetic, something to prompt a continuing confidence. She kept pace with Tryphena, step for step across the grass towards the gravel path by the herbaceous border, its flowers still little more than dark mounds in the damp earth, a few green shoots here and there.

“Well, if there were not pain in it, and no risk,” she mused, “then anyone would do it. It would hardly need someone special.”

Tryphena said nothing. Her face was sunk deep in thought, and perhaps memory.

“Tell me something about her,” Charlotte said at last as they
reached the path and their boots crunched on the gravel. Subtlety was not going to work. “She must have been much admired. I expect she had many friends.”

“Dozens,” Tryphena agreed. “Before she came here she lived with a whole group of like-minded people who believed in freedom to live and love each other as they chose without the superstitions of society, and the hypocrisies, to limit them.”

Charlotte thought it sounded more like license, but she refrained from saying so—what was freedom to one person frequently appeared selfishness and irresponsibility to another. Some of the difference was merely the passage of time—and having children of one’s own for whom one could see all the dangers of the world; the desire to protect them was overwhelming.

“It takes a lot of courage,” she said aloud. “The risks are great.”

“Yes.” Tryphena stared at the ground as they walked, very slowly, along the path to the shallow steps. “She spoke about it sometimes. She told me of the sense of exhilaration they had, how intense passion could be when it is utterly true, no law binds you, no superstitious dread holds you or inhibits you, no rituals make you wait or try to hold you in an anchor after the fire and the honesty had gone out of it.” There was such bitterness in her voice, such a depth of emotion, that Charlotte could not help wondering at Tryphena’s own experience of marriage. She glanced at her and saw no softness in her eyes or mouth, no warmth in her memories at all. Had she wanted the marriage herself? Or was it something arranged by her family, and she had agreed to it, willingly or unwillingly?

“It is all so”—Tryphena furrowed her brow, looking for the word—“so … clean! There is no pretense.” Her eyes became fierce, her lips pressed together. “No ownership by one person of another, no slow eating away of independence, of self-esteem and the knowledge and beliefs of who you are. Nobody says ‘You must think this way, because I do.’ ‘You must believe that, because I do.’ ‘This is where I want to go, so you must
come, too.’ A marriage of equals is the only sort that is worth anything! It is the only sort which has honor or decency or any inner cleanliness.” Her fists were clenched at her sides, and her arms seemed locked right up to her shoulders. “I will not be second-rate … second-class … worth only second-best!”

Charlotte wondered if Tryphena had any idea how much of her own hurt she betrayed in her words. Some of this might be Unity’s thoughts, but the passion was Tryphena’s. “I think if somebody loved you, they would want you to be the best you possibly could,” Charlotte said gently, walking up the steps beside her. “Isn’t that what love is, wanting someone to fulfill all the best in themselves? But then you would want the same for him, wouldn’t you? And be prepared to give something that might cost you quite a lot, to that end?”

“What?” Tryphena turned her head, looking surprised.

“If you love, you stay, even when it isn’t convenient, or fun, or easy,” Charlotte elaborated. “If you leave the moment you no longer feel like staying, isn’t that simply selfishness? You are talking about freedom to please yourself, freedom from hurt or boredom or duty. Life is about giving and being vulnerable, which is precisely why it needs both courage and self-discipline.”

Tryphena stared at her, stopping on the gravel close to the glasshouse. “I don’t think you understand at all, Mrs. Pitt. You may think you are a fighter for freedom, but you sound just like a traditional woman who is prepared to do exactly as her father and then her husband tell her to.” Her words were so angry they had to come from her own experience. “People like you are the ones who really hold us back. Unity truly loved, and she was terribly hurt. I could see it in her eyes, and sometimes catch it in her voice.” She looked at Charlotte accusingly. “You are speaking as if she were selfish, as if her kind of love were less than yours, just because you are married and she wasn’t. But that is blind and false and utterly wrong. You don’t win great victories by playing safe!”

The scorn in her face now was as plain as the sunlight across the grass. “I am sure you meant to be kind, and I daresay you thought you supported the women of the new age, but you really haven’t any understanding whatever.” She shook her head sharply, the wind catching the stray pieces of her fair hair. “You want to be safe … and you can’t be … not if you are fighting a great battle. Unity was one of the finest and the best … and she fell. Pardon me, but I don’t want to talk about her to you anymore.” And with that she turned and walked stiffly into the rose arbor, head high as if she were struggling against tears.

Charlotte remained where she was for several minutes, thinking over the conversation. Did Tryphena know of one real tragedy in Unity’s past, or was she being melodramatic? Had Unity loved someone intensely, and was the result of that love the child she had been carrying when she died? The child of one of the three men in this house?

Had she been hurt by this man? If so, she would not be the first to retaliate blindly out of pain and fear. Was she afraid? Most women would be terrified of the ruin unmarried motherhood would bring them, but Charlotte had no idea whether that was true of Unity or not. If Pitt had explored that, he had not told her. But then perhaps he could not imagine the emotions a woman might feel: the mixture of elation at knowing of the life within her, that it was part of the man she loved, in a sense an indissoluble bond between them; and yet also a reminder of him she would never lose, and with it a reminder of his betrayal of her … if he had betrayed her!

And then there was the fear of childbirth itself, of being left alone at one’s most vulnerable both emotionally and physically. Charlotte could remember how she had felt when carrying each of her children. She had been radiantly happy one day, and plunged into misery another. She remembered the excitement, the aching back, the tiredness, the clumsiness, the pride, the self-consciousness. And she had had parents who were steady
and calm, and a husband who made her laugh and kept his patience most of the time, when it mattered—and the approval of society.

Unity would have been alone. That was altogether different.

Had she tried to blackmail him? It would be understandable.

Charlotte started to walk back to the house, wondering about Dominic and about the love by which Unity had apparently been so hurt in the past. Perhaps knowing that would prove who the father was—and that it was not Dominic.

Or that it was.

That was a cold, sickening thought. What did she think of Dominic that she feared to find that out? And, she was afraid, the feeling was sharp and far too familiar to deny. She could remember being in love with him herself, and behaving stupidly, feeling so vulnerable, hurting when he seemed to ignore her, floating on air if he smiled or spoke, being consumed with jealousy if he favored someone else, dreaming, imagining all kinds of things. She blushed hot to think of it now.

But that was what obsession was like, the kind of love which is all in one’s own mind, not the kind that is sure and sweet, as she had with Pitt. That had its pain and its darkness as well, its racing pulse and burning embarrassment, but it was rooted in reality, in sharing thoughts and ideas and, above all, feelings about the things that cut the deepest.

She came through the side door into the short passage to the hall. At this point the floor was carpeted, and her feet made no sound. She saw Dominic and Vita standing near the foot of the stairs, close together, almost touching. They stood just about where Unity must have lain when she fell. Vita was looking up at him, her eyes wide, her expression filled with softness as if she had just said something private and very tender. He moved his hand to touch her, then changed his mind and smiled, then he stepped back. She hesitated a moment, then, with a little shrug, went lightly up the stairs.

Charlotte’s mind raced. How could Dominic be so incredibly
foolish, so dishonest? Vita was older than he, but she was also charming, beautiful, and acutely intelligent, a woman of passion and wit. He could not possibly be considering having an affair with her, could he? Not the wife of his mentor, his friend, the man in whose home he now lived?

Was it possible?

The past crowded in on her too closely with all its remembered pain and disillusion. It was imaginable … it was possible. Was it Dominic that Unity had fought with at the top of the stairs? Was it conceivable Vita would lie to protect him?

No. No, because others had heard Unity cry out to Ramsay. Tryphena had heard it, as had both the maid and the valet. She felt relief flood through her.

Dominic turned around. There was no embarrassment in his face, not even any awareness that he had been seen in a situation far better to have remained private.

“I’m sorry I left you,” he said with a slight smile. “It was an urgent matter. I am afraid the Reverend Parmenter is not able to care for things as he does normally.” His face was shadowed with concern. “Mrs. Parmenter says he is not at all well. He has the most severe headaches. I suppose that is not to be wondered at, poor man.” He looked at her ruefully. “It’s odd, but I can remember the Cater Street tragedies in retrospect with far more understanding than I think I had at the time.” He was close to her now and spoke very quietly. “I wish I could go back and improve the way I behaved then, show more sensitivity to other people’s fears and pain.” He sighed. “And that’s absurd, because I don’t even know how to help this now. The only thing I can say is that I am trying, whereas I thought only of myself then.”

She did not know what to say. She longed to believe him, but that look on Vita Parmenter’s face prevented her … she hesitated now to use the word
love.

She turned away so he should not read her eyes, and started
to walk towards the withdrawing room. It was five minutes before teatime.

    Tea was actually served nearly ten minutes late, and Vita was not present. It was left to Clarice to host the small gathering and to try to make some sort of conversation. Tryphena was there, but she made no effort to entertain Charlotte. Mallory came in, picked up a dainty sandwich and ate it in two mouthfuls, not bothering with a cup of tea. He stood restlessly by the window, as if feeling restricted in the room but obliged to stay. It was almost certainly not the house but the circumstances which imprisoned him, but those were beyond escape.

Clarice surprised Charlotte by talking both tactfully and interestingly on a number of subjects. She touched on the theater as if the recent death in the house were a normal happening, to be expected in the course of events of life, and there was no need or purpose in speaking in hushed voices or avoiding any mention of happiness or glamour. She referred to a recent visit of foreign royalty written of extensively in the
London Illustrated News.
She drew Charlotte into the conversation, and for nearly three quarters of an hour it would have been perfectly possible to mistake the occasion for a most agreeable afternoon call between people who were newly discovering each other and might become friends.