Castle of Secrets (30 page)

BOOK: Castle of Secrets

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Helena thought
of Mrs Willis and the young man at the ball, and then she thought of Mrs
Willis’s strange words when they had taken tea together
: It was a pity she
was all alone in the world, with no one to miss her when she was gone
and
knew now that Mrs Willis had not been thinking her aunt was an easy target for
wrongdoing, as she had suspected at the time, but had simply been thinking of
her own situation.

Helena
finished her breakfast
and then went to the housekeeper’s room to start on the day’s work. As she went
in, she saw
Le Morte d’Arthur
sitting on her desk, and she picked it up,
meaning to return it to the library, for she had finished it. As she did so,
she thought about the many forms love could take: the courtly love of her book,
Maria’s love for Morton, Simon’s love for Anna, Anna’s love for her son.

And then she
thought about her own love: her love for her parents, her love for Caroline,
her love for her aunt . . . and her love for Simon. She could no longer hide it
from herself; she was in love with him.

She was
crossing the hall when she saw Miss Parkins coming down the stairs. Miss
Parkins was dressed in her outdoor clothes, with a long grey cloak covering her
bony body, and in her hand was a valise.

‘Are you going
out?’ asked
Helena
in surprise.

Miss Parkins
turned calm eyes on her, and
Helena
was surprised at the change in them. They looked human at
last. Her face had smoothed, as though she had been holding herself rigid for a
long time and had finally allowed herself to relax.

‘My time here
is done,’ she said.

‘You don’t
mean you’re leaving?’ asked
Helena
in surprise.

‘I have done
what I promised. I have looked after my lady’s children. Her oldest son I could
not save; he was dead before I made my vow. But her remaining children will now
be happy. Her daughter is rid of a monstrous brute, and her younger son . . . I
blamed him for a time, but now all is forgiven. I have forgiven him, and he has
forgiven himself.’ Miss Parkins walked towards the door, then turned and said:
‘I wish you well.’

There was a
flicker of a smile in her eyes and
Helena
saw in her a completely different person; not a terrifying,
unnatural mannequin, but a devoted woman who had loved her mistress and who had
loved her mistress’s children.

It seemed
strange to think she had been so frightened of Miss Parkins when she had
arrived at the castle, for now she knew that, although Miss Parkins had been
alarming, she had been dangerous only to those who had threatened the
Pargeters, and had been dangerous to
Helena
only whilst she had thought that
Helena
was a threat.

‘And I you,’
said
Helena
. ‘Where will you go?’

‘To my sister.
She lives in
Dorset
. It is where we grew up.
I am looking forward to going home.’

Simon stood on the landing, watching
Miss Parkins through the window as she climbed into the carriage and set out on
her journey. She had been a part of his life ever since he could remember. She
had given him a sense of security in his childhood, for she had always been
there, always the same . . . until the day his sister-in-law had died.

He remembered
how Miss Parkins had blamed him; not for the death of his sister-in-law, nor
even the death of his brother, but for the way Richard’s death had killed his
mother.

But now Miss
Parkins had forgiven him. And she was right, he thought, as he remembered the
words he had overheard, he had forgiven himself. It was as though a great
burden had been lifted from him, and now that it was gone, he could look to the
future again. A future with
Helena
.

He began to
walk downstairs. He had been determined never to fall in love, because love led
to loss, and loss led to pain. But something had happened to him when Morton
had turned the pistol on
Helena
. He had known in that moment that it was impossible to avoid
love, because love had found him anyway. But he had known something else, too:
that, terrible though it would be to lose
Helena
, it would be better than never
having loved her, because the joy and the pleasure of loving her had been worth
any pain.

And now he
wanted to tell her so.

Helena
returned
Le Morte d’Arthur
to
its place on the bookshelves and was about to leave the library when Simon
walked in. He stopped and looked at her with such intensity that her hands
clenched and unclenched themselves. He seemed about to speak, but then he
closed his mouth and walked over to her until he was standing in front of her,
so
close
that the front of his coat was touching the front of her dress. She could feel
the warmth of his breath on her cheeks and she felt as though something
momentous was about to happen.

‘
Helena
. . . there is so much I want to say
to you . . . ’ he began.

She turned up her face to
his expectantly and saw the words die on his lips. His head came closer and her
own tilted in response, and then he kissed her.

And her heart quaked.

‘I suppose it is too much to hope
that the v
illagers
will stop calling you Stormcrow,’ she said, as they walked outside in the
garden some hours later. Though the day was dull, it was fine, and it felt good
to be out of doors.

‘It is. But it
is not a bad name, and when our children are old enough, I will tell them so.’

She looked at
him and he took her hands in his.

‘
Helena
, I’m in love with you.
Will you marry me?’ he said.

‘Yes, Simon, I
will.’

He smiled, a
natural smile, with no shadows in it, then he put his arm around her and they
walked on.

‘A stormcrow
brings warning of a storm, it is true, but it also flies before the storm and,
in the end, outraces it,’ he said. ‘We are all stormcrows, each one of us, for
we all, at some time, bring bad news. But whilst I had to tell my brother that
his wife was dead, and my mother that her son had died, I was also the bearer
of good news, for I told my sister she was free. Our children will have their
own storms and their own sanctuaries in the course of their lives, their own
good news and bad.’

‘And, if they
are lucky, they will find their own loves, as we have,’ said
Helena
.

She thought of
the first time she had seen Simon. She had had no idea, when he had taken her
up in his carriage, that she would fall in love with him. It had come upon her
so slowly that she could not pinpoint the day or the time when it had happened,
but it was now so much a part of her existence that she could no longer
conceive of life without him.

Byron’s poetry
came back to her and she murmured the words softly:

‘A long, long kiss, a
kiss of youth, and love. Each kiss a heart quake.

‘I never thought I would
find it, that kind of love, nor my place in the world,’ she said, ‘but here it
is, at
Stormcrow
Castle
, with you.’

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