‘I will see you at home.’
She turns quickly before Odette can speak, steps onto thetrain and closes herself into a compartment. A cloud of steam obscures the platform, and then they are moving, splitting, as far divided as they have ever been.
*
Penelope catches Cecilia as soon as she sets foot inside the Gate House. ‘There you are. Come in here and help me with my wardrobe. There is so much that needs altering that I cannot possibly manage it myself. Of course there is no immediate question of leaving this house, but it is wise to be prepared. You would learn that if you were to become a wife. There are a few things that can be sold, just to be sensible of course .?.?.’ Penelope trails off, chattering to herself, always smoothing, arranging, schooling the world to suit the story she must believe.
Cecilia is too jumbled up from the events of the morning to refuse, and she finds her arms full with a mound of dresses and skirts and blouses and jackets, all of which must be examined for wear, for style, for fashion, for what is unbecoming, what is passé. Penelope chatters through it, discussing Leo’s prestige at his firm, the shows she wants to see in town, the poem she thinks Mr Wrexham will write about her.
Once that is done, Cecilia is tasked with sorting through Penelope’s writing desk, piles of correspondence, albums, diaries, pens, cards. Amongst them is a worn photograph album of red leather that Cecilia has not looked at in at least a year. It shows all their summers at Herne House. She opens the cover and leafs through the images that have become as familiar as Lydia’s paintings: Odette and Cecilia in their school uniforms, lined up together at the front door; a sprawling party on the back lawn, George dressed up as Nelson and Leo a diminutive Wellington; George stood proudly by a shy Odette presenting a school prize book; Penelope and Lydia arm in arm in front of a wall overgrown with honeysuckle.
With a pang of regret, Cecilia wishes she had a photograph of Odette’s nineteenth birthday to add to the collection. She should have documented those last moments before they were parted.
At the end of the album, the pictures become older, showing summers from her mother’s youth, which have little interested her before. The only ones she has ever paid attention to are the ones of her father – the man who died before she was born. Her favourite is one of him leaning against the fireplace in the smoking room in Herne House, wearing a waistcoat that she can tell from the pattern must have been brightly coloured. It is only a little detail to hold onto, but it is to Cecilia as though she can conjure a whole man from one small trace.
‘Did you never want to marry again?’ she asks.
Penelope does not look up from the dressing table where she is sorting through her jewellery, but there is a sharpness to the set of her shoulders, a sadness in her voice. ‘No. I loved once and lost it. When you know a love like that, you know there is no love after it.’
Cecilia thinks of Odette and knows that what her mother says is true. If she lost Odette, there would be nothing else left for her. It would be the end of her life.
On the opposite page is a picture of George and Lydia, looking extremely young. Lydia is sitting on George’s lap, and George is kissing her cheek.
Cecilia looks again and stops.
No, it is not Lydia.
She would have thought it was before, when there was no reason to ever doubt it.
But now she has seen Claudine, she has observed the clear differences between the two women.
Claudine is sitting on George’s lap.
Claudine is being kissed by George.
The previous engagement. The estrangement.
Claudine must have been engaged to George, until it was abruptly called off and she went abroad. After that, she was estranged from her sister.
Her sister Lydia, who married George.
Suddenly, Cecilia feels very cold and very frightened of Claudine.
Before Cecilia can lose her nerve, she speaks. ‘Odette mentioned that a shopkeeper in town said Claudine used to be engaged. Years ago, before she went to Europe. Before she became estranged from Lydia.’
Her mother looks at her sharply. ‘Yes. Well. It happens.’
Cecilia’s heart is a painful pressure in her chest. ‘She was engaged to George, wasn’t she?’
Penelope changes in a breath, face distorting into a mask of fear and anger. ‘Never say that again. You have no idea what you are talking about.’
‘It’s true, isn’t it?’
‘What happened in the past doesn’t matter.’
‘If it doesn’t matter, why was it kept secret? What do you know about it?’
For a moment, Cecilia thinks her mother might throw the perfume vials across the room or smash the mirror on the table.