"Polly," I said. "I had to get away. You see, he's coming home and he is going to be married."
"What?"
"Lady Harriet is making preparations. She is Lady Geraldine Fitzbrock."
"What a name to go to bed with!"
"She will be Lady Geraldine Framling. I couldn't stay there. She wouldn't want me."
"Not when she sees he's got a fancy for you."
"It was only a passing fancy, Polly. He'd forget all about me if I was not there."
"You'd better get out of that place, I can see. There's always a home for you here."
"That's another thing, Polly. Lady Harriet says he will do something about Fleur."
"What about her?"
"She says they will stand by their rights. She's the grandmother, you see."
"Grandmother, me foot! Fleur's ours. We brought her up. We had her since she was a few weeks old. Nobody's going to take her away from us now. I tell you straight."
"If she took it to court ... all their money and the fact that Fleur is their flesh and blood ..."
"I won't have it. Eff won't either. They wouldn't want all that dragged through the courts ... all about Madam Lavinia's affairs in France. Course they wouldn't."
"Nor would you, Polly. You wouldn't want Fleur to be faced with all that."
Polly was silent for once.
"Oh ... it won't get to that," she said at length.
"They are very determined and accustomed to having their own way."
"Here's someone who's not letting them. But we're talking about you. You know you want to get that Fabian out of your mind. That other one ... well, it mightn't be such a bad idea."
"You mean Dougal?"
"Yes, him. He's a bit of a ninny, but there are the children, and you know how fond you are of them."
"We were great friends really. I liked him very much. But then Lavinia appeared. She was so beautiful, Polly. I think it ruined her life in a way. She couldn't resist admiration. She had to have it from everyone and in the end ... she died."
I found myself telling the story. It all came back to me so vividly. Roshanara ... the Khansamah ... his meetings with Lavinia in her boudoir ... to that last terrible scene.
"She was lying on the bed, Polly. I knew what had happened. She had insulted his dignity and she paid for it in a special way. He gave her a peacock-feather fan. She thought it was because he was contrite and so enamoured of her beauty. But it was the sign of death. That's what it meant. And there she lay with the bloodstained fan at her feet."
"Well, I never."
"You see, Polly, there is a legend about peacocks' feathers.
They are bringers of ill fortune. You remember Miss Lucille and her fan."
"I do indeed. And reason to be thankful for it. I reckon it saved our Fleur's life."
"But getting the jewel cost her lover his."
"I reckon them men would have got him at any time."
"But it was when he was taking the fan to have the jewels set in that it happened. Lucille believed it was the ill luck of the fan."
"Well, she was off her rocker."
"I know she was unbalanced ... but it was due to what happened to her."
"You want to get rid of all them fancy ideas about fans."
"But it means something to them, Polly. They are a strange people. They are not like us. What seems plain common sense here is different there. Dougal found there was a legend about peacocks' feathers. The Khansamah must have believed it, for he gave Lavinia the fan and when he killed her he laid it at her feet. It was a sort of ritual."
"Well, let them think what they like. A bundle of feathers is a bundle of feathers to me, and I can't see anything to frighten yourself about that."
"Polly, I have the fan. At one time my father ... and others ... thought Dougal would ask me to marry him. They all thought it would be good for me."
"He'd have shown a lot more sense if he had asked you, and I'm not sure you wouldn't have shown some if you'd said yes. He might not be all that you'd want ... not one of them dashing heroes ... he might be just a timid little man ... but he's not so bad, and you can't have everything in life. Sometimes it's best to take what you can get ... providing it's all right in the main."
"He didn't want me when he saw Lavinia. It was as though he were bewitched. He didn't see me after that. I was interested in what interested him, as my father was. He enjoyed being with us ... talking to us ... and then he saw Lavinia. He had seen her before, of course, but she was grown up and he saw her afresh. He forgot any feeling he might have had for me. You see, it's a sort of pattern."
"I shall begin to think you're going wrong in the head. What's all this got to do with fans?"
"I think, Polly, that I shall never be happy in love because I took the fan. It was in my possession for a while. That is what Miss Lucille believed ... and it seems as if ... you see."
"No, I don't see," said Polly. "This isn't like you. I always thought you had some sense."
"Strange things happen in India."
"Well, you're not there now. You're in plain, sensible England, where fans are just fans and nothing else."
"I know you're right."
"Of course I'm right. So don't let's have any more of this nonsense about fans. I reckon that fan done us all a good turn. When you look at young Fleur now and think what she was like at that time ... it makes me tremble all over now to think of it. So you're not going to marry this Dougal?"
"He hasn't asked me yet, Polly."
"Looks like he's just waiting for a shove in the right direction."
"I shall not do the shoving."
"Well, you'd have a grand title, wouldn't you? I never thought much of them myself, but there's plenty as do."
"I wouldn't want to marry for that, Polly."
"Course you wouldn't. But he seems a nice enough fellow. All he needs is a bit of pushing and you'd be rather good at that. And there's the children, too. They're fond of you and they'd have you as their mum. I reckon that's what they'd like."
"They probably would, but one doesn't marry for that reason."
"You're still thinking of that old fan. You're thinking it's going to be bad luck and nothing will go right while you have it. Here. Wait a minute. Come into the kitchen. I want to show you something. Just a minute. I'll go and get it."
I went into the kitchen. It was warm, for the fire was burning. It always was, for it heated the oven and the kettle was always on the hob.
Within a few minutes Polly came in; she was carrying the case that contained the peacock-feather fan.
She took it out and unfurled it.
"Pretty thing," she said.
Then she went to the fire and put the fan into the heart of it. The feathers were immediately alight—their deep blues mingling with the red of the flames. I gasped as I watched it disintegrate.
Nothing was left of it but the blackened frame.
I turned to her in dismay. She was looking at me half fearfully, half triumphantly. I knew she felt unsure of what my reaction would be.
"Polly!" I stammered.
She looked a little truculent. "There," she said. "It's gone. There's no need to worry about that any more. You was getting worked up about that fan. I could see it was beginning to get a hold of you. You was expecting things to go wrong ... and somehow that's often a way of making them. It's gone now ... that's the end of it. We make our own lives you know. It's got nothing to do with a bunch of feathers."
I had been in the park with Mrs. Childers and Fleur, and as soon as we returned Polly came hurrying into the hall, Eff just behind her. Polly looked anxious. Eff excited.
Eff called, "A visitor for you, Drusilla." And then, in a high-pitched, overawed sort of manner, she added, "In the parlour."