“You implied it…most clearly. That’s what I find so stimulating about you. You always want to know. There is one thing I cannot endure, and that is indifference. Now be prepared for a great surprise. I’ve been to the Brancots’ helping with the garden. Ah, that has shaken you.”
“I—I think it’s extremely kind of you.”
He bowed. “It’s pleasant to bask in the warmth of your approval.”
“You could of course have sent one of the gardeners.”
“So I could.”
“Your tenants will think you a most unusual landlord, working in their gardens.”
“One tenant—one garden—and I didn’t do it as a landlord.” He leaped back into the saddle. “This is too good an opportunity to miss. We’re going for a ride together.”
“I have only an hour to spare.”
He laughed again and as I could do nothing else but move away, he followed me out into the sunshine.
While we walked our horses through the narrow lanes he said seriously: “About Brancots…yes I could have sent one of the gardeners, but old Brancot didn’t want that. There are some malicious people around here. So self-righteous they are. There’s our dear vicar’s wife for one. She believes in justice. No matter how uncomfortable everyone is, justice must be done. She would say that if old Brancot cannot manage the garden he should move to a cottage without one; but he’s lived in that cottage all his life.”
“I understand.”
“And your opinion of me has improved a little?”
“Of course.”
He looked at me quizzically. “Who is to say that I did it to win your approval and not for old Brancot.”
“I’m sure there is no question of it.”
“You do not know me. I have mean, ulterior motives. My ways are devious. You should beware of me.”
“That could very likely be true.”
“I’m so glad you realize it, because you will be much more interested in me for that very reason.”
I thought then: There is no doubt to what he is leading. I must show him quite clearly that he is making a mistake. I was not going to run away simply because the master of the house—well, he was not quite that while Sir William lived—but because he was trying to force his attentions on me. I would show him that he could make no headway with me, nor could he drive me away. For the first time the thought struck me that he might want to drive me away.
We had come to an open stretch of country and he broke into a gallop. I followed, and when he finally pulled up I was not far behind him.
I brought my horse to a standstill and we looked down on the sea together. Ahead lay Dover Castle, gray, impregnable and magnificent, standing like a sentinel guarding the white cliffs as it had for hundreds of years. Dubris—as Roma would have called it—the gateway to England; and there was the remains of the Pharos—Roma again—which had so delighted her, on what was known as the Devil’s Drop, built in green sandstone and Roman brick and cemented together by Roman mortar, which my sister had told me had stood up to the weather for nearly two thousand years. Away to the west was that wonderful formation known as Caesar’s Camp. Invisible now, but I remembered my sister’s taking me along this coast and gloating over the evidence of Roman occupation.
Napier’s thoughts were clearly not with the Romans for he turned to me and said: “Shouldn’t we speak frankly?”
I was brought back to the present. “It would depend on what that would entail.”
“Isn’t frankness always desirable?”
“No, not always.”
“Your husband would not wish you to go on mourning him.”
“How can you know?” I fiercely demanded.
“If he did wish it, it should be easier for you to forget. That would show clearly that he was not worth remembering.”
I was angry—unfairly so perhaps, because he was making me look at what I did not want to see. Of course Pietro would want me to go on remembering him for the rest of my life.
I remembered something else then. There had been at the Paris pension a girl student who had been smitten with an incurable disease. She had had a lover and a sudden vision of their two melancholy faces came to me. They were in my room in the pension and we drank coffee together and talked of love and she quoted the poem which she said she had given to her lover to read when she was dead if he should remember her and be sad.
“No longer mourn for me when I am dead
Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled…”
And it went on:
“…for I love you so,
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot
If thinking on me then should make you woe.”
My eyes filled with tears which I tried to blink away but he had seen them.
“He was an extremely selfish man,” he said brutally.
“He was an artist.”
“Weren’t you?”
“I lacked something. Otherwise I should never have been deterred.”
He leaned toward me: “Caro…no not Caro…that was his name for you. Caroline, you have forgotten sometimes…since you’ve been here.”
“No,” I said firmly. “I never forget.”
“You are not telling the truth. You forget now and then, and the times of forgetting grow more frequent.”
“No, no,” I insisted.
“Yes, Caroline, yes,” he went on. “There is someone here who makes you forget. Why were you not here when I came back. Before…”
I looked at him coldly and prodding my horse, moved away from him.
He was beside me.
“You are afraid,” he said accusingly.
“You are mistaken,” I replied. I was horrified to find that my hands were shaking. I should never ride alone with him again.
“You know I am not. What sense is there is pretending things are what they are not.”
“Sometimes it is necessary, to…accept.”
“I never would.” His voice rang out clearly. “Nor should you, Caroline.”
He cut at some nearby bushes with his riding crop. “There must be a way,” he said.
At that moment I heard a shout from the bushes and Allegra was calling to us. I turned and saw the three girls.
“We’ve come rather a long way,” said Alice almost apologetically. “Then Allegra thought she saw you.”
“Shouldn’t you have a groom with you?” I asked.
Alice looked at Allegra who said: “I dared them.”
Napier had not spoken. He seemed scarcely aware of the girls.
“It’s time we started back,” I said.
And we rode home, Napier and myself ahead; the girls keeping that discreet distance behind us which was so disturbing.
“It’s a beautiful story.” said Alice. “I felt I knew all the people…especially Jane.”
They had been reading Jane Eyre—a task set them by Mrs. Lincroft and they had been commanded to write an essay commenting on the book and comparing it with others.
Mrs. Lincroft had said to me: “Sir William has had a bad night and he’s a little fretful this morning. I feel I should hover over him. Could you go to the schoolroom for an hour or so?”
I had readily agreed, thankful to have something to do. I was disturbed by my conversation with Napier. He was very interested in me, I did not doubt that; what I did doubt was the depth of his emotion. I knew so little of him. But I had to admit that had he been free I might have been eager to discover more; that but for Edith I would have been willing to allow him to show me whether it was possible to forget the past.
“Have you completed your essays?” I asked.