Victoria Holt - The Secret Woman

“And the man whom Johnny saw carrying him?”

“He might have come out on his own before the tablets had had their effect. It’s possible that the two boys were on deck for some time and Edward suddenly began to feel sleepy. Seeing him lying there fast asleep Johnny didn’t know what to do so he invented the Gulli-Gulli man story to get them out of a scrape.”

“It’s the most likely explanation so far, and the most comfortable one. I had to talk to you. I had to.”

“I know,” he said.

“I shouldn’t have come here … disturbing you. It’s most unethical I’m sure.”

He laughed: “My only answer to that is that I’m delighted to see you at any time.”

The door had opened so silently that we were not aware of this until a strident laugh rang through the cabin.

“So I have caught you!”

It was Monique. She looked wild, with her hair half up, half down; she was clutching a red silk kimono about her on which was painted a golden dragon. I could hear the faint gasp as she struggled for her breath.

“Come and sit down, Monique,” said Redvers.

“And join in your tête-à-tête? Make it all cozy, eh? No, I will not sit down. I will tell you this. I will not have it. I will not. Ever since she came into the Castle she has been trying to take you from me. What will she do next, I wonder? I am watching her. I will have her know that you are married … married to me. She may not like it … you may not like it … but it is true, and nothing will alter that.”

“Monique,” he said gently, “Monique.”

“You are my husband. I am your wife. Nothing will change it while I live. Nothing will change it.”

I said: “I will call Nurse Loman.”

Redvers nodded and going to Monique tried to lead her into his bedroom, but she thrashed about wildly and began to shout more loudly, but the more she shouted the more difficult it was for her to breathe.

I ran down to the cabin. Chantel was just coming out.

“Oh Chantel, there’s a fearful scene. I think Mrs. Stretton is going to be very ill.”

“Where is she?” asked Chantel.

“In the Captain’s cabin.”

“Heaven help us,” she groaned, and seizing the case in which she kept her things she hurried off.

I wanted to follow her, but I knew that was unwise. It was the sight of me that had started the trouble.

I went back to my cabin and sat down uneasily, wondering what would happen next.

Monique was very ill, so ill that the nocturnal episode involving the two boys was forgotten. Chantel was constantly up in the Captain’s quarters attending to her. It was the general opinion that the Captain’s wife was on the point of death.

Edward had completely recovered. We told him nothing about his adventure. He merely believed that he had eaten something that had not agreed with him and that it had made him very sleepy as well as sick. He was very excited to have been in the sick bay which gave him a decided advantage over Johnny. As for Johnny he was reprimanded very severely by his mother — of whom he was in great awe — and told that his wisest plan was to forget the whole affair. It was some sort of joke connected with the Arabian Nights’ party and as he had no right to have been there, it could mean that the decision to let him go unpunished might have to be reconsidered. His best plan was, therefore, to forget all about it as quickly as possible.

Besides Edward had a further importance. His mother was very ill.

The atmosphere of the ship had changed. People had changed towards me.

It was inevitable that the fact of Monique’s becoming so ill when she had discovered me in the Captain’s cabin should be common knowledge. Miss Rundle had seized on the information like a jackdaw on a glittering stone. She embellished and garnished in her usual manner and served it up with the special Rundle flair for making the most of juicy titbits.

The discovery of a woman in his cabin had brought on the attack. Poor woman, she had a great deal to put up with. The tales she had heard of that Captain! Miss Rundle didn’t know what the world was coming to. Even among such a small company of passengers there was Nurse Loman far too often in the company of Mr. Rex Crediton and she wondered if the scheming creature hoped to catch him. (What a hope! Miss Rundle had it on good authority that he was all but engaged to the daughter of another shipping magnate.) There was Mrs. Malloy constantly in the company of the First Officer and she with a husband in Australia and he with a wife and two children in Southampton. (This was gospel truth because when Mr. Greenall had shown him a picture of the grandchildren in England, which he was taking out to show the grandchildren in Australia, the First Officer had been trapped into confessing that he was the father of two children himself.) But all this paled against the scandal of that “governess creature” being discovered in the Captain’s cabin by his wife, which had so upset her (poor thing and no wonder!) that she was brought to the point of death. No, she didn’t know what the world was coming to, and with such a Captain what could one expect?

It was certainly unpleasant.

Chantel tried to comfort me. When she came down from the Captain’s quarters she invited me into her cabin. Edward was with Johnny in the charge of Mrs. Blakey; but I was never happy at such times. I felt that I should watch over him always and although Mrs. Blakey was conscientious, I never liked him out of my sight. On the other hand I was afraid of showing my fear and communicating it to him.

“She’s not as ill as she appears to be,” said Chantel. “These attacks terrify people who see them, and they’re awful for the patient. It’s the gasping for breath. But she’ll be all right in a day or so.”

“I do hope so.”

“My poor Anna.” She began to laugh. “You must admit the thought of you as the femme fatale is amusing. But the Captain, I do believe, is as Edith would have said ‘a little gone on you.’”

“Chantel!”

“It’s true. There’s a look in his eyes when he speaks to you. And you too, my dear. Well, of course you did build up an image of him all those years ago. You’re a romantic, Anna. I’ll tell you something else. Dick Callum is rather taken with you too.”

“He’s been very kind to me.”

“But of course you prefer the romantic Captain. Well, he’s not free, but he might be one day. She could go off any day in one of those attacks, and then there’s the lung trouble.”

“Oh Chantel, please don’t talk like that.”

“I never thought, Anna, that you would be one to shy away from the truth.”

“This is all so … so … disturbing.”

Her face was almost mischievous suddenly. “Do you wish you had never come? Do you wish you had gone to that antique dealer to be of assistance for a small remuneration. You’d never have found him … or her … in any case. It’s fate. The way it all worked out. My coming to the Queen’s House, my going to the Castle, and bringing you in. Fate … with a little assistance from Nurse Loman.”

“I didn’t say I wished I hadn’t come.”

“A crowded hour of glorious life

Is worth an age without …”

“… something. I forget which but Wordsworth knew.”

“Attributed to Scott, but it’s by no means certain that he was the author, and it was a name which doesn’t really apply, does it?”

“Trust you to know. But the sentiment is the same. I’d rather have my brief gaudy hour (and there’s another one for you) than live out my drab unexciting days without danger and without fun either.”

“It depends,” I said.

“At least I’ve given you something to cogitate about and have taken your mind from that beastly Miss Rundle. But don’t fret. In a few days our Captain’s wife will be on her feet again. I shall bring her down here as soon as I can so that I can keep my eyes on her and give the poor Captain a rest from her. She’s a fearful trial to him, I believe. But at sea the high drama of one day is forgotten the next. Look how we’ve all recovered from the Edward-Johnny incident It’s scarcely ever mentioned now.”

So once more she had comforted me.

I said suddenly: “Whatever happens, Chantel, I hope that we shall always be together.”

“I’ll arrange it,” she said. “Fate may take a hand — but you can safely leave it to me.”

* * *

Chantel was right. In a few days Monique was as well as she had been when she first came on board. She returned to her cabin next to Chantel and everyone ceased to talk of her imminent death.

Occasionally she sat on deck. Chantel would bring her out and sit with her. Edward would be with them sometimes, to be petted or ignored according to her mood. This he accepted philosophically.

She ignored me, although at times I would find those beautiful dark eyes fixed on me, and it seemed with amusement. I wondered whether she would dismiss me when we reached her home. I mentioned this to Chantel but she said this would not be the case. It was for us to decide whether we should return home or stay. Hadn’t Lady Crediton said so? I was too good with Edward for Monique to want to get rid of me, and there was no malice in Monique. She made scenes because she liked them, and she would be especially grateful to those who gave her cause to do so and I, because of the Captain’s penchant, was in this category.

This seemed to be the case, for one day she asked me to sit beside her on deck and she said, “I hope you don’t take the Captain seriously. He likes women you know. He’s gallant to them all.”

I didn’t know what to reply to that so I stammered that I thought there had been a misunderstanding.

“It was the same when we came over to England. There was a young woman on the ship. She was rather like you. Rather quiet … what is the word … homely. He likes that. It makes him feel so good to be kind to those who must rather specially appreciate his kindness.”

“I’m sure,” I said with some asperity, “we are all very grateful to him, the more so for being unused to such attention.”

She laughed. Chantel told me afterward that she had said she liked me. I had such an odd way of talking which amused her. She understood why the Captain had selected me for his attentions this voyage.

“You see,” said Chantel, “you should not let the gossips worry you. Monique is not like a conventional English woman. I doubt whether Island morals are like those of a Victorian drawing room. She gets angry because she’s passionately in love with her Captain and his indifference maddens her at times. But she likes to see him admired by others.”

“I find it all rather bewildering.”

“It’s your habit of taking everything too seriously.”

“Serious matters should surely be taken seriously.”

“I am not sure.”

“Chantel, there’s not much time left. Everything has changed suddenly. There seems to be an atmosphere of … doom. I’ve felt it since that night when Edward was taken from his cabin.”

“Doom!” she cried.

“Well, I can’t forget what happened. I can’t get out of my mind the fact that someone was trying to kill him.”

“There must be another explanation.”

“The Captain thinks that he found his mother’s sleeping tablets and thought they were sweets.”

“Very likely. He’s an inquisitive young man — always probing here and there. ‘What’s this?’ ‘What’s that?’ And Mamma’s room is an Aladdin’s cave to him.”

“If he and Johnny went out on deck perhaps to peep at the dancing from some place, and he fell asleep and Johnny invented his Gulli-Gulli man …”

“Of course. That’s the explanation. It fits perfectly. When you come to consider it, it’s the only explanation.”

“I wish I could be sure.”

“I feel perfectly sure. So much for your doom. I’m surprised at you, Anna. And you the practical, sensible one!”

“All the same I intend to watch over that child every minute he’s in my care. I shall lock the cabin door at night.”

“And where is he now?”

“In Mrs. Blakey’s care, with Johnny. She feels the same because you see Johnny should never have been allowed to get out. We now lock the cabin doors in the evenings when they’re in bed.”

“That will put a stop to their nightly prowls. Well, we shall soon be saying goodbye to Johnny and his mother and aunt.”

I looked at her sharply. And Rex too, I thought. Did she really care for him? Sometimes I thought she hid things from me.