“Castle Crediton,” I repeated. “Is someone ill there? Lady Crediton?”
“No, the old lady’s as strong as a horse. It’s Mrs. Stretton I’m going to nurse. The Captain’s wife.”
“Oh,” I said faintly.
“Yes, she’s delicate. Our climate I expect. Some lung infection. It wouldn’t surprise me if she is going into a decline. There’s a child, too. I couldn’t resist the job when Dr. Elgin suggested it.”
“When do you … start?”
“Next week.” She leaned over and taking my hand pressed it firmly. “I’ll be near at hand. We’ll see each other often. And don’t forget there are our journals. Have you written in yours recently?”
“I couldn’t, Chantel.”
“You must start at once. I’ll tell you all about Castle Crediton and the strange life of its inhabitants and you must tell me everything that happens here.”
“Oh Chantel,” I cried, “what should I do without you?”
“To repeat oneself is a sign of encroaching age, I’ve been told,” she said with a smile. “But I must say I found such repetition endearing. Don’t be morbid, Anna. You’re not alone. I’m your friend.”
I said: “Everything has changed so abruptly. I have to make plans. The business is rocky, Chantel. I shall have to see so many people — Aunt Charlotte’s lawyer and the bank manager, among others.”
“It’ll keep you busy. Write it all in your journal. I’ll do the same. We’ll make a pact, we’ll tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. And we’ll both have the comfort of knowing we are not alone. We can live our own lives and that of the other.” Her green eyes were enormous. “You must admit, Anna, that that is a very exciting state of affairs.”
“We must never lose sight of each other,” I said.
She nodded. “And we’ll exchange journals so that even when we can’t see each other as often as we’d like to, we shall know everything that is happening.”
“I shall know everything that is happening to you in Castle Crediton.”
“Everything,” she declared solemnly. “Anna, have you ever felt you would like to be a fly on the wall to hear and see everything and no one be aware of you there?”
“Who hasn’t?”
“Well, that’s how it is going to be. You’re the fly on my wall.” She laughed. How she lightened my spirits! And how I was going to miss her!
Ellen, married to Mr. Orfey, came back to say that he had no objection to her coming in in the mornings to give a hand; Mrs. Buckle continued to come in to dust and polish, but she left at four o’clock, and from then on I was alone in the Queen’s House.
It was when the shadows fell that I would find myself brooding on Aunt Charlotte’s death.
I would wake up suddenly from a dream in which I walked down to her room and took the pills from the bottle, to hear myself crying out: “No. No. I did not do it.” Then I would lie still listening to the clocks and it would seem as though they soothed me. It must have happened as Chantel said. There was no other explanation.
I should not brood on the past. Goodness knows the future was stark enough. How was I going to pay Aunt Charlotte’s debts? Many of the pieces which I believed were hers had not been paid for. She had spent far too much of her capital on the Chinese collection; during the last years the business had not been paying its way. Alarming as this was it gave credence to Chantel’s theory. Obsessed by ever-increasing pain, always impatient of inactivity, seeing her debts rising and eventual bankruptcy, she had forced herself — and I knew the extent of her will power — to get out of bed and seek oblivion.
I should have to make some decision. I could not allow things to drift. Indeed I should not be allowed to do so. I formed all sorts of plans. To advertise for a partner with money? To sell out and see what remained? Enforced sales often meant cut prices. If I realized enough to pay my debts I should be lucky. There would be nothing left but the house. I could sell that perhaps. That was the answer.
So my mind raced on during the sleepless nights and in the mornings when I looked at my face in the mirror I would murmur to myself: “Old Miss Brett.”
Chantel came and left her journal for me while she took mine away. She would return with it the next day.
That night I took it up to bed with me and the thought of reading it brought me out of my melancholy. My life was drab, and even frightening, but Chantel as before was my savior. To look in on what was happening at Castle Crediton would give me the respite I needed. Besides I would always be particularly interested in anything that happened in Redvers Stretton’s home.
I felt my spirits lighten a little as I lay back on my pillows and brought the oil lamp — which I had carried up from downstairs — nearer to my bed and started to read Chantel’s journal.
THE CASTLE
5
April 28th, 1887. Today I came to Castle Crediton. I couldn’t help feeling rather pleased with myself. I had a new patient and I should not be too far from Anna. We should see each other frequently. I was going to make sure of that. The Castle I knew was not a real one. “Fake,” Miss Brett had called it, but that meant little to me. It had all the appearance of a castle and I liked driving under the great archway with the gate house overhead. But I never cared for antiquity. I’ll ask Anna about it all sometime, if I ever think of it. The stone walls of the castle looked as if they had been there for centuries. I wondered what had been done to give them that appearance. Another thing to ask Anna — if I ever think of it. As for myself I couldn’t help thinking how pleasant it must be to own such a place — fake or not. There is an air of opulence about it; and I feel sure that this castle will no doubt be more comfortable to live in than the genuine article. I alighted from the station fly which I had engaged to bring me and my belongings from the Queen’s House. I was in a sort of courtyard and there was an iron studded door with a bell beside it, rather like the one at the Queen’s House. I pulled this bell and a manservant appeared.
“I’m Nurse Loman,” I said.
“Her ladyship is expecting you,” he answered. He was very dignified, the perfect butler. I had an idea that everything would be perfect in Castle Crediton — outwardly at least. I went into the hall which I was sure was the one Anna had once mentioned to me. Yes, there were the tapestries she had talked of, and which she had been examining when she had first met her Captain.
“If you will wait for a moment, Nurse Loman, I will inform her ladyship of your arrival.”
I nodded and looked about me, impressed by it all. I thought I was going to like living in a castle. In a very short time the servant reappeared and took me up the stairs to her “ladyship.” There she was seated in her high-backed chair, a tartar, I thought, if ever I saw one and I was glad that she was not to be my patient. I knew from experience that she would be the very worst possible, but she was in perfect health and would scorn illness, thinking, I was sure that it was due to some mental weakness. I can’t help comparing myself with Anna. She would have made an assessment of the treasures of the house, and while their obvious worth did not escape me I included them in my summing up of “grand” and concerned myself with the people. Nursing gives one a very clear insight into people; when they are sick and to a certain extent at one’s mercy, they betray themselves in a hundred ways. One becomes perceptive, and the study of human beings always seemed more interesting to me than that of inanimate objects. Yet I am inclined to be frivolous — at least when I compare myself with serious Anna.