“Yes.”
“Rather elegant?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not very talkative tonight, Damaris.”
“You always pointed out to me and others that I had little to say for myself.”
She laughed. “You were always such a meek child. But you’re supposed to have grown up now. Are you sixteen yet?”
“No, I’m not.”
“Still you will be in the not too distant future. When I think of how I had lived at your age, Damaris, I realise how different we are.”
She came over suddenly and kissed me.
“You’re good, Damaris. You know, I could never be good like you.”
“You make it sound as though there was something rather disgraceful about being good.”
“I didn’t mean it. Sometimes I wish I were like you.”
“Never!” I cried.
“Yes, I do. I wish I could settle down and be good and happy. After all, I have so much, as you are all so anxious to keep telling me.”
“Oh, Carlotta, you’re pretending. Of course you’re happy. Look how merry you were tonight.”
“Merriment and happiness do not necessarily go hand in hand. Still, Damaris, I rather like your Matt.”
“Yes,” I said, “so do we all.”
She bent swiftly and kissed me again.
“Good night,” she said and went out.
I sat looking at my reflection in the mirror and seeing not my own face but her beautiful one. What had she been meaning to say? Why had she come to my room in this way? I thought she had been going to tell me something. But if she was she had changed her mind.
The next day Matt came over to go riding. I was in the garden when he arrived.
He called to me.
“It’s a lovely morning. There won’t be many more like this. Winter is advancing on us.”
Carlotta came out then and when I saw that she was dressed for riding in her dove-grey habit and little blue feathered hat and had evidently expected him, I realised with a twinge of dismay that they must have arranged this the previous evening.
I looked from one to the other and flattered myself that I hid my disappointment admirably.
“Oh … so you plan to take a ride?” I said.
Matt said: “Are you coming with us, Damaris?”
I hesitated. Obviously they had arranged this on their own and he had only asked me to join them because I was here.
I said: “Well, I’m supposed to be doing lessons, and then I was going to deal with the herbs I’ve been drying in the stillroom.”
Was it my fancy or was he relieved?
He said with some alacrity—or perhaps I imagined that—“Well, let’s get going, shall we? Days are getting very short.”
They went off and I went back into the house feeling depressed.
The morning seemed endless. I kept wondering whether they had returned. I went to the stables twice. The horse Carlotta was riding was not there.
It was about four o’clock and they had not returned. I was too restless to remain in the house. I decided to go for a ride. I loved Tomtit and he always seemed to understand my moods. I thought irrationally I might not be as attractive as Carlotta but animals loved me far more than they ever had her. She rode with grace and ease but there was no rapport between her and her horses. She would have laughed me to scorn if she heard me say that. Matt had understood. There was that feeling between him and his horses and with Belle, of course.
As we rode along I thought I heard the sound of a shot. I stopped and listened. Someone potting a hare or rabbit in the woods, I thought. The workers on the land did it often.
Without thinking I allowed Tomtit to lead where he would and took the familiar road to Enderby.
I stopped in a clump of trees and looked at the house. I tried to think of practical things and I thought while Carlotta is here we must talk to her about doing something about the house.
My gaze wandered over the creeper-covered walls, now so beautiful, gleaming reddish in the pale sunshine of an autumn day. I looked towards the fenced-in land close by. It was very silent. The summer was over, there were few flowers left—just a sprinkling of campion and shepherd’s purse, a clump of gorse here and there, and woolly seed heads of thistles and a little roundwort.
So many of the birds had gone now. I saw a sparrow hawk hovering, looking for prey, and heard the sudden cry of a gull.
That meant stormy weather. They flew inland when gales and wind and rain were threatening. I marvelled how they could sense these conditions long before we could. We were about three miles from the sea and whenever we heard the gulls we always said: “Bad weather on the way.”
It was warm for November. What was the old saying: “A cold November, a warm Christmas.” Perhaps it worked the other way too.
As I sat there taking comfort from the contemplation of nature, which I had been able to do from the time I was aware of anything at all, I saw a movement in the fenced-off land. I was not far from the gate and could see through the bars. I remained still and silent, wondering who it was who had ventured there.
It was a man. He came to the gate and unlocked it. I saw that it was my father and that he carried a gun under his arm.
My impulse was to call to him; then I decided not to. Ever since Belle had been trapped there he had shown a disinclination to talk about the land. I decided therefore that I would not let him know I was here. He might wonder why I came. I hid myself among the trees. It would not be easy to explain the impulse which prompted me. So I thought: Let well alone.
I watched him walk away in the direction of the Dower House. Then I continued my ride.
When I returned Carlotta was back from hers. Matt had returned to Grasslands and we did not see him again that night.
The next morning he came over in some consternation.
“Belle has not been home all night,” he said.
I was very concerned.
“It is so unlike her,” he said. “I know she likes to roam about on her own, but she always returns at night.”
“You don’t think she is caught in a trap, do you?”
“Oh, no. Your father has shown his disapproval of them. I don’t think anyone would use them after what happened to the Rooks.”
“Let’s go out and look for her,” I said.
We went everywhere we could think of. We even went into the fenced land and I got the key of the house and we explored that.
They had been Belle’s favourite haunts but there was no sign of her.
It started to rain while we were looking.
“That will bring her in,” said Matt. “She hates the rain.” We went back to Grasslands. Matt went all over the house and grounds calling to Belle, but there was no sign of her.
That brings me to that day when my whole world was turned upside down—a day I cannot bear to think of even now.
The sky was overcast and it was dark when I awoke. It had been raining heavily during the night, and although it had let up for a while, by the appearance of the clouds it would start again at any moment.
Matt came over in the morning.
I saw him coming and called: “Any news of her?”
He shook his head blankly.
Carlotta came down in her riding habit. “Let’s go out and look for the dog,” she said to Matt.
They went off together. I could have gone with them but I declined as I had the previous morning and they made no effort to persuade me.
I could not concentrate on my lessons, and Miss Leveret said: “I think we’d better abandon lessons until that dog is found.”
The day seemed endless again. What had happened to time? The clouds were still heavy but the rain had kept off. I decided that Tomtit could comfort me and, who knew, I might come across Belle. Hurt perhaps, shut up somewhere. It was possible; she had a passion for exploring, she might have crept into some hut and the owner could have come along and locked her in not knowing she was there.