‘Soon, soon. Will you be so very glad to see me go?’
‘Yes! Oh, yes!’ Hester says, and she begins to cry, helplessly, not trying to hide it. She does not turn her face away, or reach to wipe her eyes. Robin Durrant takes one look at her stricken face and bursts into delighted laughter.
‘Hester! Dear girl, why do you fret so? Stop that, you’re making yourself ugly. Why do you want me gone so badly? Have I been such an awful house guest?’ He cups her face with one hand and rubs his thumb along the line of her cheekbone.
‘Because… because… Bertie loves you so! Far more than he loves me… than he has ever loved me! With you here I may as well… I may as well not exist!’
‘No, no! You’re quite wrong, Hetty. He does love you. The problem lies elsewhere, with Albert. It’s not love he feels for me, but something else. Something I dare say he does not even know. Or won’t admit to himself.’
Gradually, Hester stops crying. She notices that her hand, though he has released it, still rests on his chest. ‘What is it then? What does he feel?’ she asks.
Robin takes another step closer, so that when he speaks, his lips brush the skin of her forehead, send shivers tumbling down her spine.
‘You’re such innocents! You and the vicar. Hard to believe such innocence can last so long into a marriage. Normally by now the innocence is gone, replaced by satisfaction, by knowledge and experience, and then by familiarity and distaste. Not that I can claim to have experienced marriage myself, but I have seen it enough times, in friends and family.’ He puts his arms around her loosely, but Hester is caged. The smell of him fills every breath she takes, his flesh so close that her skin flares with heat, as though they are already touching. ‘Haven’t you experienced anything like this with him? Not even on your wedding night? Has he never touched you, or kissed you?’ Robin whispers. Hester can’t find her voice to answer him. She shakes her head minutely – though in answer to his question or reaction to his embrace, neither of them can tell. ‘Such a dereliction of duty! And such a terrible waste. He denies you one of life’s great pleasures, Hester; when you were good enough to save yourself for him.’ Robin shakes his head and then presses his lips to her forehead. Hester stands transfixed, entirely trapped between the terrifying excitement and the wrongness of his touch, unable to move or think. She shuts her eyes; Robin kisses her eyelids. ‘Shall I show you what he should have done? Hester? You look so pretty with your hair undone like that, and tears on your cheeks. If you were my wife, I wouldn’t waste a single moment of time with you…’ I am not your wife! Hester cries silently, but still she does not move, for underneath her disgust at this betrayal of Albert, her fear and confusion, she does want to know these things he offers to show her. She is desperate to know. The room is dark, protective. It makes her invisible, makes her disappear.
When he kisses her mouth she sags against him, her legs tingling and weak. She cannot breathe. All strength seeps from her, and though she braces her arms against him, as if to fend him off, her mouth kisses him back, in spite of herself. When he breaks away he is smiling slightly. Had it been his normal smile, she might have acted differently. Had it been a smile of triumph or satisfaction, or a mocking smile, she might have found the resolve to run from him. But it is a soft and tender smile; one of admiration and desire, one that she has so longed to see, albeit on another man’s face. The storm lights his face again, gives every inch of him an unearthly glow, so bright that Hester flinches. He is beautiful, it is true. She does not open her eyes again, but lets herself be touched by him, be kissed and held by him. With every movement of his hands and mouth she feels her own rising desire – a longing like an ache, an unbearable ache right at the core of her. Robin opens her robe and pushes her back onto the window sill. The pain as he reaches for this ache makes her shudder and clench her teeth together, but it is wonderful too. A thousand fiery sparks whirl behind her eyes, shoot her thoughts to pieces, set light to every inch of her and leave her to burn. For that short while, she is not herself. She does not even exist.
When she opens her eyes Robin Durrant is pulling up his trousers, buttoning the fly, catching his breath. There is sweat gleaming on his chest now, and on his brow. Hester is on her feet again, still by the window, her heart slowing down, and a cold touch of horror to make her sick just beginning to grow. Between her thighs she is stinging, burning, and something begins to trickle. She touches her fingers to it, finds smears of blood amidst something else, some other stuff she does not know. Robin looks up at her as he tucks his shirt in roughly.
‘Go to bed, Hetty. Albert will have to take care of himself tonight,’ he says, impatiently. Hester swallows. Her throat is parched, ragged. Slowly, with limbs that do not wish to obey her, she pulls her dressing gown closed, and fumbles for the belt. Staring at him all the while, her eyes wide in her face, mind racing now. Robin sees this expression of hers – of incomprehension, of shock. He rolls his eyes a little, scornfully, and then comes to her, puts his hand to her face again. ‘It’s all right, Hester. Nobody need ever know. It’s quite natural – it’s not a crime, you know! Go to bed and sleep. I shan’t ever tell a soul, I swear.’ He speaks in a bored tone, as if to a child. That is all she is to him, Hester sees. A weakling, a fool to be used to his own ends. Now Hester snatches her face away from him. Now she can move, on numb legs, clumsy and slow. But she can’t lay all the blame on him, she knows. She walks from the room, eyes fixed and flat like a somnambulist’s. She takes the stairs steadily, quietly, and the burden of her guilt grows heavier with every step.
12
Now that she has made up her mind, has settled things with George, Cat itches with impatience. She longs to be gone, to be away with him, and heading for the coast on a train. Not for half a day, which is all the time off she has in a week; not for one precious full day, which she is granted for each two months she works. But for two days, three, four. However long they want, with the silver-grey sea stretching to the far horizon, and the tang of salt water clinging to their skin. She thought for a while that she should give notice to Hester, give some kind of warning. But then she remembers Hester’s broken promise, to send her out to see George, and the motto she embroidered, which hangs on Cat’s walclass="underline" ‘Humility is a servant’s true dignity.’ Then I have neither, she thinks with grim satisfaction. The words repeat themselves in her thoughts, giving her face an expression of disgust, and she hardens her heart against the vicar’s wife. Let her find her breakfast table unset one morning; let her be obliged to lift a finger for once. But she finds it hard to stay angry with the woman, as she takes their dinner up to them in the evening. Hester has dark circles under her eyes, red rims around the lids. Her face is drawn, her expression stunned. She looks wholly miserable, and Cat must repress a flicker of unease, the unexpected urge to seek her out, to find out the cause of her dismay.
In the end, she tells herself that she could do nothing to help Hester, even if she knew what troubled her. She is a servant, a nonentity. Not a person, not a friend. The night is sultry again, warm and balmy, and the breeze that blows is so soft it feels like a lover’s fingertips, brushing her arms as she stands, and she smokes, and she waits for Robin Durrant to appear. She does not have to wait long. All she need do now, when she wishes to speak to him, is catch his eye at the dinner table. She kicks off her shoes as he walks towards her, feels the warm bricks of the courtyard on the soles of her feet, and the springy tufts of moss between them, like strips of fine carpet. Everything feels more real, now she knows she will be free. Everything is more alive, and brighter.