Page 26 of Rivals at Ashmore Castle

‘What’s a nexus?’ Rupert asked, from the corner where he and Lizzie were sharing their own tea-tray.

Bobby looked across and frowned. ‘You’re not supposed to be listening.’

‘But, Mummy, you didn’t say pas devant les enfants,’ he objected indignantly, and Bobby’s stern expression melted into laughter.

Nina thought that for all her talk of being ‘cross and cruel’, in reality she was quite indulgent with her children.

When they had gone, Nina felt in need of fresh air and, since it wasn’t actually raining, she put on a coat and hat and went out for a walk, forbidding Alfred to accompany her. The air smelt fresh and damp, of grass and nettles and running water in ditches. Already the robin had changed from his winter to his spring song, and a great tit was calling ‘me too, me too’ from a bare tree. She missed her little dog Trump running about her, and felt a renewed pang. Mr Cowling had wanted to buy her another dog, but she was afraid to risk it again. To love left you open to loss.

It made her wonder suddenly how much she would love the baby when it came. Did the love come automatically, like breathing? For the moment the baby was just a theory: she knew it existed somewhere, but it didn’t seem real to her. She wanted to be a good mother, but was afraid she would fall short. What if, when the time came, you simply didn’t feel what you were supposed to? She knew it was possible – consider Giles’s mother. She didn’t seem to care for any of her children.

But it was a mistake to think about Giles. She had spent the past five months training herself not to. Even thinking about Kitty now came with a sting. She had wronged Kitty, and the fact that she could not wish the deed undone only increased her guilt. She had taken that one night with Giles in full awareness, and must now live with the consequences. Answering Kitty’s letter of delighted congratulation had required great concentration and several drafts to complete, such that she half hoped she would never have to meet her face to face. Was that to be another consequence? She remembered how, when they had left school, Kitty had mourned that they would probably never meet again: Kitty then was to make a high marriage and Nina was to be a lowly school-teacher. Things had not turned out as expected. Perhaps they never did. Women were always dependent on men, and men’s actions complicated women’s lives. At school, there had been no shadows between her and Kitty; but school was not real life…

At this point she realised that the sky had been growing steadily darker, and now cold, sharp raindrops began to fall. She didn’t mind walking in the rain, but if she got home soaked Mrs Deering would feel obliged to tell Mr Cowling when he came home the next day and there would be scoldings. So she turned for home. The rain grew heavier, and she hurried under a big oak tree to wait it out, though the tree was bare and the shelter inadequate. She was staring hard at the sky to the north-west where the weather was coming from, hoping to see a break, when an umbrella materialised over her head, and she turned with a start to find Decius Blake holding it.

‘Don’t worry, I won’t tell him that you were out in the rain,’ he said. ‘But you really shouldn’t put me in the position of dividing my loyalties.’

‘If it worries you, I’ll tell him myself,’ Nina said, with the courage of her husband’s absence. ‘And,’ she added in her own defence, ‘it wasn’t raining when I set out.’

‘Well, I have you covered now, so shall we walk on?’ said Decius.

She took his offered arm companionably. She always felt at ease with Decius. She imagined it was how she would have felt if she’d ever had a brother – oh, blessed state! She hoped people like Bobby knew how lucky they were to have siblings. Decius, too – one of a large family. Perhaps that was why he was such easy company: he had learned to love widely and easily, where love for her had been narrow and perilous.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asked.

‘I’ve just arrived on the train,’ he said. ‘I was walking up to the house to pay my respects.’

‘Or to check on me?’ she suggested.

‘Oh, a little of one, a little of the other. Mr Cowling will be here tomorrow, but there’s a meeting then at the factory and he wanted me to look at some figures beforehand. You know how he likes to be prepared.’

‘I do. You once told me it’s the secret of his success.’

‘One of them,’ Decius allowed.

‘Well, I shall be glad of your company this evening. I haven’t any guests coming to dinner.’

‘Do you have—?’ he began, but she was never to know how that sentence was to end. She stopped dead, and her hands went instinctively to the roundness under her coat that she was only just getting used to. Decius looked at her with concern. ‘What is it?’ She didn’t answer. ‘Are you in pain?’ he asked, anxiety making his voice shake.

She shook her head, staring at nothing. ‘I feel…very peculiar,’ she said.

‘We must get you home quickly. Can you walk all right, or shall I run ahead and get help?’

‘I can walk. But I feel…I can’t describe it. Something’s different.’

‘Lean on me, let me take your weight. Thank goodness it isn’t far.’

They walked in silence for a few steps, then Nina said in a small voice, ‘Decius, I’m a little bit afraid.’

He answered in a steady voice, ‘We’ll soon have you home, and Mrs Deering will be there. She’ll know what to do.You’re sure you’re not in pain?’

‘No pain,’ she said.

‘That’s a good sign,’ he said.

Decius spoke confidently, but she could almost read his thoughts: this was women’s business. He could not be expected to have the answers. And for a man whose entire career depended on finding answers, it was not a happy state to be in.

He wanted to reassure her but she wasn’t reassured. Something was wrong. And ignorance was an anguish in itself.