The Forgotten Garden Part 23

"What other cousin?" Really the girl spoke no sense. Rose was beginning to think she truly was simple. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said. "There is no other cousin."

"She's a secret. They keep her locked upstairs."

"You're making it up. Why would anyone keep her a secret?"

"They kept me a secret, didn't they?"

"They didn't keep you locked upstairs."

"That's because I wasn't dangerous." Eliza tiptoed to the nursery door, prised it open a crack and peered outside. She gasped.

"What?" said Rose.

"Shhh!" Eliza held a finger to her lips. "We can't let her know we're in here."

"Why?" Rose's eyes were wide.

Eliza tiptoed back to the edge of Rose's chair. The flickering firelight in the darkening room gave her face an eerie glow. "Our Other Cousin," she said, "is insane."

"Mad?"

"As a hatter." Eliza lowered her voice so that Rose had to lean close to hear. "She's been locked in the attic since she was small, but someone's let her out."

"Who?"

"One of the ghosts. The ghost of an old woman, a very fat old woman."

"Grandmamma," whispered Rose.

"Shhh!" said Eliza. "Listen! Footsteps."

Rose could feel her poor feeble heart leaping like a frog in her chest.

Eliza jumped onto the arm of Rose's chair. "She's coming!"

The door opened and Rose screamed. Eliza grinned and Mamma gasped.

"What are you doing up there, wicked girl?" Mamma hissed, gaze flitting from Eliza to Rose. "Young ladies do not sit astride the furniture. You were told not to move." Her breathing was loud. "Are you harmed, my Rose?"

Rose shook her head. "No, Mamma."

For just an instant, Mamma seemed at a rare loss; Rose almost feared that she might cry. Then she seized Eliza by the upper arm and marched her towards the door. "Wicked girl! You'll have no supper tonight." A familiar steel had returned to her voice. "And no supper any night thereafter. Not until you learn to do as you are told. I am mistress of this house and you will will obey me..." obey me..."

The door closed and Rose sat alone once more. Wondering at this peculiar turn of events. The thrill of Eliza's story, the curious enjoyable fear that had stalked up her spine, the terrible, wonderful specter of the mad Other Cousin. But it was the crack that had appeared in Mamma's usually cast-iron composure that intrigued Rose most of all. For in that moment, the stable borders of Rose's world had seemed to shift.

All was not as it had been. And that knowledge made Rose's heart thump-strongly now-with unexpected, unexplained, unadulterated joy.

TWENTY-NINE.

THE B BLACKHURST H HOTEL, 2005.

THE colors were different here. Ca.s.sandra had never realized how sharp the Australian glare was until she met the gentle Cornish light. She wondered how she'd go about replicating it in watercolors, surprised herself for having wondered. She took a bite of b.u.t.tery toast and chewed thoughtfully, looked at the line of trees that stood on the cliff edge. Closing one eye, she lifted her index finger to trace along their tops. colors were different here. Ca.s.sandra had never realized how sharp the Australian glare was until she met the gentle Cornish light. She wondered how she'd go about replicating it in watercolors, surprised herself for having wondered. She took a bite of b.u.t.tery toast and chewed thoughtfully, looked at the line of trees that stood on the cliff edge. Closing one eye, she lifted her index finger to trace along their tops.

A shadow fell across her table and there was a voice right beside her. "Ca.s.sandra? Ca.s.sandra Ryan?" A woman in her early sixties was standing by the table, silver-blond and shapely, with eye makeup whose application had left no corner of the shadow compact unexplored. "I'm Julia Bennett, I own the Blackhurst Hotel."

Ca.s.sandra wiped a b.u.t.tery finger on her napkin and shook hands. "Nice to meet you."

Julia indicated the vacant chair. "Mind if I...?"

"Of course not, please."

Julia sat down and Ca.s.sandra waited uncertainly, wondering whether this was part of the personalized service threatened in the brochure.

"I hope you're enjoying your stay with us."

"It's a lovely spot."

Julia looked at her and smiled so that dimples appeared in each cheek. "You know, I can see your grandmother in you. But I bet you hear that all the time."

Behind Ca.s.sandra's polite smile, a flock of questions resisted shepherding. How did this stranger know who she was? How did she know Nell? How had she put the two of them together?

Julia laughed and leaned forward conspiratorially. "A little birdie told me the Australian girl who'd inherited the cottage was in town. Tregenna is a small place. You sneeze on the Sharpstone Cliffs and the fellows in the harbor know all about it."

Ca.s.sandra realized who the bird in question was. "Robyn Jameson."

"She was here yesterday, trying to enlist me for the festival committee," said Julia. "Couldn't resist imparting the local comings and goings while she was at it. I put two and two together and connected you with the lady who came to call some thirty years ago, saved my skin by taking the cottage off my hands. I always wondered when your grandmother would return, kept an eye out for her for some time. I liked her. She was a straight shooter, wasn't she?"

The description was so accurate that Ca.s.sandra couldn't help wondering what Nell had said or done to earn it.

"You know, the first time I met your grandmother, she was hanging from a rather thick wisteria near the front entrance."

"Really?" Ca.s.sandra's eyes widened.

"She'd scaled the front wall and was having difficulty getting down on the other side. Lucky for her I'd just had an argument with my husband, Richard, number ninety-seven for the day, and I was stalking around the grounds trying to cool down. I hate to think how long she'd have been hanging there otherwise."

"She was trying to see the house?"

Julia nodded. "Said she was an antiques dealer interested in Victoriana and wondered if she could take a peek inside."

Ca.s.sandra felt a fierce flame of affection for Nell as she imagined her scaling walls and telling half-truths, refusing to take no for an answer.

"I told her she was welcome to come in, just as soon as she'd finished swinging from my wisteria!" Julia laughed. "The house was in pretty poor condition, it'd been roundly neglected for decades by then, and Rick and I had dismantled things to the point that they looked far worse than they had done to begin with, but she didn't seem to mind. She walked through, stopping at each and every room. It was like she was trying to commit them to memory."

Or retrieve them from memory. Ca.s.sandra wondered how much Nell had told Julia about the reason for her interest. "Did you show her the cottage, too?"

"No, but I sure as h.e.l.l mentioned it to her. Then I crossed my fingers and everything else I could manage to cross." She laughed. "We were that desperate for a buyer! We were going broke just as surely as if we'd dug a hole beneath the house and tossed every last pound into it. We'd had the cottage on the market for a while, you see. Almost sold it twice to Londoners looking for a holiday home, but both contracts fell through. Rotten luck. We dropped the price but there was no way we could get anyone local to buy it, not for love nor money. Spectacular views and no one interested because of some silly old rumors."

"Robyn told me."

"As far as I can see, there's something wrong with your house in Cornwall if it isn't haunted," said Julia lightly. "We've got our very own ghost at the hotel. But you already know that, I hear you met her the other night?"

Ca.s.sandra's puzzlement must have shown on her face, for Julia continued, "Samantha on the front desk told me you reported a key in your door?"

"Oh," said Ca.s.sandra, "yeah. I thought it was another guest, but it must've been the wind. I didn't mean to cause any-"

"That's her, all right, that's our ghost." Julia laughed at Ca.s.sandra's expression of perplexity. "Oh, now, don't you be alarmed, she won't do you any harm. She's not an unfriendly unfriendly ghost exactly. I wouldn't keep an unfriendly ghost." ghost exactly. I wouldn't keep an unfriendly ghost."

Ca.s.sandra had the feeling that Julia was pulling her leg. All the same, she'd heard more talk of ghosts since she'd arrived in Cornwall than she had since she was twelve years old and went to her first slumber party. "I suppose every old house needs one," she ventured.

"Precisely," said Julia. "People expect it. I'd have had to invent one if there hadn't been one here already. An historic hotel like this...Why, a resident ghost is as important to guests as clean towels." She leaned forward. "Ours even has a name. Rose Mountrachet: she and her family used to live here, back at the start of the twentieth century. Well, before that if you consider the family went back hundreds of years. That's her in the picture hanging by the bookcase in the foyer, the young woman with pale skin and dark hair. Have you seen it?"

Ca.s.sandra shook her head.

"Oh, you must," said Julia. "It's a John Singer Sargent, painted a few years after he did the Wyndham sisters."

"Really?" Ca.s.sandra's skin cooled. "An actual John Singer Sergeant?"

Julia laughed. "Incredible, isn't it? Another of the house's secrets. I didn't realize its value myself until a few years ago. We had a fellow out from Christie's to look at another painting and he spotted it. I call it my nest egg, not that I could ever bear to part with it. Such a beauty was our Rose, and such a tragic life! A delicate child who overcame ill health only to die at twenty-four in a dreadful accident." She sighed romantically. "Have you finished your breakfast? Come with me and I'll show you."

ROSE MOUNTRACHET at eighteen was fair indeed: white skin, a cloud of dark hair swept back in a loose braid and the full bosom so fashionable in the period. Sargent was renowned for his ability to discern and capture the personality of his sitters, and Rose's gaze was soulful. Red lips relaxed in repose but eyes that remained watchful, fixed on the artist. It was a seriousness of expression that fitted with what Ca.s.sandra imagined of a girl who'd spent her entire childhood imprisoned by ill health. at eighteen was fair indeed: white skin, a cloud of dark hair swept back in a loose braid and the full bosom so fashionable in the period. Sargent was renowned for his ability to discern and capture the personality of his sitters, and Rose's gaze was soulful. Red lips relaxed in repose but eyes that remained watchful, fixed on the artist. It was a seriousness of expression that fitted with what Ca.s.sandra imagined of a girl who'd spent her entire childhood imprisoned by ill health.

She leaned closer. The portrait's composition was interesting. Rose was seated on a sofa, a book in her lap. The sofa was angled away from the frame so that Rose was in the right-hand foreground and behind her was a wall papered in green but with little other detail. The way the wall was rendered gave it a sense of being pale and feathery, more impressionistic than the realism for which Sargent was known. It was not unheard of for Sargent to use such techniques, but this seemed somehow lighter than his other work, less careful.

"She was a beauty, wasn't she?" said Julia, sashaying over from the reception desk.

Ca.s.sandra nodded distractedly. The date on the painting was 1907, not long before he swore off portraiture. Perhaps he had been growing tired of rendering the faces of the wealthy even then.

"I see she's worked her spell on you. Now you know why I was so keen to enlist her as our ghost." She laughed, then noticed Ca.s.sandra hadn't. "Are you all right? You look a little peaky. Gla.s.s of water?"

Ca.s.sandra shook her head. "No, no, I'm fine, thanks. It's just the painting..." She pressed her lips together, heard herself say, "Rose Mountrachet was my great-grandmother."

Julia's eyebrows leaped.

"I only found out recently." Ca.s.sandra smiled at Julia, embarra.s.sed. No matter that it was the truth, she felt like an actor speaking soap opera lines, bad soap opera lines. "I'm sorry. This is the first time I've seen a picture of her. It all feels very real suddenly."

"Oh, my dear," said Julia. "I hate to be the one to break it to you, but I'm afraid you must be mistaken. Rose couldn't be your great-grandmother. She couldn't be anyone's great-grandmother. Her only child died when she was practically still a baby."

"Of scarlet fever."

"Poor little cherub, only four years old-" She looked sideways at Ca.s.sandra. "If you know about the scarlet fever, you must know that Rose's daughter died."

"I know people think that, but I also know it's not what really happened. It can't be."

"I've seen the headstone in the estate cemetery," said Julia gently. "Sweetest lines of poetry, so sad. I can show it to you if you'd like."

Ca.s.sandra could feel her cheeks flushing as they always did when she sensed the outskirts of disagreement. "There may be a headstone, but there's no little girl buried there. Not Ivory Walker, at any rate."

Julia's expression vacillated between interest and concern. "Go on."

"When my grandmother was twenty-one, she found out her parents weren't really her parents."

"She was adopted?"

"Sort of. She was found on a wharf in Australia when she was four years old, with nothing but a child's suitcase. It wasn't until she was sixty-five that her dad finally gave her the case and she was able to start searching for information about her past. She came to England and spoke with people and researched, and all the while she kept a journal."

Julia smiled knowingly. "Which you have now."

"Exactly. That's how I know she found out that Rose's daughter didn't die. She was kidnapped."

Julia's blue eyes searched Ca.s.sandra's face. Her cheeks had taken on a sudden flush. "But if that were the case, wouldn't there have been a search? Wouldn't it have been all over the newspapers? Like what happened with the Lindbergh boy?"

"Not if the family kept it quiet."

"Why would they have done that? They'd have wanted everyone to know, surely?"

Ca.s.sandra was shaking her head. "Not if they wanted to avoid scandal. The woman who took her was the ward of Lord and Lady Mountrachet, Rose's cousin."

Julia gasped. "Eliza took Rose's daughter?" took Rose's daughter?"

It was Ca.s.sandra's turn to look surprised. "You know of Eliza?"

"Of course, she's quite famous in these parts." Julia swallowed. "Let me get this straight. You think Eliza took Rose's daughter to Australia?"

"Put her on the boat to Australia but didn't go herself. Eliza went missing somewhere between London and Maryborough. When my great-grandfather found Nell, she was all by herself on the wharf. That's why he took her home, he couldn't leave a child that age alone."

Julia was clicking her tongue. "To think of a little girl abandoned like that. Your poor grandma, terrible not to know one's origins. Certainly explains her eagerness to take a look at this place."

"That's why Nell bought the cottage," said Ca.s.sandra. "Once she discovered who she was, she wanted to own a piece of her past."

"Of course." Julia lifted her hands, then dropped them again. "That part makes perfect sense, I just don't know about the rest."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, even if what you say is correct, if Rose's daughter survived, was kidnapped, wound up in Australia, I just can't believe Eliza had anything to do with it. Rose and Eliza were so close. More like sisters than cousins, the very best of friends." She paused, seemed to run the equation once more through her mind, then exhaled decisively. "No, I just can't believe Eliza capable of such betrayal."

Julia's faith in Eliza's innocence didn't seem that of a dispa.s.sionate observer discussing a historical hypothetical. "What makes you so certain?"

Julia indicated a pair of wicker chairs arranged in the bay window. "Come, sit for a moment. I'll have Samantha organize some tea."