Page 110 of The Gathering Storm (Morland Dynasty #36)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

It was not until the next day that Polly went to look at the damage to the chapel. She was shocked at the sight, but Lennie told her it wasn’t as bad as it looked. ‘Once the debris is cleared away, you’ll see.’ Workmen had been up on the roof already, to stretch a tarpaulin over the hole.

‘But the Lady altar!’ Polly said. ‘We must get that beam off it straight away. It’s not respectful. Oh, and the memorial!’

The marble memorial to their ancestors was in the form of an elaborately carved sarcophagus, though it was thought the bodies were not actually inside, but down in the crypt.

On the top life-size marble effigies of the couple lay side by side, hands folded in prayer, Robert’s head resting on a lion and Eleanor’s on a unicorn.

Around the frieze ran the words, ‘The brave heart and the pure spirit, faithful unto death. In God is death at end.’ But the impact of the end of the beam had chipped off a corner of the lid’s lip and broken away the ‘ath’ of ‘death’ and all of ‘In’.

‘It’s nearly as old as the house. Can it even be repaired?’ Polly mourned.

‘Anything can be repaired,’ Lennie said. ‘They’re only material things. Just be thankful no-one was hurt.’

She had turned her attention to the altar, on which the main body of the beam rested. It had split the wooden panelling right down the front to the ground, but more alarming, the ancient wooden statue of the Lady was missing. ‘It must be under all the rubbish,’ Polly said, anguished.

Lennie saw she was about to get down on her knees and search, and caught her arm. ‘Leave it for now.’

‘But she looks after the house. It would be terribly bad luck if anything has happened to her.’

‘I never knew you were so superstitious.’

‘It’s not superstition,’ she said indignantly. ‘There are lots of stories about how she weeps real tears if anything bad is coming to the house.’

‘Stories.’

‘Not stories as in fiction. Things that really happened and have been handed down.’

‘All right, but she’s probably under the beam, and you can’t look for her until that’s been taken away.’ He patted the beam. ‘Amazing, this old oak – it’s so weathered, it’s like iron. You’d never be able to drill into it.’

‘Lennie!’

‘Don’t be upset. I’ll get some men together this afternoon, and we’ll see how best to lift it.

Some kind of crane-and-pulley system.’ He looked up.

‘We’ll have to see if it can be used to repair the hole – put it back where it came from.

It’s no use for anything else. You couldn’t cut it up for firewood, for instance – you’d never get a saw through it. ’

‘I should think not,’ Polly said, obscurely comforted by ‘crane-and-pulley’. It was lovely to have a man again, to do the man things in her life.

Charlotte got back late from Charles Street, where she had supervised the packing of her personal belongings.

She wasn’t taking any of the furniture, but she had still accumulated a worrying amount, given that Molly and Vivian lived in a flat with no cellar or attic.

But the guest room was large and well provided with cupboards, and Molly had said her trunks could be stored in the nursery for the time being, since the children were away.

She didn’t see Milo while she was there, which was a relief.

She said goodbye to the servants. They hadn’t been with her for long enough to be tearful, and – having called at the bank on her way there – she gave them all a parting tip.

She knew they would easily find new positions: good servants were hard to come by in London.

And in any case, as soon as the war started, there would be a multitude of other things they could do, and perhaps would have to do.

When she got back to Arlington Street, it was almost dinner time, and Basil was there. ‘How did you know?’ she demanded.

He kissed her cheek. ‘That’s not much of a greeting.’

‘Hello, Basil. How did you know?’

‘Kit rang Uncle Oliver, and he rang me. Was it meant to be a secret?’

‘Not really, but I wasn’t expecting my shame to be broadcast all over London.’

‘Oh, Charley, there’s no shame to you,’ Basil said, so tenderly that Charlotte’s eyes filled with tears. She was used to being teased by Basil, not petted.

‘But you never trusted him,’ she said. ‘I should have listened to you.’

‘No, you shouldn’t. My prejudice was just that – a prejudice. It wasn’t based on anything. And you were in love with him. And he made you happy.’

‘Yes, he did. For a while. I don’t regret that part.’

‘You should never regret anything. It’s a terrible waste of time and energy. Do what you do, then move on to the next thing. Which is?’

‘Everyone keeps asking me that. Something useful, if I can. Is there really going to be a war? Vivian is sure of it. I expect you know more than most, being in the news business.’

‘I’m afraid it’s probably coming quite soon,’ Basil said.

‘Have you heard of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact? It’s a treaty between the Soviets and the Germans, not just promising to be allies but we think there’s a secret protocol to carve up Eastern Europe between them – Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia, Finland and Poland.

So that puts an end to the hope that the Soviets would be on our side. ’

‘Would they really have been good allies?’ Charlotte said doubtfully.

‘Better than having them as an enemy. Now Poland’s surrounded, Germany one side and the Reds the other. And if Hitler attacks Poland, we have to go to their aid.’

‘Do you think he will?’

He hesitated. ‘The New York Times reported German troop movements on the Polish border yesterday, but today it’s gone quiet. It’s possible that the Anglo-Polish pact has put the wind up him. But I wouldn’t depend on it. It’s a respite, that’s all – in my opinion.’

Charlotte was silent, staring at nothing, thinking about Milo scuttling off to Switzerland. Was it sensible, or cowardly? He’d said he would be doing war-work over there. Perhaps she should have given him the benefit of the doubt. But if war was coming, she wanted to be here, at home.

Basil, watching her face, said, ‘You’ll find your useful thing.’

She came out of her reverie. ‘A woman’s thing? Helping in a canteen? Serving tea and keeping up the morale of the troops?’

‘Someone has to do it,’ he said.

‘I was toying with the idea of the ATS.’

‘Toy by all means, but no more than that. You don’t want to be a typist or a driver. You’ve got brains.’

‘So have you. What’s your great contribution going to be?’

Basil thought back to earlier that day when he had been summoned to the editor’s office.

It was a rare thing to see the great man face to face, and he racked his brain for any egregious misdemeanour he had committed recently.

But though Comstock had been grave, he had not looked disapproving.

He had come straight to the point. ‘Ah, Compton. I’ve had a communication about you from Lord Culbeath at the War Office. ’

‘Yes, sir?’ Basil said, a little surprised.

‘We are old friends,’ Comstock explained, ‘and we’ve been working together for some time on various aspects of war planning.

However, all you need to know is that you have a file in a special unit of the War Office.

They know all about you there. When the National Service Act comes into force, you will receive a letter requiring you to present yourself to that special unit, but after that you will come back here and continue in your usual job at the Messenger .

I have agreed with Culbeath that you will work here until they’re ready for you. ’

‘When will that be, sir?’ Basil had found his mouth unexpectedly dry.

‘I have no idea. You will be told. In the meantime, the Messenger will provide cover for you. In the last war, men who were not in uniform were subjected to unpleasantness, and we don’t want that. You will mention none of this to anyone, of course.’

‘Of course, sir.’ The interview seemed to be over. ‘Thank you, sir,’ Basil had said, and left.

Now he said to Charlotte, ‘I’ll come when I’m called and go where I’m sent, just like everybody else.’

Polly had put a team of servants with brooms and buckets to clearing up the debris, among which they unearthed the Avro’s missing wheel. ‘I suppose they’ll want this back,’ she said.

‘Well, we don’t need it,’ said Lennie.

‘I don’t know. Alec might. I remember in the last war, boys collected war souvenirs like anything. This could be a real prize – no-one else would have one.’

Lennie smiled. ‘Give it back. It’s government property.’

‘They took my land. It’s a fair swap,’ Polly said.

Once the beam was lifted the statue of the Lady was found at once, and put into her hands.

‘It’s believed she’s much older than the house,’ she said to Lennie.

‘The wood’s as hard as stone. Look, she’s not even scratched.

’ She held it reverently. ‘I’m so glad no harm came to her.

I’ll put her on the main altar for now, until we can put her own altar back together. ’

The sweepers had started on the debris that had been under the beam, and footman William found the chunk of marble that had broken off the sarcophagus, obviously along a natural fault in the stone.

He handed it to Lennie, who said, ‘I’m pretty sure marble can be stuck back together. Ought to be quite easy.’

‘But the altar panelling will have to be completely replaced,’ Polly said.

She knelt down to look more closely, put her fingers into the split and pulled.

The whole front came away, spitting splinters and ancient dowels.

‘I never knew what it was made of, under the wood,’ she said.

‘I assumed it was a solid stone, but look – there’s a sort of recess at the bottom. Almost like a cupboard.’

‘Maybe it was meant as a cupboard originally,’ Lennie said. ‘Yes, look, aren’t those dowels hinges? A cupboard for putting altar things in – the cup and plate and so on.’