Bright Hair About the Bone Read online

  A precious moment, quite spoiled by Laetitia who, with breathtaking insensitivity, had chosen that moment to throw an apple core at a passing squadron of ducks. The ensuing racket had drowned out his next stanza.

  He’d been flattered that he’d been chosen to take the daughter of the house in to dinner. “Felix, you’ll take in Laetitia?” (All Christian names here for the duration of the party.) Surely there’d been meaning in this? And he’d been flattered, too, by the attentions of the other weekend guests, all distinguished figures. He’d affected not to hear when he’d caught the edge of murmurings behind raised hands: “Neo-pagan is what they’re saying, my dear!” And he’d fostered the glamorous image, salting his talk with the odd guttural phrase of Anglo-Saxon, his speciality. His Viking warrior looks impressed the ladies; he set out to impress the gentlemen with his deep-drinking. In that unbuttoned hour after dinner when the port circulated and the conversation picked up a masculine pace, he’d showed off. He’d been unwise.

  Emboldened by four glasses of port and two of brandy, he’d retired upstairs, slipped into his silk dressing gown, and watched from his doorway as her maid said good night. Then he’d crept along the corridor and entered her room.

  He flushed with anger and shame at the memory of the scene that followed. He’d never even heard before some of the curses she’d directed at him along with the sponge. Of course there’d been a rumpus. Guests had inconveniently popped out of their rooms in various stages of déshabille prepared to repel burglars or preserve a girl’s honour; the Lord Lieutenant had brandished a revolver. But, amongst the retired military, politicians, and lions of London literary society, he’d been aware of one face only: the darkening features of the Dean of his College.

  The chill command had rapped out with all the authority of a school housemaster: “Dalton! See me in my room! At once!”

  You can hear the closing of ranks as far off as Fen Ditton when the University decides to protect one of its own. The outcome was never in doubt. The honour of the College is paramount. There was no question that the matter would be swept under the carpet and one of the two parties removed. On the trumped-up accusation of a manufactured offence against the College—“Just leave this in our hands, Dr. Dalton”—Miss Talbot was required to leave a week or two before she was due to take her final examinations. He savoured some of the phrases: “…conduct bringing the name of her college into disrepute…behaviour likely to redound to the dishonour of her sex…setback to the integration of females into the University…”

  Sir Richard had stormed and threatened but had accepted the inevitable. A product of the university himself, he understood the rules.

  Ah, well…in all conscience, the girl would have achieved nothing more than title to a degree at pass level, Dalton judged. Quite rightly, Cambridge had held out against the women walking away with a full degree on equal terms with the men. In any event, this woman was never about to scale any academic heights. And perhaps in the end she had been conscious of that? She had certainly accepted the decision of the authorities and departed with surprisingly little fuss, he remembered. Suspiciously little fuss? He tried to read the bland, friendly face across his desk. Comeuppance time? He didn’t doubt it.

  “I hear that congratulations are due, Felix? In my absence, I understand, you have succeeded in securing the affections of a certain Miss Esmé Leatherhead? The publishing family Leatherhead? Peregrine is her father? What a fortuitous connection for an up-and-coming young poet! You are still up and you are still coming, Felix? I wonder if you are aware that Esmé and I are old chums? No? She and I were at school together. A dear girl, though something of an idealist, I always thought…fastidious…exacting…she carries the burden of a Quaker upbringing, poor child! Have you not found so? I really must make a point of looking up my old friend—so much gossip to catch up on…And so far it seems you are managing to retain her affections?” There was no mistaking the menace in her sweet voice as it trailed away leaving thoughts unspoken.

  “You unprincipled hussy! You wouldn’t!”

  “I most certainly would.”

  He assessed his options. “What do you want of me?”

  “A very undemanding little favour. Something you do every day as a matter of course, I expect. I want you to write a letter of recommendation on college writing paper…I’m sure you have a supply buried somewhere in a lower stratum of this rubbish heap?”

  Well, the girl had always been direct.

  “I’m afraid I could not recommend you to any man or to any organisation, Miss Talbot,” he answered frostily, “whatever you threaten. I am amazed that you have the temerity to ask.”

  She dismissed his bluster with an understanding smile. “Just as well, then, that that is not what I am seeking. You jump the gun, Felix. It seems to be a trait of yours. I am just recently back from Egypt. Indeed, I spent the autumn and winter there. I had gone to lick my wounds, bury my anger in the sands, and see if some hard physical work would take away the sting of injustice. I’ve been digging. Under the direction of a friend of my father—Andrew Merriman, the archaeologist. Perhaps you’ve heard of him?”

  Dalton nodded. “So—you’ve been doing a little tomb-robbing?” The sneer was barely concealed behind the polite smile.

  “If you’ve been doing a little versifying.” She sighed. “It would take up too much of our time to attempt to convince someone who makes a parade of his scorn for the sciences of the value of the new discipline. The Romance of the Past has ensnared me, and I’m not talking about your deeply unattractive Anglo-Saxon warriors. I’ve learned all Andrew could teach me about the techniques of archaeology and I’ve read a good deal of ancient history. I can even decipher a line or two of hieroglyphs…I see I’m boring you?”

  “No, no. My expression is one of incredulous fascination. I quiver with curiosity to know where you are leading me with all this.” He took from a drawer a sheet of college writing paper, unscrewed the cap of his fountain pen with a provoking flourish, and sat, head tilted, all compliant cooperation. Anything to get rid of the girl.

  “Good. We’re ready then. My intention is to foster the career of a friend and colleague, a Miss St. Clair…Stella St. Clair.”

  “Sinclair?”

  “No. Not quite.” Laetitia spelled out the surname. “Miss St. Clair is a talented, though at present unqualified, archaeologist, and she is seeking to fill a position which has recently come vacant on a dig in France. This is where I hope to enlist your help. I won’t presume to dictate—I’ll leave the wording to you. Choose whatever formulae come most readily to mind, but the substance of your letter should be this: You are recommending to the attention of the recipient—more of him later—the bearer, a Miss Stella St. Clair, graduate—yes, I said graduate—of this university. Having covered herself with glory during her time here…no…better, I think, say that she achieved title to an honours degree of the second class…Miss St. Clair has subsequently spent a year in Egypt working with the celebrated archaeologist Professor Sir Andrew Merriman (who will also bear testimony to the good character and capacity of the said lady) and is certainly well fitted for a position with a foundation of the highest order and international reputation. Now—you are writing specifically to an American academic. Here are his details.”

  She handed a note over the desk and he read, intrigued despite himself, Charles Paradee, Directeur, Fondation Archaéologique Américaine. The address was in Fontigny, Burgundy, France.

  She paused for a moment, then added, “And you’d better assure Mr. Paradee that your protégée speaks perfect French.”

  “French?”

  “I understand it to be the lingua franca of Burgundy,” she replied annoyingly. “And that is one point at least on which you need have no bad conscience. Miss St. Clair’s mother was French. Felix, stop puffing and blustering and what-iffing and get on with it! No one will ever find out. And if they do, you may say I held a gun to your head. I’ll confess to it.”

  Ten min
utes later, a final draft was approved, folded, and tucked away in her bag, which she closed with a triumphant click.

  “And what guarantee do I have that this little show of pettiness is to be the end of your attempts at coercion and not merely the first of a succession of demands?” Dalton wanted to know.

  “Guarantee? None at all. I am no gentleman, Felix. If there’s anything more I should need, I shall be back for it. And…would you really call it coercion? I’d call it blackmail. You should pray that the pursuit of my career takes me away from this snug academic world of yours and distracts my attention from your affairs.”

  “Look here! I would like your Miss St. Clair, whoever and wherever she may be, and any other performers in this Grand Guignol you are staging, to understand,” he said carefully, “that should there be repercussions, I shall take steps to protect my reputation.” Then, catching a cynical grey eye, he shrugged and adjusted his tone. “I wish her every success and you also, Miss Talbot. I shall watch your future career with some interest. I hope your success will lead you on to further—and farther—triumphs in lands distant from Cambridge. I believe wonders are to be unearthed in Italy…or Crete…or Ur of the Chaldees! The scorching sands of the Mesopotamian desert conceal many things an enterprising girl might lay hands on—golden crowns, precious jewels…scorpions!”

  Abruptly the sleek professional mask slipped and Laetitia caught a glimpse of the spiteful schoolboy he must once have been.

  She replied coolly, “I find the creatures in the most surprising places. Just as well I have become immune to their sting.”

  He rose to his feet but did not offer to shake her hand or see her out.

  Laetitia Talbot paused, her hand on the doorknob, and turned with a charming smile to the pale and deflated don. He readied himself for her Parthian shot, always, he remembered, her speciality.

  “By the way, Felix…the story that has circulated amongst you…”

  Dalton looked puzzled.

  “The alleged loss of my most precious possession…”

  “Ah! That? Great Heavens! You were aware…?”

  “Naturally, since it was I who initiated the story. It has always annoyed me that such a sprightly tale could have become so garbled in the retelling. I’m afraid it will shock you even further, Felix, when I tell you that the gentleman in question was not a Satanist—he was a scientist.”

  CHAPTER 3

  She closed the door gently, adjusted her hat to a less rakish angle, then stood for a moment or two struggling to achieve a level of control. Disgust both for her own subterfuge and for Dalton’s treachery expressed itself in an inconvenient inability to pull gloves onto shaking hands and a sudden loss of impetus.

  She had conducted her business with such ruthless haste she found herself with an hour to spare before her next appointment. A walk by the river would calm her. And she could say good-bye to this most lovely, most gracious spot in the world. She made her way along to Garret Hostel Lane, tormenting herself with the memory of her eight-year-old self careering uncertainly down the path on her first new bicycle. An impetuous purchase by her godfather, Daniel, who’d taken her into the bike repair shop in Laundress Lane a week before her birthday. They’d gone in to pick up a new brake cable for him and had come out with a gleaming, two-wheeled, dark green wonder for her. As excited as she was, Daniel had run behind anxiously shouting advice. “Don’t look back! Keep pedalling, Letty!” He’d caught up with her on the sharp upward slope of the bridge at the end of the lane where, finally, she’d run out of courage and puff and they’d hung laughing and gasping over the parapet.

  Now, she paused in the same place. Turning the knife in the wound. There was no one else around to enjoy the fresh spring day. With examinations looming, undergraduates were all closeted away with their books, desperately filling in gaps and plastering over the rough surfaces of three years’ study. She was glad to have the river to herself for a bit. She watched as a black swan, all too conscious of his exotic good looks, was joined in a pas de deux by a white swan. She almost applauded as they dipped and bowed and exited left, behind a curtain of yellow willow boughs.

  A punt approached going at quite a clip. Four young men in blazers were singing a boating song and drinking champagne. Their companion working on the pole joined in the chorus, apparently unaware that he was moving off course and about to collide with the arch of the bridge. Laetitia knew this stretch well. With the authority of one who’d taken part in the Saturday morning seven o’clock punting classes for women and had the valued certificate of competence under her belt, she called out a warning: “Oy! Watch out! Pull to starboard!”

  The punter took time to doff his boater gallantly to the pretty girl on the bridge before correcting his course with a flourish, sending the boat skimming with a swift fish-tail through the arch. Laetitia crossed to the other side and waved a friendly acknowledgement of his skill, then wandered on over the bridge and along the riverbank. Why was she doing this? Tormenting herself with the sight of all that she’d lost? This was a world that had rejected her without compunction largely because she was female, and because she had challenged authority’s model of female behaviour. To survive in this hostile environment it was wise to pin back your hair, wear spectacles and clumpy shoes. It was prudent to acquire a taste for lisle stockings, weak tea, and earnest conversation, and never to hanker after silk, champagne cocktails, or racy talk. And it was no disadvantage to gain higher marks than the men. She had found she could do none of those things.

  She followed the winding western bank of the Cam through the beech trees until she came upon the sight of King’s College across the river. The light was so intense she had to squint up into the gem-hard blue of the sky to admire the slender thrust of the pinnacles of the Chapel. For an unsettling moment a pillared temple at Karnak standing out against an equally brilliant sky superposed itself. But the sun-scorched vision was dispelled by the movement of a herd of black and white cows, up to their udders in buttercups, lazily munching their way across the lush meadow grass in front of the college.

  She knew why she loved this place. The monuments, the pillars, the carved temples of Egypt were not on a human scale. They towered; they threatened. You lowered your eyes before the stones of Egypt. But the golden architecture she now looked at raised the eyes as it lifted the spirit. Every line of the Chapel pointed heavenwards; every pinnacle exhorted the onlooker to praise God. But it was the secular buildings clustering about—Clare, classical and handsome with its pilastered front smiling genially onto the river; the graceful Wren Library; the balanced and elegant Senate House—which gave out the confident statement: “If praise is due—praise Man.” Not one single potentate, no Ramses, no Thutmosis, demanded the onlooker’s abasement; the name of no single vaunting personality came to Laetitia’s mind as she stood, smiling and admiring. A few English kings and queens had attempted to secure immortality here by their benevolence perhaps, but she could never remember their names. And none of the architecture rang a martial note; no brazen trumpets sounded—just the deep and jovial swell of the chapel organ. This was a place that celebrated learning, progress, and creativity. It celebrated Humanity.

  Distantly, a cracked bell dinged the three-quarter hour and Laetitia walked on along the path skirting the lawn towards the gate leading into King’s Parade. The scene of her crime. She’d foolishly accepted a challenge from a group of male undergraduates, some of whom she had counted her friends. Of course she was bold enough to light a cigarette and walk across the middle of the lawn! The Proctor and his two Bulldogs must have been lurking close by. Her companions had mysteriously melted away: she’d been left alone to face the wrath of the college hierarchy.

  She paused, tempted for a moment to repeat her crime. No. Time to grow up. The cigarettes stayed in her bag and her feet on the path.

  This was not and never would be her place. She heard again in memory her godfather’s voice: “Don’t look back, Letty!” and she kept her face determined
ly set towards Trumpington Street and her second meeting of the morning.

  Fitzbillies tea shop was strangely empty when she arrived, and she hardly needed to hear the welcoming voice calling, “Over here, Letty!” to locate her friend. Laetitia hurried over, weaving between the tables towards the small brown-haired, brown-eyed girl jumping to her feet in excitement. They clasped hands and kissed each other warmly before settling down on either side of the starched cloth.

  “Train on time? I hope you’ve not been waiting long?”

  “No, no, Letty! I took a taxi from the station and I’ve only just got here. Tell me at once! Were you successful! Did you get it?”

  Laetitia looked with amused affection at the anxious face and decided it would be cruel to spin out the tension. “Yes! It worked like a charm!” she replied. “Oh, we’ll have a pot of tea for two, Miss, and two of your Chelsea buns, please.”

  When the waitress had gone off with their order, Laetitia took the letter from her bag. She passed it to her friend, watching her reaction as she opened and read it.

  “Perfect! This is perfect! I couldn’t have written a better recommendation myself. Well done! Gosh, it took some courage to face him down like that. I say, Letty, did he fall easy victim to the blackmail?”

  “He did! I laid it on a bit thick—I mean, I made out that I understood him to be your fiancé…Hope you don’t mind? Esmé, I have to warn you that he made no attempt to deny the relationship. In fact he looked rather smug, I thought, when I brought it up. Anything you feel you ought to confide?” She looked anxiously at Esmé Leatherhead. “You will be careful, won’t you? Dalton’s a vindictive little twerp. I hope you’ve not got into an entanglement for my sake?”