‘You mean the lady Isabel.’

‘His wife. The mother of young Jonathan.’

‘And David,’ I added.

She was silent and her mouth hardened; her eyes looked wider and consequently more wild.

‘I’ve seen you,’ she said almost accusingly. ‘I’ve seen you … with him.’

I glanced towards the window. ‘I think I have seen you up there … from time to time.’

‘I know what goes on,’ she said.

‘Oh, do you?’

‘With him,’ she added.

‘Oh?’

‘I’ll never forgive him. He killed her, you know.’

‘Killed! Who killed whom?’

‘He did. The master. He killed my little flower.’ Her eyes filled with tears and her mouth quivered. She clenched her hands and I thought she looked quite mad.

I said gently: ‘I don’t think that is true. Tell me about Isabel.’

Her face changed so suddenly that it was startling to watch her. ‘She was my baby from the first. I had had others but there was something about little Isabel. An only child, you see. Her mother died … died giving birth to her just as …Well, there she was, my baby. And him, her father, he was a good man. Never much there. Too important. Very rich. Always doing something …. But when he was there he loved his little daughter. But really she was mine. He never tried to interfere. He’d always say, “You know what’s best for our little girl, Griselda.” A good man. He died. The good die and the evil flourish.’

‘I can see that you loved Isabel very much.’

She said angrily: ‘There should never have been this marriage. Wouldn’t have been if it had been left to me. It was the one thing I can’t forgive him for. He just had the notion that girls ought to marry and that Isabel would be all right just as others were. He didn’t know my little girl like I did. She was frightened … really frightened. She used to come to me and sob her heart out. There wasn’t anything I could do … though I would have died for her. So she was married, my poor little angel. She said, “You’ll come with me, Griselda,” and I said, “Wild horses wouldn’t drag me away from you, my love.”’

I said: ‘I understand how you feel. You loved her dearly just as a mother loves her child. I know. I have children of my own.’

‘And I had to see her brought here … to this house with him. He didn’t care for her. What he cared for was what she brought him.’

I was silent. I could agree with Griselda on that.

‘Then it started. She was terrified. You see, she had got to get this son. Men … they all want children … but it would be different, eh, if they had the bearing of them. She was frightened when she knew she’d conceived … and, then before three months had gone she had lost it. The second was even worse. That went on for six months. There was another after that. That was her life. That was all she meant to him—except of course the money. And when her father died he got that too. Then he was ready to be rid of her.’

‘You said he killed her.’

‘He did. They could have saved her … but that would have meant losing the boys. He wouldn’t have it. He wanted the boys. That was it. He got them … and it cost her her life.’

‘You mean there was a choice?’

She nodded. ‘I was mad with sorrow. I was there with her. She would have me and even he did not try to stop that. He murdered her, just as sure as you’re sitting there, Madame. And now he has his eyes on you. What does he want from you, do you think?’

‘Griselda,’ I told her, ‘I am a married woman. I have a husband and children in France and I intend to go back to them shortly.’

She moved close to me and lifted her face to mine; her eyes seemed luminous in her wrinkled face. ‘He has plans for you. Don’t forget it. He’s one who won’t see his plans go awry.’

‘I make my own plans,’ I said.

‘You’re with him all the time. I know him. I know his way with women. Even Isabel …’

‘You know nothing about me, Griselda. Tell me more about Isabel.’

‘What more is there to tell? She was happy with me. She came here and was murdered.’

‘Do stop talking about murder. I know she died giving birth to the twins. You’re very fond of them, aren’t you?’

‘David killed her,’ she said.

‘David!’

‘It was both of them. Him forcing that on her … using her … my little Isabel, just to bear children when she wasn’t capable of it. Her mother had died giving birth to her. It was a weakness in the family. She should never have been forced to try it. Then there was David. He was born two hours after Jonathan. She might have been saved. But he had to have David, you see. He wanted two sons … just in case something happened to one of them. Between them they murdered her … him and David.’

‘Griselda, at least you shouldn’t blame David. A newly-born child! Isn’t that rather foolish of you?’

‘Whenever I look at him, I say to myself: It was you … It was your life or hers. They had Jonathan. That should have been enough.’

‘Griselda, what proof have you of this?’

Her wild eyes searched my face and she did not answer my question. She said: ‘He never married again. He’s got his two sons. That leaves him free for his women. He’s brought them here sometimes. I’ve seen them. I used to wonder whether there’d be anyone set up in Isabel’s place.’

‘Isn’t it time to forget the past, Griselda?’

‘Forget Isabel? Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Why did you watch me?’

‘I watch all of them.’

‘You mean … ’

She leaned towards me again and said: ‘His women.’

‘I am not one of them.’

She smiled secretly. I remembered that moment in the minstrels’ gallery at Enderby and was ashamed.

I said: ‘Do you have helpers in your watching?’

‘I can’t get about,’ she said. ‘It’s my rheumatics. Had them for a long time. Makes getting about very hard.’

‘Do you see a good deal of Jonathan?’

She nodded, smiling.

‘And David?’

‘I don’t have him here. He was never what his brother was.’

‘So Jonathan comes on his own. What do you talk about?’

‘His mother. The past.’

‘Is it wise to talk about that to a child?’

‘It’s truth. All children should be taught truth. It says so in the Holy Book.’

‘Do you let Jonathan … do things for you?’

‘He wants to,’ she said. ‘He comes in all excitement. “What’s the scheme for today, Grissel?” he says … the little monkey.’

‘So he follows his father. He … spies on him?’

‘We all want to know if the master is going to marry again. It would make a difference to us all.’

‘As a nurse, don’t you think it is wrong to involve a child in these things?’

‘Jonathan’s not a child. He was born a man … like his father. I know much of what goes on. I learned through Isabel. I saw him through her eyes. Have a care, Madame. No one is safe from him. Remember he murdered my Isabel.’

I had a great desire to get away from the scrutiny of those mad eyes. The room seemed to be stifling me. I felt I was shut in with a crazy woman. She had accused Dickon of murder because his wife died giving birth to twins. She was teaching Jonathan to spy for her. The idea of that boy following us to Enderby … lying in wait there to spy on us, revolted me.

I wondered whether I should tell Sabrina what I had discovered. I felt someone should know, and yet who? My grandmother was not in a fit state to cope with the situation. Sabrina? My mother? Dickon?

I did not feel I could confide what I had discovered to anyone in this house. Then I thought: What harm can the old woman do with her spying? To Jonathan it was just a game. To spy on his father and report to Griselda! There was something decidedly unhealthy about that. But there was something unhealthy about the entire matter.

While I turned all this over in my mind, preparations for our departure went on apace and a few days after my meeting with Griselda, my mother and I were on our way to the coast.

MY FATHER WAS AT Calais waiting for us when we landed. I was amazed and a little envious to see the overwhelming love he had for my mother, so strong that it could not be hidden. My mother took it for granted and I know felt the same towards him. I was sure she believed that this was how all married people felt towards each other. I often thought that her blind belief in such a bond was so convincing that my father, who was first of all a man of the world, was carried along in her belief. She was innocent of the world, it appeared, and here was an example of the strength of innocence. How different were Charles and myself. There was a passionate attachment, yes; we could say we loved each other with reservations. Yet I had almost succumbed to Dickon and I was sure Charles had his affairs. I accepted this as the state of marriage—the only way in which it could survive. How shocked my mother would be!