She Came Back

CHAPTER 11

The mist which had lain over the churchyard all day had by half past three in the afternoon spread into the park and was creeping up the long slope towards the house. A brief hour of pallid sunshine had failed to disperse the haze overhead. Milly Armitage began to count up bedrooms and rations, because if it was going to be foggy, neither Inez nor Emmeline would want to go back to town, and if they stayed-and of course Thomas-it would really be very much better if Perry and Lilla were to stay too. Three bedrooms… And fishcakes-the cod went farther that way than when it was boiled or grilled… And if Emmeline thought she could keep to a diet in war-time she would have to go hungry, because the next course would just have to be sausages, and they could have baked apples for a dessert… Mr. Codrington would probably prefer to go back to town unless the fog was very bad indeed. Well, if he stayed he must have the blue room… And Florence must put stone hot-water bottles in all the beds… The question was, if Mr. Codrington stayed, did it mean that his clerk would have to be accommodated too? She supposed it did-and he would have the dressing-room at the top of the stairs. A harmless, elderly, confidential person who was to take shorthand notes of everything that was said. Very unpleasant, but of course Mr. Codrington was quite right-it was only fair to everyone that there should be an accurate record. Her mind swung back to food again. If there were going to be two more, Mrs. Ramage would have to put a lot of rice into the fish-cakes, and they had better have potatoes in their jackets… Perhaps it wouldn’t be foggy after all… A glance out of the window dismissed this rather optimistic hope.

Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Jocelyn were the first to arrive. Having met them in the hall, Milly led them into the dining-room, where the polished table and its attendant chairs awaited the expected family.

No one could say that the scene was a cheerful one. An aged, dirty, and extremely valuable Chinese paper covered the walls-one of those heirlooms supremely uncomfortable to live with but too costly to discard. Its prevailing tone was that of over-boiled greens. The carpet, which had once possessed a lively Victorian pattern, had now gone away to a murky drab. The furniture, which was in the largest mahogany tradition, reared itself in massive sideboards and serving-tables. If less than twenty-four people dined in the room, it had an under-populated appearance. A large wood fire struggled in vain to mitigate the chill of long disuse.

Mrs. Thomas Jocelyn looked around her, said, “A fine room, I always think,” and did up the top button of her fur coat again. Mr. Codrington came in behind her and switched on the light in the chandelier over the table. The shadows retreated to either end of the room, leaving the table and its surroundings isolated in a warm golden glove. Mr. Codrington’s clerk, who had followed him, moved now into this circle of light and proceeded to lay a writing-pad and pencil at one end of the table and set a small attaché case down at the other end, after which he withdrew to the fire and stood there warming himself.

Mr. Codrington nodded in the direction of the case.

“I shall be sitting there. Philip wishes me, as it were, to take the chair. It is all extremely painful for him, but I hope some definite conclusion may be arrived at. If you don’t mind, we won’t discuss the matter at all beforehand. It is so difficult to remain quite unprejudiced.” He shepherded them towards the table. “Now Philip will be on my right, and the-well, I suppose I had better call her the claimant-on my left. Then Mr. Jocelyn and yourself on her side, and Mr. and Mrs. Perry Jocelyn next to Philip, Miss Inez Jocelyn next to them, and Mrs. Armitage and Lyndall on the other side. My clerk, Mr. Elvery, will sit at the bottom of the table and take a shorthand record of the proceedings.” He pulled out the third chair on the left, looked down the table, and said, “Perhaps you will sit down. I think the Perry Jocelyns have just arrived. Miss Jocelyn was to travel with them, so that we shall be able to begin immediately.”

Mrs. Thomas Jocelyn sat down. As she drew in her chair, the light flooded down upon the massive waves of her abundant red hair. At forty it was as lively and burnished as it had been at twenty-two under her wedding veil, but, like her figure, it was now a good deal more rigidly controlled. Her complexion was still very good, and owed hardly anything to art. If her eyes had been a little more widely set, a little more deeply blue, she would have been a beauty, but no tinting of lashes originally sandy could disguise that shallow milky tint. Every time Milly Armitage saw her she was reminded of the white Persian cat she and Louie had had as children. Louie was gone, and the Persian cat was gone, but here were its eyes in Emmeline’s head, for all the world like a couple of saucers of skim milk. For the rest, Mrs. Thomas Jocelyn was a managing woman with everything handsome about her, from the small black fur cap on her careful waves, and the expensive coat that went with it, to her fine silk stockings and well cut shoes.

Beside her Thomas Jocelyn looked grey and insignificant.

He had the family features, but they seemed to have shrunk. He was not much over fifty-five years younger than Philip’s father-but he might easily have been taken for sixty-five. Perhaps the confinement of office life, perhaps his wife’s exuberant vitality.

The Perry Jocelyns came in. Perry had been laughing, and Lilla was pinching his arm to make him behave. On the brief occasions when they were together it put them both in such high spirits that they found it difficult to be decorous. Perry was fair like all the Jocelyns, but he was not as tall as Philip. He had a squarer face and a wide, mobile mouth. Lilla was little and plump and rosy, with wide brown eyes, a wide red mouth, and an enchantingly tilted nose. They were so much in love with each other that they brought happiness with them. It flowed from them in warmth and light even in this dreary room.

Behind them, and not too pleased at bringing up the rear, came Miss Inez Jocelyn, talking volubly as was her wont. As she came into view and Milly Armitage turned to greet her after embracing Perry and Lilla, she had to exert considerable self-control in order not to look as startled as she felt.

Even in the midst of these rather wretched preoccupations Inez Jocelyn’s appearance was arresting. Her hair, originally of a mousy fairness, was now quite aggressively platinum. Oblivious of her fifty years, she wore it cascading upon her shoulders from a little black hat of about the size and shape of a jam-pot cover. Everything else was to match-the short flared skirt, the tightly waisted coat, the sheer black stockings, and the stiltheeled shoes. Against this extreme of youthful fashion there was Inez‘ unfortunate face, very long, very thin, very elderly in spite of make-up lavishly but not very skilfully applied. Nobody could have taken her for anyone but a Jocelyn, but she was a Jocelyn in caricature.

She pecked at Milly’s cheek, talking all the time in a piercing voice.

“My dear, I never heard of anything so extraordinary! Incredible, I call it! How do you do, Thomas-how do you do, Emmeline? Where is Philip? Surely he is going to be here! How do you do, Mr. Codrington? Surely Philip is going to be here! Most extraordinary if he isn’t-but then the whole thing is most extraordinary. I cannot see how there can possibly be any doubt myself. Either Anne is dead, or she is alive. That is surely beyond dispute.”

“Certainly, Miss Jocelyn. Perhaps you would be seated. Philip will be here in a moment. Perry, you and your wife here, please-and Miss Jocelyn beyond you. Now before we go any farther I will just say this. You are here to give your opinion as to the identity of someone who claims to be Anne Jocelyn. She arrived here on Tuesday evening wearing Anne’s going-away dress, her fur coat, her pearls, and her wedding and engagement rings, and in possession of Anne’s handbag containing her passport and identity card. She was unhesitatingly recognized as Anne by Mrs. Armitage, by Lyndall, and by Mrs. Ramage the cook, who is the only one of the old staff left here. Philip was away in town. When he returned next day he absolutely refused to accept this identification. He asserted then, and he asserts now, that the claimant is Annie Joyce.”

“Theresa’s Annie Joyce?” Inez Jocelyn’s voice was shrill.

“Yes.”

Emmeline Jocelyn said firmly,

“There surely cannot be any great difficulty about the matter. We all knew Anne-I suppose we should all recognize her. It seems the most extraordinary story.”

Mr. Codrington turned to her with some relief.

“Yes, it is-but I think we had better not discuss it now. Ah-here is Philip!”

Philip Jocelyn stood for a moment inside the door. He lifted a hand to the row of switches beside the jamb. All the rest of the lights in the room went on-one over each of the two big sideboards, one on either side of the chimney-breast, one over a serving-table, one over the door itself. The room remained dreary, but it ceased to be dark. Every object in it, every person, every shade of expression, was unsparingly illuminated. The three large windows blanketed with fog receded and lost their importance. The failing light outside could no longer compete. It withdrew, and became unnoticeable.

Philip came over to the table and shook hands with his uncle and aunt, with Inez and Lilla. He touched Perry on the shoulder and dropped into the chair between him and Mr. Codrington, who at once turned his head and made a sign to his confidential clerk. Mr. Elvery then left the room.

Milly Armitage thought, “It’s exactly like a funeral, only worse. Lyn’s stubborn, but I don’t know that I want her any different. She’s identified herself with Anne, waiting to come in with her like this. It is going to hurt Philip horribly. She’s taking sides against him. No, it’s not that. She’s loyal-she loves Anne, and if there’s even a chance that this is Anne, she won’t let her down.”

Mr. Elvery came back and sat down at the foot of the table, pulling his pad towards him and bending over it, pencil in hand. He left the door open, and almost immediately Lyndall and Anne came in together.

Lyn turned to shut the door, but Anne walked straight on and up to the table. She wore the blue dress in which she had been painted. She wore the pearls. She was well and delicately made up-eyelashes darkened, but no eye-shadow; skin well creamed and powdered, but very little rouge; lips tinted to a coral shade; fingernails enamelled to match. Without hesitation she passed to the right of Mr. Elvery and approached the Thomas Jocelyns, putting out a hand to each.

“Uncle Thomas! Aunt Emmeline!”

It was plain that both were thunderstruck, but without giving them time to speak she went on and took the chair on Mr. Codrington’s left. From there she nodded across the table.

“Oh, Perry-how nice to see you! It’s such a long time, isn’t it? And I haven’t met Lilla, but it’s nice to see her too.” Her eyes went past them. “How do you do, Cousin Inez?”

Philip leaned back in his chair. If this was the first test, she was passing it with honours. But then Annie Joyce would have known enough to pass it. Theresa had all the family history and all the family photographs. She wouldn’t have known about Lilla of course, but that, he fancied, was where Lyn came in. He looked at her accusingly. She had taken the chair next to Milly Armitage. She wore a dark green dress with a turn-down collar of some musliny stuff. The colour made her look very pale. Perhaps it wasn’t the colour at all. Her skin had the smooth, even pallor of milk. Her queer smudgy eyes were dark behind dark lashes. She wouldn’t look at him. He mustn’t look at her. He made a frowning effort and turned his eyes away. Lyndall thought, “He’s angry-he hates me. It’s better that way. What is going to happen to us all? I couldn’t let her come in alone.”

Mr. Codrington looked down the table and said,

“Has anyone any questions they would like to ask?… Yes, Mrs. Jocelyn?”

Emmeline leaned forward.

“You recognized my husband just now-perhaps you will tell us where he comes in the family.”

Thomas Jocelyn sat back and looked down his nose. He disliked all this extremely. He wished that Emmeline hadn’t come, or that, having come, she would sit quiet and leave the talking to someone else. After nearly twenty years of marriage neither of these two things appeared to him as possibilities. This did not prevent him from dwelling on them.

On his other side Anne made smiling answer.

“But of course-Philip’s father had two brothers. Uncle Thomas is the youngest. Perry’s father came in between. He was Peregrine too.”

Emmeline went on.

“And what children have we?”

“Four boys. I suppose the eldest is about sixteen now. He is Tom-and the others are Ambrose, Roger, and James.”

Emmeline said, “We call him Jim,” and Anne laughed.

“You know, I don’t think this sort of thing gets us anywhere. I mean, if somebody asks me who Cousin Inez is, and I say she’s Cousin Theresa’s sister and their father was a first cousin of my grandfather’s, well, it simply doesn’t get us anywhere at all, because Philip seems to think I’m Annie Joyce and Annie would know all these things just as well as I do.”

They all looked at her. Philip looked at her. She seemed frankness personified, her colour a little risen, her lips smiling, her left hand with the big sapphire of Anne’s engagement ring overlapping the platinum wedding-ring laid carelessly- or was it carefully?-on the dark shining board. The women’s eyes were on the rings. Inez said,

“Perfectly right-that sort of thing is no good at all-sheer waste of time.” Her light eyes went maliciously to Emmeline. “What we want is to be practical. Why does Philip say that she isn’t Anne? Why does he think that she is Annie Joyce? That is where we should begin.”

Impossible for common sense to take a more irritating form. The voice, the darting glances passing from Emmeline to Lyndall and back to Philip, had a singularly antagonizing quality.

Mr. Codrington looked resigned and said,

“Perhaps Philip will answer that.”

Philip looked straight in front of him over the top of Anne’s head to the elegant portrait of the Philip Jocelyn who had been a page at the court of William and Mary. Tight white breeches and a lemon-coloured coat, very fair hair tossed carelessly above the brow. Eight years old. At twenty-eight he was dead in a duel over an unfaithful wife. Her portrait hung, banished, in a corner upstairs-all dark love-locks and rose-red furbelows.

He told his story as he had told it in the parlour-the fall of France – Dunkirk -the desperate bid to get Anne away- her death in the moment of its success. His voice was throughout extremely quiet and without expression. He was very pale.

When he had finished, Emmeline had a question ready,

“You went over to get Anne, and you saw her and Annie Joyce together. As far as I know, no one else ever saw Annie after she was fifteen-unless Inez did?”

Miss Jocelyn shook the platinum head with its unsuitable fly-away hat.

“I thought Theresa’s craze for her ridiculous! I told her so, and she didn’t like it. People very seldom like the truth, but I make a point of saying what I think. I said it to Theresa, and she quarrelled with me. Nobody can say that it was my fault. We met at Anne’s wedding, but we didn’t speak. Theresa had a very resentful nature. As to Annie Joyce, I only saw her once, about ten years ago. A most gawky, unattractive child. Nothing to account for Theresa taking such a fancy. But if you ask me, she only did it to annoy the family.”

As everyone else round the table shared this opinion, there were no comments.

Emmeline said quickly,

“Please let Philip answer my question, Inez. He saw Anne and Annie Joyce together-you did, didn’t you, Philip?”

“Yes.”

“Then how much alike were they? That is what we all want to know.”

Philip looked at her. Milly Armitage thought, “He’s horribly strained. It’s worse than any funeral-and it’s going to go on for hours.”

Then that expressionless voice:

“I wasn’t thinking about likeness, I’m afraid. It was after midnight. I had to break in at the back of the house. Pierre woke up and got the girls. You say I saw them together- we were in the kitchen with a single candle. I hustled them off to get ready. I sent Pierre for the other people. The girls only came back just before we started.”

Emmeline persisted.

“But you did see them together-you must have noticed whether there was a likeness.”

“Of course there was a likeness.”

“Annie’s hair was darker than Anne’s,” said Inez Jocelyn. “Even when she was fifteen I’m sure it was darker.”

Emmeline threw her a look.

“Hair doesn’t always stay the same colour-does it, Inez?”

Lilla wanted to laugh, and it would be just too dreadful if she did. Those terrible platinum curls! Why couldn’t people let their hair go grey when it wanted to? And then all at once she stopped wanting to laugh and thought, “It’s horrid- they’re not kind.”

Philip was speaking to Aunt Emmeline.

“Annie Joyce had a scarf tied round her head. I never saw her hair.”

“Then you don’t know how much like Anne she might have looked with her hair hanging down on her neck-if that’s the way Anne was still wearing hers.”

Thomas Jocelyn spoke for the first time. He said,

“This is all very painful, but it will have to be cleared up. You say Anne died in the boat. I take it you identified her afterwards-formally, I mean. Did anyone else?”

“They didn’t ask for anyone else.”

“And you were quite sure that the girl who died in the boat was Anne?”

“I was quite sure.”

“It would have to be a very remarkable likeness to deceive you. But, on the face of it, this likeness must have existed. If this is not Anne who has come back, it is someone so like her that Milly, Lyndall, and Mrs. Ramage accepted her immediately. I must tell you that I myself would have accepted her. We may be mistaken. I am not giving it as my opinion that she is Anne-not yet. But do you not think it at least possible that the mistake is yours, and that it was Annie Joyce who died in the boat?”

“It was Anne.”

“You certainly thought it was Anne. It seems to me it would be much easier to make a mistake about a dead person than about a living one. The arrangement of the hair makes a great deal of difference to a likeness. Annie Joyce’s head was tied up in a scarf. If that scarf had come off, as I suppose it might very easily have done, may not the family likeness have been intensified sufficiently for you to mistake Annie for Anne- especially after death, when personality and expression are withdrawn and only the features remain?”

The two Jocelyns looked at one another. Philip had always respected his uncle’s judgment. He respected it now. He had also a good deal of affection for him. He said in a thoughtful tone,

“I agree that it might happen. I don’t agree that it did happen.”