Rose, who had come before the funeral and stayed on at the request of Reeve and the children, had now been at Fettiston for over two weeks. Rose was surprised later, though at the time it seemed natural and inevitable, at the speed with which it was she who, in the immediate management of the scene, took Laura's place. Reeve and Neville and Gillian, helplessly overwhelmed by grief, begged Rose to take charge and, without being told to, the servants all ran to her with their problems. The Vicar rang Rose about the funeral arrangements, and Rose extracted Reeve's wishes. Rose organised the `party' after the funeral, and allotted bedrooms to relations who were staying the night. She also decided what, in the emergency, to delegate to Mrs Keithley, the extremely able cook. Of course Rose was glad to be of use; and a little more than that, she felt a certain ambiguous gratification at being suddenly important in a house where she had often felt she counted for little. Fettiston was a larger and far more beautiful house than Boyars. It was a pure simple unspoilt eighteenth- century house built in a local stone which varied in colour between a liquid brown and a faint rose. An ancestor who had visited Vicenza had adorned the balustraded roof with rows of statues, which had been removed to discreet places in the garden by Reeve's and Rose's great-grandfather. The house sat upon a wide terrace reached from the lawn by a fide narrowing stone stairway. Upon the lawn was the fountain, a rather more successful addition by the same ancestor. Beyond was the vista of English countryside, and farther away die slopes of the Pennines fading (today), outline against outline, into a blue distance which became the sky. Rose had never had any strong sense of 'family possessions' or indeed of family, beyond her parents and Sinclair. After they were dead she had settled to an idea of herself as having friends but, except in some formal or literal sense, no relations. She felt no belongingness to 'the Curtlands', no 'old Yorkshire family' bond, though the 'old house' had been in Yorkshire and all her forebears had lived there. (A local joke had it that when Curtlands referred to 'the wars', they meant the Wars of the Roses.) Rose was fond of Boyars, but would not have felt any great or special pang if she had had to sell it. Now, experiencing the Yorkshire house more intimately, she thought how odd it must be for Neville and Gillian, though perhaps after all they found it natural, to feel that this place was their place, to be entrusted to them and to their children and to their children's children, and filled with the pale strong presences of their ancestors, whose pictures, painted, unfortunately, by minor artists, hung (mostly) in the larger rooms, though some were banished to the bedrooms. On the wall of Rose's bedroom was a small awkward seventeenth-century picture of a rather touching lady, who had lived before Fettiston was built or thought of, who looked remarkably like Gillian.
The drama, for it was that among other things, of Laura's death had interrupted Rose's prolonged period of mourning forjenkin. In a sad but understandable way it had come as an almost welcome interruption. It had removed Rose from the dark obsessive almost maddening atmosphere in London, to a place where her emotions were less deeply involved and where there were many practical things she could do. Her usual Christmas visit to Yorkshire, coming fairly soon after Jenkin's death, and before Laura's condition was diagnosed, had been a nightmare. Christmas at Fettiston was celebrated, as usual, with every extreme of jollity, log fires, Christmas trees, mountains of holly and ivy and mistletoe from the garden, carols, indoor games, excessive eating and drinking, and manifold exchanges of beautifully wrapped presents. Sleigh rides, skiing and skating were also hoped for, but a perverse period of warm weather made these impossible. Rose, hating every moment, got away as soon as she could. She had said nothing to her cousins about the terrible thing which had happened, and they made only perfunctory enquiries about her life elsewhere. Gerard, in so far as he had 'spent' or 'noticed' Christmas, passed it with Gideon and Patricia. It had been a notable occasion because, evidently persuaded by Gideon, Tamar and Violet had joined them. Jean and Duncan were in France as usual. Lily went to stay with her friend Angela Parke. Gulliver was said to be 'in the north', in Leeds or Newcastle. Rose had at first intended to stay in London with Gerard, but he had urged her to go to Yorkshire. In fact both Rose and Gerard felt a certain relief at being separated. They had spent too long grieving together and helping to make each other even more miserable. It was perhaps 'good for them' to be with people less affected, or unaffected, with whom they would have to behave in ordinary ways. Rose had become aware, after the appalling shock of his death, how much, how much more than she had ever realised, she had loved and depended on Jenkin. A slight haze had perhaps always, for her, rested upon him because of an old jealousy of Gerard's affection for him, a sense as if' one day Jenkin might take Gerard away from her altogether. Now she remembered what a wonderful presence Jenkin had been in her life, he had indeed given a soul to all things'; and remembering his wisdom, his particular gentleness, his kindness to her, the unique charm of his physical being, it also seemed to her that he had perhaps loved her with some kind of special love. This thought made her particularly miserable, mingling her sorrow with remorse Life without Jenkin seemed impossible, too much had been taken away. Her own mourning had of course blended with Gerard's much greater grief. Gerard's grief had appalled Rose, and wounded her the more because she could do nothing for it. Inevitably this death made them speak of Sinclair and renew their old sorrow. Rose had forgotten that Gerard could cry, and cry so terribly, sobbing and shedding wild tears as women do.
What, as time passed, they more and more discussed, and made themselves more wretched thereby, was the extraordinary nature of that death, the circumstances, the accident. Here, after a while, they found themselves asking and saying the same things over and over again. Well, it was an accident, wasn't it, and accidents are bizarre. To the police and at the inquest Crimond had explained in the utmost detail what had happened, how he and Jenkin had been discussing Crimond's marksmanship, and had had a bet on his ability, how Jenkin had gone down near the target, how Crimond had told him to keep clear, and, concentrating upon his aim, had fired just as Jenkin turned and moved to say something to him, not realising he was in the line of fire. It was a simple, awful accident. The verdict was death by misadventure. Crimond's evident grief impressed the police and the coroner. Many reliable people were ready to testify that Crimond and Jenkin were friends, no one suggested they were dangerously close friends. Jenkin's golden character was attested by all. There was no suggestion of a sordid homosexual feud, nothing about jealousy, or about money, no shadow of any motive for foul play. If there was carelessness, it was on both parts. Crimond did get into trouble for possessing firearms without a licence, and was heavily fined. The police searched his flat but found nothing incriminating. He had never, in fact, even in his days of fame, been a terrorist suspect. He was now, so long had he been a recluse, scarcely news at all. No keen young reporter, apt to find out some hidden infamy, was sent to pursue the case. It did not seem to occur to anybody that there might have been a quarrel about politics. There was at that moment a great deal of 'news' around and plenty of far more scandalous and violent and sickening goings-on involving far more famous and important people. This odd little accident attracted small attention. Gerard did not expect, or receive, any communication from Crimond after the event, and of course neither Jean nor Duncan heard anything. The only person Crimond was known to have communicated with was Jenkin's schoolmaster friend Marchment who mentioned in the course of his testimony that Crimond had telephoned him from a call box just after Jenkin's death and immediately after he had rung the police, and told him briefly what had happened; and that Crimond had later told him the whole story in much greater detail. Gerard telephoned Marchment, then went to see him, and received the same account. So it was an accident. It was not possible, was it, that Crimond had murdered Jenkin? No, it was not possible. There was no conceivable motive. Surely it was not possible?
In all these rather horrible discussions Rose took part with a rather important reservation. She had, now, her own rather special view of Crimond, 'her Crimond', which must be henceforth and forever her darkest secret. Rose had, even before Jenkin's death, recovered from what now looked like the amazing, unique, inexplicable fit of insanity wherein she had felt herself to be madly in love with Crimond, during which Crimond from being nothing had become everything, Rose, who had at once told herself to 'return to reality', had managed reasonably well to do so within a few days of het `seizure'. Gradually the lurid glow faded, her usual attach- ments regained their power, above all the agonising, tormenting sense of a possibility, a possible move, began to leave her; and she was able to be thankful that she had not found Crimond in the street when she ran down after him, had not written him a compromising letter whose existence would have disturbed her ever after. Of course she couldn't love Crimond! She loved Gerard, and could not, for thousands of reasons, love both of them. Moreover, she absolutely could not, for Jean's sake, have anything to do with Crimond Crimond was a person she disapproved of, was perhaps even a mad person-what could have been madder than that sudden proposal? He was not someone with whom she could envisage spending time, let alone developing any close relation. One of her best comforts, in the early days of her recovery, was the thought that Crimond was actually a bit deranged and would have repented of his rash idea soon enough if Rose had showii any interest in it! All the same, and she realised this as soon a4 she was able to tell herself that it was over, something remained, and perhaps, Rose told herself with an odd mixture of
