were all of the empty bench, all taken from the same angle, in every degree of brightness from full sunlight to near-darkness, hundreds and hundreds of them.
'I read about it here, you see.' Mr Thornton, his eyes still wet with emotion, passed them a large book.
'I do all my own developing now,' he continued. 'Mr Mclntyre says-or at least implies-that commercial developers are not always to be trusted. The Church, you know; they don't approve. And I had almost despaired, after so many attempts. But now… I am so happy, now you have seen him too.'
Soon after, they went out into the garden. Though it was a mild, tranquil autumn day, Cordelia could not repress a slight shiver as they approached the now-celebrated bench. I don't think I could ever sit there again, she said to herself; it would seem-like trespass, or tempting fate. Yet why should I find it sinister? I should simply be delighted for poor Mr Thornton.
But as the extremity of their host's emotion subsided, she became aware that he was not as happy as he professed to be. His earlier anxiety reappeared; he asked them several times whether they were completely certain they had seen Robert in the photograph. With each repetition, Uncle Theodore's assurances sounded less convincing, her own more forced. Her spirits sank lower as the afternoon wore on, until the pressure of Mr Thornton's haunted, beseeching gaze became quite unbearable, and despite the warmth of their farewells, she left with the dismal feeling that their visit had done him more harm than good.
'I wish he had never seen that book!' she said passionately, as they were walking back to the station. 'What he really wants is for Robert not to have died in the war; to have him back alive and warm and breathing, and he can't have that, and cant bear it, and the photograph only torments him.'
'Indeed. But-er-how did you know, my dear, exactly what he wanted us to see?'
She explained about her illusion.
'I see-or rather, I didn't. So you think it was simply your memory of the other photograph?'
'I suppose it must have been,' she replied uneasily, remembering that Mr Thornton had not actually brought out the earlier picture for comparison, 'only just for that instant, I really did see Robert, sitting there in his uniform…'
CORDELIA WAS STARTLED OUT OF HER RECOLLECTION BY the awareness that Uncle Theodore was standing beside her on the landing, contemplating the portrait on which her own unseeing eyes had been fixed.
'I am so sorry, my dear. I did not mean to alarm you. You seemed so deep in thought, I didn't like to interrupt.'
'No, I'm glad to be interrupted. I was remembering our last visit to poor Mr Thornton.'
Uncle Theodore, when agitated, had a habit of running his hands through his thick, unruly silver-grey hair; today it was sticking out wildly in all directions. Small and wiry (at five feet seven, he was only a little above Cordelia's height), he had always looked years younger than his age. But today he seemed to be feeling the burden of his sixty-seven years; his face had taken on a greyish tinge, making the lines scored vertically down his cheek seem more than ever like fine scars or claw-marks. And there was a lurking indecision or anxiety in his bloodhound eyes that reminded her suddenly of Mr Thornton.
'Is something troubling you, uncle?' she asked, when he did not immediately reply.
'Not exactly-the fact is, my dear, I have something to say to you, and I don't know where to begin.'
'Well,' she smiled, 'you should take the advice you always used to give me: begin at the beginning, and go on until you come to the end.'
'Ah, the beginning…' he murmured, his eyes upon the face of Imogen de Vere. 'Did you know' he continued, as if irrelevantly, 'that your grandmother and I were once engaged to be married?'
'No, I didn't,' said Cordelia, surprised.
'Ah. I thought perhaps Una might have said something.'
'No, she hasn't.'
I see.
He paused, as if seeking guidance from the portrait.
'As you know, I grew up mainly in Holland Park; we only came here for the summers, then. Her fathers house was only a few hundred yards from ours, but much grander. He was a City man-stocks and shares and directorships, all that sort of thing-and did very well out of it. Whereas we were in tea, as you know; perfectly comfortable, but by no means rich.'
He lingered for a while on familiar ground, rehearsing the slow decline of the importing house founded by his grandfather, and the growth of the friendship between himself, his sister (Una was two years younger than Theodore), and Imogen Ward.
'Imogen and I were so slow to realise that we were in love-it was mutual-that I couldn't tell you when it began. We must have been eighteen or nineteen before anything was declared between us. But once we had spoken, we were quite certain-that is to say I was quite certain-that we would be married as soon as she had turned twenty-one.
'We knew that her father wouldn't like it. Horace Ward didn't approve of me, for a start; he thought, quite rightly, that I lacked ambition; and then, aside from the difference in wealth, he was violently opposed to marriage between cousins. We were second cousins, not first, and the relation was on our mothers' side, not his, but it made no difference. Any degree of relation was too much for him. From the day she first sounded him out, I was banned from their house, and she from ours, under threat of disinheritance. To do him justice, he was very fond of her; I think he genuinely believed that if he'd consented, he would have been making a sort of human sacrifice of his only daughter, for whom some princes mightn't have been good enough-quite apart from their habit of marrying their cousins. Anything she wanted was hers for the asking; anything except me.'
Theodore was still speaking as if to the portrait of Imogen de Vere.
'Why must you be so reasonable, uncle?' said Cordelia tenderly. 'He sounds absolutely horrible.'
'It's a sort of failing, I suppose, always to see the other side. There are times when you should simply act… If I had known what I know now, I'd have waited, and asked her to run away with me on her twenty-first birthday. We went on meeting in secret, but inevitably, word got back to him; there were more scenes, and more threats… it was a terrible strain for her… until I began to fear that I really was ruining her life. In the end we agreed, Imogen and I, that I would go out to Calcutta as my father had hoped, to look after the business there, and stay two years, and then, if our feelings hadn't altered… She had just turned twenty when I left.
'Her letter telling me that she was engaged to a forty-year-old banker named Ruthven de Vere arrived about three months before I was due to come home. I stayed for fifteen years.'
He turned away from the portrait, towards the window at the head of the staircase, studying the wintry fields. Traces of last weeks snow still clung to the highest of the hilltops beyond.
'But uncle, I don't understand. How could she come to live with you, after all that?'
'Do you mean, because of the impropriety?'
'No, no, I mean, how could she accept, after what she'd done to you?'
'You mustn't be angry with her, my dear. Not on my account. She was seriously ill; both her parents were dead; de Vere had charge of all her money, what was left of it; she had nowhere else to turn. We'd kept in touch, you see. Another excess of reasonableness on my part; doubtless many would call it lack of spirit.'
'I wouldn't. She was very lucky, to have such a generous spirit to turn to,' said Cordelia, taking his arm. 'But why did she leave her husband, just when she became ill? Did Papa ever see his father again? Why would Papa never speak of him? Or Aunt Una? Even you? Did you ever meet him? Ruthven de Vere, I mean?'
'No, my dear. You must remember, I was away in India until the year before-it happened; if my mother had lived longer, I wouldn't have been here at all. And Imogen's letters had been mostly about Arthur. I had heard that
