me, and if you can keep her occupied for a bit, I ought to be grateful to you.’
It was exactly what Josephine had wanted to hear and she could have left triumphant, but her pride was reluctant to be so easily dismissed. She had told herself that she didn’t much like Morwenna when perhaps the more truthful way to put it was that she was intimidated by her – by her looks and her self-possession, by the closeness of her relationship with Archie and by the twelve years between them which separated youth from approaching middle age. Morwenna had a knack of making her feel as though she’d been caught out in a lie which she wasn’t even aware of telling – and she resented it more than she would have cared to admit.
‘Do me a favour, though, if you do go to see Loveday,’ Morwenna continued, looking back out over the lake. ‘Don’t insist on reading too much into what she says. It’s hard enough to get some peace round here, and telling everyone that I’m a battered woman isn’t helpful. If you’re going to spy, at least do it properly.’
‘You’d rather everyone knew the truth, then?’ Josephine asked, stung more by the justness of the rebuke than the abrupt way in which it was delivered.
‘I’m past caring what anyone knows.’
‘Even Loveday?’
‘Especially Loveday. She’ll be all right – she knows how to look after herself.’
Josephine had already allowed herself to be dragged further into the conversation than she had intended, and she had no wish to antagonise Morwenna by trying to tell her how to look after her own sister, but it seemed to her that Loveday was the most overlooked casualty of all that had gone on in the Pinching household. ‘Surely you don’t blame her for what’s happened?’ she said.
Morwenna looked at her sharply. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, I can see that bringing her up must have put a strain on you and Harry, but it didn’t have to be for ever, did it?’ Morwenna seemed to relax a little, and Josephine wondered what she had expected her to say. ‘Why didn’t you just wait a bit longer and start the relationship again once Loveday had left home? It was only a matter of time.’
‘Like I said to Archie, it was different after the fire. And anyway, who’s to say that Loveday
Christopher would have been more than happy to remove the inconvenience, Josephine thought, almost allowing her sarcasm to get the better of her, but she remembered in time that Loveday would not thank her for betraying that particular secret. She remained unconvinced by Morwenna’s explanation, though; if the fire had been the only reason for her rejection of Harry, surely the tension between them would have emerged much sooner? ‘What did Harry do that seemed such a betrayal of everything you had?’ she asked.
Morwenna was quiet for such a long time that Josephine wondered if she had even heard the question. A strong breeze rustled through the nearby reed beds, revealing the white undersides of the leaves on the low- hanging willows and driving the water against the floor of the boathouse with a muffled, persistent thud. She was about to repeat herself when Morwenna answered her with a question of her own. ‘You don’t think that killing our parents was a betrayal?’
‘Of Loveday, perhaps, but not of you. If you wanted to romanticise it, you could even say it was the ultimate act of love.’ She knew as soon as the words were out that she had gone too far; privately, she was sickened by the violence and selfishness of Harry’s behaviour and her opinion of him had changed very little since the first time she had discussed him with Ronnie, but making that obvious was hardly the best way to get anything out of someone who loved him.
‘How could you even begin to understand that love?’ Morwenna asked in a tone which made it clear that she had no intention of wasting any more time by talking.
‘Just because he was your brother…’
‘No, no – that’s not what I mean.’ She lifted her hand dismissively before Josephine had a chance to finish. ‘You can’t understand because you didn’t know Harry. This isn’t about some abstract question of right or wrong; it’s about him, only him, and how he made me feel. You never met him, you never heard his voice or saw him smile or felt the touch of his hand on your face, so you can never understand what it means to be without him.’
There was no argument to this, and it struck Josephine as ridiculous that she should be envious of Morwenna, but the emotion she felt as she listened to this simple declaration of love – a declaration all the more powerful for its ordinariness – could not be fooled into calling itself anything else. She had experienced it before – not a jealousy of anyone in particular, but a vague, unsatisfiable longing for a passion which she had never truly known and which she had now seen too much of the world ever to experience. How she wished she had been given the luxury of first love in peacetime, free from fear and believing that anything was possible rather than resenting the war which had taken away so many choices.
‘Look, go and see Loveday now,’ said Morwenna, surprising Josephine by moving forward to take the spare umbrella from her hand. ‘I can’t get through to her any more, so you might as well keep her happy. At least it’s one hour of the day when I don’t have to worry about her. Take her your book – she’s always been easily distracted from the real world.’
‘Is that such a bad thing?’ The comment had been made without malice, but Josephine – unsettled by the rest of the conversation – reacted more sensitively than was necessary.
‘It depends how far you take it, and what price you’re willing to pay.’
‘Price? That’s a bit strong for a harmless bit of escapism, isn’t it?’
Once again, she felt like a child whose ignorance was being tolerated under sufferance as Morwenna smiled and said: ‘I remember Archie telling me a few years ago about someone he loved who used books and make-believe to keep the world at arm’s length.’ Too surprised to speak, Josephine stared down at the redundant barge, where the rain was making a valiant but forlorn attempt to revive the wilting flowers, and tried not to resent the fact that she was being placed in opposition to Archie by someone who had no idea about the relationship they shared and who was a complete stranger, to her at least. ‘He called her his Lady of Shalott,’ Morwenna added, ‘because she only ever looked at life in a mirror. He didn’t mention any names, but I’m assuming that was you?’ Still, Josephine said nothing; she was too busy trying to take in what she had just heard. It was stupid of her to be hurt: she knew how Archie felt – he had accused her of being an escapist often enough to her face – and she had never assumed that he wouldn’t discuss her with other people, but somehow – perhaps because it was with Morwenna, perhaps because she had not expected to have it thrown back at her like this – it felt like a betrayal.
‘It hurts when someone destroys your trust, doesn’t it?’ Morwenna said. ‘When you find out that some sort of bond has been formed behind your back, and suddenly you’re on the outside, looking in. Perhaps that answers your question about what Harry did to betray everything we had.’
She walked a little way up the bank, but stopped when Josephine called her back. ‘It’s funny, but when Archie was talking to you about me, I don’t suppose he realised how similar you and I are.’ Morwenna looked questioningly at her. ‘Harry was your way of keeping the world at arm’s length, wasn’t he? As long as you could believe in the fantasy of that relationship, you hardly had to engage with reality at all.’
She was rewarded with a nod of acknowledgement and an ironic smile. ‘That’s the trouble with mirrors, though, isn’t it?’ Morwenna said. ‘They break far too easily, but perhaps that’s just as well.’ This time, it was Josephine’s turn to wait for an explanation. ‘Well, aren’t you sick of shadows?’ Morwenna asked, turning to go. ‘I know I am.’
Morveth Wearne stood under one of the vast pine trees that formed the thickest plantation on the western side of the Loe and watched the two women on the opposite bank, safe in the knowledge that she could not be seen – by them, or by anybody walking behind her along the track which led to the church and on to the sea. She found it hard to believe what she was seeing: one conversation at the Minack last night had made it clear to Morveth that Archie’s London friend was far too sharp-witted to be safe company for any of them at the moment, and she would have thought that Morwenna had more sense than to engage. In any case, Loveday shouldn’t be left alone for long; anyone could drop by the cottage and talk to her, and both Archie and his friend were perfectly capable of piecing together more than they needed to know from a carelessly made remark. More anxious than ever, Morveth decided to finish what she had set out to do as quickly as possible, then go and sit with Loveday until Morwenna returned.
Still she watched, though, unable to tear herself away. Her left hand picked nervously at a loose piece of cotton which dangled from the garment in her arms; the coarse brown fabric felt rough against her skin as she tried to gauge the tone of the exchange from the women’s body language, but it was impossible from this distance.
