Patricia Wentworth - She Came Back

“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.”

Anne made a quick spontaneous movement. The hand with the ring took hold of Thomas Jocelyn’s arm. The other hand went out palm upwards towards Philip.

“Uncle Thomas, I’ve got to thank you-at once, without waiting-because you’ve cleared it all up for me. I can see how it could have happened-without Philip knowing. You’ve shown me not only that it did happen, but just how it happened.” Her hand dropped, her eyes went to Philip. “I’m afraid I said some rather horrid things when we talked about it, and I’m sorry. I want to ask you to forgive me. You see, I didn’t understand how it could have happened. I couldn’t get over the feeling that I had been left-” Her voice died. She looked away from Philip, who had not looked at her. She leaned back in her chair and for a moment closed her eyes.

Without moving, Philip was aware of all she did. Behind perfect control his thoughts were turbulent and racing. How clever-how damnably clever-the slight gesture, the failing voice. Anne wasn’t as clever as that. Anne wasn’t clever at all. She had loved life. She had loved her own way, and for a little while she had loved him. Then, like a trickle of cold water-“Suppose she’s not being clever-suppose it’s real- suppose she is Anne-”

Everyone about the table shared a momentary embarrassment. Lilla sat a little closer to Perry. She slipped her hand inside his arm and squeezed it. She had the air of a small bright bird seeking shelter. Her fur coat, open at the neck, showed glimpses of a rose-coloured jumper, a string of milky pearls, a diamond clip. Everything about her was warm, and soft, and kind. She leaned against Perry, who was the most embarrassed person there. Scenes were the devil, and family scenes were the devil with knobs on. He thought the world of Philip, and he wanted him and everyone else to be as happy as he and Lilla were.