Free The Last Pier by Roma Tearne Page B

had completely reinvented herself. Now her story was that she hadrun away to England because a distant cousin had abused her at home. She told this story with eerie glibness, in public, and to total strangers, thus shocking the more conservative Agnes. Kitty refused to retract a single word. (Cecily was said to have the same stubborn streak.) Eventually, having heard her sister’s fabrications so often, Agnes began to wonder if it had been true.
    In London they saw each other rarely, at first. Agnes was busy studying the piano, learning composition and working as a student répétiteur. When she graduated from the Royal College it was with a distinction, but at her graduation performance (she played Liszt and nearly destroyed the piano) her parents were noted for their absence. Only Kitty was present.
    Kitty, living in digs, working as a secretary at the government Board of Trade.
    Kitty, mixing now in grand city circles, talking about export and bonds and taking trips abroad with her boss with whom she was on first name terms. He was a wealthy, important man, able to converse in several languages and able to introduce Kitty to people in the diplomatic service. Kitty talked so often and so highly of him that Agnes wondered if her sister was not a little in love. But any questions on her part were sharply dismissed. Then, the week after her graduation Agnes finally met the man himself.
    Selwyn Maudsley, enigmatic loner, silent listener, slow to smile, up for the weekend expecting to meet Kitty for lunch, was surprised to find her sister Agnes present. Startled too, by the colour of Agnes’ eyes. Green was a colour Selwyn associated with the land, not eyes, he told her, many weeks later. Over the course of these weeks he told Agnes other things.
    That she reminded him of roses. (Later he would want to call his first daughter by this name).
    That he would one day inherit his father’s farm in Suffolk.
    That he dreaded the very idea.
    That the place reminded him of a childhood devoid of love with a father who had beaten both Selwyn and his older brother.
    That although their father hated all Germans he still sent his oldest son, Selwyn’s brother, to be killed by one.
    That Selwyn had loved only that older brother.
    That, were Agnes to marry him, he would buy her a grand piano.
    That every little thing in life she might ever want was hers for the asking.
    (How unrealistic, Kitty said, when she heard.)
    That he would love her forever.
    (Kitty had laughed until she almost cried when she heard this .)
    The news that Kitty had decided to marry a diplomat was lost in what followed. What had also been lost on Agnes was Selwyn’s momentary shocked silence after Kitty’s announcement. Selwyn was twenty-one years older than Agnes and two days later he proposed to her. For a man so slow the speed with which he did this was astonishing. The die was cast. And, even though farms and rural life were what she, like Selwyn, was escaping from, Agnes developed certainty. Feeling fatally sorry for him, mistaking it for love, she agreed to marry him.
     
    Selwyn Maudsley’s family had lived at Palmyra House for three generations. The farm consisted of a twelve-acre orchard, a field of strawberries and three others of wheat. It was situated on a bend in the River Ore halfway between the town of Bly and that of Eelburton. Beyond the orchards and the fields belonging to the farm were the salt marshes. From the windows on the east side of the house it was possible to see the sea and on the west side there were the woods. In winter the Martello tower just outside Bly was clearly visible but in summer it was always screened by the trees. There hadn’t been a wedding there for many years. The Maudsleys were a wealthy family known both for their charitable work and their aloofness so when Selwyn brought his new bride home the little town of Bly was suddenly abuzz with curiosity. Who would be invited?
     
    In the event the church was packed and at the