Juniper’s guest was due about now.
It was possible, Percy supposed, that a person unfamiliar with the castle, approaching it by night, during the blackout, in the midst of a great rainstorm, might find themselves seeking entrance elsewhere than the front door. Slim though the possibility was, once she’d considered it Percy knew she had to check. She couldn’t jolly well leave him floundering out there.
Stitching her lips tight, she took a last glance about the kitchen—dry pantry goods ready for use on the bench, a scrunched tea towel, a saucepan lid: nothing even resembling a stack of torn paper—then she dug the battery torch from the emergency kit, pulled a mackintosh over her dress, and opened the back door.
JUNIPER WASalmost two hours late and Saffy was officially worried. Oh, she knew it was bound to be a delay on the train line, a punctured bus tire, a roadblock, something ordinary, and certainly there’d be no enemy planes complicating matters on a sodden night like this; nonetheless, sensible reasoning had no place in the worries of a big sister. Until Juniper walked through that front door, life and limbs intact, a significant part of Saffy’s mind would remain encased by fear.
And what news, she wondered with a nibble on her bottom lip, would her baby sister bring with her when she did, finally, spill across the threshold? Saffy had believed it when she’d reassured Percy that Juniper wasn’t engaged to be married, she really had, but in the time since Percy had disappeared so abruptly, leaving her alone in the good parlor, she’d grown less and less certain. The doubts had started when she’d joked about the dubious spectacle of Juniper in white lace. Even as Percy was nodding agreement, the froufrou image that had flashed into Saffy’s mind was undergoing transmutation—a reflection in rippling water—into another, far less unlikely vision. One Saffy already held within her imagination and had done since she’d started work on the dress upstairs.
From there, the pieces had fallen quickly into place. Why else had Juniper asked her to alter the dress? Not for something as ordinary as a dinner, but for a wedding. Her own wedding, to this Thomas Cavill who was coming tonight to meet them. A man they hitherto had known nothing about. Indeed, the extent of their knowledge now was limited to the letter Juniper had sent advising that she’d invited him to dinner. They’d met during an air raid, they shared a mutual friend, he was a teacher and a writer; Saffy racked her brains to remember the rest, the precise words Juniper had used, the turn of phrase that had left them with the impression that the gentleman in question had been responsible, in some way, for saving her life. Had they imagined that detail, she wondered? Or was it one of Juniper’s creative untruths, an embellishment designed to predispose their sympathies?
There had been a little more about him in the journal, but that information was not in a biographical vein. What had been written there were the feelings, the desires, the longings of a grown woman. A woman Saffy didn’t recognize, of whom she felt shy; a woman who was becoming worldly. And if Saffy found the transition difficult to reconcile herself to, Percy was going to need a great deal of coaxing. As far as her twin was concerned, Juniper would always be the baby sister who’d come along when they were almost fully grown, the little girl who needed spoiling and protecting. Whose spirits could be lifted, her loyalties won, with nothing more weighty than a bag of sweets.
Saffy smiled with sad fondness for her barnacled twin, who was, no doubt, even at this minute, arming herself so that their father’s wishes might be respected. Poor, dear Percy: intelligent in so many ways, courageous and kind, tougher than leather, yet unable ever to unshackle herself from Daddy’s impossible expectations. Saffy knew better; she’d stopped trying to please Himself a long time ago.
She shivered, cold suddenly, and rubbed her hands together. Then she crossed her arms, determined to find steel within them. Saffy needed to be strong for Juniper now; it was her turn. For she could understand, where Percy would not, the burden of romantic passion.
The door sucked open and Percy was there. A draft pulled the door closed with a slam behind her. “It’s bucketing down.” She chased a drip from the end of her nose, her chin, shook her wet hair. “I heard a noise up here. Before.”
Saffy blinked, greatly perplexed. Spoke as if by rote: “It was the shutter. I think I fixed it, though of course I’m not much use with tools—Percy, where on earth have you been?” And what had she been doing? Saffy’s eyes widened as she took in her twin’s wet, muddy dress, the—were they leaves?—in her hair. “Headache gone then, has it?”
“What’s that?” Percy had collected their glasses and was at the drinks table pouring them each another whisky.
“Your headache. Did you find the aspirin?”
“Oh. Thank you. Yes.”
“Only you were gone a long time.”
“Was I?” Percy handed a glass to Saffy. “I suppose I was. I thought I heard something outside; probably Poe, frightened of the storm. I did wonder at first if it might be Juniper’s friend. What’s his name?”
“Thomas.” Saffy took a sip. “Thomas Cavill.” Did she imagine that Percy was avoiding her eyes? “Percy, I hope—”
“Don’t worry. I’ll be nice to him when he arrives.” She swirled her glass. “Ifhe arrives.”
“You mustn’t prejudge him for being late, Percy.”
“Why ever not?”
“It’s the fault of the war. Nothing runs on time anymore. Juniper’s not here either.”
Percy reclaimed the cigarette she’d left earlier, propped against the rim of the ashtray. “That’s hardly a surprise.”
“He’ll be here eventually.”
“If he exists.”
What an odd thing to say; Saffy tucked a wayward curl behind her ear, confused, concerned, wondering if Percy was making some sort of joke, one of the trademark ironies that Saffy had a habit of taking literally. Though her stomach had begun to churn, Saffy ignored it, choosing to take the remark as humor. “I do hope so; such a great shame to learn he’s a mere figment. The table will look terribly unbalanced minus a setting.” She perched on the edge of the chaise longue, but no matter how she strove for ease, a peculiar nervousness seemed to have transplanted itself from Percy to her.
“You look tired,” said Percy.
“Do I?” Saffy tried to affect an amiable tone. “I suppose I am. Perhaps activity will perk me up. I might just slip down to the kitchen and—”
“No.”
Saffy’s glass dropped. Whisky spilled across the rug, beading brown on the blue and red surface.
Percy picked up the glass. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I just meant—”
