Page 55 of Happily Ever After
‘Whathaveyou been doing? Is this yours?’ She waved a hand at Hugo’s dress, then glanced around the Yellow Room, where the wardrobe doors stood open and one or two garments were hanging outside the cupboards. ‘Andthis?’
Hugo swallowed. I became aware that I still had the diaries swinging from my hand in their bag. I wondered if I could use them as a cudgel. ‘We need to go,’ I said urgently, trying to distract her.
Over at the window, the twin metal arms of a ladder made a clonk as they came to rest against the frame.
‘Er,’ Hugo said. ‘Um. Yes. But we do need to get out, Mother.’
Lady Tanith raked him with another stare. ‘Velvet.’ She shook her head. ‘Whatpossessedyou, Hugo? You clearly don’t have the hips for velvet. And blue isnotyour colour at all. You could get away with a mulberry silk, satin at the very worst.’
Hugo’s mouth dropped open. I tried to drive them both towards the window, where the ladder was tapping with impatience.
‘And these are yours too?’
Hugo clearly couldn’t speak, so I intervened. ‘Yes, yes, these are all Hugo’s. Now can we get down that ladder before the fire comes along the landing?’
From far away came the sound of something dropping, big, heavy and ominous, right through the house. The room was filling with smoke, and we’d all started to cough.
Without another word, Lady Tanith moved to the nearest wardrobe, reached in an arm and scooped the contents out onto the floor. Then she began throwing the dresses out of the window, to the evident and loud consternation of those waiting on the ground below, and the possible disruption of someone halfway up the ladder.
‘Mother! What are you doing?’ Hugo made a motion to stop her.
‘These arecouture!’ She had to speak up over the general sounds of fire, smoke, coughing, and random yells from outside.
I made a face at him, and the three of us emptied the wardrobes out of the window in record time. By now, there were audible crackling noises, the heat had risen and there were sounds coming from the ceiling as though the rafters above us were giving up. Thumps and bangs, and a small hole had appeared in the plaster rose in the centre.
‘Look, just go!’
At last Lady Tanith, with extreme dignity, slung a leg over the windowsill and climbed barefoot down the ladder in her negligee. I followed her and Hugo, wrenching off his diamanté shoes, which twinkled in the firelight, came after me. Being followed down a twenty-foot ladder by a man in velvet carrying six-inch heels was almost more of an experience than being in a burning building.
Jay wrapped his arms around me as we arrived on the grass. It was only from down here that I could see the full extent of the fire – the opposite wing was blazing from roof to floor level and the roof was almost fully alight. We all ran into the gardens, away from the inferno, to join the small crowd of watching villagers, several of whom were filming the conflagration with every sign of enjoyment. Jay kept an arm wrapped around me.
‘My house!’ Lady Tanith gave a little cry. ‘My house! All my wonderful things!’
I had the uncharitable thought that most of her things could only be improved by an enormous blaze, and then I remembered the cat, shut away to prevent him from following Hugo and me. ‘Oh my God! The Master! He’s in the dining room!’ I pointed at the windows, flaming with reflected light beneath my bedroom. The glass was as yet unbroken, but there was smoke filling the space and pressing itself against the window.
Lady Tanith screamed. Jay let me go and gave me a resigned look. ‘It might be too late,’ he said.
‘We have to get him out.’
‘But we can’t. Look, the whole place is going up.’
‘The fire is worst in the roof above the library. The dining room is ground floor in the other wing, it will be the last place the fire gets to.’
We all stared again at the windows of the dining room. Apart from the smoke which puffed and billowed against the glass, there was no sign of life.
‘I’m sorry,’ Jay said, and Lady Tanith screamed again. She turned and began to run back towards the flaming house. Hugo, showing a surprising turn of speed for a bloke in a frock, belted after her and tackled her to the ground, where she lay, sobbing.
‘We have to get him out,’ I whispered. ‘I owe that cat. Plus, it might be the only thing that Tanith has a healthy relationship with.’
Jay gave me a resigned look. ‘You’re as batshit as the rest of them, aren’t you?’ he said, but there was a fondness to his tone which took the sting from his words.
I clutched Jay’s arm. ‘We can’t leave him. We justcan’t.’
‘All right,’ he said tiredly. ‘I’ll do the heroics.’
Cautiously, with an arm up in front of his face to protect him from the heat and smoke, Jay approached the building. Massive rafters were coming down now, as though the roof was tired of the weight and slumping down through the house. Our wing was still intact but the tiles were cracking in the roof as the fire made its way through the space.
Jay drew his other arm back. He was wearing his gardening clothes, jumper and mud-encrusted trousers, and he flickered like an elemental in the ominous light from the fire. A siren wailed now, just audible above the sound of the alarms, and a blue light strobed its way along the drive. Its noise was almost drowned out by the sound of Jay swearing as his elbow rebounded off the glass of the dining room window without making so much as a crack.
