The Boundary Line

by Denise Robins

Genres: Romance

Synopsis

Terry Manstone is a vivacious young girl indulging her passion for the country in a hiking tour, when a badly sprained ankle leaves her as unexpected in Dr. Blaise Farlong?s house and victim of his wife?s evil scheming. In the months that follow, this slight young girl and the frail doctor pursued by a hypocritical and hostile society can draw comfort only from one another, until the wicked plot is finally revealed.

Release date: December 5, 2013

Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton

Print pages: 224

Sample

THE storm broke suddenly and with unexpected violence over Rossdown Forest, and it was only then that Terry Manstone realised three very important things: firstly, that it was growing very late; secondly, that she had lost her way; and thirdly, that she had no idea where she was going to sleep tonight.

Ten minutes ago she had been sitting under an old and beautiful beech-tree, her back against the broad trunk that was grey with lichen and scarred with many initials, extremely weary but quite content. Above her the leaves were spread like green lace through which only now and then, when the wind stirred the branches, she glimpsed blue skies. All around her stood other beeches, as big, as beautiful, as serene. The rich gloom of the forest was pregnant with peace. Here was tranquillity and dim enchantment; a silence broken only by the twitter and chirp of many birds.

The girl resting alone had found what she had wanted so badly. Peace, relief from the heat, the rush, the stifling atmosphere of London in July. The joy of being alone—with time in which to think her thoughts and dream her dreams undisturbed.

Then this sudden, treacherous change in the weather. The muffled boom of thunder, sudden darkness, and big drops of rain spattering through the leaves on to her upturned face.

She picked up the rucksack which contained her entire travelling-kit, slung it over her back, brushed a few twigs and dry leaves from her grey flannel suit, put on a mackintosh, and pulled her scarlet beret firmly over her head. She was not particularly afraid of storms. She rather liked to see the lightning flash and play in the heavens. But she did not relish being in a forest during a storm. It was a little dangerous. Besides which, her wrist-watch told her that it was half past eight. She had had nothing to eat since that heavenly tea in a Sussex farmhouse at four o’clock. She was hungry. And she had tramped fifteen miles today. That was enough.

She was loving this first day of her solitary walking-tour. She had had to fight for it, too—defy her mother and sister who had done their best to prevent her from going away.

Her mother—a conventional, narrow-minded woman—considered it dreadful for a girl of twenty-one to roam round the countryside alone. Her sister, Barbara, who would never have dreamed of doing such a thing, felt the same about it. But Terry had broken loose—sick to death of the restrictions, the boredom, the waste of time of the social round at home in Wimbledon.

The storm rather spoiled things this evening, however, and Terry’s heart beat a little nervously as she walked quickly through the forest. It was not the way which she had come. She had no “bump of locality,” and she had lost her bearings completely.

She looked anxiously around her. She was on a moor—Rossdown Moor—famous in Sussex for its wild and unspoiled beauty. Magnificent now, with the lightning flashing over it, but the sky was black with storm-clouds and the thunder crashed with deafening peals, crackled like the sound of calico being ripped down in pieces. It was rather nerve-racking even for Terry, who was young and had very few nerves in her healthy body.

Where on earth was she?

The rain pelted upon her, soaking through the red beret set so jauntily on the small brown head, through the thin silky mackintosh and flannel suit and white silk blouse—soaking her to the skin. Her tan brogues squelched with water. She found a road—followed it—running breathlessly. The rucksack became a heavy weight, and her heart-beats hurt her.

Then she came to cross-roads and a signpost. It was darkish now, but the lightning lit up the words: “To Rossdown 1 mile.” Ah! that was a village. She would find shelter for the night there. She ran, lowering her head as the rain beat into her eyes. The thunder crashed on.

Her sense of humour prevailing, Terry thought:

“Mummy and Barbara would be so pleased if they could see this finale to my first day’s hiking. ‘Serve you right,’ would be the slogan. …”

Half a mile more. Terry became drenched, hot, trembling with fatigue. She felt she could not move an inch farther. Rossdown village seemed to be at the other side of the world.

Then she saw lights twinkling mistily ahead through the driving rain. Turning off the road, she began to run over the moor, taking a short cut toward those lights. She could see many lights now. She was near the village.

Then an exasperating thing happened. She caught her foot in a rabbit-hole, stumbled and wrenched her ankle. It was fortunate she did not sprain it. It hurt enough, anyhow. Grimacing, she limped slowly, now, toward those beacon lights. She was nearing a human dwelling, and she did not care to whom it belonged—prince or pauper; she was going to ask for shelter and rest and get out of this horrible storm.

The pain in the ankle intensified. Terry’s face whitened under the golden tan. Setting her teeth, she moved on, limping badly.

At last she came to the house—a biggish one with a walled-in garden. A vivid flash of lightning showed her a wrought-iron gateway; a brick pathway, flanked by shaped yews. She was utterly exhausted when she reached the door which was just inside the old porch-way, and knocked upon it; too exhausted even to look for a bell.

Nobody answered her knocking. She knocked again. She knew somebody was at home. She had seen a light. Her head felt queer. Was she going to faint? Surely not. Terry had never done such a thing in her life. But of course she had walked a tremendous distance, for her, and not eaten very much.

Then a light gleamed through the hall window on the left of the door, which was opened cautiously.

“Who is it?” said a woman’s sharp voice.

“Can you let me in—please?” gasped Terry.

The door opened wide. Half blinded by rain and lightning, Terry saw an elderly woman wearing a black dress and white apron. At the same time a terrific peal of thunder echoed and re-echoed over the moor. The woman shrank back, shielding her eyes with her hand.

“Ugh! that dreadful lightning. Come in, for goodness’ sake.”

Terry stumbled in. The door was shut after her. She managed to smile and say:

“Thanks—awfully—”

Then the hall began to spin round her. She felt an arm about her, and heard the woman say:

“Hold up—don’t go and faint. Gracious me—you’re only a child—what on earth are you doing out in a storm like this? Soaked through—mercy on us!”

Terry was too exhausted to answer. She did not faint, but she was a little vague as to what happened for a moment or two—just felt herself being helped along to some room and put in an armchair. She sat with eyes closed, panting, fighting off a feeling of sickness.

Then the faint sensation passed and her head cleared again.

“You’d better have a drop of brandy,” the woman said, and left her alone.

Terry looked round. Heavens, what a relief to be indoors—out of that awful storm! It was most comfortable and pleasant in here. A long-shaped room with low, casement windows, green silky curtains shutting out the stormy summer’s night. The atmosphere was close, for it had been a very hot day, and there was a rich scent of roses in here. Terry saw several vases and bowls of luscious scarlet and yellow blooms; some on the window-sill; some on a small table beside her chair; a big crystal bowl full on a big mahogany desk in front of her.

She began to take note of many significant things in this room. A screen, half shielding a wash-basin; a glass and enamel tray on wheels, and a tall cupboard with glass doors revealing rows of bottles, jars, bowls, instruments, a couch covered by a rug. One wall completely lined with books. Medical and surgical books.

“This is a doctor’s house—this is a surgery”—the thought leapt to Terry’s brain.

Then the woman came back with the brandy.

“Better drink this,” she said.

“I’d rather not,” said Terry. “I’m all right now, thanks.”

“Where on earth have you come from?”

“The forest.”

“Are you a stranger here, then?”

“Very much so. …” Terry laughed a little shakily. “I only left London this morning—on a walking-tour. I’ve never been to this part of Sussex before.”

“A walking-tour,” repeated the woman, and stared at the girl.

Terry took off her rucksack and her beret. Water dripped on to the thick green carpet. The woman hastily took them from her.

“Gracious—you’ll make the place wet. …”

“I’m so sorry. I’m afraid I am—drenched through. Is this a doctor’s house?”

“Yes. This is Russet Place—Dr. Farlong’s. He and Mrs. Farlong are away for the night. I’m Mrs. Clarke, the housekeeper.”

“I see,” said Terry.

“It’s getting on for nine,” added Mrs. Clarke. “Where on earth do you intend going?”

“To tell you the truth,” said Terry, “I don’t feel I could go a step farther. I’m played out.”

“You look done in,” admitted Mrs. Clarke. “It’s a nuisance. There’s no car—the doctor’s away in it—and the house-parlourmaid’s gone home to the village for the night. There’s no one here but me and my little boy, and I can’t see how to get you into the village. You might get a room at the Crown—but you’re not fit to walk a hundred yards with that ankle.”

“I know,” said Terry weakly.

“I’d ’phone up the man at the Crown to come and fetch you, but the storm’s put our line out of order,” the housekeeper continued in a grumbling voice. “I tried five minutes ago to get through to a friend to come and stay—I don’t like to be alone in these storms—and the line seems dead.”

Terry gazed up at her. She did not think the housekeeper a very pleasant-looking woman. She had an angular, cross face with hard lips, and short-sighted eyes behind black-rimmed glasses. Yet she seemed quite kind. Terry looked round the doctor’s room. It was charming—flooded with soft light from an alabaster bowl hanging from the ceiling. She heard the rain beating against the window-panes. The thunder rolled on sullenly. Her heart sank at the idea of going out into the storm again. She was shivering now, cold in spite of the sultry atmosphere, and every bone in her body ached.

Suddenly she said:

“Mrs. Clarke—couldn’t you be an angel and let me stay here for the night? You say everybody is away. You could give me a shake-down, surely. I’ll be off early—before a soul comes back. Honestly, I can’t move again tonight. I’m not fit to. I feel so rottenly tired and chilled.”

“Gracious! I couldn’t let a stranger sleep here—” began the housekeeper primly.

“I’m quite respectable, really,” broke in Terry with a faint smile. “My name is Miss Manstone, and if you look in the London directory you’ll see my mother’s address—The Cedars, Poyning Avenue, Wimbledon.”

Mrs. Clarke looked down at the bedraggled young figure. Certainly she was a lady—Mrs. Clarke knew one when she saw her. A pretty thing, too. She looked very young, with her slight, boyish figure, sun-browned face and throat, bright hazel eyes, and wet brown hair tumbled over her head.

“Mrs. Farlong would give me the sack,” said Mrs. Clarke, after a pause. “I can’t risk it. I’ve got my little boy. He’s a half-wit, poor laddie, and the doctor and Mrs. Farlong allow him to live here with me, which most folk wouldn’t do. I wouldn’t like to lose my place.”

“I’m sure you’re right, but nobody will know,” said Terry wearily. “Do let me stay. …”

She fumbled in her coat-pocket for a small leather purse, and pulled out a pound note.

“Will this compensate the risk? It’s awfully wrong of me to tempt you, but I am so done in, and the storm is still raging.”

Mrs. Clarke peered through her glasses at the pound note. Again Terry had the feeling that she was not a pleasant woman. She had a horrid expression. A half-wit son, too, poor creature! Terry added:

“Dr. and Mrs. Farlong won’t be back till tomorrow, will they?”

“No. They went up to a dinner-party. They said they’d be down by car first thing tomorrow.”

“I’ll be gone frightfully early,” said Terry.

The pound passed from her slender fingers to the woman’s claw-like ones. Mrs. Clarke said:

“Well, I’ll do it, and I daresay no harm will come.”

Terry sighed with relief.

“Oh, thank you. I am really grateful.”

“Better come upstairs and get off your wet clothes and have a hot bath,” said Mrs. Clarke, “and I’ll give you some liniment and a bandage for your ankle.”

“It sounds too good for words.”

“I’ll cook you a scrambled egg and make some coffee.”

“How marvellous!”

Terry stood up and stretched her cramped limbs. The feeling of pleasure in her new freedom, in this adventure which had been intoxicating her ever since she left Wimbledon this morning, returned once more.

“Mummy and Barbara wouldn’t be able to sneer at my ‘hotel’ for the night,” she thought, as she followed Mrs. Clarke out of the room. “It’s a delightful place.”

Passing the doctor’s desk, she saw a leather-framed photograph of a pretty woman with a baby in her arms. “Is that Mrs. Farlong?” she asked.

The housekeeper eyed the photograph grimly.

“That’s her—taken five years ago with the little girl.”

“How pretty she is.”

“She is that!”

“Is the child away too?”

“No, she died, over four years back.”

“Oh, how dreadful! Poor Mrs. Farlong.”

“I don’t know that she felt it like the doctor did. She’s one for Bridge and dances and society. But he fairly worshipped that baby. Never got over it, I’m told.”

“Poor Dr. Farlong.”

“Quite a young pair they are.” Mrs. Clarke waxed confidential as she led Terry up a wide oak staircase on to the top landing. Terry, limping after her, noted the beautiful rugs on the polished floor; the charming coloured sporting prints on the cream-coloured walls. A nice house, Russet Place. Georgian, probably, and well furnished. The Farlongs seemed well off. “They married seven years ago,” continued Mrs. Clarke. “The doctor’s only thirty-two now, and missus is thirty. Only had that one baby. He wanted more, but she don’t care for them.”

“I see,” said Terry, a trifle coldly, feeling that the woman was being a little too confidential about her employers.

“Now they do nothing but quarrel,” added Mrs. Clarke, and looked over the rim of her glasses at Terry with a rather malicious expression. “The doctor’s strong-willed and so’s she. He likes gardening and music and animals; crazy about his delphiniums, he is; and she wants to be gadding about. I was engaged here when they first came to Rossdown three years ago. She wanted him to practise in London, and his health broke down. He had to come to a quiet place. Rossdown is quiet enough. The practice is very small, but she has a bit of private money, so they can keep up appearances.”

She rambled on while she showed Terry into a small bedroom and switched on the light. Terry was too tired to really take in all that the woman said, but she was given the impression that the Farlongs were not very happy together, and it seemed as though the doctor was the one to be pitied and that his wife was thoroughly self-centred and selfish.

“But I really don’t care whether they are happy or not,” thought Terry, as she unhooked her sodden grey skirt and slipped the blouse over her head. “All I want is bed and a good hot bath.”

The housekeeper went downstairs to make the coffee.

“You’d best get straight into bed,” she said. “It’s the doctor’s dressing-room, and his bed was made up clean this morning. Best take that and I’ll make it up fresh tomorrow. The spare room’s being spring-cleaned, and I don’t want to mess up the missus’s room.”

Terry agreed to anything and everything. When she was out of her wet things and wrapped in a dressing-gown—a grey flannel one, lent by Mrs. Clarke, and hideous in the extreme—she looked with some curiosity about her. This was a typical man’s room. Rather spartan: one nice tallboy; a Georgian wardrobe; a bow-fronted chest of drawers and a divan bed. Chintz curtains, brown and yellow; two good rugs on the floor, and only one picture in the room: an enlarged snapshot of a laughing, curly-haired, two-year-old baby. The little girl who had died.

Terry looked at this and felt quite grieved for the unknown Dr. Farlong.

“Poor thing—to have lost a child he worshipped so!”

Mrs. Clarke came back with a bath-towel over her arm and a photograph in her hand.

“This is one of the doctor,” she said. “I found it torn in half in Mrs. Farlong’s waste-paper basket a few nights back and saved it—pasted it together. I expect she did it in one of her tempers.”

Terry’s cheeks felt hot. She felt that she was being let into intimate details and secrets of this family which she had no right to know.

However, she would never meet the Farlongs; she was only stealing this one night in their charming home, so what matter what she knew about them?

She found herself examining the repaired photograph of Dr. Farlong. It was signed: “Blaise.” She said the name aloud.

“Yes—that’s him,” said Mrs. Clarke. “Some think him very good-looking. He’s clever at his work.”

“Dr. Blaise Farlong.”

Terry studied the face with some interest. Certainly Dr. Farlong was good-looking—in a way which appealed to her. A rugged way. Powerful lines of jaw and chin; attractive eyes—the keen, serious eyes of a deep thinker; hair which looked thick and dark, brushed back from an intellectual forehead. A rather big mouth. The lips and eyes portrayed humour and kindliness. Yet withal it was a curiously sad face. An appealing one.

“He’s a popular doctor,” said Terry’s informant. “Folks about Rossdown dote on him.”

Terry handed her back the torn photograph.

“He looks charming; it’s surprising Mrs. Farlong doesn’t get on with him.”

“If you ask me,” said Mrs. Clarke with a little leering smile, “there’s another gentleman she likes better.”

That was too much. Terry gave the woman a chilly stare and marched out of the room.

Lying languorously in the hot water, her slim white limbs relaxed and a delicious feeling of well-being pervading her, Terry dwelt on the thought of Dr. Farlong and his wife. What an attractive face he had. She always liked doctors. She was sure she would like him. But she would never meet him. She would be gone early in the morning—carry on with her solitary walking tour through this lovely Sussex country.

Turning her reflections to Mrs. Farlong, Terry felt quite indignant.

“Beastly of her—to quarrel with him—make him unhappy—and not have any more children,” was her youthful opinion.

Half an hour later, having eaten a good supper, her strained ankle bandaged, Terry went to sleep tucked up in the bed of a complete stranger. Certainly, if she had wanted to get away from her humdrum, conventional life at home in London and find adventure, she had found it on this, the first night of her tour.

THE storm did not abate for several hours after Terry fell asleep. The lightning continued to play over the countryside and the thunder growled and grumbled intermittently.

At half past one in the morning the rain ceased and the storm passed over, and suddenly the moon broke through the clouds. The little village of Rossdown and the moorland fringing it lay wet and glittering with an unearthly beauty in the white moonlight.

At a quarter to two the gates of Russet Place were pushed open and a man walked quietly into the garden and up the brick pathway with the assured air of one who knew his way. The rain dripped off the yews and the feathery mass of montana clematis which grew profusely over the porch. The man took off his hat and shook it. It was like everything else—soaked with rain.

He had just walked a considerable distance from Crowborough, the nearest big station from which he was able to reach Rossdown so late at night.

In the moonlight his face looked pale and fatigued. He was wearing a light Burberry over his evening dress. He took off the coat and shook that also.

“Quite crazy,” he said to himself. “But, my God, I’m glad to be home. At least it’s peaceful here, and Ruth can’t nag at me any more. If I’d stayed with her in that hotel, I think I d have done something violent. …”

He found a latch-key, inserted it in the Yale lock, opened the front door, and walked into the house, yawning.

It was very quiet. Old Prince, the retriever, in his kennel at the back of the house did not bark. He knew his master’s footsteps.

Blaise Farlong walked into his consulting-room, switched on the light in there, and stood by his desk for a moment while he lit a cigarette.

He glanced at the letters lying on his blotter—nothing of interest; then at a telephone message on the pad beside the ’phone:

“Mrs. Deemer would like to see you in the morning.”

Blaise smiled grimly. Mrs. Deemer was a most trying patient. A malade imaginaire. The type he hated to deal with. But she had money. He must make something—anything, these hard times. His practice at Rossdown was very small. He was considered more in the light of a consultant than a G.P. Dr. Beggland, the other practitioner in the village, did all the panel work.

That did not worry Farlong. His health had been groggy since the war. A year in Mesopotamia as a youngster had started the trouble which had never really left him. He could not work too hard. But work to some degree he must. He adored his job. It was an unceasing grief that he could not have a big practice. He had the ability. He knew that. The fact that Ruth, his wife, had money of her own made things difficult. It made them easy for her, of course, and easier for him in a way. It enabled them to live much more comfortably than they could have done otherwise. Blaise had only three hundred a year private means and what he earned. But he had grown to loathe depending upon his wife for any contribution toward the mutual maintenance.

It had been all right in the beginning—when she had cared for him and they had been happy together. Now that she had so utterly ceased to care, her money was a curse—something she could choke down his throat—a subject which never failed to make him writhe. Oh, God, those ghastly money discussions! When Ruth, coldly sarcastic, reminded him that she had paid for this, for that, for the other. She continually reproached him for not being in a better position than this one in Rossdown.

She wanted him to buy a practice with her money in London. He loathed town—the life up there. He only asked for a garden; a little time to grow his flowers; the country wherein to exercise his dog. He had tried for Ruth’s sake to live in London, but he had felt unable to cope with the rush—the artificiality of London—since that bad breakdown in his health, after Priscilla had died.

Priscilla had been the one perfect gift that Ruth had given him—and she had even begrudged that—the temporary discomforts of producing a child. But Priscilla had been born, and Blaise, who had always loved children, expended all his starved affections on the delicate little thing—too delicate, alas, to survive a sudden attack of pneumonia when she was nearly three years old.

From that shock Blaise had never recovered. His hopes of parenthood had died with Priscilla. Ruth told him brutally, soon after the child’s death, that she would never go through the business again.

Today Blaise was better, stronger in health than he had ever been. If Ruth had been different, he might have sold Russet Place, sacrificed his love of the country for her sake and taken a new practice in London. . .