She looked at the girl, whose stare continued as if she would drink the river dry with her eyes. ‘There wasn’t a bird? A swan? Something to catch her attention?’
Margot shook her head.
Rita sighed. ‘Perhaps it was the light that attracted her,’ she said. She stood for a moment in case she should see it – whatever it was, if it was anything at all. But Margot was right. There was only the river.
Margot dressed and roused her husband, noticed Jonathan was already up and out, and sighed – he had never been one to respect the conventional hours of sleep and wakefulness – then set to making tea and porridge. While she was stirring the pot, there came another knock at the door. It was early for drinkers, yet after last night there were bound to be curious souls dropping in. She unlocked, a greeting on her tongue, but when she opened the door she took half a step back. The man on the threshold had black skin. He was a head taller than most men and powerfully built. Should she be alarmed? She opened her mouth to call for her husband, but before the words were spoken the man took off his hat and nodded at her with grave good manners.
‘I’m sorry to trouble you so early in the day, Madam.’
Tears trembled suddenly, unavoidably, on his lashes and he raised a hand to his face to brush them away.
‘Whatever is it?’ she cried, all thought of danger gone as she drew him inside. ‘Here. Sit down.’
He put a thumb and forefinger into the corners of his eyes and pressed, then sniffed and swallowed. ‘Forgive me,’ he said, and she was struck by the way he spoke, like a gentleman – not only in the words he used, but in the way he said them. ‘I understand a child was brought in last night. A child found drowned in the river.’
‘That is true.’
He heaved a great breath. ‘I believe it might be my granddaughter. I should like to see her, if you don’t mind.’
‘She is in the other room, with her father.’
‘My son? My son is here?’ His heart leapt at the thought and he leapt up with it.
Margot was puzzled. Surely this dark man could not be the father of the man in the bed.
‘The nurse is with them,’ she offered, though it was not an answer. ‘They are both rather poorly.’
He followed her to the pilgrims’ room.
‘This is not my son,’ he said. ‘My son is not so tall, nor so broad. He is always clean-shaven. His hair is light brown and does not curl like this.’
‘Then Mr Daunt is not your son.’
‘My son is Mr Armstrong. And so am I.’
Margot said to Rita, ‘It was for the little girl that the gentleman came in. He thought she might be his grandchild.’
Rita stood to one side and for the first time Armstrong set eyes on the child.
‘Well!’ exclaimed Armstrong uncertainly. ‘What a …’
He hardly knew what to say. He had had in mind – and he realized his foolishness instantly – a brown-skinned child like his own. Of course, this child would be different. She would be Robin’s child. At first disconcerted by the uncolour of her hair and the whiteness of her skin, he was nonetheless struck by a familiarity. He could not quite place it. Her nose was not really Robin’s – unless perhaps it was, a little … And the curve of her temple … He tried to picture the face of the young woman he had seen dead so few hours earlier, but it was hard to compare that face with this. He might have been able to do it if he had seen the woman in life, but death so rapidly undoes a person and the detail of her face was hard to recall in any ordinary way. Still, he fancied there was something that linked the child to the woman, though he couldn’t put his finger on it.
Armstrong became aware that the women were waiting for a response from him.
‘The difficulty is that I have not met my grandchild before. My son’s daughter lived at Bampton with her mother, apart from my own family. It was far from what I would have wished, but it was so.’
‘Family life … It is not always easy,’ Margot murmured charitably. After her initial trepidation she discovered she had quite come round to this large, dark man.