‘Wasn’t she examined?’
‘By a doctor, yes. But again, back then, they simply confirmed that she’d had sex. Even that was hard to prove because she had been swimming. The doctor examined Edward too, and confirmed that he had recently ejaculated, but Edward confessed that he’d recently had sex with me.’
‘But if she hadn’t had sex – of any kind – with Edward, who had she had sex with?’ asked Amy.
Georgia sighed.
‘About a year after Edward’s death, I heard that Clarissa was dating Christopher Carlyle. I immediately thought that was strange. I mean, her story was that she had been horribly traumatised by Christopher’s brother – would you want a daily reminder of what had happened? Would you want someone who looked like him to come anywhere near you?’
There was a definite logic to that, thought Amy. If it was her, she certainly wouldn’t, but again, it wasn’t proof.
‘Maybe they just fell in love,’ she said.
‘Maybe,’ replied Georgia without conviction. ‘Either way, within another six months they had announced their engagement. I had just gone up to Cambridge, and one day in the quad I met an old friend of Christopher’s. He told me that he’d seen Clarissa and Christopher together in the summer of ’58. They definitely knew each other then. I remember seeing them together at my birthday dance.’
‘What does that prove? Surely they would have bumped into each other – they were on the same social circuit, weren’t they?’
Georgia shook her head.
‘Christopher had confided in him – he and Clarissa were an item. So I think the person Clarissa had sex with that night was Christopher, not Edward.’
‘But why on earth would she accuse Edward of something so awful?’
‘Envy? Greed? Spite?’ she said softly. ‘I’ve been asking myself that question for the past fifty years.’
She fell silent for a moment, seeming to gather her thoughts.
‘Whatever the reason, Clarissa got what she wanted: a good marriage. A great one, in fact. The Carlyles were one of the most prominent families in England at the time. When I found out about Clarissa and Christopher, I did a bit of digging around. I spoke to a few debs who had done the Season the same year as Clarissa. It turns out she’d been after Edward Carlyle – “set her cap” at him, as we used to say. I mean, to be honest, Edward was the catch of the Season – rich, titled, handsome and clever, he was the one all the girls were after. But according to her friends, Clarissa was obsessed.’
Amy shook her head.
‘But she didn’t get Edward, did she?’
‘No, but Christopher was the next best thing. With Edward out of the way, Christopher moved up the pecking order to elder son. And as Christopher’s wife, she became chatelaine of that great house: a real lady. Although only in name, of course, not in the ways that count.’
Amy tried to take it all in. It was a big accusation that Georgia was making; no wonder it had caused such a bitter rift in the family, and no wonder Will had said they didn’t want any whisper of the scandal getting out.
‘Did you tell them what you thought had happened?’
Georgia nodded.
‘Of course, how could I keep that to myself? My family thought I was wicked for even thinking such a thing. I was an outcast. Even my mother thought I was deluded. She knew how much I wanted Edward to be innocent, but like everyone else, she believed Clarissa. Why wouldn’t she? So my relationship with Estella never really recovered either.’
‘What happened to you? What did you do?’
The old woman shrugged.
‘What could I do? I left home, got a job. At night I studied. I lost myself in a world of books and kept thinking about university and how Edward said I’d be happy there, how I would flourish. I took the Cambridge exam and got in. I didn’t apply to Oxford. It would have been too painful for me. I went up to Newnham College and I made a new life for myself.’
She spread her hands.
‘And here we are.’
Amy looked around the apartment. When she had first come here, it had looked so impressive, all the art, all the books, the wonderful view. Now she could see it as Georgia must have done from time to time down the years: big and lonely, a consolation prize at best, a pale substitute for the grand house and the happy life she should have had – the life she sho
uld have shared with the man she adored.
‘Have you seen Clarissa since?’ she asked.