“It must have been so beautiful,” she said.
“I’m sure it was.” He sniffed hard. “But it’s gone forever.”
“It could be restored.”
“For a fortune.”
“You’ve got a fortune.”
“Not that big.”
“What about Oscar?”
“No. This is mine. He can come and go, but it’s mine. That was part of the deal.”
“What deal?” she said. He didn’t reply. She pressed him, with words and proximity. “Tell me,” she said. “Share it with me.”
He took a deep breath. “I’m older than Oscar, and there’s a family tradition—it goes back to the time when this house was intact—which says the oldest son, or daughter if there are no sons, becomes a member of a society called the Tabula Rasa.”
“I’ve never heard of it.”
“That’s the way they’d like it to stay, I’m sure. I shouldn’t be telling you any of this, but what the hell? I don’t care any more. It’s all ancient history. So . . . I was supposed to join the Tabula Rasa, but I was passed over by Papa in favor of Oscar.”
“Why?”
Charlie made a little smile. “Believe it or not, they thought I was unstable. Me? Can you imagine? They were afraid I’d be indiscreet.” The smile became a laugh. “Well, fuck them all. I’ll be indiscreet.”
“What does the Society do?”
“It was founded to prevent . . . let me remember the words exactly . . . to prevent the tainting of England’s soil. Joshua loved England.”
“Joshua?”
“The Godolphin who built this house.”
“What did he think this taint was?”
“Who knows? Catholics? The French? He was crazy, and so were most of his friends. Secret societies were in vogue back then—”
“And it’s still in operation?”
“I suppose so. I don’t talk to Oscar very often, and when I do it’s not about the Tabula Rasa. He’s a strange man. In fact, he’s a lot crazier than me. He just hides it better.”
“You used to hide it very well, Charlie,” she reminded him.
“More fool me. I should have let it out. I might have kept you,” He put his hand up to her face. “1 was stupid, Judith. I can’t believe my luck that you’ve forgiven me,”
She felt a pang of guilt, hearing him so moved by her manipulations. But they’d at least borne fruit. She had two new pieces for the puzzle: the Tabula Rasa and its raison d’etre.
“Do you believe in magic?” she asked him.
“Do you want the old Charlie or the new one?”
“The new. The crazy.”
“Then yes, I think I do. When Oscar used to bring his little presents round, he’d say to me, ‘Have a piece of the miracle.’ I used to throw most of them out, except for the bits and pieces you found. I didn’t want to know where he got them.”
“You never asked him?” she said.
“I did, finally. One night when you were away and I was drunk, he came round with that book you found in the safe, and I asked him outright where he got this smut from. I wasn’t ready to believe what he told me. You know what made me ready?”
“No. What?”
“The body on the heath. I told you about it, didn’t I? I watched them digging around in the muck and the rain for two days and I kept thinking, What a fucking life this is! No way out except feet first. I was ready to slit my wrists, and I probably would have done it except that you appeared, and I remembered the way I felt about you when I first saw you. I remembered feeling as though something miraculous was happening, as though I was reclaiming something I’d lost. And I thought, If I believe in one miracle I may as well believe in them all. Even Oscar’s. Even his talk about the Imajica, and the Dominions in the Imajica, and the people there, and the cities. I just thought, Why not. . . embrace it all before I lose the chance? Before I’m a body lying out in the rain.”
“You won’t die in the rain.”
“I don’t care where I die, Jude, I care where 1 live, and I want to live in some kind of hope. I want to live with you.”