by Ann Bridge
‘No, we do not fish; we are geologists’ he said.
‘Géologistes? What is this? I never heard the word.’
‘We study the structure of the rocks and the soil; it is an important science’ Nick said firmly. ‘À la longue it is helpful to agriculture. And one of the best and easiest places for this study is the banks of rivers, where the face of the soil is exposed; hence we go to look at the Gave.’
The old man was impressed—‘Ah, les Messieurs are scientists! Tiens!’ But he was not altogether satisfied. ‘And why do ces Messieurs go to examine the banks of the Gave at such an hour?’
‘Because we have to cover several hundred kilomêtres of the Gave today—so like Monsieur, we start early for the day’s work!’
Now the old man laughed, at last contented. When he got out he wrung Nick’s hand warmly with his own gnarled, brown, and wrinkled one.
‘Bonne chance, Monsieur, with your enquiries. If you discover something of use to agriculture, please pass it on to Le Général!—we others, we feel that he ignores us.’
‘You handled that very nicely’ the Colonel said to Nick, as they drove on. ‘I am in luck here, to get such good help on the spot—yours, and your Mother’s. Oh!’—as the road bent right and crossed a bridge—‘Is that Lacq?’
In the bright early light that astonishing place, Lacq, lay spread out before them—the acres of low white buildings, the silvery aluminium globes, and towering over all the four great chimneys, their black and red plumes of smoke and flame streaming out on the morning breeze.
‘Yes, that’s Lacq. I hope to get a job there sometime; I think it’s one of the most worth-while places in the world’ Nick said, with a fervour which surprised his companion.
Chapter 13
Luzia was rather silent on the drive back to Pau. She had been upset by Dick’s behaviour on the bank of the Gave, and wondered whether she had perhaps provoked it by her impulsive protest against the idea that Nick should start the Bugatti’s engine and jump clear. She knew quite well how Dick felt about her—had she been indiscreet? (Discretion is really Rule I for Portuguese young ladies.) But she had also been impressed by Nick: his choice of the spot, and by his practicalness over ruffling up the crushed grass, and getting the wheel-marks removed from the lip of the bank, about which Dick had been so uncooperative. She had never consciously compared the twins before; Dick was her declared suitor, Nick simply a friendly and amusing figure in the background—now she found herself driven to make a comparison, and it was not in Dick’s favour.
Over breakfast, for which Colonel Jamieson stayed, a small interchange took place which reinforced the girl’s good impression of Nick. Lady Heriot, again in her hair net and flowing dressing-gown—it was still only a quarter to seven—presided over the meal; she apologised for the absence of rolls. ‘The baker doesn’t get here as early as this; you will have to put up with toast.’ In response to her interested enquiries she was given a full account of the drowning of the Bugatti. Presently Nick asked Colonel Jamieson when it would be convenient for him to bring Madame Bonnecourt down to be told about Glentoran?
‘Oh, any time now; my wife seems very fit. Bring her today, if you like.’
‘No, I don’t think that would do; if would fuss her. She will want some notice. But I can go up today and let her know—for tomorrow? And would the morning or the afternoon be best for Mrs. Jamieson?’
Lady Heriot intervened.
‘I should bring her in the morning, Nick; poor Mrs. Jamieson has this awful repos in the afternoon. Then she can come and have luncheon here, and do some shopping before you take her back.’
‘I don’t think having lunch here is a good idea, Maman’ Nick said. ‘It would un-nerve her.’
‘Oh, why? We know him so well, after all; I should like to meet her.’
Luzia was impelled to speak.
‘Lady Heriot, in this Nick is right; she would be intimidated by coming here. I think that tomorrow, when she has seen Mrs. Jamieson, it would be better if I took her to déjeuner in some small, quiet place. Please forgive me for suggesting this, when you are so kind; but I am sure that for this little woman it will be easier, done so. She must meet one stranger tomorrow in any case, and hear much that will be strange to her; after all, her whole life is about to be turned upside down.’
Nick glanced gratefully at Luzia; his Mother regarded her benignly. Considerate herself, she liked consideration for others in the young.
‘My dear child, do whatever you think best; you know her, and I don’t.’ She paused. ‘If you are not too tired, mightn’t it be a good plan for you to go up with Nick, and arrange it all with her?’
‘Yes, I do this—I think it a very good idea,’ Luzia said. For Mme. Bonnecourt it certainly was, but in her new hyper-conscious state of mind about the twins the girl was troubled by the sense of pleasure that came over her at the idea of driving up to Larége, for the first time, with Nick.
Dick broke in. ‘Really, Your Ladyship, why on earth should Luzia have to do this extra chore? Nick can perfectly well tell Mme. B. to be ready to come down tomorrow; he and I have both known her for years. Luzia’s been up for hours already.’
Lady Heriot glanced at the rather surly face of her son, then at that of her young guest. With great wisdom she decided to leave this to Luzia to handle.
‘Dick, do not be foolish; I am not at all tired’ the girl said lightly. ‘I think Madame Bonnecourt might like it if I make this plan with her—about the shopping, and lunch, and so on. Entre femmes! This is different to a message from a man.’ She turned to her hostess.
‘I know Madame Bonnecourt only a little’ she went on, ‘but I have seen that she is not an adventurous character; not at all like her husband!’
The emphasis in her tone rather startled Colonel Jamieson.
‘Don’t you like Bonnecourt?’ he asked.
‘I do not know him enough to like or dislike him; I know only what I am told. But would you not agree that he is adventurous? That is all I said.’
‘Yes’ he replied, amused; very soon afterwards he left, after promising Nick that he would arrange with his wife to receive Madame Bonnecourt the following morning. He went back to the Victoire, had a bath and a shave, and then walked round to the Clinic. To his amazement Julia met him at the door of her room, up, and dressed in a close-fitting house-coat.
‘Goodness, are you allowed to walk about?’ he asked anxiously.
‘Oh yes—it’s a week today, and a Caesarian is even less bother than a normal labour—actually after those people get up nowadays in no time; none of that three weeks in bed any more. What a bore it must have been! Well, how did it go?’ As she spoke she lay down again on the neatly-made bed, and leaned back against the pillows.
He told her how it had gone. ‘That boy Nick is very bright; he’d chosen a perfect spot, and there aren’t many—I had a good look at the river as we drove down it, both before and after.’ After a pause, he mentioned the slight breeze that there had been between Luzia and Dick—Julia’s interest was at once aroused on, behalf of her precious pupil.
‘Did they quarrel?’
‘No, you couldn’t call it that, but she slapped him down pretty hard. I think she’s probably got engaged to the wrong twin.’
‘Is she engaged to him? She wasn’t three days ago.’
‘Oh, how would I know? But Nick is a really first-class boy, and I get the impression that Dick is rather——’ he hesitated.
‘Rather what?’ Julia asked, intently.
‘I think insensitive is the word I want. No, even that is too strong. He’s just not very quick at the moral uptake, where as Nick recognises all the implications of any situation at once.’
Julia was troubled, remembering her talk with Luzia about marrying Dick such a short time before; she had shown no doubts then about Dick’s character, only concerning her own feelings, and whether ‘Papa’ would like him.
‘Oh dear, I hope she hasn’t committed herself. Lu
zia would never go back on her word’ she said unhappily. ‘I wish I could see her. What’s she doing today?’
‘Going up to Larége with Nick to tell Mme. Bonnecourt that you’ll see her tomorrow morning, and give her all the low-down about Glentoran. I hope that’s all right?’ His wife nodded. ‘That was typical’ Jamieson went on; he proceeded to recount Lady Heriot’s suggestion about luncheon, and how Luzia had backed up Nick’s veto of the idea immediately. ‘They see things in exactly the same way—whereas poor old Dick sat like a stuck pig, and never said a word.’
‘I don’t suppose he felt like talking much, if he’d been slapped down in front of everyone’ Julia commented.
‘P’raps not. I wonder if she knows them apart? I don’t, unless they tell me,’ Jamieson said. ‘It would be frightful if they both proposed and she accepted the wrong one, not knowing which was which!’
‘It’s rather frightful anyhow’ Julia said. ‘Dick has been making all the running, and Nick accepted that; he told me about it himself, quite early on, and didn’t seem to mind in the least—in fact he was rather funny about it. But of course he’s seen a lot more of her since.’ She paused, leaving the implication unexpressed.
‘So that even if he had fallen for her himself by now, he would be too high-minded to cut in, you mean?’
‘Probably. Oh dear! Darling, do try to get her to come round and see me as soon as ever you can—I might learn something.’
‘It’s always rather risky to interfere, isn’t it?’
‘Oh dearest, don’t be obvious! Of course it is, but other risks are worse. And I brought her here, and got her mixed up with these infernal identicals!’ Julia’s colour was rising, as it did when she was wrought up; Philip went over and took her hand.
‘My darling, I will get her here as soon as I can’ he said. ‘Now do relax—I’m sure you oughtn’t to get upset. Won’t that be bad for the creature?’
Julia lay back obediently. Yes, it would be bad for the baby if she allowed herself to get into ‘a state’; the old sage-femme had been dinning it into her now for a week that any emotional disturbance could alter the character of the milk—hence her disapproval even of letter-writing before a feed. She clung suddenly to Philip’s hand, and held it to her mouth. So quick and grave a danger as had ushered in the child’s birth had made a more deeply-fired and unbreakable bond between them than anything she had dreamed of; the future held both more and fewer weapons against them now. Fewer, because of this new bond; more, because any risks touching them also, henceforth, touched the small Philip Bernard as well.
Philip stood silent by the bedside. He realised that some strong emotion was stirring in Julia, and guessed at its nature; but he asked no questions. Presently her hold on his hand relaxed; with a last kiss she let it go.
‘Yes—I will keep quiet’ she said. ‘I’m sorry. Give me a cigarette. Oh no, I mustn’t. Have one yourself.’
He drew up a chair, sat close to the bed, and smoked.
‘What was all that?’ he asked presently, very gently.
‘Oh, just realising about us, and him. “For ’im, and ’er, and It, And two and one makes three”—Kipling understood so well, didn’t he?’
Philip was pleased by the quotation, which he was familiar with; it gave him a very fair idea of the thoughts that had moved her to such an unwonted demonstration as holding his hand and kissing it. But he mistrusted his own powers of expression, and was ready to leave it to Kipling.
‘Yes, he did; and I do. My darling, do please take all possible care of yourself; now, and when I go away. And I will do the same, I promise you.’ He bent over the bed and gave her a long kiss; he was still doing this when as usual the door opened and the old sage-femme came in, carrying the baby.
‘Ah—here is Fortune’s hostage!’ Philip said, smiling as he straightened up. ‘Bonjour, Madame—I’m just leaving.’ He went and put a finger under the minute pink chin. ‘Well, Master Philip Bernard, how goes it?’
‘It goes well; he gains weight’ the sage-femme said proudly. ‘Madame is a good mother.’ Philip Bernard’s only response was a hungry howl; his father laughed.
‘That’s right, my boy; you look out for Number One! At your age, it’s your first duty.’ He turned to his wife. ‘I’ll find out what Luzia is doing later, and bring her round.’
In fact he was not able to do this till fairly late in the afternoon. On Lady Heriot’s advice Nick and Luzia drove up to Larége soon after breakfast—‘Then it will be done, and Luzia can have a nice little shut-eye after lunch; she got up so early, but one really can’t take a siesta in the morning’ the old lady said.
‘How nice your Mother is’ Luzia remarked to Nick, when the Dauphine was clear of the town, and he no longer had to concentrate on the traffic.
‘She is; but why do you say so now, especially?’
‘Because she is much older, and long in a position of authority; and yet when she has one idea and you and I another, and we reject hers, she is not contrariée, but accepts it—although we are so young.’
‘Her Ladyship liked your idea, when you explained it’ Nick said. ‘She saw at once that you were right.’
‘You were right first.’
‘I said it first; but you were right too, all along. How old are you?’ he asked unexpectedly.
‘Nineteen. And you?’
‘Twenty-one—same as Dick, of course.’
Luzia frowned a little, pondering; he had expected her to laugh at this glimpse of the obvious, but she sat silent beside him. Nick’s heart began to beat rather fast. Her appreciation of his Mother, her use of the word ‘we’ about their plans for Mme. Bonnecourt, and what she had said both to him and to Dick when they were drowning the hunter’s old car, brought the thoughts and feelings, which he had pushed away and refused to recognise then, flooding back into the forefront of his consciousness. Of course she was wonderful; there could be no one like her, ever. But by the time he had realised this Dick was so obviously pursuing her that he had tried to ‘leave well alone’, as the pessimist in him put it. Now, since this morning, it all looked rather different; but did these small episodes add up to anything? Of course the only thing that mattered was that she should be happy, and would she be happy with Dick? There were things Dick simply didn’t see.
Twiddling through the narrow streets of Ste. Marie des Pélérins Nick again had to concentrate on the traffic; once through the pretty, sunny little town, and out again on the broad blue-grey road, to check his troubling thoughts and break the long silence he started asking Luzia about her home. (He thought he was changing the conversation.)
‘Tell me about Gralheira’ he said. ‘It’s a huge place, isn’t it? I looked it out on the map, and the estate seemed to run right up into the Serra.’
‘Yes, it does—a long way.’
‘Aren’t there pine-forests there? Do you get a lot of resin?’
‘Yes—I believe something like 6000 barrels a year.’
‘Six thousand! But that’s worth a fortune; resin is in terrific demand today, for plastics, and all sorts of things. What does your Father do with it?’
Luzia was driven to a fresh comparison between the twins. Dick had never looked Gralhiera out on the map, so far as she knew; certainly he had never said so, let alone asked about the resin.
‘I know it is sold; I suppose this helps to make us rich’ she said. ‘But I am not sure that Papa disposes of it to the best advantage; he does not know much about these modern scientific matters, though he is always anxious to find more money, to build extra hospitals for the villages, and to employ more doctors and nurses. Plastics!’ she said, with the little frown which usually accompanied concentration in her. ‘This is these very disagreeable vessels in light colours, which it is impossible to keep really clean?’
Nick laughed.
‘Yes; those, and a lot of other things too.’
Luzia’s little frown persisted; she was still thinking.
‘Are plastics diffic
ult to make? Do they require a huge factory?’
‘I don’t think so. People with the requisite know-how can make them in quite small units, I fancy; it’s a regular light industry.’
At that the girl fairly beamed.
‘Light industry! That is what Dr. Salazar is always wanting for Portugal. How wonderful if we could have a factory or two on the estate, to make these horrible “plastics”, and use our own resin. Then not so many of the young men would seek work in Oporto, or go to the Overseas Territories; they could live and work at home, and their mothers would be glad.’
Nick was kindled by this sensible eagerness.
‘How near is the railway?’ he asked. ‘You’d have to be able to get your products out, as well as the other raw materials in.’
‘Sâo Pedro do Sul is only about 25 kilometres away, but the railway runs across our land; we could always have a station built. Oh, this could mean much!’ Suddenly she sighed. ‘Poor Papa! If only he could find someone to help him over all this. He is not young any more, and I know so little.’
‘I don’t suppose it would be too difficult to find a manager in England to run a plastics factory, only I suppose he’d have to speak Portuguese. Is it difficult to learn?’
‘Those who know Italian declare that it is impossible!’ the girl said, laughing. ‘They say it is just a patois! But Miss Probyn spoke it quite well, and I think learned it without much trouble.’
Again Nick’s thoughts were brought back towards the point from which he had meant to deflect them by talking about Gralheira. To help an aging land-owner, whose desire for more money was wholly based on his anxiety to improve the medical services on his property, and to start up light industries—what a worthwhile job! As good as Lacq, or better. And if it were combined with seeing a lot of the exquisite creature now sitting beside him, who obviously also cared about social welfare, in the simplest possible way: Mothers not losing their sons!…