by Anna Gilbert
As he hesitated, a taxi wound its way up the long drive. Margot had seen it, had perhaps been watching out for it, and went quickly down the steps to meet the visitor. It was Lance, obviously come hotfoot from Glasgow after receiving a telegram. They stood close. He put his arm round her and they went indoors.
Miles turned and walked slowly back, through the ruined priory and into the green solitude of the wood.
CHAPTER XV
Margot came out of her mother’s room and closed the door. She did it noiselessly and crept across the landing without a sound. The habit had grown on her in response to the overwhelming silence now that her mother had gone; to the emptiness of her room: the emptiness of all the rooms. The merest tap of a heel on the polished floorboards might raise an echo. Even a whisper would disturb the stillness that occupied the house from roof to cellars.
At the top of the stairs she paused, as if to go down would be too significant an act to be taken without thought. It was mid-morning. The task she had set herself – except that it had come upon her without her conscious intent like everything else in this time of passive waiting – was completed. All her mother’s things had been taken care of: sorted, washed, ironed, brushed, labelled and put safely away according to the need of each precious object. In time, the clothes would go where they could give comfort to the needy, but the rings, watch, necklaces, locket, work-basket, letter-case, pen and all the trivial things a woman feels unable to throw away, together formed a legacy of memories to be cherished for a lifetime. She had found letters from Alex, only two of them from Africa. He had presided over a native dispute involving a cow: he had shot a wildebeeste and wished that he hadn’t.
She went slowly and quietly down and stood with her back to the newel post, inactive, not even wondering what to do next. Presently she would be mechanically impelled to do something and must wait until the impulse came. She heard the distant metallic ring of a saucepan lid, the eerie crowing of a cock. Someone had opened the windows. It was July, the weather perfect. Faint recollections of how one behaved and what one did on perfect summer days came and went. What did one wear? Without looking down to see, she didn’t know what she had on. Not black. Her mother had said more than once, ‘If anything happens to me, for goodness sake don’t wear black.’ As a girl she had spent years in black for dead relatives, one after another.
The dining-room door was open. Margot could see straight through the room and beyond the window to the flagged terrace where two people were standing in conversation, their backs to the house. Ewan Judd and Toria Link. For some reason it had been necessary to worry when those two were together. Was it still necessary now that her mother was dead? It was also, confusingly, supposed to be a good thing that those two got on well together. Conscious of a lack of sequence in her thoughts about Ewan and Toria, Margot looked to her right. The study door was also open. Her father would be at his desk. He was always there.
The desk, placed cornerwise with the window to the left, was covered with a disorderly mass of papers. He sat, head bowed, unmoving.
‘Margot.’
She went and put her arm round him. He laid his head on her shoulder.
‘You’re my one comfort now,’ he told her. ‘What would I do without you? I’ve made such a mess of things. What can we do? You can’t be expected to live like this.’
They had talked everything over, several times. It was worse for him, she thought, he blamed it all on himself: her mother’s illness, Alex’s absence from home. (‘He didn’t take to this place,’ Edward said, unaware of Alex’s reason for leaving.) She grieved for him with the bewildered feeling that their family, compact, strong and secure had fallen apart. He didn’t know that it was not his fault. Her conviction that it was Linden who had set in motion the whole sad train of events had sunk too deeply into her mind to be easily uprooted.
It’s worse for her, he thought. Without Sarah, without Alex, no neighbours apart from the two families in the cottages, Lance banished except for daytime visits and at present taking a midwifery course in Glasgow. He was missing Lance.
‘We must pull ourselves together,’ Margot said. It had become a weary joke; they had made it their slogan. ‘Let me help you with all this stuff.’
They made a little progress. She was too apathetic to do more than make lists and put papers into separate piles. She had already gathered that there was need for economy and was aware that amid the welter of papers there were more bills than receipts.
Even before Sarah’s death, Edward had realized that his plans for Langland must be curtailed. To do him justice, he could not have foreseen the collapse on Wall Street in three months’ time and the subsequent Depression. As a result mines would be closed and the shipping company on which his personal income depended would come near to collapse owing to the reduced demand for pit-props.
He was not without capital but it must remain safely invested. Fortunately he would be able to extend his work as a consultant: closures raised almost as many problems as working pits. He had the advantage of experience at a time when fewer young men were training as mining engineers and he would never be short of work, but it was work that would necessitate his being a good deal away from home. They must remain at the Hall until the lease expired. He was already doubtful as to whether he would renew it.
In future he would be dealing with young Rilston. It was too soon to discuss future plans with him. It occurred to him that they didn’t see much of Miles these days. Well, naturally, they couldn’t have young men calling at will now that Margot was alone. Something must be arranged. A housekeeper-companion? Did such a creature exist, a sort of hybrid like a mermaid?
They were interrupted by the arrival of Dr Pelman who called to chat and stayed to lunch.
‘I’m not happy about her,’ he said when the meal was over and Margot had left them. ‘If she goes the way she’s heading it’ll be a breakdown or a decline.’
‘She’s missing her mother.’ Edward had brightened a little and was instantly wretched again.
‘Of course she’s missing her mother – and she’s worn out with nursing and seeing to one thing and another. But it isn’t her nature to droop as she is doing. She scarcely spoke a word at lunch. Is there anything else bothering her that I don’t know about?’
‘Good Lord, not as far as I know. It’s dull for her here, I admit. She must see more of her friends when this tiredness wears off.’
‘I don’t know if it would interest you but I could make a suggestion.’
They put their heads together.
Margot went out of the cool house into the warm afternoon and presently found herself by the roofless gatehouse. It was this way that Miles might come if he ever came again. She often stood there or wandered to where the trees thinned to look along the woodland path. Sometimes she stood at the sitting-room window or on the front steps in a kind of limbo between the hope of seeing his car and the certainty that he would not come. And if he did come, he would be unlike the Miles she had known: a different person, as he had seemed when he came to offer his condolences like someone on an official visit. They didn’t even sit down and she had actually wished that her father would join them so that she could excuse herself.
‘And you,’ she had ventured when he had told her how sorry he was about her mother, ‘what have you been doing? You seem.…’
It was not coldness that cut her off from him, he could never be cold, it was distance, as if the few words they exchanged should have been shouted across a chasm: murmured, they drifted away and became meaningless. His face had lost its gentleness and was unsmiling. His eyes? She could not see into them. He never really looked at her until he said, ‘Goodbye, Margot,’ and after hesitating, ‘I hope all will go well with you,’ as if he were going away like Alex and Lance – but permanently. It was then that she saw the bleakness in his eyes, their blue faded.
‘You’re not well,’ she said. ‘What’s wrong?’
Again he hesitated, then with a deprec
atory smile and a movement of his head, he was gone – to walk home, had she known it, wishing he had the courage to put an end to himself. It would be a fit climax to all his other shortcomings. The past ten minutes had been an ordeal, but if for one moment he had shown how he actually felt, she would have had to draw away, embarrassed, thinking of Lance, as he had done the whole time they were together.
Margot had rushed to her room and lain face down on her bed in the depths of disappointment and shame. She had been so sure, so childishly mistaken about his feelings for her, so naively over-confident. How could she have been so wrong? No one must know, no one must ever know that she had thought – that she had actually expected.…
She heard Dr Pelman drive away and at last went downstairs. The visit had done her father good: he looked more alert.
‘Pelman has made a suggestion. How would you like to have Jane Bondless here for a time? As it happens, she may soon be free.’ And as Margot was slow to answer, ‘You like Miss Bondless, don’t you?’
‘Very much.’
‘The arrangement wouldn’t be permanent. She and her sister Constance have scraped up a little money, enough to set up house together. If she were to come here for six months or so, her salary would help to pay for altering and furnishing the house.’
It would undoubtedly be a stroke of luck if she agreed. He had dreaded engaging a stranger who might be officious or ceaselessly talkative or annihilatingly dull. He was disappointed by Margot’s lack of enthusiasm.
‘It would be an immense relief to me, darling. I can’t leave you alone here, but I can’t afford to turn down consultation fees either. If we can get through the winter, things should be in better shape next year. Miss Bondless is rather a special sort of person. You’ve always enjoyed her company, haven’t you?’
‘Oh yes.’
‘Then shall we risk it?’
‘Yes, if you think so.’ She was looking past him at the angle of the gatehouse visible from the study window. What did it matter who came if Miles did not?
Phyllis and Freda had written sympathetic letters full of gratitude to her mother who had made Monk’s Dene such a wonderful place to visit. Each urged her to come – Switzerland was so beautiful, London so stimulating. At the end of the month came a third invitation from Jane Bondless in a letter to Edward. Nothing would have suited her better than to come to Langland and lend a helping hand for a while. Unfortunately, Miss Crane was unwell and could not be left just now. She enclosed the address of an agency which might have a suitable person on its list. In the meantime why not let Margot come to Cannes on a visit?
She had also written to Margot.
It would not be like coming to strangers. I knew your mother so well. It would make me very happy to be reminded of my visits to Ashlaw. Miss Crane often regrets that her spare room is never used. She is more or less confined to the apartment at present and would enjoy the company of a younger person – as you would enjoy sunshine, sea and glimpses of the leisurely lives of the well-to-do. Actually I sometimes feel the urge to give them a good talking to and I do have spells of longing for home. Do come and soothe me.…
Edward smiled when Margot showed him the letter.
‘Just like Jane.’ She had known how to make the invitation difficult to refuse. ‘A splendid idea. It’s extraordinarily kind of her – and Miss Crane. You’ll write – at once?’
Margot did so, with many thanks for the kind invitation which she would have been happy to accept if it had not meant leaving her father alone. He was often away on business trips and must not come back each time to an empty house. She looked forward to seeing Miss Bondless on her return to England and hoped that Miss Crane would soon be well again.
It was all perfectly sincere but not absolutely straightforward. It was hard to admit even to herself that she could not bear to move so far away from Bainrigg House. To salve her conscience she tried to give her mind to the decorating and furnishing of a room for Miss Bondless. In the absence of other company the emptiness of the house was gradually occupied by the two who were there: not merely occupied but filled. For Margot in her downcast state they became larger than life. She was always conscious of them, expecting them to appear before they actually did, Ewan with step-ladder or tool-box; Toria with a string-bag of items to be checked and change to be counted; the two of them at the end of a passage or in the kitchen when Bessie Todd had gone home. Talking or silent, they did no harm, were known to be reliable, yet they seemed significant like messengers from a painful past or a worrying future.
It was impossible to think of them without thinking of Katie, of her pitiful end, the cruelty with which she was sacrificed and its consequences. The old days at Monk’s Dene seemed a lifetime away, the family no longer a living organism, friends out of reach or estranged. Instead there was Ewan, self-contained, bitter, liable at any minute to erupt into reckless anger, and there was Toria forever responding to some weird dictate of Providence. A spark from one could set the other alight.
Foxgloves grew tall, pink and purple in the shelter of the priory walls. The birds were silent, it was high summer. Next there would be harebells to warn of its approaching end. Weeks passed and Miles did not come.
CHAPTER XVI
Margot’s instinct had not misled her. From the beginning, Toria and Ewan were allies, drawn together by a common interest. On one subject at least they were in complete accord and since the subject was one of many facets – more than either of them knew – as a topic of conversation it never grew stale.
On the morning after Boxing Day, having watched the departure of Mr Humbert, Alex and Linden, Toria had gone downstairs. In the hall she met Ewan who had just closed the front door after them.
‘Good riddance,’ he said.
‘Who do you mean?’
‘Her. Swanking about in her silver dress and white fur.’
‘Miss Grey?’
Toria was not surprised. From the gallery on the previous evening she had seen a good deal, including Ewan’s ferocious snarl in Miss Grey’s direction. She had not known then that he was a Judd. Heedful of Margot’s warning, she did not pursue the subject, which cropped up again a week later when Alex went back to the university.
‘He’ll be safer in London,’ Ewan remarked grimly. ‘Out of her way. I had her summed up from the minute I first laid eyes on her.’ Under their scowling brows the eyes were now baleful. ‘That was before I ever came here and when she turned up last week I thought trust her to be in with the bosses and driving about in motor cars.’
They moved to the kitchen. Having by this time begun to make herself useful, Toria started on the washing-up. Ewan riddled the fire in the huge grate and banked it up with coal.
‘When did you first lay eyes on her?’
‘Well, I can tell you exactly. It was the day they had prayers and that at the War Memorial. I was coming back from Elmdon where I’d been to sign on and there were these two women waiting at the bus stop. It’s against the animal-feed warehouse. The bus came all of a sudden. There was a bit of a splash and her high and mighty ladyship stepped back, never looking behind her. And there was this woman like a pedlar, standing up against the wall with tapes and stuff like that on a tray hung round her neck. Hair-pins and bootlaces. Her ladyship barged into her and knocked the woman off balance. The tray tipped up and all the things were scattered on the ground in the mud and muck.
‘Did yon stuck-up bitch apologize? Did she not know the woman was just trying to make a living? Had she ever had to wonder where her next dinner was coming from? You’d have thought she might have slipped the woman a bob or two – or a tanner – or a threepenny bit. Not likely.’
‘It was a shame.’ Toria had listened with deep attention as if the story confirmed what she already knew of Miss Grey. ‘A wicked shame.’
‘The woman had to get down on her knees and pick up a few of the things. I tell you it sticks in my gizzard, a thing like that. That’s life, I says to myself, some down in the gutter and
some riding their high horse. And the woman felt the same. “You may be down in the muck yourself some day”, she says to her, “and that’s where you ought to be”.’
‘She was right. “He hath put down the mighty from their seats and hath exalted the humble”.’
‘And so he should,’ Ewan said, guessing from her tone that He was someone in the Bible. ‘Take the French Revolution.’ He had not made the most of his years at the village school but he had been interested in A Tale of Two Cities. ‘Can you blame them for cutting the heads off them aristocrats? I’m not saying it was right: all I’m saying is that it was understandable.’
At an early age Ewan had made the discovery that the bosses existed in order to grind the workers into the dust. In the hope of unseating them he had joined the Labour Party. He found the meetings tame, but they had enlarged his vocabulary.
‘I saw her at that party,’ Toria said, ‘and the way she treated Mr Alex.’
‘You haven’t heard the rest of it. A constable came up, a chap I know. He used to play quoits with our Bob. “This gypsy is annoying me”, she says. “Leave it to me, miss”, Charlie Sparr says and gives me a wink.’
‘She was a gypsy?’
‘God knows. I never had a good look at her. She had a shawl over her head.’ There had been only a minute before the bus left and he, too, had been stooping to pick up some of her wares. ‘She could have been. There’s a few of them about. You can take it from me – yon upstart very likely put that woman in the workhouse. And that wasn’t all. I saw her again at Ashlaw that same day.’
Ewan’s voice had changed. He could not speak of Katie. Linden’s high-handed treatment of the pedlar stuck in his gizzard, but that she had somehow contrived to frighten his sister stirred him to the depths of feeling. He could not forget that she had followed close behind when Katie rushed out from the Humberts’ gate, speechless and trembling, nor his resentment at the contrast between the two: one shrinking, defenceless, never telling her fears: the other confidently at ease as if the world belonged to her.