by Iris Murdoch
In extreme agitation Marian now followed Scottow up the almost dark staircase, past a lamp on the landing which shone dimly as in a shrine, and some way on until they came to a large double door which he opened softly. They entered a dim ante-room and Marian could see a line of golden light ahead. Gerald Scottow knocked.
‘Come in.’
He entered deferentially and Marian followed.
The room was brilliantly lit with a great many lamps and the curtains were drawn although it was still so bright outside. Marian was dazzled by the soft flooding light and by fear.
‘Here she is,’ said Scottow in a low voice.
Marian advanced across a thick carpet towards someone at the far end of the room.
‘Ah - good - ‘
Marian had, without reflection, expected an elderly woman. But the person who confronted her was young, perhaps scarcely older than herself, and while not exactly beautiful was yet strikingly lovely. She had a tangle of reddish gold hair and eyes of almost the same colour and a wide pale freckled face. She wore no make-up. She was dressed in a flowing robe of embroidered yellow silk which might have been either an evening dress or a dressing-gown.
Marian took the white freckled hand that was offered to her and murmured that she was glad. She was conscious of a familiar pervasive smell which she could not place; and there was a lot of emotion in the room, not all of it her own.
‘How wonderfully good of you to come,’ said Mrs Crean-Smith. ‘I do hope you won’t mind being imprisoned with us here miles from anywhere.’
‘I hope so too,’ said Marian, and then realized this sounded rude. She added, ‘No one would mind being imprisoned in such a lovely place.’ This sounded rude too, so she added, ‘It wouldn’t be imprisonment.’
Scottow behind said ‘Hannah.’
Marian edged back against the wall so that the two could see each other.
‘I expect you’d like to take a bit of supper with Miss Taylor?’
‘Yes, please, Gerald, if that would be all right. Would you mind asking Violet? I don’t want to cause trouble, but it would be so nice and I’m sure Miss Taylor is hungry. Is it not so, Miss Taylor?’
Marian, who was feeling sick, said, ‘Well, yes, but anything will do -‘
There was a short silence. Then Scottow bowed and withdrew and Marian detached herself from the wall.
‘We keep odd hours here, I’m afraid. We have no one to please but ourselves. I do hope you had a good journey? I’m afraid it’s very dull until you get to the mountains. Come nearer to the fire. These evenings are cold already.’
A small turf fire was burning in a big grate and there was fine china on the black marble mantelpiece. There were a great many mirrors, some of them pretty, but no pictures and few attempts at orderly embellishment Two brass vases full of pampas grass and dried honesty had clearly been there for a long time. The room was decrepit and ponderously old-fashioned like the one below, but immensely, almost too much, inhabited; and Marian felt herself shut in, almost menaced, by the circle of faded armchairs piled with books and papers. She noticed upon a leather-topped writting-table littered with manuscript the photograph of a man in uniform. She joined her employer beside the fire and they looked at each other.
Marian now saw that Mrs Crean-Smith was barefoot. This observation at once defined the yellow robe as a dressing-gown ; and with this there came to her a general impression of something very slightly unkempt, the hair tousled, the finger-nails not quite clean, the lovely face a little tired, a little sallow and greasy, like that of a person long ill. Marian wondered at once whether Mrs Crean-Smith were not in fact somehow ill, and she had a guilty little feeling of revulsion. Yet she felt too relief and immediate liking. This person was harmless.
‘I hope you like your room? If you need anything, don’t fail to ask. Please sit down. I expect you’d like some whiskey.’
‘Thank you.’ Marian realized now that what the room smelt of was whiskey.
‘Now you must tell me a little about yourself. But I expect you’d like to ask questions too. This place must seem very strange to you.’
‘I can’t help wondering,’ said Marian, ‘about my pupils. Perhaps I should have asked earlier. Mr Scottow said nothing in his letters.’
‘Your - pupils?’
‘I mean the young persons, the ones I’m to teach, the children.’
There was a sort of blankness in Mrs Crean-Smith’s eyes which suddenly made Marian feel very frightened. Had there been some terrible, some grotesque, mistake?
Mrs Crean-Smith, who had paused with her stare, moved to the whiskey decanter. ‘There are no children here, Miss Taylor. Mr Scottow should have explained. I am the person that you are to teach.’
Chapter Three
Dearest Marian, I had hoped to get a letter to you for your first day, but I’ve been hideously bogged down in exams and Campaign work. I don’t know precisely how long a letter takes to reach your distant point. I shall note day and hour of posting this and if you will let me know exact time of arrival we can construct a working hypothesis! I shall expect a letter from you reasonably soon. I have been looking at some books and maps and when I have a second I’ll do some simple itineraries. There’s some prehistoric stuff that absolutely must be seen. Tell me, by the way, if you want your bike sent on. I think you were an ass to go without it.
I envy you the bird life more than the high life. Apropos the former, I’ve just tied up and will post tomorrow those two bird books you wanted, and also a book on shells and one about limestone rock formations. (Most interesting and curious that) Nay, pray accept as presents from me! Apropos the high life, I hope you’re enjoying it and finding your clothes stand the strain. (Your blue dress is quite adequate to any occasion in my humble view.) What are the pubs like and can you get out to them? What are the kids like, more important, and what do you teach them? I hope they aren’t little morons. If you can’t stand it, let me know and I’ll send you a wire to say someone’s died.
This is a hasty note, as I have to go to Campaign headquarters for the usual chores. I hope you will be happy over there, dear Marian, and will not fret any more about worthless me. Don’t on the other hand forget me! One has so few real friends and I can’t spare you.
I must fly. A fat lecherous-looking girl called Freda something whom I met at the Campaign coffee party and who says she knows you insisted that I should send you her regards, which I now do. God I’m tired and term only starting. You’re well out of it Floreas, and let me know the worst Love ever,
Geoffrey
Dear dear Geoff, heavens I was glad to get your letter. Not that it’s dreadful here, but it’s so terribly isolated, I’m beginning even after five days to forget who I am. I don’t know how the natives stay sane and I conjecture they don’t But let me tell you how it is.
To begin with, there are no kids! I’m supposed to ‘teach’ Mrs Crean-Smith herself, that is read a little French with her and later on maybe teach her Italian. I suspect, and they’ve more or less admitted it, that they really wanted a ‘lady companion’ and advertised for a ‘governess’ so as to get an intelligent one! I give them marks for that and don’t feel swindled. Mrs Crean-Smith is youngish and beautiful and spiritual-looking in a rather fey way. There is also a hunting and shooting type called Scottow (the one who wrote to me) who is thoroughly nice and ordinary and seems to be a sort of bailiff-cum-family-friend. Then there’s a rather creepy woman called Evercreech who is the sort of housekeeper (everything is rather ‘sort of here!) and is I gather some sort of poor relation of Mrs C.-S. Her brother Jamesie (sic) Evercreech acts as the chauffeur. I thought he was an ordinary chauffeur at first but I suppose not as he’s a relation. I can’t make out if there’s a Mr Crean-Smith, but he’s never mentioned so I assume Mrs is a widow. There’s also a gloomy little clerk called Nolan and a lot of black maids with casts in their eyes and incomprehensible accents. (One of them brought your letter in, Friday 4.30. I’ve no idea how it got here and on re
flection it seems miraculous. Please write often!) No grandeur! The ‘castle’ is a big Victorian house with nothing near it except a few cottages and one other gent’s residence. The nearest pub is in Blackport and won’t allow women! Fortunately whiskey flows like water here at Gaze. Everyone drinks a great deal and goes to bed early. If I start to go mad I’ll let you know.
I must stop now and go and swim. My duties are not exactly arduous! I’m even hoping someone will suggest that I learn to ride. (On a horse, you know! There are some horses. I saw Mr Scottow and Jamesie horseback riding the other day. Felt envious!) That Freda girl must be Freda Darsey, a nice quiet girl, not at all lecherous ! I was at school with her. Greet her back from me. I hope the Campaign is going well. I haven’t seen a newspaper since I arrived, it now occurs to me, nor missed one! Perhaps I am being influenced. All that seems far away - but not you, who are so splendidly present in your letter and present in my heart. No fretting. Don’t worry about me, darling. I embrace you and will write again soon. Much love, M.
P.S. Mr Scottow says there are golden eagles, but I wouldn’t trust him to recognize any bird he can’t shoot and eat!
Marian finished her letter, sealed it in an envelope, and then wondered how she should dispose of it. There was an old-fashioned box marked ‘Letters’ down in the hall, giving details of postage rates of fifty years ago, but it seemed unsafe to drop her missive in there without further enquiry. She decided to ask Jamesie at tea-time. She wrapped up her bathing-togs.
It was still the deep trough of the afternoon. At Gaze people retired to their rooms after lunch and were not heard of again until five o’clock. Presumably they slept. Marian was amazed at how much they seemed to sleep, since they then retired for the night about ten; and walking on the terrace at eleven two nights running she had seen no lights.
Marian’s sense of loyalty to her employers was already preventing her from admitting that she was disappointed. She had indeed expected more. She had wanted, had wanted always, as she obscurely knew, some kind of colourful uplifting steadying ceremony, some kind of distinction of life which had so far eluded her. She had never, herself, really known how to live, had never been able to spread her personality comfortably about her; and the society she had lived in hitherto had given her no help. She lacked grace, she lacked style, she knew it. While seeming to pass for what she was, she had felt unfairly diminished and frightened into herself. In moments of self-examination, which for Marian came frequently, she had asked herself whether her desire for a more settled and confident social world were not mere snobbery, and had felt uncertain of the answer. Her love for Geoffrey, who so utterly belonged to her accustomed world, being indeed one of its sovereigns, had seemed at first a justification of that world and of her own usual persona which under his influence had so positively glowed. But after Geoffrey she had found her everyday life so empty and her daily bread so bitter that the old half-understood desire for something quite else had grown into the frenzy which had spurred her away and which she had so much welcomed and admired.
It had seemed like the end of her timidity. Marian came of timid parents who had moved quietly through life in a little Midland town where her father owned a grocer’s shop. Marian’s earliest memories were shop. Sometimes she felt as if she had been delivered in a cardboard box marked ‘This side up’. Certainly one had served as her cradle. She was an only child. She was fond of her parents and not, as far as she knew, ashamed of them; but it was her abiding fear that she might, in the end, come to resemble them. That she was clever was, in this, nothing. The University had been for her a prize competition rather than a social scene; and that, again, because she was timid.
So she had thought of Gaze as the beginning of something quite new; and if she was, at this early moment, disappointed it was not, she obscurely felt, because of the lack of ceremony, or even the lack of company and entertainment, but because of some deep lack of assurance in the place itself. The place, somehow, resembled her strangely, it was nervous too. Its quietness was aimless rather than calm and its sleepy dragging routine was expressive more of some futility than of the feudal insouciance which Marian was still trying to perceive. Days seemed of immense length and their simple pattern already seemed to her monstrous, as if the monotony were inherent and not cumulative. There was a sort of dragging music barely heard. Her day began with breakfast at nine, brought up to her by a squinting and uncommunicative maid. About ten-thirty she made her way to Mrs Crean-Smith and stayed there for part of the morning. So far they had merely chattered and discussed possible reading. Mrs Crean-Smith, though both more cultured and more quick-witted than Marian had at first given her credit for being, seemed in no great hurry to be instructed, and it was not for Marian, whose desire to instruct was always considerable, to force the pace. Lunch again she took alone in her own room and was left to herself till five o’clock, when a large tea was served in Miss Evercreech’s room. Mrs Crean-Smith did not appear at this ceremony, which gathered Scottow, Jamesie and sometimes Nolan together and was awkwardly cheerful. Miss Evercreech attached importance to Marian’s attendance and seemed to regard this meal as a sort of assertion of her sovereignty. Scottow attended a little condescendingly, Jamesie giggled and Nolan was silent. Marian talked effortfully; yet she looked forward to it. It was the nearest approach to ordinary social life which Gaze had to offer, so far. About six-thirty she returned to Mrs Crean-Smith, who was by then drinking whiskey, and stayed with her for supper at eight-thirty. At nine-thirty Mrs Crean-Smith was yawning and ready for bed.
It was not exactly a gay round, not a reassuring scene, and there were moments late at night when Marian felt curiously frightened, though never with a repetition of her panic of the first day. The people at Gaze were not exactly bored, but they had, even Gerald Scottow had, some quality of anxiety which she supposed belonged with the solitude of the place. Two things however very much supported her. One was sheer curiosity. There were many matters for puzzlement in the big self-absorbed house and she found herself still, sometimes disconcertingly, unable to ‘work out’ the relations of the individuals to each other. She was curious too about Riders and a little surprised that so far no one had said anything about social communication with the other house, or indeed, apart from what Scottow had told her on the first day, anything about the other house at all.
The other thing which supported her, and that more deeply, was the sense that Mrs Crean-Smith was very glad of her presence. Marian wanted and needed to love and to be loved; and she was very ready to attach herself to her employer whom she found touchingly gentle and diffident. It was indeed this diffidence, together with some curious fumbling lack of assurance, Mrs Crean-Smith’s own variant of the prevalent unease, which made so far the barrier between them. Marian was also readily disposed to be fond of Jamesie, who was the person with whom, in a giggling teasing way, she got on most easily. Gerald Scottow considerably occupied her thoughts, but without yet offering her any new material for reflection. She found herself surprisingly touchy with him, while he was infinitely considerate but formal with her. She could not yet, however, quite begin to like Violet Evercreech.
There was still more than an hour before tea, and the house was silent and asleep. Marian tip-toed a little guiltily down the stairs, carrying her bathing things in a closed bag in case anyone should object to her plan. She had not yet been down to the sea and this was the first day on which she had felt enough confidence to leave the house by herself, except for brief ambles about the immediate grounds. She thought she knew by now the best way down to the bay, as she had examined the prospect carefully through her glasses. There were two gates in the wall which circled the garden on the side nearest to the sea. One gate, the southern one, gave on to a path which led toward the top of the cliff; but the northern gate revealed a steep stony track which led downhill between wind-ragged fuchsia bushes and licheny boulders and nibbled velvety stretches of grass. As Marian passed through the gate, the sun shone warmly and the sea, openin
g now before her as she descended, quick and goat-like on the rocky path, was blandly azure. She found herself, sooner than she expected, at the bottom of the slope and came upon the dark brown stream with its wide bed of round grey stones. The village was by now just visible behind her, the cliffs towered up on either side of the bay, and both Gaze and Riders were hidden by folds of the hill. She paused and listened to the light near tinkle of the stream and the further beat of the sea.
The stream slithered and side-slipped along, appearing and disappearing among the big grey speckled stones, winking and flashing in the sun, seeming to sink underground, then leaping out in a minute waterfall and then fanning into a little wrinkled pool. Then at once it left the stones behind and sank noiselessly into a deep cleft in the dark peaty soil, running straighter and faster now in the direction of the sea. Marian, who had been following it thoughtlessly, found her feet sinking alarmingly into earth which had the consistency of soft fudge. She hesitated, and after nearly losing her shoes made her way to the left where some grey rocks were struggling up out of the soil. She clambered past a series of dark warm glutinous sea-pools fringed with pungent goldeny-yellow weed and at last found herself upon a small pebbled beach at the foot of the cliff upon which Gaze stood. She walked along a bit. Her heart was beating very hard.