“Belong to you?” I asked.
“That is one of the so different things. Your English peasants have independent natures and depend upon themselves; our people depend upon us.”
“That’s feudalism, isn’t it? England used to be feudal.”
“Oh, yes,” said Charles, nodding. “You told me history was your favourite subject. It is mine also.”
“I’ve done Queen Elizabeth’s reign three times.”
“Why three times?”
“Well, I never get any further.” I explained. “I did it when I first went to St. Elizabeth’s and then, when I moved into a higher form, they were doing it. Now I’ve been moved again so I’m doing it again.”
“This seems a dreadful waste of time. Surely it would be more useful to study some other period in history.”
“Yes,” I said thoughtfully. “Yes, it seems silly, doesn’t it?”
“It shows a lack of co-ordination and supervision,” said Charles.
We walked on in silence for a few moments.
“Do you live in the castle all the time?” I asked.
“I wish we did so,” he replied ruefully. “Life in the country is free – freedom to do as I like and go where I like is important to me – but my father has a house in Vienna and we live there during the season. We entertain our friends and go to parties and concerts. Oh, it is quite pleasant for a short time, but I would rather mount my horse and ride for miles over the open country. My young sister is different, of course; she enjoys the festivities; she has a gay time in Vienna.”
“Is your sister older than I am?”
“Oh yes, much older. Gretchen is seventeen. Already my father is thinking of arranging her marriage.”
“Arranging her marriage?” I echoed in astonishment.
“It is the custom of our country,” explained Charles. “Or perhaps I should say it is the custom for people in my father’s position to make a good match for their daughters.” He looked at me and added, “You are very young, Sarah.”
“Why do you say that? Is it because I didn’t know about marriages being ‘arranged’ in Austria?”
“No indeed! How could I expect you to know about the customs in our country? I said it because you have the eyes of a child.”
“I’m fourteen . . . but I suppose that’s too young to be interesting,” I said sadly.
“It is not too young to be interesting.”
“Good!” I exclaimed.
“Why is it good?”
“I was afraid you might be bored . . . and I do want to take you up to the top of the hill. It’s such a lovely view.”
“I never allow myself to be bored,” he declared emphatically.
“What do you mean, Charles?”
“You thought I would be bored to have you and Mrs. Morris to lunch, and you think I might be bored to walk with you in the woods, but I would not do either of these things if it bored me.”
“You couldn’t help it,” I pointed out. “I mean you needn’t have asked us to lunch, but you couldn’t have got out of this afternoon’s walk when father suggested it.”
“I am very clever at getting out of things that I do not like to do – very clever indeed. My sister could tell you how clever I am.”
“You might have come as a sort of duty – or just to be kind.”
“My sense of duty and my kindness are not so great,” declared Charles, laughing. He laughed so heartily that he had to sit down on a boulder.
I was obliged to smile, though I saw nothing funny about it. Then, quite suddenly, I thought of the reason why he had come: “I’m a new experience for you!” I exclaimed.
“Quite new,” he agreed, chuckling.
“You don’t know any girls in Vienna.”
“I know a dozen girls in Vienna.”
“Then why——?”
“My sister’s friends are different,” explained Charles. “It is all different. I will tell you, Sarah: One, no father would suggest that I should walk with his daughter in the woods; two, if he were to do so, I should refuse to go; three, if I were so foolish as to accept, we would not talk about history and Druidical stones and cuckoos.”
“What would you talk about?”
“The question does not arise; I have told you that I would refuse to go.”
“But if you did——” I began.
“I would not,” said Charles firmly. He rose and added, “Let us climb to the top of the hill.”
Chapter Eight
When I awoke on Tuesday morning I heard the rain pattering on the sloping roof outside my window. I jumped out of bed to see whether it was just a shower or was going to be a thoroughly wet day. Alas, the sky was grey all over! Would mother say it was too wet to go to Larchester? Oh, why did it have to be wet to-day!
Fortunately by breakfast time the skies were clearing.
“Yes, we’ll go,” said mother cheerfully. “There are several things I want for the house and it will be fun to have lunch with Charles. We’ll take umbrellas.”
I ran upstairs to put on my tweed coat and skirt; I liked it much better than any of my other clothes because it made me look older.
“You’ll be too hot in that,” said mother. “A frock and your school blazer would have been better . . . but there’s no time to change now.”
I had often been to Larchester before, but I thought it had never looked so pretty as it did that morning when the bus stopped for a few minutes on the ridge of hills and we saw the town below us in the hollow by the river. The rain had stopped and the sun was shining on the church spires and the fine buildings, and glittering on the windows.
Part of the town is very old and encircled by a massive stone wall, which was built when it was necessary for towns to be fortified. The wall is so broad that there is a walk along the top and, here and there, a little tower which was used as a “lookout tower” for the soldiers.
From the ridge the road winds downhill, it crosses the river by a wide bridge and enters the town through an arched gateway.
There wasn’t a breath of wind this morning; the smoke from the chimneys was drifting lazily; the sky and the air and the buildings were all washed beautifully clean and fresh. In that clear atmosphere everything seemed quite near . . . the steeple of St. Margaret’s looked so near that it seemed as if you could put out your hand and touch it; four fan-tail pigeons, sitting one above the other on a crow-stepped gable, looked as if they had been carved out of snow-white marble.
We had to go through the old part of the town to get to the new part where there were shops and restaurants and the Town Hall and offices. Outside the Town Hall was a park with a pond and flower-beds and trees and seats.
We had a busy morning, shopping. Then we left all our parcels at the bus office and walked down to the Golden Hind . . . and although we were a little early Charles was waiting for us in the lounge.
Charles looked different to-day; he looked older. I thought at first it was because he was wearing a brown suit, instead of grey slacks and a tweed jacket, but afterwards I decided that it was because he was entertaining us to lunch. He had engaged a round table in the big bow-window which looked out on to the garden and the river.
“I hope you are ready for lunch,” he said as we sat down.
“I’m absolutely starving,” I said. “I expect Mother is, too; we had breakfast early and we’ve been shopping all the morning.”
Mother laughed and nodded. I thought she looked even prettier than usual; her cheeks were pink and her eyes were shining. One of the nice things about mother was that she enjoyed everything so much.
“How delightful it is to feed the hungry,” said Charles. “It is so sad when one asks friends to a meal and they have no appetite. Let us see what we are going to eat.”
We had a gorgeous lunch. I chose veal-and-ham pie with puff pastry and mother had sweetbreads; then we all had asparagus and strawberry mousse. The asparagus was “extra”; Charles had ordered it beforehand.
Mothe
r and Charles talked about music.
“You must come to the Vicarage as often as you like and play the piano,” mother told him.
“You are very kind,” said Charles. “But I find I must go to Austria to see my family. I hope to return to Oxford in September and resume my studies.”
“Do you mean you’re going soon?” I asked.
“Yes, I must go to London on Friday to see my lawyer and adjust some business matters connected with my mother’s estate . . . and then I must go to Schloss Roethke. It is unfortunate; I had hoped to stay in Oxford during the vacation and improve my English but my father has written asking me to go home.”
“Oh well, we shall look forward to seeing you in September,” said mother, smiling.
After lunch Charles suggested that we might like to go on the river. There were boats to be hired at a landing-stage near the hotel.
“I’m afraid we must catch the three o’clock bus,” said mother.
“But the afternoon is so fine,” said Charles. “It would be delightful on the river. I could take you to Fairfield in my car.”
I looked at mother anxiously.
“Well, that’s very kind of you,” she said. “It would be lovely, of course – and I can see Sarah wants to go – but I must be home by five.”
Charles hired a rowing-boat. He explained that he was learning to punt but was not yet proficient.
There were lots of boats on the river that afternoon, but when Charles had rowed some distance up the river it was quiet and peaceful. I had been on the river once or twice with Willy but we had always gone down-river from the landing-stage so this part was new to me.
Charles had taken off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves; he had a blue silk shirt and his arms were strong and brown. We passed meadows with cows grazing in them and there were willow-trees hanging over the water. It was so still and sunny and peaceful that we didn’t talk much.
Then suddenly we heard the sound of singing and a large punt came down the river towards us. It was absolutely full of people and a tall man in grey trousers with braces over his shoulders was standing up and punting with a long pole. The river was not very wide here so Charles drew in at the side under a willow-tree to let them pass.
“He isn’t very good at it,” said mother apprehensively.
She had scarcely spoken when the man looked round and waved to us, this upset his balance and he fell into the water with a terrific splash, still clinging to his pole. The punt swept on without him.
“Goodness, he’s drowning!” exclaimed mother.
“No, no,” replied Charles, laughing. “The water is little more than three feet deep. I hope you do not expect me to dive in and rescue him, Mrs. Morris.”
By this time the man was standing up and I saw that the water only reached his waist. He stood with the pole in his hands and shouted angrily to his friends to come back and fetch him, but as he had the punt-pole they couldn’t do anything and the current was carrying them farther away every minute.
When he saw that they couldn’t or wouldn’t come back he began to wade towards our boat.
“’Ere!” he shouted. “You’ll ’ave ter taike me ’ome!”
“No, my friend,” replied Charles. “You are too wet to be a comfortable passenger in a boat with ladies, besides it will do you good to walk.” And with that Charles pushed off from the bank and rowed on up the river very quickly.
“Oh, the poor man!” exclaimed mother.
“Put your fingers in your ears,” said Charles.
Mother did as she was told, but I only pretended . . . so I heard some of the horrible things he said.
When we had reached a safe distance we stopped and watched him climb out of the river and start walking back to Larchester, still carrying the pole.
“I am afraid you think I am very hard-hearted, Mrs. Morris,” said Charles sadly. “But he would have been a very unpleasant companion for you and Sarah . . . and it is quite true that it will do him good to walk. When one is very wet it is better to walk than to sit in a boat. He is not very nice, but we do not want him to get a severe chill, do we?”
I was laughing . . . and after a moment mother began to laugh too.
When we turned to go back Charles let me row; it was quite easy rowing down the river. We kept a good lookout for the wet man, but we didn’t see him, nor did we see the other people who had been in the punt.
Then we fetched our parcels from the bus office and Charles ran us home in his car.
It had been a lovely afternoon and I had enjoyed every minute of it.
At supper mother told father about the man who had fallen out of the punt – she always told father everything – and father laughed and said Charles was right.
“He was a horrid man,” I said. “He had braces over his shirt and he called us dreadful names.”
“Charles told you to put your fingers in your ears,” said mother.
“Yes, but I didn’t put them in tightly,” I explained.
*
Our school reports were taken very seriously by father. Lewis was clever so he always got good reports – without having to do much work. Willy’s reports were usually “could do better” but this term they were quite good because he wanted to pass his exams as soon as possible and go to Mr. Romford’s Engineering Works. Lottie didn’t bother about lessons; she played games and enjoyed herself, so her school reports were poor; but Miss Bain, the headmistress, had written “a bright, attractive girl and very popular . . . should do well when she settles down,” so father and mother were quite pleased. They still thought of Lottie as “a child.”
One morning father called me into his study and I saw my reports lying on the table.
“Your reports are good, Sarah,” he said. “But I’m distressed to find you haven’t started Latin. You’re quite old enough to start Latin, so I’ve decided to take you for an hour three times a week during the holidays. I’m sure we’ll both enjoy it.”
Father looked so pleased with the idea that I hadn’t the heart to make any objections to working in the holidays; I thanked him and said it was very kind of him.
Then he began to explain how important it was to have a thorough grounding in Latin . . . and this gave me the opportunity I had been waiting for.
I said, “Yes, I know it’s important, but I want to be able to speak to people in their own languages.”
“That will come later, my dear. Latin is the groundwork——”
“Yes, Father, I want to learn Latin, but I’ve got to live in this world with all sorts of people: French and German and Spanish and——”
“You’re learning French at school.”
“Not the sort of French that French people talk.”
He smiled . . . but I was grimly serious. I had been thinking about it for days and days and I knew this was the only chance of getting what I wanted. “And I want to learn German too,” I went on desperately. “I want to be able to talk French and German properly and understand what they say.”
There was silence. Father looked at me over the tops of his spectacles. “How long have you been thinking about this?”
“Oh, quite a long time.” It seemed quite a long time to me.
“Have you thought how extra tuition in languages will fit in with your work at school?”
“I shall have to leave school. You see——”
“Leave school? Really, Sarah, I never heard such nonsense! You’re only thirteen——”
“No, fourteen,” I said quickly. “But it isn’t my age that matters. It’s because I know what I want.”
“What do you want?”
“I want to learn languages . . . and I know what I don’t want, Father. I don’t want to spend hours and hours learning things that will never be any use, like fancy dancing and embroidery and how to make lamp-shades. I don’t want to spend hours learning parts in the school play; I shall never be any good at acting. I shall never be any good at drawing either, so drawing lessons are just a was
te of time.”
“It’s all part of your education; other girls learn these things – and so must you.”
“Perhaps it’s all right for other girls, but not for me. I want to learn languages.”
“But there are other subjects: history and——”
“I can study history at home . . . and much better.”
“Better?”
“Yes, I’ve done Queen Elizabeth’s reign three times; this is a dreadful waste of time; surely it would be more useful to study some other——”
“Sarah!” interrupted father. “What do you mean by saying you’ve done Queen Elizabeth’s reign three times?”
I explained what had happened and added, “It shows a lack of co-ordination and supervision, doesn’t it?”
He looked at me in surprise.
“Well, doesn’t it, Father?”
“Yes, it certainly does.”
“I can work at home,” I told him. “I can read history; I can do Latin with you; I can learn to speak French properly and Minnie can teach me to cook.”
“You’re learning cookery at school. We pay extra for it.”
“Minnie could teach me much better; she could teach me how to make sensible things. At school we’re taught to make little cakes and decorate them with icing sugar.”
“Well, I must say that doesn’t sound very sensible.”
“It would be much more useful to learn how to make a veal-and-ham pie. You like veal-and-ham pie, don’t you, Father?”
“Yes, I must admit I’m very partial to a well-made veal-and-ham pie . . . but that isn’t the point, Sarah. You must continue to go to St. Elizabeth’s until you’ve obtained your School Certificate. Later, when you’re older, you might want to take some sort of post, so it’s essential to have your certificate. You hadn’t thought of that, had you?”
“Yes, I thought of it, but it isn’t important.”
“It’s exceedingly important.”
“No, honestly, Father! If you want a job nowadays you’ve got to have specialised training. Daphne Frome is learning typing and shorthand and book-keeping – she wants a job in an office. Shorthand is terribly difficult.”
Sarah Morris Remembers Page 7