Dark Angel

by Sally Beauman

  “We beseech thee,” began the priest.

  Constance’s hat came into his view (the hat Winnie had pronounced doubtful, a hat that dismayed the vicar, a hat the color of Parma violets). He averted his eyes. He cleared his throat.

  “We beseech thee, for thine infinite mercies, that thou will mercifully look upon this Child; wash her and sanctify her with the Holy Ghost; that she”—he paused—“being steadfast in faith, joyful through hope, and rooted in charity, may so pass the waves of this troublesome world, that finally she may come to the land of everlasting life, there to reign with thee, world without end, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

  “Amen,” replied Constance in a quiet voice.

  “Amen,” replied Acland and Jane, exchanging a glance, and then a handkerchief.

  “Amen,” replied Wexton, looking toward Steenie.

  “Amen,” replied Freddie, looking up at the memorial window to Boy.

  “Amen,” replied Steenie, thinking of the war memorial—where, as instructed by Acland, he had counted forty-five names.

  “Amen,” replied Maud, looking down at the baby.

  “Amen,” replied Winifred Hunter-Coote, glancing at Freddie.

  “Amen,” replied Jenna from a pew behind, where she sat with William, the butler.

  “Amen,” replied Jack Hennessy, who sat alone at the back of the church, one empty sleeve pinned neatly to the front of his best jacket.

  The vicar proceeded with the prayers. It was the same vicar who had married Constance some thirteen years before; he had not forgotten that occasion, or Constance. The woman who had insisted her pet dog should attend her wedding. He had a clear memory of this animal, seated on Steenie’s lap, panting during the prayers, yawning during a hymn, and sniffing in a threatening way at one of the pews on the way out.

  He had protested.

  “He is one of God’s creatures,” Constance had replied.

  He had given in.

  This he had resented at the time, and he found he resented it still. Indignation intruded between him and the words of the service. Constance was looking at him in a way he found unyielding, and inappropriate. The vicar averted his eyes. He fixed them, instead, on the large and benevolent, the rumpled figure of Wexton, whose poetry the vicar greatly admired. A wise godfather, he said to himself; the meaning of the words returned to him. He proceeded.

  There is a point during the Church of England service of baptism when, since the baby cannot speak, the godparents make vows on its behalf. It had been previously agreed that when this point was reached, Freddie and Maud should stand on one side of the baby, Wexton and Constance on the other. Acland had already rehearsed them in this tactful arrangement.

  When the moment came, however, something went wrong. Wexton, abstracted and vague, walked the wrong way. He stationed himself next to Freddie, leaving Maud to flank Constance. To the dismay of everyone, the vicar launched into the next part of the service with two godfathers on one side of the baby, two bristling godmothers on the other.

  Maud, less dependable than Freddie had said, behaved with provocative decorum. Clutching her prayer book to the breast of her superbly tailored suit, and hitching the furs she wore around her neck, she contrived—with every air of accident—to elbow Constance to one side.

  Maud was tall. Constance was not. Constance’s view of the baby was obscured by Maud’s shoulder, and by the mask of the fox fur draped around Maud’s neck. Right on a line with Constance’s eyes was a small, pinched, beady-eyed, triangular, dead fox head.

  “Dearly beloved,” began the vicar, pressing on.

  “I am so sorry,” said a small clear voice. “I am so sorry, but I seem unable to see.”

  The vicar coughed. Maud did not move one inch.

  “All I can see,” continued the voice, in a tone of patient reason, “is a shoulder. And a dead fox. I am a godmother. I should quite like to see the baby.”

  “Ah, Constance, is it you?” cried Maud. “Are you there? I must have missed you. I forget … how small you are. There—is that better now?”

  She moved six inches to the right.

  “Thank you so much, Maud.”

  “Perhaps the veil obscures your view, Constance? Might it be an idea, to lift the veil?”

  “Oddly enough, Maud, I see through the veil. That is the purpose of veils.”

  “Yes. Well, this is hardly the moment to discuss hats.”

  Maud turned back to the priest. She had no respect for priests whatsoever. Her brother had endowed this church; its living had been in his gift, as it was now in Acland’s. As far as Maud was concerned, the vicar was a hired man. She gave him a firm look.

  “Proceed,” she said.

  The vicar gave a sigh. He proceeded.

  He completed the initial prayer. He came to the godparents’ vows. He addressed four faces.

  “Dost thou,” he asked, “in the name of this Child, renounce the Devil and all his works, the vain pomp and glory of the world, and the carnal desires of the flesh, so that thou wilt not follow, nor be led by them?”

  “I renounce them all,” replied three voices. Freddie and Maud spoke firmly, in unison. Constance more slowly, a little behind the others. Wexton did not speak at all. He was looking at Constance in a preoccupied way. The vicar cleared his throat. (Great poets were allowed, perhaps, to be absentminded.) Wexton came back to attention.

  “Oh. Sorry. Yes, I renounce them, too, sure.”

  Wexton blushed. The vicar continued with the vows. He inquired whether the godparents believed, on the baby’s behalf, in God the Father, in His only-begotten Son, in the crucifixion and the resurrection, in the Holy Church, the Communion of Saints, the forgiveness of sins, and life everlasting.

  “All this I steadfastly believe,” the godparents answered.

  It was at this point in the service (or so he decided later) that Acland noticed that Constance, despite all predictions to the contrary, was moved. Throughout the vows she stood still, her hands clasped before her. Her eyes never wavered once from the priest’s face; she seemed to hang upon his words, her face composed, sad, intent.

  The baby was baptized; the sign of the cross was made. Acland, looking up from the font, saw that Constance wept. She did so silently; two tears, then two more ran down from beneath the veil. Acland, deeply moved himself, was touched by this. He thought: Constance is more than she seems.

  “Victoria Gwendolen,” Constance said to him afterward, as they walked through the churchyard, back to the waiting cars. She took his arm, then released it.

  “Victoria Gwendolen. They’re lovely names.”

  “Her two grandmothers’ names—”

  “I like that. It links her to the past.” She glanced up. Ahead of them, Maud waited by her car.

  “I’ll go back to the house now, with Steenie.” Constance gave a little smile. “I know I’m in the way. I just wanted to say thank you, Acland, for letting me be her godmother. It means a great deal to me. I’m so happy—for you and for Jane.”

  She said no more. With admirable discretion, she avoided Maud, climbed into the first of the waiting cars with Steenie. The car drew away in the direction of the house. Maud watched it depart, her expression haughty. She turned to Jane, then Acland. She kissed them both.

  “I shall come back,” she said, “when that woman has gone. No, Acland, I shall speak my mind for once. I have to say that I find your selection of her as a godmother quite inexplicable, and deeply unwise. I cannot understand, Jane, how you, of all people—”

  “It was my decision, Maud,” Acland said in a quiet voice.

  “Yours? Then I can only say it was foolish.” Maud drew herself up. “She has not improved—in fact, if anything, she is worse. That hat! That hat, in my opinion, was a calculated insult—”

  Behind Maud, Winifred Hunter-Coote, who concurred with this view, gave a loud snort.

  “Quite unsuitable for a christening,” Maud went on. “But then, she must always draw attention to her
self. She feeds on it. I am glad to say I thought the hat most unbecoming—far too young for her. She is beginning to show her age.”

  “Maud. Could we stop this, please?” Acland interrupted her. “It’s unkind and unnecessary. It’s upsetting Jane—”

  “Jane?” Maud gave him her coldest look. “Jane is not the one who is upset.”

  “Maud, I think that’s enough.”

  “Did you see how she looked at my poor fox? She gave it a most malignant glance—”

  “It was in the way, Maud.”

  “It was intentionally in the way. I’d prefer her to look at my fox like that, than your baby—”

  “Maud, please.”

  “Very well. I shall say no more. I shall return to London.” Maud, somewhat flushed, adjusted the contentious fox. She glanced grandly to left and to right. It did not escape her notice that Freddie, listening to this exchange, was trying hard not to laugh.

  “I shall say only one thing—and no, Freddie, it is not a cause for amusement.” She paused. “That woman is ill-bred. And what is more, it shows.”

  “I’m in disgrace,” Constance said that afternoon, after lunch. Wexton and Steenie, she and Acland were walking down by the lake. Jane had retired to rest; Freddie had fallen asleep over a new novel by Dorothy Sayers; Winnie, with a quelling glance in Constance’s direction, had refused to join them. She was, she said in a meaningful way, retiring to her room, where she would write to her husband, Cootie.

  “Winnie thinks I should be writing to Montague.” Constance made a wry face. “I have a sneaking impression she thinks I’m a less than dutiful wife.”

  “She’s in Maud’s camp,” Steenie said, with an air of glee. “She disapproves of you violently, Constance. I think she took exception to your hat.”

  “How unkind! And I took hours choosing that hat.”

  “Maud said it was a calculated insult,” Steenie continued cheerfully, ignoring Acland’s warning look. “Do you know what Maud calls you? She calls you ‘that woman.’ She said you gave her poor fox fur a most malignant glance.”

  “So I did,” Constance replied with spirit. She took Acland’s arm. “I must say, Acland, it is nice to come three thousand miles, to my old home, and be made to feel so welcome.”

  “Oh, Maud doesn’t mean half she says,” Acland replied in an unconvincing way.

  Constance gave him a little glance. “Oh, she does. I know she does. I can just hear her saying it: ‘That woman is a bad influence. I cannot think why you should select her as a godmother. Did you see how she looked at my poor fox?’”

  Constance smiled. It was a brilliant piece of mimicry: Constance had Maud’s voice to perfection, its swoops, its glides, its exaggerated emphasis. For a moment, tiny though she was in comparison to Maud, she even contrived to resemble her, drawing herself up in just the way Maud had done, outside the church. Acland smiled; Steenie laughed; Wexton gave no reaction. Constance, reverting to her own self, gave a sigh.

  “Oh, well, I cannot blame her. She once loved Montague, and she will never forgive me. I regret that. I always liked Maud, very much.”

  She gave a shake of the head; they walked on for some way in silence. Acland wondered if perhaps Constance was more hurt by Maud’s remarks than she acknowledged, for there had been a certain defiance in her tone—a defiance he remembered from long before, when Constance, as a child, had used it to deflect the dislike she seemed always to expect from others.

  They came, after some ten minutes, to a division of the paths. There, Constance paused.

  “Do you know where I’d like to go? The old Stone House. Is it still there? Do you remember, Acland—your mother’s favorite place? I haven’t been to that part of the grounds for ages.”

  “Oh, it’s still there. It’s not in very good repair—like everything else—but it’s still there.”

  “Shall we go and look at it now? May we? Steenie, Wexton, will you come? I remember it so well. Gwen used to keep her watercolors there, and her flower press. Boy took our photograph there one morning, I remember. Let me think—Gwen was there, and you, Steenie. Oh, and my father.”

  She stopped. She made a small gesture. She turned away, then walked apart a few steps.

  All three men stared at her back. Seeing that Acland was puzzled, Steenie mouthed the word comet.

  “We were in the Stone House that day,” he said in a low voice. “The morning of the comet party. I think it might not be a terribly good idea to go there. You know how she is when she remembers—”

  “I’m going back to the house in any case,” Wexton announced abruptly. “It’s cold. Are you coming, Steenie?”

  To Steenie’s surprise, Wexton—who usually ambled along—set off for the house at a smart pace, without a backward glance. Steenie, who was anxious to tell Wexton all about his quarrel with Vickers, but who was also filled with a sudden unease, hesitated. He looked at Constance’s back. He looked at Acland.

  “You go on,” Acland said.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yes. Go on. We’ll catch up.” He lowered his voice. “It’s all right, Steenie. She’s obviously upset. Give her a minute or two.”

  “Oh, very well.”

  Steenie turned with apparent reluctance. He began to walk away, hesitated, glanced back, then ran to catch up with Wexton. Once Steenie was at his side, Wexton slowed. Both men paused to look back; Constance and Acland were now out of sight.

  “My dear,” Steenie said with a sideways glance. “Ought we to leave? I’m not entirely sure Acland’s safe….”

  “Nor am I. However, it’s his problem, don’t you think?”

  “I wouldn’t like to see him hurt—or Jane, for that matter.” Steenie hesitated. “It’s probably all right—after all, it wouldn’t be terribly apposite timing, would it? Just after the christening. On the other hand, with Constance—”

  “Quit meddling, Steenie. Come on. Let’s go back to the house.”

  “You’re sure?” Steenie sighed. He turned with some reluctance. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe she was genuinely upset. I have seen it before—when something brings her father back. She did love him, Wexton.”

  “Oh, yes?” Wexton did not sound convinced. “You remember that story you told me once—her father’s novel, the nail scissors?”

  “Yes.”

  Wexton shrugged. “If she loved her father so much,” he said simply, “then how come she cut up his books?”

  “Do you want to go back?” Acland said when they had reached the Stone House.

  “No. No. Truly—it’s all right. I’m glad we came. Not all my memories hurt, you see. I always liked this place. You can watch the woods and the lake from here. Do you remember, Acland—your mother used to have a table here. And her watercolors and her easel—over there. And then there were her books—on these shelves. My father’s novels. He had them bound in vellum, especially for her.”

  Constance wandered about the small room as she spoke. She seemed oblivious to the damp of the building, the chill of its stone floor. She touched the pillars of the loggia outside, which fronted toward the lake, then retreated into the building’s one room, gesturing, touching.

  Acland stood watching her in an uncertain way. Despite what she said, he felt it had been unwise to come here. He hesitated, half in the building and half out, leaning against one of the loggia’s pillars. He lit a cigarette. One of the black swans moved across the lake, then disappeared behind a clump of sedge. Alone, he thought, and palely loitering. He was unable to remember the rest of the poem.

  Constance seemed reluctant to end this exploration. He watched her move back and forth, her breath making small white clouds in the cool of the air. She drew off her gloves and ran her hand over the bookshelves. Her rings glittered. Acland thought she looked small, delicate, lovely, and solemn: an odd exotic creature to find at Winterscombe. She wore no hat. Her Egyptian hair framed her face. Her expression was forlorn, almost disconsolate, as if—now the others had left them—she could dr
op the defensive mask of mockery and gaiety.

  She wore a soft coat of some dark-gray material—an unusually somber choice, for Constance—which gave her a religious air, reminding him of a nun, a nurse, some quiet and ministering female influence. Beneath this coat he could just glimpse the whiteness of a blouse, its collar crumpled against the stem of her throat. As he looked at her, Constance, unconscious of his gaze, unfastened her coat. It swung back as she reached up to touch the place where a picture had once hung. She traced the mark it had left on the plastered wall. Beneath the pale silk of her blouse, the line of her breast was clearly visible. Acland could see the jut of the flesh, the outline of the aureole. Startled, even shocked by the lack of underclothing, he looked away.

  When he looked back once more, Constance was sitting on an old wooden bench, a bench once placed on the loggia outside. She seemed to have forgotten his presence completely. Her head was bent, her hands clasped, her gray coat wrapped around her. Once again Acland was reminded of a nun, a penitent. He smiled to himself—it was an unlikely image for Constance. She is lovely, he thought to himself, and, remembering the time when she had been ill, when he had gone to her room in London, he felt an old affection welling up, distant and yet strong, like the memory of a perfume. She looked, he thought, very young; fragile, vulnerable, costly, highly finished—the kind of object a person might glimpse through the glass window of some expensive shop. They would stop, look at it, think That is lovely, but not for me—and then pass on.

  “I shouldn’t have come to Winterscombe.” Constance looked up at him, her face sad and pinched. “I shouldn’t have come. I shouldn’t have asked to be Victoria’s godmother. I’ve put you in an impossible position, I know that. You’ve been very kind, and gallant—but it wasn’t fair. I’m sorry, Acland. All I’ve done is irritate everybody. Even Jane. Why do I do that? I don’t mean to—yet I can see it happening. Oh, I wish I’d never worn that stupid hat….”

  “It was a very pretty hat.” Acland smiled. “I liked it.”

  “Oh, Acland—such a gentleman! That’s not the point, anyway. The hat is trivial—I know that. It’s me, not the hat. I don’t belong here, and I never did. It was wrong of me to force myself on you. And yet, I’m glad I was there. I’d never been to a christening before. The words—the words are extraordinary, don’t you think? ‘Steadfast in faith,’ ‘joyful through hope,’ ‘the waves of this troublesome world.’ You see?” She smiled. “I have them by heart. Waves—I understood that. I hate the sea. And the world is troublesome.”