by A. J. Cronin
He began to assume an air of genial indulgence, and when, during their walks, an appraising masculine eye was turned upon her, he would remark:
‘You’re quite a good-looking woman yet, you know, mother’; and nod encouragingly. He invented and invested her with a most tender passion for the leader of the pierrot troupe, twitted her for languishing under a secret and unrequited attachment.
In the evenings, after tea, they strolled along the grassy front arm in arm, and went, as an event, to these pierrots. Fourpence permitted them to enter the reserved enclosure and sit comfortably in chairs, but this luxury was, they decided, an economy; to stand outside was to be haunted by the little red velvet bag, and Lucy had, in her present mood, no heart to withhold her contributions. The entertainment, moreover, was excellent – Val Pinkerton’s Troupe had a reputation second to none upon that, sea-beach, and Val himself, by day a quantity unknown but by night a hero distinguished from the commonality of the troupe by a broad red ribbon which split diagonally the white front of his evening dress with an almost Continental distinction – yes, Val Pinkerton had a presence that was aristocratic – even haughty – and a baritone voice of surpassing soulfulness. To Lucy and Peter it seemed that he achieved the pinnacle of his art when he sang, with one hand romantically outstretched and the other eloquently upon his ribbon-covered heart:
‘Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do,
I’m half crazy just for the love of you.
It won’t be a stylish marriage;
We can’t afford a carriage;
But you’d look sweet
Upon the seat
Of a bicycle built for two.’
‘We’ll be able to afford the carriage all right, mother,’ Peter remarked with sly complacency. ‘Don’t you worry about that.’
Again that eager assurance towards their future which thrilled her. And always he linked her with him in the upward scintillation of his flight. Often they sent up a request for the ‘Daisy’ number, and when the admirable Val himself announced that he would ‘oblige with the old favourite’, they had the feeling that he sang it exclusively for them. On the way home, moving intimately together in the warm darkness, they hummed the catchy tune, and into the refrain came a low bourdon note – the sea sound that rose and fell upon the unseen beach. As they walked, the air came damply upon their cheeks, mingled with a saline freshness; the distant harbour lights threw pointed yellow pencils across the black water; the turf beneath their feet was plastic with the lightly fallen dew. Outside the Marine Hotel – whose large illuminated windows proclaimed its unabashed magnificence – Lucy often pressed her son’s arm, and they would stop, secure in the darkness and the distance, to watch the glittering progress of life within. A row of rose-shaded tables, the swift passage of waiters, the curve of a woman’s shoulder rising from her evening gown, the whole moving picture of an easy and refined existence was revealed before them. Filled by the hidden watcher’s intentness, each had a secret ardour towards this scene, his eager, hers passive; yet for each an inspiration which rose into the throat and became intensified, moulded to a firm reality. She saw herself, at the end of the long struggle which lay before her, moving in that atmosphere of leisured ease; and he, with parted lips, placed his future against a background of equal elegance and wealth.
When they moved off, filled with their own thoughts, they did not speak much; yet she was aware of a closer union between them, of a common aim which bound them.
Throughout this happy period, filled with such delightful intimacy, she ceased almost to regard him as her son. His companionship occupied her day; she hung upon his word, waited for his smile, anticipated, as best she could, his every want. The dishes which she requested the landlady to prepare were those which he desired or demanded. To gratify his whim became her joy, yet mostly she gratified it under a guise of brusqueness. Never did she permit her intention to be weakened by her fondness. She did not spoil him. That thought was clearly preposterous. Her giving was not an indulgence, but the token of an affection which demanded an equal affection in return.
That was their relationship during this period at Doune, and when, at last, after the fashion of all holidays, this holiday did indeed draw to its end, the relationship seemed solidly and permanently established between them. Lucy returned to Flowers Street with a feeling of assurance, girded for battle and the future.
They had spoken little of the result of the examination at Doune, avoiding the subject through a tacit understanding of its certainty. Her own feeling tended inevitably to support his belief: what had he not done in the past? Nevertheless, as the day upon which the results were to be made public drew near, her excitement ran again a little feverishly within her. And when actually the morning of this day arrived, the stiffness of her hands betrayed her as she dressed.
It was a Saturday, and he proposed, he said, to attend at the University at eleven o’clock, by which hour the results would assuredly be posted upon the general notice-board; he would be in a position to let her know the best or the worst when she returned at lunch-time.
‘Oh, it must be the best,’ she said hurriedly, as she stood dressed for the street, yet lingering unconsciously at the door.
‘I think so,’ he admitted. This suppression of their feelings made them constrained with each other. It was with an effort that she said:
‘I’d better get along now or I’ll be late’; and she tore herself away from him.
As she went down the street, which held still the freshness of the early air, she felt restless, strung to a high impatience. Although she had already waited an entire month in stoic equanimity, now she was fidgety, and the few hours until lunch seemed to stretch out interminably before her. At the corner of the road the old man who kept the small paper-shop was busy affixing the morning placards outside his window, and, as she passed, by an association of ideas a sudden thought struck her. She stopped abruptly, returned, entered the shop, and bought the Glasgow Herald.
On her way to the tram station she held the folded paper in her hand, half regretting her impulse, realising now that it was impossible for the results to be published in the morning paper.
And yet, seated in the red tram, her hands were tremulous as they opened the white sheets. Her eyes, travelling heedlessly over the trivialities of news: the earthquake in Japan, a tidal wave in Borneo, a murder in Leeds: sought anxiously for intelligence of greater moment. But she became aware gradually; that there was no mention of the supreme tidings. Had Peter’s name been in that paper, it would have arisen instantly out of the jumbled medley of dead words and useless letters. She half lowered the paper to her knee, then, all at once: ‘University News’ – she saw the heading, perceived also a list of names. Her eyes devoured the short list – only twenty-five names – and all names of no importance, names blank with a horrid futility.
It was not the proper list. Her startled gaze jumped to the head of the paragraph. Then instantly her mind doubled upon itself, veered towards another issue. It was the list; but some mistake had been made. A misprint! Her son’s name had been omitted from this paltry register. She swallowed dryly and read the whole again. Twenty-five successful candidates out of nearly two hundred competing for the open scholarships. Every detail of these pedants was given: their schools; the bursary allocated to each; even their stupid, pretentious, bombastic middle names. Her brows drew together bitterly.
At last it was evident; she was confronted, not by his defeat, but by her own. A long sigh went out of her stiff body like the expiration of all hope. She let the paper slip under her feet. She sat staring in front of her, filled by a galling despair. The intensity of her disappointment made her physically sick. Dully, at her station, she arose and got off the car. She wanted, not to walk through these busy streets, but to lie down limply and weep.
At the office she said nothing, yet, as she went about her work, she could not wholly comprehend the reason of it all; at the back of her mind hope still lingered. His career a
t school had been satisfactory; he had worked hard; he had expressed gratification at his own performance upon the day of the examination; and she, for her part, had prayed; yes, she had prayed. The whole thing struck her with a sudden bewilderment.
In this same confusion of mind she hastened home shortly after one o’clock. Saturday was her half-holiday, and on this day she reached home earlier than usual. One swift glance at his face sufficed, confirming her rising fears, shattering her last faint hope. He was lying back in his chair, his head sunk into his shoulders, his hands thrust deeply into his trousers pockets: in the same attitude of apathetic misery that he had manifested in his bouts of childish pique or sickness at Ardfillan. She had always known this dejected attitude to represent the lowest level of the barometer of his feelings. And now she saw that he had touched the pit of his wretchedness.
‘Never mind, son,’ she cried out at once, forgetting instantly her own grief at the sight of his distress. ‘ You did your best.’
‘It’s a swindle,’ he said miserably, keeping his pale face averted from her. ‘The whole thing’s a fraud.’
‘What do you mean?’ she faltered, her own vague suspicions confirmed by his manner.
‘They don’t half read the papers,’ he shot at her glumly. ‘Fling them up to the ceiling and see the one that sticks there longest. That gets the first prize.’ He paused, then broke out again, ‘I tell you I did great papers – splendid papers, every one of them.’
‘Perhaps the others were good too,’ she murmured haltingly. ‘Perhaps –’ She was thinking paradoxically of those youths who had confessed to having done vilely at the examination.
‘It’s all favouritism, I tell you – the school you come from,’ he muttered almost sullenly. ‘They haven’t given me a dog’s chance.’
‘But surely –’
‘That’s right,’ he cried, ‘blame me. Go on and take sides against me. After me nearly killing myself.’
Her lips trembled; she placed her arm lightly, caressingly on his shoulders. But he shook it off and said, with a hint of weak tears in his voice:
‘Let me be, mother. Can’t you let me be? You know as well as I do I should have got a place. It’s not fair, I tell you.’
She said nothing, and her hand dropped back to her side; she had no thought but for him and the bitterness of his disappointment. His resentment, though perhaps misjudged, seemed to her supremely natural. She stood for a long time in silence; then with a heavy heart she started to move about the room, making a pretext of tidying things up.
At length she was about to venture a remark when suddenly the flap of the letter-box clicked open and shut. She heard a letter flutter on to the floor of the hall. She gazed towards his stiff profile doubtfully, concluding from his apathy that this was the confirmation of the wretched news: the official notice of his failure.
‘Go on,’ he muttered sulkily, without lifting his head, ‘ go out and get it. But don’t show it to me. I’m sick of the whole thing.’
He had the same premonition as she; nevertheless she went slowly into the hall and picked up the letter. When she returned, she gave him another compassionate glance, and, with a melancholy foreboding, tore open the envelope.
For a moment she stood perfectly still, then her hand fell upon her bosom and a short, inarticulate cry came from her lips. Her dull face quickened; her eyes, still unbelieving, still fixed upon the letter, widened and filled with a shining light.
‘Peter!’ she gasped. ‘Oh, Peter!’
‘What is it?’ And at her tone he started up and snatched the letter from her hand.
‘Don’t you see?’ she said weakly. She could say no more; her eyes brimmed; she gave a short, hysterical sob and sat down in a chair. His face was a study, traversed by the conflicting emotions of surprise, amazement, and, finally by a leaping ecstasy of joy.
‘The Reekie Trust!’ he said eagerly, ‘I never heard of it.’
‘But I did,’ she cried. ‘Miss Tinto told me about it. I entered your name just – oh, just in case. Oh, isn’t it splendid?’
He looked at the letter again. It said concisely that he had been elected to the Reekie Trust – a bursary of twenty-five pounds per annum, tenable for five years – created by the late Kezia Reekie for the assistance of the sons of widows in specifically indigent circumstances. With almost brutal brevity it informed him that, although he had been placed ninety-seventh in the list of open competitors, he was the first to fulfil the conditions of eligibility. Would he therefore communicate with the writer – of Fullerton & Co. – at the given address at his earliest convenience.
‘I didn’t know anything about this. Did you enter my name?’
‘I heard about it in the office,’ she admitted eagerly. ‘I didn’t think there was any need, but one afternoon I was passing Fullerton’s, and somehow – I went in and gave them all the particulars about – about myself – and what – what I was earning.’
He stared at her.
‘Well, I’ve got something, anyway,’ he returned slowly, looking up at her.
‘And we can do it after all,’ she said exultantly. Her face had become flushed; words rushed from her lips. ‘ I couldn’t think what we were going to do. I was at my wits’ end. I thought it was finished. Oh! isn’t it wonderful!’
Her gaiety infected him; yet for a moment his eye clouded.
‘I like their cheek, making me out ninety-seventh.’ He favoured the examiner’s ruling with a final and facetious contempt.
‘It’s wonderful, though,’ she persisted. ‘We’ve got all we wanted – and remember – you came out above more than a hundred of the others who tried.’
This aspect of the case which he had not considered now struck him happily.
‘You’re right,’ he cried. His elation rose; he flung himself back in his chair, with his eyes upon the ceiling, exclaiming: ‘ I’ve done it, and in spite of them.’
Than this nothing more could be said. All had been lost and all was now regained. That span of anguish which they had endured left in its mircaulous banishment an ecstatic sensation of relief. A sanguine conviction of the future stole into her, and her eye glistened with a trembling happiness.
Chapter Ninteen
Life, which now seemed wonderful, swept on gaily for them both. They had intimate talks in which they discussed his future at the University. He mentioned the word. Union with the conscious air of one who might shortly claim membership of that distinguished body; he took, moreover, long striding walks, chiefly in the evenings, when the swing of his stick and the forward thrust of his head betokened the consciousness that he was, or might shortly be, a figure; a young man poised on the threshold of the darker sciences.
Returning later than usual from one of those excursions, he was surprised to find his mother seated in the rocker with an open letter in her hand. Quite a spate of letters, this had been: three in one month – which was three more than they ordinarily received. His lips shaped to a query, but before he could speak Lucy called out:
‘You’ll never guess who from, Peter.’ She paused, felt slippers neatly crossed, still rocking gently to and from. ‘Mr Lennox!’
But he was not impressed. His memory of Lennox was vague, a letter from Lennox to him a relatively petty incident in the joyous sweep of life.
‘It leaves me rather cold,’ he retorted, the faintly ironic twist of his lips befitting his future profession.
‘No, really though, Peter,’ she replied, looking up quickly, She lowered the letter and tapped her knee meditatively, glanced again at him a trifle self-consciously. ‘And now he wants to come up and see us – on Saturday.’
‘You don’t say.’ He let out a whistle; then, with a speculative raillery, he added: ‘Let him come, and we’ll have a jolly party in the palace.’
She looked round slowly at the palace – this now his satiric designation of their home – and said:
‘How could I ask anybody here? It’s too bad – after the way he used to see us
in Ardfillan.’
The recollection of the fastidious elegance of her villa, an illusion gilded by time, made her forehead pucker; then all at once her face cleared.
‘I could get him to meet me, though, and have tea at Miss Chisholm’s,’ she exclaimed decidedly. ‘Yes that’s just what I will do.’
He burst into a roar of laughter, which doubled him up convulsively.
‘You and old Lennox, mother,’ he gasped, ‘strolling like this. It’s good – it’s good – oh, it’s good!’
Straightening himself, he crooked his arm and, affecting a frightful simper, gave a ludicrous impersonation of their united passage along some fashionable thoroughfare.
She observed him, half frowning, half smiling.
‘Laughing like that!’ she protested, and paused. ‘I will meet him, though. He’s not a bad sort – whatever I may have thought of him.’
She had, indeed, a vague, incomprehensible desire to see Lennox again now that she had definitely set her son upon his career; and this idea of taking tea with him – her own suggestion, but one, she knew, with which he would instantly concur – appealed to her. After a moment’s further thought, she took pen and wrote her reply.
During the next few days she did not quite forget about the matter. It lay pleasantly at the back of her mind, touching some instinct long neglected and overlaid; indeed, she was at moments surprised by her own anticipation, yet explained it by the recollection of part indebtedness to Lennox and the paucity of her present pleasures.
Upon the Friday night she considered the condition of her wardrobe – an inspection performed slowly and rather sadly. The ‘grey’ had now become her stand-by, and she was tired of it; it showed, moreover, on closer inspection, a faint suspicious shininess of hem and cuff.