This Was the Old Chief's Country

by Doris Lessing

  Sarah was saying to herself, about ‘this thing I have with Stephen’, that if she had had a brother – a real one, not a clown like Hal – then this is what it might have been like. Extraordinary it had not ever occurred to her that to have a brother might be a pleasant thing.

  Sarah and Mary flew together to Nice. When high in the air over Europe, Sarah observed that Mary’s mouth was moving as she sat with closed eyes. No, Mary was not praying. She made a point of repeating her mantra as a public relations woman several times a day: ‘This summer dozens of festivals will compete for attention. The Julie Vairon Festival will be only one of them. I shall make sure it will be the best, the most visible, and that everyone will want to come.’

  They were met at the airport by Jean-Pierre le Brun, whom they felt they already knew, after so many consultations by telephone. He was dark, good-looking, well-dressed, combining in that uniquely French way correctness, politeness, and a practised scepticism, as if at university he had taken Anarchy and Law as his main subjects, and these had merged and become subdued to a style. Meeting the Englishwomen, also officials of a kind, he managed to express an extreme of respectful politeness, with a readiness to be affronted. He was not aware that he radiated resentment as well, but in no time he had forgotten about it, for he decided he liked them. They enjoyed an amiable lunch at Les Collines Rouges, Belles Rivières’ main café-restaurant. It then being late for business in the town hall, he drove them off into the wooded hills behind the town, first speeding along a tarmacked road and then driving not much slower when it became a rough track. This was the road Julie had followed when she walked to and from Belles Rivières. ‘She walked in all weathers, la pauvre,’ said Jean-Pierre. Here two unsentimental Englishwomen smiled at the Frenchman who was being so formally sentimental, exactly as expected. And in fact he had tears in his eyes.

  At the track’s end they walked up a rocky path till they stood in a wide space between trees and rocks. The soil was a vibrant red in the late afternoon sun. The green of the trees was intense. The air was full of a murmur like bees, but this was the river and the waterfall: apparently there had been heavy rain. There was not much left of the ‘cow-byre’ the citizens had complained about. To quote from Mary Ford’s publicity brochure: A little stone house, cold, uncomfortable, was where Julie Vairon lived in the south of France, from the day of her landing penniless off the ship until she died. It had been a charcoal burner’s house. ‘Well, why not?’ Mary demanded. ‘Someone must have lived there before she did.’ After Julie’s death it stood empty for many years. Then the farmer Leyvecque, whose grandsons still farm in the area, used it as a stable. A storm took off the tile roof. If the town of Belles Rivières had not rescued it, there would be left only a heap of rubble, but instead the site is now a charming theatre, where this summer…

  There wasn’t much left of the house. The long back wall stood, and parts of the side wall, now capped with cement to stop them collapsing further. Behind the house red earth sloped to the trees. Umbrella pines. Oaks. Olives and chestnuts. Some of these trees had known Julie. The air was full of healthy aromatic smells. The three people walked back and forth over the site where Julie’s life would shortly be re-enacted. Well, her life as edited by the necessities of the production. The acting would be on the space on a side of the house. The musicians would be on a low stone platform – at once Sarah and Mary began explaining that this platform must be larger, and nearer the acting area, because of the importance of the music. Jean-Pierre argued for form’s sake and then said he had not understood the music would carry so much of the meaning. He gracefully gave in, as he had been going to from the start. These negotiations were going on in a mixture of French and English – the English for Mary’s benefit. She had explained over lunch that she could not learn languages, in the way the English have, as if afflicted by a defective gene as yet unknown to science. Because it was Mary who was going to have to work with Jean-Pierre on publicity, Sarah listened to what turned out to be a pretty fundamental clash of views. He said he expected an audience of about two hundred for each night of the two weeks. Mary protested that many more must be planned for. Jean-Pierre said that one could not expect large audiences for a new play, and one with only local significance. Still gracefully disagreeing, the three arrived back in the town. Jean-Pierre left them at their hotel to return to his family, and it was with regret. Mary and he were making a game out of her inability to speak French and were communicating in Franglais. Clearly he enjoyed the surprise of this large, calm, apparently stolid young woman, with her equable blue eyes, taking off into ever surrealer flights of language.

  There were three hotels. Among them the whole company would be distributed. All this was arranged by Sarah next morning, before the visit to the town hall, which was a formality, since everything had been already agreed on. Then Mary went off to interview descendants of the Imberts and the Rostands, Paul’s family and Rémy’s. Jean-Pierre went with her. Both clans had announced themselves only too willing to aid the Julie Vairon Festival, which would add such lustre to the little town. She also intended to visit the Julie Vairon Museum, and the archives, and the house – still as it was – where Julie would have lived had she decided to marry Philippe the master printer. And how about Philippe’s son Robert’s family? Perhaps they would agree – but they were a good way off. All this was going to take at least three days. Sarah flew back to London by herself.

  She telephoned Stephen. On hearing each other’s voices they at once entered a region of privileged complicity, like children with secrets. This new note had been struck from the moment the script was judged finished by the Founding Four. When adults do this, it often means they are over-burdened, or even threatened in some way. Well, Stephen’s Julie was certainly threatened. ‘Now Julie’s gone public…’ as he put it.

  She told him what she had seen of Julie’s house. Stephen had visited it ten years earlier when bushes were growing up through the floors and dislodging stones from the walls. She told him of the three hotels, two new, all named after Julie. She described Jean-Pierre. Because of her tone, he enquired, ‘And how does he see her?’ and she was enabled to murmur, ‘La pauvre…la pauvre…’ so that Stephen was able to exclaim, ‘Sentimental bloody…’ and she laughed. In short, they behaved as they had to in this ancient business of the French and the English finding each other impossible, to the satisfaction of both. But perhaps each nation’s need always to find the same traits in the other imposes a style, and so it is all perpetuated.

  And now she and anyone else from The Green Bird who was interested were invited to the house in Oxfordshire, because there would be an evening of music and dancing, a miniature festival, and Julie’s music would be sung. Sarah had been invited for the whole weekend. She did not really want to see him in his house, his other life – his real life? Their friendship was threatened, so she felt. Surely it was a tenuous thing, based on imaginings, on phantoms? She knew very well what she was afraid of: that the ‘magic’, the charm, would simply evaporate. But of course she had to go, and she even wanted to. During the week before that weekend, they met for dinner, on his suggestion. She could see that he too was uneasy. He was giving her information, facts, one after another, fielding them to her, she thought, and even said it to him, earning a smile – like an elder brother practising bowling on a sister, watching to make sure she accepted what was sent in the right way. ‘No, no,’ she parodied, ‘don’t step back, you’ll knock the stumps off! Elbow up, as you bring the bat forward.’

  The house was his wife Elizabeth’s. His was the money. No, it certainly was not for mutual convenience they had married, but the house was central to their lives: they both loved it.

  There were three children, boys, at boarding school. They like boarding school, he insisted, in a way that said he often had to insist. She was interested that people like him felt they had to defend the sacred institution. Boarding school suited them, said Stephen. Yes, it was a pity they hadn’t a daughter. ‘P
articularly for me,’ he said. ‘Perhaps if we’d had a daughter, Julie wouldn’t have got to me the way she did.’ But there would not be another child. Poor Elizabeth had more than done her bit.

  They were good friends, he and Elizabeth, he said, choosing his words, but not looking into her face, rather down at his plate. Not because he was evading something, but because – she felt – there was more he might be saying, which he expected her to see for herself.

  He liked to think he managed the estate productively. Elizabeth certainly ran the house well. Every summer they had festivals. ‘Half the county come to them, and we do them proud. Elizabeth had the idea first, but it was because she knows it’s the kind of thing I like. Now we both put everything we’ve got into it.’ This was said with satisfaction, even pride. They were going to expand, become something like Glyndebourne, only on a much smaller scale. And only in the summers. Sarah would see it all for herself, when she came.

  Again she felt that another meaning was carried by these words: and wondered if he was aware that everything he said seemed to be signalling: Listen to this carefully.

  ‘I want you to see it all,’ he insisted, this time looking at her. ‘I like the idea of your being there. I’m not really the kind of man who likes his life in compartments – yes, I know there are plenty who do, but I…’ His smile had energy in it, the mild elation that seemed to expand him when he talked of his house and his life in it. ‘You mustn’t think I don’t know how extraordinarily lucky I am,’ he said, as they strolled to the tube. ‘Well, you’ll see for yourself. I don’t take anything for granted, I assure you.’

  She was to take the train to Oxford on the mid-afternoon on Friday. At two the doorbell rang, and there was Joyce. Having not seen her for some time, Sarah saw her with new eyes, if only for a moment. At once her heart began to feel an only too familiar oppression. As Joyce walked in she seemed to be straying, or wandering in some private dream. She was a tall girl, now very thin. When her sisters put make-up on her she could be lovely. Her hair – and this is what struck to the heart – was marvellous, a fine light gold, and full of vitality, loose around her pasty spotty little face. ‘Make yourself some tea,’ said Sarah, but Joyce fell into a chair. She really did seem ill. Her great blue eyes were inflamed. Her characteristic smile – she had faced the world with it since she stopped being a child, was bright, scared, anxious. Yes, she was ill. Sarah took her temperature and it was 101.

  ‘I want to stay here,’ Joyce said. ‘I want to live here with you.’

  Her dilemma was being put to Sarah in as dramatic a form as it could be. She had been afraid of something like this. All kinds of pressure, though none that could be visible, or even probable, to anyone but herself, were urging her to give in at once. But she was remembering something Stephen had said: ‘You’ve been looking after her for – how long? Did you say ten years? Why don’t her parents look after her?’ And when Sarah could not reply, ‘Well, Sarah, it looks a funny business to me.’

  ‘At the time it seemed quite natural.’

  But his silence was because he had decided not to say what he thought. Yet usually they did say what they thought. Would he have said, ‘You’re crazy, Sarah’ and admitted her to the company of those who behave as they do because they cannot help themselves? And another time he had remarked, ‘If you hadn’t taken her in, what do you think would have happened?’ This was not the hot and indignant voice she was used to hearing from people who feel threatened, because they are thinking, If you take on such a burden, then perhaps I shall be expected to sacrifice myself too. No, he had been thinking it all out. She had never wondered what would have happened to Joyce if she had not looked after her. But would Joyce have been worse off if her aunt had left her to her parents? She couldn’t be much worse off, could she?

  Now she made herself say, the effort putting severity into her voice, ‘Joyce, I’m just leaving. I’m off for the weekend. I’ll take you home and put you to bed there.’

  ‘But I’ve lost the door key,’ said Joyce, her eyes filling with tears.

  Sarah knew the key had not been lost, but to prove that meant she would have to search Joyce’s pathetic grubby bag, which once had been a brightly striped Mexican affair.

  She told herself that on this ground she would have to fight, though it was poor ground. If she did not…She telephoned the hospital where her brother was a consultant, was told it was his afternoon in Harley Street, rang Harley Street, was told he was with a patient. Sarah said to the receptionist that this was Dr Millgreen’s sister, and the call concerned his daughter, who was ill. She would hold on. She held on for a good ten minutes, while Joyce cried quietly in her chair.

  At one point she said in a little voice, ‘But I want to stay here with you, Auntie.’

  ‘You can’t stay here with me now. You’re ill, you need treatment.’

  ‘But he’ll make me go to hospital. I don’t want to.’

  ‘No, but he’d make you stay in bed, and so would I.’

  ‘Why are you all so horrible to me? I want to live with you always.’

  ‘Joyce, none of us has heard one word from you – good God, it must be five months. I was running all over London looking for you.’

  At this point the receptionist said Dr Millgreen could not come to the telephone, Mrs Durham must manage. ‘Tell my brother that his daughter is in my flat. She is ill. I shall be away until Monday.’

  She was angry. That she was full of guilt goes without saying. It was no use telling herself she had no reason to feel guilt.

  She said to Joyce, ‘I suppose someone will come and fetch you. If not, I should simply get into a taxi and go home.’ Here she put some money into the Mexican bag.

  Joyce whimpered, ‘Oh Auntie, I don’t understand.’

  Because this was a child talking, not even Joyce the unpredictable adolescent, who did manage to cope with life on some sort of level, Sarah did not reply to her. Instead she said to an adult, reminding herself that Joyce was twenty, ‘Look, Joyce, you understand perfectly well. Something or other has happened out there, but of course you’ll never tell us what…’

  Joyce interrupted angrily, ‘If I did tell you, you’d take advantage of me and punish me.’

  Sarah said, ‘I don’t remember my punishing you for anything, ever.’

  ‘But my father does. He’s always horrible.’

  ‘He is your father. And you have a mother; she stands up for you.’ Joyce turned away her face. She was trembling, in spasms. ‘You are a grown-up woman, Joyce. You’re not a little girl.’

  At this a little girl looked vaguely in her aunt’s direction with enormous drowned eyes. A small pink mouth stood pathetically half open.

  ‘I’m not going to spend my life looking after you. I don’t mind if you come and stay here when I’m here. But I’m not going to wait on you. If you like I’ll take you for a holiday somewhere. You certainly look as if you could do with one. Well, we’ll talk about it, but not now. I’ve got a train to catch. I’ll ring up from Oxfordshire and find out if you’ve gone home.’

  Joyce would not go home. Late that night Hal might mention to his wife, if he remembered, that the girl was ill and alone in Sarah’s flat. Rather, ‘Joyce has turned up at Sarah’s, and Sarah seems to think she’s not well.’ Anne, exhausted and irritable, would instruct the two girls, Briony and Nell, to go over to Sarah’s. They would be angry with Joyce for disappearing for so long. They would be angry with Sarah for not coping. Everyone would be angry with Sarah. As usual. It crossed Sarah’s mind now to think that was indeed a bit odd.

  When Sarah got off the train, it was Elizabeth who came to introduce herself. The two women frankly inspected each other, Elizabeth in a way that made Sarah wonder exactly what Stephen had said about her, for Elizabeth had the look of someone checking to make sure information had been correct: apparently, yes, it had. Elizabeth was a smallish woman, with shiny yellow hair held by a black velvet ribbon, and this made her look both efficient and spirited
. Her face was round and healthy and her cheeks were country pink. She had unequivocal bright blue eyes. Her body was firm and rounded: if one touched it, one’s finger would bounce off, thought Sarah. Everything about this woman told the world, but in a take-it-or-leave it voice, You can rely on me for anything reasonable. She seemed pleased with Sarah and was certainly thinking, Good, I don’t have to bother with her, she can look after herself. For Elizabeth – like Sarah – was one of the people who wake every morning with a mind’s eye list of items to be dealt with. Sarah had already been crossed off the list.

  Now Elizabeth strode off to a station wagon, but slowed so as to adjust to Sarah’s pace. The back of the car seemed crammed with large healthy dogs. Elizabeth drove fast and well – what else? She commanded the car with every muscle of her body, as if it were a horse she could not trust not to get out of hand. Meanwhile she gave Sarah information about what they saw as they drove through the jolly countryside. At the top of a rise she stopped the car and said, ‘There it is, there’s Queen’s Gift.’ Although she had lived in the house all her life and could hardly be unused to this view, she sounded like a child trying not to be too pleased with itself, and Sarah liked her from that moment.