Steve tilted her small pointed face back and gazed down into her bright, dark eyes, half hidden by the thick, curling lashes. He shook his head slowly. What was it about her that got into your blood? Why had he let himself in for this? Life had been easy and pleasant before. What gave her the idea about him and the mistress? God! The things she said put him in a panic. Some of them were true, too. How did she know? But it wasn’t true he was in love with Ka…the mistress. Well, not as she implied. He thought of Kate as a being apart. She was the doctor’s, very much the doctor’s. But Cathleen had unearthed this feeling and brought it startlingly into the light, terrifying him. She was uncanny. He said aloud, ‘You’re uncanny, you know too much. How do you know so much?’
Her lids hid the expression of her eyes; she pressed closer, wriggling against him.
‘You’re a witch,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t wonder but you’ve been burnt already.’
She laughed, and the sound had the tone of a bell, wide and deep and in strange contrast to the slightness of her body. ‘Do you think so? That’s interesting, for I’ve already come to that conclusion about myself. You’re the only one that’s troubled to think what I’m like. The others are like children, and they’re afraid of me…Yes, they are. Sometimes I feel old, old, old. Do you know, I can tell what the reactions of others will be to any situation. I love creating situations just to prove myself right.’ She drew her finger lightly round the outline of his lips. ‘I knew I could make you want me; I knew exactly what would happen when I started. Remember the first time I came in here? You nearly had a fit.’
He pushed her roughly away. ‘I know what I should have done that first time,’ he said. He began putting on his collar, tugging the ends to meet the stud. ‘I can tell you something I do know,’ he said, turning his back on her: ‘this is going to mean disaster to both of us if you don’t stop it. You started it thinking you would hurt someone else. But you were mistaken; you’ll be the one who gets hurt in the end, cocksure as you are…and me too, more than hurt. Something will happen if this doesn’t stop.’
When she made no reply, he turned round. She was standing with her hand on the latch of the door. She looked tiny, like a wisp of dark gossamer. Her voice sounded very small and pathetic when she said, ‘Will you come up then?’
He took two strides towards her and lifted her hand off the latch. ‘Cathy, you do see, don’t you?’
Her fingers curled round his and his flesh leapt under her touch. ‘Cathy, I don’t want to hurt you…I’m afraid of…of this going further…of anything happening. Don’t you see?’
She lifted her hand, and without taking her eyes from his switched off the light. They stood apart. She saw him as a great, black shape outlined in the glow from the fire. She made no further move, but waited. Then her feet left the ground, and his mouth came searching blindly for hers; his hands moved over her, pressing her into the curves of his body; she felt the hardness of the door against her shoulder-blades and the hardness of his muscles against her thighs, and out of the caverns of her being rose a deep laugh.
Terence was leaning back in the chair, his feet perched on the hob, his eyes on the low ceiling.
River reed pipes, soft-lined for water notes,
Play the tune of ripplets lapping the stalks …
Now what? He saw floating in the ceiling that river in Norfolk, with the tall rushes swaying gently in the breeze, and the dying sun taking with it the red from the river; he could see again the moon stealing up from a corner of the sky, and feel the sense of quietude and peace that comes on a river unawares, and touches you if you remain still. He wrote on:
Sent from the moorhen as she swiftly floats,
And the night moths as they alight and walk.
River reeds, play gently to the wind’s time
And sway your slender forms into the dance,
Nodding your heads gracefully to the moon
And stilling all the river things in trance.
It didn’t really express what he had felt that night sitting alone by the river. Could one ever express what one actually felt? No: only the shadow of what is in one’s mind can be transmitted on to paper, for the thought loses most of its substance in the actual transmission.
From the stark facts of mathematics, from Eddington’s interpretation of Einstein’s theory of relativity, his mind would revert, and there would well up a desire to express something that needed no proving, that could be made concrete by feeling alone, to express a thought by a word, however inadequate, and add another, and another; and there you had a picture; and the picture was real, holding for all time the shadow of the thought that would have been lost. Where did thought go when it was allowed to slide away? Did it float in the ether of your own particular aura, round and round, waiting for you to pluck it out? That was something like Larry’s idea: your thoughts built themselves into a mattress on which your body was transferred after death to the next stage of its journey. If the thoughts during your life were mostly good, the mattress would hold together; if they were bad, your body would fall through, and you were born again into this world, and renewed your apprenticeship.
John Dane Dee and Larry; strong tea and anchovy toast; and debates going on and on into the night, ranging from the mentality of a worm to the illusion of the sovereignty of princes. Soon they would be gone for ever, merely another memory floating in the ether.
He started when he heard the knock; it was unusual for anyone to come to the cottage after dark. He slipped the book in which he had been writing under the cushion of the chair, and went to the door.
‘Hello, Terence,’ said Annie shyly.
He didn’t answer, but stared at her. Although she had been but a matter of yards from him for the past few days he was as surprised as if she had come from another world. She stood below him in the snow, a green thing with a golden head. The hood had fallen back on to her shoulders and her hair of pale liquid gold framed her face; her eyes, like the clear green of the river, looked up at him. And he thought, as he had thought years ago, why has she to look like that? He said haltingly, ‘Hello. Won’t you come in?’
She walked up the two steps and into the full light of the room. Still he stared at her. Now that they were on a level he saw that she had grown considerably during the past year. She was tall like the river reeds about which he had been writing, and as graceful. But she hadn’t much shape; she was rather flat, like a boy, immature still. She must be—what? Seventeen? Eighteen? Yet her expression remained that of the child he had known, trusting, open, unable to hide what it felt.
‘Won’t you sit down?’ he said at last. ‘My mother and father are out.’
‘Yes, I know,’ she replied. ‘I saw them going.’
‘Oh!’ His eyebrows were slightly raised.
‘Terence…Are you coming to my party?’
He turned from her and took a cigarette from a green packet on the mantelpiece, and tapped it quickly on the back of his hand. ‘It was very good of you to send me an invitation, and I suppose it was very bad of me not to reply; but…well, I’m not much use at parties; I’m the kind of fellow who gets stuck in a corner and remains there.’ Lighting the cigarette, he took two quick draws, his back still towards her. He seemed to be waiting for her to say something. When she didn’t speak, he turned towards her again: ‘I’d most likely put a damper on the whole thing. I can never find anything to say; I’m not what you’d call a party man.’
‘It doesn’t matter; we’d love to have you. Won’t you come?’ Her eyes were soft now, misty, and he found himself fascinated by the movements of her lips as they shaped the words. Laughter, young and free, glinted on their full redness. His mother said she’d grown into a ‘nice lass’. Lord! what an adjective to describe her…‘nice’! Dane Dee could put her into words, he’d never be able…But he was not going to that party…he wasn’t starting anything. Oh no!
‘Your mother told me to come along for you,’ Annie said, her smile widening.
&nb
sp; ‘My mother!’ he exclaimed in surprise.
‘Yes. She said you might come if I asked you.’
‘Well well!’ he laughed.
‘Oh Terence, do come!’ She made a small, pleading motion with her hands. ‘You’d only be sitting here alone…That is, if you’re not going anywhere else.’
He was on the point of saying that he was sorry but he was going out, when she put out her hand impulsively and caught his: ‘Come on, Terence. Please. It’s my birthday party, I’m eighteen—and two days,’ she added, laughing.
He looked down at her hand on his as she went on talking. She still retained the spontaneity of the child who had buried her head on his chest and cried. Lord, he had been scared that day! And hadn’t it been a job keeping out of her way? It had been like fighting two people, himself and her. Odd, but it was through her he had acquired the walking habit…The miles he had tramped during the vacs; the places he had seen. Really he owed her quite a lot…He had never been as close to her again since that day on the Jarrow road …
She was saying, ‘I never used to have birthday parties at all; no-one seemed to think about it, because it falls on Christmas Eve. I forgot I had a birthday myself. But now Mam always gives me a party on Boxing Day…Won’t you come?’ Her face became grave. ‘I…I promise not to cry all over you.’
The room filled with laughter. She watched his head go back. How different he looked when he laughed, and she hadn’t thought he was so tall. Oh, he was nice. She had always known he was nice.
‘I was just thinking of that day,’ he said.
‘So was I. Have you an aunt who drinks?’
‘No. I’m afraid my only aunt is a staunch Wesleyan.’
‘Oh, how funny. You lied beautifully,’ she said. ‘I did use to howl, didn’t I? When I look back I see myself in stages: there was the period when I was always falling down and tearing great holes in the knees of my stockings; then the crying period. Somehow you seemed to figure largely in that.’
‘Well, you know, you seemed always to be at it whenever we did meet.’
You didn’t stay long enough to get to know me when I wasn’t crying, she thought to herself as she continued to smile at him. You avoided me…Why? Was it because we have money and things? Oh, that would be stupid. Well, what was it then?…Oh, what does it matter, she chided herself, so long as he comes now? Oh, he must come, he must come. Her eyes all appeal, she said, ‘You’ll come?’
He heard himself saying, ‘All right then, I’ll come. But be it on your own head if your party goes flat…I’ll be down in about a quarter of an hour.’
‘Oh, I’ll wait for you,’ she said eagerly. His eyes twinkled, and again they laughed together. ‘Well, you see, I’m afraid you’ll change your mind.’
What a child she was! Were all girls so frank and open? He guessed not. But of course he didn’t know much about them. Yet he felt sure she was entirely different. Girls of eighteen generally assumed that grown-up air, they tended to fly to sophistication, but there was something so utterly…utterly…what was it? He smiled at her. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘sit down. I won’t be a few minutes.’
She watched him mount the steep stairs, with the rope banisters, that ran up by the wall in the corner of the room, and disappear through a hole in the ceiling. She glanced about her. Everything was very clean and neat. The small room had a comfortable, homely look. There were bunches of herbs hanging from a beam and holly trailed over the pictures and mantelpiece. She looked into the bright fire. She was sitting in Terence’s kitchen, and he was coming to her party. She gave herself a hug. Everything would be marvellous from now on…the ice was broken. Why didn’t she do this last year, or the year before? She told herself laughingly she would never have dreamt of doing it but for Mrs Macbane.
When he came downstairs again, he had changed into a dark, pinstriped suit that made him taller and thinner than ever. The only part of him that seemed to have expanded during the years was his shoulders.
He stood before her, buttoning his jacket. ‘Shall we go?’ he asked.
‘Aren’t you putting on a coat?’ she said, standing up.
‘No. I very rarely wear one.’
‘But the snow…It’s so cold.’
‘I don’t mind the cold.’
Her face showed concern. ‘But you’re so—’ She stopped.
He smiled, a little twisted amused smile. ‘Yes, I’m so thin…Look!’ He went to the back of the door and took a top coat from a peg. ‘I do have a coat…but I really don’t feel the cold; it’s just what you’re used to. Now do you believe me?’
‘Oh, I’m so sorry.’
He laughed at her downcast face. ‘I remember,’ he said with mock-seriousness, ‘you once tried to feed me because you thought I was hungry…Now you must get it into your head that I am neither cold nor hungry.’
The hot blood rushed over her face and neck, and she hung her head before him, as she did years ago. ‘I’m quite tactless,’ she murmured.
‘Of course you’re not,’ he laughed. ‘I was only meaning to be funny. You see what you’ve let yourself in for? I’ll most surely say all the wrong things at the party…Shall I come?’
Her head came up with a jerk. ‘Oh, of course!’
‘All right then. Let’s go.’
Outside, waiting for him while he locked the door and put the key under a loose brick of the step, she experienced a whirling spring of joy. It trembled through her, making her draw in great draughts of air to feed it. There were times before when she had felt this light, quivering joy, but not so intense as now. It was the signal for movement, for flying feet, for her arms to be flung wide, for her to race over the earth, for her exuberance to lift her into the very sky itself. Terence was amazed to see her fly from him into the lane, her dark shape leaping against the snow. When he reached the gate she was running back to him, and a soft snowball hit him on the shoulder. She let out a little yelp of joy, and was off again.
He hesitated a second. Then the reticence of years was flung off, like chains from a prisoner, and he was after her. No time now to say, ‘This must not start,’ but let the feeling have rein at last…on, on, to catch her, and touch her, to explore that radiated joy, to hold the youth that emanated from her.
He caught her before she had gone very far. Gripping her with one hand, he gathered up snow with the other. She struggled, and cried, ‘No, no! Don’t scrub me!’ She bent down, hiding her face, and he bent over her, saying nothing, just struggling with her gently, playfully. The snow-banked lane hemmed them in, and they swayed together in the dark. Then quickly they both straightened. She was in the circle of his arms; her face was hidden in her hands. They were still now, standing close. One minute his arms were about her, and she was surprised at the strength and hardness of them; the next she was standing alone, and he was saying in a low voice, ‘All right, I’ll let you off this time.’
Somewhat self-consciously, they walked a little way down the lane in silence. When they bumped against each other in the rutted snow they made small laughing noises and put some distance between themselves.
Annie’s voice sounded high-pitched even to herself when she said, ‘We had a marvellous snowball fight today. Will you come out tomorrow?’
‘There’ll be a heavy thaw during the night, there won’t be any snow left.’
‘Oh, don’t say that.’ She sounded forlorn.
They walked nearer to each other again, and she said suddenly, ‘I’ve left school, Terence; I’m at college. I’m going to be a teacher too.’
‘You’ve left the convent then?’
‘Oh yes,’—she sounded as if the convent were a thing of bygone ages—‘I’m eighteen, you know.’
When he laughed out loud, she said, ‘Oh, you make me feel as though I am only eight.’
‘You are.’
‘Oh, Terence! That isn’t fair. I’m very grown-up…I’m putting my hair up next term.’
‘Oh no, don’t do that.’ He drew up for a mom
ent and peered at her in the darkness. ‘Once it’s up …’
He hesitated, and she put in, ‘Yes. That’s what Mam says: once it’s up, it’s up for good.’
His voice was deep as he said hesitantly, ‘Keep it…keep it down.’
They walked on again in a strange, rapt quiet. It was as if her hair had drawn them tightly together.
5
As they neared the gate, a sound of singing came from the house and Terence said, ‘What a fine voice! Is it a gramophone record?’
‘No,’ laughed Annie; ‘that’s Rosie. She’s a friend of mine. She’s so nice,’ she added. ‘You’ve seen her, you know, down in the wood.’
He shook his head. But as he walked up the path he saw the short figure standing near the piano in the drawing-room. ‘Oh yes,’ he said. ‘I remember her. She has an amazing voice.’
‘She’s going to be a great singer.’
‘I should imagine she’s one already.’
‘Yes. But I mean she’s going to be famous. I’m sure she is. She’s sung in some big concerts already this winter, and she’s going up to London for an audition shortly.’
‘Really? It all sounds very romantic. Who’s that accompanying her?’
‘Oh, that’s Michael. Michael Davidson. He plays beautifully. He wants to be a concert pianist, but Uncle Peter, his father, won’t let him take it up…Michael’s nice,’ she added.
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