The Feast

by Margaret Kennedy

  ‘I was,’ he agreed. ‘I was mending the umbrella.’

  He paused, pondered, and then added:

  ‘I couldn’t help hearing some of what your father was saying. I’m so very sorry.’

  She made a variety of grimaces before she could reply. But at last she burst out:

  ‘It’s not true! I used to sleep badly, and I felt better if I got up and went for a walk. He found out and thought I was going to meet some … some man. But it’s not true. I wasn’t. I … I don’t know any men.’

  ‘Has he forbidden you to go out with Mrs. Paley again?’

  ‘Oh yes. And he says he’ll shut me up in an asylum if I do.’

  ‘That’s rot, you know. He can’t, without a doctor’s certificate.’

  ‘He might get one. If he brought a doctor to me I should be so frightened I should be sure to do something silly. And a lot of people do think I’m mad.’

  ‘No qualified doctor would,’ declared Gerry.

  ‘You’re a qualified doctor, and I’m sure you did … on Sunday.’

  This was disconcerting. The dangers of her situation began to be more clearly apparent to him.

  ‘You should get away,’ he said. ‘Why do you stay with him?’

  Evangeline explained her rash vow. He argued with her until the luncheon gong roared inside the house. Evangeline grew very white.

  ‘I can’t go in,’ she whispered. ‘I can’t go into the dining-room. Everybody heard. I’m sure they did.’

  Gerry stood up and wiped his oily hands on a piece of rag.

  ‘Wait a minute,’ he said, ‘and I’ll bring you some lunch out here.’

  He ran up into the house. In a few minutes he was back again with a tray. He had snatched up two plates of cold tongue and salad, two rolls and four large plums from the serving-room hatch.

  ‘We can eat our lunch here,’ he said, sitting down beside her on the sunny step. ‘And then we’ll go fishing. Would you like to go fishing?’

  Evangeline’s heart leapt with pleasure and then sank to extreme depths, as she became convinced that he had only asked her because he was sorry for her. She said mournfully that she would like to go fishing very much indeed. Gerry’s heart sank too, for he regretted the invitation even as he gave it. He had meant to get an afternoon in the boat, all by himself, away from his exasperating family; and now he had saddled himself with this depressing girl. He was extremely sorry for her, but he had, after all, troubles enough of his own. Sometimes he felt that his father would drive him crazy, and he did not rush about making faces.

  He grew more and more morose as the meal proceeded. Evangeline’s timid little attempts at gaiety were not encouraged. As they finished their plums she said:

  ‘I think, perhaps, that I won’t come after all. Thank you very much for asking me. The … the sun on the water might make my head ache.’

  Gerry knew that this was a lie and that she wanted to come. But he was, by now, so sulky that he made no attempt to dissuade her.

  ‘I’ll take the tray in,’ she said, getting up.

  She sounded so meek and humble that Gerry was infuriated. He said certainly not, snatched it from her, and hurried into the house. Evangeline followed him, protesting miserably:

  ‘I could perfectly well … it’s silly … I don’t see why I shouldn’t….’

  In the kitchen passage they met Mrs. Siddal, who looked at them as though they were the last straw. When Gerry explained what they had been doing, she exclaimed:

  ‘So that’s where those two helpings went! And I’ve been scolding poor Fred. Really, Gerry … I can’t think what possessed you to do such a thing. To take the dining-room lunches….’

  ‘One of them was Angie’s anyhow,’ protested Gerry.

  ‘Whose?’

  ‘Miss Wraxton’s! One of them would eventually have been given to her in the dining-room, wouldn’t it?’

  Angie? thought Mrs. Siddal. He calls her Angie? Oh, the sly creature! And she glared at Evangeline.

  ‘I really can’t have people walking off with their lunches like that,’ she told them. ‘I’m always ready to cut sandwiches if I’m asked.’

  ‘I’m so sorry, Mrs. Siddal….’

  ‘I’m very sorry, Mother. It was entirely my fault. I suggested we should have lunch on the rocks. I didn’t know there was any rule against it.’

  ‘But you weren’t having tongue for lunch, Gerry. That was only for the dining-room. You’ve eaten Canon Wraxton’s tongue. What can I give him for lunch?’

  ‘Can’t you give him whatever I was going to have?’

  ‘No. It was only bread and cheese.’

  Mr. Siddal, who had been listening to all this from behind the boot room door, now intervened and called out:

  ‘Duff’s getting tongue, Gerry. Give the Canon Duff’s tongue.’

  ‘There wasn’t enough for everybody,’ explained Mrs. Siddal. ‘And it’s all very hard on poor Fred. I blamed him.’

  ‘Fred’s getting tongue,’ cried the voice from the boot room. ‘And Nancibel is getting tongue.’

  ‘Well, I’m very sorry,’ said Gerry again. ‘We were going fishing, and …’

  ‘Going fishing? In the boat?’

  ‘Of course we’re going in the boat, Mother. And Angie …’

  ‘But not this afternoon, surely, dear. I … I really can’t spare you. Miss Ellis has given notice. Perhaps … some other day, if Miss Wraxton really wants you to take her in the boat….’

  ‘I don’t,’ muttered Evangeline.

  ‘You asked me yourself,’ protested Gerry, ‘to try and catch you some mackerel for supper.’

  ‘I know. But I can manage. I’d rather you stayed here.’

  ‘But what do you want me for?’

  There was a pause. Mrs. Siddal could not, for the moment, think of anything, though she was determined to stop the fishing scheme. The voice from the boot hole was heard to suggest that she wanted Gerry to catch a mouse, and she was too much flurried to be aware of any sarcasm.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, brightening. ‘There has been a mouse. In the pantry.’

  Gerry lost his temper.

  ‘Borrow Hebe’s cat,’ he said. ‘Come along, Angie. The tide will be just right by now.’

  He strode out of the house and down the steps followed by Evangeline, who saw that now he really wanted her to come.

  ‘I’m getting just about sick of it,’ he muttered as they pushed the boat down the slip-way.

  ‘You can’t think …’ he exclaimed, as they went chugging out of the creek, ‘… nobody could ever imagine what I have to put up with. All this fuss because I want to take you out fishing.’

  ‘You didn’t want to,’ said Evangeline, ‘until there was a fuss.’

  He looked at her, a little startled.

  ‘Well,’ he said at last, ‘I do now.’

  ‘So you really ought to be grateful for the fuss,’ she pointed out. ‘But we’d better fish, hadn’t we? I mean, if we don’t catch enough mackerel for supper I don’t see how we can ever dare to come back.’

  They fished, cruising up and down outside Pendizack and Rosigraille coves. In less than two hours they had caught twenty-seven mackerel.

  5. Dead Man’s Rock

  Their progress was observed by the Paleys, who were sitting in their usual niche, a hollow on the headland looking towards Rosigraille Point. Nothing could have pleased Mrs. Paley more, for it was plain, even at that distance, that they were enjoying themselves. She had already wondered if she could not persuade them to take some little jaunt together, and now they had done so without any persuasion, apparently, from anybody. For it did not occur to her that Gerry’s mother might have supplied the impetus.

  And in Africa, she surmised (for in her opinion they were already as good as married and despatched overseas) in Africa they will get a lot of fishing, so the sooner she learns how to manage a motor boat the better. But will they? Why do I think that Africa is full of enormous rivers? The Zambesi…. Perhaps
their part will be swamps and crocodiles; too dangerous. And then there is the veldt. That’s dry. We must get him to tell us some more about Kenya. But whatever it’s like they’ll enjoy it. Neither of them has ever had any fun. They’ll never get over the pleasure of being first with somebody … of being cherished and considered….

  The boat chugged out of sight round Rosigraille Point. But she did not think that it had gone far for she could hear the noise of the engine now and then.

  She asked her husband for information about Kenya. He looked up from The Times Literary Supplement and gave it to her. It was the sort of thing which he could be relied upon to do, for he had a retentive memory and he liked to accumulate facts. He gave her a concise account of Kenya, its history, geography, fauna, flora, products and population.

  ‘It sounds nice,’ said Mrs. Paley when he had finished.

  He waited for a moment in case she should wish to know anything more, and then went back to his paper.

  ‘Gerry Siddal thinks of going there,’ she explained. ‘He’s been offered a job there.’

  Mr. Paley looked up, but said nothing, though his expression conveyed a faint bewilderment, as if wondering what he was expected to say.

  ‘Don’t you think he’d better go?’ asked Mrs. Paley.

  ‘I’m not sure which one he is. Not the one who has just got a Balliol scholarship?’

  ‘No. That’s Duff; the good-looking one. Gerry is the little spotty one who does all the chores. He’s a doctor.’

  ‘How should I know whether he’d better go or not?’ demanded Mr. Paley. ‘I expect he had. England is no place nowadays for a young man who wants to stand on his own feet. If I were his age I should emigrate.’

  ‘Where to?’ asked Mrs. Paley, pleased at having established something so nearly resembling a conversation.

  But he did not seem to know. It was easier to him to speak of shaking the dust of Britain off his feet than to accept the dust of any other country.

  ‘I think China would be rather nice,’ mused Mrs. Paley. ‘Not just now, I expect. But I’ve always liked the idea of China.’

  And she sat for a while in the sunshine smiling at her idea of China. For she knew it to be fantastic and ridiculous, founded upon the memory of a screen which she had admired as a small child. At the bottom of China there was a lake and people fishing from frail boats amid curiously curved rocks. Then, after a layer of clouds, another landscape began. A procession went up a mountain path towards a kind of shrine. After more clouds the mountain tops emerged and some birds flying.

  The afternoon sun sparkled in a myriad diamonds on the sea in Rosigraille Cove, so that she had to shut her eyes against the glare. It was very quiet. No waves fell on the beach and round the rocks there was only the faintest whisper and gurgle of water. For twenty minutes or more this murmurous peace was unbroken save for the occasional scream of a gull, and then she heard voices calling on the beach. She opened her eyes and saw some children scrambling over the boulders towards Rosigraille Point. It was the three Coves and Hebe, and they were all carrying bathing towels.

  They had chosen a bad time to bathe, she thought, for the tide was rising and the hard sandy floor would be out of their depth. They would have to splash about among the boulders at high water mark, since the little Coves could not swim.

  She watched them as they scrambled steadily along towards the far side of Rosigraille, and then, glancing up at the cliff, she saw that somebody else was watching. A small, active, dark-clad person was standing on the path which led over to Porthmerryn. Mrs. Paley had good eyes, but she picked up her husband’s field glasses to make sure.

  Yes, it was Mrs. Cove. The glasses revealed her face distinctly—they even revealed her expression which was, in itself, a revelation. Its uncontrolled bitterness, as she watched the children down on the beach, gave Mrs. Paley quite a shock. For the face which she showed to the world, though disagreeable, was watchful and guarded. Now that she was alone, now that she believed herself to be unobserved, the guard was lowered. She was looking at Blanche, Maud and Beatrix, not with her customary calm indifference, but with unmistakable dislike.

  After a few seconds Mrs. Paley turned her glasses upon the children. They had not paused upon the beach, but were climbing the rocks at the foot of the point and making their way towards a long ledge called Dead Man’s Rock which ran out into the sea at the extreme end of it. Blanche was finding it difficult to get up, but the others were pulling her along.

  A first faint qualm of uneasiness assailed Mrs. Paley. But she told herself that they could not possibly be meaning to bathe from there. The water off Dead Man’s Rock would be completely out of their depth. And a notice, pinned up in the hall at Pendizack, warned all visitors never to bathe from any of the rocks because the currents were dangerous.

  She looked quickly again at Mrs. Cove, who had not moved. And she thought that a shout from the path would reach them, if they tried to do anything silly. It was lucky that Mrs. Cove should be so near. The Paleys up on the headland could never have been heard.

  Now the children were collected in a little group on Dead Man’s Rock. Her uneasiness changed swiftly into real terror when she saw that they were stripping off their dresses. All four emerged in bathing suits.

  ‘But they can’t … they mustn’t …’ she exclaimed aloud.

  ‘What’s that?’ asked Mr. Paley, rousing.

  ‘Those children. They seem to be going to bathe off Dead Man’s Rock.’

  He sat up to look and reached for the glasses.

  The three Coves were standing in a timid row on the edge of the rock. They seemed to be receiving some kind of harangue from Hebe.

  ‘They’ll be drowned if they do,’ he said.

  ‘But their mother! Why doesn’t she stop them?’

  ‘Their mother?’

  ‘Mrs. Cove. She’s up on the cliff.’

  She snatched the glasses from him. But she could not, immediately, find Mrs. Cove, who seemed to have left the path.

  ‘Oh, there she is,’ she exclaimed after a few seconds. ‘She’s going down. Thank goodness. But I wish she’d shout.’

  ‘Good God!’ cried Mr. Paley.

  She lowered the glasses and looked at the rock. Hebe, dancing up and down excitedly, was now the only child to be seen. The Coves had vanished.

  ‘But where are they? Where are they?’

  ‘They all jumped in together. On the far side of the rock. The current is probably taking them round the point.’

  Hebe had stopped dancing. She was shouting now, so loudly that the echo of her cries rang across the bay. Then she too vanished.

  ‘Gone in after them,’ commented Mr. Paley. ‘Much good that will do.’

  ‘But their mother … their mother….’

  Mrs. Cove was not scrambling down any more. She had stopped dead in her tracks and was staring, as they had stared, at the empty rock.

  ‘She saw. She must have seen.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘Just a bit below the path. By that big patch of bracken. Oh, why doesn’t she go on?’

  ‘Not much use if she does,’ said Mr. Paley. ‘They’ll all be round the point by this time.’

  Mrs. Paley picked up the glasses again and focused them on Mrs. Cove. The pale square face came into view. It looked blank and uncertain.

  ‘We’d better go round to her,’ said Mr. Paley, getting up.

  ‘She’s … going away….’

  Mrs. Cove had turned and was scrambling up to the path again. She did not seem to be in any great hurry. When she reached the path she paused for a moment, as if undecided whether to continue towards Pendizack or return towards Porthmerryn. Then she made up her mind, apparently, and left it altogether. She went higher up the cliff slope and vanished behind a stone wall.

  ‘There’s nothing in the world that she or we can do,’ Mr. Paley was declaring. ‘By the time we could get to the rock they’d be half a mile away. We’d better go back to the hotel and
raise the alarm. If they can swim they might manage to get on to some of those rocks far out….’

  ‘But they can’t. The Coves can’t swim.’

  ‘Then it’s hopeless.’

  They were both hurrying back across the headland, and they now came in sight of Pendizack Cove which was unexpectedly full of people. Nearly everybody from the hotel seemed to be running and shouting. Robin and Duff, closely followed by the Gifford boys, had almost reached the top of the path. Half way up were Sir Henry and Caroline. Strung out across the narrow strip of sand left by the tide were Mrs. Siddal, Bruce, Nancibel and Fred, while Miss Ellis and Mrs. Lechene were scrambling down the rock pathway from the house. Mr. Siddal was on the terrace.

  ‘Boat!’ shouted Mr. Paley. ‘Get a boat!’

  Duff turned and yelled to the people on the sand:

  ‘Boat! Boat! Get the boat!’

  But nobody seemed to understand except Nancibel, who turned and began to run back. Whereat Bruce turned too and followed her.

  Robin had reached the headland and was panting out questions to the Paleys. Had they seen the Coves? When he heard what they had to tell he groaned and Duff, joining them, exclaimed:

  ‘Off Dead Man’s Rock? Then it’s hopeless. The current is wicked. That bloody Hebe …’

  But he started to run round Rosigraille, followed by the other boys.

  The next to arrive was Sir Henry, so badly winded by an attempt to run up-hill that he had to sit for a while on a rock. Caroline, who was with him, explained to the Paleys the cause of this panic-stricken pursuit. It was she who had raised the alarm, as soon as she discovered that Hebe and the Coves were missing. She had warned Hebe that she would do so, unless the swimming ordeal was abandoned.

  ‘And I thought she’d given it up,’ wailed Caroline. ‘I’d have told before, if I’d thought she was really going to do it!’

  Cries and shouts of Stop them! Oh, stop them! interrupted her. They came from Mrs. Siddal who had now gained the top of the hill and was running and shouting with but one purpose: Robin and Duff were not to go in off Dead Man’s Rock. They would save nobody, and they would only be drowned themselves.

  ‘Hush!’ said Mrs. Paley, suddenly. ‘Listen!’