To the Dark Tower

by Francis King

  She began to pray, her lips moving restlessly: "Oh, God, don’t let it happen... Please don t let it happen... Please don’t let it happen." The words fitted themselves to the clatter of rails. She thought of what she had eaten—potato soup, roast pigeon and spinach, ice-cream and pistachio nuts. She thought of Uncle Maurice using a toothpick to remove slivers of white meat. She thought of him crossing plump hands over his stomach and belching, and saying: "That was good, Denise. That was very, very good." She thought of the glass of milk she had drunk, and freckled hands squeezing at leathery dugs. She thought of the acids that Cousin Maurice said were in everybody’s stomachs, and the advertisements in the paper, and the time she had vomited in the corridor of a train and how angry everyone had been.

  She clutched at the rail in front of her. "Please, God... Oh, please, God." Her eyes pricked with tears of shame and impotence. The sight of someone swaying with every jolt of the train made her turn away, her gorge rising hot and sour with vomit. Then someone else crashed against her. "Sorry. I’m so sorry. These corners ..."

  With a gulp she rushed for the toilet.

  But she was not sick. On the floor was the fragment of a paper. Only a fragment. The rest had presumably been used. She stared at it for a while and then picked it up.

  The photograph was of a man whose eyes were screwed up against a dazzling light: he was wearing a uniform of white drill; his face was oddly lined.

  She began to read as best she could, her back wedged between the basin and the door. It was a short paragraph, describing an obscure campaign in an obscure state in South America. It said little of how one man, a foreigner, had turned a handful of men into a well-disciplined force: rather, after the fashion of the press, it recounted how his life had been saved by a half-caste boy; how he had performed an amputation without anæsthetic; how he had a horror of publicity.

  This cutting became the first of the scrapbook.

  For one term she went to a boarding-school in England. Her English relatives paid for this. For many years they had made a figure of romance out of Shirley—having never met her. So they badgered her mother, and plotted, and talked of "giving the poor mite a start in life"; and finally Shirley was shipped off to them.

  Of course, they were disappointed. She was not a friendly person; she said none of the amusing things that can be repeated to visitors; she was plain, and dull, and tended to cry for no reason.

  Six months was sufficient. After that, they felt that they had done enough for poor Ralph’s child. Shirley was shipped back.

  The school was by the sea: the pines were so healthy, and the headmistress was the niece of a baronet, and there were a number of rules, one of which ran, "No girl may faint in chapel." The school was called a ‘Ladies College’; and the fees were sufficiently high to make it so.

  At the school was a girl called Barbara Maul. Her parents were said to be ‘artistic’; she had red hair in a plait, a gold brace over her teeth, and eyes that filled with tears when it was cold; in her locker was pinned a photograph of Pavlova, dying swan on the stage of a provincial theatre. Her mother had seen Pavlova when she was enceinte; Barbara was to be a ballet dancer she had decided. So every Saturday afternoon Barbara joined Miss Moore’s classes in the town; and once she danced Hiawatha in the end of term show.

  But she did other things than dance. She wrote poetry; she painted; she played the piano.

  It was the piano-playing that began it all.

  She and Anna-Marie Blech were to play a duet arrangement of the finale of the Beethoven Fifth Symphony at the school concert. Anna-Marie was a Polish Jewess, plump, unattractive, but a competent musician. Barbara played with ‘expression’—and all that that usually implies.

  In the drawing-room Miss Mixton watched her pupils with anxiety, as one by one they walked up to the piano and treated the parents to "Hark, hark, the lark," "On Wings of Songs", Beethoven Sonatinas, and ‘bits’ of Mozart (the easy bits).

  Then came the turn of Barbara and Anna-Marie. Miss Mixton patted Barbara’s hand as she rose from her seat and made for the piano: it was a gesture of faith, of reassurance. Barbara was fiddling with her plait, rubbing her fingers together as though they were cold, and biting her nails. She was nervous. Anna-Marie needed no such encouragements. Decisively, she elbowed the last performer out of her way and put the music on the rest. Then she drew a deep breath, nodded to Barbara, murmured "One, two three" and thundered out the opening chords. The muscles swelled in her calves as she thrust at the loud-pedal.

  But poor Barbara couldn’t come in. Twice she missed her beat; twice Anna-Marie stopped and went back to the beginning; the "One, two, three" became sibilant, viperish.

  But no. "Try again," said Miss Mixton, wondering in exasperation why Barbara made such a fuss. One beat or another, it made no difference to the parents. "Try again," she repeated. "Third time lucky, you know." She smiled, first at the two girls and then at the audience. "Come along, Barbara."

  But third time was no longer luckier than second or first. In dismay Barbara rushed from the room, her cheeks pouring with tears. Anna-Marie, unmoved, began a Brahms Berceuse, But Miss Mixton had already gone, in uncrushable silk, after the child.

  Barbara was crying in the lavatories.

  "What is the matter, dear?"

  "I’m so unhappy! I’m so mis-er-able!"

  "But why, dear?" Miss Mixton turned Barbara’s face from a wall which was decorated with glaucous tiles. "But why? Why on earth?"

  "Oh-oh-oh!"

  "But Barbara, darling—"

  "I’ve let you down! And I did so want it to be a success—for your sake. I practised all yesterday afternoon—and it went p-p-perfectly..."

  "But what does it matter, dear? It doesn’t matter a jot. Who cares what they think?" She stroked Barbara’s hair and wondered how many parents had noticed her absence. "Now buck up, old thing! Parents don’t matter."

  "It’s not the parents! It’s—you ... Oh, I did so want to show you—"

  "But I know that you can play it. I’ve heard you often. I know that you can play it beautifully. So if, just once—because of nerves, and parents, and everything else—well, if just once it goes wrong—well, what does it matter!"

  "Oh, Miss Mixton!"

  "Barbara! My dear!"

  She, too, was crying now. They clutched each other, damp cheek pressed to damp cheek, while the electric light gleamed at them from each rectangular tile on the wall.

  "My poor dear—you mustn’t worry so!"

  "Miss Mixton! Oh, Miss Mixton."

  At that moment Shirley appeared from one of the lavatories and grinned sheepishly.

  Such things cannot be forgiven.

  "Oh, do look! Oh, look, girls!"

  Bare feet pattered over the expensive parquet floor, plaits swung.

  "My goodness! What’s this? How priceless!" They jostled each other, giggled; someone climbed on to a bed. Barbara stood in the centre of them all, holding a large book that had been bound in newspaper. Her toe-nails were varnished daringly.

  "Give it back! Oh, please, give it back! It’s private! Oh, don’t you see? ... It’s private. Oh, please... Oh, please give it back." Shirley, in flannel pyjamas, ran round the circle of girls, trying to clutch at the book, until someone pushed her and sent her sprawling across a bed. She began to whimper, but her eyes remained dry.

  Barbara asked: "What is all this? Who is this General, anyway?"

  "It’s nothing... Oh, please..."

  Her face was suddenly slapped. "Oh, stop that row! Nothing’s going to happen to your precious book."

  Shirley began to bawl. A tall girl with a worried expression said: "Go easy, Barbara. We don’t want the hag in."

  Barbara lowered her voice to an inquisitorial whisper. "Who is this, anyway? Who is this General? Have you got a crush on him?"

  "I don’t know what you mean."

  "I don’t know what
you mean!" The words were mimicked back at her. "Of course you know. Don’t pretend..."

  Only a lie could save her. Inspired, she retorted: "He’s—he’s—he was a friend of my father’s. His best friend. They fought in the war together. My father saved his life. And—and when my father died he said to him: ‘Hugh, look after my child.’ Those were his last words—his dying words." The danger past, she was lying for the sheer pleasure of the thing. All the fantasies with which she had consoled herself in secret suddenly became real. Of course they were real. If the girls believed them, then she did. And if they all believed them, then this somehow made them true.

  Barbara stood alone, the book still in her hands. Everyone had clustered round Shirley’s bed.

  "Then you really know him?"

  "What’s he like?"

  "Oh, do tell us about him?"

  For hours she talked, while the late June sunlight dimmed and deepened, and the shadows under the yews spread outwards, out and out, and Miss Mixton and the Maths mistress ceased to play clock-golf on the lawn and went in to a cup of cocoa, and Matron fell asleep over a book of Michael Aden. She told them all the details that she had scraped together from newspaper articles, conversations in trains, Who’s Who. "Yes, he shot a lion ... He swims wonderfully ... In South America ... He told my father ... They were together right through the war ... Oh, yes, in Bulgaria—and Russia ... Oh, yes, all the time..."

  It was dark now; faces gleamed, arms gleamed under coils of hair; the flat voice continued, evenly, but with a suppressed throb of excitement. The sheets seemed hot and twisted about her; her heart pounded; her eyes ached. She stared into the night outside, where Orion stretched, and the yew trees made furred patches against the smoothness of the sky’s cheek, and the late birds twittered drowsily.

  But Barbara slept, or appeared to sleep, one arm hanging out of her bed and pointing to the floor.

  On Sundays, most of the girls walked in pairs; but Shirley always walked alone.

  This time, however, as they all began to congregate outside the changing-room a twittering throng of girls surrounded her. "Oh, do walk with me! Oh, please walk with me! Shirley, please!" For the moment Sir Hugh Weigh had taken the place of Mr. Ivor Novello.

  Shirley looked round her in embarrassment, small and squat, with the school hat pulled unbecomingly over her ears. It was as if she were afraid that her leg was being pulled. How could she choose? And having chosen, what would she say?

  Then she noticed Barbara, who stood on the outskirts of the little circle, waving a hand from which dangled a gold bracelet (all personal ornaments were forbidden) and crying: "Shirley! Oh, please, Shirley!" By turning up her school hat in front and pinning a brooch on to it she made herself seem oddly adult.

  Shirley pushed her way towards her, blushing. No words would come.

  Over the South Downs seventy girls moved off, for a moment petrified into a crocodile. Strangely, Miss Mixton was ‘taking’ the walk; and Shirley knew that on such occasions Barbara was one of the vociferous crowd who clamoured and fought for a ‘side’. She realised then how greatly she was being honoured.

  As they turned up a slope where lovers sprawled in ungainly beatitudes ("Don’t stare, girls!") Barbara spoke for the first time:

  "Shirley?"

  "Yes."

  "I’m sorry I was so horrid about your scrapbook. I was a pig to take it from your locker."

  "That’s all right." She longed to be gracious, but could not find the requisite words. "I didn’t really mind."

  "Shirley?" This was more tentative: the gold bracelet gleamed as she fiddled with it.

  "Yes."

  "Can we be friends now? I mean, real friends."

  "Oh, yes. Oh, please."

  Fingers pressed her arm through the dark-blue macintosh.

  "It must be marvellous to have a man like that as your guardian."

  "Well—he’s—he’s not exactly my guardian. Of course—well—it comes to that—"

  "Like a father, really."

  The words filled her with an extraordinary pleasure. "Yes," she said. "Yes. That’s it. Like a father." For no reason there was an ache in her throat, her eyes misted. But she was elated, she was content.

  "Your father’s dead?"

  "Yes."

  "You don’t mind my asking? My father nearly died when he had his appendix out. It burst. But he got all right again. He’s in the Foreign Office... Did you love your father very much?"

  Shirley nodded. "I can’t remember him very well. But he was awfully nice."

  "Were you very young then?"

  "Oh, yes. Only four." For the first time she was telling somebody. In a moment she would mention the photograph, and, Cousin Maurice, and the box of old clothes. "He was killed in the first week of the war."

  Barbara’s head jerked suddenly towards her. "In the first week?"

  "Yes. He just went away—and never came back."

  The snare snapped shut. "But you said—that night—you said that he had saved the General’s life—that they were comrades—comrades, you said—oh, right through the war. You said they went to South America together—"

  "I never said—"

  "Oh yes you did! If you like we’ll ask Felicity—and Beatrice—"

  "No, please don’t do that!"

  "Then you were lying?"

  "But you—you were asleep—"

  "Of course I wasn’t asleep. I heard every word. So you thought you could take us all in, and—"

  "No, honestly Barbara. What else could I do?"

  "Have you ever met this creature—this General Weigh?"

  "Well—"

  "Have you ever met him? Answer me!"

  "Well—no."

  "I see."

  She shook her wrist so that the bracelet jingled. She smiled.

  The crocodile moved on, threading the fanatical lovers. Tears poured down Shirley’s cheeks, but she made no sound. This was the end, she decided. This was the end.

  No one likes to be deceived. "The little bitch," said Felicity, as she pulled down from her cubicle wall a picture which she had torn out of the Sketch while waiting to have her teeth filled.

  This was the opinion of all of them.

  Mr. Ivor Novello in Tyrolean shorts was restored to locker-doors, albums, picture-frames. Shirley, after a few days of ‘baiting’ was sent to Coventry. At meals no one passed her anything.

  The incident had its ironic sequel.

  As they were filing out of a lecture on "Early English Brasses" Barbara beckoned her into a darkened music-room.

  "But it’s time to go to bed," Shirley protested, fearing some unseen torture. "Matron will—"

  "Matron won’t be round for another ten minutes. Don’t be frightened. I’m not going to hurt you."

  "But, Barbara—"

  "Oh, come on."

  In the twilight, in a room which smelled of peppermints and eau-de-Cologne, Barbara faced her. She put out a hand: "I’ve made you so unhappy. I’m an awful beast. Oh, do forgive me, Shirley. Say you forgive me."

  "But I—I—" It was impossible to say anything. When one most wanted words they eluded one.

  "I betrayed you. I see that. Oh, I do see that." She put an arm round her. "I trapped you. It was horrible of me. But you see—you see..." She broke off. "Shirley, may I tell you a secret?"

  "Oh, yes!"

  "Promise not to tell anyone? Promise? It’s between you and me—no one else? Promise?"

  "I promise."

  "Cross-my-heart?"

  "Cross-my-heart."

  Barbara drew Shirley towards her so that her hair brushed the other’s wan cheek. "I’ve never told anyone here before. You’re the first person I’ve told. You see—there’s something queer about me." Her hand tightened on Shirley’s wrist; her voice thrilled.

  "Queer?"

  "Yes. It’s in the family, really
. Mother—she was an actress, you know—a famous actress—before she married Father, that is. Well—I get it from her. She calls it her ‘temperament’. But it’s not really that."

  "What is it then?"

  "Shirley. You’re not frightened are you?"

  Mutely she shook her head. Then she started as the school cat whisked past the window after a rabbit. Her heart began to pound.

  "It’s a sort of—madness." Barbara went to the window, rested her elbows on the sill, and stared outwards into the gathering darkness. "No—not madness. That’s too strong a word. But something—something queer. It makes me do things which I don’t really want to do. I didn’t want to betray you, Shirley: honest, I didn’t. But then one of these fits came over me, and it—it happened... Oh, I felt so miserable about it afterwards. I cried all that night in bed."

  "Did you? Did you really?" No one had cried because of her since the day when her mother had thrust her, head first, into the world. "Did you really cry?"

  "Oh, yes, Shirley. I was so unhappy, you see. I’m very fond of you, really. I want to be your friend. You do see that, don’t you?"

  "Yes."

  Shirley stood by her at the open window. The wind blew strands of Barbara’s hair across her mouth. It was sweet and fragrant on the lips.

  Barbara put an arm round her shoulder. "Say you understand," she whispered intensely. "Say you understand. Say you forgive me."

  Someone, a school servant, was turning out lights in the corridors and the schoolroom; they could hear the clicks of the switches, the ring of her shoes on vacant concrete. A mournful sound. Then there was silence.

  Huddled together, they both wept luxuriously for a full five minutes. Afterwards, they scurried up to bed, hand-in-hand, just evading Matron by a passage and two steps.

  But the next day, strangely, Barbara said nothing to Shirley. The whole incident might never have occurred.

  Soon after that first and only term she spent at boarding-school Cousin Maurice died.

  He was to have come down for his customary week-end by his customary train. But the day wore on and the dinner Mother had cooked for him grew cold, and she, who was usually so indolent and placid, rang up the station and walked down to the end of the drive, and said repeatedly: "I can’t think what can have happened to him."