Snow and Roses

by Lettice Cooper

  Martin turned a smiling face towards him.

  “Super.”

  If Lalage had said that to him he just wouldn’t have answered.

  “What a sweet kid your niece is, Martin,” Ludo offered enthusiastically.

  “Dulcie? Do you think so? She seems to me to have become so sulky that she’s almost moronic. I was tempted to push her out of the car several times on the journey.”

  “Oh, poor little thing, she’s only shy.”

  “People have no business to be shy. It’s anti-social.”

  “She’s just young. They soon grow out of it, don’t they, Flora?”

  “Very soon.”

  Miranda pulled up her car behind Martin’s. Dulcie got out slowly and stood beside it conveying in every line of her thin young body that she did not want to bathe, but had been brought here against her will. She let the towel that she was carrying trail on the dusty path, and dropped her head so that the valances of dark hair swung right over her face.

  Her father stepped out briskly. He seemed to be informed with a bad-tempered energy, but Flora had the impression that he was not by nature bad tempered. He had jumped at the idea of a swim before dinner as if he wanted to work something off by action. His smile, which so far they had not seen often, was attractive. His hips were broader, and his hair longer than the Dennis of the photograph, but he still looked a very probable husband for Miranda. Flora wondered if it was wise or foolish of Jane not to come here with him.

  “Out of the way, Dulcie. Your mother wants to turn her car now.”

  Dulcie, dragging her feet in their dirty white sandals, shifted her ground by about half a yard.

  “Go on, child, jump to it.”

  “She could turn her car just as well afterwards.”

  Miranda when she had finished with the car came to Flora and slipped an arm through hers.

  “Did you enjoy the drive? I thought of you when we came over the hill and got the first sight of the valley. I know how much you always love that moment. I wished I had you with me. Dennis was talking to me about money all the way over and Dulcie was gloomily silent behind me. I could feel it right down my spine. I’ve apologized about her birthday, and said I’d take her to Florence to choose something, but she says there’s nothing she wants and she hates Florence anyway. Well, never mind, let’s get into the water, they can all come in when they like. On a day like this I don’t know why anybody wants more than a day like this, do you?”

  Flora wanted Hugh to share it with her, wanted to be free to enjoy it herself without the haunting sense of loss, wanted all these other people to go away and leave her alone to bathe with Miranda. At the same time she was interested in the others, and her natural good spirits were trying to reassert themselves. She plunged into the pool. Miranda followed her and they swam to the far end, side by side. As they turned, Dulcie, firmly maintaining a look of distaste, lowered herself slowly from the rim and swam towards them.

  “Darling, how your over-arm stroke has come on since last year!”

  Dulcie scowled through her wet hair.

  “Six people are too many for real swimming in this size of pool.”

  “If you’d all like it we could go a little way up the path into the wood when we’ve finished dinner and hear the nightingales.”

  “I can hear them now,” Dulcie replied. “At least I could if everybody wasn’t talking so much. As a matter of fact I prefer blackbirds.”

  “My sweetie, are you very tired after that long drive? Would you like to go to bed early and have a good night’s rest?”

  “I never go to sleep before midnight.”

  Martin eyed her with disfavour.

  “By which I suppose you mean that once lately you happened to be awake after eleven.”

  “I always say what I mean.”

  “How inconvenient. I am beginning to feel a good deal of sympathy with your stepmother.”

  At the introduction of this off-stage character Miranda smiled as if the remark pleased her. Dennis scowled.

  “Jane and Dulcie get on remarkably well.”

  “I haven’t the pleasure of knowing Jane but I should think that in that case she must be a ‘state-registered masochist’. What do you think, Flora?”

  “I was thinking that Dulcie is so like you.”

  Neither Dulcie nor Martin looked pleased. Dulcie was wearing the dirty blue denims in which she had travelled from London, but she had made a concession to dinner by tying her hair back with the red handkerchief she had been wearing round her neck, thus exposing a finely cut profile very like her uncle’s.

  “Yes, of course,” Miranda agreed, “that’s who you are like. I never saw it before. You generally hide your face behind your hair. How clever of you to be like Martin.”

  “Most people consider her like my mother.”

  “Do they, Dennis? It’s so long since I saw your mother. I can see her now at our wedding in that wonderful hat all grown over with blue roses. I should think a hat like that would suit Jane.”

  “Jane never wears hats.”

  “Oh, I thought she might. Well, what about the nightingales?”

  “Are we not going to have coffee, Miranda?”

  “Yes, Martin, we are. I meant after coffee for the nightingales.”

  “You should try to say what you mean, like your daughter.”

  “I assume a certain amount of intelligence in the people I am talking to. Perhaps that’s only because I have been talking to Flora for ten days.”

  “You’re all so clever.” Ludo’s voice always sounded as though it was mounting to a squeal. “You’re so clever I’m quite frightened of saying something stupid. I was terribly afraid of Martin when I first knew him, wasn’t I Martin?”

  “But you’re not now, are you?”

  “Oh no, not now.”

  Miranda rested her elbow on the table and her chin on her hand. The full sleeve of her filmy dress slipped back from her wrist, as she lifted her glass. She looked through the red wine at her brother, then at Ludo, who self-consciously shook his hair.

  “Your first instinct was right, Ludo, to be afraid of Martin. He is the most ruthless person I know.”

  “Oh, no, Miranda, I don’t believe it! Martin is the kindest person. He has been perfectly sweet to me.”

  Nobody was listening to Ludo. Miranda and Martin were eyeing one another like cats before a fight.

  “If you want to be accurate, Miranda, you should say, ‘Martin is the most ruthless person I know except one’.”

  “Sometimes I do say what I mean.”

  “Then you haven’t sufficiently examined your meaning.”

  “You know, my dear Martin, you are not always as infallible in your judgements of people as you think you are.”

  She let her eye travel to Ludo.

  “Keep off my ground, Miranda.”

  “Then you, Martin, keep off mine.”

  “Ruthlessness,” Dulcie contributed, “is a good thing.”

  Her father said, exasperated, “You simply don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s a bad thing this world can’t afford any more of, I can tell you that. And I don’t think you need brandy after all that wine.”

  “All that wine was two half glasses.”

  “That’s enough at your age without brandy.”

  “Oh, let her alone Dennis; if she’s tiddly she’ll probably be able to sleep before midnight. My sweetie, are you sure you really like brandy? There’s some Tia Maria here, a lovely, delicious chocolate liqueur; wouldn’t that be more in your line?”

  “No thank you, I prefer brandy.”

  “Look, I’m going to give you a drop of brandy in this big glass just so that you can smell it, and I’ll give you this tiny glass of Tia Maria just to see if you like it. All right?”

  Dennis sighed ostentatiously.

  “It’s her first night here, Dennis. Have you got what you like yourself?”

  “I’m all right thanks.”

  He turned h
is attention to Flora who was sitting on his left.

  “You teach, don’t you, Dr James?”

  “Yes. I’m a lecturer at St Frideswide’s College, in Oxford.”

  “Parents must make it difficult for you nowadays sending your pupils up half-debauched with grown-up pleasures.”

  “It’s so difficult for a girl to get a place at Oxford that we tend to get those who really do want to work.”

  “I should like Dulcie to do something of that sort. I don’t want her hanging about in London and going to cannabis parties and all that.”

  “What does she want herself?”

  “Hard to say. Between us she’s been rather pushed about. It’s six years since Miranda and I got a divorce, and I didn’t marry again until two and a half years ago, so Dulcie was more with my mother than with me. I’m glad I can give her a stable home now. She’s bright, she can do very well at school when she tries, but that’s not always. I don’t know what she really wants. Perhaps she’ll talk to you, you’re so different from the usual idea of a school mistress.”

  He added, “Of course Dulcie sees her own mother in London whenever they like, and that’s all right, but these visits here always seem to upset her. That’s why I make a point of coming with her.”

  “It’s a heavenly place for a holiday.”

  “It’s all right for a short holiday. There’s not much to do here. I shall have had enough of it after a week.”

  He added with apparent irrelevance,

  “Have you met this woman that Miranda designs clothes for? Pauline.”

  “No. This is the first time I’ve met Miranda.”

  “Pauline’s coming here I suppose, isn’t she?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “When?”

  “She hasn’t let Miranda know yet when she will be arriving.”

  “No, I’m sure she hasn’t. That would be far too simple and straightforward for Pauline.”

  Miranda stood up. “Come along now, anyone who wants to hear the nightingales.”

  “Flora,” Dennis’s shadow darkened the sunlit page of the book she was reading, “would you like to come into Florence with me? I want some English papers.”

  “I should like to, very much. I could send a telegram to my sister about her new baby much more easily from there.”

  “Right. As soon as you’re ready then. We can’t stick here all day going backwards and forwards to that bloody pool.”

  Flora was inclined to agree with him. Driving alone with Miranda over the hill road, swimming in the cool water, lying, idly talking, drowsy in the shade afterwards had been pure pleasure. Listening to the arguments about who should go in which car, and to the abrasive sparring of Martin and Miranda, bathing in a pool which, as Dulcie had observed, was not large enough for six people, had proved to be less enjoyable.

  “Martin says we can take his car. Miranda wants hers for the daily trek. If you’re not in a hurry to get back we’ll have lunch in Florence. I’m tired of hearing those bad-tempered servants screaming at each other in the wings through every meal. I’ve told Miranda before that she ought to move the kitchen round to the back of the house, change it with that little room where the television is, but she says it would cost too much and it’s convenient to have the dishes just carried along the loggia, and when she’s alone she likes to hear their voices. She never is alone and nobody could really enjoy hearing that screaming, but Miranda is as obstinate as she always was. That precious brother of hers is just as bad. Except that their voices don’t rise to such a pitch, they really go on like Agatina and Enrico. Have you any idea when Martin is leaving for Greece?”

  “I believe when Pauline comes.”

  “Of the two,” Dennis said heavily, “I’d sooner have Croft. Even with his appendage. Do you know that Dulcie likes that popinjay?”

  “Of course she does.” Flora was glad to hear that Dulcie liked anyone or anything. “He’s very nice-looking.”

  “In a sissy way.”

  “Well, yes. But they’re the only two young people in the party.”

  “What do you call yourself, then?”

  “A crone—to Dulcie. I’m ten to twelve years older than the people I teach in term time.”

  “It’s not term time now. You’re on holiday and so am I. And I don’t mind telling you that there are plenty of holidays I could enjoy more than this one. I think next year I shall send Dulcie here on her own. Meanwhile we’ll have a day out and forget the lot of them.”

  Oblivion was not yet. As they drove along the village street they saw Dulcie slouching towards them. She wore the same crushed and dirty denims, and was spooning ice cream out of a tub.

  “At this hour of the morning,” her father muttered. He pulled up the car with a jerk.

  “Dulcie, why don’t you put on some clean clothes? You’ve worn those filthy rags ever since you left home. It’s an insult to your hostess. Go in and change them.”

  “Miranda doesn’t mind, and I happen to like these.”

  “Never mind what you like. You’re not fit to be seen. I know Jane bought you some new things for this visit. People will think she doesn’t look after you properly.”

  “Yes, I expect they will.”

  “It’s not fair and I won’t have it. If I don’t see you in something clean when I come back from Florence I shall send you to bed before dinner. Do you hear?”

  “Nobody could help hearing you when you shout like that.”

  “Well, remember, I mean it.”

  “Where are you going?”

  “To Florence. I shan’t invite you to come too because I shouldn’t like to be seen about with you as you look at the moment.”

  “I don’t want to come anyhow. I hate Florence, it’s stuffy and noisy. What are you going there for?”

  “To enjoy ourselves we hope.”

  Dulcie gave Flora a gleaming, hostile glance.

  “I daresay Jane wouldn’t like some of the things you do here.”

  Without answering Dennis started the car again, and drove too fast down the village street. After narrowly missing a hen and frightening an old woman with a shopping basket, he slowed down to a more reasonable pace.

  “Sorry, Flora. That child drives me round the bend sometimes. I wish Miranda would take a hand. After all, she is her mother. I asked her last night to make Dulcie brush her hair, but she said she couldn’t nag the poor little thing on her holiday. Poor little thing indeed! I assure you my wife is only too kind to her, they don’t get on at all badly, but Dulcie isn’t like this at home, at least not often. These visits here seem to knock her off her balance. Well, that’s enough of that. This is our day out, and to hell with the lot of them.”

  Flora too felt in a holiday mood. Such moods were shallow above the preoccupying sadness that sucked her down all the time beneath them, but she was becoming more able to accept their partial release. She had known for the last day or two that Dennis found her attractive. Although, even if she had felt like it, she would not have been willing to start anything with Miranda’s ex-husband, it was of course a fillip that Dennis was not disinclined to. For the first time it floated across her mind that Hugh had left her free to be interested in other men, although he had also left her with the feeling that just now none of them were interesting.

  Dennis, like Dulcie, was evidently different away from Le Rondini. He bore with unexpected good humour the exasperating search for a parking place in the crowded streets of Florence. When Flora had sent off her telegram to Isobel, and Dennis had collected a Times and a Telegraph, and three of last Sunday’s papers, they walked round the Spanish cloisters, and then made their way to the middle of the city. In the narrow streets the heat was stifling, it poured back at them from the lion-coloured stone of the old walls, and seeped up from the cobbles through the soles of their light shoes.

  “Do any shopping you want,” Dennis said amiably. “Your Italian is better than mine, but I might happen to know the words you don’t.”

>   They went to the straw market and pottered between the gaily coloured stalls, laughing, bargaining with the stallholders, who recognized that the game had to be played but were secretly perhaps rather tired of playing it, since they knew exactly how little they were prepared to take for their goods, and whether the customer meant to pay it.

  Dennis bought a present for his wife and a large straw hat for Dulcie.

  “If she won’t brush her hair she’d better cover it.”

  Flora, after choosing presents for her family, found herself buying a scarf with half an idea that it was for Lalage.

  But I can always give it to someone else for Christmas.

  Dennis’s patience with shopping was not inexhaustible. Soon after midday they walked into a cool, shuttered restaurant, blissfully quiet after the streets outside. At that early hour it was almost empty. One of the waiters who were chattering round the bar came and bowed them to a table. With a flourish he put two large handwritten menus into their hands. Dennis ordered two martinis. When the waiter had brought them the ice-cold glasses Dennis said laboriously,

  “Non siamo pronto. Bisognio pensare.”

  “Si, si signore.”

  The waiter went back to the bar.

  Dennis, with the air of a man settling down to enjoy himself, sipped his drink and smiled across the menu at Flora.

  “I didn’t expect to find anyone like you staying at Le Rondini. As a rule I can’t stand Miranda’s friends. She picks up the most trying women, so conceited and aggressive.”

  “Are you sure I’m not conceited and aggressive?”

  “Quite sure. I can tell from your face. I’m a fairly good judge of character, I can generally tell the first time I meet people if I’m going to like them. That’s a very pretty dress, Flora. That blue-violet colour suits you, it brings out the colour of your eyes.”

  “Thank you.”

  A pang shot through her as if a dentist had touched a nerve in her tooth. Hugh had also liked her in this colour. She had chosen the dress to please him in the Easter vac. Wandering along Knightsbridge window-shopping she had seen it, and had gone into the shop and spent far more on it than she meant to afford. Coming out with the black and silver carrier bag swinging from her hand into the April sunshine she had been shot through by a quivering happiness, looking forward to the summer term, and the renewal of Hugh’s evenings.