Voss

by Patrick White

  She had grown contemplative of the whole of time.

  ‘Now, had it been Wednesday, that is always inconvenient. And Friday, that would be out of the question. Miss Lassiter is to fit Belle for her dress. The wedding-dress. My daughter, Mr Badgery, is to be married, you may not have heard. To Lieutenant Radclyffe.’

  ‘Ha!’ exclaimed the surgeon of Nautilus, and was horrified to hear himself smack his lips.

  This unexpected noise was distinguished quite clearly by all the ladies present, the kinder of whom hastened in their minds to blame the madeira, of which Mrs Bonner had offered a glass, but lately imported, too. It could have been the madeira, or the biscuit; a dry biscuit does encumber the tongue. Mrs Bonner herself examined the surgeon afresh, and saw a somewhat thick-set individual, of healthy complexion, and crisp hair. If not quite a gentleman, at least his eye was honest.

  ‘Lieutenant Radclyffe,’ the tactful hostess continued to explain, ‘who will resign his commission shortly before the ceremony. The young couple propose to take up residence in the Hunter Valley.’

  ‘Oh, Mamma, you are becoming tedious!’

  Belle blushed, and did look very pretty.

  ‘The Hunter Valley?’ said the surgeon. ‘I must confess to ignorance of almost everything concerning New South Wales, but hope to remedy that, with time and study. The sea-shells, I have noticed, appear to be particularly fine.’

  It is a dismal fact that, to know one is not as dull as one can sound, does not help in the least.

  ‘Dr Badgery reads books,’ Una Pringle contributed.

  ‘Ah,’ Mrs Bonner accepted, ‘my niece, Laura, who will be down presently, is the one for reading books. She is quite highly educated, Mr Badgery, although I do say it myself. Most men, of course, are prejudiced against education in a woman; to some it even appears unseemly, but then, on the whole, men are timid things. Please do not misunderstand me, Mr Badgery. Naturally, there are exceptions. Although, in my opinion, timidity in certain avenues does enhance manliness. Just as intellect in a woman can spice her charm and sweetness. As in our Laura.’

  Oh, Mamma, Belle barely breathed, who had not suspected her mother of such enlightenment.

  ‘Laura is so sweet,’ said Una Pringle, as she had been taught, and examined her new kid glove, which had rather a distinctive smell. ‘How is the baby? Laura has a baby,’ she explained kindly, for the sake of Dr Badgery.

  ‘A baby?’

  The surgeon suspected that his surprise sounded less polite than indelicate and, for the second time, was made most unhappy.

  It was fortunate that the midshipman had broken his biscuit. As he gathered up the fragments from the carpet, everybody was able to stare at his big, cold-looking, boy’s hands.

  ‘Yes,’ said Mrs Bonner, who was most fascinated by the midshipman’s god-sent crumbs. ‘A baby. It is a touching story. Laura herself will tell you.’

  Thus inspired, she dared that Una Pringle to say another word, and Una did not.

  It was then that Dr Badgery noticed the dark young woman entering the room, and realized that all else, though elegant in its way, had been the preliminary roll of kettle drums. All were soon looking at her, because by now she had closed the door, and was forced to face them. Equally, the strangers were forced to face Miss Trevelyan, so that the walls contained a certain feeling of suppressed thunder.

  ‘Please sit down,’ Laura did not quite command, but addressed them as a woman who had attained to a position of authority.

  She had also distributed kind smiles, but as there was no further debt owing to Dr Badgery, she proceeded to talk in a low, agreeable voice to Una Pringle about the latter’s brothers and sisters.

  ‘And Grace?’ Laura asked.

  ‘Grace has had the croup. We were terrified,’ Una said.

  ‘But is better?’

  ‘But is better.’

  Dr Badgery watched Miss Trevelyan’s hand, which was most pleasing, as it hung from the arm of the chair. Or withdrew itself to her lap. Or rested upon the line of her jaw. On one finger she was wearing a little agate ring, that she would twist suddenly. Her hands were never still for long, yet preserved their air of authority and grace, if not of actual beauty, for they appeared to have become reddened by some labour.

  ‘We are forgetting,’ said Laura, with an effort, ‘that Dr Badgery is not entertained. He will go away with the poorest opinion of the ladies at Sydney.’

  This was an affectation, of course, and in which he refused to believe.

  Immediately on closing her dark lips, she saw that the stranger might have read her, so she put her handkerchief to her mouth, but without being able to hide more than the lower part of her face.

  Dr Badgery was, in fact, a man of some native sensibility. He would have liked to convey his appreciation of what he had observed, but had been rendered temporarily wooden by conventions and too many ladies.

  At this point the aunt, beaming for her niece’s self-possession and looks, could not resist announcing:

  ‘Mr Badgery is anxious to study the geography of New South Wales, Laura. He, too, is of an intellectual turn of mind.’

  Such compliments are apt to become accusations.

  ‘I do not make claims on the strength of one or two hobbies.’ The surgeon began to bristle.

  Then he gave up. It would have been exhilarating if the young woman had united with him in their common defence, but he realized that for some reason she did not wish him to continue. In fact, she was beseeching him not to involve her in any way.

  His immediate respect for her wishes should have increased that understanding which obviously did exist between them, but in the case of Laura, she was embarrassed. She found herself staring at his rather coarse, though kind hand spread upon his thick, uneasy thigh. As for the surgeon, he would remember certain of her attitudes, to his own torment.

  ‘We have forgotten the picnic, Mrs Bonner.’ Una Pringle returned in disgust to the prime reason for their visit.

  This man would be good enough for Laura, she decided with the brutality of which refinement is capable.

  ‘Ah, the picnic,’ said Mrs Bonner. ‘Why, Una, you may tell your mother it will be delightful. For all of us.’

  It did seem as though she had reserved her decision, in order to enjoy the subtle pleasure of making it at last.

  Laura did not comment, although everybody expected it.

  There was little more to discuss, beyond the final arrangements for meeting. Then, as silences were growing, Una Pringle rose, with the two men, to whose respectability her company was tribute. However, she ignored them thoroughly, on principle, and because her thoughts were more profitably engaged.

  ‘Till Thursday, then.’

  To this extent Laura expressed her approval of what had been arranged.

  ‘Till Thursday,’ repeated Una, laying her check against that of her friend.

  Miss Abbey had to admire Laura’s dress. She had to touch it.

  ‘What a sweet dress,’ she had to say. ‘And the dearest little sprigs. Could they be heliotrope?’

  The other women bore with the governess. Poor thing, she was the fourth daughter of a Bristol clergyman.

  Laura made some excuse not to accompany their guests to the steps, leaving them to Belle, whose amiability seldom failed her, and to Aunt Emmy, who would have loved to receive the whole world.

  Everyone seemed gratified by the general situation, although the midshipman was, in addition, relieved.

  Arrived outside, this relief escaped from him in his funny, clumsy, recently acquired man’s voice, in remarks addressed exclusively to his shipmate. There was also the voice of the surgeon as he followed at the heels of the two ladies, along the wing, and round the corner of the house. Laura listened to them all talking. But it was the men, it was Dr Badgery who predominated. His rather rough, burry voice seemed unable to tear itself out of the thorny arms of the rosebushes which lined the path.

  So that Laura Trevelyan was persuaded, guiltily
, to lay aside her belt of nails, and to recline upon the most comfortable upholstery the room had to offer.

  In passing to the front gate, the surgeon touched the creamy, if not the creamiest rose. The heat of the sun had saturated his thick clothes, and he was wondering a good deal.

  ‘Did you care for that Mr Badgery?’ Aunt Emmy asked at a later occasion – it was, in fact, the Wednesday, the Pringles’ picnic almost upon them.

  ‘One could not dislike him,’ Laura replied.

  ‘By some standards, not quite a gentleman.’ Aunt Emmy sighed. Then, seeming to remember, she added: ‘We must not decide too hastily, however, that those standards are desirable. Men, you will learn, I think, because you are a practical girl, Laura dear, men are what women make them.’

  Mrs Bonner, who was at that moment counting the silver, was very pleased with her estimation.

  ‘Then, are we to assume that poor Dr Badgery’s wife did not quite finish him off?’ Laura asked, who loved to tease her aunt at moments when she most loved her.

  ‘Such an assumption would be most foolish,’ Aunt Emmy returned.

  She was very angry with the forks.

  ‘A young girl, provided she is a lady, may safely assume that a gentleman is a bachelor, until such times as those who are in a position to discover the truth inform her to the contrary.’

  Then Mrs Bonner, who had made it quite clear, was again pleased.

  But, on the Thursday, she was dashed.

  For Belle had come downstairs alone, in a bonnet that made her dreamier.

  ‘Where is Laura?’ asked the aunt and mother, kissing from habit, but distractedly.

  ‘I do not know,’ answered Belle.

  She would not tell. She was drifting upon her own cloud. She was separate now.

  ‘Laura!’ Mrs Bonner called. ‘How provoking! Laura, wecannotexpectthehorsestostandindefinitelyyouknowwhatitleadsto!’

  ‘Has Tom come?’ inquired Belle, who was fitting the old gloves she wore for picnics. Her cheeks were lovely.

  ‘As if she has not experienced the incivility of servants who are kept waiting! It is the worst of all risks. Laura!’ persisted Mrs Bonner.

  ‘Yes, Aunt,’ said the niece, appearing with miraculous meekness. ‘I shall not keep anyone waiting a second longer.’

  ‘But you are not ready.’

  ‘Because I am not going.’

  ‘You will deprive us of such pleasure?’ asked Tom Radclyffe, who had just arrived, and who was looking not at this thorny cousin, but at his own precious property.

  ‘When we are all expected!’ protested Mrs Bonner.

  The latter would have gone with her leg sawn off rather than diverge by one inch from the intended course.

  ‘My baby is suffering from the wind, and I must stay with her for the very good reason that she needs me,’ Laura answered gravely.

  ‘Have you really also learnt to deflate babies?’ Tom Radclyffe asked.

  But Mrs Bonner’s mind had conceived a tragedy grander than the detail of the baby’s wind at first suggested.

  ‘Your baby,’ she gulped. ‘Give me your arm, Tom, please. I will need it.’

  Then she burst into tears, and they led her to the carriage.

  Laura was now free. She wiped upon her apron those hands which the observant Dr Badgery had seen to be too red, and with which she had just been washing various small articles of the baby’s clothing, for she had decided in the beginning that this was a duty she must take upon herself. Now she returned upstairs.

  The healthy baby had been no more than passingly fretful that afternoon. The young woman stood looking at her. No longer could anybody have doubted their relationship. They were looking at each other in the depths of their collusion, fingering each other’s skin and face. They were covered with the faintest silvery webs of smiles, when the blood began to beat, the shadow swept across the mother’s face, and suddenly she took up her child, and was walking up and down.

  The young woman was going up and down, but, in the familiar room, amongst the stolid furniture, the two beings had been overtaken by a storm of far darker colours than human passions. As they were rocked together, tossed, and buffeted, helplessness and desperation turned the woman’s skin an ugly brown. What could she do? The baby, on beginning to sense that she had been sucked into some whirlpool of supernatural dangers, could at least let out a howl for her mother to save her, and was probably convinced she would be saved. The mother, however, was unable to enjoy the comfort of any such belief and, for the moment, must be presumed lost.

  ‘My darling, my darling,’ Laura Trevelyan whispered, kissing. ‘I am so afraid.’

  Kisses did drug the child with an illusion of safety, and she calmed down, and eventually slept. The mother saw this mercy descend as she watched. Then it seemed to the young woman that she might pray to God for love and protection of greater adequacy, but she hesitated on realizing her own incapacity to save her trusting child. Only later in the afternoon did she become aware of the extent of her blasphemy, and was made quite hollow by it.

  When finally she could bring herself to pray, she did not kneel, but crouched diffidently upon the edge of an upright chair. She formed the words very slowly and distinctly, hoping that, thus, they would transcend her mind. If she dared hope. But she did pray. Not for herself, she had abandoned herself, nor for her baby, who must, surely, be exempt at the last reckoning. She prayed for that being for whom the ark of her love was built. She prayed over and over, for JOHANN ULRICH VOSS, until, through the ordinary bread of words, she did receive divine sustenance.

  That evening Laura Trevelyan sat beneath smooth hair and listened to her aunt recount to her uncle details of the Pringles’ picnic, although none was deceived as to the true direction of the narrative.

  ‘The air was most bracing,’ Mrs Bonner declared, still snuffing it recklessly. ‘Everyone was agreeable, and some even well-informed, for a much-travelled man cannot fail to acquire instructive scraps of information. Did I perhaps forget to mention that several of the officers from Nautilus and Samphire were present? It is not surprising if I did. I am scattered from here to Waverley. Such a jolting, and worst of all down a fiendish lane where we were driven at last to the home of Judge de Courcy – whose wife is a lady of the very best connexions, it appears, in Leicestershire – and were shown their glasshouses and gardens. In the course of this little excursion, I received a most interesting lecture on topiary from Mr Badgery – you will have heard tell, Mr Bonner, the surgeon of Nautilus, who accompanied Una Pringle on the occasion of her last visit.’

  Mr Bonner could sit whole evenings without answering his wife, but they understood each other.

  ‘Now, it appears, Mr Badgery is known to Mrs de Courcy, and that he is quite well connected, through his mother, with whom he lives when at home, for in spite of his many excellent qualities, he has remained a bachelor.’

  Laura, too, in spite of her resolutions, could have strolled along the paths between the solid, masculine, clipped hedges, and touched them with her hand. All that is solid is at times nostalgic and desirable.

  Mrs Bonner had paused, and was knotting a thread that her work demanded.

  ‘I am sorry, Laura, that I have not inquired after Mercy,’ she said. ‘Earlier in the afternoon, I myself was so very much upset.’

  ‘I am sorry, Aunt, if we have caused you unhappiness of any kind,’ Laura replied. ‘As it happened, it was only a slight indisposition. But I cannot run the risk of neglecting what I have sworn to do.’

  Mrs Bonner could not answer. At this point, however, her husband was beginning to stir. A stranger might have failed to perceive the subtle sympathy that did exist between the couple, for coupled they were, even in irritation, by many tough, tangled, indestructible, instinctive links.

  So, when the tea was brought in, Mr Bonner began. He stood upon the hearth, which was the centre of their house, and where a small fire of logs had been lit, because the nights remained chilly. He said:

&n
bsp; ‘Now, Laura, you are a reasonable girl, and we must come to a decision about this child.’

  Laura did not answer. She was cold, and had twisted her fingers together as she watched the flames writhing in the oblivious grate.

  ‘You must realize that your own position is intolerable, however laudable your intentions, in keeping someone else’s child.’

  ‘It is unnatural that you should become so stubbornly attached. A young girl.’ Mrs Bonner sighed.

  ‘If I were a married woman,’ Laura Trevelyan answered, ‘I do not think it would be so very different.’

  The pitiful fire was leaping out in sharp, thin, desperate tongues.

  Mrs Bonner clucked.

  ‘But a baby without a name,’ she said. ‘I am surprised, to say the least, that you should not find us worthy of consideration.’

  ‘I am aware of my debt, and shall attempt to repay you,’ Laura replied, ‘but please, please, in any other way. As Mercy is guilty of being without a name, and this offends you, the least I can do is give her my own. I should have thought of that. Of course.’

  ‘But consider the future, how such a step would damage your prospects,’ said the uncle.

  ‘My prospects,’ cried the niece, ‘are in the hands of God.’

  She was holding her head. The wood-smoke was unbearable, with its poignance of distances.

  Then she dragged herself forward a little in her chair, and said:

  ‘I will suffer anything you care to inflict on me, of course. I, too, can endure.’

  Mrs Bonner was looking round, in little, darting glances, at her normal room.

  ‘Oh, she is hysterical,’ she said, tugging at the innocent thread that joined her needle to the linen. And then: ‘We only wish to help you, Laura dear. We love you.’

  They did. Indeed, it was that which made it most terrible.

  Fortunately, just then, Belle ran across the terrace and into the room. She had accompanied the Pringles home for supper, and had returned in the brougham of the two Miss Unwins who also lived at Potts Point.

  ‘Am I interrupting an important conference?’ Belle inquired, rather casually.

  Mr Bonner frowned.

  ‘Young ladies about to be married walk into a room,’ said her mother. ‘They do not run.’