Memories Of The Storm

by Willett, Marcia

  Blaise holds her hand tightly. 'It would be the worst kind of thing for someone of Michael's temperament. To be deceiving his closest friend. I can imagine how easy it would be to believe that Edward was dead, and submit to the temptation of making love to his widow, but when Edward came back it must have been hell on earth for a man like Mike. To be torn between two people or two different kinds of love. Poor devil.'

  'Shall we tell Edward?'

  Blaise thinks about this and then shakes his head. 'I think not. He seems to have put them out of his mind. Let's not reopen old wounds. If he asks about him then we shall have to tell him the truth, of course, but he's got quite enough to handle with his memories of what he's been through.'

  Hester knows that Edward talks to Blaise about the camp, though he always falls silent when she comes in, but she catches odd fragments that allow her a tiny glimpse of the hell he has survived: the beatings and the torture and the starvation.

  'Men bartered food in exchange for tobacco,' he says one afternoon when he and Blaise are having an after-lunch smoke. 'They knew they would die of starvation but the habit had such a hold that they didn't care. When we got tobacco the problem was what to roll it in. We started to use the leaves out of books and we got to the stage where men were wanting to using their bibles. It made a good smoke because the paper was so thin and fine. The padre agreed that bibles could be used so long as each man read the page he was about to smoke.' Hester hears him chuckle. 'It gave a very fragmented picture of the good book. I remember Habakkuk and Micah. He was an amazing man, the padre. He used to refuse to allow those who were sick to be forced out to work. The guards would knock him senseless and then drag the poor devils out anyway. He never gave in, though. He fought for us and was beaten up for us and showed what Christianity really meant by living it. He kept our faith alive even in the most degrading circumstances when it seemed impossible to believe in anything except evil.'

  When she comes back with the coffee they are talking about religion more generally.

  'I think the only true, honest revolution is the one that takes place within a man's soul,' Blaise is saying. 'Any other kind simply means the destruction of one set of people by another so as to set up a new regime, which in time produces exactly the same kind of misuse of power and privilege. But if a man dies to himself so that Christ begins to live in him that can only be good, surely?'

  Later that evening, sitting by the fire, Hester tells him that she and Edward have been reading John Clare's poetry again and Blaise talks to them about their father's work at Cambridge.

  'Have you thought about going to Cambridge?' Blaise asks Hester. 'It's what your father would have wanted for you. Edward and I could prepare you for the entrance exam, couldn't we, Edward?'

  Edward agrees at once, delighted by the idea, and they immediately set about drawing up a reading programme, joking about how hard she'll have to work. Hester goes along with it readily, though she can't imagine how Edward would cope without her and clearly Blaise can't remain with them for ever. The thought of his leaving them fills her with an unfamiliar misery.

  For now, though, Hester is happy: she has Blaise. She accepts that she is in love with him and, to begin with, the joy of having him here at Bridge House is enough. Each morning, when she wakes, her heart beats with excitement rather than with dread. As the spring approaches, however, Hester notices another change in Edward.

  'Edward is so much better,' she tells Blaise. 'He doesn't seem mad any more. But have you noticed that there's a kind of resignation about him?'

  Blaise looks at her, an odd look. 'The poor fellow. The trouble with these things, Hes, is that you can't have it both ways. From what he's told me I know that it was the thought of Eleanor that kept him going through those appalling times. Coming home to her was what gave him the will to survive. And what happens? He finds her again and then discovers that she doesn't want him any more. Worse, she's in love with his closest friend. Eleanor was the wire in his blood that first of all kept him alive and then drove him mad. He's accepted that he's lost her but he's also lost the thing that made life worth living. Now he's simply existing.'

  Hester is horrified. 'Is he really so unhappy?'

  'That's the whole point. He doesn't feel unhappy because he doesn't feel anything much. In the camp the prisoners were systematically humiliated and degraded. One of the things that sustained them was the thought of someone somewhere to whom they were important and it was for their sakes they endured and survived when it might have been easier to give up. Edward came back to rejection and betrayal and it's knocked the stuffing out of him.'

  'He's got us,' says Hester sadly. 'But I can see that it isn't the same.'

  'Not quite.' Blaise smiles at her. 'But it's ever so much better than nothing. That's why this idea of getting you ready for Cambridge is a good one. It gives him a goal to work for; something worth doing.'

  Hester looks at him directly. 'But how could I leave him? You won't stay for ever, will you, Blaise, and then what does Edward do while I'm at Cambridge?'

  'We have to think about it. To tell you the truth, Hes, I'm thinking of taking Holy Orders. Oh, I know,' he grins at her expression, 'it is pretty amazing, isn't it? But I feel very strongly drawn to it. This is giving me time to discern; to see if I really have a vocation. Perhaps we might all go to Cambridge and get a house together there. Oh, I don't know! Let's just give ourselves time to think and work and get Edward properly fit.'

  And she is too grateful to know that he will be with them for a while longer to make any kind of protest.

  Hester's coaching programme continues and Edward chooses Twelfth Night as part of her studies. To help her, they read it aloud at night around the fire, discussing the structure and the plot and Shakespeare's characters. They share out the parts, Hester playing Viola to Blaise's Duke Orsino, and although he doesn't suspect it, Edward's choice of play is particularly and poignantly apt for, all through the cold, blowy, green and golden days of early spring, Blaise and Hester are falling in love.

  Oh, neither of them knows of the other's feelings – they are both too cautious to let their love show – but each of them grows more and more aware. It is as if their nerve-endings have become abnormally alert to each touch, however casual; their ears attuned to any observation, however familiar. They watch and listen hopefully, almost desperately, but the family trait of detachment runs strong in these two and in this instance it serves them both ill: instead of trusting to intuition they stand off, weighing up their emotions, dissecting and analysing them until their true instincts are weakened by lack of nourishment and smothered by denial.

  To Blaise, the eldest of them all, the one who tried to take their father's place when he died, this love he is beginning to feel for Hester feels perilously akin to incest. He has been a big brother to her – he is thirty years old to her eighteen – and it seems impossible, almost wrong that he should have such feelings for her. Even though he tells himself that they are cousins, not siblings, and watches her hopefully to see if there is any sign that she might be feeling the same way towards him, nevertheless he is convinced that it would be quite wrong to frighten or embarrass her with a declaration of love; she depends on him and nothing must be done to destroy her trust in him.

  At the same time he is trying to discern whether or not he has a vocation or whether it is some trick of the imagination that gives him a sense of Presence: as if someone is watching him, standing just out of his own line of vision. His heart beats hard, as if it might be some lover who is waiting for him, and he tries to laugh off this new, strange desire. After all, why should he be called?

  There's nothing special about you, he tells himself, half-mocking, half-longing for the slowly growing awareness to be a true sign.

  He tries to see himself as a priest, thinking carefully about the dedication required, and once again comes up against his love for Hester. He knows very well that the majority of Anglican priests are married yet he wonders how he would m
anage if his loyalty were to be put to the test.

  If I give myself wholly to God, he asks himself, how would I react if something were to be required of me that meant that my wife or children might suffer? Or, put it the other way round: if I have a wife and children will I be able to dedicate myself wholly to God's will?

  Yet each time he looks at Hester, his heart turns over with tenderness for her and he longs to reach out and gather her tightly in his arms; and each time he resists lest he should frighten her. He feels certain about one thing: if it is not to be Hester then it will be nobody. He will remain free for God's work . . . if that is what he is called to do. And then it all starts up again: the uncertainty, the lack of confidence in his calling, the longing for some sign.

  Hester too is guarding herself from any display of affection that might be misconstrued. She knows that to Blaise she is the youngest, little Hes, and she fears that he might be shocked or even disappointed to think that she feels such strong love for him that it makes her tremble and burn. These overwhelming physical emotions remind her of Eleanor and she is afraid that there might be something shameful about it all. She couldn't bear to disgust Blaise, to have him turn from her in disappointment, and she takes care to give no sign of the heart-aching love that she bears him.

  It doesn't help that Edward, who sees nothing of this, has his own strong views on Blaise's future.

  'He'll make a first-class priest,' he says to Hester one morning as they walk beside the river. 'He'll be completely dedicated. He's in love with God and with God's creation and he will spend his life trying to minister to it. I had a padre like Blaise, utterly committed to service. He had no idea, of course, the effect that he had on us. He'd achieved that true humility that ceases to be self-aware, but I imagine that none of us who survived will ever forget him.'

  The dim, winding path through the damp wood seems to be lit by the golden flowers of the kingcups that grow luxuriantly amongst the trees; the yaffle's laughing call rings out, clear and high above the river's crooning, watery chuckle. As they walk on a little further, Hester screws up her courage to ask Edward a question.

  'So you can't imagine Blaise with a wife and children?' she asks at last.

  His derisive snort of laughter hurts her more than he will ever know. 'Absolutely not. Or, if he does marry then he'll never be happy. He'll be constantly torn between his duty to his wife and family and his duty to God. It would be hell for a chap like Blaise. He's so whole-hearted, isn't he? It would make him utterly miserable.'

  This reminds her of what Blaise said about Michael, being torn between two people and two different kinds of love, and she sees with a devastating clarity that she must never be responsible for ruining Blaise's life.

  'Some priests manage it,' she says lightly – almost as if she is making one last desperate throw for happiness.

  'Some priests,' Edward agrees, 'but not Blaise. Anyway, I'm not sure we make good marriage material. We think too much. The passionate side of it can make us obsessive and drive us mad, and once that fades we're too detached to make good spouses or parents. Yet at the same time we feel guilty about it.'

  Hester is taken aback by this declaration, anxious lest the conversation might edge into dangerous territory, yet fascinated by this view on their shared characteristics.

  'Patricia manages very well,' she ventures at last.

  'Yes,' he agrees readily, 'Patricia manages. She's very maternal, of course. I just think that the men of our family aren't very satisfactory marriage material, that's all. Maybe I'm biased. Father was always very wrapped up in his work, wasn't he, though Mother encouraged him. She was very like him, actually, and I think we were lucky to have Nanny. Father always tried terribly hard during the holidays to make up for it, poor fellow, as if he felt guilty for all the times we never saw him and Mother was left alone. He drove himself too hard in all directions and I often wonder if that's why he had a heart attack whilst still quite young. He wasn't much more than forty. Blaise is very like him – well, that's not surprising, our father and his were very much alike – but for a priest I should think that kind of pressure would be frightful. That's another thing about us. We don't seem to cope very well with emotional pressure. Look at Mother when the boys died and I was taken prisoner; you told me she simply couldn't face it.'

  His expression has become brooding and Hester hastens to distract him.

  'Can you reach those catkins?' she asks. 'Cut them long enough. Thanks. It must be nearly lunch-time. Shall we go back?'

  As they retrace their steps, scrunching over the beech mast and dead leaves, Hester knows that at some level a decision has been made and, ever afterwards, when she sees the kingcups blooming along the riverbank and hears the yaffle calling in the wood, she is filled with a strange sense of melancholy and loss.

  Duke Orsino: 'And what's her history?'

  Viola: 'A blank, my lord. She never told her love . . .'

  PART THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Lizzie Blake came into the kitchen and paused for a moment in appreciation. The big room with its two windows, one looking west towards Dunkery hill and the other into the sheltered garth, never failed to give her a little thrill of pleasure. A slanting beam of spring sunshine glanced off the toast rack on the large square table and touched the old Welsh dresser that held china belonging to four generations of women – an eclectic display that included Wedgwood and Clarice Cliff; art deco and Royal Doulton. Lizzie had brought one or two pieces of her own from her small house in Bristol to add to the collection and she surveyed the effect with satisfaction.

  Lion rose from his bean bag near the Aga and came to meet her, tail waving, and she bent to kiss his silky head before slipping into her chair. She smiled a greeting to Piers, slit open the envelope that he'd put beside her plate and read the enclosed letter with a growing impatience.

  'Honestly,' she muttered. 'For goodness' sake!' and, folding the paper, she put it on one side with a smack.

  Piers raised his eyebrows but remained silent whilst Lizzie reached for some toast and buttered it with irritated swipes of her knife.

  'I'm beginning to lose patience with Jonah,' she announced. 'You know how keen he was about the film event with the sixth-formers? Well, first of all he wrote to say that he couldn't get down for our next meeting at the end of the month and now he's saying that he might not be able to take any part in it at all. His father is very ill so he's been trying to spend time with his mother and now the work's building up; unexpected rewrites and stuff.'

  Piers put his own letters to one side, poured coffee for her and refilled his large breakfast cup. 'Do I take it that you don't absolutely believe his reasons?'

  'Excuses,' said Lizzie crossly, 'not reasons. There's something going on. Clio was saying the same thing.'

  'Clio?'

  'Do you remember that she took him to meet Hester last autumn? Well, they got on swimmingly together. Jonah's mother stayed with Hester and her family during the war and it turns out that Hester knew Jonah's grandfather terribly well. Something happened, apparently, some war-time romance or whatever, and Jonah was fascinated by it all and went down again to see Hester after Clio had gone back to London. So, everything's going fine, Jonah's even thinking of dramatizing the story and then, suddenly, with no warning, silence. Hester had a Christmas card from him and then a little note saying his father was ill and something had cropped up with his work – he script-edits on one of the soaps – and that he'd be very tied up for a while. Clio says Hester's really sad and worried. She thinks she must have upset him but can't think how. It was all so curt. You know, a kind of "Goodbye and thanks for all the fish" kind of thing. And now he's telling me much the same thing.'

  Moodily she tore off a piece of toast crust and passed it to Lion, who was sitting hopefully by her chair.

  'I wish you wouldn't do that,' said Piers, distracted momentarily from her recital. 'I hate a dog who begs at the table and salivates all over people's shoes.'
>
  'Oh, sweetie, I'm sorry.' Lizzie made a penitent face, rolling her eyes guiltily at Lion, who crunched appreciatively. 'I wasn't thinking. I'm just so upset about Jonah. I mean, he's usually such a darling and I can't think why he's behaving like this. Apart from anything else, I need him. He's a rising star and he'll draw the punters.'

  'Well, why don't you ring him up and ask him what he's playing at? Or why doesn't Clio?'

  'That's what I said to her. She hasn't got a telephone number or an address, apparently. She gave him her mobile number but that doesn't help much.'

  'Well, you've got his number and his address. Ring him up and tell him everyone is worried. Tell him he's vital to your event. You don't have to submit to a secrecy and silence conspiracy.'

  'That's very true.' Lizzie appeared to be much struck by this approach. 'We won't let him get away with it. I did telephone his flat actually after his last letter but I just got his answerphone. That's the snag, of course: we can hold people at bay indefinitely these days with our voice mails and answerphones.'

  'Hound him,' said Piers brutally. 'You and Clio take turns to telephone. Leave desperate messages. Got his mobile number? Well, phone that too. Text him.'

  'I might just do that.' Lizzie finished her toast thoughtfully. 'But I just wonder why he's taken such a scunner to us all. He was so keen about it. What could it be?'

  Piers raised his eyebrows, his mouth turning down at the corners, in a kind of facial shrug. 'Ask him,' he said. 'We don't want him upsetting Hester. I'm very fond of old Hes. They've got the fishing rights along the river there and we used to look after the letting of it all those years she was away. I only really know Hester and Blaise, though I've met Jack and Robin once or twice. Father knew the family much better than I did.' He stood up. 'By the way, has he had his breakfast yet?'