Will You Surrender?

by Joyce Dingwell

  The pre-preps arrived back on the following Monday. The juniors circled them curiously to view their spots. All were disappointed with the exception of Semple. James, of course, knew that the spots would have vanished in a fine flake within a matter of a few days of their appearance. "The spots emerge on the fourth morning," he said haughtily, "first on the face and then on the chest."

  "Why does Semple know everything?" asked Warren Phillips of Geraldine.

  Gerry pretended not to hear and absorbed herself instead with her pre-preps, grateful that they, anyway, did not know much.

  A few days afterwards, Manning's insistence on a lifesaving squad and Neville's persistence in training the squad bore fruit.

  As a result of fine teamwork, because of newly acquired calm and method, four small boys, if not exactly snatched from a watery grave, were spared the scare of finding themselves suddenly and too long for their liking out of their depth.

  They were on rubber floats—strictly forbidden by the H.M. and the P.T. instructor, as the floats afforded false confidence as well as giving the poorer performers little encouragement to swim.

  Directly Neville's back was turned, however, as was the way with all boys, rules went to the wind and the floats appeared as if by magic.

  There was a deceptive mildness in the ocean's swell that day, and in no time four young bodies on four inflated platforms were much further out than they thought.

  Semple discovered his dilemma first—Gerry knew at once that it was James by the neat outline of his impeccable trunks, not dragged askew like the others boys'. Only a Semple, she thought, could remain immaculate even in water like that.

  He raised his hand. Three other hands rose after him.

  "Ian," shouted Gerry in alarm.

  "It's all right," grinned Ian MacPhail with relish. Geraldine, even in her anxiety, could see that he had been praying for an emergency like this.

  The rescues went like clockwork. The reel was pushed further down the beach; MacPhail and Summers donned the belts; the squad stood alert and orderly guiding the lines; the victims were brought back to shore.

  Ian was not content with this, however. These boys had started something that had to be finished. In spite of their assertions that they had been returned in good order and felt perfectly fit and able, they were obliged to undergo the ordeal of artificial respiration.

  First, Ian opened their mouths to remove foreign bodies and minimize the dangers of choking, according to the primary law of resuscitation.

  "Any sand, weed or fish?" he inquired of James. "Any partial false teeth or complete set of dentures that have gone back into your throat?"

  James gave him a chilly look.

  The 1,2 ,3 routine began on the backs of the four juniors. Mr. Carter had said it was important as one operator exhausted himself that another take over. The entire squad queued up to take over. Eventually the four casualties owed their lives to no less than thirty-seven boys. They rose an hour later more exhausted from being saved than from being in the water.

  Another ordeal awaited them, not merely an irate sports master but a flint-faced Head.

  "Up to my study," he thundered, "the four of you." Gerry stepped forward. She couldn't help herself. "Don't you think—" she pleaded, "I mean, it has

  been rather awful for them, Mr. Manning

  Damien ignored her.

  James Semple said, probably in the vain hope of escaping punishment, "I must congratulate you on your school's lifesaving squad, sir, and I shall certainly sit down and write to my father."

  "I give you permission to write to him, Semple, but the sitting position will be entirely your own prerogative."

  Letting this bad news sink in for a minute, Damien said briskly, "Quick march."

  Gerry wheeled away indignantly—only to find some-

  body else needing her attention much more than the four misguided boys.

  It was Elliott Bethel, and he was ashy and shaken.

  She crossed quickly to his side, concerned at his pallor. "Elliott, what is it, dear?"

  "Those youngsters—they could have been drowned, Miss Gerry."

  "They certainly could, Elliott, but they are not."

  "One of them," continued Elliott, not heeding her, "might have been Thomas."

  "Yes," murmured Gerry, and waited.

  "He could have been Thomas, swept out, drowning before my eyes, and I wouldn't have known what to do."

  "Yes," repeated Gerry, seeing the lesson strike home at last, the personal lesson that Neville had urged. "Now you can appreciate how unwise you were to stand aloof.",

  Elliott bit his lip. "I do, but I'll know better next time. I'm going to train." His expression was resolute. "I'll start immediately. I'll put myself in MacPhail's hands. He asked me before, but I refused."

  This was a big thing for Elliott to do. MacPhail was two years younger and three classes behind him. It was not easy for a senior boy to defer to an intermediate like this.

  But Elliott was not thinking in terms of seniority, he was only thinking in terms of Thomas.

  "He might have drowned," he repeated, stricken, "my own little brother, and I wouldn't have known what to do."

  Gerry stared at Elliott. Even allowing that all these boys were brothers of Galdang together, there somehow seemed something she did not understand in Elliott's voice.

  "What do you mean?" she asked.

  Elliott lost his stricken look and looked almost ecstatic.

  "He is my brother—at least, he will be. Mr Manning told me this morning. I still can't believe it. I can't believe it of Mother and Dad."

  "What, Elliott? Tell me." Gerry was eager.

  Elliott was eager, too, but he was more eager just now to commence instruction. With a mumbled, "Later, Miss Prosset," he raced off to offer himself to MacPhail.

  Unable to wait until MacPhail released him again, which, knowing Ian, would certainly be another hour, Gerry raced up the cliff track.

  She got to the master house just in the wake of the four sinners and the H.M.

  Semple, who, like his colleagues, was a member of the Meadow House and had not yet set foot across the holy threshold of Galdang itself, at once observed the saint above the door, and stopped short.

  "That's a dreadful thing, sir," he said, "damage inflicted on a really fine piece of sculpture."

  Damien was not to be side-tracked. He had only one object in view.

  "There is to be more infliction," Gerry heard him remark drily, and, since she was the coward she was, Geraldine fled.

  CHAPTER XXV

  EXPLANATION did not come until a week later.

  All at once Geraldine found herself inundated with work, not the patently concocted tasks of Matron and Cook, but her own work, the importance of instilling primary information into the minds of twenty-odd more or less receptive six-year-old boys.

  Anyway, she thought, catching up one afternoon with her school programme, filling in the weather circles that in the novelty of spelling and numbers had been neglected by the boys, she would not have had an opportunity. Every evening, it seemed, Cynthia was there.

  So Cynthia, she told herself, if what Elliott had blurted out was true, had objected to a ready-made family Not that it had made any difference to Damien. He and Cynthia might not be destined to become Thomas's foster-parents, but they still, judging by Cynthia's constant attendance at Galdang, intended to become man and wife.

  She painted in yesterday's blue circle and regarded the chart with considering eyes. Now that the year was ending and the circles almost completed it would look better hung higher on the wall. Gerry carried across a chair.

  She was standing on it and searching for a suitable position when she heard steps behind her.

  "Just a minute, dear," she said over her shoulder, her arm still in the air.

  "That's the first time you have ever addressed me kindly," commented a voice, and Gerry stood still, not trusting herself to turn.

  They had been in just this
position, she remembered with a catch at her heart, the child Thomas between them, when Tom had said gravely that time, "You mustn't mind 'cause you're not like Miss French, Miss Prosset, you're more like a mother, the same as me Mum."

  She remembered how in spite of the boy beside them and five hundred boys outside as well there had suddenly been only the two of them, pinned there, waiting, and around them and all over the world, it seemed, nothing and nobody else.

  Did he remember, too? Did Damien remember? She waited, her heart standing still.

  Evidently Damien did not. After a moment he said coolly, "Mahomet has come to the mountain. It appears that I must give in first."

  "What do you mean?" She was scrambling down now unaided. She thought a little drearily, "The moment has gone—if it was ever there."

  He replied impatiently, "Elliott, of course, Elliott and Thomas and the Bethels. You must have been consumed with curiosity and yet you would not climb a hill to hear. You are, Geraldine, possibly the most stubborn of creatures."

  "Perhaps I learned from Elliott."

  "Perhaps you didn't. I interviewed Bethel and forbade

  him any more confidences." "why?,

  "Because I wanted to tell you myself."

  Gerry admitted, "I did come. It was that afternoon of the lifesaving episode." As she recalled the H.M.'s significant rejoinder to Semple her lips tightened in a disapproving line.

  "I see you do not approve of corporal punishment. Those, I find, who should have had it in their own youth seldom do."

  "We are not discussing me."

  "Oh, yes, we are, Geraldine. You come into all of this. Without you there would be no need for explanation. We shall begin with Thomas—and the Bethels. They are adopting him, as no doubt you have guessed."

  "I had not guessed until Elliott told me. Even then I thought it might only be a boy's eager chatter."

  He looked at her in puzzlement. "But that can't be right. You told me at the hotel in Sydney that you expected as much."

  She flushed vividly. "I had expected adoption but—but not with those parties."

  "You mean you thought the foster-parents would be—" He was looking at her eagerly.

  "Yes, I believed they would be Cynthia Trenning," she said, "and yourself."

  "Cynthia Trenning—" He echoed it hollowly. He looked at her with dawning enlightenment. "Oh, no, Geraldine," he said.

  She turned to him coldly. "Why not? She is always here, always up at the master house. She took a cottage to be near you. You took her everywhere, even"—her voice broke in spite of herself—"even there."

  "Where? Where, Geraldine?" he asked urgently.

  Gerry said, "Harvest Home Island," and, unable to face it any longer, she walked towards the door.

  She did not reach it. He crossed quickly and turned her back masterfully. His voice was husky when he spoke.

  "Not so fast, Miss Prosset. You've been avoiding me for months—ever since I came here, but this time you're not escaping me. This time, Geraldine, we're having this out. We'll leave the Bethels a moment and discuss Cynthia. What gave you the idea that she and I—" He paused.

  Angrily, she turned on him, all her pride forgotten.

  "Haven't I just told you—the constant attendance here, the Colonel's cottage, and then—and then there." She nodded beyond the window towards the island. Again there was that treacherous break in her voice.

  He put his hands on her elbows and pressed them against her sides. He held her at arm's length away from him, but she was still his prisoner. He spoke calmly and clearly as though to a child.

  "Cynthia Trenning's attendance here was never of my asking. Indeed, short of being downright rude, which today

  I was, I never could get rid of her. No need for you to look contemptuous and think of me as a gay Lothario, either, Geraldine, because Cynthia in her heart has never cared two hoots for me, and she, and I, and wise Aunt Isabel have known it all along. She's hopelessly spoiled—as you are. Like you, she was never disciplined enough. I only hope when Dennis marries her he will overcome that deficiency."

  "Dennis—Dennis Farwell?'

  "Who else? Surely that was obvious enough. They were attracted from the first, but right from the beginning Dennis made the error—a dangerous error when dealing with a girl like Cynthia—of wearing his heart on his sleeve. Cynthia should be ignored a little; like all women, mastered. Yes, Geraldine"—tightening his grip of her elbows as she stirred indignantly—"I said mastered."

  He waited a moment to let that seep in.

  "Because I took her current fancy, and because being unavailable made of me, I expect, a kind of challenge, I was temporarily put in Dennis's place. Temporarily, Gerry."

  "But Plimsoll, the Colonel's cottage—why did she go there?"

  "Why not? Wasn't it also close to Dennis? I don't say that Cynthia knew she was taking Plimsoll just to be near him, but I do say that she was obeying an instinct as old as the hills, as old as Mother Nature herself."

  There was a silence. In the distance Gerry could hear the boys at play, and at the back of their voices, sounding like the under-drag of the waves through shingle, the sigh of the sea.

  She knew a blur in her eyes. "You took her there," she choked, "to our island." She did not realize she had described it like that.

  Because of the blur she did not see the new light in his own eyes, the triumph, the gladness.

  "I did not take Cynthia to Harvest Home," he said distinctly. "Look at me, Geraldine, look at me and see that I never could take anyone—else there."

  Her eyes were swimming now, but not in anger. She kept them away from his probing glance.

  "Tell me about the Bethels, Damien," she asked him "They are adopting Thomas. I don't know how you're

  going to feel about that. It's really a matter of how much you love him. I love him enough to let him go. Do you?" "Do they really want him?"

  "Gerry, they need him That marriage needs a link if ever a marriage did. And Thomas is it. Olwen Bethel will take Tom back with her to Villamarine Island. He will not be enrolled here for another couple of years. By that time Elliott will be back home again from his university course, and any void Mrs. Bethel finds in parting with Thomas will be filled by her own son."

  "But," asked Gerry, "is that the right remedy?"

  "For some people," said Damien, "for people like the Bethels who have to have someone with them, it's the only remedy. And, who knows? in time they might be sufficient to each other. Somehow, I think they will. It has been a solution, also, for Elliott. Already, Mr. Dawson has reported, he has forged ahead with his lessons. Neville Carter gives a pleasing account of his sport. Elliott has been a lonely boy. Some children do not suffer from being an 'only', others do. Elliott Bethel has suffered all his life."

  "So we are to make the sacrifice," murmured Gerry, knowing a little amputation, thinking with a pang of small Tom.

  "I don't believe it's that, Geraldine." Damien was looking at her directly. "Remember our coffers are yet to be filled."

  He kept his eyes on hers. There was no denying that look. She felt the warm rush of her blood, and she glanced away.

  When she turned to him again she saw that the direct look had changed to one of frustration.

  "All this time wasted," he despaired. "I could shake Cynthia. She has come between me and my realization of you, and you, Geraldine, have let her. You were credulous, pigheaded, eager to believe the worst of me. You are as much to blame as Cynthia herself."

  "How could I know?" defended Gerry.

  Then hesitantly, a little quiveringly, "Damien, how can I know now?"

  For reply he released her and flung wide the door and pointed up to Galdang.

  "There is your answer. Will you come?"

  Breathlessly, she permitted him to lead her up to the master house. They climbed the hill without exchanging a word.

  At the entrance she stood puzzled and looked at him in inquiry. "Something seems different," she said.


  "It is different. Your saint has undergone some facial surgery. The nose is reconstructed, the teeth restored." "You had it repaired, Damien?"

  "Semple Senior sent up a mason as a gesture of gratitude to Galdang for saving the life of his son. It appears James wrote as he said he would, though whether he sat down to do it or not I have not discovered. Anyway, here is the evidence of his thanks."

  Gerry looked at her saint uncertainly. "I believe," she confided, "I preferred him as he was."

  Damien laughed.

  "Then have no regrets, he soon will be. There is a certain small fry you might have encountered, name of "

  Gerry said, "Mark Berry."

  This time they both laughed.

  Gerry paused a moment beneath the arms outstretched in benediction looking back on the wide blue sea.

  "Taking frozen meat, wheat, wool and apples," she whispered, remembering the Professor.

  "Bringing onyx and turtle fins, cinnamon and joss sticks," said Damien in her ear.

  They looked to Harvest Island, a faerie land, a lilac

  country, beckoning, inviting, promising nothing withdrawn. Then they looked to Galdang, Gerry's Barbary. "Barbary surrenders," whispered Damien gently. "I

  surrender, Geraldine."

  He pulled her to him, quietly at first, then closer with a demanding, almost savage tenderness.

  She stood in the circle of his arms a stilly moment, feeling the sweet flood of capitulation drowning all regrets.

  When she raised her eyes to his he read the answer to his unasked question.

  This girl who was now a woman had surrendered as well.