by Sara Seale
“Never mind,” he said indifferently. “Baba will sing to me about the white lily, won’t you, Baba? I wish Smithy had a migraine every evening.”
Dinner was pleasantly informal, for although Gaston brought in the dishes, Bart and Lucy waited on themselves. It was only then that Lucy remembered to enquire seriously as to the state of Smithers’ health.
“A fit of the sulks more likely,” Bart replied shortly. “He’ll be all right tomorrow.”
She remembered the cook saying that Smithers’ feelings had been hurt and enquired with casual amusement if Bart had been reprimanding him.
“Yes,” he replied, and she looked up at the familiar note of harshness in his voice. Her eyes were enquiring in the candle-light, but she asked no questions and he said deliberately:
“I had wished this matter to be closed between us, but in fairness to myself I have to tell you that it was Smithers who was responsible for the state of Marcelle’s room. I hadn’t set foot in it for years.”
“Smithers?” She sipped the wine which she now drank nightly to please him, wrinkling her forehead in perplexity.
“With his extraordinary mania for histrionics he’s evidently been weaving his own dramas up there. I’m having the stuff cleared out. I thought it had been done long ago.”
“Oh!” said Lucy, and wished she had not enquired. She had no desire for Marcelle’s ghost to disturb her newfound serenity.
“Shouldn’t that please you?” he asked impatiently.
“I—I don’t know. As you said yourself, I have no concern with that part of your life,” she replied gently.
They had reached the dessert stage and he began to peel an apple with the easy neatness which always fascinated Lucy. She watched now as the skin unwound into a complete shining spiral under his skilful fingers to fall in a delicate symmetrical pattern on his plate.
“I can never do that,” she said.
“Do what?” he answered absently, still pondering over her last remark.
“Peel an apple all in one. It looks so easy, but mine always ends in pieces.”
“Comes of carving people up,” he said with a grin, then regarded her thoughtfully.
“You’re a strange child,” he said. “You don’t conform to pattern at all.”
She looked enquiring.
“Is there a pattern?” she asked, without coquetry.
“Generally speaking, I should say. Women are demanding, I’ve found, and not content to be excluded. Where have you learnt your wisdom, Lucy Baa-lamb?”
She sat there eating grapes and considering. She would have liked to tell him that such little wisdom as she might be acquiring came largely from the rules he himself had set and which she was trying most scrupulously to follow, but she was unsure what lay behind his observations.
“You can’t,” she said gently, “be excluded from something you have never shared.”
“I suppose not,” he said, but he sounded uncertain and sat observing her reflectively as if she puzzled him.
“How long will you be satisfied with what I can offer you, Lucy?” he asked abruptly, and she twisted uneasily in her chair. This dawning intimacy, the delicate probing beneath the superficial, was disturbing.
“We made a bargain, Bart,” she answered carefully. “I have no reason for being dissatisfied with my share.”
He sighed and pushed back his chair, and the light from the guttering candles gave his face a strange expression.
“Unlike most women, you play fair,” he remarked with faint surprise. “Well, my dear, I hope I won't give you cause to regret your bargain. I'm not sure that of the two of us I haven’t got the better part.” He rose as he spoke and held out a hand to her. “Coffee in the library, and then I must do some work. Should you like me to drive you to Tintagel, or somewhere, on Sunday to make up for so many dull evenings?”
“Very much,” she said, but she knew in her heart that when Sunday came more important matters would intervene or he would simply forget.
They settled for the evening, she by the fire with her sewing, he at his desk in a little pool of lamplight. The wind had dropped at last, but the sound of the breakers rose and fell with their familiar crescendo and diminuendo. Lucy stitched absently, her thoughts rising and falling with the rhythm of the sea.
She looked up as she heard him give an exclamation of .impatience. He had taken off his horn-rimmed glasses and was rubbing his eyes irritably.
“Tired?” she asked, and would have liked to coax him to sit beside her near the fire.
“No concentration tonight,” he replied. “I’ve an extra early start tomorrow, so I think I’ll go to bed. Will you see to the lamps?”
“No, I’ll come up too,” she said, folding her work. “I feel sleepy now the wind has dropped.”
While he stacked his papers and then turned down the lamps, she pulled back the curtains and stood looking out at the night. The moon was nearly full and the terrace lawns lay bathed in radiance, the shadows sharp and clear where they dropped one below the other. It was beautiful and rather strange after the incessant battling of the elements.
“Are you taking a more kindly view of our wild Cornish coast?” he asked, and she was aware that he was standing close behind her, looking out over her head.
“It’s very beautiful,” she said. “I like your terraced lawns, Bart, they match the place, and you.”
“Do they? Abel tells me you want to grow flowers?” His hands rested lightly on her shoulders and she leaned her head for a moment against his breast, then a small picture crept, unbidden, into her mind of the flower-room and Marcelle singing her little French songs as she arranged great bowls of garden blooms.
“It doesn’t matter,” she replied hurriedly. “I didn’t know then—I mean—” She broke off in confusion and felt his hands tighten with ungentle pressure on her shoulders.
“Don’t be so damn’ self-effacing, Lucy!” he exclaimed roughly. “Why the hell shouldn’t you grow flowers if you want to? Give what orders you like, only don’t for God’s sake’, humor me!”
He let her go abruptly, and she turned, dismayed by the storm she had so unwittingly provoked.
“I’m sorry,” she said, swallowing nervously. “I’ll talk to Abel in the morning. Are you going up now?”
“Yes. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight,” she said gently, and turned back into the room to collect her needlework before following him to her lonely bed.
CHAPTER FIVE
I
BART was away for several days during the month of April. His consultations took him all over the Duchy and often into the next county, and Lucy was becoming used to his curt voice over the telephone informing her briefly that he would not be home that night. She was invariably disappointed, and Paul would tease her gently, although his blue eyes held a speculative look.
“It’s a shame,” he said once. “You aren’t getting much of a break, are you?”
“What do you mean?” asked Lucy in surprise.
“Well, no outings, no honeymoon, even. Devotion to work can be carried too far.”
“That’s Bart’s affair,” said Lucy quietly. She had become so used to Paul as part of the household that she was apt to forget that he, as well as the servants, probably guessed at the true state of affairs between them.
“You can’t put me in my place as easily as that, Lucy Locket,” he said with engaging impudence. “Bart has deputed me to amuse you in his absence, so you mustn’t mind if I sometimes become personal. What shall we do today?”
It became a familiar question, and Lucy had to admit that she was grateful for the young man’s company. Those vaguely suggested Sunday expeditions had never materialized, and it was Paul who took her to Tintagel and Land’s End and treated her to lobster teas in the little fishing town of Merrynporth where he lived. The town, with its steep cobbled streets and quayside smelling of fish and seaweed and the fishermen’s tarred nets, fascinated her. She loved to browse round in the j
unk shops buying anything odd or colorful that took her fancy, and Paul would enquire with a grin if her pieces of junk were intended to share the cabinets which housed Marcelle’s valuable collection of French china. He was a gay, diverting companion, but he would not take Lucy to his home.
“Why? I’d like to see where you live,” she said, then wondered with embarrassment if he was ashamed of it.
On one occasion he had hurried her into a nearby cafe, having seen his aunt on the other side of the street, and when Lucy protested that she would like to meet Aunt Minnie, he replied impatiently:
“For heaven’s sake why? She would freeze on to us for the rest of the afternoon and bore you to tears with her senseless chatter.”
“Perhaps she’s lonely,” Lucy said, and wondered if she ought to call on Aunt Minnie, since her nephew was employed at Polvane, but, when she suggested it, Paul at once extracted a reluctant promise that she would not do so.
“My aunt has never been on visiting terms at Polvane,” he said. “She’d send Bart round the bend for one thing. She’s a very silly, gossipy sort of woman who can keep nothing to herself, and—” he gave her a sidelong glance—“I don’t imagine you want your and Bart’s affairs broadcast half round Cornwall.”
Lucy frowned over the coffee which she did not want and which had undoubtedly come out of a bottle.
“You don’t sound very fond of her,” she said, ignoring the innuendo in his last remark.
“One can’t command affection,” he retorted. “Were you fond of your aunt?”
“Yes, I think so. She was kind in her way, though we hadn’t much in common.”
“Aunt Minnie and I have nothing in common—nothing at all, and there you have it. You have no conception, Lucy, how galling it is to be tied to a weak woman who won’t let you go. I have no money and no prospects and with poor Aunt Minnie round my neck, no chance of ever cutting loose.”
“You could get a better job,” she said gently, and saw his weak mouth twist into the lines of discontent which so ill became it.
“My health has always been my handicap,” he said gruffly. “I had rheumatic fever badly as a boy and it’s left me with a bit of a heart. They wouldn’t take me for National Service, you know.”
Her eyes were compassionate. He looked so healthy, so typical of the golden, clean-limbed young heroes of fiction that it was difficult to think of him handicapped by health and a foolish, clinging woman without the ability to help him.
“I’m sorry,” she said gently. “I—I hope Bart makes it worth your while.”
“Oh, he’s generous enough,” he answered carelessly. “Actually he pays me far more than the job is worth, but it’s hardly a man’s occupation, acting nursemaid to a kid of seven, is it?”
“I suppose not. What will you do when Pierre goes to school?”
He looked round him uneasily, as if the buzz of feminine chatter and the rattle of crockery suddenly irritated him.
“Has anything been said about that?” he asked, frowning.
“Only indirectly. I think Bart is still undecided whether to send him to a preparatory school first, or not, but I think he should.”
“You’re not working against me, are you, Lucy?”
She looked surprised.
“Of course not, but Pierre’s future must be considered first. I think it would be unfair to the boy to let public school life be his first introduction to the world at large. If he lives in seclusion at Polvane until he’s thirteen or so, he’ll be utterly unprepared for the rough and tumble of school.”
“I advised you against a prep school.”
“You did?”
“Yes. You must have seen for yourself that Pierre and his father don’t get on too well. I think that if the boy is sent away too young, the gap will widen. Bart saw that point.”
She sat considering, an uneasy pucker between her eyebrows. There was some flaw in his argument, she felt, but she could not put her finger on it.
“Don’t try to talk Bart into anything, my sweet,” he told her softly. “You won’t succeed, in any case, if his mind’s made up.”
“I think we’d better be going,” she said a little flatly. The day which had begun, like so many others, with a holiday spirit, seemed to be ending for Lucy with that uneasy sense of puzzlement that was becoming familiar.
Her pleasure upon getting home to find that Bart had returned unexpectedly soon from a trip which should have extended to another twenty-four house was so spontaneous that she forgot to be shy with him.
“How pretty you look, and how young,” he observed, regarding her with fresh eyes. “My young cousin evidently takes my instructions seriously.”
“Did you really tell him he was to amuse me when you weren’t here?” she asked, flushing at his rare compliment.
“Why not? It relieves my conscience to know that you aren’t being neglected in my absence.”
“Have you got a conscience, Bart?” she asked, and he looked quite surprised to find she was gently teasing him.
“Oh, yes, quite a considerable one,” he replied gravely. “Have you enjoyed your afternoon?”
“Y-es,” she said doubtfully. “We met Paul’s aunt—at least we didn’t, because he rushed me into a cafe as soon as he saw her. He doesn’t seem to lead a very happy life, does he?”
“Is that what he tells you?”
“No, not in so many words. But this aunt—and his health—well, it must be tough when you’re only twenty-six.”
His brows rose.
“There are tougher things in life,” he observed dryly. “So Paul’s been showing you the sights? I hope you’re taking more kindly to the Duchy as a consequence.”
“I never disliked Cornwall,” she said mildly.
“Only Polvane?” he suggested, then smiled as he saw the look of consternation on her face. “Never mind, Lucy, no one would blame you; your home wasn’t of your choosing, was it? I’m going in to my consulting-room latish tomorrow morning, and I’ll give you a lift in to St. Minver, if you like. You can have a prowl round the shops and buy yourself a new frock, or something. Would you like that?”
It was his way of making amends for his negligence, she supposed, and wanted to assure him that she expected nothing from him, but she only smiled and thanked him politely.
Breakfasting with him the next morning, she realized with surprise that it was the first time she had partaken of that particular meal of the day with him, and he behaved as she imagined all husbands must, engrossed in the morning paper while he let his coffee get cold. Lucy poured it away and filled the cup again and he looked up in some surprise at seeing her and asked why she was down so early.
“You offered me a lift in to St. Minver—remember?” she said, and he removed the glasses from his nose with a rueful grin.
“So I did,” he said. “You were to find yourself something in the shops.”
“I don’t really need anything,” she said. “You’ve been very generous as it is.”
“It’s a husband’s duty to clothe his wife,” he told her severely. “And haven’t you found out yet, Lucy Baa-lamb, that the things you don’t need are the most fun to buy?”
“I didn’t,” Lucy said meekly, “think husbands understood that point of view.”
“Didn’t you, now? Well, perhaps you have something to learn as well as I.”
She smiled, taking simple pleasure in waiting on him, pouring his coffee, passing him toast and marmalade, glad that there was no Smithers seeing attentively to his needs. Smithers had not yet forgiven her for being the innocent cause of Bart’s fresh and uncompromising instructions concerning the late mistress’s bed-room, and he still treated Lucy with offended dignity.
“It’s rather pleasant being waited on by you, Lucy,” Bart observed, but when she told him she would be glad to do so every morning, he only frowned and retorted that most days there was no time for chatter over the breakfast table.
He had little to say, either, as he drove at his
usual breakneck speed into St. Minver. Lucy would have liked to idle along the lanes this bright April morning, but Bart never had time or inclination for dalliance, and he dropped her now in the town’s centre and drove away to his consulting-rooms.
She stood for a moment in the little grey square feeling rather lost. It would have been nice, she thought wistfully, to have had a date for coffee with a girl friend and exchange news and look in shop windows together, but Miss Heap had not encouraged friendships and Lucy knew no one in the town.
“Why, Lucy! Lucy Lamb—or should I now address you as Mrs. Travers?” a voice exclaimed, and it took Lucy a moment to realize that the elderly woman who had stopped her was the matron of the hospital. The only time Lucy ever remembered seeing Mary Morgan out of uniform was at her wedding, nearly two months ago.
“How do you do, Matron?” she said, and suddenly knew an aching desire to hear news of the children’s ward, to experience even at second hand the warmth and welcome of the ward and remember the shrill young voices chanting: “Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?”
“How are they all—the children?” she asked eagerly. “I suppose they are all a fresh lot, now. Did the little girl with mastoids have to stay long? And how did the boy with the amputation manage his artificial limb?”
Matron smiled, but her shrewd, rather tired eyes had unspoken questions of their own. She had often, in the last two months, spared a thought for little Lucy Lamb and wondered how that marriage was faring.
“You should come to see us, Lucy. You’ll always have the freedom of the children’s ward. We miss you,” she said.
“Do you—do you really?” Lucy sounded so surprised—and so highly gratified, too, that Mary Morgan laughed.
“Indeed we do,” she said. “You have a way with children. Few of my more experienced nursing staff can soothe a frightened child as you could. And now what of your favorite patient—little Pierre?”
“He’s wonderful,” Lucy replied. “Quite strong again and much less nervy and temperamental, but Bart will have told you, of course.”