‘We didn’t see you – had no idea you were there.’ It was Uncle Edward with Teddy, who emerged from the shadows of a large tree.
‘I got him!’ Teddy was exultant. He picked up the rabbit by its hind legs; there was scarlet blood on its white stomach. He swung it round in the air. ‘My first this hols!’
Christopher looked from father to son. Uncle Edward was smiling indulgently, Teddy was beaming. Neither of them thought it in the least horrible, which he knew it was.
‘A good clean shot,’ Uncle Edward was saying.
‘He screamed,’ Christopher blurted, and felt tears scorching his eyes. ‘It can’t have been that clean.’
‘He won’t have felt anything, old boy. It was too sudden.’
‘Oh, well, he’s dead now, isn’t he?’ his voice sounded artificial, even to him. ‘Got to go,’ he muttered, turning away just as the tears spurted out of his eyes, and broke into a run. He scrambled over the gate and momentarily looked back. They were walking away from him, towards the bank by his wood: they were going to try and kill more. A fox might have got it, but it would have needed it. They were doing it for some damn stupid idea of fun; the rabbit meant nothing to them. If he was living in his wood, he would have bows and arrows and he would kill rabbits from time to time, but it would be for food, like the fox. Not that that made it any better for the rabbit. He was walking now that he’d got well away from them in the smaller field where there was not a rabbit to be seen. No wonder it was difficult to watch any wild animals unless you waited for ages; they knew people were awful and quite sensibly ran or flew away from them. He tried to think about death – it happened to everything, of course, in the end, but making it happen was probably wicked, well, it was murder, which people got hung for if they just killed one other person, but got medals for in wars. He would be a pacifist like a boy’s father at school and he’d rather be a vet than a doctor any old day because it seemed that animals didn’t have enough people on their side. Then, because he saw a Painted Lady, he remembered how he’d killed butterflies last year just to collect them and he had honestly to admit to being a bit of a murderer himself. The fact that he didn’t want to do it any more was only because he’d got all the kinds that were in this part of the country, so there was nothing very marvellous about stopping. He was no better than his cousin, who was, after all, a year younger – only fourteen. But if he was serious about not murdering things, he ought to give away his collection. This was a horrible thought: Mum had given him a collector’s chest with twelve shallow drawers, and he’d only just got everything properly arranged, with each specimen set on pale blue blotting paper and a little white ticket to say what each one was. Perhaps he needn’t give the chest away as well and he could use it for collecting something else. The point was, he loved the butterflies and wanted to keep them, but he could also see, rather uncomfortably, that that wasn’t the point. It was no good saying you were against something if you went and did the opposite. He wondered whether being a pacifist would turn out to be like this, only worse; he didn’t know much about what it entailed, except that Jenkins got ragged about having a father who was one. He supposed he’d be bullied about it, but he was used to that: they already bullied him about his father being the school bursar. Perhaps he could put off being a pacifist until he left school, and just begin by being against people killing animals for any reason except when they needed to eat them? That certainly meant giving away the butterfly collection. Giving the chest away with it would hurt his mother’s feelings. There he went again; it might, but the point was, he wanted to keep the chest. ‘Admit it!’ he said furiously aloud.
‘Admit what? Hallo, Christopher! Are you coming to the museum meeting? It’s happening now in the old hen-house. You are cordially invited to attend.’
It was Polly. He’d gone into the stable yard of Home Place without thinking because he’d always stayed there before. Polly was sitting on the wall that led to the kitchen garden. She wore a bright blue dress and was eating a Crunchie. His mouth watered.
‘Want some?’ She held the bar waveringly down to his mouth. ‘That was a pretty large bit.’
He nodded. When his mouth was less full, he said, ‘I missed tea.’
‘Oh, poor you!’ She gave him the rest of the bar. So then he felt he had to go to the museum meeting.
When Rupert got back to Home Place to put the car away, he could hear Mrs Tonbridge making a scene in the flat above the garage that the Brig had so misguidedly built for them. He could hear her yelling even before he switched off the engine. Then there was the sound of a piece of china being smashed and, after a moment, Tonbridge emerged in his shirt-sleeves looking more pinched and gloomy than usual. He stopped and stood in the doorway at the foot of the stairs, then took a cigarette from behind his ear and lit it. His hands were shaking. Rupert, who had been collecting bathing towels from out of the boot, pretending not to have heard anything, straightened up and greeted him.
Tonbridge, with one expert movement, pinched out the cigarette and put it back behind his ear. ‘Good evening, Mr Rupert.’ The boot was still open. ‘I’ll take the lunch in, sir.’ He hadn’t been able to eat any of the awful tea Ethyl had provided him with, with her blinding on about the country being too quiet and, anyway, everything fried kicked up his ulcer something wicked, which well she knew and much she cared. Mrs Cripps would give him a nice cup of tea and a fairy cake before he went off to fetch Miss Rachel from the station. Rupert, who guessed that he would do anything to get away from Mrs Tonbridge, took one end of the handle of the heavy wicker picnic basket and they marched with it to the kitchen back door. Rupert walked around to the front. The door of his father’s study was open and he began calling as soon as he heard Rupert’s steps.
‘Hugh? Edward? Which one of you is it?’
‘It’s me, Dad.’
‘Oh, Rupert. The very feller I wanted to see. Come in, my boy. Have a whisky. Shut the door. I wanted to have a word with you.’
‘Darling, eat your cake.’
‘I suppose if I can’t have it, I’d better.’ Then she saw Rachel’s eyes cloud with comprehension and pain and added quickly, ‘Don’t mind me. I always feel blue when you go.’ She broke off a piece of the walnut cake with her fork and ate it. ‘I meant it would be quite nice to be able to take it to eat on the bus on the way home.’
Rachel’s face cleared. ‘Why don’t you? Better still, have another piece for the bus. Have mine. I don’t want it a bit.’
They were sitting in Fuller’s in the Strand, having tea before Rachel caught her train to Battle. She had been up for the day, attending a meeting that was called to raise funds for her Babies’ Hotel. That had been in the morning, and she had met Sid for lunch – a picnic of ham and rolls and apples consumed amid the dust sheets at Chester Terrace. The house was shut for the summer, with only old Mary caretaking in its vast and cavernous basement. Afterwards, they had walked in the Park, arm in arm, discussing, as they nearly always did, the problems of the holidays and Evie’s health and state of mind, and the consequent difficulties of Sid coming down to stay. It had been finally determined that Rachel should sound out the Duchy about the possibility of Evie coming too, if the conductor for whom she worked as a secretary went on tour and did not need her.
‘Walnut cake reminds me of going back to school,’ Rachel now said. ‘The Duchy used to take me out to tea, but I always felt homesick and I couldn’t eat anything. So do have it,’ she added.
‘Righty-ho.’ Sid picked up the piece, wrapped it in the paper napkin, and put it in her battered bag. Rachel had been eating or rather not eating a piece of buttered toast.
‘You know I’d stay up if I possibly could.’
You possibly could, thought Sid, if you weren’t so damnably unselfish.
‘My darling, I’ve come to accept that you live for others. It’s just that – sometimes – I wish that I could be one of them.’
Rachel put down her cup. ‘But you couldn’t ever be!’ T
here was a silence, her face flooded with colour that slowly ebbed away as Sid watched. Then, in a voice that was both casual and unsteady and not looking at Sid, she said, ‘I’d always rather be with you than anyone in the world!’
Sid found she was unable to speak. She put her hand over Rachel’s, then, meeting those troubled innocent eyes, she winked and said, ‘Oy, oy! We must catch your blasted train.’
They paid for their tea and walked without speaking to Charing Cross to the platform barrier.
‘Want me to see you off?’
Rachel shook her head. ‘It’s been such a lovely day,’ she said, and tried to smile.
‘Hasn’t it just? Goodbye, my darling. Mind you ring.’ She put two fingers on Rachel’s face, stopped for a moment when she reached her mouth to receive the minute trembling kiss. Then she turned clumsily away and walked out of the station without looking back.
‘The fact is, my dear, that it’s jolly unfair. We’re the only ones who aren’t allowed grown-up supper.’
‘Wills isn’t.’
‘Wills! He hardly exists! He’s not even a child.’
‘Well, we don’t have to have supper with him. And I quite like him, anyway. He is my brother,’ she added.
‘Oh, he’s all right as far as he goes. But it doesn’t alter the fact that it’s jolly unfair. Even Simon has dining-room supper and he’s only twelve. You have to admit that there’s not much justice there.’
‘No, there isn’t. Pass the soap.’
They were sitting in each end of the bath, not washing. Clary’s plate lay on the mahogany shelf by the tooth mugs. Their backs were pink from the sun, with white marks from their bathing dresses. The soles of their feet were dark grey from not wearing sandals. Polly scrubbed her flannel with soap and began to wash a foot.
‘We should stop washing as a protest,’ said Clary.
‘I’m only washing the bits that are dirty, only my feet, in fact. Mummy always inspects them.’
Clary was silent. Zoë wouldn’t dream of bothering with her feet and Dad wouldn’t notice. In some ways this was better, and in some ways worse. Polly looked up, and recognising Clary’s silence, said quickly, ‘It was a jolly good meeting. Christopher was super. Think of having all those butterflies. It was a good idea of yours to make him Curator of the Natural History section.’
‘And if Louise doesn’t like it she can lump it.’
Without a word, Polly got out of the bath and wrapped herself in the threadbare bath towels that the Duchy felt were good enough for children.
‘You haven’t washed your other foot!’
‘I don’t want to stay in the bath with you. You’re too horrible. First you’re against everybody, then poor old Wills, and now Louise. You’re getting like Richard III.’
‘I’m not!’ When Polly didn’t reply, she said, ‘I’m really not. Give me your other foot. I’ll wash it for you.’
‘How do I know you’re not going to drag me off my balance? You’re in a very treacherous state of mind. I don’t trust you as a matter of fact.’
Polly was perfectly right, of course. She was horrible. Angry things just mounted up in her until some of them had to come out – an explosion of nastiness – and then she felt awful, like now, ashamed and confused to be so much worse a person than Polly, who never seemed to have bad feelings about anything and certainly not about people. ‘I wouldn’t drag you,’ she muttered. Her eyes were full of scorching tears. A grey, horny foot was thrust over her left shoulder.
‘OK,’ Polly said. ‘Thanks.’
Clary washed with tremendous care. ‘I’m trying not to tickle,’ she said humbly, when Polly wriggled.
She didn’t want to be too nice, which would make Clary cry more, so she said, ‘I know you are.’
‘I bet Jesus tickled the disciples’ feet when He washed them. There were so many of them, He would have got careless.’
‘Bet they didn’t dare laugh, though. Have you noticed how in books people do things with hair that you never could do?’
‘Like what?’
‘Well, like Mary Magdalene drying Jesus’s feet with it, or heroines embroidering handkerchiefs. I bet when you ironed them the hair would just sizzle away. And Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair. You couldn’t climb somebody’s hair like a rope – it would be agony.’
‘I suppose it’s just that in books you can say what you like.’
‘They ought to stick to real things,’ Clary said, getting out of the bath. ‘When I’m a writer, I shall. I shan’t write any old nonsense that doesn’t work.’
‘You are so lucky having a career! Don’t forget your plate.’ Clary looked at the plate. One minute she was lucky, the next minute, the reverse.
‘I was going to forget it,’ she said sadly. ‘You might have shut up about it.’
‘Put it in,’ advised Polly. ‘Then take it out again, and I won’t say anything. That’ll be sort of true.’
Clary picked it up and put it in with an audible click. Then she took it out again. Then she looked at Polly. ‘You wouldn’t do that,’ she said. ‘You’d stick to the truth.’
Their eyes met, and Polly said, ‘Sorry! I suppose I would. But you don’t have to wear it.’
‘But if you had, you would.’ She put the plate back in. ‘I admire your character enormously,’ she said even more sadly. The plate hurt immediately: it really spoilt meals. She picked up her towel and sneezed.
‘You won’t have to wear it for ever, and I think you’re frightfully brave about it. You’ll end up as beautiful as the day.’
‘But not good, like all those princesses in the books. More likely to be a wicked ugly sister. Or cousin.’
‘Tell you what. When they’ve started their dinner, let’s take our supper to the orchard and have a midnight feast in the tree.’
‘That’s a brilliant idea! We’ll have to wait till they’ve said goodnight to us. We’ll have to pretend to eat the food and hide it in our beds, and then go out.’
They were friends again.
Rupert fairly reeled out of his father’s study, started to go upstairs to Zoë, and then changed his mind and went to the drawing room, which he knew would be empty since the Duchy never used it until after dinner. It was cool and full of the comfortingly familiar scent of sweet peas: the Duchy adored them, and there were always large bowls crammed with them about the house in the summer. The blinds were still drawn against the sun: the Duchy, who lamented the room not facing north, kept it well shrouded until all danger of sunlight had passed. He went to the window and released the blind, which flew up with a snap revealing a tumultuous orange and purple sunset and, as he watched, a train, like a small black toy, puffed steadily from right to left in the distance. He badly wanted to talk to somebody, but not to Zoë since he could imagine exactly what she would say and it would not resolve his dilemma. ‘The Brig has asked me to join the firm.’ ‘Oh, Rupe! What a marvellous idea!’ ‘He has only asked me to consider it. I haven’t made up my mind.’ ‘Why ever not?’ And so on. She would see it only in terms of a relief from financial anxieties. She would not for one moment consider what it would be like to stop being a painter of any kind, and become a businessman – something he would dislike and be no good at. On the other hand, it wasn’t as though he was painting much now, anyway: in term time he was too fagged from teaching all day and the holidays were more or less spent with, or on, Zoë and the children. It was certainly true that their car was absolutely on its last legs and, due to Clary’s extremely expensive dental treatment, he could see no way of getting a new one in the foreseeable future. And when Zoë could drive, she would want a car more than ever.
If he joined the firm, he wouldn’t have to worry about things like getting a new car. He could paint in his holiday. No, he couldn’t. He’d only get a fortnight a year, plus Christmas and Easter, and if he couldn’t manage to paint in the long school holidays, he certainly wouldn’t manage in one short one. Zoë would expect to be taken somewhere exotic – s
kiing or something like that. He thought fleetingly of the Sunday painters, and even more fleetingly of the lengths to which Gauguin had gone to be a painter. Perhaps I’m not a real painter at all, he thought. It needs to be put first, and I never do that. Better to give it all up. He wished that Rachel was back from London. She would be the best person to talk to. Either of his brothers might have views either way about it that preempted them from giving him good advice. ‘Don’t expect you to make up your mind at once,’ the Brig had said. Think about it. Serious decision. I needn’t say how delighted I should be if you agree, though.’ The poor old boy was having to give it up by degrees, although he’d fight his blindness all the way. He didn’t want what he described as outsiders. But it was difficult to go into a job feeling that your greatest, if not only, asset was that your name was Cazalet. The drawing-room grandfather clock struck seven. He’d have to go up if he wanted a bath before changing.
He’d planned not to say anything to Zoë, who was lying on their bed reading yet another novel by Howard Spring, but when he went to kiss her forehead and greet her she simply said, ‘Fine, thank you,’ without taking her eyes from her book.
Some childish urge to startle her, get her attention, made him say, ‘The Brig has asked me to join the firm.’
She dropped her book on her stomach. ‘Oh, Rupe! What a marvellous idea!’
The Cazalet Chronicles Collection Page 27