Virginia nodded. ‘That’s why I’m going to America. I’m going to have plastic surgery. Helen’s going to pay for it,’ she said, and realized how odd that sounded. It was natural that a mother should pay for a daughter’s operation. Natural, unless you knew what had happened between Virginia and Helen. ‘Did you know she had married an American?’
‘I heard about it. That’s nice for her.’
‘He’s very rich. Helen is going to send me to Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. I wanted to have it done in England, but Helen is so Americanized now that she doesn’t believe that any English surgeon could do it properly.’
They both laughed. ‘You know,’ Harold said, with a note of surprise, ‘after all these years, I’m really rather fond of your mother. I don’t remember the quarrels and bitterness now. I remember how bright and smart and attractive she was – always so much too poised for me. But that wasn’t her fault. It was mine. A rich American.’ He smiled. ‘Much more her style.’
He paused. Virginia thought about her mother, wealthy and discontented, running to fat and losing her looks from idleness; and about her father, finding out from Vivien what marriage could be, losing her, and plodding along in the wake of her guidance, with his hopes pinned on the two children who meant so much more to him than Virginia ever had.
After a while, her father said diffidently: ‘Do you want to tell me about the accident?’
‘Not now. There’s too much to tell. I don’t want to start telling you now when we’re only just getting to know each other again. I’ll tell you another time. When I get back to England. Helen thinks I’m going to stay in America, but I’m not. When it’s over, when I look human again, I shall go back to London and get a job.’
‘Will you really come and see me?’ Her father’s lined face looked younger and happier. Virginia could see what he must have looked like during the serene years with his wife.
‘If I may. It will be something to look forward to.’
They were silent for a while. Her father closed his eyes. Virginia switched off the pencil of light, and presently her father switched off his light too, and she thought he fell asleep.
In the darkness, his hand came over to her arm. ‘Jinny,’ he said, ‘I’ve no right to say this, no right at all. But the night is going by, and when the plane lands, you will go off with your mother, and I’m afraid of losing you. I don’t want to tie you down, and I don’t want to stand in the way of marriage for you –’
‘I’ve been married,’ Virginia said shortly. ‘He died three months ago.’
‘My God,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. How appalling that a man’s daughter should go through that, and he not know. You’re young and lovely, Jinny. There will be someone else. Forgive me. No one wants to hear that, but there will be. And until there is – won’t you please come and live with me, and be my daughter, and help me bring up my children?’
The stewardess passed quietly up the aisle like a night-nurse in a hospital, checking briefly but competently on her charges. When she had gone, Virginia said: ‘Yes, father. I’d like to.’
Soon after that, they fell asleep. They woke and smiled into each other’s travel-weary faces. They breakfasted together, talking easily. They were father and daughter travelling together, leaning close to each other to gaze down at fabulous Manhattan, looking like a collection of grubby child’s bricks perched precariously on end. Windows flashed in the morning sun. As they passed over the Hudson river, crawling with craft of all sizes, the Statue of Liberty waved at them with the hopeful, useless gesture of a stay-at-home woman watching the trains go by.
They dropped on to the runway. The plane braked, slowed, and gathered speed to run towards the buildings. As it approached, Virginia could see her mother clinging to the rail on the airport roof.
Helen wore a mustard-coloured suit. With one hand, she held on to a large blob of scarlet hat. No one but the woman Helen was nowadays would dress like that to meet a plane.
‘Is Helen there?’ Virginia’s father asked. ‘I’ll stay in the background. I don’t want to meet her, but I would very much like to see what she looks like.’
‘She’s not there,’ Virginia said. ‘She’s waiting for me at the house.’ It was going to be distressing enough for Helen to learn that Virginia was going to live with her father. This much at least Virginia could do for her. She could allow her to remain a bright, attractive memory, and not let her be exposed as a spoiled and selfish ageing woman who looked for contentment in money, and looked in vain.
The plane stopped. Virginia drew her scarf forward across her cheek and got up to join the people crowding to the exit, the people who had sat submissively in the plane for twelve hours, but now could not wait to get out of it.
Her father sat in his place, searching in his brief-case for his passport. He reached up, took Virginia’s hand, and held it for a moment to his lips.
‘Hurry back to England,’ he said.
To PRUDENCE
This electronic edition published in 2011 by Bloomsbury Reader
Bloomsbury Reader is a division of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 50 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DP
Copyright © Monica Dickens, 1956
First published by Michael Joseph 1956
The moral right of the author has been asserted
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ISBN: 9781448203147
eISBN: 9781448202812
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The Angel in the Corner Page 34