Checkmate

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Checkmate Page 10

by MARY HOCKING


  ‘And what did you do?’ the other woman asked, helping herself to toast.

  ‘I said, “Bring that piece of paper to me, William” in the sort of tone that William expected. I could see the rest of them hugging themselves with delight while I unfolded it, so I knew it was pretty pornographic. William’s drawing is improving, though; it was a nude woman holding a kettle and anatomically it was really quite good.’

  ‘Did you tell him that?’

  ‘Oh no. I just regarded it with all the horror they anticipated and then I said, “William! Have you ever seen a kettle like that? If you’re going to draw you must observe things more carefully. However would you pour water from a spout at that angle?” I went on about the inadequacies of William’s kettle until the others were bored to tears with the ruddy drawing.’

  Rhoda poured herself another cup of tea while the friend mused:

  ‘I feel sorry for the secondaries. We can just about cope with the little perishers, but imagine William at fifteen!’ She shuddered and held her own cup out for more tea.

  ‘I had a letter from William’s mother once,’ Rhoda remembered. ‘It began “You trouble-making old cow . . .” There are things I should miss if I gave up teaching.’

  ‘I don’t know why you’ve stayed in it so long,’ the friend said. ‘There’s so much else you could do with your brain.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Administration.’

  ‘And become like those damsels at the education office? God forfend!’

  The friend lit a cigarette as a preliminary to serious discussion.

  ‘I still think you should have gone away after Harry died. Why didn’t you?’

  ‘I’ve been asking myself that lately.’ Rhoda examined the table as though she might find an answer in the coarse grain of the wood. ‘I was happy in the cottage. But mainly, it was Anna that made me decide to stay. We got on so well and I felt that she needed me. Besides, she was Melita’s child.’

  ‘That was important?’

  ‘I’ve always felt I owed something to Melita. I was terribly mixed up when she came, strongly-sexed and anxious about it.’

  ‘Now you are no longer anxious?’

  ‘As you say. I realized, just by being with Melita, that I wasn’t in the least peculiar and that those turbulent emotions were not something of which to be ashamed. We didn’t talk about it, she would have been very embarrassed; she cured me without knowing that she was doing it. I don’t know whether we succeeded in converting her to the Christian faith, but she certainly saved me from puritanism.’

  ‘In which case, it’s a pity if you’re going to be repressed for her daughter’s sake.’

  ‘Oh, Anna and I have plans. We are going round the world when she’s twenty-one.’ Rhoda stirred her tea thoughtfully; it was almost black, but it didn’t seem to be curing her headache. ‘At least, that was the idea. But now I’m not sure that Anna still needs me. She might be able to manage on her own, and if she can, she should.’

  ‘But she can’t do anything, can she? At least, nothing that would earn her an honest penny.’

  ‘She’s quite artistic. She sews beautifully and I think she might be able to design.’

  ‘I wouldn’t call Anna “with it”.’

  ‘In some ways, she’s ahead of it. She has a strong colour sense. I’ve wondered lately whether it wouldn’t be better for me to spend the money I’ve saved for this world trip on sending her to an art school in London.’

  The friend exhaled smoke and regarded Rhoda through narrowed eyes.

  ‘And you?’

  ‘I should stay here. Don’t worry, I’m not being completely altruistic. I started teaching to earn money, but I’ve a dreadful feeling I’m hooked on it. If the prison doors opened I’m not sure I should want to walk out. I should have to marry, of course.’

  ‘So there’s hope for faithful Frank yet?’

  Rhoda frowned. Frank Lander was the head of her school, a quiet, gentle man whom she was afraid she might hurt if she married. She did not like to hear him laughed about, so she changed the subject.

  ‘None of this may happen; Anna and I may set off together yet. Now, tell me about your battle with the office over your opportunity class. Have you convinced them that you can’t run it on one-eighth of a teacher?’

  She half-listened while the friend talked; she made the right responses automatically. Her face was pale and there were sharp lines beneath her eyes; it was the last week of term, a time when one realized how stretched the nerves had become. She poured more tea. The last time she had been here she had sat on the terrace with Richard Oliver. The memory disturbed her. We don’t really grow more sensible as we grow older, she thought; we merely learn to cover up better.

  Later, when she was on her way back to her cottage, she drove past The Cod and Lobster. Richard Oliver was standing on the jetty talking to one of the fishermen. He was a part of the scene now, a burly figure in dark slacks and a loose blue jersey. He came across to her when she stopped the car.

  ‘I was hoping to see you,’ he said.

  ‘Hope has been rewarded.’ She switched off the engine and sat back, watching his face quizzically. He was not pleased by her response; like most men, he did not like the suspicion that he was being mocked.

  ‘Why not come down here and have a drink with me this evening?’ He was torn between irritation at her manner and the fact that he had a reason for wanting to see her. The invitation sounded calculated. Behind him the grey sea was still as glass.

  ‘I shall be much too tired to go out once I’m comfortably settled,’ she answered. ‘But you can come and have a drink with me if you like.’

  While he was thinking about this she drove away. As she turned the corner, she called out, ‘Any time after eight, if you decide to come.’

  She put him to the back of her mind while she prepared her meal. By the time she had finished eating and cleared away, it was half past seven. She changed her dress, washed, and brushed her hair. The light was fading, and silhouetted against the window she looked slight, almost insubstantial; the last rays of the sun caught her hair, making a red-gold halo round her head. She hummed softly to herself, ‘Vilia, oh Vilia, the witch of the wood.’ But when she switched on the table-lamp she saw herself as she really was, a crisp little person with a droll face dominated by clear, candid eyes. And yet, she thought, I am a witch at heart. How unfair life is!

  It was nearly dark when Richard Oliver came, but she did not put the light on at once in the sitting-room. The rain had cleared and it was warmer; through the open window they could smell the wet earth.

  ‘How nice this is!’ He looked round the dim room. ‘So comfortable, without any fuss. People must like coming to see you.’

  She bit back a flippant rejoinder; the moment had its magic which it would be a pity to spoil. One should always find time for a drink between the daylight and the dark, she thought; time to sit quietly without trying to resolve anything. The curtains moved slightly; the evening breeze stole into the room, barbed with the regret that seems to lie at the heart of all lovely things. She said softly, before regret should win:

  ‘Why did you come to me?’

  He looked at her and she sat quite still, looking back at him. He was very nearly hers in this moment.

  ‘To ask questions.’ There was regret for him, too, and bitterness. He liked himself less than when he had first come here.

  ‘Must you?’ she whispered.

  It was dark now, she could not see his face; she felt the magic fading, leaving behind only a sense of loss and disenchantment.

  ‘Curiosity is a disease with me,’ he said heavily.

  ‘Perhaps I can cure you.’

  ‘I’m incurable.’

  ‘Ah, never say that!’

  But the night wind said it. She got up and switched on the lamp. He shut his eyes as though the light hurt them. She closed the window and pulled the curtains; the room was suddenly a small bright box imprisoning them. Sh
e took his glass and her own and refilled them.

  ‘Now, let the interrogation begin.’

  He winced, ‘Please . . .’

  ‘Don’t worry; I intend to have my say. There are questions I want to put to you.’

  He looked at her warily; they were opponents now.

  ‘Your move,’ she said.

  He looked into his glass. Rhoda watched him. His face was blank and she thought that perhaps he was suffering; she was side-tracked by pity so that when he spoke she was unprepared.

  ‘How do you know that Melita is dead?’

  ‘Oh!’ She jerked her head back and then laughed without amusement. ‘You really are a professional, aren’t you?’

  He waited, watching her, his face expressionless. She said a little defiantly:

  ‘It’s generally assumed that she may be dead. Catherine has often said so . . .’

  ‘But you told Anna that it was so as a fact.’

  ‘It was better that Anna should think that her mother was dead.’ Rhoda spoke sharply, defending herself to herself. ‘Otherwise she would have built a dream around her, planning a reunion. We have enough disappointments when we grow up: at least I could spare her that one. I told her that I had had a letter informing me of Melita’s death. Anna was young at the time and she accepted it without question.’

  ‘And she didn’t tell the others?’

  ‘I said that it was a secret. We had several secrets.’

  They were silent. Richard looked down at the carpet, thoughtfully tracing the pattern; he looked tired and there were tight lines around his mouth. Rhoda watched him, wary of pity.

  ‘Didn’t you take rather a lot on yourself?’ he asked eventually.

  ‘Oh yes.’ She was ready for him this time. ‘It troubles me from time to time: lies are not easy to live with, it’s something of which we are made insufficiently aware when we are young. And yet in a sense, it wasn’t a lie. I was quite sure that Melita really was dead and I felt that it was important that Anna should know.’

  ‘Why are you so sure of this?’

  ‘She would never have abandoned Anna. I wanted Anna to believe that, because I wanted her to believe that Melita loved her.’

  ‘But she did abandon her, didn’t she?’

  ‘She would have come back for her as soon as she had the opportunity.’

  ‘You may have been quite wrong about Melita’s character. Has that occurred to you?’

  ‘I wasn’t wrong.’

  ‘But if she cared so much for Anna, wouldn’t it have been simpler to have taken the child with her in the first place?’

  Rhoda looked at him. He was not watching her, but sitting with his head turned slightly to one side examining the books on the shelf beside him. The studied casualness of the attitude told her that this was important to him. She wondered why. The only chance of finding out was to tell him what she knew, so she sat back in her chair and recalled the events of that distant summer.

  ‘Anna wasn’t home at the time. She was staying in Newquay with me and my parents. We had a holiday cottage there and we took Anna to give Melita a rest. She had not been at all well; there was a lot of tension at the farm and that may have affected her, Silas was anxious to buy a bookshop and Hester was fighting him all the way. In fact, he was in Bristol making enquiries about a bookshop there when Melita left.’

  ‘A hard time to leave her husband.’

  ‘Silas had made enquiries before. They never came to anything. Perhaps Melita couldn’t stand it any more. Or perhaps her man wouldn’t wait any longer. Who knows? But whatever happened, she would have got in touch with Anna if she had lived long, I’m sure of that.’

  ‘And she never got in touch with you?’

  He looked at her. There was no trust in his eyes; if she had been lying she was sure that he would have known.

  ‘She didn’t get in touch with me or anyone else. The story ends there. Life’s like that; it leaves a lot of loose ends.’

  ‘Sometimes the loose ends have to be drawn together.’

  He waited, and she sensed that she had been given an opportunity. It was her turn to ask questions now, and he might be prepared to answer some of them. But in the end, the advantage would be his. She finished her drink and put the glass down.

  ‘You’ve done all that you can do here,’ she said, ‘You’ve caused a bit of havoc, but you’ve come to the end of things now.’

  ‘And Anna?’ he asked. ‘What is to become of her?’

  ‘Anna will manage.’

  ‘What will happen to the farm?’

  ‘You should know more about that than I do. You did say you came from a firm of solicitors, didn’t you? Well, what happens when property is left to the male heir and there is no male heir? Whatever the answer, an unconscionable amount of time will pass in legal wrangling.’

  ‘It will be intolerable for Anna.’

  ‘Anna will manage. There’s steel in Anna.’

  ‘I’m not so sure.’

  ‘There’s nothing you can do.’ She stood up. ‘You’re an outsider. You’ve done well to survive this long; but there isn’t another move you can make. You’ve reached checkmate.’

  When she saw him out, she said, ‘It’s warmer. You can pack your bags tonight. Tomorrow will be a good day for travelling. The fine weather is coming back.’

  He looked up at the sky, which was cloudless and faintly hazy.

  ‘You think so?’

  Chapter Twelve

  The wind raided the french windows. There was something imperious about it, as though someone was demanding entry and would not be long denied. Catherine sat very straight in the middle of the couch; her head was still as though held in a vice, but her eyes looked round the room, expecting something to happen, hoping to forestall it. She looked at the antimacassar on the back of the winged armchair; it was a fine example of tatting and had a swan as centrepiece. She had never examined it carefully before, although it was so familiar; the swan had an exceedingly long neck, she was not sure whether it had always been as long as that. She switched her gaze sharply to the mantelpiece. Sure enough, the heavy serpentine clock had moved nearer to the edge. The wind buffeted the windows in a surge of frustration. Catherine looked at the angel which swirled above the clock, the angel was blowing a trumpet the end of which had been broken off. She was not sure how long the trumpet had been broken. Grit fell in the hearth and a little soot puffed into the room. She clenched her hands; they should have had the chimney bricked up long ago. Then, behind her, something clattered down. The shock brought her to her feet, but it was a moment or two before she turned round. The picture of old Martin Jory which stood on the side table had fallen forward on its face. She went across and righted it; Martin, she reflected, as she looked down at it, had always drunk too much. The wind knifed through the side window: they should have had the cracks sealed up, even the window itself, there were too many windows in this room. She began to pace up and down the room. Outside, the wind in the trees sounded like a great rushing stream bearing down on the house. Catherine came to rest in front of the french windows; she stood erect, her hands at her sides, as though defying the wind’s violence. Her face was smooth as wax; but after a moment her eyes focused more sharply and tiny cracks appeared on the forehead and between the eyes.

  Anna was sitting on the wicker seat beside the cedar. She sat still, her hands folded, her body relaxed and quiescent in the sober black dress, her head raised. Anna was not defiant: Anna offered herself to the wind’s violence. Catherine watched the wind tearing the strands of hair from the coil at the back of Anna’s head.

  The branches of the cedar swayed majestically while to the right an aspen twisted and turned and its leaves, caught in the sunlight, danced like a thousand castanets. Catherine put her hands to her temples and turned away.

  There was a knock on the front door. She stopped, rigid, not breathing. After a while the knock was repeated, a tentative, apologetic knock. Catherine smiled slyly, not deceived. T
here was the sound of footsteps shuffling across the hall. She ran to the drawing-room door and flung it open.

  ‘No!’ she cried. ‘No! Don’t let him in; you mustn’t let him in!’

  ‘Not let him in?’ Hester stared at her. ‘When I sent for him?’

  ‘You sent for him!’

  ‘What’s the matter? You look whishter than tatey water. It’s not the devil out there.’

  Hester fumbled with the heavy latch. Catherine watched, her breath hissing through slightly parted lips; as the door swung open, her face was momentarily transformed by a cold radiance.

  Then the old solicitor, Mr. Corder, came fussily in, a few strands of white hair standing up around his bald pate like a frill on a cake.

  ‘Nasty wind! Very nasty wind!’ He gave a wheezy cough to prove it. ‘I had to come through Pentive; there’s a tree blown across the Truro road.’ He coughed again. ‘Bad for my chest.’

  ‘I’ll give ’ee summat to cure that,’ Hester promised.

  Catherine glanced at the clock: four in the afternoon. She said severely, ‘I’ll put the kettle on.’

  Mr. Corder devoted his attention to Hester. ‘And I wouldn’t say no!’

  They went into the drawing-room and Hester took a bottle of whisky out of the cabinet. She placed two glasses on the top of the cabinet. The glasses were smeared and dusty, but Mr. Corder was too interested in the dose to be administered to trouble about that. Hester gave him a good dose. She poured its equal for herself; some of the whisky went on to the cabinet and a few drops spattered the carpet. The smell hung in the stuffy room. Mr. Corder put his brief-case on the floor and devoted himself to the whisky.

  ‘Ah! That’s better.’

  ‘Had it a long time,’ Hester told him. ‘Improves with keeping.’

  Mr. Corder did not ask its age.

  Hester held her glass cupped in her bony hands so that Catherine could not see how much she was drinking. Mr. Corder made a perfunctory gesture towards his brief-case.

  ‘I can’t tell you much as yet. It’s going to take a long time, Mrs. Jory. A very long time. You’ve got old Martin to blame for that.’ He shook his head and let go of his brief-case.

 

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