Susan Settles Down

by Molly Clavering

  Cissie, evidently the youngest, became rather painfully skittish at once, and made allusions to the Navy, and Susan saw Oliver wince as she uttered the loathsome word “middy.”

  “And what boats were you on?” she continued. Oliver replied that he had served in several ships; and then Susan’s own turn came.

  Miss Bell Pringle, the eldest and the blue-stocking of the remarkable sisters, opened fire. “I hear that you write, Miss Parsons. Are you the author of ‘Partners for the Lancers’? Such a pretty story.” Susan did not at all dislike being asked about her book, for it was pleasing to discover that anyone had heard of it; but the question when accompanied by the dreadful expression “a pretty story,” was more annoying than flattering. Even as she acknowledged the novel to be hers, she could guess what was coming.

  “We have a cousin who writes, you know. Such a gifted woman. Of course, not novels”—this in a tone which relegated novels and their miserable authors to some lower plane of intelligence—“articles for really good periodicals. The Scrutator and so on. I always feel I could write a book myself if I had time.”

  Susan bit back the retort: “Try it, and see if it’s as easy as you seem to think!” and smiling wanly, murmured a more suitable reply.

  “You must join our Literary Club this winter,” said Miss Pringle more graciously than ever. “We meet at a different member’s house each fortnight, to read our own compositions, and we have a little friendly criticism—so helpful, we all find it—and tea. I feel sure you would enjoy it, Miss Parsons and find it useful to you in your work.”

  Susan felt perfectly certain that she would not, and registered a mental vow that nothing short of brute force would drag her to the meetings where tea and criticism were so freely mingled. But by this time they had reached the door of Reiverslaw, and even horror at the prospect of a winter spent in dodging Miss Pringle’s invitations had to yield to curiosity as they entered the house.

  Susan’s anticipations of Jed Armstrong’s abode had prepared her for one of two alternatives. Either it would be full of heavy Victorian furniture, stuffy hangings, and quantities of ugly valueless trifles left in their places because his mother had put them there; or it would be bare and comfortless, a dwelling used only as a shelter for sleeping and eating.

  Her lively imagination had misled her, for the reality was like neither of these pictures. Reiverslaw was furnished in a completely harmonious fashion which made it difficult to pick out details, the general effect being entirely satisfactory and pleasing to the eyes. Tea was ready in the dining-room, comfortably set out on the table. The room was small. Coloured prints, a series of hunting recollections by Aiken, hung on the walls, and there was a set of fine Hepplewhite chairs. The silver was old and well-cared for, the china of good design. There were sandwiches as well as the large scones and solid cakes which Susan had expected, and China tea. It was all quite unlike Jed Armstrong as she knew him, and she had the irritating feeling that she was mistaken in her judgment of this big bluff man with his sneaking fondness for practical jokes.

  The sitting-room, to which they wandered after tea, was another surprise. Walls, curtains and chair-covers were all in autumn colourings of brown and buff, with an occasional hint of soft orange or blue, yet nothing about it bore the obvious stamp of the professional interior decorator. Low book-cases were filled with heavy old calf-bound Volumes, gazetteers, works on farriery, and the like, long out of date. Probably they were never opened now, and had hardly been looked at for generations but they added a last touch of mellow colour to the room. There was a high oak dresser on which were ranged a few bits of good china, a handsome Toby jug among them, and two beautiful little pieces of lustre-ware; but that it was no show apartment, used only when visitors were there, could be seen from the large wireless set lurking in a corner, the deep, rather worn arm-chairs, the pipes and tobacco-jar on a small table, and the atmosphere which hangs about a frequently occupied room.

  “Do you like it?” asked her host.

  Afraid that her wandering eyes had betrayed more astonishment than was altogether polite, Susan said that she found it delightful.

  He nodded. “I rather like it myself,” he said. “Not that it was all my idea. It was really partly—”

  The high imperious voice of a Miss Pringle broke in, piercingly shrill: “And what news have you of Mrs. Holden?”

  3

  Susan, turning from a closer inspection of the lustre jugs, saw that Peggy Cunningham’s sensitive face had clouded a little, and that she darted an indignant look at the questioner. Astonished, she glanced at Jed, but he was answering with absolute composure.

  “She was quite well when I last heard from her,” he said.

  And Peggy, who had been listening with forced politeness to a long monologue by the eldest Miss Pringle, now said in her clear tones, evidently determined to change the subject.

  “But if you believe in spirits, Miss Pringle, why not in the fairies too?”

  “Yes,” chimed in Oliver. “Spare us the fairies! This country is so full of stories about them that it would be ungrateful to deny their existence.”

  “Conan Doyle said—” began Peggy, only to be cut short by a maddeningly indulgent smile, a bony hand playfully raised.

  “Dear little Peggy! Always so enthusiastic! But I’m afraid your zeal carries you away, my dear. And I do not altogether agree with Conan Doyle,” said Miss Pringle. “In fact, I think I may say that I have gone farther in my experiences than Conan Doyle.”

  She looked round the room as if defying anyone to contradict her, but her statement passed unchallenged, since none of her audience could know exactly how far these mysterious experiences had gone.

  “But—fairies—” said poor Peggy, still clinging to her belief in what had been a living delight of her not far distant childhood.

  “I believe in them firmly, Peggy,” Susan said, boldly entering the lists under Miss Pringle’s supercilious stare. “Nothing would persuade me to do anything to annoy them. I never touch their trees—”

  Miss Pringle uttered the high, unamused cackle of laughter which she used to indicate boredom or displeasure. “How charmingly naive of you, Miss Parsons. Do you mean to tell me that you never pick hawthorn?”

  “Never,” Susan said firmly. And spurred by the joyful thought that if Miss Pringle continued to disapprove of her she might cease to be considered eligible for the Literary Club, she added: “I never pick hawthorn, or blackthorn, or rowan. I don’t even like to pick broom since I read the ballad of Young Tamlane, when the queen of the fairies spoke ‘out o’ a bush o’ broom’.”

  “Really!” ejaculated Miss Pringle. “Now I make a point of filling the house with hawthorn and blackthorn blossom as long as they are in season, and I never even heard that about broom.”

  “How strong-minded,” murmured Susan, and though she hoped she sounded polite, she could see by Oliver’s strained expression that he, at least, realized that politeness was not altogether her intention.

  Jed Armstrong, who had listened to this crossing of swords in silent appreciation, now came to the rescue of his fellow-man, and suggested a move.

  “What about going to see the steading?” he asked, and immediately there was a flutter of girlish ecstasy among the three sisters. As he led the way across his narrow cream-walled hall, Susan could hear the eldest Miss Pringle telling him how devoted they all were to animals of every kind. “Neddy—our dear little donkey, you know—is such a pet with us. And whenever I am in Edinburgh I make a point of visiting the Zoo—”

  Strange, thought Susan, that such an ardent animal-lover should care to gloat over wild creatures in captivity, even such luxurious captivity as the beasts at Corstorphine enjoy.

  Her arm was clutched by Peggy. “Every time I see them I make up my mind not to let them annoy me,” she hissed in Susan’s ear. “And every time they infuriate me to the verge of screaming. I—I hope the fairies will pay Bell out for what she said about them!”

&
nbsp; Susan rather hoped so too, for she also had found the intense self-satisfaction of Miss Pringle exasperating, and her temper was ruffled.

  “I’m afraid,” Oliver said, joining them in time to hear Peggy’s remark, “that I’d rather have some speedier vengeance than the fairies’!”

  They visited the long cattle-shed, where phlegmatic bullocks standing deep in clean straw, blew out their wide black nostrils suspiciously and backed away from everyone except their owner, of whom they seemed to have no fear. The dim place was fragrant with their sweet breath, the air was filled with the placid crunching of their meditative jaws. The stables housed eight pairs of stalwart cart-horses, glossy as newly fallen chestnuts, but Susan did not linger there, for a couple of ploughmen had come in to visit and make much of their own particular teams, and horses and men alike made her feel an intruder. As soon as she could, she went out, to find that Jed Armstrong had followed her.

  “You’re surely not afraid of the horses?” he asked. He sounded aggrieved.

  “No,” said Susan. “But it seemed such a pity for us to disturb the men when they had come to see them.” He opened his mouth as if to say something, and then shut it again without having spoken. They were standing on the cobbles in the warm sunshine, watching two kittens play at tigers-in-the-jungle among some long grass.

  “Have you seen the barn yet?” he asked suddenly. Susan awoke to the fact that the others had not joined them.

  “They’ll come after us,” he said carelessly, reading her look. “Unless you want to wait for them?”

  “No, I don’t,” Susan answered truthfully. A very little more of Cissie, Jelly and Bell might have made her forget the courtesy due to them as fellow-guests.

  It was very quiet in the great barn, empty save for a pile of grain in one corner. Jed saw Susan glance at it, and shrugged his massive shoulders. “Can’t get any price for it with all this foreign stuff coming in,” he said. “This is good, too.”

  He let a golden handful trickle through his fingers, and Susan did the same, liking the cool hard feel of it, almost like a handful of uncut gems.

  “It’ll lie there till it rots, likely,” he ended. “Unless we feed hens on it. I’ll need to turn grazier in another year or two if things don’t get better.”

  He took her up an unrailed wooden stairway to another barn above, low-roofed, lighted by sky-light windows, immensely long, running away, at right-angles from the one below it, to a shadowy dimness at the farther end. Here was more grain, and several small plundering birds, disturbed by their entry, flew twittering close over their heads, finally making their escape with considerable noise by a broken pane of glass.

  “All this—does it bore you?”

  “Far from it,” Susan assured him. “Though if anyone had told me a year ago that I should enjoy seeing over a farm, I’d have laughed at them. I never knew, you see, how interesting it would be.” He kicked idly at a knot in the floor-boarding. “You ought to see the big Ram Fair at Abbeyshiels,” he said after a pause. “It’s rather a sight. Ten rings, and ten auctioneers, or more, all selling at once. I’ll be going there to buy a ram. Like to come?”

  “Yes, I should like to, if it isn’t going to be a nuisance to you to take me—”

  “I’ll see that it’s not,” he replied at once, and Susan’s faint surprise at his politeness vanished. Evidently it was purely temporary, and she wondered why he had troubled to invite her. . . .

  4

  “Let’s escape,” murmured Oliver in an undertone. He touched Peggy’s arm, nodded towards the Misses Pringle, who were admiring a small brown and white calf fenced off in a hay-carpeted corner, and glanced meaningly at the open doorway.

  Peggy said nothing, but when he edged cautiously in the direction of the door, she went with him. Once outside he seized her by the hand. “The hay-loft. Come on!” he whispered, and the two raced across the cobble-stones of the yard, dodged round a corner, and in at an entry where a steep ladder led to the loft above. It was as Oliver hoisted himself up rather painfully after her that Peggy remembered his limp.

  “Oh!” she cried in dismay. “Your leg! You shouldn’t have run like that!”

  She regretted her impulsive words as soon as they were spoken, and reproached herself bitterly. She should have remembered that he hated any reminder of his infirmity. Though his limp was never very noticeable except when he was tired or when, as on this occasion, he had used his leg more violently than usual, he was morbidly sensitive about it. Always an active man, he loathed the necessity for having to take care of himself. And now, striking almost unconsciously at the offending limb in his nervous fashion, he met her penitent look, which he fancied to be one of pity. For the moment he hated her. How dare she, or anyone, look at him like that? Following on this sudden flare of rage and humiliation came the sullen desire to show her that, lame or not, he was a man still. The air in the dusty, sweet-smelling hay-loft was heavy with uncomfortable emotions. Peggy was miserably aware of having spoilt this escapade for both of them. She longed to tell him she was sorry, but had sufficient wisdom to say no more. Only when the silence had become unbearable to her, she rose from a heap of hay and walked to the ladder.

  “Let’s go,” she said rather shakily. “I’m sure the others will be wondering what’s happened to us.”

  Oliver laughed savagely. “Aren’t you going to offer to carry me down the ladder?” he jeered. “Or at least give me your arm? Remember what a crock I am!”

  He was behaving abominably, and he knew it, but half-ashamed of his childishness, he persisted in it. The fault was the girl’s after all. He had been feeling particularly fit that afternoon, more like himself as he had been before his accident, and even the ridiculous escape at full speed from the Misses Pringle had done him very little harm. True, there had been a twinge or two in his game leg, and climbing the ladder had not been easy but that would have been nothing if she had not pitied him, reminding him that however well he might feel, he must still seem a semi-cripple to others like her. Even now, when his jeering tone brought the blood to her cheeks, and he thought she was going to give him the indignant answer he deserved, he saw her head droop again.

  “Please don’t,” he heard her say in a low voice, and panic seized him.

  “My God!” he thought. “She’s going to apologize for hurting my feelings!”

  That would be the last straw. Rising quickly, though the sudden movement jarred his leg, he limped across to her. “Don’t say any more. It doesn’t matter,” he began, awkwardly, abruptly. “I’m afraid I made rather an ass of myself.”

  His voice was still angry, his words could hardly be construed as an apology for his outburst, but Peggy’s tender heart reproached her still and told her that it was really her fault. It did not occur to her that it would have relieved the situation if she had taken him to task, and in any case she was too young and inexperienced to do so effectively.

  Instead, she looked at him appealingly, and he saw that her thick lashes were stuck together in little black points by the tears she had kept back with difficulty. Oliver laughed again, but this time there was a note of triumph in his voice. She might pity him, but she was a little afraid of him too. Without stopping to think, he put his arm round her, felt her stiffen, then relax. As his lips met hers in a long, hard kiss, and she, at first holding back, finally yielded, even seemed to return it, he knew that somehow, even by these unfair means, he had proved his manhood to her. He was no longer to be pitied by Peggy, at least. . . .

  He let her go at last, and stood looking at her. His dark eyes were bright, the lips that had been pressed so passionately to hers were curved in a smile. Peggy stared at him silently. She was still dazed by the sudden strange feeling which had made her, instead of repulsing him, return his kiss. Could this be love, of which she had read so much, which she had never yet experienced? All she knew was that she had hated to have Ronald Graham’s arms about her, but . . . she had not hated Oliver’s. Her mouth still burned from the p
ressure of his, and she was trembling a little. His first words, carelessly spoken, were like a sudden splash of ice-cold water in her face.

  “Well,” he said, still smiling, “we’d better go and hunt up the rest of the gang, hadn’t we?”

  Plainly the kiss, so shattering to her, meant nothing to him; and something in his voice or his look, or her own intuition, told Peggy with brutal dearness that he had only been taking his revenge for her unfortunate remark. She was hot with rage and shame: his kiss was an insult, far more so than Ronald Graham’s abhorrent clumsy embrace, for he at least was in earnest, much as she disliked him. In that one moment Peggy lost some of her childishness, and it was a woman’s pride that raged against this man who had treated her so lightly. He must never know what it had meant to her, never.

  “Never! Never!” Vowed Peggy to herself. And she answered him lightly, the effort bringing a rush of colour to her cheeks. “Yes, we really must. They’ll think we are lost.”

  And: “Brute! Beast! Cad!” she stormed inwardly, following him down the ladder so recklessly that she almost missed her footing and had to be steadied by him. It might have comforted her sore heart to know that Oliver by this time was thoroughly ashamed of himself, and was applying her very words to his conduct. But his manner gave no sign of what he felt, and he whistled with what seemed to Peggy odious gaiety as they crossed the stackyard.

  His voice rose in a stentorian bellow to Susan and her host from the lower barn. “Ahoy, aloft there! Come down out o’ that, Jed! Do you think I’m going to do all your entertaining for you? The Pringles are in the pig-sty for the moment, but Lord knows how long they’ll stay there.”

  “What have you been doing to Peggy?” demanded Jed, when he and Susan had obediently come down, to find Peggy quite speechless with laughter on the bottom step of the stairs.

  Susan, knowing her brother’s ways with young women, fixed him with a stern glance, which he met with one of firm innocence. “Nothing,” he answered.