when she’d finished she didn’t wait for the clapping but went straight into the C sharp minor, in case they should stop her, because she had been put down for one piece only. But in fact she got an encore and could have played for much longer. One of the Belgian nuns took her aside and said that God had given her a great gift. Afterwards there were games, and a feast. It was only ten days away from the anniversary of the Bombardment. They said special prayers, their voices raised in thanksgiving that those who’d had the faith and courage to stay on, in that exposed place above the sea, were still safe. Te Deum laudamus.
The next morning a letter came from her father: ‘There is no question at all of your going to the Royal College of Music – or any college, for that matter. We were a little surprised that you should have consulted with and made decisions with your teacher without first approaching us…’
In the music room, practising, she could do nothing systematic. Her hands roamed over the keys. Then suddenly with grim determination she began to work through the Brahms’ Fantasias. But she could bring none of the joy of execution to them: could only thrust and press, heavy where she should be tender, aggressive where she should have been vibrant. Appalled at the sound she was making, ashamed, she sat there muttering, praying: ‘Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldst enter under my roof…’
Her father was angry before he spoke. She was angry too of course, but showed it by her cool greeting, her tart questions. ‘No, I don’t want any luncheon, thank you.’ Coming down at six o’clock. ‘Where is Father?’ Saying aggressively, ‘I want to see him.’
He was in the library, in front of him a mound of paper, envelopes of different sizes, forms in a toppling pile, a glass of brandy and a decanter at his elbow. Behind him on the wall, the War map, its little headed pins marking out the progress of the armies.
He didn’t look up when she came in. ‘Yes?’ he said. ‘Is it urgent? This report has to go up to York for the Wednesday Assizes.’
‘Well,’ she stared at him, so that he would have to look up. ‘What am I going to do instead?’ she asked angrily. She had been saying this to herself ever since. She’d wanted to write to Franz. She’d composed a letter several times over, but the bits of paper were still in her writing portfolio.
‘I think you should sit down, Edwina.’ She noticed that his face was very red, the blood rushing thicker as he spoke in his turn angrily: ‘Perhaps you can explain your rudeness?’ He had got up and was walking to and fro in an effort to keep calm.
She said obstinately: ‘I want to go there –’
‘I don’t think, neither of us think from any indication you’ve given us, that you are old enough, leave alone responsible enough to live in London –’
‘I wouldn’t be living on my own – I just want the chance to learn. If I’m properly, fully trained, I can make a career of my playing. I can give concerts –’ She searched for further heights. ‘I want –’
‘We seem to be hearing a great deal of what you want. Why should you know what is best for you? How have you suddenly come by the experience and knowledge?’ His forehead looked lumpy with veins. ‘I had meant, wanted to speak to you calmly. But you have precipitated the whole discussion.’
She shouted at him, in a passion of terror that unless she fought for it, it would go beyond her reach utterly. ‘If they say they’ll have me, I’ve the right to go. I could get some money. I’ve the right –’
‘Right! Women’s Rights, I suppose. We are to hear of those now.’ He was pacing up and down faster. ‘Yes, you have rights. You have the right to be loyal and good. And to your mother and myself for a start. Your place is here, do you understand? Until you marry. I don’t think you realize what your mother has been through – a son lost…’
That’s not fair, I only want to take my chances. I want, I want – ’
‘Lower your voice!’ His hand was shaking. ‘I think you had better go – ’
She was shaking too. After a while, because she didn’t know what to do with her rage, with her body, she went, like he had said.
New Year 1916. Philip’s friend Denis came to stay. He was to go out to India at the end of the month, and talked about it at dinner in a quiet voice. He had blond hair in very tight curls and neat regular features and reminded Edwina of a more pleasant, more handsome Philip. He was polite to her in a cool way; once they had a short conversation together. He and Mother went for long walks when the weather allowed it and Mother wasn’t working. Her behaviour was very emotional. She has lost her only son, Edwina told herself in excuse of her odd moods, her sudden lashing out at Aunt Josephine, at Father, at Edwina.
She herself felt sullen and angry still, wanting only now to be back at school. Mother scarcely noticed. Father, busy, ignored her. It was Aunt Josephine who helped the most, sometimes just by giving her work to do and then praising it, sometimes by talking. Things always looked worse in the cold weather, she said. She knew about Edwina’s disappointment. She said robustly: ‘Everything passes. Even this dreadful War. And I might, it is just possible, be able to help you later. I have some means. Also, you will not be under age for ever you know.’
But she spoke of an unimaginable five years ahead. I have to get through 1916, Edwina thought. She wasn’t sleeping well. Once she woke shaking, covered in sweat. She had been watching the sea through thick glass: grey-black water churning, white spray rising, thrown high in great spouts. Uncle Frederick, struggling, arms flailing, tried to lift himself up above the waves, the great white horses. He was calling her, but she could hear nothing. She drummed on the thick glass, panicky, shouting: ‘I’m coming!’ He rose and fell, struggling always. But even as she banged and shouted he rose again. She saw then that he was Ben. ‘I’ll save you,’ she cried, hurling herself again and again at the glass, so violently, so despairingly, that she woke herself up.
They got Jack back, you know,’ Fanny said. ‘Everything seems all right.’ But she hadn’t been over to Bay, nor could Edwina get her to talk about it very much. All those first weeks of term she was in a flat, frustrated kind of mood. She said to Edwina, ‘The one clear good thing in my life is that I’m going to be a nun.’
Edwina said, ‘You’ve never told anyone though – shan’t you?’ But Fanny just replied: ‘Why upset them? It’s going to be the most terrible shock to everyone. And Mother Anselm, people like that, I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction. Just think how she’ll feel when she hears…’
Franz showed Edwina a letter from Father. This I ought not to do, but you see it is not without hope.’ Europe, which Franz had evidently mentioned, was described by Father as ‘a possibility we could certainly discuss in happier times’. Perhaps, Franz said, when she was eighteen they would allow her to nurse or even to join one of the services ‘and then one day the War is over and life begins again’.
The spring weather was so beautiful that year that it felt almost as if perhaps life would begin again. Mother wrote to say that Ned was spending a fortnight’s leave with them, at her invitation. ‘He is stationed near, you know, but is about to move south. He seemed so reluctant to go home, and it is a tremendous help to have him here now that Denis has left.’
The temperature was nearly in the seventies when she went to stay with Fanny. She could never remember so warm an April, sitting out in the garden at the back, walking by the sea. It was then that she confided in Fanny.
‘Why ever didn’t you tell me you liked him? Just because I don’t want to be spoony doesn’t mean you can’t.’
‘It isn’t that –’ She felt compelled to lie. ‘I just like seeing him. I know he likes seeing me.’
‘He’s interested enough. I told you that And he is my cousin so you might have asked my permission –’
Edwina was amazed. ‘All right then. I’m asking.’
‘Don’t be so assy,’ Fanny said. ‘If you like though, we’ll go over.’
It was almost like old times, travelling with Cook (who grumbled all the way that her frien
d was getting old and didn’t listen properly). But first she’d written to Ben, just in case.
‘If you wanted to write to each other,’ Fanny said, ‘he could write here, if it was holiday time. Marmee would never open anything. It would have to be addressed to me of course.’
They’d chosen a Sunday so that Ben would be free. Fanny was a great help, saying after they’d both walked up to Ben’s and had a cup of tea: ‘I’m going for a walk, everybody. Ben, you have to come too, but I don’t want Becky or Sal…’ Then on the path nearing the woods, she skipped off: ‘I’m going to say my rosary quietly. You’ve got till half past.’
‘What’s up wi’ her?’ he asked. Edwina told him and he grinned: ‘Well, she did us a good turn.’ He’d taken hold of her hand, gripping it tight. She said: ‘I thought I was only going to be able to sit and look at you.’
‘I reckoned same –’
At first they only wanted to kiss. They found somewhere that seemed hidden. A wood pigeon could be heard just through the copse. The sea seemed very far away. He gave her his coat to sit on. Hands clasped tight, mouth to mouth – it was just as she’d remembered. No, better. Much much better.
‘It’s wrong,’ she said, ‘I think, what we’re doing. From what they taught us, I mean – only, the language they use is a bit vague.’ She said between kisses, ‘I don’t mind though, because it’s you.’ She could not relate it to anything. She had prayed and he had come to her.
‘Have I to stop then?’ He was laughing.
Apart, they talked, listening all the while for people nearby, for Fanny.
‘What time’s it got to?’
‘You have the lovely watch,’ she said.
He sat up straighter, pushing his feet out. She looked down at them and thought: why did I have to see Aunt Adelina’s, when it’s his I’d like to see bare? Why? She saw then that he was watching her. He said, his voice husky: ‘I reckon it’s worse – when you come.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘when we’re out wi’ boats, or summat needs doing, then I forget mebbe. But nights –’
She shivered suddenly. He said, not looking at her: There’s not much for us – together.’
She sat choked, silent.
‘There’s not, is there?’
She wanted him to look at her. She said desperately: ‘If you got your Captain’s ticket like you said then I could sail with you, or I could play concerts while you were away and then we could be together whenever you came home.’
‘And bairns?’
Oh well,’ she said, ‘I’d be able, we’d be able to afford a nurse –’ It was so simple that she couldn’t see why he too didn’t see it.
He said angrily, looking at her now: ‘That’s daft. Well you know that – Like’s best marrying like – There’s more to it than love.’
‘But you love me?’
‘Aye, I love you.’ She felt a great sadness. ‘I love you right enow.’ There were only minutes left. Another parting. She thought: I am him, he is me. It is only our thinking that’s different. And how can that be important?
Behind them the wood pigeon cooed persistently. They got up to go. She dusted down his coat, and they went off to meet Fanny.
‘Did you let him do anything?’ Fanny asked. ‘Touch you, I mean. Or kiss you?’
‘No, of course not…’
There were ten days of holiday left when she got home. She played the piano when she wasn’t helping Aunt Josephine. More Brahms: ‘Variations on an Original Theme.’ For no reason that she could think of it became associated with Ben, with her love for him.
Mother was edgy and difficult so that Edwina wondered about the ‘trouble’ Aunt Adelina had described. Aunt Josephine tut-tutted when she tried to mention it. The days dragged on. She was pining, love-sick. She could hardly speak for it.
Mother sent for her, one late afternoon. It was like being sent for at school, except then she was frightened only up in her head. Now she felt it in her belly as if she must defend herself, as if she had something to protect.
Mother was lying back on her sofa, smoking, a cornelian ashtray beside her.
‘I want to talk to you about your sulks.’
‘My sulks?’
‘Yes, your sulks? She drew lightly on her cigarette. ‘Your utterly too childish sulks, I can’t tell you how unpleasant I find them.’ Then in an irritated manner: ‘Sit down, can’t you. It’s the very way you stand – defiant, cocking a snook. It won’t do.’
‘What won’t do? .’ don’t care –’
‘Don’t be rude to me. You were rude and defiant when Tom spoke to you at Christmas. He made his reasons quite clear, it’s not as if he merely forbade you –’
‘It seemed like that, it sounded like that –’
‘Don’t interrupt me. You didn’t wait for his reasons. You went off the deep end. If you’d stopped to listen, if, you would have heard that he had very good reasons. The very idea of a career in music. It makes one fear for your sanity.’
‘Why? I’m good enough. Lots of people have said –’
‘It’s not proved, is it? Your duty is to stay at home for as long as you’re wanted. Then to make a good marriage-if anyone will have you. No man will stand for arguing, sulks, forward behaviour – they don’t like it. And they won’t want to hear all you know and how gifted you are. This parable of the talents, that’s not what it means. You could tinkle to give pleasure surely? If you weren’t so selfish you could think of doing something for the War Effort with it.’
‘What?’
She shrugged her shoulders. ‘People like a nice tune. You play quite well after all’ She reached back to a small table behind her: ‘My medicine – the doctors said –’ She sipped: ‘Whether you marry or not you have absolutely no need to earn money. So why the career? If you know, had any idea what it’s like to live, sometimes not even sure you can pay for the next meal, never being able to forget about money. You want for nothing.’
‘But Uncle Frederick… He would want me to go.’
‘Oh Frederick. He’s had this bee in his bonnet always, always, about your playing. His judgement is nothing to go by – Look at the woman he married.’
‘She’s rich at least. You should be pleased.’
‘Did I ask for your opinion?’ Seeing her cigarette burnt out, she lit another. ‘I sent for you, to tell you I won’t stand for either your sulks or your defiance. I am a woman who has lost her only son, and I don’t think that a mother who has made that sacrifice should be asked, expected to put up with conduct of this sort. In the face too of a perfectly reasonable edict. You may not go, Edwina. Do you understand?’
‘No.’ (Why was the whole matter being brought up again?)
Mother laid down her cigarette suddenly then, taking hold of Edwina, shaking her roughly, pushed her back against the chair. ‘You shan’t speak to me like that. Duty,’ she said, ‘don’t the nuns ever speak to you of duty? Don’t they teach you that obeying your parents is the same as obeying God?’
‘Yes,’ said Edwina sullenly.
‘Why are you so rude? Fanny doesn’t give her parents trouble, does she? Does she? Perhaps you could try to be more like her. That’s what friendship is about surely? And take that miserable look off your face-what right have you to look miserable? What did Philip’s death mean to you – you didn’t give birth to him, did you? And that other baby, that son, I lost him.’
‘I know. I know.’
‘You couldn’t possibly imagine what it could be like to carry for nine whole months, to go through hell. And now, I have nothing. Just you – and look what a bargain I have there.’
‘Cora–’
‘Yes, Cora. I rely on Cora. And Denis, when he was here. And Ned. Now Ned–’
‘Ned’s my friend.’
‘What do you mean, your friend?’
‘I got him first –’
She mimicked: ‘ “I got him first!” You don’t get people, Edwina. I think you’ve misunderstood som
ething-as usual. Ned, quite simply, would rather be with me. Has he ever shown the slightest interest in being in your company?’
‘Yes.’
‘when? I should be very surprised if that’s anything but a fairy tale. Fanny now, he admired Fanny. I shouldn’t mind if he were to take that further –’
‘I should mind very much indeed.’
‘How quite disgusting. You would, would you? Sour grapes. To fight with your best friend over a boy.’ She drained her glass: ‘But it would be for him to decide, wouldn’t it? It’s not really as if a girl, a woman has any choice in the matter.’ She rearranged herself on the sofa, yawned.
I shall choose, Edwina thought. Nobody decides anything for me.
‘Do go, can’t you? I need to sleep before dinner ..
There was a letter from Uncle Frederick. Aunt Adelina had died ten days earlier. It had not been unexpected, he said: The outlook had been hopeless since the autumn. They had wintered in Rome with the Antici-Montani – they had had a suite in the palace and every care had been lavished on her. Because of the War there had been shortages, although their farms and estates had produced food otherwise unobtainable. She had not suffered too much: the end had been a gradual weakness. She had not been strong enough even to be carried to the Spanish Steps which she loved so much in spring – although they were a sorry sight these days: no flower-sellers, no artists’ models, green-grey soldiers everywhere: The idea of a short war has gone… two of the sons are in the granatieri, the Grenadiers, against the old Marchesa’s wishes. To be Black is still very important to her – that a Black should fight for the King! It is she, I will say, who has supported me throughout our whole ordeal. Without her… A debt I cannot hope to repay…’
Fanny said: ‘I know I didn’t like her, but I feel so much for him.’ She said wistfully, ‘I wish I could help. I wish sometimes I didn’t have such a pash for him. It makes my life so difficult. Edwina, do you think I’ll ever be a nun?’
Men On White Horses Page 21
