“Do! Nothing. I spoke to her of course. She was very feeble. I don’t think she knew who I was, though I thought her face changed when I mentioned you. She said ‘Caroline’ and nodded. Rather like a child she was really. I meant to go round with flowers, but one thing and another kept me. When I did go, she was dead.”
“Dead!”
“Why Caroline,” Louisa patted her knee. “Don’t look so upset. I wish I hadn’t told you. Of course, it’s very sad to think she was as poor as that. But we couldn’t know, could we? I expect she muddled her life. She was always a silly old thing.”
Louisa tried to change the subject, but Caroline, obviously upset, only answered her in monosyllables.
When the theatre lights went down and the curtain was rising on the last act, John came to his seat. He found Caroline’s hand.
“Isn’t it wonderful, darling? I don’t know whether I’m on my head or my heels. Everybody says it’s good. And you know, I do think actors know when audiences like a play.”
“John,” Caroline clung to his hand as if it was a spar and she drowning. “Old Longy is dead. She died of starvation.”
John gave her a look of comical despair.
“You’ve brought talking of extraneous matters at what are, to me, important moments, to a fine art.”
Caroline took in scarcely a word of the last act. She could only think of Longy as she had seen her last. She had looked like a frightened hen at Victoria Station, alternatively ejaculating, “Oh, I do hope you’ll be happy, dear,” with “This is very wrong of me.” She had absolutely no excuse for herself. When she had come back from her honeymoon she had meant to have traced her. But they were poor. There had been a good deal for her to do about the house. She had asked Aunt Rose if she knew what had happened to her, but she had not. Uncle Peter had said something about finding out where she was at the registry office, but either he never had, or he had not let her know. Her own life was so full, Longy slipped into the background. She had often worried that her children, growing up in London houses, had no opportunity to learn a sense of responsibility to their dependants. She had said to herself that if you learnt that sort of thing as a child, it stayed with you all your life. Yet look at her! She clasped her hands together and forced back the tears. She could remember those drives with her mother delivering food and clothes. How often she had seen her mother come down to the hall, looking white and tired, and heard her father say: “Do you feel up to driving to-day, dearest?” and heard her mother retort that Lizzie was expecting her, or that old George did so look forward to his soup, or that little Annie Briggs had a new baby. Her father, too, had always seen there was enough to live on when one of his people got too old for their work. He had never considered the matter from the point of right or wrong; merely to him it was one of the things you did if people worked for you and that was the end of that. Old Longy had done much more than work for her, she had lost her own work for her. It was dreadful the way she had been neglected.
After John had made his speech, Caroline slipped out of the theatre and went home. John had said there would be a party, but of course, he would quite understand that, after what she had just heard, she would want to go home. She drove home gulping back her tears. Naturally, one could not cry in a carriage, but she wished the horse would go quicker and she alone in her bedroom. But when she reached Swan, Elizabeth’s tousled head came round her bedroom door.
“Mummy, was the play a success?”
Caroline pulled herself together and managed to smile. “A tremendous success, darling. Daddy made a beautiful speech. What are you doing awake at this hour, you bad girl?”
“My goodness,” Elizabeth skipped back into bed, “you wouldn’t expect me to go to sleep? All the evening I’ve been wondering and wondering if it was all right.”
“It’s more than all right. Daddy will tell you about it in the morning.”
Caroline stooped and kissed the top of Elizabeth’s head.
“Good night, my pet. Go to sleep. God bless you.”
It was the early morning when John came in. It had been a night of complete triumph. He could not help being pleased at the flattery of the great. He tried to accept it all as a matter of course, but he had been desperately gratified. It was hard to bear that there should be a fly in his ointment. Yet a fly there was. He missed Caroline. Driving home in the early morning he tried to reason with himself why Caroline’s absence should have taken the glow off his evening, why she had never been out of his thoughts. There had been plenty of people to take her place. Women who discussed his play with real intelligence. Caroline would never have done that. Lilias to show how slavishly she was his. Other women, who would like to entertain for him, inviting him to this and that. He was furiously angry with Caroline.
He had no idea why she had gone home. He supposed she had not liked the play. The last act had been a little outspoken, but he had told her the plot, she must have known how it would turn out. Narrow-minded fool. He would tell her when he got home.
Caroline was still awake when he got in. Her face was smeared and swollen with crying. John turned on the light. He sat on the bed.
“My dear Caroline. What is the matter?” Caroline blew her nose and sat up.
“But I told you. Longy’s dead.”
John’s face puckered with amazement.
“Do you mean to tell me you left me on my first night, and missed the party, because of an old governess that you haven’t seen for nearly seventeen years?”
Caroline’s voice shook.
“She died of starvation, John. How could I have let her? I ought to have done something. I ought not to have let her die like that.”
“Of course you ought not. But surely, all this remorse is a bit misplaced to-night? I have made a tremendous success, you know. You ruined my evening. I thought you went home because you didn’t like the last act.”
Caroline gave him an ashamed look.
“It was in the interval I heard about Longy. I never listened to the last act.” John leant back at the end of the bed and roared with laughter. Caroline stopped him. “Do be careful. You’ll wake the children.”
John got up and moved closer to her. He took her in his arms.
“My poor Caroline. You look like one of the children’s frocks that Nanny has put to soak before she washes it. Your face is all pleated you’ve cried so much. I tell you what I sh all do. I shall get a bottle of champagne. We’ll have a party, all by ourselves.”
“But it’s early morning,” Caroline objected. “Besides, there’s nothing to laugh about. It really is dreadful.”
“Of course it’s dreadful, but your crying won’t help things now. I shan’t be a moment.”
The champagne did Caroline good. While they drank John told her a few of the nice things people had said. Then he put down his glass.
“Lately, Caroline, I’ve thought about us. You know, darling, one of us has got to give in, or we are going to drift apart. What you want of life and what I want are two quite different things. You married me for better or worse; and I don’t think you’re accepting the ‘for better.’ I’m not a very good husband. I’ve horrible failings. But I can’t see it’s helping either of us if you’re not a good wife.”
“John!” Caroline was so surprised that her voice came in a gasp. “I never think of anything but you and the children.”
He shook his head.
“I grant, according to your lights, you’re a good mother. But what about the Manor? All these weeks, when my play has been so important to me, you’ve been engrossed in nothing but your brother’s business. Now it’s your old governess. To-morrow it may be a great-uncle. At supper to-night a whole lot of people asked me if I would come to dinners and receptions. I am a successful man. That means that my wife has got to entertain and perhaps put other things aside and think of me first.”
Carolin
e spoke with the courage of champagne.
“Do you put me first?” Then she shook her head. “I didn’t mean to ask that.”
“But you have asked it.” He stroked the back of her hand where it lay on the eiderdown. “Sometimes I wish you did not come so far first with me. Whatever happens, Caroline, never get into your head that anything else, or any other person, has that bit of me that belongs to you. I’m weak and a fool but you are my harbour. With poetic licence, accepting me as a ship, if you follow.”
“Am I?” Caroline looked puzzled. If that were true, how could Lilias be true? Everything in Caroline, even after a glass of champagne, shrank from a direct question. Was it possible that the love John had for her could be apart from that side of being husband and wife? From that side in which John had for so long lost interest?
“I’ve no right to ask favours of you, Caroline. Whatever I may say, you are a far better wife than I am a husband. But I want you to help me. Our children have nurses, governesses and schools. They don’t need you as I do. I want us to build my reputation. I want you to entertain for me, and to be entertained with me. We are on the crest of a wave. I have had this tremendous reception to-night, except from you. I can write more plays. If you would try, we could become figures in London. I know to you this seems very unimportant, but to me, who started life in a national school, it’s everything. Can you understand? I want to be a ‘person.’ You know writers can be quite important, almost as important as a Torrys.” She said nothing. In the pause he ran his first finger up and down the bone-lines on the back of her hand. “As for to-night, you can’t help Longy, but you could, if you like, help some others. I will set aside some of my royalties, and you can start a little fund, for old governesses.”
“Oh, John!” Caroline’s eyes shone. “That’s a lovely idea.”
He made a face at her.
“But remember, old governesses, the children, or the Manor, or whatever else it is, come second. Mr. John England is to come first.”
Chapter XVII
“‘LADY WALMER’s reception on Thursday was one of the smartest of the many events of a full week, and the lovely house never looked better. The great glass doors were thrown open, and the arriving guests passed through the great hall up the white stairs, and at the head Sir George and Lady Walmer received. Amongst the guests coming and going into what was the fullest evening of the season, I saw—’” Helen laid down the newspaper. She looked across at Miss Brown.
“I don’t call this a very good sort of cutting, Brownie. Mum and Dad come right at the end, as if they were servants.” She picked up the paper again and read: “‘and Mr. and Mrs. John England.’”
“If you just paste them in the book,” Miss Brown retorted, “and don’t read them all out loud, we’d get on quicker.”
“They make very dull reading, anyhow,” said Elizabeth.
“They don’t all,” Helen argued. “Listen to this one.”
She looked back at a cutting already in place. “Mother wore a gown of white gauze striped in graduated lines with white moiré, a short embroidered corsage adorned with a ceinture and sash end of silver embroidery, finished with silver boules, the decolletage softened with a vest and sleeves of silver pailleted net and silver lace, the manteau de cour of white satin softened with tulle and trimmed with lilies of the valley and thick ruche of tulle bordering the train inside. We saw her go out. We should never have thought of all that to say about the dress.”
Elizabeth stuck a cutting into the book in front of her. “I shouldn’t want to say all that about a dress. Who cares, anyway?”
“Mum thinks Grandmother England cares, or she wouldn’t collect them like this. I often wonder what she’s like. I wonder what Grandmother Torrys is like, too.”
“She’s nearly ninety.” Elizabeth stretched out her hand for another paper. “I should think she’s shrivelled up like a mummy. Great-Aunt Rose told Mum she doesn’t care for much but her food now.”
“It’s lucky she doesn’t care about reading about Dad and Mum in the newspapers, or we would have to do, all this cutting-out and sticking-in twice over.” Helen picked up a paper and read the marked paragraph. “At the musical party Mother wore ‘an Irish lace tunic, a commingling of black Chantilly worn over oyster-white satin, the completing touch being imparted by grey velvet bows.’ Isn’t it awful, Brownie, to think that next year you and I will be cutting out what Betsy wore, and sticking them into a book? Just imagine, ‘Miss Betsy England wore a gown of baby-blue charmeuse, slightly draped and arranged with a bertha and sleeves of paste embroidery. A cluster of baby-blue ribbons were arranged in her hair.’”
“Oh, shut up,” Elizabeth growled. “You won’t hate cutting the bits out half as much as I shall having to wear the clothes.”
“What a pity it is,” said Helen, “that I am only thirteen. Years and years more of lessons. There’s you nearly grown-up and only wanting to go on doing them.”
Miss Brown skimmed through another paper and put a pencil cross against a paragraph.
“Going up to Girton is hardly doing lessons.”
“I don’t see the difference,” Helen argued. “It seems much the same to me.”
“It would.” Elizabeth cut savagely at a newspaper. “You only want to dress up and show yourself off.”
“And a very good thing too, dear,” Helen agreed cheerfully. “I want to do my duty in that state of life in which it has pleased God to call me.”
Miss Brown spoke firmly, scenting a quarrel. “Don’t be tiresome, Helen.”
Helen made a face.
“Well, Betsy’s so silly. She always wants things she can’t have, and goes on grumbling and grumbling. First she wants to go to a boarding-school, and then she wants to go to a college, and she knows quite well she can’t.” She turned to Elizabeth. “Can’t you see that Mum would never let you?”
“Even if I can see it,” said Elizabeth wearily, “there’s no reason why I should be pleased about it, is there?”
Helen dipped her brush into the paste.
“Only for the sake of Brownie and me. We get tired of hearing about it, don’t we Brownie?”
Miss Brown smiled at Elizabeth.
“Betsy knows just how keen I am on her going to Girton.”
Helen patted the cutting to make it lie flat.
“We’re a very upside-down family, really. Laurence is going to Oxford and he doesn’t want to, and Betsy always wanted to go, and now Jimmie has had to go to school and simply hates it, and Betsy always wanted to go and wasn’t allowed to. It’s lucky that I’m of such a contented disposition.”
Miss Brown threw her an amused glance.
“I wonder how contented you’ll be when I’ve got you all to myself. You’ll have to work then.”
“Well, thank goodness the holidays start in a fortnight.” Helen held out her hand for another paper. “Though I wish we hadn’t got to go and stay in that beastly Kent. No bathing, and nothing to do but to look at that dull old Manor. I wish I could go to Spain with Dad.”
Elizabeth looked up.
“He won’t take any of us. I asked him yesterday.”
“Did you?” Helen opened her eyes. “How mean of you not to have told me, and I would have asked him, too. What did he say?”
“Well, I didn’t catch him at a very good minute. He was trying to get something finished before he dressed for dinner, and you know how vague he is when he has just finished writing. He looked for a moment as if he might be going to say ‘yes’ and then he said, ‘Your mother wouldn’t like me turning you into a tramp. You’ve got to be a society lady, my dear.’”
“Well, if Dad’s going to tramp, I don’t want to go.” Helen threw down the paper she had been cutting. “Well, that’s the last. I hope dear Grandmother England enjoys this lot, because it’s all the reading she’ll get till the autumn, unless there’s a
bit to say, ‘Mr. John England, the well-known writer, spent his holiday tramping in Spain.’” She stuck the cutting into the book. “Can I go,Brownie?”
Miss Brown nodded.
“You must be back in half an hour. It’s your turn to sit with your mother while she dresses.”
“There’s no need to remind Helen about that,” Elizabeth observed, as the door closed, “she likes it.” She got up and looked out of the window. “Sometimes, on paper-cutting nights, I feel I’d rather be dead than be me.”
Miss Brown looked at her sympathetically.
“It’s silly to talk like that.” She picked up the newspapers and rolled them into a bundle, and put them into the paper-basket. “Even if you do have to go in for a social life, you’ll get time to write and you will meet a lot of types.”
Elizabeth turned round.
“This sounds conceited, Brownie, but when I’m not doing lessons any more next term, won’t you find it dull teaching Helen?”
Miss Brown hesitated.
“It’s one of the funny sides of life, how the things you don’t want to do often turn out well. You want to get a degree and then go in for writing, and you think all the dances and things you will hate. Well, I wanted to be a doctor. It was out of the question. There was no money to train me for anything and I had to teach. First I taught in a school, but I hated it, and then after a time I came to you. You didn’t make my life any easier.”
Elizabeth laughed.
“I know I was bad-tempered.”
“Very. Then, when I was just thinking that I couldn’t bear it any more, your mother’s fund for governesses turned up. You’ve no idea how interesting that has been.”
“You only keep the books, don’t you?” Miss Brown smiled.
“That’s all you know. I’m not dependent on teaching for my only interest now. I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that governess fund, Betsy. In the autumn, when you’re supposed to be helping your mother, that’s one of the things that I think you’ll find interesting.”
Caroline England Page 21
