by Guy McCrone
Coldly, she watched his awkward going; heard his hoarse goodbye as he went. And yet she was left with the awareness that Robin’s father had got from her what he had wanted.
None too softly, she shut the door behind him and turning, began, mechanically and distraught, to collect her papers.
Philomene had withdrawn into the little kitchen. Now, as she reopened the door, she was surprised to see that Mademoiselle was dropping tears upon the sheets; that the hands that held them were trembling.
II
Just before lunch-time a knock sounded on Robin’s bedroom door and a voice begged admittance.
“Of course, Aunt Lucy. Come in.”
“How do you feel now, Robin?”
“Oh, all right. I’m having lunch here in bed.”
Lucy hesitated, then she asked: “No more—unpleasantness?”
He shook his head and smiled. “Not these last two nights. Besides, the doctor told me this morning not to worry. He says I’m better. I certainly feel it. He said I had only been coughing a bit too hard. No, Aunt Lucy, I’m feeling grand.”
Lucy smiled, too. “Your uncle and I have to go out to lunch. I just looked in to ask about yours before we went. What shall I tell them to bring you?”
Having shown an encouraging desire for food, Robin thanked her and saw her close the door. He wondered where they might be lunching. He did not know that she had gone to make a third at a family conference.
He lay back on his pillow and looked out at the date-palm standing motionless and hot. Beyond it there were glimpses of the sea rimmed by a line of low cloud. He wondered idly if it was storm-cloud; if there was thundery weather over Corsica. Here, certainly, it was curiously warm and airless.
He was glad the doctor’s report had been good this morning. For although he had not liked to admit it, even to himself, the illness of the last two days had frightened him. The reappearance of red spots on his handkerchief—what his aunt had delicately called ‘unpleasantness’—had been, to say the least, discouraging. But now they had disappeared, and he had spoken the truth when he had told her he felt grand. The Denise affair had put him off his sleep, he supposed. That, and the worry of writing to his father, had probably upset him. He felt a qualm now as he wondered what the reply would be. But the optimism of his illness did not allow despondency. Sir Henry would just have to understand. And as for Denise: it was impossible that, in the end, she could not be forced to see reason.
A waiter came with his lunch-tray and gave him a letter. Robin thanked him, watched him go, then opened it. It was an acceptance of another of his short stories. A mere few pages, that Denise, from experience rather than from judgment, had suggested might please this particular editor’s fastidiousness. There was a line of encouragement with the acceptance and a request to see more of Mr. Hayburn’s work.
Robin attacked his lunch in high glee. This, if anything, was the medicine he needed. Having gobbled it, he was too happy and excited to stay in bed. Denise must see the letter and rejoice with him. Robin got up and walked across to the window. He remembered now that the Stephen Hayburns were elsewhere and could not prevent his going. When the waiter came to fetch the tray he was surprised to find Robin almost dressed.
Taking his way now by the high road into the old town, Robin felt the oppressive languor of the weather. Women, glad to be free of their lunch-time kitchens, lounged in little terrace gardens. A boy, spraying tomato-plants, had stopped to take off his straw hat, and was leaning against the water-barrel, wiping his brown face and neck. In the Rue Longue itself few people were moving. It was cooler in their cellar-like, shuttered rooms.
Robin ascended the first flight on Denise’s staircase. Here he halted. He must not go so fast as this. He had been forgetting. He could feel the quick beat of his pulses. And what if she were not in? But he must risk that. He continued upwards, taking time.
Now, the top. And the door was off the catch. He stood waiting regaining breath to call out the good news. As he stood there, the door swung open. Philomene had heard his step.
“Mademoiselle?” Robin asked.
The woman shrugged. She looked glum, but she beckoned him to come in. The studio was in the confusion of packing. In his halting French, Robin asked when Mademoiselle would return. Again she shrugged. Never, so far as she knew.
Never? What did she mean?
But Philomene had turned to the table, picked up an envelope and given it to Robin; an envelope addressed to himself. “You’ve saved me a walk to the hotel,” she said in the Mentonese dialect. But had she spoken in any tongue, Robin would not have taken it in, for he had run to the balcony, thrown himself into a chair, and burst Denise’s letter open.
III
With a numb deliberation, Robin folded the letter, fitted it carefully into the opened envelope, and put it into his pocket.
It was only after he had done this that he became aware of a feeling of nausea. The balcony began to swim round him, and he asked himself if he were going to faint. He grasped the arms of the wicker chair in which he was sitting and kept himself rigid, staring at one point, in an effort to stop this sickening spinning. That was better. His surroundings were once again becoming stable. But he must go on sitting here for a time, steadying his shocked bewilderment.
So Denise had done that to him? Left him without a word. Vanished. But what had his father said to bring about her going? What did the letter say? Robin drew the envelope once more from his pocket. But as his fingers held it, they shook so alarmingly that he had to put it back again. Now he merely sat staring at nothingness in a trance of misery.
At last Philomene, hearing no sound from the balcony, came to have a look at him. His aspect frightened her. He was sitting forward, wild-eyed and pale, clasping and unclasping his hands.
She had always wondered what Mademoiselle had seen in him. Why she had chosen this thin, delicate creature as a lover. But it was plain now that she had left him; and Philomene could not but be disturbed to see him suffer thus. She found a flask of wine, poured some out, and came back to Robin. He was slow to raise his eyes, when she touched his arm. But at length he drank, holding the glass with both hands to keep it from spilling. Once more, as he gave it back, he looked up. She could only shrug; gesticulating sympathy. Then presently, as she was working, she lifted her head to see him hurrying past her, making for the stairs. Fearing he might stumble, she crossed to the door and listened to his steps, then, reassured, she closed it, glad to have him gone.
Robin panted along the Rue Longue. He did not really think where he was going or what it was that impelled him. He had, perhaps, been taken by a momentary notion that Denise might still be in the town; that he might still find her.
But soon he had stopped. Where was he? At the stairway leading in an easy flight to the small cathedral square. Turning, he went up. But now he must halt and rest himself a moment.
He was sitting on the steps of the cathedral itself, when he heard his name called out.
“Robin! Whatever are you doing up here?” It was his Aunt Lucy’s voice. She was coming down into the square from the higher side, accompanied by his uncle and his father.
Robin looked up. But he neither spoke nor rose to his feet.
“I was told you were in bed, young man,” his father said not ungenially, by way of a greeting.
Now, standing over him, Lucy was distressed at Robin’s aspect. But she was still more distressed at the distracted look he turned upon Sir Henry.
“I want to talk to you,” Robin said.
“You can talk to me when we get back, Rob,” his father answered.
“No. Here.”
Sir Henry straightened himself. “Indeed? Oh, very well, then!” He turned to the others. “I’ll bring him.”
He said this as though his son were a naughty child. Now, but for themselves, the square was empty. Henry sat down on the steps beside his son. “Well, Rob?” He made his voice calm. “And what have you to talk to me about?”
&
nbsp; “You know very well what I have to talk to you about! Denise has gone!”
“Who? Oh, Miss St. Roch? I saw her this morning.”
“I know.”
“It was the most sensible thing she could do, Rob.”
His son looked away from him. “What did you say to make her go?”
Henry continued to keep hold of himself. “Rob, I don’t like this unfriendliness. And remember this mess is of your making, not mine. I’m only here to do what I can for you.”
“What did you say to make her go?” The young man raised his voice as he repeated his question.
His father stopped to consider, then he said: “I wish with all my heart you hadn’t done this. For one thing, you’re looking wretched. Worse than when we sent you here.”
“What made her go?”
Henry thought of the interview this morning with very little pleasure. “I don’t know,” he said. “I should say she went of her own accord. She seemed very ready to go. You see, Rob—” Here he laid his hand on Robin’s arm.
“Liar!” Robin shook off the hand and jumped up.
Henry lost his temper. He stood up to face him. However ill the boy was, these insolent hysterics would not do. Now he, too, was shouting. “That’s enough! I’ve nothing more to say to you about that woman. You’re coming home with me tomorrow.”
Robin drew back, shook his head, then spoke in tones that he hoped were low and telling. “I’m not coming. I’m independent now. I’m staying in France to write.”
“Rubbish!”
“After what you’ve done to Denise and to me, I don’t see how I can have any choice. How can I ever come back to Scotland now?”
Had the boy’s wits left him? Would he have to take him home in a strait jacket? Henry controlled himself. He must try reason. “Look here, Robin. Stop this crazy nonsense. I’m not going to lecture. But this lack of sense makes me frightened. Think of what you have waiting for you at home. Your mother. The new house. The shipyard. Listen, man. Glasgow and shipbuilding are in your very blood.”
“Blood?”
“Your grandfather was a great engineer. And I’ve done well enough. If only—”
“My grandfather?”
Sir Henry Hayburn hesitated, then he stopped and looked at his son glumly. Had the boy’s mad behaviour almost forced him to betray himself? “Well, anyway, you know what I mean,” was his lame reply.
“Yes, I know what you mean. And I’ll tell you, if you like. You lost your own child in Vienna, didn’t you? And you took me because my parents were dead. Very nice of you. But ever since, you’ve gone on building a fantasy round me until you’ve forgotten who I am. You’ve forgotten I haven’t a drop of your own blood in me. I don’t and won’t belong to you any more. Goodbye!” Robin was shouting as he had turned to climb the steps on the far side of the square.
“Robin! Your mother—” Henry ran towards him.
“Yes. I’m sorry about—Lady Hayburn. But all the same—goodbye.”
His father stood watching him climb. He had caught the cracked note in Robin’s voice as he had tried to say the words “Lady Hayburn” with indifference. Henry felt reassured. Things were not so bad, perhaps. Robin used to have these tantrums as a child, he reflected. Still, twenty was getting old for them. But he had better let him go. Always, in the old days, Robin had come back ashamed and purged of his anger.
Chapter Twenty-One
WHAT was he doing up here? He did not know. What time was it? He did not know that either. His watch? No. He must have forgotten it. And he couldn’t see where the sun stood in the sky. Clouds had come over; heavy clouds that hung low and dense on the mountains.
It was hot—breathless. Or was it merely his own lack of breath? But he must have found some breath to toil up here. Yet he hardly remembered coming. He must have struggled up wildly, noting nothing; half-stunned, he supposed, by what had happened.
Once more a sense of nausea threatened. Robin put out a hand to gain support from an upright post, one of several that carried wire-netting round a hillside vineyard.
His surroundings heaved and fell distressingly. The mountains, the pathway, that plot of market roses, the crescent of Garavan Bay, the black rim of the sea. Better sit down, take a rest and try to think steadily. Why wasn’t he down there? Down there in the quiet of his own room, instead of sitting up here, light-headed and soaked in sweat, his pulses thudding?
But hadn’t he been here before? Of course! Now he knew. He had come up on muleback with Denise. On the day they went to Castellar. They had stopped at this very place to admire the view. No wonder he was puffing a bit. It must be quite high up. But why?
He tried to remember. The balcony. Denise’s letter. After that for a time he had gone on sitting there. Then the Rue Longue. The cathedral square. His father. His father, who had brought this catastrophe upon him, who had driven Denise away. Robin trembled, as he pieced his thoughts together. Rage had claimed him, he supposed. He had lost all hold of himself.
The flame was fanned by recollection. No! He could not go back to his father. He could not and would not. Not yet. Not now. Never, perhaps. Robin jumped up in his renewed excitement. So that was why he was here? Why he had stumbled blindly away from them all? Stumbled away from his father, from Denise, from himself, from his misery? If this was how you felt when unhappiness had almost crazed you, then it was a relief to let your reason go.
A large drop of water fell, rolling about for an instant as a little ball of dust before it burst and sank into the pathway. The still air, heavy with the scent from flower terraces, lay like a weight upon the hillsides. Robin wiped his brow and looked upwards. The clouds were black and low above him. Lightning had begun to flash along the southern horizon. He had better go on. But where? Never mind. Just go on. So long, at least, as this burning resentment drove him. He could do it. He was all right. He could keep going. Going away from the man who waited for him down there below.
Yes. They had come this way, he and Denise. He remembered everything clearly. This part of the track that passed underneath gnarled olive-trees, where the ancient paving was broken and the mules had to choose their steps slowly. And now it became very steep as the way led straight up the face of the hill. The mules, he remembered, had climbed up through the rocks like monkeys.
No. That was too much for him. Better take this path branching off to one side. Robin turned to follow it. An old man working in his plot of vegetables called out to the thin young foreigner with sweat-sodden hair and strange eyes that seemed to burn but not to see. This was a private path, he shouted after him, a path leading round the side of the mountain, passing vineyards and losing itself at last among heath, juniper, and boulders. But his voice was weak, perhaps; or the young foreigner had merely paid him no attention.
A roll of thunder sounded in the distance. A second, nearer. Angrily, Robin pushed on. Now the heavy raindrops came more quickly, leaving dark splashes on sun-whitened stones, broken stones, rolled from the hillside lying everywhere and forcing him to go more slowly. But the rain that fell upon his head was cool and grateful to him as he laboured forward. The lowering clouds had begun to make it dark. He must be careful not to stumble.
Denise. No. He must keep walking away from the thought of her. Walking along this path. She would not have been so heartless, had she not been driven to it.
He must stop to breathe for a moment. Stop to calm the hammer beating in his throat. Funny he had never climbed so high on foot before. Hadn’t liked to risk it. Was it these heights that were making his head swim? But it wasn’t so high, really. Not when you looked down. Bother the rain. It had turned into a shower-bath! Should he look about him for shelter? But there was no shelter. Only some dwarf junipers. Should he go on, then? Or, after all, turn back and face—but how could he do that?
Damnation take this rain and darkness! What was to be done? If only—
A piece of rock lay upon the pathway. In his distraction, Robin tripped against it, then stum
bled sideways, wrenching a foot in a crevice. As he drew it free, the pain dazzled and sickened him, causing him to cry aloud. He sat down on the hillside, rocking back and forth, while the drenching rain dripped from him.
But after a time he saw that he must stand up somehow. Stand up and try to get back down the hill. Self-preservation was now the force that ruled him. Fear and the thunderstorm were giving Robin back his senses.
He got up, clutching at a juniper bush to steady himself as he stood, one-legged upon his sound foot. If only he didn’t feel the return of nausea, this lightness in his head!
Failing to balance himself, his sprained foot came down heavily. With a groan of pain, Robin crumpled senseless on the stones.
II
One of the double shutters was not secure. The morning breeze caught it. It swung back against the outside wall with a loud bang.
In the chair by the window, Henry started. He looked about him bewildered. Where—? Yes, in Robin’s room. He must have gone to sleep, after the doctor went. A white-clad figure was bending over the bed. That was the nurse, of course.
She turned, saw Henry was awake, and smiled, to reassure him that the bang had not disturbed his son’s drugged sleep. Thereafter she hurried out to the balcony to catch the swinging shutter.
“I’ve been asleep,” he whispered, as she fixed it, standing near him in the once more darkened room.
“Sleep. Yes,” she answered. It was about all the English she knew. If she had known more, she might have asked him why he did not go to his own room and have a proper rest.
