Melissa laughed shortly.
“Who says the women in olden days were slim and healthy?” she enquired belligerently. “Anyway, when I’m a grandma I shan’t want to be ‘assimilated’ as you call it. I think it’s a horrible expression—it sounds like being eaten alive by one of those carnivorous vegetables in Peru, or somewhere. Besides, when I’m old I’ll still be far too busy to——”
“Of course you will, duckie. You’ll finish up being busy arranging your own funeral, I wouldn’t be surprised. What a lucky man I am! And so will Leonard be, in spite of Pop-in-law. How is Leonard, by the by?” He turned to Ellen. “Not back yet?”
“No …” Ellen felt awkward and apologetic on Leonard’s behalf. “Not yet. He has a terrible lot of business to get through before Saturday, you know. But he rings me up each day——”
Rather obviously defensive, that; and quite untrue as well. Roger looked carefully non-committal.
“Oh, well. That’s all right then. I was beginning to wonder at the chap’s sudden and total disappearance just before the happy day. I’d hate to see our Ellen waiting at the church … waiting at the church. Registry office, I mean, only how could you ever find a rhyme for that? Waiting at the registry office, nervously gulping twenty-three coffees—how’s that?” He spoke rather over-boisterously, as if to cover a real anxiety.
“Idiot!” applauded Melissa, taking his hand. “Come on, and I’ll fry you some eggs or something. Adela’s out this evening, and Jeremy’ll be full up with the Cricket Tea, so it’s just us. I’m sorry I annoyed Uncle Richard, Ellen, though he is such an old fool. I suppose it was partly my fault really….”
Greatly touched by such an admission from Melissa, Ellen hastened to meet her more than half-way; assuring her (rashly) that Father hadn’t really minded, and thanking her most heartily for all her hard work.
And so the squabble passed over, leaving Ellen standing alone in the deserted billiard room feeling as if she had been shipwrecked there while her companions had scrambled to safety without her. For it was she, alone, who was to marry Leonard; none of the others. She had to do it alone; and something, somewhere, was terribly wrong.
Why had the wedding been arranged in this frantic haste? And why had Leonard dashed off like this—could his business have been so very urgent? And why had he not rung up? Until she found herself lying to Roger about it, Ellen had not realised quite how peculiar Leonard’s behaviour was. She became aware of a horrible, growing unreality about the whole thing. Almost, she could have imagined that she had made it all up herself—like one of those crazy, love-starved spinsters one hears of, who imagine for themselves a suitor, a wedding day—who even go out and buy a wedding dress….
Yes, there was the dress box, just out there in the hall, and still untouched. Again, and more strongly than ever, Ellen recalled the odd premonition that she had experienced in the fitting room—that she would never wear the beautiful dress.
Well, that at least could easily be disproved. She would go and put the dress on this very evening, and wear it for an hour or two to show everyone. Melissa—Father—Cousin Laura—they’d all like to see how she looked in it. Surely an hour or two’s wearing was defiance enough to fling in the face of Fate. The premonition would be shown up for the nonsense that it was.
Full of this intention, Ellen crossed the hall and picked up the box; but as soon as she came to the foot of the stairs and caught sight of Howard’s plaster, she realised that she couldn’t leave it like that for the whole evening. Mrs Hammond could hardly be offended at her clearing up builders’ rubbish—if it was left it would soon be trodden into the carpets all over the house. This was no task to embark on in a new dress, so Ellen set down the box, fetched dustpan and brush, and set to work.
Rattle tap tap tap, went the plastic top of the brush against the banisters; rattle tap tap tap, rattle tap tap tap, until, as Ellen worked, it seemed to take on a definite purposeful rhythm … rapping out a message to her … yes, even addressing her by name…. “… Ellen at the church turned up, rattle tap tap tap, rattle tap tap tap…. And her Pa turned up, and her Ma turned up, and the something something something tap tap tap turned up…. But the bridegrooom some thing something never turned up … but a telegraph boy with his nose turned up brought a telegram to say that he couldn’t come today for they’d found him in the river with his toes turned up.”
Something like that. Perhaps this was the very tune to which Howard’s buckets had swung so exuberantly this afternoon. In vain, it seemed, Ellen tried to alter the rhythm of her sweeping; the catchy tune beat on relentlessly in her head. She was thankful when the task was finished … but by then it was time to get supper … and then to clear it away … and then to help Cousin Laura to bed … and then to wash the twenty-eight dusty old beer bottles from under the sink because Father had suddenly, at ten o’clock at night, decided that the rhubarb wine was ready for bottling and couldn’t wait another hour.
And so it happened that it was not until she was in bed and nearly asleep that Ellen remembered that she still hadn’t worn the new dress.
CHAPTER XX
ELLEN WOKE ON her wedding morning with a sense of overwhelming relief that the time for indecision was over; by five o’clock this afternoon she would be married; for better, for worse, the decision was made.
Odd, really, that she should have woken to such a feeling of finality. Because, of course, it was still possible to withdraw, right up to the last moment. On the very steps of the Town Hall she could still draw back. Other women—and men too—had done so. Of course, the cost in embarrassment and disapproving gossip would be considerable; but it would only be temporary, and what sensible woman would let a few days’ humiliation weigh in the balance against the unhappiness of a lifetime?
No, it was not fear of embarrassment that made Ellen so certain that she would go through with it. Nor—alas!—was it that she had suddenly discovered that she loved Leonard truly and deeply, though right up till last night she had been secretly hoping against hope that Love would suddenly materialise for her, with all the shattering improbability of a legacy from an unknown millionaire uncle, in time for the wedding.
No: what made it all seem so simple and inescapable now was the fact that Leonard no longer seemed real. None of it seemed real. She would be able to go through the day with the calm acquiescence that belongs to dreams, where the wildest, the most bizarre and unnatural of events are accepted as a matter of course; one goes along with them unquestioningly, and without resistance. No use asking herself now: “Do I really want Leonard with me for the rest of my life?” or “Will I really learn to love him after marriage, as Melissa says?” for she had asked herself these questions so often that they no longer seemed to have any meaning. By now, they were like pictures that have hung on the same place on the wall all one’s life, noticed only when they are removed, leaving strange, bare patches outlined in grime.
Half scared by this strange lethargy of the spirit, Ellen made herself get out of bed. There must be a lot to do before this afternoon—though exactly what must be done she could not decide; for Melissa, taking upon herself virtually the rôle of bride’s mother, had everything well in hand. She had, after all, managed to get Saturday morning off work, and already Ellen could hear her bustling up and down between her kitchen and the billiard room. Evidently Father had given in about the billiard room being used for the party—or at least had decided to know nothing about it, which was the nearest he ever got to giving in about anything, and which really served just as well for all practical purposes. As the morning went on, it became clear that he had also decided to know nothing about the wedding itself; and the skill with which he managed to combine total ignorance of the forthcoming celebration with strict instructions that Grandfather’s old wine glasses were not to be used for it, was the wonder of all present.
However, Father’s undoubted talents must not be strained too far; and Ellen judged it wise to keep him as far as possible from the billi
ard room, where Melissa’s clever but far from surreptitious preparations included piling crockery all over the billiard table and shouting continually up and down the stairs to Adela—who, in spite of her disapproval of the whole proceeding, seemed delighted to arrange plates of cakes and savouries and to chatter endlessly about her outing last night.
So Ellen lured her father out into the garden, and left him, shears in hand, deciding which unoffending vegetable should be the next victim of his rather bracing methods.
Mr Fortescue never seemed to feel the heat. Indeed, his energy seemed to grow with the growing heat of the sun rising towards its noonday peak, and Ellen stood for a moment watching with pride as he set of across the dry grass, brisk as a man half his age, under the full blaze of the midsummer noon.
For it was a lovely day again—just as it had been for weeks now. It had seemed, a few days back, as if the sunshine couldn’t go on much longer without a break; and Ellen had had an uneasy superstitious feeling that the weather would break up just on her wedding day—a depressing omen for a mind already divided and full of doubts.
But it hadn’t broken up; and Ellen’s mind, far from being full of doubts, was strangely empty of everything—empty, and yet not at ease.
Partly, of course, it was the queer shapelessness of the stretch of time that still remained before the wedding. For there was nothing very much for her to do—Melissa was insisting on taking charge of everything—and yet she could not feel at leisure.
Without real purpose, she strolled indoors again, and into the billiard room. It was empty, except for Jeremy, who stood idly picking at the icing round the bottom edge of a cake—not enough to show, for the icing was anyway a little uneven, and had run slightly on to the plate. But all the same it was maddening of him. Even more maddening was the fact that he was not being the least bit furtive about it—if he had snatched his hand away guiltily at Ellen’s entrance she would hardly have been annoyed at all. But instead, he turned and looked her full in the face, and then turned calmly back to his reprehensible task.
“Stop it, Jeremy!” said Ellen sharply. “It’s disgusting, picking at food like that!”—and felt the familiar pang of “Is this maiden-auntish?” rising automatically to mind. A moment later she recollected that it couldn’t be maiden-auntish really—why, she was practically married already. By this evening she would be quite married, and, my goodness, if he started picking at icing then …!
Quite revived by this stimulating thought, Ellen smiled benignly at the boy’s off-hand apology, and turned her attention to the rest of the scene. How beautifully Melissa had arranged it all! Plates, glasses, bottles, carefully-covered food: the whole room shining with polish. How kind—how very sweet and kind Melissa was underneath—or rather mixed up with—all her brusque busy-ness. And what a comfort and a moral support as well. All Ellen’s uneasy feelings, laid before Melissa, had been brushed gloriously aside as Wedding Nerves. All brides feel like that, Melissa had assured her with brisk and boundlessly consoling dogmatism; it’s a well-known thing. Lots of them feel sick as well, she had added, for good measure, as she distributed teaspoons among the cups and saucers with swift precision.
Everything was all right; and, after all, Leonard had rung up, but there had been a muddle about getting the message to her—and no wonder, with all these preparations going on, and the house full of old people and children.
Ellen turned away, leaving the scene of the festivities once more to Jeremy’s mercy. As she passed through the hall, her bedroom door opened, and Cousin Laura beckoned her in.
“I’ve been wanting to speak to you, my dear,” said the old lady, leading the way towards the table by the window at which she had evidently been writing. “I wanted to—I mean, it’s your wedding day, dear, and I just wanted to give you a little present.” As she spoke, she bent over the table and picked up a cheque, the ink on it barely dry. It was made out to Ellen, signed with Cousin Laura’s own name, and it was for two thousand pounds.
Ellen stared at it unbelievingly as Cousin Laura held it out to her.
“Please take it, my dear,” said the old lady. “I shall never use it—and I can’t take it with me, as they say. I had thought of leaving it to you in my will—but I don’t want all the worry and fuss of changing it when it’s all settled for Leonard to have everything. Besides, I wanted to have the pleasure of giving it to you myself—a little wedding gift….”
The old lady looked up appealingly, as if somehow fearing a snub; and by this time Ellen had collected her wits. Of course: the cheque was worth nothing—the poor soul had no money, no bank account. So what harm in humouring her? She bent and kissed the old cheek warmly and gratefully—for gratitude was indeed due for the intention, whatever might be the hard facts.
Cousin Laura cut short her words of thanks.
“Don’t my dear, don’t. I’m not depriving myself of anything, as I told you. And I’m not depriving Leonard, because, of course, he will still be getting the bulk of what I have to leave. And in a way this is his too, of course, since you will be his wife. But all the same, I always feel that a wife should have a little money she can call her own. I sometimes think that if I had been in a position to say, ‘But we can afford it——’” She sighed, with deep sadness; and a sudden impulse of blind sympathy made Ellen blurt out, regardless of tact and discretion:
“I don’t know how you can be so good to me, Cousin Laura—when my father treated you so badly. It must have been so terrible for you when I was born—I should think you’d hate me….”
The old lady looked up at her in slight surprise.
“Oh no, my dear. I’ve always been very fond of you. You must know that. And I’m fond of your father, too. He deserved that I should hate him—that’s true, and indeed I did, for a little while. I wrote him a dreadful letter once … and the odd thing is, do you know, I came across it a few days back! I thought it had been destroyed years ago. It was so strange seeing it again … such a strange feeling….” The old lady was silent for a moment; then she went on: “But to go on hating him—oh no! You can’t, you know. It’s too hard work for any ordinary person. It’s as hard to go on hating someone because of some injury as it is to go on loving them because of some benefit. The effects of an injury may last for as long as you go on living; but the person who administered it—oh, you’d be surprised how you slip back into being fond of him again—like a kind of laziness. You see, the odd thing is, you find that he is just the same person after he injured you as he was before; he hasn’t changed a scrap. You expect him to be suddenly quite different after acting in such a way; and he isn’t. That was the thing that surprised me most, I remember.”
The old lady sighed again; but this time there was less of sadness in the sound than of relief.
“I’m glad to be able to tell you all this, Ellen,” she continued. “I was never quite sure how much you knew about it all…. I don’t want you to think there is any bitterness between myself and your father. Oh no, not for years. It’s not that I forgive him, exactly. Real forgiveness, I suppose, should be something deliberate—something positive. But for me it wasn’t like that at all. It was just that hatred began to seem so tiring and complicated—when I began to feel my affection for Dick coming back it was such a relief—just like having a charwoman come back after you have had to manage without her for months. Affection is mostly habit, anyway. You can’t break a habit at a single blow. And then, of course, in my case, it was very pleasant to come back to visit my old home when your mother died … and very convenient, too, as the lodgings I was in were very uncomfortable. And you were a nice little thing, Ellen, I liked looking after you—for one thing, it was a much easier life than I’d had for some time. Oh, I don’t know—I think that’s how it is for an ordinary person. Great hatred— I think you need to be a very selfless sort of person to keep it up for very long, because it demands the sacrifice of such a lot of small comforts and satisfactions. And you know, Ellen, being deprived of the big satisfac
tions in life doesn’t stop you still wanting the small ones…. You think it will, but it doesn’t…. That was another surprising thing, I remember…. Such a narrow, disappointing life as mine, and yet it’s taught me such a lot of surprising things!”
Laura laughed, almost gaily, at the paradox. She wondered, for a moment, whether to tell Ellen about the other time she had hated Dick. For looking back, now, it seemed that no hatred she had ever felt could compare with the hatred she had felt for Dick that summer afternoon seventy-five years ago, when he had idly snipped a fringe along the pages of her brand new copy of Little Lord Fauntleroy—her birthday present of that very morning. Seeing Melissa’s children mishandling the book all over again had brought it all back—but only for a few seconds. Hatred was like that—here and gone before you could really grasp it. Like life itself. No, no use telling Ellen all this; it sounded so silly now—now it was all over…. Cousin Laura laughed again; and Ellen found herself laughing, too. For a moment, she felt that she too, was coming to the end of her problems. But of course she wasn’t; she was still quite young; and this was her wedding day.
CHAPTER XXI
NEVER HAD ELLEN felt so gay, so witty, so much the centre of attraction. But then, never before had she had three glasses of champagne pressed on her in quick succession; and never, she reflected giddily, had she had such cause for relief and triumph.
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