Kate stole a look at her. Hollow-cheeked, inert … A ghastly colour, greyish beneath the make-up. Thinner than ever. Blast her … and she’d been looking so much better, so happy: in love obviously: somebody with money it seemed like—those silk stockings, those expensive flowers, that handbag. Who is he, has it gone wrong? Damn. Damn.
She said sharply:
“You haven’t told me much about Austria. Did you enjoy it? What did you do?”
“I did enjoy it,” Olivia opened her eyes, tried to think, to speak briskly. “It’s so difficult to describe a holiday, isn’t it? Unless you know the country.”
“God knows when I shall get abroad again,” said Kate bitterly. “Never, I shouldn’t think … Not since my honeymoon. And even then Rob didn’t like it.” She brooded.
“Some day we’ll pop off together somewhere. We’ve always said we would. Not that I believe you’d ever bring yourself to leave the family.”
“Wouldn’t I!”
Perhaps when Christopher’s gone to school … When Priscilla’s stopped minding my being out of reach …
After a while Olivia said:
“Getting this blasted food-poisoning on the journey has sort of spoilt it all.”
“How d’you feel now?”
“Oh … better … Only it still niggles on.”
“Gripes?”
“M’m. Can’t seem to keep much inside me. Still, as Mrs. Banks says, a good turn-out never did nobody any harm.”
“Don’t be idiotic,” said Kate crossly, worried. “You’ve said that the last five days—ever since you’ve been here. You ought to see a doctor.”
“Good God, no! It’s nothing. Etty’s doctor gave me some stuff. He said I’d be all right.”
Time for the next dose … When will it work? “We’ve never had any complaints,” said the rat-faced young man in the white linen coat, knowing, smooth, reassuring among the jars and bottles. “Of course, you must persevere.” I’m persevering. Per ardua ad astra.
“For Pete’s sake don’t say anything to Ma about a doctor.” Not Dr. Martin saying, “Well, young lady …” and peering through his glasses, grunting, saying, “Now are those cheeks your own, or are they not?”—remembering me as a child, when I was jollier …
But Kate was looking round for Polly, and shouting at Jane and listening to Christopher. Her non-parental, undiluted moment of attention was over. She was dispersed again, split up with nervous alertness among them all.
No danger there.
“Now me!”
“No, me!”
“Get him out, Grandma.”
“Please,” said Kate.
Grandpa, a non-magical effigy, without the sinister power of a guy or a ventriloquist’s doll, was hoisted out of his conveyance and placed in a chaise-longue. He opened one eye, closed it again. Christopher climbed into his place, Jane seized the handle, away went the bath-chair at a spanking pace, Christopher jigging and squealing inside, Jane rushing with a crimson face and grimaces of mad exertion.
“It’s much better without Grandpa,” shouted Jane.
“Look out for Polly, don’t run her down,” called Grandma indulgently. Really, the bath-chair was the greatest blessing; it kept them happy for hours.
“Now, Christopher, it’s my turn. Get out, I want to try by myself down this hill.”
The chair and Jane launched themselves from the top of the mildly sloping terrace and, gathering impetus, ran down to the very end of the lawn, coming to rest with a bump against the kitchen-garden wall. Grandma started forward.
“Leave her alone,” said Kate sharply. “Don’t shout at her. She’s much more likely to crash if you make her think she will.”
“My border,” said Mrs. Curtis doubtfully. “Still …” She sat back again. “Her nerves seem very strong. It’s curious how much more fearless girls are. You and Olivia were just the same. James took twice as long with his bicycle.”
They said all the things, it all went on and on. They were handed over lock, stock and barrel to the young.
“Kate, dear,” said Mrs. Curtis smoothly, “I’ve asked Miss Mivart and Miss Toomer to look in for tea on Saturday. They’re so longing to see the children.”
“That’ll test their nerves,” murmured Olivia.
Kate groaned. But not now, as in the old days, did she object with scorn, argue with acrimony, make herself difficult. The old scarecrows could see the children if they wanted to.
“Well, keep Dad out of the way,” was all she said. “You know Miss Mivart will try to shake hands with him and pass him the bread and butter and generally bring herself to his notice with tender tact and solicitude.”
“Dad doesn’t bother,” said Mrs. Curtis comfortably. “He doesn’t take any notice. She likes to do little things for him. She always admired him so very much.”
“I wonder if she sees now why God in his infinite mercy didn’t see fit to let her marry Dad.”
Mr. Curtis lay back without stirring in his chair, pale, his jaw sunk, his lips blowing in and out as he lightly dozed.
The bath-chair stood abandoned in the herbaceous border beneath the wall, half-hidden in August perennials. Jane and Christopher were hurrying back.
“We’re very very sorry, Grandma,” began Jane from some distance. “We accidentally snapped off this.” Flushed, anxiously honest, she held out a head of pink hollyhock.
“Oh, dear!” said Grandma, “what a pity. Poor hollyhock.”
“We don’t call them that,” said Christopher.
“What do you call them?”
He considered a moment, his eyes blank, false.
“Mountains,” he said casually.
Polly also had returned.
They stood in a row before their elders—the two solid, mouse-haired, unproblematic little girls, the frail-legged dangerous little boy.
“I wish we had our Priscilla here,” said Mrs. Curtis, trying again, sparing a thought for her eldest grandchild, on a visit to her other grannie.
Jane and Christopher exchanged sly glances. “We don’t,” said Jane. They doubled up, cackling with laughter. “We don’t! We don’t!”
“Not want Priscilla? Oh, come now, why not?”
Christopher went on squawking, but Jane looked troubled, sighed, turned a negligent somersault before replying:
“Well, she’s rather rude. She bites.”
“She bites,” said Christopher, “but she’s not rude. I’ve met rude people. They smash flowers.” He also turned a somersault, a poor one, continued: “I’ve met them in Scotland.”
Grandma raised inquiring eyebrows at Kate, who shook her head.
“This is rude,” said Christopher. He ran a few steps forward, stopped and stuck his bottom out towards them.
“What could be ruder?” said Olivia faintly. She covered her face with a handkerchief and her chair shook.
“Mabel said it was rude. Pip’s rude sometimes. D’you know who Pip is? He’s our dog. I call him Poodle. D’you know which he wears, fur or fewers?”
“Fur, of course,” said Jane with scorn. “Only birds wear feathers.”
“Gentlemen wear fur on their legs,” said Christopher, rolling aimlessly on the ground. “Daddy does. Mabel does too, but she’s not a man, she’s a nursemaid.”
“Mummy, Polly’s got something in her hand, she won’t give it up.”
“Polly, show Mummy.”
Another unripe mulberry. Jane pounced on it, and Polly shrieked. “It’s a mulberry, Mummy.”
“Throw it away,” said Kate, rubbing her eyes.
“Can’t I eat it?”
“No, it’s too sour.”
Jane bowed her head over the mulberry, murmured to it regretfully, “You’re too sour,” and threw it into the bushes. “It was a shame to pick it,” she said regretfully.
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Grandma started to croon, tossing the tearful Polly on her knee. “There was—an old woman—tossed up in a blanket, seventeen times as high as the moon,” she sang. Marvellous how the old rhymes came back to one. James had been the one for nursery rhymes. Ceasing to toss, starting to jig, she continued, “Polly put the kettle on, Polly put the kettle on …”
“I don’t care for your singing, Grandma,” interrupted Christopher. “So please stop.”
Mrs. Curtis stopped abruptly … No, not an attractive child. Spoilt, tiresome. His father spoils him. James was inclined once to have a phase like this, I soon got him round … It wouldn’t do to appear to be noticing him. She started singing again, but in a suppressed way.
Christopher sat down on the arm of Grandpa’s chair. The effigy behind him put out a hand and touched him, smiling faintly … the faintest hovering flicker … But all passed unnoticed. Christopher didn’t even wince or wriggle. He seemed dreamy, gazing at the grown-ups each in turn with melancholy hazel eyes.
“What a nice smiling face you’ve got, Mummy,” he said gently.
“Have I?” Kate shot him a sharp glance behind her smile.
“I like smiling faces. Daddy’s got the best smiling face.”
“Hasn’t Grandma got a nice smiling face?” coaxed Mrs. Curtis, rushing as ever upon her fate.
“You’ve got a cow’s face,” he said casually. The pause was too long, nobody did anything whatever. He added, “You’ve got the best smiling cow’s face.”
“Mummy, Polly’s wet,” said Jane.
“Never mind,” said Kate. “Here comes Mabel. Get up, Christopher, bed-time. I’ll see to you. Mother, will you keep Jane? Mabel’ll come for her after she’s bathed Polly. Polly, say night-night, Grandma. Christopher, say good-night, give Grandma a kiss.”
Jane sat in the swing, wound herself up and unwound again rapidly.
“What a pity they’ve all got such straight hair,” said Mrs. Curtis to Olivia. “You had such lovely curls, every one of you. I believe it’s all in the brushing. However, don’t mention it to Kate.” To Jane she said: “Don’t make yourself giddy, dear. Wouldn’t you like me to read?”
“No, thanks.”
“It’s funny they don’t care to be read to. You all loved it so.” To Jane: “Well, what about a little game then?”
“Yes, shall we climb the potting-shed roof?” Jane got down rapidly.
“Very well. Olivia, you’ll stay by Dad, dear, won’t you?” She took Mr. Curtis’s handkerchief from his pocket, wiped his nose, tucked it back again. “Come then, Jane.”
They went away hand in hand.
“How much can you do on it?” Olivia heard Jane ask. “Can you get to the top?”
Grandma was Jane’s favourite person. “She’s just what I was,” said Grandma. Jane alone received Grandma’s tomboy confidences: how when she was six she’d fallen out of an apple tree and left her skirt caught on the topmost bough; how she could jump high hedges and had beaten all the boys once vaulting a five-barred gate …
“And when we were children,” said Kate aggrieved, “she was so on her dignity she practically pretended she had no legs.”
Was it Jane’s influence, or the withdrawal of Dad’s? … Was a load lifted now she was freed, in all but elementary impersonal ministrations—freed in her mind and speech—from that ever incongruous-seeming union?
There he lay. Sometimes he knew one, sometimes he didn’t. On and off he muttered, mostly he was silent. Uncle Oswald’s visits seemed to revive him a little, but Uncle Oswald didn’t come so often now: Mrs. Curtis had never liked the little man. He’d got quite fat too. His bird’s face had a pouch beneath the jaw, like a pelican’s in embryo. Miracle: his asthma was gone. Not a trace of it since his mind began to go to sleep. There was a lot to be thankful for. He was obviously quite comfortable.
Only when he did those things … like putting his hand out to touch Christopher … it was a bit upsetting. Otherwise one took him for granted. After all he hadn’t said—whatever it was he should have said, had been on the point of saying. He’d given up, let it slip; and now it didn’t matter … even to me … any more. What was left had gradually, imperceptibly lost power to disconcert, to move to love or sorrow … Only pity and a somewhat weary patience … After he dies I’ll remember him again and weep … remember that he said: I want you to be happy; and I said: I will be happy, I promise.
His eyes were open now. He was leaning slightly to one side, studying a small patch of sun that moved and nickered on the grass, shadow-crossed in the light breeze. After a while he looked at her, cocking one eye, amused.
“Never try to take away his bone,” he said quite clearly.
“Not I, Dad. I wouldn’t dare.”
“Get your foot snapped off.” He chuckled.
Simpkin the Pekinese, a handful of bones this many a year beneath the mould and the primroses in the hazel grove at the bottom of the garden, still revisited his master in glimpses of sun or moon, as a shadow on the floor by the chair, a hump in the eiderdown at the foot of the bed.
He closed his eyes again. Almost she leaned forward to say: “Dad, are you pretending?”—the notion was suddenly so strong that he was still there, that it was all assumed, out of perversity, laziness, disillusionment: as people decide to be deaf. But the moment passed. He was far out of earshot.
The loud deep voice of Jane floated over the garden from the potting-shed roof. She got up and crawled languidly over the lawn, down into the kitchen garden. She saw Jane’s strong brown legs and scarlet-suited rear vigorously ascending the slope of the tiled moss-grown roof. Grandma on the path was adjusting a ladder and preparing to follow her.
Olivia called:
“Mother! I’m going in now. Dad’s all right. He’s dozed off.” What an effort to raise one’s voice … Nearly fatal.
“Very well, dear.”
“Do take care on that roof, Mother. Your skirt’s too tight for climbing.”
“I’m quite all right. I shan’t go all the way up … Go on, Jane, Grandma’s coming.”
Vigorously Mrs. Curtis launched herself upon the ladder.
Olivia went briskly indoors, spurred on by the rising nausea.
Thank God … That’s over for a bit.
Now I must, I really must force myself to write to Rollo. Probably he’d been ringing up Etty’s every day, poor boy; and getting no answer. Sitting on her bed, she scribbled a note in pencil.
Darling, no word from you—or have you written and it’s got stuck in this cul-de-sac of a month? I got back and thank God for your sleeper, for I began to feel ill on the journey and illish I’ve been ever since. So not wishing to show you a glum green face I made tracks for home to give my family the benefit. My plans are vague. Please let me know here, darling, if you’re in London. I want to see you. Your O.
She put it in an envelope, sealed and addressed it; then opened it again and scrawled under her signature: I must see you.
Something must be done, something …
Tell him, or not tell him?
I don’t want to say it to him. I don’t know him … Far in the back of her mind persisted a loved, an almost abstract image, free of taint. Not to hate him she must think of him thus, by himself, unrelated to her, impersonal.
She took two pills, washed; summoned the bare energy to make her face up carefully. I mustn’t let myself go. If nobody else suspects, that damned nurse soon will … She went down and slipped her letter into the middle of the pile—Kate’s and mother’s—lying ready for post on the pantry table. She began once more to think about prune juice, to yearn for it. Prune juice, prune juice … I must have it … She took a glass from the pantry shelf and went softly to the larder door. No one about. She heard the wireless going in the kitchen where Ada was cooking dinner. She went noiselessly into the larder, saw the basin of prunes, poured
out a glassful of juice and drank it greedily. More. More. Must leave some … just a little. She stole out again, washed the glass under the pantry tap and put it back.
Kate called over the stairs.
“Liv, they want to say good-night. Can you be bothered?”
“Of course.”
She went up with a show of alacrity. Jane in the camp-bed, Christopher in the old cot with headrails, sat up in Aertex sleeping suits, their bath-flushed faces tense and shining with self-conscious expectation.
Olivia sat down on Jane’s bed and looked at her animals: a monkey, a teddy bear, a Doleful Desmond, and a rabbit in a suit of pyjamas.
“What are their names?”
“They haven’t got names.” She looked troubled. “They’re my Annies.”
“Short for animals,” said Christopher.
“Have you got anything of the sort?” said Olivia.
“No, I wouldn’t have Annies. I call everything names.”
“He’s got a doll,” said Jane. “She’s called Barriecasie.”
“May I see Barriecasie?”
“I haven’t got her to-night. I wanted something else instead.” His hand crept under the pillow, his eyes, fixed on her, looked dangerous: If you laugh I’ll hack you up.
“His new shoes,” said Jane, bouncing in bed.
“May I see them?”
He drew forth a pair of scarlet sandals.
“How beautiful. No wonder you wanted to sleep with them.”
“He always has to sleep with anything new,” explained Jane, without scorn. “Last Christmas Father Christmas brought him a porter’s hat.”
“A real one,” interrupted Christopher, making a quick peak-expressing shape with his hands.
“And he had to have it on to go to sleep. He went right to sleep with it on.”
The Weather in the Streets (The Olivia Curtis Novels) Page 26
