Rose, deprived of three admirers at once, by a schoolgirl whom she despised, made a last bid for attention by going and sitting by Noel, but he was amusing himself with Miss Pettinger, and when Rose broke in with a request to be taken on the river, Noel said, ‘Presently, Rose,’ and Miss Pettinger said, ‘Don’t interrupt, Rose,’ just as if one were still at school. Before Rose had sulked for long the air was rent by the gong and the motor-horn. Mr Keith said he supposed they had better go, or Lydia would never stop that noise, so the whole party moved towards the pond.
Here a scene of unparalleled splendour met their eyes. Lydia, Swan, Morland and Geraldine, all spotlessly clean, were lined up on the opposite side of the pond, which was now as clean as Mrs Twicker’s kitchen table. At the upper sluice, in which a Union Jack was stuck, stood Philip and the Fairweathers. Mr Twicker in his Sunday clothes holding a bucket, Hacker with the frog in its bowl, Henry and Catherine and Mrs Twicker, stood in respectful attendance.
‘Look here, Twicker,’ said Mr Keith, whose respect for the Sunday rest of his gardener had forbidden him to look for him and complain, but who wasn’t going to miss this chance, ‘I can’t have this sort of thing again. Mess all over the lawn. You shouldn’t let Miss Lydia do it.’
Twicker said it wasn’t no good speaking to Miss Lydia, and so long as she didn’t cut her initials on the marrow he was saving up for the Flower Show, the way she done last year, he didn’t hold with interfering, and Miss Lydia and the young gentlemen had cleaned the pond up a treat, and did Mr Keith know that the catch of the tool-house needed repairing and how he was to do it with the Flower Show coming on and all the young vegetables, he didn’t know.
‘All right, Twicker, all right,’ said Mr Keith.
‘Ready?’ said Lydia, who had been champing and chafing while this conversation went on. ‘All right. Go!’
At this word Philip pulled up the sluice gate, the Fairweathers cheered loudly, Swan and Morland beat the gong and blew the horn, the children shrieked with joy, and water came gushing into the pond. Twicker then emptied the goldfish into their home and went off with his wife. Hacker carefully decanted the frog onto the grass. The frog, who had not at all enjoyed his Sunday outing, looked at his surroundings, disliked them, and leapt away into the bushes. Edith’s nurse descended on the children and removed them, followed by Hacker, who had promised to tell them a story while they had their supper.
‘That’s all,’ said Lydia.
‘Well, that has been most amusing,’ said Miss Pettinger, ‘and I must really be going now. Goodbye, Lydia. We shall meet again next term. Goodbye, Rose. You ought to keep up your physical exercises, dear; you are getting quite a slouch. I can always arrange for her to have special gym at the school if you like, Mrs Birkett.’
Mrs Birkett thanked her and said she must think of it. Rose felt that she was now a new girl in the Lower Second, and wished she could hurt someone.
‘Can we send you home, Miss Pettinger?’ asked Mrs Keith.
‘Oh no, thanks. I have my little car,’ said Miss Pettinger. ‘I drive myself everywhere. I went to Dalmatia in the holidays with my secretary. It was most interesting.’
As no one wanted to hear about Dalmatia, Mrs Keith made a move towards the house with her guest. Some of the tennis players drifted back to the court. Everard, Colin and Philip lingered, somehow back in school shop again, and Rose nursed her growing wrath and mortification. Lydia, with Swan and Morland, was absorbed in watching the water rise, and waiting till it had reached its usual level before opening the lower sluice gate.
‘Oh, Philip,’ said Rose, ‘let’s go on the river. It’s sickening to do nothing but talk all the time.’
‘I’m afraid I can’t just this moment,’ said Philip. ‘I promised to have a single with Everard as soon as this set is over. But we shan’t be very long, and then I’d love to.’
‘I’ll ask Noel then. He can punt,’ said Rose.
‘Yes, do,’ said Philip. ‘He’s playing now, but he’ll have finished soon.’
‘But I do think it’s sickening of you,’ said Rose. ‘You never do anything I ask you to. You won’t even get a new car.’
Philip said nothing. Colin and Everard felt acutely uncomfortable and didn’t know if it would be kinder to move away, or to pretend everything was normal.
‘Well, you might answer me,’ said Rose, working herself up for a good scene. ‘Of course if you like letting water into a pond with Lydia better than being with me, that just shows.’
‘I’m sorry, Rose,’ said Philip. ‘If I could please you by talking I would, but if I can’t it isn’t much good.’
‘Well, if I’m not fit to talk to, we’d better not be engaged any more,’ said Rose. ‘Here is your horrid old ring, and I hope you’ll be very happy and all that, and it’s all perfectly sickening.’
As she spoke she pulled off her ring, threw it at Philip and walked away. The ring fell short of Philip and lay on the grass. No one liked to speak. Colin cast an anxious glance at the other end of the pond, but Lydia and the boys were intent on the sluice and their own conversation.
‘She’s full enough now,’ said Lydia. ‘I’ll open the sluice a bit. That’s it. Now we’ll go and bathe. You boys go and get your things. I’ll wait here for you.’
Philip stooped, picked up the ring and walked towards the end of the pond where Lydia was standing.
‘Do you think he’s going to drown himself?’ Colin asked Everard, awe-struck at his first experience of real life.
‘No,’ said Everard, ‘but it would be a very good thing if he could get drunk. Mind, Colin, you and I are witnesses that Rose broke off the engagement. Nothing is to get Philip back into that mess – nothing. Look here, don’t tell anyone yet. Go back to the tennis-court. I’ll be along soon.’
Everard went over to Philip. Lydia had pulled up the gate, and the little stream was pursuing its way. Just below the sluice it widened into a deep pool fringed with wild mint and grasses. In the clear water above the muddy bottom some minnows were flirting about. Philip was standing by Lydia, looking into the water.
‘What’s that you’ve got?’ asked Lydia.
‘A ring,’ said Philip.
‘Whose?’
‘It was Rose’s,’ said Philip. ‘I gave it to her. She has given it back to me.’
He dropped it into the pool. It sank down into the mud. A little swirl of clouded water rose from the bottom and settled again. In the clear water above the minnows wove their ceaseless pattern.
‘I’ll see that no one clears out the pool,’ said Lydia.
‘Thanks awfully, Lydia,’ said Philip.
‘If you and the boys took Philip bathing it wouldn’t be a bad idea,’ said Everard.
‘Rather,’ said Lydia, with a sudden sense of responsibility that she felt but could not have expressed. ‘I’ll get Colin’s bathing things for him. I say, Philip, stay to dinner. We shan’t be changing much, what with Sunday and playing tennis late and all that.’
Philip looked undecided.
‘I’ll tell the Birketts you are staying, if you like,’ said Everard.
‘Thanks. You might tell them everything,’ said Philip. ‘God! I could do with a drink.’
‘Come on then,’ said Lydia. ‘I’ll get you a whisky and soda. Would that be the right thing?’ she asked anxiously.
‘Quite right,’ said Philip gravely.
‘Hi, Tony!’ shouted Lydia, as the boys appeared. ‘Philip is coming with us and I’m going to get him some things. You go on down to the boat-house and we’ll come.’
In the dining-room Lydia gave Everard and Philip whisky and soda, contenting herself with grapefruit squash.
‘Many happy returns of the day,’ said Lydia, looking at Philip.
‘Thank you,’ said Philip. ‘I don’t suppose it will last but I didn’t know one could feel so happy.’
He went off with Lydia, while Everard, a considerable weight off his mind, went in search of the Birketts. Mrs Birkett had go
ne home, taking Rose and Geraldine to evening service, but by great luck Mr Birkett was watching the tennis by himself. Everard sat down beside him.
‘I was looking for you,’ he said.
‘When will you young men learn that the phrase “I am looking for you” at once conveys to the sensitive ear that there is trouble about, trouble which you are too cowardly to approach by direct methods,’ said Mr Birkett. ‘Out with it.’
Everard laughed.
‘It isn’t exactly trouble,’ he said. ‘Rose’s engagement is broken off.’
‘It may mean trouble, but it’s certainly good news,’ said Mr Birkett. ‘How do you know?’
‘I was there. Rose was annoyed with Philip because he wouldn’t take her on the river at once. He had promised to play a single with me, as a matter of fact. So she said the engagement was off and threw her ring at him – but it didn’t get anywhere near him,’ he added reflectively.
‘No girls can throw,’ said Mr Birkett. ‘You don’t think Philip will ask her to think it over?’
‘Philip dropped the ring ceremoniously into the pool below the pond,’ said Everard.
‘A little on the heroic side,’ said Mr Birkett, thinking of his last interview with Philip, ‘but a good move. This is going to simplify next term, Everard. If Philip takes the Mixed Fifth and gives his whole mind to his work, he may make a success of it for us.’
‘Lydia asked him to stay here to dinner tonight,’ said Everard. ‘It may save some awkwardness, and I said I’d tell you.’
‘Good girl, Lydia,’ said Mr Birkett, secretly thinking that much as he disliked his Rose in many of her aspects, he was heartily glad that his daughter was so pretty and attractive, not a loud-voiced Amazon like Lydia Keith. ‘But about the Lower Fourth, Everard. If Harrison takes the Junior Classics, we might get Prothero to change with Smith. Did I mention, by the way, that we are getting Prothero back next term? He writes to me that he enjoyed his year at that Canadian school very much and hopes he’ll never see the place again. They might make a good team for the Lower School…’
The talk became wholly technical.
Dinner at the Manor had an atmosphere of discreet hilarity that Mr and Mrs Keith and their eldest son and his wife could not quite understand, though they enjoyed it very much. Colin had told the good news to Noel and Kate, Lydia had told Swan and Morland. No one thought it necessary to tell Hacker. Colin persuaded his father to have champagne, nominally to celebrate the clearing of the pond, and what with the fizzy taste to which they were unaccustomed, and their excitement over the news, Lydia, Swan and Morland all choked. It was not till after eleven that Philip got back to the Rectory. Seeing a light in the library he thought he had better get it over, and went in.
‘Don’t say a word about Rose, because I’m sick of the subject,’ said her father.
Philip shook hands, feeling extremely happy and a little ashamed.
‘I’ve got to apologise, sir, for all the trouble I’ve given you. If you don’t mind I’ll go home tomorrow till I go to Russia. It will be more comfortable for everyone.’
‘Perhaps it will,’ said Mr Birkett. ‘But make it Tuesday if you can. I want to talk over one or two things with you and Everard. You know I’m hoping to get Prothero back next term from Canada, and we’ll have Harrison, so —’
Philip settled down to a really interesting talk with his headmaster, no longer, thank heaven, though with all due respect, his future father-in-law. So absorbing did they find their talk that Rose’s return, her whispered giggles of farewell to the Fairweathers, her going upstairs to bed, passed entirely unnoticed by them.
11
Bank Holiday Excursions
On Monday morning Philip woke up in a confused state of mind. For weeks he had been used to waking with a sense of oppression, which, when examined, turned out to be a deep apprehension for the future, that had to be resolutely pushed away into the dark places of his mind, from loyalty to Rose. Today he woke as usual with a feeling of impending doom. Heavy black clouds obscured the horizon, a dead, terrifying waste of land lay ahead. It was impossible to retreat. One could only walk forward by the path on which one had wilfully set one’s feet, a beautiful encumbrance at one’s side, making every step more difficult, bringing no help, no companionship, uttering loud complaints. But as the exquisite face and form of Rose drifted querulously across his inner vision, light began to break. The clouds lifted, the land ahead began to blossom, the lovely phantom threw something at him and disappeared. Philip suddenly sat bolt upright in bed, with the glorious certainty that his Rose was his no longer. This thought made him jump out of bed, do a little shadow boxing, sing, whistle, cut himself while shaving, and carry on a lively conversation with himself in Russian. Not till he was half-way downstairs did it occur to him that he still had to meet Mrs Birkett and Rose under these new conditions. About Mrs Birkett he felt no particular anxiety, but Rose might do anything. She might say she wished to be engaged again, and though Philip was determined to resist to the death, jumping into the river and drowning himself if the worst came to the worst, he felt that he might have a very uncomfortable time before him. Rose never fought under Queensberry rules, and would be quite capable of metaphorically tripping him up and hitting below the belt.
To his mingled relief and terror Mrs Birkett was alone in the breakfast-room when he came in. Before he could begin any apology she had spoken to him very kindly about the engagement, saying that she and her husband were both relieved that it was over, that it had all been largely Rose’s fault, and that they both blamed themselves for having allowed the engagement in the first place. Philip said, as he had previously said to Mr Birkett, that he didn’t think they could have prevented it.
‘Perhaps not,’ said Mrs Birkett, ‘but we do feel to blame all the same, especially as this is driving you away earlier than you would have gone. Rose told me about it last night on our way to evening service, and she would like to have a talk with you before you go. Not to ask you to be engaged again,’ she said hastily, seeing a look of panic come into Philip’s expression, ‘only to thank you, I believe, for having been considerate about it, and to say goodbye to you on friendly terms.’
‘It’s very nice of Rose,’ said Philip nervously, ‘but need we really have a talk do you think?’
‘I do think so,’ said Mrs Birkett firmly. ‘It isn’t as if you were going off this very moment, and it will be better to clear the air. From what she said I gather that she didn’t behave very well last night, and she wants to apologise. Then you will be able to meet at school next term as if nothing had happened. It needn’t last long. Will you ask Rose to walk round the garden with you after breakfast?’
Philip, feeling that one could escape more easily in the garden than in the house, said he would. Mr Birkett, Rose and Geraldine then came in and conversation became unnaturally general. Rose, who was full of the cinema she and the Fairweathers had seen at Barchester the night before, seemed to Philip to be exactly as usual. Any embarrassment that was felt was felt by him and in a lesser degree by the Birketts, but Rose appeared to be entirely unconscious of any tension in the atmosphere. Geraldine, who had been up to Mrs Twicker’s cottage before breakfast, reported that the chameleon had escaped while having its supper the night before and been lost for two hours, at the end of which time it had been found in the basket with the chickens, the cat benevolently watching the whole brood. And so they managed to get through breakfast, by the end of which meal, the post and newspapers not having yet arrived and Mr Birkett being a little peevish in consequence, Rose, Geraldine and Philip were glad to escape into the garden. Philip and Rose walked up and down the flagged path with Geraldine in close attendance.
‘Do you very much mind not coming with us, Geraldine?’ said Philip. ‘I want to talk to Rose rather privately.’
Geraldine said she didn’t see what they had to say to each other, but in any case she had to finish the fourth chapter of Woodstock, a book which she freely characterised as
mouldy, and intimated that they could say anything they had to say while she did her reading, after which she thought they might pick raspberries. She then sat herself with her book on a seat which commanded most of the little garden and the tennis-court, so that Rose and Philip had to go away into the vegetable garden, where a gardener was occupied among the pea-sticks, which forced them to betake themselves to a rather drab corner by the rainwater butt to get a little privacy. Here Philip found that he had nothing to say. As Rose also appeared to be incapable of speech, they walked slowly towards the incinerator, where Rose stopped.
What Rose’s thoughts for the last eighteen hours had been, or indeed what they were at any time, we shall never know, owing to their complete vacancy. Vague ideas may have floated like thistledown in and out of her so-called mind, but she could have formulated none of them. On the way to church on Sunday evening she had told her mother, with some indignation, that Philip had been sickening, and she had thrown his old ring at him, and never wanted to see him again, and being engaged was horrid. At first her mother had taken no notice, but as Rose went on talking about it, boring Mrs Birkett and Geraldine dreadfully, Mrs Birkett had gathered that the engagement was really over for good, and was extremely thankful. After the service Rose had apparently forgotten her wrongs and talked about nothing but the Fairweathers, who came to dinner and took her to the cinema. When she got home she had slept comfortably for eight hours, but between getting up and coming down to breakfast she had put what mind she had seriously to work.
Summer Half: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC) Page 23
