An Unofficial rose

by Iris Murdoch

  He had not so far thought very much about touching her; at least he had not thought about it with any kind of precision. He had been content to touch her hand and her shoulder in a way which was natural, but had an added sweetness and excitement: and the thrill of her presence had affected his whole being like a warm breeze which soothed rather than disturbed. Now however it began to be different. It was as if Miranda's savage pinches were designed to awaken in him something far more primitive, and he felt, sometimes with wretcheddness and sometimes with a sort of dark zest, more depraved. The thoughts of strategy found here their context. Penn found himself wondering if it wouldn't be a good plan, if it would not perhaps further his cause, if he were to give Miranda a hard slap one of these days. Perhaps this indeed was what her treatment of him was designed to produce, perhaps she wanted him to be brutal? Before this conjecture Penn paused, first with amazement and then with a sort of pride. He was in deep waters. But he was shocked to find, now that it was suddenly released, how much sheer animosity he had in him against his young mistress. With this release, terrible, black, new, came sexual desire. Penn had imagined earlier that he was suffering. But those had been pure flames. Now he lay tossing sleepless in bed and imagined her body. Guilt now blackened his vision and complicated his pain. His desires grew hideously precise; and in the dark stream of his new yearning it was as if he were back at the beginning again and the real Miranda had disappeared. Only that had been heaven whereas this was hell. The first Miranda had been a heavenly vision. The last Miranda was a doll of flesh.

  On the day of the expedition to Seton Blaise Penn's gloom had been a little alleviated at first because Miranda had been nice to him in the morning. She had been particularly unpleasant to him on the previous day; and although Penn believed that he filled a certain need for her, during the time after her father's departure, her malice was hard to bear all the same and he was glad, the next morning, of a kind word. Lunch had been all right. He had felt a little reconciled with Miranda, and he couldn't help enjoying the food; but after lunch, in the garden wanderings, she had avoided him. He had hurried away, he hoped not too rudely, from the kindly Humphrey who had seemed disposed to talk to him, and pursued her a little through the trees; but each time as he came near she had run on, and he could see her now ahead, following close behind Ann and Felix, going in the direction of the lake. Mildred, who had detached herself from that group, had joined her husband beside the water, and they seemed to be discussing a possible new landing-stage. Penn was alone with his trouble.

  They all converged upon a place where the trees ended and there was a little gently sloping shingly beach. The sunshine was bright and large after the scattered light of the grove. The lake stretched away into flat expanses of reddish and yellowish reed beds, in front of which a few coots and tufted ducks swam lazily about. The open fields, scarcely visible on the other side, were fringed with ragged lines of elm and hawthorn. Penn edged near to Miranda, but she was holding on to her mother's Ann in a little-girlish sort of way and paid him no attention.

  Mildred and Humphrey had joined them. 'We must get that boat, don't you think? said Mildred. 'A boat is what this scene needs. It would look so romantic nestling among the reeds.

  'It wouldn't be so romantic having to paint it every winter and stop up the holes. Eh, Penn? said Humphrey.

  Penn laughed.

  Felix would do all that, said Mildred. 'Wouldn't you, Felix? It's so nice that you're going to stay in England. You're so useful.

  Felix smiled, but did not seem disposed to pursue the question of the boat. He was looking, Penn thought, very fine today, huge and brown in a sagging open-necked white shirt.

  Ann picked up a pebble from the shingly beach and threw it into the water. She stared at the ripples. She was looking rather nice in a pretty flowery dress, but sad. She had her hair sleeked back as usual, but Penn thought she must have put on some make-up or something. Her face looked different.

  Felix picked up another pebble and threw it after Ann's. It fell dead into the centre of her circle of ripples. They looked at each other smiling.

  Almost automatically Penn selected a rather larger stone and threw it far out in the water. It fell near the coots, who beat a hasty retreat into the reeds on the other side.

  'That was a mighty throw, said Humphrey. 'But you're a cricketing man, aren't you, Penn?

  Penn was pleased. He picked up another stone.

  'I bet you couldn't throw as far as that, Felix, said Mildred.

  'I'm sure I couldn't!” said Felix. He found himself a stone and mounting a little up the beach discharged it high into the air. It fell with a loud splash a good few yards beyond Penn's.

  'Oh, well done! said Ann.

  Miranda had detached herself from Ann and mounted to the top of the bank behind Felix. She was watching with interest.

  «I don't think Penn was really trying, said Humphrey. 'The competition hadn't begun, so it wasn't fair.

  Penn mounted a little too, getting a good foothold in the shingle.

  He was conscious of Miranda behind him like a pale cloud. He threw his stone with an easy strength and outstripped Felix's throw by a yard!

  Everyone cried' Splendid! and began to egg Felix on to try again.

  'Let each of them have three throws, said Humphrey, 'not counting Penn's first throw. I will undertake to give a first prize and a booby prize.

  Felix prepared to throw again. As his great shoulders moved for the throw he seemed to Penn giant-like, yet of an extreme grace. His shirt billowed and his sleeves flapped and he was perspiring freely. Penn, who was wearing a tie and a blazer, felt dapper and neat by comparison. But he was glad to be throwing the stones in front of Miranda and he felt suddenly happy.

  Felix's next stone fell a little way beyond Penn's last one.

  Penn was now determined to excel. He took a little time, as when he was about, to bowl, trampling about and weighing the stone, pleased to have all eyes upon him. Then with an easy turn of his body he sent it flying. It fell, amid applause, well beyond the last mark.

  'It's incredible, said Mildred. 'I can't think how a human being can send a stone so far. Penn must be a superman!

  Felix, with a look of comical determination, took his stance, and without preliminaries, while the others were still exclaiming, hurled his pebble. It out-distanced Penn's last throw by several yards, landing almost among the reeds on the other side of the lake. There were admiring cries.

  Penn thought, I can beat that. It was almost as if his will alone could carry the stone bird-like and drop it out of sight in the middle of the reed bed. He loosened his shoulders and dropped his arms for a moment as his coach had told him to do. He moved into action. But just as his hand was coming forward he saw Miranda, who had advanced to the edge of the beach a little beyond the group, and with apparent unconcern was taking her shoes and socks off. Penn's stone fell a little short of his second throw and well behind Felix's. There were groans of commiseration.

  'Never mind, said Mildred. 'We think you're both wonderful.

  Now let's go in and have some tea, I'm getting cold.

  'You shall both have a prize, said Humphrey. 'What would you like for yours, young Penn? I've got a fine Swedish knife. I'll show it to you when we get back.

  'Miranda, do be careful, said Ann. 'You may cut your feet on those sharp pebbles.

  They began to trail back through the trees. Penn wanted to wait for Miranda who had walked out knee-deep into the lake, but Humphrey was still making conversation. Penn, who felt a little guilty at having refused Humphrey's invitation to London, thought he had better not run away from him again, so with frequent backward glances he answered as best he could.

  They moved on slowly. Back in the grove it was dark at first until they got used to the greenish half light. Patches of sunshine high up, moving in the leafy space like miraculous fishes, illumined sudden vistas of thick boughs and canopied galleries. Penn looked upward as they walked between the huge trees and
it seemed as if there were a silence spread above them, a brooding green silence beneath which their voices ran to and fro. He wished Humphrey would stop chattering and leave him in the quietness of the wood to wait for Miranda.

  'Ha-a-a-ay!

  There was a loud cry from behind and everyone stopped. It sounded at first like a cry of fear, and Penn felt an immediate sickness of alarm before he realized that it was a cry of triumph. It came from somewhere high up.

  'Hey, everyone, come and see where I am! Miranda sang out. 'Good heavens! said Ann. She began to run back and Penn and everyone else ran too.

  They reached a slight clearing where a great tree spread its Anns over a circle of grass. There, near to the top, half hidden in the leaves, was Miranda. They had to strain their necks back to see her as she edged out on to what seemed a perilously thin branch.

  'Miranda, come down at once I' cried Ann. 'Are you mad? Come back off that branch.

  'Ho, ho, ho! Come and fetch me I' called Miranda. She began to swing on the branch.

  Ann turned away, hiding her face.

  'Miranda, don't be a bloody little ass, said Mildred. 'We think you're very clever to have got up there. Now come down and stop frightening us, or by heaven you shall have no tea.

  'I'm going farther up, Miranda announced. She edged back off the thin branch and began testing higher footholds.

  Penn felt giddy at the sight of her so high up. He wondered crazily if he ought not to climb the tree after her. But he had a horror of high places and felt so sick he almost had to sit on the ground. 'Miranda, said Felix in a voice of authority. 'Don't go any farther up. Come down now and come down slowly. He had a hand on Ann's shoulder.

  'Do you really want me to come down? said Miranda. She had stopped and was half visible, her legs pale among the dark leaves. 'Yes, I certainly do, said Felix. 'Come down at once.

  There was a moment's pause. 'All right, said Miranda. 'Watch out.

  I'm going to jump.

  'Don't — cried Ann.

  But the next moment Miranda had jumped. Someone screamed.

  Penn rushed madly forward. He had a strange instantaneous glimpse of her leaving the branch, her skirts flying up. The next moment something struck him on the shoulder so violently that he was hurled stumbling to his knees several yards away. It was Felix, who arriving first, caught the falling Miranda in his arms and the two of them whirled to the ground in a spinning hurly-burly of arms and legs.

  There was, after the tumbling heap came to a stand-still, a moment of immobility. Then Ann rushed with a cry to where Miranda lay. But already Miranda was picking herself up. She got as far as a sitting position and began to rub her leg. Felix was getting up slowly.

  'Are you all right? said Ann, kneeling beside her.

  Miranda didn't answer at once. She breathed deeply. She said then, 'I'm all right except for my ankle. That hurts a lot. She began to cry. 'Don't try to get up, said Ann. 'Move yourself about a bit. No bones broken?

  'Needs whipping if you ask me, said Mildred.

  'I'm all right really, said Miranda through her sobs, one hand on her leg and the other in her eye. 'It's just the ankle. It hurts so much.

  It took a little while for everyone to be satisfied that nothing was indeed broken except perhaps the ankle. Then it was decided that she should be moved back to the house. After consulting with Ann, Felix knelt beside the child and gathered her carefully in his arms. He rose bearing her, she still weeping, and the others formed a procession behind and set out toward the bridge.

  Penn had picked himself up. He was still aching dreadfully from the collision with Felix. But no one asked how he was. He and Humphrey brought up the tail of the procession. As they passed slowly over the bridge Penn found that he was crying quietly. Humphrey put an Ann round his shoulder.

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  IT WAS of course Mildred's idea that Miranda should stay on at Seton Blaise: and once suggested the notion seemed to please everybody. It pleased Miranda because it represented a holiday, it pleased Felix because it represented a chance to get to know the child and because Ann must be constantly at the house, it pleased Ann (he hoped) for the same reasons, it pleased Humphrey because it left Penn in need of consolation, and it pleased Mildred because she had thought of it. Only Penn was cross.

  The doctor, summoned at once, had declared the damaged ankle to be severely sprained and had prescribed rest and quiet; more danger was to be apprehended from shock than from anything else, he privately explained to them. Miranda herself, cheerful at first, was established upon the big settee in the library, and from there lorded it over the household, consuming during the day fantastic quantities of coffee, biscuits, chocolate, cakes and ice-cream, as well as her usual meals.

  Felix was in a strange state of mind. He was by now very much in love. He observed with mingled feelings of delight and dismay the terrifyingly rapid alteration of his (as it now seemed in retrospect) gentle and sensible love for Ann into a passion which shook him with stormy gusts and left him trembling. By declaring his love he had completely changed the world. He was a different man, she a different Ann, and the place they inhabited was not the same. Yet in the midst of the new landscape they constantly apprehended, in ways which seemed to puzzle them both, their old knowledge of each other; and upon this, when their steps faltered, they laid a steadying hand.

  On the whole, for Felix, joy predominated over fear. Falling in love is a rejuvenating process, and he surrendered himself to it as to a delightful course of treatment. He had, too, the reassuring sense of an interval during which forces were working on his side. He had cast a stone and now watched the ripples. He had, at moments, gaped at his audacity. Yet his haste, which seemed like a sort of violence, also seemed to him to merit, to compel, its reward. He had a sense of acting upon Anne at a distance; and his powerful love, making him feel a giant, filled him with confidence in his cause.

  Chronologically speaking, Felix was completely disoriented. He had told Ann, which now seemed a positive and also an absurd lie, that he expected nothing. He had said that he did not want» to rush her, and had implied that he would wait for years if necessary. He did indeed at times try to picture himself as patient, and as settling down for a long siege. But his forces were constantly demoralized by the idea of an immediate capture, and he caught himself more than once with the expectation that the whole thing could be settled in months or even weeks. He tried not to think too much about what Ann was thinking. Tacitly, for the present, they avoided intense conversations and were indeed not often alone together. But Felix could not help watching her for signs of love, and at moments when their eyes met he felt he could not be mistaken about the message. He felt, could almost see, powers within her working for him. He waited; and as a result of his dislocated time scheme could do nothing, could plan nothing. He prolonged his leave and procrastinated about his job. He did not write to Marie-Laure; and decided after a while that his silence, functioning instead of a letter, was the right answer.

  After a day or two of Mildred's bright idea the arrangement began to seem a little less inspired and to afflict Felix, in the midst of his hopes, with a certain immediate nervous melancholy. The weather changed, became colder. Rain battered the garden and a gloomy yellowish light lurked at the windows. Lamps were turned on within. A fire was lit in the library and Miranda shivered and called for rugs. Ann came over regularly, driving the Vauxhall through the spitting downpour. She would not let Felix fetch her. She came, and she sat with Miranda in the library, sometimes with Felix there, sometimes not. She seemed exceptionally absorbed in her child and Felix had an unnerving sense, even when he was subsequently alone with Ann, of being somehow chaperoned by that mysterious little nymph. Ann was depressed and jumpy; yet she gave him, by wordless looks, by pressures of the hand, and by an increasing helplessness and reliance upon him in various practical matters, enough encouragement.

  Mildred seemed thoroughly depressed and moody too. Having suggested the retention of
Miranda, she would have nothing to do with looking after the child, of whom she privately professed dislike, and left the task entirely to the embarrassed Felix. It was as if Mildred had suddenly given up hope and consented to become older. She looked older, frailer, less interested in life. There was only, through Ann, the most perfunctory news of Hugh, who could now spare no time at all from his London activities, and limited his evident concern with his granddaughter's accident to the dispatch from?Hatehards? of a complete set of the novels of Jane Austen in a modem leather-bound edition. Mildred seemed to have no spirit left even to be curious about Felix's progress, and they now talked rarely. She had been prepared to launch him with a brave face, but not to follow his subsequent vicissitudes. Her excitement about his match seemed to have faded, and she left him, after so much encouragement, to paddle his own canoe. She withdrew, and he missed her.

  Humphrey was also depressed, Felix had always, from the very beginning of his sister's marriage, found it a trifle difficult to believe in Humphrey. He found his brother-in-law mysterious, in some ways substanceless, in some ways too good to be true. There was something in him he admired and to which he found it hard to give a name: perhaps it was Humphrey's courage, or an artistic aloofness from conventional life. His brother-in-law had particularly taken his breath away at the time of the catastrophe, which Humphrey had weathered with a calmness and irony which made him seem a man truly superior to fortune. Yet Humphrey was also, for Felix, a nothing. It was partly that Felix could not really believe in homosexual love. Mildred had many a time, defending her husband out of the curious deep attachment which bound them together, tried to make him see the seriousness of the matter; and that Humphrey often suffered Felix was prepared to believe and could even see. But be could not envisage Humphrey's bizarre relationships as having any possible connexion with the human heart; and there was, in his picture of Mildred's husband, a chilling void at the centre.