Adrian Glynde

by Martin Armstrong

  “I shall expect him to treat me as his mother,” answered Minnie conclusively.

  “Then I’m afraid,” said Clara, “that you will be disappointed.” She rose from her chair. “You and I, Minnie,” she said with a smile, “understand each other remarkably well, I believe. I never mince matters with you, even when I am being what you so flatteringly call witty; and I will do you the justice to admit that you generally take what I say in very good part. It would be hypocrisy in me to pretend, and in you to claim, that you have been a good mother to Adrian, and all I am trying to do is to persuade you not to demand much of him at present. If you can win his affection during the next week or two, it will be time enough then to speak of his duty to you as a son. Will you come and pay a visit to your rivals?”

  Minnie, tight-lipped and cold-eyed, shook her head in impatient bewilderment. “I’m afraid I don’t understand, Clara.”

  Clara went towards the door. “The pups, I mean,” she said over her shoulder.

  VI

  Clara regarded it as a symptom when, at nine o’clock that night, Adrian, who had sat silent all evening, got up from his chair and began to bid them good night. Nine o’clock was his usual bed-time, but on the first night of the holidays it was always understood that he should stay up as long as he liked, and hitherto he had always sat up, chattering all the time, till she and Bob went to bed. He now came first to her, as usual, and Clara without a thought put her arm round him and received and returned his kiss. To bear in mind all the time that he was Minnie’s child was difficult. It was only when Adrian went from her to Bob that she remembered and glanced apprehensively at her sister-in-law.

  Minnie was sitting tight-lipped and with knitted brows, staring in front of her like a petulant child. When Adrian went shyly towards her, she showed no consciousness of his approach, and it was only when he had stopped in front of her that she turned her head and regarded him as if she had been unexpectedly roused from a reverie. The boy waited timidly for some sign from her, blushing with embarrassment, and, when none came, he awkwardly held out his hand. Minnie glanced at the hand, then at the boy’s face, but she made no responsive movement. Then her lips parted.

  “Good night, Adrian!” Her tone was like a school-mistress’s rebuke, and the boy, with a hardly audible good night in reply and a troubled glance at his aunt, went slowly out of the room.

  Thereafter there was a long, painful silence, during which Minnie sat staring resentfully in front of her, her face set like a mask but for a spasmodic twitching of the chin.

  It was Bob who spoke in the end. “You mustn’t mind at first, Minnie,” he said. “You see, the boy’s shy.”

  His intervention came as a relief to Clara, who, in these painful circumstances, had wanted to be sympathetic, but had been at a loss how to begin. She glanced now at Minnie, and Minnie, turning her head at that moment, met her eye, avoided it, and turned to Bob.

  “I am glad at least,” she said, angrily tearful, “that someone had the … the decency … to … to apologise.”

  Clara’s flicker of sympathy was quenched at once. “You are mistaken, Minnie,” she said. “No one is apologising.”

  Minnie turned narrowing eyes on her. “Oh, not you, of course. I didn’t expect you to. You’re only too glad to have prejudiced my child against me.”

  “Prejudiced?” Clara considered the expression. “If you mean that I’ve made him love me more than you, you’re right. But whose fault is that? Yours: not mine.”

  Minnie sniffed. “My fault! I like that. It’s my fault. I suppose, that you’ve been influencing my child behind my back?”

  “Most certainly it is. I wasn’t competing with you, Minnie. I was competing with no one. That’s the point: there was no one here to compete with. Somebody had to be a mother to him. You’ve been glad enough, these six years, to let Bob and me do your job for you, and now you’re selfish enough to be surprised and indignant when you see the inevitable consequences. Your theory is, isn’t it, that we should do the work and you should draw the pay. Unfortunately for you, things don’t work out like that. For six years Bob and I have loved and cared for the boy—not, I’m ashamed to say, as much as we ought to have done, but still, a good deal better than you have. In return he gives us his love. What have you done for him?”

  “What have I done? Loved him too, and much more than you are capable of doing, Clara.”

  Clara shook her head. “Love at long range, and unexpressed at that, is cold comfort to a child. If you wanted to preserve his affections you should have preserved them in person. You can’t delegate a job like that, as though it were a mere pickling business like Elizabeth Lazenby’s. Nor, with the best will in the world, can we transfer our share to you.”

  Minnie’s small body gave a sudden angry wriggle. “I don’t want your share, thank you,” she broke out with exasperated emphasis. “I want my own, that’s all; and, what’s more, I shall insist on having it, in spite of you both.”

  Clara regarded this explosion with scornful calm. “Your share? I’m afraid you’re getting it now.”

  Minnie, breathless and sobbing with rage, turned on her. “Oh, you’re a fool, nothing but a chattering fool. You talk and talk and talk, and you know as much about love as a magpie.”

  Clara laughed. “Whereas your method,” she said, “is that of the cuckoo. You laid your egg, didn’t you in the magpie’s nest. But don’t let us quarrel, Minnie. You’re right: I let my tongue run away with me. Now run upstairs and wash your face. You can’t imagine what a muddle your complexion has got into.”

  Minnie, in horror at this information, rose from her chair, and, holding a small lace handkerchief to her nose, hurried from the room. As the door shut, Clara made a gesture of despair. “Really,” she said with a sigh, “she’s hopeless.”

  Bob nodded his head. “Pretty bad!” he said. “But you really ought to draw it a bit mild, you know, Clara. The cat was … well, head and shoulders out of the bag.”

  Clara smiled. “I know. But I’m no good with children—least of all children of forty. I treat Adrian as a grownup person and it works perfectly, but then Adrian’s ten years older than his mother.”

  Minnie fled to her room. She was feeling terribly upset. Arrived there, she shut the door and, switching on a light; hurried to the dressing-table. The first glance told her that what Clara had said was no more than the truth. She was a perfect sight. Had Bob noticed, she asked herself as she stared at the haggard face in the mirror that stared deplorably back at her. Really one ought to be more careful: one ought never to forget oneself except at home. It was all Clara’s fault: Clara was so infuriating. And to be treated by the boy like that in front of them both had been too humiliating. She had never liked little boys, and it had been an unpleasant shock to her to discover, on first catching sight of Adrian this afternoon, that he was so much of a boy, so little of a baby. And then, after this first feeling of dislike, she had all at once seen in him, as he stood looking at her across the hall, that extraordinary look of Sandy, and that had been so very disturbing, so very painful. She did not like to be reminded of poor Sandy nowadays, after all that had happened since. It was too upsetting. That was the worst of having such strong feelings. The meeting with Adrian which she had imagined had been quite different. She had expected to find a gay, affectionate child anxiously looking out for her when she returned from the luncheon, that he would rush up to her gleefully as she entered the house, overjoyed to see his mother again. In fact, she had anticipated that the difficulty would be to avoid having him hanging about her too much. Children, however charming, soon become so extraordinarily exhausting. But the trouble, as it turned out, was precisely the opposite. Unless she kept him up to the mark he would avoid her altogether and spend his time feeding pups with that stupid fellow Bob. What could have induced Clara to marry Bob? But for that matter, what could have induced him to marry Clara, for he didn’t seem really to care tuppence about women? In most men one was aware of … well, a k
ind of response; but one never received the smallest response from Bob. He was simply not interested. A boor. But of course that was the reason why he had married Clara. Exasperating woman. She was glad she had let her have a piece of her mind in the drawingroom just now. “You’re a fool, Clara, nothing but a chattering fool. You talk and talk and talk …” Yes, that would take her down a peg or two, give her something to think about. “A chattering fool.” In her re-absorption in the scene, Minnie surprised herself by murmuring the phrase aloud. Then, consciously, she repeated it, eagerly savouring the dramatic emphasis of its consonants. But now her attention was monopolised by the restoration of her complexion, which was very nearly complete. She glanced at the mirror and felt, and looked, more like herself again. It was as if, with the skilful replacing of youthful calm on her face, calm had been restored to her spirits. She no longer felt very angry with Clara. After all, she had given her back as good as she had received; and Clara, strange creature that she was, was somehow a good sort and rather fun. Her half friendly, half malicious attacks were always rather invigorating. Or nearly always; for to-day, about Adrian, she had really been a beast.

  Then, just as she was going to put a finishing touch to her eyebrows, she paused and looked at her watch. Ten o’clock. To go down to the drawing-room again was going to be a little difficult, a little embarrassing, after what had happened; and, after all, there was nothing much to go down for. The evenings at Yarn were always rather dull; no bridge, no one to talk to but Clara or Bob, and she had talked to them all day. If only they would ask people in to meet her, a nice little dinner or two with a few pleasant people to talk to, and then a game of bridge. But they never did. That was the worst of Clara and Bob: they never put themselves out to entertain one. No; it would be tiresome to go down and begin the evening over again. She would go to bed now and read her novel. And it would serve them right. No doubt when she didn’t reappear, they would feel a little ashamed of themselves. She began slowly to undress. In less than a quarter of an hour she was luxuriously settled in bed, wrapped in a blue and salmon silk kimono, with an electric lamp at her elbow and the novel in her hand.

  Through the wall, not three feet from her head, her son was dreaming of her. He was out on the lawn playing with the pups, and from time to time he glanced down the drive to see if his mother was coming. At last something yellow flickered behind the shrubs near the gate and in a moment he had recognised her. She was moving, not walking but gliding, towards the house in the lovely yellow silk dress, pale as the pale gold of her hair, like a fairy princess. He waved to her, and, catching sight of him, she waved back and turned off the drive on to the grass and came floating towards him. He knew she was coming back to him as he had always hoped she would come, and his heart fluttered with joy. But when she was not many yards from him he saw that some one was hurrying from the front door. It was a woman in a black dress. With a feeling of terror he recognised her. It was the woman he had found writing letters in the hall that afternoon. She came running towards them, waving a warning hand at his mother. “No, no,” she shouted; “you mustn’t speak to him. Go away.” He glanced at his mother. She had stopped and was gazing, frightened, at the woman in black. Then her eyes returned to him. “It’s all right, my lamb,” she said, smiling at him; but he saw from her smile that she was afraid. He moved impulsively towards her, but the woman in black, his other mother, stepped fiercely in between them, and then, to his horror, she flew at his mother, attacked her, struck at her with her fists. His mother was half hidden from him: he could not see what was happening. But suddenly he heard a cry and saw that she had fallen. The woman in black was standing over her. He rushed at her, seized one of her black arms and pulled, pulled frantically; but she turned and laughed at him and shook him off. Then he ran past her and bent over the body of his mother. She was lying quite still, and he discovered with horror that he was bending over a mere heap of yellow clothes. The shock awoke him, and he lay feeling the night air cold on his face, his heart thumping loudly in his side.

  Next door, Minnie, totally unaware of the fierce self-combat in which she was indulging in her son’s dream, leaned back on her pillows in her salmon and blue kimono, utterly absorbed in her novel. The electric lamp on the table beside her shed a bright light on her book and a soft, rosy glow filtered through its silk shade on her face. In that discreet, flattering glow she looked, with her newly restored complexion, her little pointed chin, and her downcast eyes, amazingly young and pretty.

  It was so that Clara found her when, at half-past ten, she tapped at the door and entered. Minnie looked up from her novel, calm, amiable, attractive, as Clara went up to the foot of the bed.

  “Ah, so you’ve gone to bed,” said Clara. “We’re just going too. I looked in to say good night and to apologise for being such a pig.”

  “You were a pig,” said Minnie in amiable reproach.

  “I know I was. But you force me to be, Minnie, when you’re such a child.”

  Clara had not foreseen the effect of her rebuke, for Minnie welcomed it as the most delicious flattery. Her face broke into a bright smile, looking, in the rosy light from the lamp, like the face of a little girl. “I’ll try to be good in future,” she said coyly as she laid down her novel. The tone and manner filled Clara with horrified astonishment. It was almost as if she had witnessed an indecency. She turned abruptly from the bed.

  “That’s right,” she said in her most expressionless key. “Well, good night, Minnie.” Then, as she opened the door, she turned and added with a sub-acid melodiousness: “Angels guard you!”

  Outside, she shrugged despairing shoulders. “Quite, quite incurable!” she said to herself.

  Minnie, blissfully confident in the charm she had just exercised, returned with a little care-free sigh to her novel.

  VII

  Next day it was evident that Adrian was being taken in hand. An intensive course in filial duty had begun for him: he was being taught to revolve round Minnie instead of revolving round Clara and Bob. A sudden change of orbit is a ticklish business and likely to be accompanied by explosions, but in the case of Adrian it appeared to be proceeding with surprising calm. It seemed that he was actually pleased to perform the endless errands which Minnie imposed upon him. His willingness puzzled Clara, for she did not realise that he had all the while been acutely aware that something was due from him to this strange woman and had been terribly embarrassed by his inability to offer anything. Emotionally she made no call on him and thus frustrated all possibility of reponse. But now she was giving him something he could do and do easily, a set of merely mechanical tasks which comfortably disguised the lack of emotional contact between them and relieved the strain from which he had been suffering. So it was that he obeyed Minnie’s continual demands with cheerful alacrity, running to the morning-room to see if she could have dropped her handkerchief there, running to her bedroom to fetch a little bag from her dressing-table, running after Rayner with a letter which had not been quite ready when he called, and which, like all Minnie’s letters, was very important. If material revolutions were all that was needed, Adrian appeared to be revolving beautifully. He even, at the instigation of Clara, achieved something of the outward and visible form of filial affection by kissing his mother when he said good night and good morning.

  But these things did no more than throw over Adrian’s insufficiency a veil which Minnie was not long in penetrating. For it was obvious enough at various revealing moments that his heart had not followed his body into its new orbit, and Minnie with growing irritation sat waiting in vain for him to display symptoms of the inward and spiritual graces of sonhood. Her attitude was worse than childish, for it had nothing of the impulsive generosity of a child. If she was a child, she was a spoilt and selfish child; she demanded everything, and it never occurred to her to give anything. Of the humility and uncalculating prodigality of love she knew nothing. She would never give till she had received some guarantee that it would be profitable to give. Her d
isposition was that of the confirmed philanderer, ready to fling herself at the head of the first comer not for love of him but for love of herself, using her flippant charm as a bait with which to catch still unsufficing assurances of her beauty and power. Unfortunately she stopped short of flirting with her own son, not from any moral principle, but because she rightly mistrusted her power over children. Their incorruptible simplicity turned the points and edges of her glittering armoury and she felt ineffectual and ill at ease in their presence. So it was that she withheld from Adrian even the gay enticements she offered to older people, which might at least have sufficed to set his heart in motion. But even if she had believed that her charm would work on him, her pride would have forbidden her to exercise it. She exercised it to compel those to give who owed her nothing. Adrian was her son, he owed her everything, and so she waited impatiently, not deigning to plead for what was hers by right.

  She waited, but still the due homage was delayed: worse, it was given to others in her presence. The afternoon after Adrian’s arrival, Clara and Bob declared their intention of going for a walk. A walk with Clara and Bob meant a cross-country scramble of anything up to eight miles, a form of activity which Minnie hated. She did not care for the country, and could not bear to feel herself getting hot and untidy; besides fields and rough tracks played havoc with her smart, high-heeled shoes, and nothing would induce her to be heavily shod. “Clara,” she had told a friend, “positively goes about like a carthorse.” So when a walk was suggested Minnie always had important letters to write.