by Jane Gardam
‘She never had the postcard. It arrived just before the funeral.’
‘Oh, for hell’s sake,’ shouted Una.
They wandered the sands, the sandy wind blowing.
Then, on the way back by the side streets, for Hetty didn’t want to be seen yet:
‘I can’t go, Una. Not yet. She’s with me all the time.’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘Whatever I say, it’s to her. Whatever I do, she is watching. When I pick up my toothbrush she says, “Now, did I pack your toothbrush?” She sent my trunk off to College a month ago while I was at Betty Bank. She sent all the presents from the Lonsdale gang. Doilies and a coffeepot, and a chip-pan. I ask you, a chip-pan! I argue with her twenty-four hours. She’s here. She’s here now. Here on the sands. She’s everywhere. I can’t live without her, Una. It would be treachery. We were far, far too close to be ever without each other. I almost hate her.’
‘This is what has to stop.’
‘Oh, it would be so cruel to her to leave her!’
‘She’s being cruel to you at the moment.’
‘Well, maybe I deserve it. I’ve no interest in going to College. I’ve done all the exams I ever want to do, and won a big award. I’ll always have that. And I’ve met all the people I ever want to meet. More than enough.’
‘I met some of the ones you met. I slept in one of their beds. But I want to meet more, and so will you again, when you’re yourself, Het.’
‘I should have stayed at home.’
‘No. You shouldn’t. You should have left your books at home and gone somewhere with someone for some fun.’
‘That wouldn’t have been fair to Eustace. I was a fraud. He’d have found me out. I only got in because of him. I had to read.’
‘Hetty, he didn’t do a thing for you. He went off with Brenda Flange. Anyone who could go off with Brenda Flange after you . . . But I gather that’s all over. I saw him at the—’
‘He only loved Ma, anyway. And who would I have been able to go and have fun with?’
‘I’d have come with you.’
‘You had Ray. Well, you have Ray. Don’t you? You do still have Ray?’
‘Yes. I have Ray. Actually, I’ll marry him.’
‘What? But he’s the first.’
‘Yes. First and last. But I’m going to Cambridge, and you’re going to London. I’ll be round on Wednesday night. We’re both to sleep at the Stonehouses’, and then Hilda and Dorothy are driving us as far as York.’
On the Wednesday morning they waited in the Stonehouses’ sitting-room for Hilda and Dorothy to arrive and the Stonehouse dahlias were rich in the sandy borders.
‘My Pa’s coming to live here for a bit,’ said Hetty to Una. ‘He’s going to help with the garden.’
‘Shall we have a bit of silence?’ said Mr. Stonehouse.
Una squirmed, but then the silence flowed across them all.
At last they stirred, and all shook hands.
‘How is your mother, Una?’
‘Oh, fine. Dancing about.’
‘Does she mind you going?’
‘Oh yes, dreadfully. But she’s got herself ready for it. Years ago, probably. I don’t believe she’ll even write to me. But Ray will tell me if she’s more doolally than usual.’
‘I’m sorry she won’t be writing to you,’ said Mr. Stonehouse.
‘Oh, she’s pretty ruthless, Ma. She wants me to be “honed as steel”.’
‘Dear me.’
And here were Hilda and Dorothy coming up the path. They were in Girl Guide uniform today. Dorothy was wearing ankle socks and mittens for her circulation. Farewells. Then across towards the Vale of York they went, keeping clear of Hetty’s house, for fear of seeing the grave-digger working passively in his garden. In time they crossed the railway line in the Wolds, where long ago, from the selfsame car, Lieselotte’s papers had blown away, though nobody knew it. There was a man in the signal-box now, reading a newspaper and looking bored, as if his job was far from the Western Desert.
At York Hetty said, ‘Miss Fletcher, I’m terribly sorry but I’m afraid I can’t get out of the car. I’m not able to go.’
They were in good time and so they all sat patiently waiting, not speaking, in the car in the station forecourt. At length, Hetty got out.
There was a fluster, when the train came in, about the disposition of Una’s bicycle, which had done very well on the first part of its journey, expertly attached to Miss Fletcher’s car roof by a round turn and two half-hitches. The guard’s van needed adaptation.
Then Una and Hetty found seats and Hilda and Dorothy stood to attention and gave the Guide salute as the train drew out. It was an hour before the travellers said a word.
‘Una?’
‘Yes?’
‘I’d better tell you now. I’m absolutely serious. I have been from the first. I can’t do this. It’s asking too much. I can’t do it.’
‘What shall you do, then?’
‘I’ll have to tell them. At the College. When I get there. I should have done it at once, by letter.’
‘Yes. You should. Anyway, you could have let them know what’s happened.’
‘Yes. I’ll go and see the principal tomorrow. I’ll apologise, of course.’
‘And then?’
‘I shall go home again.’
Una looked out of the window.
‘I mean, I can’t stop talking to my mother. All the time.’
‘Shall we go and get a cup of tea?’
They joggled along in the dining-car.
‘I mean, I talk to her day and night. Night and day.’
‘Het,’ Una was peering forward at the dreary Midlands, ‘did you ever hear of someone called Lady Anne Clifford?’
‘Born 1590; died 1675,’ said Hetty, her face a mask. They’d reached Stamford. She observed unseeingly all the great pale churches. ‘Wrote a diary. Quite important. Went to Queen Elizabeth’s funeral, only she wasn’t tall enough to see much, she was thirteen. Lived through the Commonwealth and the Restoration. Hated Catholics but told Cromwell where to get off. Mad on Spenser. Is that who you mean?’
‘You do know a lot, Het. Is she well known—sort of First Eleven?’
‘No. She kept to herself. Had a marvellous tutor and governess and . . . mother. Couldn’t read French and neither could her mother, because the men in the family didn’t let them, not liking France. Any more?’
‘Please?’
‘Two marriages. Rotten husbands. Crazy about her daughter—and grandchildren, et cetera. Never stopped.’
‘Never stopped?’
‘Lived for ever. Bashed on and on. Fought for her inheritance but not a hope since she was female. Got it in the end at sixty. Queen of the north for twenty-eight years and never went south again. Loved possessions, rooms, furniture, doing places up. She had five castles. Built almshouses for the poor and everyone visited—servants up to dukes and duchesses. Very religious, very generous.’
‘Did she like beds?’
‘I expect so.’
‘She sounds tough.’
‘Strong constitution. She used to be seen year after year with her horses and servants and pikemen stamping about the mountains between one property and the next, all weathers, terrible roads. When she got old she went around in a sort of bed on poles.’
‘So she did like beds. Was she beautiful?’
‘No, not a bit.’
‘Did she have a romantic side?’
‘How will we ever know? I’d think there might have been something with the tutor; she built him a tomb. She was passionate and grand and busy. Una . . . ’
‘Yes?’
‘You are pathetically manufacturing a distraction for me.’
‘No, I’m not. I’m impressed. I didn’t know you knew all t
hat.’
‘You can have a run-down on Thomas Carlyle if you like.’
‘No, thanks. Het, all that knowledge! You can’t let it all go.’
‘Anne Clifford never went to College, Una. You are being transparent. I don’t want a scene at the end. You have to accept it. I don’t think I can possibly go.’
‘O.K.,’ said weary Una, ‘O.K.’
Another hour. They were approaching London. Hetty had not spoken. She was staring, staring at the long, long suburbs.
‘Una, what is it? Look, don’t worry any more about me. I’m perfectly calm now. I know what I must do. Una?’
‘I’m not even thinking about you. I’ve lost interest.’
‘Oh. Oh, yes, I see. I’m sorry.’
‘I’m just missing Ray a bit, that’s all. He is the only person in my life, if you really want to know.’
‘I’m sorry. Oh, I’m terribly sorry! I’m being so insensitive. Oh, how could I think only of myself?’
‘You’re sounding just like your mother. Listen. You’re not the only one with a dead parent, you know. It’ll all have happened before at the College many a time—someone’s mother dying. The principal’s not going to be all that interested. She’s not the Lonsdale. You’ll be just another student.’
‘How do you know all this?’
‘I know a lot more than I did. It must be because I have a lover.’
They sat in silence as the train rushed on; began to slow down.
‘You mean a real lover?’ said Hetty. ‘In the technical way?’
‘Yes.’
And so Hetty, as the train swept into King’s Cross, realised she was more alone even than she had thought.
‘What do we do now, Una?’
‘I’m supposed to be taking you to the College; it’s nearby. Then I’m getting a taxi to Lieselotte’s old lodgings, where she was before America. Ma found them, don’t ask me how. Ray gave them the train time and said I’d be getting to them after tea. Then tomorrow I go to Cambridge. By myself.’
Hetty stood on the platform, dignified and chill.
‘There’s absolutely no need for you to come with me now, Una. I don’t want to put you out. I’ve obviously been a great deal of trouble to you.’
‘Too right you have.’
‘Una . . . oh, Una!’ and Hetty began to cry. There on the station for the first time, she began to cry, Una taking no notice but staring down the platform. Oh, how she cried among the rushing people, nobody taking any notice at all, not of a girl bereft of her lover nor of another girl awash with mourning tears.
Una then put her hand on Hetty’s arm and said, ‘Look! Look,’ she said: ‘Standing at the barrier. Who’s that?’
Behind the gates stood a small old man with a fine hat held against his chest, a tall black-haired boy with a twitch, and a sharp, bright girl in high heels and lipstick, waving and calling.
‘It can’t be Lieselotte! She’s smashing! She’s lost stones. Whoever are the men?’ and Una ran down the platform, for the moment forgetting even her bike.
The three of them went looking for a tea-shop. Hetty did not have to sign on at the College until six o’clock, in time to change for dinner, and it was only half-past four and the College a short walk away. Carl said he would take Una’s luggage to Rillington Mansions, disregarding the cabbie’s doubts about the bike, which had to stand in the open front with the one wheel over its shoulder, dreaming of the Yorkshire moors. Carl helped Mr. Feldman into the back of the cab.
Then Mr. Feldman got out of the taxi again, removed his hat and opened his arms in order to deliver a short speech. He informed the station forecourt that the three girls were all his children, that Rillington Mansions was Hetty’s home if she needed one while she was in London, that Mrs. Feldman was about to purchase a camp-bed from Army Surplus, that this was the longest journey he had ever made since 1939, that the Feldmans were now upon the telephone and here is the number; and that he would expect all of them, at any time they wished, and would suggest tomorrow.
Carl twitched and looked Una and Hetty appreciatively up and down with Polish eyes. Then he jumped in beside Mr. Feldman and the taxi disappeared.
The three girls went looking for a Lyons Corner House and Hetty thought she would die among the tall buildings and the awful traffic.
‘I’m sorry about your mother, Hetty,’ said Lieselotte.
‘Oh, thanks.’
‘It’s a good thing you can start the term right away.’
‘Have you really been to California and back, Lieselotte?’
‘I suppose I have. Look.’ On her finger was a cube of amethyst set in gold.
‘Wow! Is that an engagement ring?’
‘You are still so very romantic, Hester. No. It’s my inheritance from my painted aunt. It might have been a lot bigger. There was more than the ring. Had I sold my soul.’
‘You can always flog it,’ said Una, ‘and we could all go to Paris in the spring.’
They had reached Baker Street, where there were a good many establishments called Milk Bars, but everybody inside them looked terribly ill under the new fluorescent lighting. They walked on, therefore, towards the College and came to a wine bar with latticed Tudor windows.
‘Here,’ said Una.
The wine bar had a sign hanging outside, all vines, grapes, a flagon and flourishing writing.
‘Will they let us in here? Three girls?’
Lieselotte said that they were all just about eighteen now.
‘Yes. But they don’t like girls alone in bars in London.’.
‘Let’s see,’ said Una, and they went in and set Hetty’s suitcase down upon the floor and looked around. The little room was empty and dark but there was a good coal fire in the grate.
A waiter came up. He didn’t seem to mind that they were girls but looked askance at Hetty’s suitcase, once the grave-digger’s in his carefree Oxford years but which for over half a century had been used as a store for sexton’s appliances. ‘I can put that thing round the back,’ said the waiter.
‘We shan’t be staying very long,’ said Una. ‘We just want a coffee.’
‘I’m sorry, we don’t serve coffee, only wine. What wine would you like? A bottle? A half bottle?’ He went off with the suitcase.
Nobody liked wine, and silence fell. Una said, ‘I expect it’s our Yorkshire accents.’
‘I didn’t know we had them. We didn’t at school, compared with the rest.’
‘Here they will think we have them.’
When the waiter returned, Lieselotte said to him, ‘Well, now, Ah’m a spirits drinker, but I don’t mind if we open a bottle of red and I’ll take a glairse or two.’
The two girls looked surprised and the waiter went off for a wine list, Una saying, ‘I didn’t know you could do American like that, Lieselotte. My mother would go crazy to hear you.’
‘I’m a student of Modern Languages,’ said Lieselotte.
The wine list arrived and bewildered them. The waiter hovering near was fully aware of it.
‘I suppose you don’t have any crème de menthe?’ asked Una.
‘We do serve crème de menthe,’ said the waiter, ‘but not often at this time of the day.’
‘Three crème de menthes,’ said Una, and when they arrived looked with disbelief at the size of the glasses.
‘It’s in thimbles,’ she said.
‘And they’re half a crown each,’ said Hetty. ‘It must be a try-on. Yes, I bet it’s because we’re from the North.’
Lieselotte sipped from her thimble and then took it all down in a gulp.
‘I think it’s spirits,’ she said. ‘Tastes just like peppermint creams. It’s gone so fast. It’s a wonderful colour,’ and she ran a scarlet fingertip round the rim.
‘I feel wonderful inside,’ said Una. ‘We’d bet
ter leave at once or we’ll have Hetty arriving at the College rolling. It wouldn’t be a good beginning.’
‘Una, Lieselotte,’ said Hetty looking down into the oily green eye in the bottom of her glass, ‘could I go back with you both now to those people? That marvellous old man? I’m being perfectly calm and sensible. Una, tell her. I’ve known for a long time I can’t go through with this, Lieselotte. College is asking too much of me. Please.’
They paid, retrieved the suitcase and went out into Baker Street, where, across from Regent’s Park, they could see the College lights shining through the trees.
‘Could you just make this one, last try?’ asked Una; and Hetty, as they stood amid traffic on an island in the middle of the road, thought, She does look tired.
And so they walked on, and reached the park in the blue and golden autumn evening with transparent smoke going up from the piles of bonfire leaves in the grass, other leaves drifting down, scratching the paths. Along a side road, the traffic noise faded and black-painted iron gates stood before them wide open, joined overhead by a black and gold scroll, that made Una think of the coal cart. But on this scroll were Latin words. Under the scroll they went and the windows of a library came in view, shadowy girls all reading at desks.
‘Miles of books for you, Hetty.’
‘Yes,’ said Hetty. ‘Fine.’
Down an avenue of towering plane trees they went, the grave-digger’s suitcase knocking against Hetty’s leg like a tiresome puppy. The trees were very high above them with clusters of black round fruits dancing against the night. Side by side the three marched on, up two shallow steps between the urns; and here were the College doors.
‘Well, thanks masses, and goodbye,’ said Hetty.
‘We’re coming right in,’ said Una.
There was a block of wooden pigeon-holes on the wall outside the porter’s office and it was obvious at once that the one marked F was packed solid. There were even letters overflowing along the shelf above, where a dubious package had been stood in a saucer. Something inside it seemed to have broken and there was citrus juice about.
