by MARY HOCKING
‘No, I don’t know where he is.’ She listened for a moment, and said, ‘No, I don’t know when he will be back.’
‘Who was that?’ he asked when she put down the receiver.
‘A woman. She said she telephoned a moment ago and you said you were just going out. She has telephoned before, but she said it wasn’t important, so I didn’t tell you.’
This was, he suspected, a rather longer speech than she had intended to make when she came into the room. The telephone call, which was undoubtedly from Beth, had thrown her off-balance; Beth projected her personality very strongly over the telephone. While Phoebe was still rattled by this encounter Tom seized the initiative.
‘Never mind about that now. Put on your coat. I’m taking you home.’
‘I don’t want to go home,’ she protested. ‘I’m better now, and anyway I’ve got my car here.’
‘We’ll work something out about your car.’
She put one arm into a sleeve and then looked at it in surprise as though it had betrayed her; she seemed only a sick, inadequate person who would always have to be helped through life and his excitement died down.
‘I think I had some shopping to do,’ she muttered.
‘The shops will be closed. It’s Wednesday.’
‘Is it? Dear me, I am confused, aren’t I?’ She rallied, and he was glad to see her adapting herself to the situation, wriggling into it and drawing it close about her, familiarising herself with every wrinkle. ‘I expect Miss Conroy will find I’ve made a few mistakes on those papers. It was all such nonsense. I’m glad I didn’t have a good education.’ She did up the buttons of the coat and allowed him to usher her out of the room. In the lift, she said, ‘I hope I haven’t left those tests in too much of a mess for poor Miss Conroy.’ He wanted to tell her, joyfully and without rancour, that she was a bitch, but he was not sure that she was yet ready to acknowledge this degree of intimacy.
‘I’ve been a proper old tabby this morning, haven’t I?’ she said with sly enjoyment as she settled herself in the passenger seat.
‘You must tell me the way.’
‘Just take me as far as the crossroads on the Brampton Road. I can catch a bus from there.’
‘Don’t be silly.’
‘In any case, there’s no need to take me right into the village, it’s a very narrow lane and. . . .’
‘It’s a very narrow lane into my village, too.’
‘I don’t want to be a nuisance.’ She sounded sulky; for some reason she wanted to prevent him coming home with her. Had she left things in a muddle, cup unwashed, an ornament or two out of place, the carpet unvacuumed? Was she ashamed of her cottage because it was ugly, utilitarian, lacking in character or charm? Might the cat be asleep on one of the chairs?
‘What is the cat’s name?’ he asked.
She hesitated before she said, ‘Pippa.’
‘What colour?’
She said, ‘White’ as if she was picking a colour at random. She was definitely sulky now.
It was a longer journey than he had anticipated; if she went home at lunchtime to feed the cat she could have little time to feed herself. She directed him off the main road into an area which he did not know very well, farming country threaded with narrow, winding lanes used mainly by farm vehicles; a countryside in which man was still a solitary figure. They came to a signpost with a broken arm and as she failed to tell him which path to take, he stopped the car.
How green and mysterious the country is in winter when it turns away from man and becomes absorbed in its own secret life! The desolate fields and spare trees filled him with an intense sense of separation and a desperate longing to overcome that separation. He wound down the window; they were well away from the main road and it was very quiet. The air was raw and smelt of wet earth. There were no strong colours now. It was all pale and remote as if Nature had said, ‘Don’t let’s do anything to attract attention.’ And suddenly, from out of desolation, came a memory as cheering as it was inconsequential. He remembered that his aunt had sometimes turned off the sitting-room light in the evening so that neighbours wouldn’t call and spoil her reading of the serial story that he so enjoyed; he had crouched in the darkened room, heart beating fast, until the footsteps passed the house and he knew there would be no interruption of that evening’s reading.
Phoebe said, ‘I like the country in winter. In summer it’s all so bright and beautiful I feel I’m expected to applaud when I come to Stratt’s Corner.’
‘Is that where we are now?’
‘Yes. I can walk from here.’
There was no sign of human habitation, let alone a village, and she tossed the remark away without conviction on the off-chance it might annoy. For a moment, looking out from that long-forgotten window of the childhood world, he saw Phoebe Huber as an angular and rather tiresome spinster and had the village been in sight he might have let her go. As it was, she pointed out the path and he started the engine.
‘Were you born here?’ he asked.
‘No. I was born in Ramsgate.’ Her tone invited him to make something of that!
‘Why did you come here?’
‘I came to live with my aunt. My parents died when I was ten.’
‘Both of them?’
‘Yes. We Hubers are an inconsiderate lot.’
‘I used to spend my holidays with an aunt. I was thinking about her when I stopped the car.’
She did not contribute any reminiscences and it occurred to him that she would be a poor companion on a long journey. In the distance, beyond the flat green fields, the path climbed gently and he saw a church spire rising from a knot of trees; as they came nearer he could see other buildings amidst the trees and he knew they had reached the outskirts of her village. The narrow lane dived beneath the tall trees but while they were still on the edge of open country, she said, ‘Turn left here.’ It was a sharp turn to the side of the church and he overran it and had to back the car several feet. The path was little more than a stone track which skirted the graveyard and the long lawn of a large old house; beyond he had a glimpse of one or two cottages. To the left of the track lay the valley through which they had been driving and in the far distance the Downs rose steeply; it was a beautiful view and he stopped to admire it before driving slowly along the bumpy track. As they came to the end of the low wall of the graveyard he had a clearer view of the nearest cottage which must surely be deserted since the trees were so close they seemed to be growing out of the roof. Phoebe said, ‘Stop here.’ While she assembled handbag and gloves he stared in dismay at what he could see of the roof of the cottage which did indeed have greenery growing out of it.
Phoebe said discouragingly, ‘I don’t suppose you want to stop for coffee?’
He was not sure about it himself but as he had come so far, he said, ‘If it wouldn’t be too much trouble.’
They got out of the car and he paused to stare down the track towards the neglected cottage, while Phoebe opened the gate leading onto the lawn of the big house. He followed her, supposing she must leave her house key here: perhaps someone fed the cat for her. As they walked across the lawn at least four cats appeared hurrying from borders and shrubbery, all miouwing militantly in the manner of animals who are confident of attention. Tom looked up at the house which was older than the village and the pattern of fields; only the Downs and some of the trees would have pre-dated it. Its immediate surroundings had been styled to suit its needs over many centuries so that house, garden, trees and stables had the quality of a Constable painting, a scene fixed forever in a moment of time that was not his time. He felt he was trespassing as he stepped onto the paved path.
Phoebe took a key from her handbag and she and the cats entered the house where they were welcomed by an enormous black cat which rose, stretching itself and digging its claws into an old rug. It was apparent that this was a routine homecoming. Tom followed the last of the cats into a dark, narrow hall; it seemed they had come in at a side door, the main ent
rance must be on the far side of the house. Phoebe opened a door which led into a stone-flagged kitchen, while Tom stayed for a moment looking down the hall towards a flight of narrow, uncarpeted stairs. There was a smell of age, unpleasantly compounded of damp and dirt. It was quiet; a quiet without vibration which made him feel he had become deaf.
The kitchen was reasonably clean but smelt of cats. There was an old rocking chair in which a white cat lay curled asleep, nose to tail; a big pine table with newspaper laid across it which had cat prints on it but no cat; and four upright wooden chairs with faded cushions on the seats. Saucers of milk stood in the corners of the room and bits and pieces of food which the cats had rejected were dotted about the floor.
‘How many cats are there?’ Tom asked.
‘I don’t count any more. They bring their relatives.’
He looked round the room again. There was a Welsh dresser stacked with white and blue pottery mottled with age; a long kitchen range with saucepans on top of it, and a shelf above on which were jars reassuringly labelled sugar, salt, coffee, tea, flour. On the wall near the hall door was a row of bells festooned with cobwebs. Phoebe was fetching milk from the pantry and the cats were rubbing round her legs.
‘Do you mind if they have theirs first?’ she asked.
Tom inspected the cushions on the chairs to find one which had cats’ hairs to match his grey suit. ‘Do you live here alone?’ he asked as he sat on a chair which was obviously reserved for a tabby who had not yet put in an appearance.
‘Cats are better company than human beings; their demands are more easily satisfied.’
‘Don’t you find the house rather big to run?’
‘Not really. I’m not one of those house-proud females.’
He watched her pouring out the milk for the cats who showed a tendency to push their faces against the rim of the bottle; he was glad he did not take milk in his coffee.
‘Would you like to have coffee in more elegant surroundings?’ she asked without enthusiasm.
It was obvious that politeness would get him no farther than the kitchen, so he said firmly, ‘Yes, please. I’m very interested in your house.’
‘I thought you would be,’ she said resignedly. ‘Whenever people come here it’s obvious they are yearning to have a good look round.’
She made the coffee and placed the cups on a tray together with a packet of sweet biscuits. He followed her into the hall, down the dark corridor, past the narrow stairs and on into a big, square hall from which a wider flight of carpeted stairs led to a gallery which was so dark that had someone been standing there watching he would not have seen them. His imagination was working over this disturbing possibility when Phoebe said, ‘Would you mind?’ She nodded her head towards a door on the left of the hall. He opened the door for her.
The room which they now entered was long and low-ceilinged for its size; there were oak beams running across the ceiling which sagged in the centre, and the plaster on the walls was yellow and badly cracked in places. A huge brick fireplace took up almost the whole of one wall and there was a small electric fan heater in the grate which would scarcely have warmed the hearth let alone the rest of the room. The furnishings, although elegant, were in a style that was at variance with the structure of the room, and this created an air of unrest. There was a rather fussy Victorian couch by one of the windows, a smaller couch by the fireplace, and several decorative armchairs, all in faded purple velvet ribbed with gold; the sides of the armchairs were badly torn where the cats had sharpened their claws. The faded rose carpet, originally smooth, had become tufted with constant clawing and the rose and brocade curtains hung in shredded folds. There were ornate side-tables in walnut and satinwood, and two enormous aspidistras, one on either side of the main window. The side-tables had not attracted the attention of the cats but had suffered damage from cigarette butts and wet saucers. The aspidistras alone flourished, their leaves shone as though polished lovingly each day; they gave a curious life to the room, a sense of intrigue, of people whispering behind the giant plants.
Tom sat on one of the armchairs; the springs had gone and he had to balance on the edge, one knee almost on the carpet; while Phoebe turned away to rest the tray on one of the side-tables, he quickly moved to the couch.
‘You have a gardener?’ he asked, looking out at the smooth green lawn and the flower beds which showed fewer signs of the cats’ depredations than the upholstery.
‘Chapman worked for my aunt and I don’t think he’s registered the fact that she’s not here any longer. He’s stone deaf and very bad-tempered, so I don’t want to start an argument with him.’ She spoke about the gardener in the offhand, amused way in which people of an earlier generation referred to their servants.
‘Is he an eccentric?’
‘Peculiar, anyway.’ Eccentricity, her tone suggested, was the preserve of the aristocracy. Tom was not sure whether she was speaking with her own voice or whether another person was speaking through her. The sense of another person was strong in the room.
‘Did you inherit Chapman along with the house?’ he asked.
‘I didn’t want the house.’ She handed Tom a cup of coffee and seated herself without apparent discomfort in the chair he had rejected. ‘But she left it to me to spite my cousins and I felt the poor old trout’s gesture shouldn’t be thrown away, so I stayed.’
‘Weren’t your cousins good to her?’
‘She didn’t want people to be good to her!’ Again that note of amused contempt. ‘She wasn’t that kind of person.’
‘What kind of person was she?’
‘She was a terror. They all hated her. They plotted and planned in corners all over the house.’
‘Behind the aspidistras?’
‘Everywhere! Their lives were one long conspiracy.’
Tom wondered how much of what she was saying was true; but as he knew that the quality of a person’s imaginings is quite as important as their command of facts, he encouraged her with questions whenever this seemed necessary.
‘Why was your aunt a terror?’
‘She wanted to stage-manage other people’s lives, not because she thought she knew what was best for them, but because she was so bored. She wanted them to put on an entertainment for her every day.’ Her enjoyment was childish but without innocence. ‘She led a very wicked life when she was a young woman and then she had a riding accident and lost the use of her legs along with a husband who didn’t have much time for a woman without legs. So there weren’t so many openings for wickedness and she had to manoeuvre other people into it for her amusement. She had plenty of opportunity because she had a lot of money so her sons and daughters never liked to stray very far from home in case they found themselves disinherited. She set one against another. You couldn’t believe a word she said.’ She paused to linger admiringly over this particular attribute of her aunt. The white cat, who had followed them into the room, leapt at one of the curtains and made a pretence of climbing it. ‘If she hadn’t had so much money she would have been quite powerless because everyone would have ignored her preposterous stories. But people don’t ignore money. My cousins got frantic if they thought any one of them had stolen a march on the others.’
‘How did you fit into all this?’
‘I was only ten when I came to live here and she wasn’t interested in children so she didn’t try to manipulate me. She used me to pass messages and to report on my cousins’ activities; she would talk aloud to me, rehearsing her little schemes. It was fascinating. She knew so much about people, bless her.’
Had it never occurred to her that she was the most manipulated of all, having no adequate defences against this woman? She was not naïve. Tom had the impression she was enjoying playing the role of the woman who has been corrupted as a child.
‘What did you do about schooling?’ he asked.
‘Miss Towton in the village gave me private lessons. My aunt had a battle with the education department about it. She said Miss Towto
n could teach me all I needed to know.’
‘And did she?’
‘What conventional learning I’ve got, she pushed down me somehow or other.’
‘You liked her?’
‘She’s all right.’ There was some reserve here. She went on quickly, ‘But it was my aunt who really taught me. She was the most wonderful character. When she was in a room no one else existed. I think she had so much energy she couldn’t use that it all went to her wits. She could see five, six, seven moves ahead. No one ever put anything over on her. It was a marvellous education for life, growing up with her.’
The white cat, who had abandoned his curtain-climbing exploits, jumped on the back of her chair.
‘Weren’t you sorry for your cousins?’ Tom asked.
‘They were just a pack of cards,’ she shrugged. ‘Aunt Mady was the dealer.’ She looked round the room, recreating the past a shade obviously. ‘I often wonder what is missing from life; I wonder why the amusing, exciting things don’t happen any more. I look over my shoulder, expecting her to come along and stir things up. . . .’ She turned to tickle the white cat behind the ear.
Tom did not say anything. After a moment or two, she left the cat to its own devices and asked, ‘Was your aunt like that?’
‘No. She was good.’
‘Really?’ She raised her eyebrows as though he had committed a social solecism. ‘How nice for you.’
He returned to the subject of Aunt Mady. ‘Did she leave her money to you as well as the house?’
‘What there was of it. The clever old thing didn’t really have much money, her husband had run through most of it. But she knew that the idea of money is just as powerful as money itself. All she had to do was to keep the idea alive.’
‘Your cousins didn’t challenge the will?’
‘They took advice. But when she became very ill I was the person who looked after her and it seems there were quite a few people prepared to testify to my worthiness and my cousins’ lack of interest. It wasn’t that anyone cared about me, but they hated my cousins. My cousins thought they were too good for the local gentry and there were a lot of people of honest Sussex stock who were glad of the opportunity to do them a mischief.’
