The Young Clementina

by D. E. Stevenson

  Mr. Howard waved to me as he approached. “What d’you think you’re doing?” he said when he was still some yards away.

  “I think I am making a rock garden,” I replied with a smile. Mr. Howard amused me; he was always so alive and vivid, so full of excitement and eagerness about everything. He always seemed to me much younger than his years, much younger than myself although in reality there was only about a year between us. I suppose it was his life which had kept him young; he had lived his life in the wilds untouched by the frets and boredoms of civilization.

  “I don’t mean that,” he said. “You can make a dozen rock gardens if you like—it doesn’t affect me. I mean what are you doing with Clementina?”

  “Clementina is down at the stables; she always goes down at teatime to take Black Knight an apple.”

  “I know. I’ve seen her. She says you’re sending her to school.”

  “Yes.”

  “You must be mad!” he cried. “You must be crazy! Do you realize the risk?”

  “The girls are well taken care of, I can assure you. Hill House is an excellent school.”

  “I daresay it is. One of those high class establishments for the daughters of gentlemen, I suppose.”

  “You’re very old-fashioned in your ideas,” I told him, trying not to laugh. “Hill House is not a seminary. Nowadays the daughters of gentlemen rub shoulders with the daughters of sausage-makers quite happily—it prepares them for modern life.”

  “It may be an excellent school for ordinary girls, but Clementina—the idea of sending Clementina to any school!”

  “Why not?”

  “Why not?” he echoed with disgust. “The woman asks me why not. Do you realize that Clementina will become like other girls?”

  “That’s what I’m hoping,” I replied inaccurately. It was rather fun to tease him; he was getting more and more furious at my obtuseness.

  “My God!” he exclaimed piously. “You’re hoping that, are you? You’re trying to turn Clementina into a simpering, giggling schoolgirl.”

  I had to laugh. I couldn’t help it. The idea of a simpering, giggling Clementina was so absurd.

  “It’s no joke,” he said furiously.

  “I can’t help laughing,” I told him. “You’re so funny when you’re angry, and Clementina will never learn to simper if she stays at Hill House for twenty years.”

  “How old is she?”

  “Thirteen.”

  He did some rapid calculations. “I’m old enough to be her father,” he said sadly.

  “Yes. What a nice idea that is!”

  “Nice!” he cried. “It’s absolutely hellish, that’s what it is. Look here, Charlotte, I’ve come here to talk to you this afternoon. I’ve been offered a job in Australia; it’s a dam. I meant to take a long holiday, but I’ve changed my mind. I shall go away for four years—it’s a four years’ job—I shall accept the job and build their damned dam for them. I shan’t hang about here and watch you turn Clementina into a modern young lady with plucked eyebrows and painted lips.”

  “Very wise of you,” I agreed.

  “Wise! I don’t know whether it’s wise or not. Probably not. Most likely I shall come back and find her married to some lounge lizard of a creature with oiled hair.”

  “I think it unlikely at seventeen.”

  “Curse you, Charlotte!” he cried. “Can’t you be decent to me? Don’t you see that I’m half-crazy with all this?”

  I burst out laughing in his face. “Not if you curse me. You can call me Charlotte if you like, but you ought to know better at your mature age than to curse a lady, especially if you want something out of her.”

  “Be serious, for God’s sake,” he adjured me. “It’s serious. I’m serious. Clementina is the most serious thing in my life. I suppose you think I’m a fool to go on like this about a child, but Clementina isn’t a child; she’s a person, and she’s absolutely perfect as she is—and you go and send her off to a boarding-school so that she can be made like other girls.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said, taking compassion on him. “Clementina will be all right. She must learn to mix with her kind, but it won’t change her—not inwardly. The real Clementina is too strong a personality, too formed in character to be changed by a few years at school.”

  “That’s true,” he said more quietly and thoughtfully. “She’s a strong character, but the risk is frightful—simply frightful.”

  “Go and build your dam and leave Clementina to me.”

  “I suppose I must. I’ve no option really. I’d chuck the dam if it would be any use, but it wouldn’t, would it?”

  “None,” I replied firmly. “None whatever. For heaven’s sake go and build your dam.”

  “I shall come back.”

  “Come back when the child is grown up. I shan’t stand in your way if Clementina loves you.”

  He scraped about on the ground with his toe. “Thank you, Charlotte—you couldn’t say fairer. I must just take my chance I suppose—I’m old enough to be her father—damnable, isn’t it?”

  He went away sadly.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Waiting and Looking Back

  I took Clementina to Hill House and left her there. I was all alone now in the big empty Manor, waiting for Garth’s diary to arrive, so that I could start the book. I was used to being alone, but I was not used to idleness. I had always had as much to do as I could accomplish; ever since I was a small child my days had been full. In my parents’ house I had helped old Martha to make beds and puddings, and when father grew older, a considerable amount of parish work had fallen quite naturally upon my shoulders. In London I had my job and small household tasks as well, and latterly Clementina had filled my days and occupied my mind. This was the first time in my life that I found myself a lady of leisure.

  The Manor was now running on oiled wheels, it required little or no supervision—my housekeeping took me about an hour in the morning, and for the remainder of the day I was absolutely free. I spent as much time as possible in the rock garden, and I rode, of course, but the weather was too cold and wet to spend many hours out of doors, and the evenings were long and empty. It was then that the idea came to me that I should write the third part of my life story for you, Clare. To beguile the long winter evenings and to bring you here to keep me company and listen to my tale. I had the old schoolroom bureau brought down to the library—Garth’s desk was too big and shiny, it took my mind off my work—and settled down to write the story of Clementina’s father.

  It is strange how the figure of Garth has dominated my life. He dominates this third part of my story—I see that quite clearly—even though he only appears in it at the very beginning. Garth is still here: death has not obliterated him; the house and garden are redolent of his personality. Perhaps it is because he loved his home so dearly that his spirit returns to watch over it and see that all’s well; I don’t know. But I do know that he is here. When I come into the library I have a feeling that Garth has just left the room, I can almost smell the sharp tang of smoke from his pipe, and the strange, peaty perfume of his Harris tweeds. When I work in the garden he is with me in spirit guiding my choice so that the rock garden which he planned shall be as he imagined it.

  The thread of my life has been tangled with Garth’s, and, even now, when he is dead, I cannot escape from him. Even now I am waiting for Garth, waiting for his diary to come, so that I may write his book—the task that he entrusted to me. Everything is prepared, and I am waiting impatiently to begin. How much of the real Garth shall I find in the diary, how much editing will the diary require?

  Once before, long years ago, I waited for Garth to come. It was spring then, and the flowers put on their brightest colors to welcome him home; it is winter now, and the branches are bare—that is how it should be. I hope that the diary will not disappoint me, as Garth did, long ago. H
e would not be welcomed then; he had turned from me; his face had changed. That dreadful change in Garth’s face still haunts me. I looked for love and found hatred; I found lines of cynicism where gentleness and kindness had been—it still haunts me. I shall never know, now, what changed him. I want to put the old Garth in the book that I am going to write—if the diary will let me—want to wash out the memory of that bitter, ruthless man who came home from the war, who looked upon the world through distorted lenses and would believe good of nobody. He tortured himself as well as others; he twisted his life out of shape. Why did he do this, why? Oh, Clare, I wish I could find the answer to that question! Even if it were a terrible answer—some dark secret that preyed upon his mind and changed his nature—I could face it better than the uncertainty; better than the possibilities conjured up in my imagination. The scales swing this way and that. One part of me argues that Garth would do nothing shameful, he was so straight, so clean; he detested lies and deceit with every fiber of his being. And then another part of me replies: “What was it that changed him then? It must have been something terrible to change a man like that. Men have temptations that we can never know.” So the scales swing this way and that, and I shall never know the answer to the question. The third part of my story is finished, and still the diary has not come. I shall read over all that I have written and put the papers together—with the first and second parts of my story—in the bottom drawer of the old bureau.

  Part Four

  Charlotte’s Dream

  Chapter One

  Clare

  The fourth and last part of this history is written solely for my own satisfaction. I feel that the thing is incomplete. Problems are set and left unsolved. There are half a dozen loose tags and ends to be drawn together and finished off. I can now elucidate the problems and collect the scattered threads, and that is what I have set out to do.

  The first three parts of my story have lain for two years in the bottom drawer of the bureau waiting until I could find the time and the opportunity and the inclination to write the fourth part. The fourth part is not written for you, Clare, but only for myself—there is no need for me to write to you anymore.

  I shall start this part from the moment when I left off writing the third part, from the very moment when I had finished writing and collected the loose sheets of paper to put away in the drawer. It was nearly time for tea, and I went upstairs to tidy my hair and wash my hands. I was still busy with my hair when the front doorbell rang, and, a few moments later, Barling came to say that Mrs. Felstead had called and was waiting in the library.

  As I went downstairs I wondered what Mrs. Felstead would be like. We had so nearly met on several occasions. She had called on me, and I had called on her. I had been asked to Oldgarden and had been unable to go; it had almost seemed as if we were fated not to meet. It was natural that I should want to meet Mrs. Felstead; Clementina spoke of her with affection—she had been very kind to Clementina, she seemed to understand the child. I knew that only a very understanding sort of woman could possibly understand Clementina, therefore Mrs. Felstead must be an understanding sort of woman. I felt quite excited—would I find somebody congenial waiting for me in the library, a potential friend…

  ***

  I found Clare. She was standing at the window gazing out at the darkening garden, and she turned toward me when she heard me come in. I saw at once that it was Clare. She was older than I had remembered her, and her face was thinner and sadder—she had been through a lot of trouble in the last year.

  I stood there, gazing at her stupidly; I could not make up my mind whether she were a real woman of flesh and blood or a figment of my imagination.

  “Oh, Miss Dean!” she began, and then she laughed and added, “Why, we have met before—do you remember?”

  “Of course, I remember you,” I said slowly—she was real then. My imaginary Clare never called me Miss Dean, never asked me if I remembered her—

  My first instinct was fear; fear lest I should be disappointed. Clare had been with me so long, and meant so much to me—would this woman take from me the Clare of my dreams?

  “I have often thought about you,” she was saying, in that curiously deep voice which I remembered so well. “I have often cursed myself for being such a fool as not to ask your name. Perhaps you think it rather silly.”

  “I wanted to ask yours,” I told her.

  “Good,” she said, laughing at me with her eyes. “You felt it too—that we should understand each other I mean—then we needn’t begin at the beginning. We are old friends.”

  “Old friends,” I agreed.

  I knew I was being stupid and gauche. I was leaving the whole thing to her, I was not even meeting her halfway. But I could not help it; I was dazed with the unexpectedness of our meeting—I was bewildered because my dream had become flesh. If I had started to say anything then I would have gone on and said too much. The woman would think me mad if I said one quarter of what I felt. I knew that. I must say nothing until my brain recovered and could choose my words calmly—I must not expose my dream.

  I busied myself over the tea-things, inquiring about milk and sugar—my hand trembled foolishly. It seemed so extraordinary to be having tea with Clare, and the next moment it seemed quite natural. How often had we had tea together? Never. A thousand times. The two answers were both right and both wrong—my head whirled.

  Clare was talking about Clementina now.

  “I have always been interested in that child,” she was saying. “I don’t know much about these complexes that people discuss nowadays, but if ever anybody had a complex Clem had. She was—she was frustrated by life, if you know what I mean. Always on guard before the portals of her soul—or nearly always. One caught a glimpse of the real Clem now and then, and the real Clem was worthwhile—always. What a difference there is in the child!”

  “A difference?” I could do nothing but stupidly echo her words.

  “Since you came,” Clare said, biting into a buttered crumpet with obvious enjoyment. “Clem is much more human now. She lets herself enjoy things…her guard is down…she does not hold herself apart. I see a great difference in the child.”

  “I’m glad.”

  “Yes, it was worth doing. I was very fond of Clem, even when she was so difficult, and I liked having her at Oldgarden. She and Violet are as different as can be. Clem so quiet and thoughtful and Violet as harum-scarum as they make ’em—at least she was, poor lamb. She hasn’t much opportunity to be harum-scarum now—but she will be again—we shall have her tearing about again—someday.”

  “I’m glad,” I said again.

  “Yes, it’s wonderful,” she said. “Sir Maxton Grant has almost promised—the few months that I had her away in the South of France improved her enormously.”

  “You have had a terribly anxious time.”

  “It has been—almost unbearable,” she said in a difficult voice. “But somehow one just—bears it. They told us at first that she would never walk again.”

  I could say nothing, my heart was too full; I put my hand out and she took it.

  “You understand,” she said in a surprised voice. “So few people understand, but I can feel that you do.”

  “I do,” I said.

  “It is strange how few people understand,” she said. “People say it was good of me to give up everything to be with Violet—good of me! That annoys me, makes me furious. Silly to be furious, of course, because the poor things can’t help not understanding, can they? I would have given up anything, everything to have been able to ease Violet’s pain. I would have given my own body to bear it for her gladly, eagerly. There is nothing wonderful or self-sacrificing about that; it would have been easier for me. When you see the child you love suffering…” She was silent for a moment and then she added in a lighter tone, “So there was nothing ‘good’ in my giving up hunting to be with Violet because she wante
d me near her all the time, because she felt a little easier when I was there and the pain was harder to bear when I was away. It was just pure selfishness…I don’t know why on earth I am talking like this. I don’t, as a rule.”

  “Because you know I want to hear.”

  “I believe you really do.”

  “I do,” I said earnestly. “I’m stupid at saying things, but you have been so often in my thoughts all these years. I don’t want the usual tea-table talk from you. It would be almost—almost an insult.”

  “The first time we met we talked of real things,” she agreed thoughtfully.

  “I know. We said so much…I seemed to know you…seemed to know exactly what you were like. It is difficult for you to understand because you have people to love and to care for, but I had nobody.”

  I stopped suddenly, afraid that I had said too much. I had known that if I started to talk to her I would say too much.

  Clare was stirring her tea, she did not look up. “I knew you were lonely,” she said in a low voice. “Your face haunted me. Not unpleasantly, but I could see you when I shut my eyes. I thought there’s a woman who could see my jokes, and I’ve let her go!”

  I laughed at that, she was so funny in her annoyance, and it relieved the tension.

  “That was not a joke,” she said in mock disapproval. “So you have no business to laugh. It is very sad when people don’t see your jokes—and lots of people can’t, for the life of them, see mine. My jokes are either very subtle or very poor—I can’t think which it can be.” She handed me her cup for more tea and continued, “You were very kind to Bob when I was away. It was good of you. He’s a lonely person without his family.”

  “We loved having him,” I said. “It was kind of him to come.”

  She laughed. “Tea-table talk—we can’t escape it.”

  “Not on my side,” I told her quickly.