Family History

by Vita Sackville-West

  The engine shrieked as the train moved on; it shrieked with a persistence that suggested a notice saying “Whistle for half a mile.” Dan could think of nothing save that Mr. Vane-Merrick with his crazy car would be waiting for them at the next station. Several times he repeated “Dusters and bits of string!” and went off into fits of laughter every time he said it. Evelyn told herself that she ought to be delighted by the boy’s excitement, but she could feel only that he was allied with everything that rushed her faster and faster towards collision.

  The idea of collision made her think of railway accidents. The little train, however, pounded on its way with a leisureliness that turned such apprehensions into an absurdity. She was nervous, thatt was all; not unnaturally. This going to stay with Miles in his own home, taking Dan with her, was the most momentous thing she had ever done. For years, life was tame as a ball of wool unwinding; then suddenly a wild beast leaped upon one’s shoulders with a roar.

  “Oh, Mummy, look! look! he’s running away!”

  She joined Dan at the window, and in the fading day-light saw an old farmer trying in vain to hold a bolting horse. The cart rocked wildly down the lane, and the gallop of the terrified hoofs on the road echoed even through the shut windows of the passing train. Evelyn clutched Dan by the wrist. “Oh, Dan, don’t look,” she said, shutting her own eyes; “he’ll upset in a moment,—and we can’t do anything.”

  The train went over the level-crossing with a final triumphant shriek as the cart crashed into the gates, overturned, and left a ruin in the descending silence.

  “Don’t look, Dan, don’t look,” she said, covering his eyes with her hand.

  A moment later, the train drew up at the station.

  Miles was there, waiting, under the lights. The lights were yellow in the cold, blue evening. He was bareheaded, in an old leather jacket, riding-breeches, and leather gaiters. He looked vivid and eager, glancing impatiently up and down the train, with the station lights shining on his hair.

  Evelyn had pictured their meeting exactly so, but the accident had flung her abruptly into a different region. There had been an accident, she said, clutching his arm. She did not know whether anyone else in the train had seen it. He must make enquiries; he must ask the guard. “Hurry, Miles; the man may be dreadfully hurt, he may be dying.”

  Dropping from his eagerness, Miles became grave at once. She and Dan must wait in the car, he said; they would find it in the yard outside.

  He was away for what seemed to be a very long time. Dan and Evelyn huddled under the ramshackle old hood, while other motors drove away with their loads and the station yard became empty and silent. A goods train shunted in the distance. Darkness came quickly, and the signals sprang into green and ruby lights, high up. An express rushed through, screaming, and pouring out a long trail of smoke and flying sparks. Then silence again, while the signals clicked back with a little wooden sound.

  Finally Miles came back.

  “It was old Rowland,” he said briefly. “He’s all right. The man from the level-crossing box has just come down. There’s nothing for you to worry about.”

  Evelyn knew from the way in which he said, “It was old Rowland” that he was not speaking the truth. But she asked no questions.

  Miles drove off at a furious rate, his head-lights tearing down the road and rounding the hedges at the curves. By thatt, also, she knew that he was upset about something. She trusted him absolutely as a driver. His car might be falling to pieces, but he hunted it along the road as though he were driving at Brooklands. He could extort an extraordinary response and speed from such an assemblage of scrap-iron.

  The country was unknown to her. They flashed through villages and past cottages which she had never seen before. They swept down a hill and up the next slope before she had had time to record the incidents upon their course. The darkness added to the mystery into which Miles was driving her.

  She began to think that Miles’ castle was a surprisingly long way from the station.

  At last they turned off the main road, down a rough little lane between hedges. A board at the turning said “Private road. No thoroughfare.” For some reason the words startled her, as they sprang out in black lettering on the white board when the car lights swept across them. No thoroughfare. So this track led nowhere; nowhere but to Miles and his castle; one could not pass on and beyond, on the further side. One could of course turn round and come back, but in life there was no turning round and coming back. In her overwrought state of mind she nearly besought Miles to stop before it should be too late. But perhaps it was already too late, now that she had actually entered his domain,—for, knowing that the castle stood in the midst of a large farm, she assumed that the woods and fields on either side were his property.

  She resigned herself to the symbolism. The old, rapturous happiness flooded over her again. Still, the shadow persisted, and she was afraid. She wished that the horse had not bolted with old Rowland; she wished that she could wipe the scene out of her memory. It had occurred so quickly; it had been so suddenly horrible.

  The lane widened, and the fan of light showed up a group of oast-houses beside a great tiled barn; then it swung round on a long, low range of buildings with a pointed arch between two gables. Miles drove under the arch and pulled up. It was very dark and cold. The hard winter starlight revealed an untidy courtyard, enclosed by ruined walls, and, opposite, an arrowy tower springing up to a lovely height with glinting windows. Miles switched off the engine and the lamps. In the ensuing quietness and darkness, the stars sparkled with redoubled brilliancy.

  An old man came up with a lantern.

  “Bring the luggage out, Munday, will you? Mind your head, Dan. I’m afraid there are a lot of nettles, Evelyn, but we’ve trodden a path across them. Anyway, they aren’t up at this time of year. Can you see? Give me the lantern, Munday.”

  They crossed the courtyard, Miles going in front with the lantern swinging in his hand. They passed through an archway beneath the tower and came out on a cleared space with an old orchard beyond. The dark shape of a cottage rose up, and other walls, all of the same Tudor brick. Miles’ castle seemed to consist of isolated buildings, connecting walls, and the dark background of the country lands. It was very lonely.

  “This is where I live,” said Miles, leading the way towards the cottage, which by its structure had evidently once formed part of the original castle. It was only a cottage, but in its mullioned windows it preserved traces of grandeur.

  Evelyn now saw that the entire encampment, including the orchard, must be enclosed by a moat. In spite of its untidiness, it had a symmetrical outline.

  On the threshold of the cottage they were met by an old woman of surprising beauty, like a Roman peasant. She stood there, waiting, like eternal Ceres, ready to gather them to her breast. Her brows were wide over her grey eyes; her hair lay parted in two placid bands which reminded Evelyn of the wings of a bird.

  “This is Mrs. Munday, Evelyn. Mrs. Munday, I know you’ll do all you can to make Mrs. Jarrold comfortable, won’t you? Come in; you must be cold. Come in, Dan “

  He was nervous; the experience of seeing Evelyn in his home was almost as strange to him as the experience of coming there was to her.

  “There’s a cup of tea for the lady and the young gentleman,” said Mrs. Munday. She had a rich, country accent. She looked at them in a motherly way, as though she were sorry for them after their long, cold drive, but also in an examining way, as though she were taking their measure as friends for Mr. Vane-Merrick.

  A Great Dane got up from in front of the fire and came to Miles, nuzzling his hand.

  The room was roughly panelled with dark boards from floor to ceiling. It was all rather rough, but comfortable. A glass of violets stood on the table. Books and newspapers lay about.

  Evelyn thought of the library at Newlands.

 
Miles turned up the lamp under its green china shade; he took a wax taper from the fireplace and lighted the candles in the sconces. Evelyn realised that he was doing these small things to cover his embarrassment. Regaining her wits, she saw that she must make an effort.

  “May I pour out the tea, Miles?—It’s very exciting for Dan and me, arriving here after dark and not knowing what we shall see when we look out tomorrow morning. This place seems to be quite away from the world. I didn’t know there were such uninhabited tracts in Kent.”

  She talked for the sake of talking, and Miles played up to her, but their usual spontaneity was absent; neither of them could think of anything but their desire to get Dan out of the way. Munday arriving with the luggage, created a diversion. Miles said that he would go and put the car away in the shed. The great black-and-white dog followed him out into the night. Dan, who had been silent hitherto, burst out into chatter.

  “Oh, Mummy, isn’t it romantic here? Did you see thatt lovely tower, and all the buildings, and the oasts? What a queer place,—does he really live here all alone with those two old people? Do tell me more about it.”

  “I don’t know any more, Dan, you must ask him yourself. Now would you do something for me? Would you go upstairs and show Munday which is your luggage and which is mine? And you’d better unpack your own. Put your things away tidily; don’t hurry.”

  “Of course. I will, Mummy.”

  He sprang to his feet willingly; he was always so willing and charming when she asked him to do anything! Remorseful,—for had she not thought out this little plot against him?—she watched him as he moved with his young clumsy grace towards the door, stumbling over the leg of the table, dropping his camera with a clatter on the floor, knocking his head as he stooped to retrieve it. The pathos of his clumsiness, his ignorance, and his innocence tore her heart.

  “Dan!” she said imperiously, “come here.”

  He came, surprised. She pulled him down on to the arm of her chair, held his hands tightly, and gazed searchingly up into his face.

  “Dan, you love me, don’t you? Say you do!”

  “But Mummy, darling, of course I love you,—why? What’s the matter? You aren’t going to cry, are you? your eyes look so bright.”

  “I’m not going to cry,” said Evelyn. “I just wanted you to tell me. I think perhaps the accident upset me,” she said, feeling that she must give some explanation. “Dan, you must always love me,—promise,—whatever happens. Promise. Promise,” she repeated urgently, pressing his hands till her rings hurt him.

  He was frightened. Emotional himself, but outwardly controlled, except on paper, it frightened him to see this manifestation of emotion in a grown-up person. He felt as though he were looking down into a pit full of fire, such as he had once seen at Orlestone and from which, as a small boy, he had been carried away screaming. It was a force he feared and recognised, but could not wholly understand.

  He divined, as from a great distance away, that his mother was shaken off her usual balance. The responsibility, the necessity, of reassuring her frightened him too. He could not cope with these intricate grown-up mysteries. He did not know what one ought to say. He wished he could escape, to help Munday,—nice, solid, grizzled old man,—with the luggage. But he must say something.

  “Mummy,—of course,—I needn’t promise,—I love you,—and there it is. For keeps.”

  “Whatever happens?” she repeated.

  “Mummy, what could happen? Don’t go on saying thatt. I expect the accident upset you,—I thought it was rather horrid myself,—but the man was all right, Mr. Vane-Merrick said so. Don’t think about it any more.”

  “No, no, I won’t think about it,” said Evelyn. She let his hands go and gave him a little friendly push. “I was silly, darling, but I’m all right now. You go upstairs now and forget about it.”

  “Truly?” He kissed her, putting a special warmth into his kiss, but she knew that he was relieved by this return to the normal. She loved him for his sweetness to her, and for the childishness which had made him look at her so aghast, so bothered, and for the awkward, mistaken sympathy which had gratefully attributed everything to the accident.

  He gave her a last, soft look; smiled; and was gone.

  She was alone. She wandered to the door which opened straight on to the invisible garden, and stood on the threshold looking out into the night. She strained her ears for the sound of Miles’ returning footsteps, or even for the sound of his car throbbing and rattling on its way to the shed, but could hear nothing in the black, frosty air; nothing but the cry of a wild duck coming from the south. The lake, she supposed, must lie in thatt direction. The lighted room lay behind her, but in front of her were darkness and shadow, which her eyes could not explore. The wild duck’s cry heightened the loneliness.

  Irresolute, she had almost determined to go and look for Miles, when the great dog came up the path, and the light streamed from the door on to his patches of black and white. Miles followed him, a quick step up the path; he almost collided with Evelyn standing at the door.

  “Evelyn!—Where’s Dan?”

  “Upstairs unpacking, Miles, tell me quickly, before he comes back,—you weren’t speaking the truth about the man in the cart? Old Rowland, I think you said. He was hurt? Killed?”

  Miles frowned. He hoped her anxieties had been allayed. He persuaded her back into the room and shut the door. “Miles?”

  “Yes, he was killed. He was dead when they picked him up.”

  “I was sure of it. Who was it? Somebody you knew?”

  “An old farmer,—he used to come to the market every Monday morning, driving thatt very cob, and he used to hunt it too. I hate hunting, but still, he was a splendid old fellow; we do get thatt type, round here. I was sorry you should have seen it happen. I wanted everything to be perfect for you, from start to finish.”

  Her heart rejoiced at the personal note: Miles was coming back to her. Even those few words began to disperse her gloom, such was the power of love over her.

  “I wish I could decide what I really feel about these country people,” Miles went on, “I see so many of them down here. They are dying out, of course, and with one half of myself I can’t help regretting it. I see their sons going off to the towns, or grumbling about the dullness of life when they do stay on the farms, and for all their insolence and independence they seem to have lost the old people’s real dignity. It was never undignified to be content with what you truly were. Pretension only makes for falseness and vulgarity. Yet one can’t expect them to stand still. Instinct makes me reactionary, reason makes me progressive. I can’t help feeling that if some of my constituents saw me here I should lose a good many votes at the next election.”

  What a way, thought Evelyn, to spend the few precious minutes while Dan was upstairs! She was too much of a woman to relish this impersonal tone. She was also too much in possession of her wits to protest against it, except inwardly. She had coached herself very severely into the resolution that she must make no mistakes with Miles but must let him follow the mood that took him. At the same time it was intolerable that he should greet her by talking like this.

  He answered something of what was passing in her mind as he said “Thank goodness one can talk to you. I’ve been down here for ten days without speaking to a soul except the Mundays and the farmhands.”

  “But you like it, Miles? Your letters sounded as though you were ideally happy.”

  “And you resented it!” he said laughing. “You wanted me to be miserable without you? Well, I wasn’t. I was longing for this day, it’s true, but I was living in such a state of exaltation that it carried me over. All day long I was busy, and the knowledge that you were coming warmed me like a secret fire. I almost wanted to put off the day, so that it should not be so quickly over. Even now, I want to put off, and put off, and delay . . .”

&n
bsp; He sat down on the floor at her feet, putting his head against her knee. “For shame, Miles! your pretty phrases!” But her happiness flowered to a sudden perfection. His change of mood, she thought, was like the swoop of a swallow: a moment ago, he was the serious young politician; now, the lover, with the rich, extravagant phrase at his command for her reassurance. It was his peculiarity to express himself extravagantly, picturesquely, and without false shame. In this he differed from the younger Jarrolds, who had been taught at school, and who had thoroughly absorbed the lesson, that understatement was the mark of a manly English reserve. Miles was less careful than they, less self-conscious. Indeed, he seemed to belong to an earlier generation altogether, earlier even that thatt of William Jarrold, who on occasion could be eloquent enough.

  Irritated though she had been by his first detachment, Evelyn could appreciate the swoop of contrast. Exasperated she might be, but never bored, never secure. This richness and danger between them satisfied all her needs. She was more afraid of losing Miles than of coming to an end of his resources, but the possibility of losing him only added to his value. She prayed that she might manage him coolly; she had had experience of men; the only experience she had not had was of her own heart whose intemperance might betray her.

  Dan thought that he would never get to sleep; he was much too excited, too much disturbed. Mr. Vane-Merrick’s untidy room belonged to another world than Eton or Newlands or the flat in Portman Square or the houses of his mother’s friends. Evidences of a dozen different kinds of activity lay carelessly about: periodicals of which Dan had never heard, books on such diverse subjects as Gerard Manley Hopkins and political economy, ledgers full of farm-accounts, the small blue of Hansard thrown down on the big brown of the Architectural Review; a gun stood in the corner, and a row of specimen potatoes lay ranged upon the oak beam of the mantelpiece. Dan had wandered round before dinner while Miles was away on some unspecified mission. His mother had reproved him, saying that she never knew he was so inquisitive. He knew that her reproof was not seriously meant.