Then She Fled Me

by Sara Seale

  “I’m not a visitor—I’m Kathy Riordan. I’ll row across to the other side early in the morning and ring from Casey’s. Joe will come and fetch me.”

  “Joe will come and fetch you where?” asked Sarah, coming into the room. “Here’s the key, Aunt Em. It was stuck in an egg cup at the back of the dresser.”

  “Joe will come and fetch me away from this hateful place, and from a sister who plots and schemes for her own ends.”

  “Have you lost your wits?” asked Sarah mildly, then she saw her sister’s tear stained face, and said quickly: “What’s the matter, Kathy? What’s upset you?”

  Kathy crouched, trembling, against her aunt’s knees, all her anger returning at sight of her sister.

  “Do you think I don’t know, why you were so anxious to spoil things for Adrian and me? You wanted him yourself,” she said.

  Sarah’s black eyebrows drew together in a frown.

  “Oh, don’t be so silly,” she said.

  “Silly, is it!” cried Kathy. “When I find you sitting at his feet and he fondling your hair!”

  “He wasn’t fondling my hair. What a disgusting word!”

  “He was so. I saw him with my own two eyes. Aunt Em, you shouldn’t allow it—Sarah may think she runs this family but, after all, she is only eighteen, and it isn’t right that she should spend hours in the nursery, while our fine English boarder makes love to her.”

  “Stop it!” shouted Sarah. “I will not have you make something cheap and nasty out of this. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Indeed then, I do, and if there’s anything cheap and nasty it’s you; you sly little cat.”

  “Children, children!” protested Aunt Em vainly, but Sarah was now in one of her rages.

  “You’ll not be calling me names like that without getting your, face slapped, Kathy Riordan,” she cried, reverting to the brogue which all of them slipped into in moments of stress. “All I’ve done is to try to keep you from being hurt, and you, losing your head over the first man who can quote poems to you. Adrian said you were stupid and you are, stupid and nasty minded, too.”

  “He said I was stupid, did he? And who’s he to come here lording it over us and telling us we’re stupid and upsetting the whole household!”

  “It’s you who’s upsetting the whole household with your airs and graces. Look how you’ve treated Joe.”

  “Leave Joe out of it. He’s good and kind and reliable and means what he says.”

  “He is that, but don’t go thinking he’s still dying of love for you. He’d have married me if I’d have had him.”

  “Married you!” For a moment Kathy’s jaw dropped. “He would so. He asked me at the dance, and it was lucky it was me and not some other girl. Many a man, they tell me, marries on the rebound. You may lose him yet if you play about much longer, blowing hot and cold. It’s not a flesh and blood lover she’s wanting, he said, and he’s right. All you want is a man to admire you and quote your silly poetry.”

  “Oh!” cried Kathy. “How can you! Aunt Em, how can you let her say such things to me? She’s simply jealous—because she’s always known I was the pretty one. Father said how it would be. If he’d been alive now, Sarah, he’d not have you speak to me like that, and he’d turn that English snake out of the house, too.”

  “You leave Father out of this,” said Sarah, suddenly white. “I know he loved you best for a long time because he could never resist beauty. I didn’t resent it, for I thought it was natural, but in the end it was me—too late for me to know—but he left me Dun Rury as proof of his love.”

  Kathy laughed.

  “He left you Dun Rury to ease his own conscience. He knew he’d always been unfair to you. He told me in a letter just before he died that he’d left you the place because he couldn’t leave you his love. I, he said, had all of that. He never loved you, Sarah, he never loved you at all. It was a beautiful letter.”

  There was a dead silence. Aunt Em made a futile little gesture of remonstrance, but looking at Sarah standing straight and suddenly very still in the lamplight, she too was silent and slow tears of distress gathered behind her glasses. At last Sarah spoke.

  “I don’t believe you,” she said very quietly.

  Kathy glanced at her and was suddenly frightened. The look on Sarah’s white face was the look of one who has been dealt a mortal blow.

  I—I—perhaps I shouldn’t have told you that,” she stammered. “I never meant to, but it’s true. I still have the letter—it was the last thing he ever wrote. He wrote it, he said, to comfort me when he had gone.”

  “He wrote it to comfort you ...” repeated Sarah slowly. “And you never missed him as I did, Kathy ... you never loved him as I did, either ...”

  “Would you like to see the letter?” her sister asked as if she was presenting a peace-offering.

  Sarah turned away.

  “No, I don’t want to see it,” she said. “It wasn’t meant for me.” She went quietly from the room and they heard the front door open and close and then her dragging feet on the gravel drive.

  Aunt Em found she was trembling.

  “You shouldn’t have told her that, dear child,” she said gently. “It was very cruel.”

  Kathy turned her face into her aunt’s lap and wept afresh.

  “I didn’t mean to,” she sobbed like a repentant child. “She drove me to it with the things she said. I didn’t mean to, Aunt Em ...”

  Her aunt stroked her hair, automatically giving comfort as she had always done to the young Kathleen of long ago.

  “No, you didn’t mean to,” she said sadly. “But words cannot be undone. You’ve taken something very precious from the child. Had you not enough already, Kathy, that you could strike such a careless blow?”

  Kathy raised her head and her childish face was soft with pleading.

  “Don’t turn against me, Aunt Em,” she said. “You’ve always loved me best ... don’t turn against me, now...”

  Aunt Em looked down at her. Just so had the young Kathleen pleaded when she had taken the one man her sister had ever wanted, taken him and married him and forgotten all about it. No one had ever known, but tonight in Sarah’s stricken face she had seen the reflection of her own hurt spirit.

  “I could never turn against you, darling,” she said. “You’re too like your mother, but we’ve loved you too well, Denis, Kathleen and I. Now you must grow up, Kathy, and learn that great beauty has an obligation laid upon it.”

  “An obligation?”

  “Not to trade on it too much. Now I think we should all go to bed. Sarah will come in from the fields when she’s ready. And, tomorrow—yes, I think you should ring up Brian and see if they can have you. You and Sarah will be better apart for a little. There’s just one thing, dear child. Was there—was there any truth in your hints about Mr. Flint? Because if so—”

  “No,” said Kathy, ashamed. “I don t think so, really. I was jealous, I suppose. Adrian’s fond of Sarah, that’s all, and he was never fond of me.”

  “I see. Perhaps you’re beginning to learn.”

  “And you forgive me, Aunt Em?”

  Her aunt kissed her.

  “The hurt is not mine to forgive,” she said gently. “But you’ll always have my love, Kathy. And one more thing before we say goodnight. While you’re staying with the Kavanaghs, remember Joe loves you, too. Don’t hurt him more than you can help.”

  “I’ll remember. Will I say I’m sorry to Sarah tonight?”

  Aunt Em sighed. Just so might a chided child expect forgiveness for a careless word soon forgotten.

  “No, dear, leave her alone tonight. Go to bed now. It’s getting late.”

  Adrian from the nursery window watched the small events of the following day with a troubled spirit. He had heard the angry voices in the snug, and later Sarah banging the front door as she fled to seek solace in the fields, but no one came to the nursery all day, except Mary, with his lunch tray. They all seemed to go their separ
ate ways. First Danny, cycling down the drive to school, then Kathy taking the boat alone to the other side, then Sarah, a satchel on her back, evidently set for one of her days of solitude, then Kathy returning. Not one of them glanced up at his window. After lunch the Kavanagh car drove up, and he heard Kathy’s voice cry: “Joe! Oh, Joe!” as she ran out of the house. The young man did not speak, but just held her hands in his and smiled, then he put her suitcase in the back and they drove away together.

  He heard Sarah come in soon after half-past eight, but over an hour passed and she did not come up to the nursery, and at ten o’clock he went down to the snug to find her. Aunt Em was just rolling up her knitting and putting it away; there was no one else there.

  “Good evening, Miss Emma. Where’s Sarah?” he, asked.

  Aunt Em peered at him vaguely over her glasses.

  “I was just going to bed,” she said. “Can I get you anything?”

  “I only wanted a word with Sarah. Has she gone to bed yet?”

  “No, she’s in the kitchen, doing the accounts, I think,” she said. “Wouldn’t tomorrow do? She’s very tired.”

  “If she’s very tired,” he said, frowning, “she ought to be in bed, not doing accounts.”

  “Yes, well—it’s difficult to argue with Sarah when she’s set her mind to something.”

  “I’ll soon argue with her,” said Adrian shortly. “If necessary I’ll carry her up the stairs.”

  Aunt Em tucked her knitting bag under her arm and looked at him speculatively.

  “That might, perhaps, be the right treatment,” she said slowly. “But there’s been a little upset. I’m afraid you must have heard the girls quarrelling last night. Kathy has gone away for a time, and Sarah—well, I’m not sure what is the right way with Sarah just now.”

  “I think I might find out,” said Adrian with a smile. “I’ll turn the lamps out for you, Miss Emma, if you’re going up, now.”

  Adrian put out the lamps, then went through the silent hall to the kitchen. He opened the door quietly but she did not hear him. She was sitting at the kitchen table, a lamp at her elbow but she was not doing the accounts. Her black head was buried in her arms and she was weeping bitterly.

  He bent over her, touching her gently on the shoulders.

  “Sarah ... child ... what is it?” he said softly. She did not answer and he put one hand on the bowed black head. “Tell me what’s upset you,” he said. “Perhaps I can help.”

  She looked up then and her eyes focused on him with difficulty. He was a little shocked at the look of blind despair on her face.

  “My dear, nothing and no one is worth such heartache as this. What did you and Kathy quarrel about?” She shook her head. “You’d much better tell me. Was it about me?”

  “It started with you,” she said wearily.

  “And Kathy said I was making love to you?”

  “How did you know?”

  “Well, it was pretty obvious what she thought from her expression when she came into the nursery. What more did she say?”

  “Oh, lots more—I can’t remember. I think she said I’d made mischief because I wanted you myself and—and that I was cheap and nasty and you were a snake ... but I forget...”

  He knelt down beside her chair and took her into his arms. This wasn’t the whole of it, he thought, and he knew he must get it all out of her now while her defences were down, before she could take refuge in the old barrier of reserve which she used to be so good at raising between them.

  “Listen, Sarah,” he said, his cheek against her hair. “You wouldn’t let a few jealous words blind you to the truth, would you? Don’t you know why this business has upset you so much?”

  “On account of Kathy. We never quarrel.”

  “No, not on account of Kathy. You’ve been fighting me for a long time—or have you been fighting yourself? Don’t you know yet what I feel about you?”

  “I think you like me now.”

  He gave her a little shake.

  “Oh, you foolish child, I do more than like you,” he laughed. “When I told you to think things over while I was away I wanted you to allow your own heart to teach you what your muddled feelings were. Instead of which you became all confused and were unable to separate me from your father.”

  But at mention of her father she drew away from him, and a closed look came into her face.

  What is it?” he asked. “Am I rushing my fences too much?”

  She licked away a tear that was trickling to the corner of her mouth and said in a tired little voice:

  “I don’t understand what you mean.”

  “My darling child!” he said with a hint of laughter in his eyes. “I’m trying hard to propose to you, only you won’t listen.”

  She blinked at him stupidly and he said gently:

  “You’re dead beat, aren’t you? I’ll ask you tomorrow.”

  “I went to St. Patrick’s Well today,” she said slowly. “I made a wish—an impossible wish. I wished he would send me someone else in place of my father.”

  “Well, that’s not an impossible wish, and the old boy granted it in record time. You have me. I’m quite prepared to be a father to you, Sarah, but I shall expect a little more, besides.”

  Suddenly she began to speak, as if against her will the truth was being forced from her.

  “She said my father had never loved me—even at the end. She said he didn’t leave me Dun Rury because he loved me but to ease his conscience, and I loved it and fought for it only because of him. He wrote her a letter before he died and told her that she had all his love ... all ... all ... not even a little for me.”

  As he listened his face changed and hardened. He had imagined the trouble was chiefly concerned with himself and had been confident of putting things right for her, but this was something quite different. He saw now that he was dealing not with awakening emotions which must be coaxed into the right channels, but with a case of plain shock. “Kathy told you this?” he said slowly.

  “She said I drove her to it. I expect I did. Aunt Em said she was sorry afterwards, but that was too late, wasn’t it?”

  Too late for tears, too soon for lost illusion? He knew about lost illusions. He had travelled that road himself. He searched among his own memories for words that would comfort her, but found none but her own advice to him. There are other sorts of miracles ...

  “Would you have rather built on an illusion?” he asked a little sternly. “I don’t think so. You’re not like Kathy, all dreams and self-deception—you’re a real person, Sarah, and that among other things is why I love you. Shams and illusions wouldn’t do for you in the end. I think perhaps I’m glad the spell is broken. You were giving your heart to a ghost.”

  “It was all I had for so long,” she said.

  “Yes, but you yourself told me long ago that when something was taken away you believed something else was sent in its place. Keep on believing that, for I’ve found it’s true. There’s always something to fill the gap.”

  “Yes,” she said, her chin lifting. “There’s Dun Rury.”

  He gave a small impatient sigh and for a moment was tempted to argue all over again. Was she never to be free of this fetish? But one glance at her exhausted face warned him that this was not the time, either for breaking down lost causes or for telling her he loved her.

  “Yes, there’s Dun Rury,” he said quietly. “Come to bed now, Sarah. You’ve had quite enough for one day.”

  He had got to his feet and was gently lifting her out of the chair.

  She put her arms round his neck and kissed him.

  “Did you say you’d been trying to propose to me?” she asked a little vaguely.

  “I did, but you can forget it for tonight.”

  “I think”—she said, resting her head against his breast—“I think I love you, Adrian.”

  His smile was tender.

  “Yes, I think you do,” he answered. “But we’ll talk about that another day. And another time
, my child, don’t go wearing yourself out on these solitary tramps when something bothers you. Come to me instead. It will be quicker and much less exhausting. Now, goodnight.”

  “Yes, dear Adrian, always,” she said simply. “Goodnight.”

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Two days later Sarah had a note from Brian Kavanagh asking her to call in at his office the next time she was in Knockferry. He had, he said, some business to discuss with her. He mentioned briefly that Kathy had settled down with them happily and they would be delighted to keep her for as long, as she wanted to stay.

  “I wonder what Uncle B. wants,” Sarah said, then her eyes brightened. “Perhaps he’s decided to sell out an investment after all. Let’s start at once.”

  Adrian drove with Sarah beside him and Danny bouncing exuberantly in the back. She talked away, clearly excited by a possible turn in the family fortunes, and he was glad to see that the strained look of the last two days was passing. He had had little private conversation with her, but sometimes he caught her looking at him with a wistful expression as if she would have liked to reopen that other conversation but was too shy or still too confused to do so. She had worked hard on the form and he had not tried to distract her from it. It was better for her to have something to do which would tire her out by nightfall and there was time enough for talk later.

  He dropped her in the main street of the town, having arranged that they should all meet later on for lunch, and took the eager small boy to look at the shops.

  Brian Kavanagh greeted Sarah with a sly smile.

  “That was a prompt response,” he said. “Still hoping to worm some more money out of the firm?”

  “I’m always hoping,” she said, perching on the chair he set for her. “I believe you really have relented this time, you old bear. I could certainly do with a change of luck.”

  “Well, I have a proposition to put to you, but before I go into the matter, I do advise you, Sarah, to give it very serious consideration.”

  “I always give business serious consideration,” she said with a grin. “The trouble is there’s so little to consider. Go ahead, Uncle B., and spill the beans.”