Caroline

by Richmal Crompton

  Perhaps that was the lesson she had to learn from life—the lesson of loneliness, the lesson of not lowering her high standards to conform with those of people around her. Alone upon the heights. . . . She saw herself, a pathetic figure, alone, always alone, struggling along unaided, staggering under the weight of her too great burdens, but never sinking under them. It was, in a way, a gratifying picture, and, as she contemplated it, her serenity gradually returned. After all, whatever happened, she had one great comfort. She had done her duty. She had nothing, nothing whatever, to reproach herself with.

  Chapter Twelve

  FAY ran lightly downstairs to the dining-room, where her tea was laid on the big mahogany table. It had been lovely walking home with Philippa and Billy. When she was with them—both of them or either of them—she always felt happy and light-hearted, as if she needn’t worry about the scholarship or how wicked she was, or any of the other things she generally worried about. She felt that she could just enjoy life instead of taking it seriously, as Caroline always wanted her to. But that brought her back to Caroline again, and at the thought of Caroline a heavy weight of guilt seemed to fasten itself upon her spirit. She hadn’t told Caroline about coming home from school with Billy and calling at the Dicksons’. She’d done it every day for the past week, and she’d just let Caroline take for granted that she’d been kept late at school, which, with all her extra scholarship work, seemed natural enough. It was terribly deceitful not to have told Caroline about it. She could almost hear Caroline saying, “It’s not like my Fay.”

  But then she wasn’t Caroline’s “my Fay,” and the most dreadful part of it all was that right down at the bottom of her heart she didn’t want to be. She was working hard at her scholarship subjects, but she didn’t really want to win a scholarship or go to college or teach or influence other people for good or do any of the things that Caroline was so anxious for her to do. She wanted to take up music and enjoy life and have friends like Billy and Sybil and Philippa—who seemed so young though she was old—not like Freda Torrent. She’d thought that Caroline’s reference to Doris Pemberton would have spoilt her friendship with Billy, but it hadn’t done. She’d dreaded meeting him after it, but, as soon as she did meet him, everything was simple and natural and jolly again, and she could laugh at her secret fears, as she always could when she was with him. His uncritical friendliness gave her a lovely feeling of carefree happiness—so different was it from Caroline’s anxious brooding affection. But still—her thoughts returned to it guiltily—she ought to have told Caroline about walking home with him and calling at the Dicksons’. She’d have to soon, of course. The weight of it on her conscience would suddenly become more than she could bear, and she’d go to Caroline and confess, and Caroline would be grieved and hurt but very, very sweet and would talk to her about how wrong it was and how she must fight very hard against her evil tendencies, and—she wouldn’t be able to have anything more to do with Sybil or Billy.

  One new and mysterious element in the situation was that sometimes now sudden gusts of hatred would come over her, hatred of Caroline whom really she loved so devotedly, so that she could hardly bear to look at her, so that even her touch made her want to scream. They took her by surprise, seeming to spring upon her from outside. She felt bitterly ashamed of them afterwards and would lie awake at night suffering agonies of remorse.

  She pushed her plate away and poured out another cup of tea. She didn’t feel hungry. She had a headache, but she often had headaches nowadays. She often had a curious ache in her throat too, as if she’d been crying for a long time, though really she hadn’t been crying at all.

  Richard and Philippa and Caroline were having tea in the drawing-room. Probably Richard would come in to speak to her on his way out. He generally did. She liked Richard. He was kind and understanding, and Caroline was always in a good temper when he’d been to tea. The front door-bell rang, and someone else was shown in. Fay listened. Mrs. Beecham. She made a little grimace to herself. How dreadful! The drawing-room door was shut again, and she could only hear a faint murmur of voices.

  Her mind went back over the day. Sybil had discovered that it would be her birthday next month and wanted to give a party for her and invite some of their school friends and some of Billy’s.

  It had been so hard to explain that she and Caroline always spent her birthday together, and that she daren’t even suggest doing anything else.

  “But you’ve not fixed anything definite with her for this year, have you?” said Sybil.

  “No, but I’ve always spent it at home with her. She’d be terribly hurt if I didn’t.”

  “But you spend every blessed day at home with her. Surely for your birthday——”

  “I can’t, Sybil. It isn’t any use.”

  She’d have to spend her birthday alone with Caroline as usual, and Caroline would buy a birthday cake and would be very sweet to her, and—oh, it was hateful of her to feel that she’d much rather be with Sybil and Billy and their friends.

  The same thing had happened with Philippa this evening.

  “When I get my flat in London,” Philippa had said as the three of them walked up from the town, “and Fay’s exam, is over, both of you—and Sybil, of course—must come up and have lunch with me, and we’ll all go to a play.”

  “I say, how sporting of you!” Billy had said. “We’d simply love it.”

  But Fay had flushed and murmured:

  “It’s sweet of you, but——”

  “But what, darling?”

  “I don’t think I could.”

  “Why not?”

  And again she couldn’t tell Philippa that Caroline would hate her to go up to Town with them, would consider it disloyal of her even to think of it. She couldn’t explain why even to herself. It belonged to that dark world in which one groped one’s way uncertainly, always in secret terror of hurting or offending Caroline, that world in which Caroline was the sun and moon and stars, and one must not even appear to be paying allegiance to anyone or anything else.

  “We’ll ask Caroline too,” said Philippa, as if reading her thoughts.

  “Oh no,” said Fay unhappily. “I mean, I don’t think Caroline likes theatres much.”

  It would be worse than not going at all to have Caroline there with them, to be on edge all the time lest one of them should say anything that Caroline wouldn’t approve of. Sybil and Billy would be sure to make fun of something serious or laugh at a joke that Caroline wouldn’t consider funny or be obviously bored by the things Caroline talked about. Caroline did occasionally take her up to Town on half-term holidays to the British Museum or St. Paul’s or Westminster Abbey or some other “place of interest” as the Guide to London called them—but that wasn’t the sort of going up to Town Philippa meant. Caroline taught her about architecture and history on those expeditions, and they took sandwiches with them and ate them in the park, or, if it was cold, in the waiting-room at the railway station. They were very earnest improving expeditions, and Caroline would playfully put her through a little examination the next day to see how much she remembered.

  The drawing-room door opened. Mrs. Beecham was going. Caroline was seeing her off at the front door. The front door closed again. Caroline returned to the drawing-room. Probably she and Richard were telling Aunt Philippa about Mrs. Beecham now, how funny she was and how she loved to have her finger in every pie.

  She went over to the writing-table and took some books out of her attaché-case. She’d do the French translation first. She opened her book at the place and read a paragraph without having recourse to the dictionary. Then she stopped and put her head in her hands. Jagged pains were playing about behind her eyes like small sharp knives. They nearly always did that now as soon as she began to work. She hadn’t told Caroline. It wasn’t long before the examination, and it seemed silly to start making a fuss about a thing like that just before the examination. If she told Caroline, of course, Caroline would be sweet to her, but she felt that she
couldn’t bear anyone to be sweet to her just now. If they were, she’d begin to cry and never be able to stop. It was hateful to feel that you might begin to cry at any moment for no reason, but she felt like that all the time nowadays. She’d nearly disgraced herself the other evening at the Dicksons’. She hadn’t meant to play the piano, but Billy had asked her to, and somehow she’d found herself sitting there playing Chopin’s Nocturne in E flat. And as she played all the tenseness of her spirit had relaxed, and she had forgotten everything else in the world—even Caroline and the scholarship. When she’d finished, Sybil and Billy had said “How jolly!” and begged her to play again, but they hadn’t understood. All the rest of the evening the lump in her throat kept rising . . . rising. She’d managed to control it till she went to bed, but there she had let it have its way with her and had lain sobbing convulsively, pulling the bedclothes over her head and burying her face in the pillow so that Caroline should not hear.

  No, she mustn’t let anyone persuade her to play again. Caroline was right. It unsettled her mind and took it off her work. Her work hadn’t been good lately. She knew that the mistresses were disappointed, though they were very kind to her. She felt stupid and she kept forgetting things. A terrible certainty was forming in her mind that she couldn’t possibly win the scholarship, and, of course, it would be better to die than to disappoint Caroline like that.

  The drawing-room door opened, and there came the sound of Philippa’s footsteps going upstairs. She was glad that Philippa was here. Something about even the thought of her made one feel less guilty, less frightened.

  Someone was coming into the hall now . . . opening the front door . . . closing it. She glanced through the window. Richard was walking down the short drive. He hadn’t come in to see her, after all. Perhaps Caroline had told him not to interrupt her at her home-work. And Caroline hadn’t come to the door with him as she usually did. Perhaps she didn’t want the sound of their talking to disturb her. Guiltily she returned to her French book, but again little knife-like pains began to stir behind her eyes. She turned sharply as the door opened. Caroline stood there. She looked very pale.

  “How are you getting on, darling?”

  “Oh . .. I’ve only just begun.”

  “Well, bring it into the drawing-room, then I can give you a hand.”

  Rather reluctantly Fay gathered her books together and followed Caroline into the drawing-room. There she settled down at Caroline’s writing-desk, and Caroline took her seat in the armchair by the fire. Suddenly she said:

  “Fay, is it true that Sybil’s brother walked home with you after school?”

  Fay’s heart began to beat unevenly.

  “Billy? Yes. Philippa was there, too.”

  Caroline was on the point of saying, “Why didn’t you tell me?” but stopped, realising that Fay had had no opportunity of telling her. Instead she said, “Has it ever happened before?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sybil’s brother has walked from school with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve called at their house before coming on here?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Fay,” Caroline’s voice was deep and vibrant with reproach, “this isn’t like you.”

  Fay said nothing. She felt that a scene with Caroline just now would be more than she could endure. Caroline was moving her chair to make room for her on the hearthrug at her feet.

  “Darling, come here. Let’s talk this out. I don’t understand. . . . It isn’t like you.”

  Slowly, unwillingly, her heart still beating unevenly, Fay came across the room and sat down on the hearthrug at Caroline’s feet.

  “You know, darling,” went on Caroline, “how I hate anything secretive. It isn’t worthy of you. That’s why it hurts me so. Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “I don’t know,” said Fay again in a tense breathless voice.

  “I think it must have been because you thought I’d disapprove, because you knew that I think the Dicksons don’t bring out the best in you. You know that yourself, if you’ll be honest with yourself,don’t you, darling? They make you silly and irresponsible—not my Fay.”

  Fay conquered a wild desire to cry out that Caroline’s Fay did not exist, that Caroline had invented it, and Fay had tried to turn herself into it—tried till she was sick with trying—and hadn’t been able to. “I’m myself,” she wanted to cry, “I’m not anyone else’s. Leave me alone, leave me alone, leave me alone.”

  Caroline’s grave tender voice went on.

  “Wasn’t that why you didn’t tell me, darling—because you knew that it would hurt and disappoint me to know that you were still on friendly terms with those Dicksons?”

  “Yes.”

  “And don’t you see how secretive, how disloyal it was?”

  Disloyal. The word tore at Fay’s heart, reminding her of all she owed to Caroline, of all Caroline had done for her, of Caroline’s unfailing love and tenderness. Why, even now Caroline wasn’t cross, only hurt and grieved and disappointed.

  “Yes.”

  “Has Sybil’s brother ever walked from school with you alone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Fay, darling.” The reproach was deeper, graver. “Don’t you see how cheap, how second-rate it all is?”

  The colour blazed crimson in Fay’s cheeks. Her friendship with Billy was a pleasant natural boy-and-girl friendship, but Caroline seemed determined to spoil it, to dim its clarity, to invest it with some subtle quality of evil.

  “But, Caroline,” protested Fay, “if he’s just passing when I come out of school—he comes out of school about the same time, you know—what can I do?”

  “You must tell him that I disapprove of your walking home together.”

  There was a silence in which Fay tried to imagine herself telling Billy that Caroline disapproved of their walking home together.

  “Oh, Caroline!” she protested unhappily.

  “And, Fay,” went on Caroline gravely, “I don’t want to say anything against her because she’s my own mother, but her standards aren’t quite ours—yours and mine—and I don’t want you to be on too intimate terms with her. You must be polite to her, of course, but I don’t think there’s any need for you to be more than that.”

  Again Fay was silent. Aunt Philippa, with her loveliness and charm, her radiant joy of life, and that hint of understanding tenderness that lay beneath all her dealings with one. . . . Sybil and Billy and Aunt Philippa. . . . She was to lose them all.

  “But, Caroline,” she said, “Aunt Philippa ... she’s—she’s so nice. I mean . . .”

  “Darling,” said Caroline, “you must let me be judge in this case. I know her better than you.” She put out an arm and drew Fay’s slender figure against her knee. “Darling, you know what a lot you mean to me, and how terribly even the slightest disloyalty in you hurts me. You’re my baby, you know, sweetheart. You’re all I’ve got now Susan’s gone. If ever you turned against me . . .”

  “Caroline, don’t,” cried Fay in a strangled voice. “I do love you. . . . You know I do.”

  “I think you do . . . but love isn’t just feeling, you know, dearest, it’s doing. It’s trying not to fail the one you love, to be worthy of their ideal of you, to be loyal to them in thought and word and deed, to . . .”

  The hot sultry atmosphere of Caroline’s love seemed to surround her on all sides, so that she couldn’t breathe. And suddenly the tears that she had been fighting to keep back ever since Caroline began to speak to her came with a rush, in a sharp paroxysm of sobs. Caroline, smiling tenderly, gathered her into her arms.

  “There, darling, don’t . . . don’t. . . . I know you’re sorry. I . . .” Fay flung off the encircling arms with a desperate gesture.

  “Leave me alone . . . leave me alone,” she sobbed, and rushed from the room.

  Chapter Thirteen

  CAROLINE was alone in the draw
ing-room when Philippa came down. Her face looked pale and worn in the half light.

  “Fay’s crying in her bedroom,” said Philippa. “Is anything the matter?”

  “No,” said Caroline in a hard aloof voice. “She’s a little overwrought, that’s all.”

  Philippa was silent. After this afternoon’s scene she felt that the only dignified course would be to suggest going up to London to stay in a hotel while she looked for a flat, but she didn’t want to. This household of Caroline’s was charged with electricity, and at any moment an explosion might occur. She felt inexplicably involved in it all. Fay, of course, was really no relation of hers, but there had been a feeling of kinship and understanding between them from the first moment of their meeting. The child was overworked and unhappy, on the edge of a bad nervous breakdown. For years her growing individuality had been denied every outlet by Caroline’s possessiveness. At every turn it was hampered and thwarted by the sultry unhealthy emotion that Caroline called her “love.” A less sensitive and fine-wrought character than Fay’s would have found a solution in open defiance or a course of calculated deceit, but Fay struggled blindly, despairingly, to conform to Caroline’s standards, and the struggle was obviously breaking down her health of both body and mind.

  The very atmosphere of this house of Caroline’s was so alien to her that that alone would have irked and oppressed her spirit. Fay was born for the sunshine, for gaiety and laughter and friendship. Caroline’s heavy earnestness of purpose, her unrelieved drabness of outlook, were like clumsy fingers rubbing the bloom off a butterfly’s wings. And Fay was an artist—an artist who was being mercilessly forced into a rigid academic mould. She had uttered no complaint to Philippa, nothing even that could be construed as a complaint, but Philippa guessed how integral a part of her being was her love of music. Her very fingers, which toiled so inkily at French and German exercises, were musician’s fingers, slender, nervous, instinct with life. And there was Caroline, so pathetic in her self-righteousness, so ungrudging in her labours, so full of love—diseased, distorted, but still love—for the children to whom she had sacrificed her youth. One could only feel a heart-racking pity for her.