The Young Nightingales

by Mary Whistler

  Jane had always looked up to Conway, who was five years older than she was. He hoped to become a financier in the not-too-distant future, and was very knowledgeable about stocks and shares, and had advised Irina on more than one occasion, with the result that she had added to her income considerably.

  Jane, who never speculated, and spent very little except on clothes, had built up a modest bank balance, too ... and for that she felt very grateful whenever she thought of Toby and the problem of his future once their father could no longer make himself responsible for it.

  The funeral was a very quiet affair with only a few friends and relatives attending. It was kept deliberately quiet because of the circumstances, and it was the extremely painful quality of those circumstances that prevented Miranda from being present at her husband’s interment. She preferred to remain securely locked away in her room with pads of cotton wool over her eyes to offset the effect of the light and occasional outbursts of tearful regret; and it was only when the mourners had actually left the house and were well on their way to the church that she ventured outside her room and into her bathroom, which adjoined it, and took a very hot and very leisurely bath, after which she dressed herself carefully and was ready to receive the invited guests when they returned.

  Among the guests were a few newspapermen who had managed to gain entrance to the house, and the widow knew she would have to face them sooner or later. So she chose to face them when the dismal affair in the churchyard was over, and backed by the elegance of her drawing room, and without the smallest danger that the icy rain outside would interfere with the matt perfection of her complexion, could feel comfortably conscious of appearing at her best, and therefore most likely to attract to herself any amount of sympathy.

  Jane, on the other hand, got very wet walking back to the house with Toby after it was all over, because the cars were crammed to capacity, and it seemed the only sensible thing to do unless elderly maiden aunts were to be unfeelingly crushed on top of having their feelings badly harrowed. Irina tried to tempt her into the car she was sharing with a young man friend, but Jane bowed her head and walked on beneath the dripping trees with Toby, in his second-best Sunday suit and a new raincoat bought specially for the occasion; and when they finally arrived back at the house they looked as if they had been recently fished out of a very wet pond.

  The hall was full of people, most of them wearing a certain amount of black, and all of them looking relieved because they could now look forward to good stiff drinks and lashings of boiling hot coffee. Jane, who had got rid of her drenched outer garments in the cloakroom and endeavoured to do something about her hair, permitted Toby to take himself off somewhere where he could seek his own refreshments—and perhaps indulge a certain amount of personal grief—and mingled with them because she felt it was her duty. She had caught sight of Roger Bowman handling a couple of newspapermen with the consummate ease of long practice and the slight air of cold hauteur that clung to him at all times and rendered him particularly deadly when cross-examining a hostile witness in court, and she realised that he was giving out little or nothing that could be of help to her late father’s enemies ... and now she knew that he had had plenty, men who had fawned on him in the past, used him to climb individual ladders, benefited from his generosity, and yet would not have given him any real assistance when he needed it.

  Jane had at last realised that all his married life, at least, her father had been a lonely man, ploughing a lonely furrow, looking neither to right nor left in his efforts to remain at the top. And he had remained there for a number of wonderfully secure years, during which time he had made life easy for his children, cosseted his two wives, bestowed benefits on many, and had very little in the way of ease or comfort himself.

  His first wife had been delicate, never understood him and his preoccupation with making money, and died. His second, Miranda...

  On all sides people were talking about Miranda. Jane could see them bending their heads, wearing a slightly critical expression in their eyes—only this time it was not criticism of Miranda—and she realised that they deliberately lowered their voices when she drew near.

  “Poor Miranda! Such a dreadful shock for one so very young still! ... And so extraordinarily attractive! How any man could fail a wife like that ... leave her to bear the brunt of it all, cope with the stigma, and live it all down! It was all almost unbelievable. And Miranda was being so extraordinarily brave, too ... not able to attend the funeral, which was understandable, but putting on such a determinedly brave and even calm front, interviewing members of the press. Trying to make them believe that her husband’s death was due to ill-health and the depression resulting from ill-health ... nothing more.”

  Nothing more! When everyone knew the family would have to vacate this lovely house, and what on earth was going to happen to them after they left?

  Even the maiden aunts arched their necks and quivered with what they felt was justifiable indignation.

  Jane, watching them devour the hot soup, the pate sandwiches, the dismembered chickens and the rich gateaux, and noting how rapidly the decanters were lowering, felt a surge of almost unbearable indignation as she walked amongst them and refrained from touching anything herself. She felt as if one bite out of a sandwich would choke her.

  She managed to detach Roger from a persistent enquirer who was there on behalf of one of the Sunday newspapers, and led him away to the library, which was the room next to the study where her father’s body had been found, and for that reason perhaps not over popular with the guests.

  “I hate them all!” Jane declared, a threat of a break in her voice as she sank into one of the deep chairs and tried desperately to still the trembling in all her limbs.

  Roger shrugged. He walked over to the window and looked out at the rain.

  “You mustn’t allow yourself to get worked up,” he remarked, in a somewhat curiously detached voice. “You’ve had a shock, and it’s numbed you for a bit, but now that the numbness is wearing off don’t get worked up.”

  Jane stared across the room at him. She had known him all her life—or very nearly all her life—and she thought she adored him. In fact, she was very certain of it. Next to her father he was the only man who could ever really enter her life and take possession of it, and she had long ago faced up to the knowledge that all other men were quite pallid beside him.

  He was almost twice her age, a successful barrister, and she knew that most women found him utterly irresistible. But that didn’t make any difference to her. He could smile at her and rumple her hair, as he had done when she was a schoolgirl, take her out to dinner or to the theatre, pay her compliments, criticise her, rebuke her quite severely on occasion, kiss her or caress her, make a restrained form of rather ardent love to her, and it was all the same ... everything she felt for him could be classified under the one heading, diagnosed as simple adoration. No longer schoolgirlish, for she was twenty-two now, and inclined to make her desperately unhappy sometimes. Which was fairly understandable, she supposed, since all love made you unhappy occasionally ... unless you were absolutely certain it was fully requited. And although she was reasonably certain, she was not fully. Not yet.

  She bit her lower lip, which was inclined to tremble noticeably.

  “All those relatives I didn’t even know we possessed ... talking about Father! And none of them are saying very much good about him, I’m sure of that! All their sympathy is with Miranda, who never even bothered about him while he was alive!”

  “Oh, come now!” He turned, frowning in such a way that his beautifully marked black brows were knitting together above the bridge of his slightly arrogant nose, while a certain hardness seemed to dwell about the corners of his attractive masculine mouth ... and it was a very masculine mouth, with a square, determined jaw below it. “No one can possibly accuse me of not wishing to defend your father, for he was my friend for a number of years ... and I’d even go so far as to say I was probably his best friend! But t
he way he chose out of his mess was not a pretty way, and the worst sufferers, in my opinion, are Miranda and Toby. You, Irina and Conway are sufficiently adult, and yet sufficiently young at the same time, to take it all. But Miranda has been dealt a crushing blow, deprived of a protector—left without means of support! I’m not surprised everyone’s sympathy is for Miranda!”

  “You can say that?” Jane half rose in her chair, clutching at the arms of it for support. “But you know very well she practically ruined Father with her extravagance!”

  Again he shrugged. He extracted an expensive platinum cigarette-case from his pocket, lit a cigarette, inhaled thoughtfully for a moment, and then regarded her more pityingly.

  “Poor Jane! This is the first time in your life you’ve been brought face to face with reality, isn’t it? Real reality! The shock was brutal, and it’s wiped the ground from beneath your feet ... but it has done that for Miranda, too. You must have sympathy for Miranda.”

  Jane’s lips tightened. Her small chin looked for a moment almost as square and as implacable as his.

  “I have never approved of Miranda,” she said, in a small, taut voice that was icily cold. “I hold her largely responsible for my father’s death. Why, if she had been here when he took his life he might never have taken it! He adored her ... he never denied her anything. But when he needed her she was in the South of France, having a wonderful time, not even sparing a thought for him. It’s small wonder that he took his life, is it?”

  The man confronting her frowned.

  “But Miranda was ill,” he reminded her. “Have you forgotten that she was in the South of France because of her health?”

  Jane turned from him in disgust. . “Health? She’s as fit as a flea!”

  “I don’t think her doctor would agree with you about that.”

  “Her doctor’s a charlatan. He isn’t even a proper doctor ... Daddy never approved of him.”

  “He’s a highly thought of and very expensive neurologist.” He bit his lip and turned away from her, pacing up and down the room with bent brows for several seconds while he stared at the carpet. Then his expression grew soft all at once, and he turned to her almost penitently, holding out his hand.

  “Never mind, Jane. You can’t be expected to have much sympathy for anyone save yourself just now,” he said, not even noticing when she looked surprised and recoiled slightly. “I know you’ve got a soft spot for Toby, and will look after him, but you have to think of yourself as well, and what I want to know is ... what are you going to do, Jane? Have you given the matter any thought?”

  His voice was gentle, urgent, and for the first time tears practically forced themselves between her lids. But she held them back.

  “No,” she whispered, “not really.”

  “But you’ll have to think.” She felt his hands taking possession of both of hers, squeezing them, fondling them. A sensation of almost breathless anticipation took possession of her, causing her to feel suddenly, petrifyingly shy, while at the same .time every pulse in her body seemed to start thundering in her ears. “Jane!” He squeezed her hands very hard. “I’ve been giving the problem of your future a lot of thought, and I’ve decided that if you can’t make plans for yourself I’ll have to make them for you—” Breathlessly she peeped at him. Her whole future—all the happiness life could either bestow on her or deny her—hung on his next words.

  “Do you want to know what I’ve decided for you, Jane?” he asked.

  “Yes,” she whispered again.

  CHAPTER THREE

  FAR away in the house a clock chimed, and a car started up on the drive. People were leaving—or beginning to leave—and she ought to be there to bid them goodbye, to accept their further commiserations and condolences, and long for the moment when they should be really gone. But with Roger holding her hands fast and looking down at her from his infinitely superior height with a kind of tender quizzicalness and pity in his eyes Jane could think of nothing but what he might say next.

  What—knowing as she did that he was tremendously fond of her—that it was almost inevitable that he should say.

  She half closed her eyes, and she heard him uttering those magical words ... although in actual fact he was still silent.

  “Marry me, Jane ... that’s what you’ve got to do! Your father would approve of that!” But when he spoke he said nothing whatsoever about marriage.

  “I’ve got a nice little job lined up for you, Janie my sweet ... as companion to my aunt. You’ve never met her, but you’ll like her, and knowing all the circumstances she’ll treat you more like a daughter than an employee. And she’ll even allow you to have Toby with you during the holidays. She lives in Switzerland— French Switzerland—and the two of you can have fun. That young man’s going to be a champion skier one of these days, and—”

  “Your aunt?” Jane mouthed the words. “You want me to work for your aunt?”

  “Not real work, darling.” He rallied her with an only partly humorous smile. “My relatives are all extremely reasonable, and my Aunt Agatha is an old dear. I haven’t the slightest doubt you’ll become extremely attached to her after a while. And all she’ll want you to do is to talk to her, write her letters and perhaps drive her about ... that sort of thing. You’ll be in clover, really, with your own small income ... and safe and secure with Aunt Agatha. I’ve already spoken to Miranda about your going to her.”

  “You have?”

  “Yes, of course.” He put a finger under her chin and lifted it, smiled into her stunned eyes. “She’s your stepmother, remember? And naturally she has your interests at heart.”

  “Has she?”

  “Now, now!” He wagged a finger at her reprovingly, and then caressingly stroked the tip of her slightly turned up nose with that same extremely shapely index finger. “You choose to believe that Miranda is all bad, whereas in actual fact she’s shaken by shock herself at this very moment, and is putting on a brave face in the drawing-room. She loved your father, in a kind of way. But he was too old for her, too preoccupied with matters that couldn’t possibly interest her, and she was driven to take an escapist line. Her nerves were genuinely in a pretty poor state when Chris Harrison ordered her to spend the winter abroad, and although you say she was enjoying herself ... well, you and Irina have done nothing very much except enjoy yourselves for years. Ever since you’ve been grown up, in fact. And who footed the bills for your enjoyment? Your father!”

  The room was inclined to reel round Jane. She felt as if she was clutching at useless straws when she chose to defend herself.

  “I was never extravagant...” she began.

  “Simply because it is not in your nature to be extravagant!”

  “I’d have been quite happy to take a job years ago...”

  His extraordinarily attractive eyes humoured her in a tender kind of way.

  “Poor sweet, you’re only twenty-two now. I’m not implying that you ought to have taken a job.”

  “But you are implying that Irina and I both helped to bring about our father’s downfall?”

  He was genuinely shocked.

  “Nothing of the sort, you poor, silly little nitwit. I’m only trying to plead Miranda’s case, and to present her to you in a somewhat new light. You seem so determined to hate her—”

  “I do hate her!” she declared, between her teeth.

  Roger’s black brows knitted swiftly.

  “Why?” he demanded, in a somewhat harder tone. “Try and justify yourself in actual words. Explain to me exactly why you hate Miranda.”

  Her quiet eyes were blazing now with a mixture of resentment, indignation, surprise and bewilderment. She snatched away a hand he was still holding and put several paces between them.

  “I’ve already explained it to you,” she said, fighting to prevent her voice from failing altogether, and wondering whether this was all part of a most unpleasant dream she was having. “I hold Miranda responsible for—”

  “Your father’s death.”
His eyes had narrowed, and in her ears his voice sounded critical and blightingly cold. “Now there’s nothing at all that Miranda has done in the past few months that can possibly justify such an accusation as that, and I should know, because I’ve seen her several times while she was abroad, and it was I who went to France and brought her back when your father took his life. I knew she couldn’t be allowed to face such a catastrophe alone—”

  “You brought her back?” This time she could hardly believe the evidence of her ears. “But I thought it was Chris Harrison who brought her back, and—and—” Her voice failed, and then grew stronger again. “I always thought you disapproved of Miranda as strongly as I do—as we all do! I’m positively certain it was you who actually advised Father against marrying her. And when he did marry her you predicted it would end in disaster! You told me that yourself,” she reminded him.

  “I was criminally unfair.” He spoke as if having been convinced of this himself—although perhaps only very recently—and anxious to make amends, he was prepared to go to almost any length to blot out his previous mistake. “I allowed myself to be temporarily biased ... and that is a thing a man in my profession ought never to allow himself to be. Because Miranda was already a widow when she married your father, and had acquired something of a reputation—through no fault of her own—I, like the rest, was prepared to damn her. And when I say ‘the rest’ I mean all those stupid, narrow-minded, carping, hypercritical and therefore slightly inhuman individuals who take up their residence in a district like this. The wives of socially ambitious business men and their collective maiden aunts—the do-gooders—”

  “In fact everyone in the district,” she said quietly.

  He stared at her, one eyebrow a little uplifted above its fellow, a network of impatient wrinkles at the corners of his eyes ... and then he flung out his hands and laughed. But it was a laugh without any mirth in it whatsoever, and there was quite definitely a certain amount of constraint about it.