The Strange Waif

by Violet Winspear

  "Yes, I'm leaving Chase," she said. "I'm going back to Torquay to collect my things from that cafe where I was staying."

  "I had an idea you would be going back!" He spoke trenchantly. "You told Avery you'd been to my cottage, I take it?"

  A quick flush climbed over her face. "I couldn't avoid it. I was wearing your wind-cheater and Gerda recognized it. I had to say where I'd been. Anyway," she thrust up her chin and the flush still lingered on her cheekbones, "we'd done nothing wrong."

  "I do recall that I kissed you." He smiled slightly, but not with his eyes; they were almost moody in this moment. "I didn't mean to, as it happens. I didn't take you home for that purpose and it's unfair of Avery to think I did. Damn people—good people—at times! It's the old Puritan creed—burn for your sins, you sinner! I'll hold your hand in the bonfire, but burn you must!"

  "How strange," she murmured, "that you should say that."

  "Why?" He glanced down at her, still frowning from his outburst.

  "I thought it myself, last night, that good people are sometimes hard." Then she shivered slightly and glanced back towards Chase with its towers rearing grey and rustily lichened against the uncertain blue of the sky and the faintly sallow slopes of the park. It seemed to brood among its memories, lost in time, and Robert, watching Lygia, saw her mouth shake a little, like a hurt, puzzled child's.

  "How did you get that bruise?" he asked.

  "The bruise?" She touched it. "Oh, I fell over, on the stairs at Chase. They're always polished until they're like glass. Did you think," she smiled fleetingly at him, "that Avery had gone berserk and mopped up the floor with me?"

  "I don't know. It's rather a fantastic notion, I'll admit, but not entirely beyond the bounds of possibility. He is, after all, a Chase, and there's a streak of the devil in the lot of us." Then that characteristic half-smile, half-grimace touched his mouth. "Perhaps, after all, you'd sooner be shot of all us Chases and not come to London. It's up to you, Lygia. I won't force the issue or even say that it's an absolute certainty you'll land the job. But the chance is there, if you want to take it. The chance to leave rep and all its dusty trappings behind you. The chance to make money and be independent."

  "My father would want me to try," she admitted. "He was very ambitious as a young man, but ambition died in him when my mother died."

  "And when was that Lygia?"

  "When I was eleven. She had to go into hospital for an operation and—and she died. She was very pretty. My father always said that her eyes were as blue as the skies of Killarney. She was Irish, you see."

  "Which accounts for these wild violets, wrapped in black fern!" He smiled as he put his hands at her temples and tilted back her head. "Listen, you strange waif, you enigma from out of nowhere, I do apologize here and now for the things I've said and the things I've done. Especially do I apologize for the way I kissed you yesterday, as though you were something I'd bought for an hour. It was what that fellow Downham did to you, wasn't it? And you're just a child!"

  "I'm almost twenty," she said, and she watched him gravely, no longer willing to take the risk, as she had taken it yesterday at the cottage, of accepting without reservation any gesture of kindness he might make. It didn't do, she had learned, to trust people too much; that was the way you got hurt.

  "All right, I will come and see Fenton Laye," she said. "Thank you for asking me."

  "Said like a good little girl!" he laughed. "Now we'd better be getting back to Chase. By the way, what time did you plan on leaving for Torquay?"

  "Almost directly, I think." They had begun to walk back towards Chase and a fitful spotlight of sunshine played over them. "I can get a bus down in Brinsham."

  "Have you got the money for the fare?"

  "Yes, thank you."

  They walked a few more yards, then he said, abruptly: "Don't stop at that cafe, Lygia." He dragged a wallet from a pocket at the back of his trousers and notes crackled as he quickly extracted about six. "Look, take this, call it an advance on your salary if you don't want to feel embarrassed about taking money from me." He pushed the notes into one of the pockets of her jacket. "Book yourself an overnight room at the Tanagra Hotel—it's a very decent place, you'll find— and I'll call there for you about ten o'clock tomorrow morning. We'll go up to London together. Agreed?"

  "But I don't need any money, Robert!" She drew the notes from her pocket agitatedly, not noticing that he smiled thinly and briefly to hear his name on her lips; again in a moment of reluctance and withdrawal. "Please take the money back!" She held out the notes. "I can draw money out of my Post Office book. It's in my suitcase at the cafe."

  "Lygia," the sunshine struck obliquely across his face and he narrowed his eyes against it and this gave him a faintly forbidding look as he gazed down at her, "had you thought that your suitcase may not be at the cafe any longer? You said yourself that the proprietor was a bit of a crook."

  "Oh, but it must be there!" She looked alarmed. "I have my clothes in it! And my Post Office book isn't any good to anyone but me. Other people can't make withdrawals from it."

  "Very possibly not, but the cafe proprietor might have dumped the suitcase. You've got to face that possibility." His dark eyes raked her face. "Is my money so obnoxious to you? Do you prefer to find yourself stranded in Torquay without a penny piece in your pockets?"

  "No—of course not!"

  "Then put that money back in your pockets. In the event that your suitcase is safe and sound, I haven't the slightest doubt that you'll be returning the loan with very great promptitude, but it may come in handy."

  And because, after all, it had been surprisingly thoughtful of him to offer the loan in case she did find herself stranded, she thanked him and folded the notes. They had reached the courtyard door now, but before Robert opened it, he said. "You won't run away, will you? We've made a bargain and I expect you to honour it."

  "I shall honour it." She stood before him, with the wind ruffling her hair and a thin hand toying with his grandmother's gift. The diamond eyes glistened as the fitful sunshine found them. "There is just one thing, though—"

  "What's that?" he prompted, as she hesitated.

  "Well, it's Gerda!" She looked embarrassed. "Won't she mind about all this? She doesn't like me very much and—and—"

  "And what?" He looked saturnine and mocking, standing over her, with an arm stretched to the courtyard door.

  "S-she has some say in what you do, I imagine." Lygia watched the ground, hating to have to touch on such a personal matter with him, but it was surely necessary? Gerda would hate all this. She would be blazingly angry that he wanted her, Lygia, in a play with him.

  There was a lengthening silence. Birds wheeled across the park, flapping their wings, and Robert's wrist-watch ticked close to Lygia's ear. Then he said: "Was Gerda angry last night, when she recognized my windcheater?"

  "Yes."

  "How tired you must be of angry people!"

  She glanced up at him in a startled way, and he smiled. "Don't worry about Gerda. I'll talk to her. Now you'd better run indoors and have some breakfast."

  He walked with her as far as the hall, then he went off to see his grandmother, and Lygia found that her hand was shaking as she opened the door of the breakfast-room. Avery was at the table, behind a newspaper. Gerda had not yet put in an appearance.

  Hearing footsteps, Avery lowered his paper. "Good morning!" he said.

  It might have been any other morning, except that he didn't smile in the old warm way, showing his neat, white teeth.

  "You've been out, haven't you?" he said, and his eyes were upon her wind-ruffled hair.

  "Yes." She took a slice of bread and the butter knife clattered nervously as she used it.

  "You've been with Bob, I suppose?"

  "Yes."

  "May I know what's going on?" he enquired, with a deceptive quietness. "While you remain under my roof you're my responsibility, you know."

  "There isn't anything going on, Avery. Ro
bert thinks I may get a part in his new play, that's why he came over to Chase this morning. He came to ask me if I'd like to go and see his producer, in London."

  "And you're going?"

  "Yes, I said I'd go."

  "I see." Avery had been tinkering with a spoon and now he tossed it to the tablecloth. "You've executed a real about-face where Bob's concerned, haven't you, Lygia? You used to say he frightened you. Doesn't he do that, any more?"

  "While I had my amnesia I would have been frightened of anyone connected with the theatre, you know that, Avery."

  "Do I?" He watched her with a rather grim face. "Bob, however, isn't only connected with the theatre. He's the son of a man who deliberately sought death by drowning, because he was too weak to face up to life; because he couldn't make his wife happy and she was talking of leaving him. He may not have meant her to die with him, but all the same she died, and the shadow of that has entered into Bob and made him a man of dark, unpredictable moods. A man not to be trusted because he cannot trust. A man who always strikes the first blow and then shrugs his shoulders when he has hurt a friend and not an enemy."

  "Lygia," Avery leant towards her and his eyes moved over her face, taking in each feature, each shadow, each flutter of the long eyelashes, "you always sensed all this in Bob and it was more disquieting to you, consciously, than his theatre connections ever were subconsciously. And now you're talking about going to London with him and acting in a play with him! I can't let you do it! I won't let you do it!"

  He got to his feet and came quickly round the table to her. He caught and held her hands, almost crushing the slight fingers. "I would have told you this last night, Lygia, only there was all that business about the cottage— anyway, let's forget that! While I was in Plymouth I had a long talk with Max Yentis. It was all very interesting. He has a clinic out in Toronto and the methods they're using out there are somewhat along the lines I'm using and Max has invited me to go over there for a while. Well, I thought a lot about it, driving back from Plymouth last night—listen, Lygia, I probably shall be going. What do you say to coming with me?"

  "Coming with you?" She repeated his words in a startled way. "To Canada? But, Avery—"

  "Yes, why not? We could turn the trip into a honey-moon." His hands were warmly cradling and quite gone was the cold stranger he had been last night. He was again the Avery she had always known, offering the comfort and protection she wanted so much… offering an end to loneliness…

  "No!" Fiercely she pulled free of his hands. "It isn't as easy as all that! It wouldn't be right! Don't you see—this morning—I didn't know what I was going to do. I was worried and Robert came and I promised to go to London with him."

  "Bob," he gestured with a large hand, "he's as unpredictable as the wind. How can I explain him—"

  "You've all attempted to explain him!" She felt her temple where it was bruised, for it had begun to ache a little. "You've all talked about him. Your grandmother's talked about him. But I only know that he was kind to me this morning. He—he made things seem less hopeless, asking me to go to London with him. Fenton Laye is a big man in the theatre, Avery. It isn't everybody who gets the chance to see him."

  "All right!" He turned from her, dragging his pipe from his pocket and thrusting it into a corner of his mouth. "All right, if that's what you want! It's your life, Lygia. I won't impose myself on you." He began to walk towards the door. When he reached the door he turned to look back at her. "What about Gerda, does she know Bob's intentions?"

  "Gerda?"

  "Yes. Has Bob told Gerda?"

  "He's going to."

  "She may not be too pleased."

  "No—I said that to Robert myself. I don't think she will be exactly pleased."

  "Then," the grey-blue eyes swept her face, "then what will you do if it all falls through?"

  "I—I haven't thought. Anyway, I don't think it will. I don't think people, whoever they are, stop Robert from doing what he wants to do." A smile settled briefly on her mouth and then sped away again. "They don't, do they?"

  But Avery was looking obstinate. "Gerda might. She's extremely beautiful and Bob's a man."

  "He's an actor first." Lygia tinkered restlessly with a little salt-pot. "It's a curious thing, Avery, but theatre people don't put their private life before their acting life. It's never regarded as quite so important."

  "Are you that keen a member of the acting profession?" A note of cynicism struck through the gravity of Avery's voice. "Somehow I can't help wondering. I've the strongest feeling that you would put private issues before theatrical ones. Through amnesia you attempted to run away from it all, so be very sure that you're not making a big mistake in running back."

  "A—big mistake?" She looked at him with frightened eyes. "What are you saying?"

  "Your amnesia could recur."

  "No!"

  "Oh, yes." He inclined his blond head gravely. "If you're subjected to the same mental stresses that caused it to happen before."

  "But I can't let Robert down—don't you see that? He'd be hurt."

  "Damn Bob!" An expression of acute anger and exasperation went across Avery's face. "When did he become capable of being hurt? He's encased in armour. The kind that grows harder with the years and less and less susceptible to attack. He didn't even cry as a child when Gran had to tell him his mother and father were dead. I know! I was with him! I was the one who cried for Carmelita! Funny, don't you think?"

  "No, Avery." She shook her head. "The people who can cry are the fortunate ones."

  "Very fortunate!" His mouth had a hard look. "Shall I cry because I'm not taking you to Canada with me? Will that make me feel better about it tomorrow?" Then, before she could answer him, he had swung to the door and a second later it had clashed shut behind him. Lygia sat very still for long moments, watching the door, perhaps with the hope in her heart that he would come back.

  But he didn't come back.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The Tanagra Hotel had something almost opulent about its terraced design, its white stucco walls and the way it perched on the red cliffs overlooking the Torquay harbour. In summer a cascade of flowers probably rained down its terraces. Its white walls would look dazzling with the sunshine splashing them, and there would be geraniums in green tubs on the covered verandah, glowing velvety and bright. But upon this Saturday morning in October, with a mist hanging above the sails of the boats along the harbour and a hint of rain in the air, it had something of the dejected look of a girl who has dressed for summer and finds herself confronted by winter.

  Large grey and white gulls flew inland, mewing above the tall chimneys of the hotel, and a fire had been lit in the lounge.

  Lygia sat in a bay window of the room, already dressed for the street and restlessly watching first the rather cold sea-view from the window, then a pendulum clock on the wall, and then the door. It was close on ten o'clock. Robert would arrive soon and she was feeling apprehensive and curious and a little headachy.

  The headache she put down to the rather sleepless night she had spent in this big hotel, following a lonely dinner. A sleepless night that had probably been inevitable, for she had been haunted by her goodbye to Avery.

  She could still see him, standing on the steps of Chase, his white laboratory coat blowing back in the wind as he watched David turn the car, and drive fast down the pine-walk, taking her to Brinsham to catch the Torquay bus.

  You just didn't know, she thought bleakly, how fond you could become of people until you said goodbye to them. You didn't know how the moment would linger and never seem to be over. Avery on the steps of Chase, grave and blond. Old Tanner, rugged as tree bark, leaning on his gardening fork and watching her with the disgruntled eyes of the very elderly, to whom sudden changes are not welcome. "You'm going away—who'll I get now to clear my paths?" he had demanded. "I thought maister would've married 'ee. 'Tis nigh time he took a lass, and you'm got pretty eyes."

  The bonfires of brushwood and dead leaves
had smoked above the yew hedges and there had been the sound of fieldfares grubbing in the banks of the goldfish stream for slugs and snails. The scent of the bonfires still seemed to linger in Lygia's nostrils and she smiled a little and bit her lip at Tanner's words— "you'm got pretty eyes." Avery himself had said that, she remembered…

  Oh, it did no good to keep thinking, yet she couldn't stop, somehow. The faces she had learned to know at Chase haunted her. The lines on Mrs. Chase's face had seemed deeper etched yesterday and she had looked suddenly very old and frail, there in an armchair in her own sitting-room, surrounded by massive Victorian furniture and the silver-framed photographs of her husband and her children.

  Gerda had not been at Chase when she had left—it had been the one relief of a harrowing morning—but it wasn't until she had boarded the Torquay bus and settled herself for the journey that she realized why Gerda hadn't been around all the morning. Robert had taken her back to the cottage, that was the explanation! There he had probably told her his intentions regarding Storm My Heritage, and Lygia had little trouble picturing Gerda's stormy reception of the news. She had doubtless put the worst possible construction upon it, as it followed Lygia's visit to the cottage the day before, a visit that was already highly suspect in Gerda's eyes, and Lygia could only hope that she had not relieved her temper by aiming some of Robert's lovely porcelain ornaments at his head.

  A little half-smile came into Lygia's eyes at the picture, and then the smile died away as she let herself remember other elements attaching to all this. Gerda, on the terrace at Chase, declaring that she had 'claims' on Robert, the insinuating note in her voice and the flaunting way she had held her body, telling without words what she meant by 'claims'. Lygia bit her lip. She hadn't wanted to know about that. She considered it cheap and rather sickening of Gerda, in fact, to reveal what took place between herself and Robert when they were alone at the cottage. It brought Congreve's famous reproof to mind. Oh, fie, Miss, you must not kiss and tell.

  It was then that the lounge door opened and Robert walked into the room—right on cue, Lygia thought, with a little flash of hysteria that almost made her burst out laughing.