"Was that the address, I asked."
"Yes."
He paused and regarded her sternly.
"Didn't it occur to you that you were being extremely foolish?"
"No. Why should it?" she looked at him frankly.
He looked frankly back and to her discomfort she found
herself blushing.
"We had that reason out last night," he reminded, and her eyes dropped from his.
"What was next?" he persisted.
"He took me to his room and let me see where Tom could expect to live. Then he asked me for money to improve the place."
"You refused it?"
"Yes. Then he offered to sell Tom—not to sell him actually, but to—"
"I understand," interruped Damien shortly. "He did the same to me."
"To you?"
Damien hunched his shoulders. "But by letter, not in person. Otherwise he would have been traced before this." "Why didn't you tell me?"
He looked directly at her. "Did you tell me?" he asked. There was a pause, then again he urged along her story. "What happened after that?"
"I opened my bag and took out a banknote. He laughed and said he'd have the lot. That would have been all right had he—had I—"
"Yes?" The tone was keen.
Ashamedly, she admitted, "He tried to kiss me. He said" —she reddened—"that that was all he wanted, but suddenly I knew I'd go mad if he did, he was so low and crude and unsavoury."
"So you started a row." Damien laughed shortly. "It was
a row, too, Geraldine. You made no bones about that." A silence fell between them. Pleadingly, Gerry broke it. "That's all I can tell you. There's nothing else. Can't I
have your side as well?"
Briefly and without adornment he informed her.
Betts had been wanted by the law for a long time, he said, hence his non-appearance on his wife's death.
By some means, however—Mrs. Betts's landlady still asserted no one could have broken in—he had come into possession of her personal things, including letters. Quite a few were from Galdang, some from a teacher called Miss Prosset, some from the H.M. From them Betts learned that Tom had good friends.
"By good," finished Damien laconically, "I mean worth trying. You understand?"
There was a pause as he lit up again.
"I've no doubt Betts confided in Stevens, who, when Betts was finished with, went on, though much more clumsily since he did not possess Betts's brains, with the original idea."
"What was the idea?"
"Stevens told you last night. To get money through Tom."
"How did Bert Betts die?"
"In an accident. Running away from somewhere, I expect." Damien's voice held contempt.
"Poor little Thomas."
"Why do you say that? He is better off without him " "What of Tom's chances, though, with a parent like that?"
Damien looked at her keenly. "You believe in the hereditary factor?"
"Do you?"
"No, I do not. Modern investigation has cast a great deal of doubt on the idea that defects of character are inherited. Traits are established in early life, and, apart from spasmodic visits, Tom has had only one influence from birth, from his mother, Mrs. Betts."
"What did you do when you received your letter, Mr. Manning?"
He looked at her loftily. "What do you think I did? I most certainly handed it to the law. Unfortunately it was not addressed as yours was. In my case Stevens, impersonating Betts, showed more cunning. He suggested a sum of money and a meeting place. I was there, and some police-officers with me. As you might guess, Stevens, spying the coast first, was not."
"But wouldn't Stevens anticipate that you already knew of Betts's death?" asked Gerry, puzzled.
Damien shrugged. "He acted instantly, remember. He wasted no time. When he failed with me, he tried you. It was a long shot, but it might come off. And it did."
Gerry gave a little shiver.
"There is another question—" she said.
"I know. It's how did I find his letter, isn't it? You're an astonishingly trusting person, Geraldine, I had no further to go than your desk. Oh, yes, I admit it was an unpardonable intrusion on my part, but fortunate, don't you think, for you?"
She did not answer, so he went on.
"In spite of that kiss and nothing else that Stevens promised, you're still not quite a fool, even though you are as yet a mere child in credulity and experience I think you can thank your stars—and me—for a lucky escape."
There was a little silence. If Damien really expected thanks he must be disappointed, Gerry thought.
Aloud she asked, "I shall have to see the police?"
"They have already given me the questions and I have supplied the answers. You have no more to worry about there."
"And what of Tom?" She almost whispered his name in her anxiety.
He turned to her squarely.
"Yes, Thomas," he said contemplatively, "the sole escape from your misery and-apathy, the only interest you found you had left."
She ignored his sarcasm. "Now Tom is an orphan, isn't he, a state ward?"
"Quite right."
"Then—then he is adoptable—"
"Quite right again, Geraldine."
She clasped and unclasped her fingers.
"Can we possibly take Tom?" she asked.
Damien stubbed out his cigarette. He did it thoroughly. "You will be pleased and relieved to hear that Thomas's future has been happily settled."
"You mean—he is to be adopted?"
"Yes."
Gerry looked pleased, if puzzled. To her, the only happy settlement for Thomas was back at the school by the sea. But how could he be adopted there when . . .
"I'm glad, of course," she told Manning, "but I thought —I mean you once told me—everyone said—"
"Yes, Miss Prosset?"
She flushed in her embarrassment but went on. "That the ones who adopted children," she stammered, "had to be married people."
There was a pause. To Gerry it seemed an eternity. Then: "They will be married," Damien said.
Her eyes were down. If she had been looking at him she would have seen his eagerness to explain further to her, to tell her everything, but all at once she found she could not look up.
. . . So they had come to an agreement at last, Cynthia and Damien. Cynthia did not object to a ready-made family when the father was—this man.
She felt a pain within her, and she knew it was not the loss of Thomas.
She knew she should have expected this. Cynthia had practically told her that morning in the village. She had carried the miserable knowledge with her ever since then. But for all that there is always a hope somewhere, a little light in the darkness. Her heart had refused to believe the words until he actually said them.
And now—just now he had.
"Do you want me to tell you about it?" He had been waiting for her to ask, but she sat tight-lipped, discouraging.
"No—no, thank you. I think I had anticipated as much."
"You would, I suppose." He was remembering her account of travelling from Mount Clifford into Sydney with Mrs. Bethel. He was disappointed, though. He had wanted to discuss the affair.
He rose. "Any shopping to do while you are in Sydney?" "No."
"Then you will be ready to come back with me?" "I don't think I want to come back."
He regarded her coldly. "Perhaps it cuts both ways. However, there is that little matter of a contract. I believe on my advice you did refer to that contract a few months ago."
She bit her lip, remembering how he had told her that time to check up on what was expected of her in the line of duty. She remembered that clause above it dealing with a notice duration of a full term.
She knew she could not afford to forfeit so much money. She knew there was nothing for it other than for her to return.
"Come," he said, reading her thoughts, "it can't be as bad as all that. At least, you will be near your
beloved Barbary, though, perhaps"—with a sneer—"that only makes it worse."
"What do you mean?"
"The knowledge that it has not surrendered, Geraldine; that it will never surrender; that you must surrender to it first."
She looked at him starkly, a little piteously had he only been able to see it. I did surrender, she thought, I surrendered in a room with firelit walls and a smell of apples. Only she—Cynthia—had surrendered before that.
"I shall be ready to leave when you are," she said stiffly.
"Good. That will be at once."
They drove up the coast, conversing in desultory fashion. At the farm with the rowan tree he stopped.
"Sorry to be monotonous, but it's the only place worth eating at."
He helped her out and they went to the table on the verandah.
As she ate, Gerry's eyes wandered past the grass to the garden thicket. Somewhere in there was the rowan, a weapon, he had laughed, against witchcraft. "Take a heavy heart to a garden," she remembered he had related his mother had always said.
But they did not go to the garden and the rowan tree, and her heart remained heavy.
It was heavy as they climbed up from Breffny, and heavier still as outside the master house she could see Cynthia's car and Cynthia waiting—and beyond it, set in the sea, Harvest Home Island, a faerie land, a lilac land, but for herself, thought Gerry, for ever withdrawn.
CHAPTER XXIV
PERHAPS the lesson Gerry had received from the Betts episode was a lesson to Damien as well.
Whether it was or not Gerry was never told, but she noticed—one could not help but notice—that after her return to Galdang there was no more kindly consideration, but in its place a lot more work.
Probably basing his new treatment of her on the old wise adage of mischief for idle hands to do, and believing that had she been fully occupied when Stevens's letter had come she never would have responded to it as she did, the headmaster arranged for task after task to fill in the weeks until her measles sufferers returned.
First, there came Matron, obviously prompted, guessed
Gerry, with an urgent request that she help her with her linen replenishing.
Prompt on her heels was Cook, anxious for assistance in marmalade preserving.
"But the citrus are finished," pointed out Gerry. "This is a foolish time for orange shred. The fruit is much too dear."
"Mr. Manning bought them reasonably," said Cook unconvincingly.
Gerry was more unconvinced when she saw the oranges. They were no windfalls, they were first-grade shop stock. So, she grimaced, I am not to be permitted to feel at the end of everything any more.
It takes more than tasks though, she thought drearily, as she helped out in the sewing room, assisted in the kitchen. Life would be simple if just being busy applied tourniquets about the heart.
Neville was back with his old requests concerning Elliott, though this request, admitted Gerry, if perhaps inspired by the H.M., would come from Neville as well.
Neville not only loved, he believed in physical culture. The building of a strong athletic body was next to godliness to him.
"Gerry, have you had a word with young Bethel yet? I want to include him in the lifesaving squad this season."
"I had a talk at the end of last term, Neville. He agreed to play tennis, but apart from that—"
"It's the lifesaving angle I'm working on now, the pet baby of the Head. Not"—hastily---"that that's why I'm pushing it, Gerry, it's just that—well, the whole thing, lifesaving, I mean, makes good sense."
"Not from Elliott's viewpoint; he merely dismisses it as a reason to clutter all the boys on the beach to one end."
"There's more to it than that, and you know it, Gerry." "Perhaps I do, but how can I convince him?"
"Work on the personal angle. Try to make him see his mother and father being carried out in an undertow and dependent for their lives on a trained squad like this."
Gerry thought dismally that Neville could have chosen a better illustration than either of Elliott's parents, both of
whom, the way things were going, were unlikely to be on any beach together enjoying themselves with their son. "Will you try again, Gerry?"
"Nev, I don't think I'd get anywhere. You see, Elliott's trouble is home trouble. That takes a lot of licking." Neville looked concerned, then sympathetic.
"Yes," he said, "it does."
After a while he commented, "Funny that the Head never mentioned that."
"Perhaps he doesn't know."
"He must, if you do." Neville looked at her quickly. "Why must he?" returned Gerry.
"Well, you've told me," asserted the sports master, "surely you would tell him."
His voice censured her quite severely. She deserved it, she told herself. For Elliott's sake she should have reported the boy's confidences to Manning long before this. Aware of her shortcomings in allowing her personal feelings to stand in Elliott's light and aware of the surprise and reproach—and curiosity—in Neville, she turned away with a murmured, "I'll speak to Elliott again, then, Nev."
She sought him out that afternoon in between sheet-patching for Matron and labelling some chutney for Cook.
He had taken some books with him down to one of the rocks and was making a desultory—very desultory—effort to study. Gerry remembered that the finals were in little over a month.
"Hullo, Elliott."
"Hullo, Miss Prosset."
"I've been trying to see you, Elliott. I wanted to tell you how I met your mother in Sydney."
"Did you?" The rejoinder was quite flat.
A little discouraged, Gerry persisted, "She sent you her love."
This time Elliott changed it to "Did she?" but it was just as expressionless and flat.
"Elliott, what is it?" Concern for the boy overcame Gerry's sensitive reluctance to probe.
Elliott turned a page of his history book, but Gerry knew he was not reading.
"It's the parents again," he blurted. "Apart from that
message you just gave me, I haven't heard from either of them."
"Then no news, surely, is good news."
"If they were together," said Elliott moodily, "it could be, but not apart like that."
He shut the book up and stared out to sea.
Gerry said determinedly, "Brooding won't get you anywhere, Elliott. Things may not be as bad as they seem. Meanwhile, you can only wait and hope—and while you do that, perhaps you could study a little harder and play with a little more verve."
She had meant to add something about the lifesaving squad activities, but one look at the set young face told her she had said enough.
"Think it over, Elliott," she urged. "Be a man in this." "What for?" he flung back. "What I see of adults only convinces me I never want to be one."
"You will though, you know," she reminded him. "Youth is the one complaint we all outgrow." As she stood up, Gerry suddenly felt much more than two years older than Elliott. She thought with sudden surprise, "At last I have outgrown that complaint. I am a child no longer." Unlike Elliott, she discovered she liked the idea.
In her new maturity she decided to seek out Damien and tell him everything that Elliott had told her.
She marched straight up to Galdang, and in a few minutes was sitting in the study confiding what she admitted now she should have confided right from the start.
He heard her out gravely and without interruption. When she finished he said drily, "So those little tête-à-têtes on the cliff track were merely home chats and not clumsy examples of calf love after all."
She jumped to her feet, angered beyond measure. She had told the story sympathetically, discreetly. It was infuriating to be rewarded with a reaction like this. The man was quite impossible, quite hateful, she thought.
"Sit down, Miss Prosset." He waved her back again.
"You're unpardonable." She kept retreating.
"For speaking the truth?" One eyebrow had risen. "A question, too�
�was it entirely the truth?"
She turned round. "What do you mean?"
"Was it always home chat? Didn't he ever meander from that?"
She felt the guilty red flying in her cheeks like flags. She wished she could stop it as she could stop speech.
"The signals are out," remarked Damien laconically. "I gather the answer to the last query is yes."
If she said anything in the mood she was in now, she thought, she might regret it. She had not stopped the flush, but she could at least hold her tongue.
She turned again and went to the door.
"Come back," he ordered, and, as she paused mutinously, "Come back and sit down, Geraldine."
She came back and sat on the edge of the chair. She sat too near the edge, however, and the chair tipped forward and she had to scramble in an undignified manner to keep her seat.
She heard Damien's low chuckle and her rage knew no bounds. Alas for her new maturity. She felt no older than a callow girl.
There was more yet to prick her balloon of adulthood. In a lazy detached voice Manning made anti-climax of her information concerning Elliott.
"I knew it all; I have known it for a long time."
"I'm sorry I've burdened you with my story, then," she said stiffly.
"The only sorrow you should know," he answered coldly, "is over your appalling omission to have reported all this before."
"Can anything be done to help Elliott?" she asked, ignoring his censure.
"It is being done, but at this juncture I don't propose to discuss it with you."
Gerry said futilely, "Do you propose ever to discuss anything with me?"
"Yes," said Damien, "I do." He paused, then asked quietly, "Shall it be now?"
She looked at him uncertainly, suddenly aware again of that feeling of having reached adulthood. It was a curious feeling—and yet—and yet it was good. There seemed a strange sweet fulfilment in her; it assailed her almost like a physical presence. She looked at the man, seeing the answering flicker of inquiry—and waiting in his eyes. She
began eagerly to answer him—then she heard a car pull up and light steps. She heard Cynthia's voice.
She did not know what she said to Damien; she did not know how she greeted Cynthia in the passage. She only knew she must have run down the hill, for the next minute she was in her own room in the Meadow House.
Will You Surrender? Page 19
