The Last Dance

by Carolyn McCrae

  Moving into the big house permanently gave Carl access to Arnold’s library and he loved books. From a very early age he had enjoyed history and reading about the people who lived, ruled and battled years ago. He had spent most of the Easter holiday curled up in one of the brown leather chairs by the fire in the library reading about Napoleon and Wellington, although only 12 years old he didn’t tackle the usual fiction of the day, Enid Blyton didn’t interest him, the Secret Seven, even Swallows & Amazons wouldn’t hold his interest for long, but he ate up books about the Napoleonic Wars.

  Charles thought the summons must have something to do with his mother, it wouldn’t be to do with it being his birthday. For as long as he could remember birthdays had been ignored in the household. No cards were given, there were never presents to unwrap, except, of course, the small gifts from Monika and Cook. Arnold had always simply told him a sum of money had been deposited in his trust fund. He could not look back to his time at boarding school with anything other than horror, but at least they had made something of birthdays.

  He thought that perhaps his father and Kathleen were going to get married. Perhaps they wanted to explain something of the events of yesterday – though what it had to do with everyone else he couldn’t guess.

  He stood, slightly apart from the others, looking as unconcerned as they appeared worried. He did keep glancing at Susannah though, who stood, as always, close to Carl. He couldn’t bear it if anything awful was to happen to her.

  Arnold felt awkward. He had to explain to these people, who, to a greater or lesser extent, he cared about, that their lives were to be completely disrupted. He had decided to tell them all at once so he wouldn’t have to face their individual problems. This way Kathleen would be too inhibited to voice her anger and disappointment in front of the others, Charles would keep his upper lip very stiff, Carl would accept it with calm acquiescence, as he had accepted everything else that had happened in his life and Susannah, would do what they told her as she always did.

  They would have to get rid of Cook as well as Nanny. He was aware that they were, to the children, more important members of the household than he was. Still they had had an easy few years, losing their friends was an unavoidable burden for them to bear.

  They would get over it.

  When Arnold was not in total control of things he resorted to the language and manner of the pulpit. He had had a grand-father who was a minister and something of that pomposity and grandiloquence had filtered through the generations. He stood with his back to the fire, facing his extended family, with his thumbs under the lapels of his tweed jacket, just as the masters at school put their thumbs under the edges of their gowns, thought Charles.

  Arnold fell back on a lifetime of making speeches; speeches in court, on the hustings, in council chambers, to his employees. He had always been a good maker of speeches. He preferred them to conversation. In speeches you just had to communicate facts and your own opinions. You told people what you wanted them to hear, you used language and voice in such a way that they did not interrupt, you did not have to hear anything they had to say.

  So he began by making a speech and when Arnold had the floor no one interrupted.

  “I have brought you all together this morning to tell you that Millcourt is up for sale and, since there are already people interested in buying it, we will be moving out shortly.”

  He ignored the gasps and the look on Kathleen’s face.

  “Shielding you all from the problems that have arisen is a burden I can keep to myself no longer. The business has not been going well, indeed it is folding, all the workers have been laid off with immediate effect.”

  As he continued he talked less formally; he was not going to break down, but he softened his voice.

  “Unlike many in the circumstances in which we find ourselves, we have somewhere to go. A lovely home is ready for us all. We shall be moving into Kathleen’s home. We will stay together as a family. This is all for the best.”

  One voice broke the silence.

  “Why?”

  “Why Charles? Because there is no money left.”

  Arnold left the room. He did not want to answer questions, and as he left the doorbell rang.

  Those in the study couldn’t hear what the voices in the hall were saying. The children and Kathleen stood where they had been standing as Arnold had dropped his bombshell. They all looked through the door to the hall where three men stood apparently arguing with their father.

  “We have our orders.......”

  “No, not today.......”

  “We must ......”

  “No, not today.... it’s my son’s birthday.....”

  “I’m sorry for that but .......”

  Kathleen walked towards the group.

  “What is going on here?”

  “We have orders to take away....”

  “You have orders? From whom?”

  “We have orders to take away goods to the value of three thousand pounds’ he hesitated evidently deciding where she stood in the hierarchy of the household. “Madam.” He finally concluded.

  “I repeat “From whom?””

  “From the court.”

  “They’re bailiffs my dear. I have failed....” he hesitated as the word hurt and corrected himself “I have not paid a bill that they now require goods to cover.”

  “I don’t believe this is happening. You must go away. Come another day. Let us get used to this idea before tearing our home from underneath our feet.”

  “My dear...” Arnold tried to get Kathleen away from the door and back into the library, he wanted the door shut so that she and the children wouldn’t witness his humiliation. They had no idea what was happening but they knew it was not good.

  “Go away.” Kathleen had turned to the spokesman and repeated slowly and clearly “Go away. Say we’re not in. Come back tomorrow.” She half turned pointing him to the open study door and the three children watching the proceedings with their eyes wide open.

  He retreated. “Alright missus, I’ll say you weren’t in. We’ll be back at 10 o’clock tomorrow, mind, you won’t get away with this two days running.”

  The men left, leaving the door open behind them.

  “Oh Arnold. What is all this about?” Kathleen walked to the door to shut it. She needed to have her back to Arnold as she fought to hold back the tears of frustration. Just as she had been able to leave that dreadful house she was going to have to return. It was so humiliating.

  “I will tell you everything later. Take Carl outside and reassure him while I go and talk to the kitchen.” Everything was happening far too quickly.

  When Kathleen got back to the study only her son was there.

  “Where’s Charles? The least he can do is offer support to his father.”

  When Arnold reached the kitchen Susannah was sitting at the table and Cook was pouring some of her homemade lemonade into a glass.

  “Where’s Nanny?”

  “She just left Sir, Charles had come running down the stairs and just grabbed her hand and they left, both went out the back door. Is there anything wrong Sir?

  Kathleen had reached the kitchen. “Charles has gone.”

  “I know.”

  Arnold went up stairs to the telephone in his, now empty, study. Kathleen following. He asked the operator for the Derby Hotel and after a delay asked to speak to Mrs Donaldson. Obviously it was not a name they knew so he repeated the request for Mrs Tyler. After another delay he was asking what she had said to Charles. Alicia obviously had no idea what he was talking about because he kept repeating the same questions.

  The last word Kathleen heard him say as she left the room was ‘Police’.

  Chapter Seventeen

  I got a call from Alicia asking me to help so I set off immediately for the Derby where I was ushered into the Manager’s office. There were two policemen, Kathleen standing, holding onto Arnold’s arm and Alicia, sitting very upright in the manager’s chair. I went t
o stand next to Alicia, she looked as though she needed some support.

  “I know I am his mother and possibly a proper mother would be concerned, but I will not be. He is old enough to know his own mind and to look after himself. For Pete’s sake! Fifteen years ago he would be about to fight for his country.”

  “He has run off with the Nanny!”

  “Of course he hasn’t. Don’t ascribe your own motives to your son. He is protecting her. He knew you’d sacked her. He knew you were going to split everything up and they would be separated. He is protecting her. Don’t you see? He is looking after her. He has taken charge for himself.”

  It was the first time I had spoken with Arnold Donaldson for some years. I had little respect left for the man. He had had an easy life and expected an even easier one. He had failed in every way to support the women and children for whom he had had a responsibility. I did not address him directly, but I sincerely trusted he took in what I said. “Charles is no longer a boy. He is a young man. He is a quiet, intelligent young man who has suffered much from the selfishness of his parents. I agree with Alicia, he has taken his life into his own hands. He has made a decision which I do believe should be honoured.”

  I had long found that people listened more closely to the words I spoke if I spoke quietly, calmly and slowly. It seemed to work even under these circumstances so I continued.

  “He called me at the office this morning. He knew that I would help him, just as I hope I always have. He knows that I have the trust of his mother, and, I hope, at least the ear of his father.

  “He asked me to tell you that he has gone to Sandhey. I have spoken with both Max and his housekeeper. Max has given his permission for Charles and Monika to stay at his house until he returns. When he does everything will be reviewed. But in the meantime they have a comfortable roof over their heads, they have a ‘chaperone’ in Mrs Tennyson and they are safe. I told him that none of you would try to change his mind or visit him or in any way get in touch with him until he returns.”

  “What’s Max got to do with it?” Kathleen asked

  “Max brought Monika to this country. Don’t you remember? He brought her, God knows how, to this country and found her a place in the Donaldson household. He must feel responsible for her and, also, he has a great fondness for Charles.”

  “Charles is just an impressionable boy who is being manipulated by that woman.” Arnold was having none of this idea that his son had acted in any way as an adult. “He is obsessed with her, he sees injustice everywhere.”

  “I wonder why?”

  “That’s not helpful Alicia.”

  “Charles is still a boy,” Arnold repeated “he must be brought home, he makes a habit of running away when things get too much for him.”

  “What do you mean?” Alicia asked, aware that Arnold was making sure she realised that, even though she was Charles’ mother, she knew little about his life.

  “He ran away from school. He spent a week on the run.”

  “When? You never told me. What happened?”

  “He ran away from school. We didn’t tell you because you were not here. He turned up after a week or so. He was fine.”

  “Is that why he left boarding school and went to live with you? You never did really explain why.”

  “He ran away. He came back. What was there to tell?”

  “He was my son.”

  “Yes, Alicia, he was. He is no longer. You have no claim on him and his actions.”

  “Neither it seems, do you.”

  The policemen and the hotel manager were bemused. This family bickering was not what they had expected when called to assist with a missing boy, the son of a respected member of the local community.

  I did my best.

  “I think we’re here to find out what is in Charles’ best interests. Surely we aren’t here to bicker and score points against each other. When he ran away from school he showed that he’d thought it all out, he knew what he was going to do and he did it. We must trust him. I’m sure that now, when he feels he has another person to care for, he has made arrangements, he’s done what he thinks he has to do.”

  I was going to do my best to support Charles. He had been right those years earlier, I believed he was right now.

  “You always poke your nose into my family’s affairs don’t you?” They were the first words Arnold addressed to me directly.

  “I’ve always tried to be here to help.”

  The police left when they realised that this was not a case of a missing or kidnapped child leaving me with Arnold, Kathleen and Alicia. Alicia and I eventually won the argument. It was agreed that Arnold and Kathleen would not try to take Charles back, they would allow him and Monika to find sanctuary at Sandhey for the indefinite future.

  It was a very long time before they left.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Max was behind many of the changes that now occurred in the lives of the Donaldson’s extended family.

  He welcomed Charles and Monika into his home and they thrived. He treated Charles as the son he had always wanted, encouraging him in his love of bird-watching by providing him with books and most spectacularly, for his 17th birthday, a pair of German military night binoculars. At the small gathering to celebrate that day no one dared to ask where they came from. Max and Charles would spend hours in each other’s company talking or reading quietly together. Max grew to understand and care for the quiet, determined, introspective young man.

  After some discussion Charles had agreed to stay on at school for his A levels, but since there was no money for fees from Arnold they were paid by Max. He did well enough in those exams but left school immediately afterwards to begin work in the office at Roberts and Jones. He had a good mind, a clear way of thinking and a clear way of seeing things that would make him very useful in the office, but his heart wasn’t in it. He spent most of his leisure time writing pamphlets and magazine articles about the birds of the area.

  The secretaries and typists at the office, girls on the train he travelled in on every morning all tried to catch his attention, he was a very good looking and pleasant mannered young man. But he was not interested in them.

  He found most enjoyment at the weekends sitting in the garden with Monika, who would be darning or knitting, sitting companionably next to him. Binoculars in hand he would point out birds as they flew passed and write their names along with dates and other details in his notebook. Monika was a willing guinea pig for the talks and guided walks he began to give.

  Monika got on well with Max’s housekeeper, and they began to share responsibilities. At Millcourt she had always looked after the nursery but she had never known anything of how the household was run, how menus were planned, where and how the food was ordered, which tradesmen had accounts and which required cash. Her job had been to ensure the children ate, slept, did their homework, read widely, didn’t spend too much time in front of the television and didn’t disturb their father. Now she began to learn how to run a house.

  Monika was taught how to keep the house clean, when to clean which rooms, how to clean them without disturbing The Major’s bits and pieces. Monika learned to change the curtains in the spring – the week the clocks went forward – and again in the autumn – when they went back. They breathed life into the house, keeping it clean and airy, making it into the home it had rarely been since Elizabeth Fischer had had her breakdown, even redecorating some of the rooms themselves. Monika would take over the role of housekeeper when Mrs Tennyson retired.

  Monika had rarely left Millcourt except when she took the children for a walk down to the sands and then she avoided talking to anybody, even if they pleasantly wished her a ‘good afternoon’. She had lived in the area for the best part of ten years and had not had any life of her own other than looking after the children. She had never thought about it and certainly never resented it. But now, with Mrs Tennyson as a mother figure and friend, Monika began to meet people, becoming quite well known and liked by
shopkeepers and the respectable ladies of the town.

  ‘Mrs Heller’ became a regular at the frequent coffee mornings and jumble sales in the town and she blossomed into a relaxed and confident young woman – for she still was a young woman – despite everything that had happened in her life she was not yet 30.

  In the New Year 1961, Mrs Tennyson decided Monika was ready to take over the reins and she announced she would retire to join her widowed sister in her cottage in the Cotswolds in the Spring.

  Max had a hand in developments between Arnold and Kathleen. Arnold didn’t want me to have anything to do with his affairs but, behind the scenes, I was Max’s right hand as he helped Arnold through the sale of Millcourt and his formal descent into bankruptcy.

  And it was Max who persuaded Arnold that he had to marry Kathleen.

  Arnold didn’t want to. He hadn’t found it necessary in all the years since his divorce and when Kathleen and Carl had moved into Millcourt, he was simply being practical in giving his cousin’s widow and son a home. He hadn’t cared about the gossip, but he wanted to clear up his vaguely held concerns about the exact nature of their relationship. He had Max check through all his father’s papers to see if there were any links between the families that had previously not come to light. Nothing was found, though he had had to confide in Max why he was concerned.

  Kathleen enlisted Max’s help to ensure that, before they left Millcourt, she would be Mrs Donaldson. She could not bear the humiliation of moving back to her house in Dunedin Avenue otherwise.

  Although they had been through so much together, over the years neither Arnold nor Kathleen fooled the other that there was any real love between them any more. They felt loyalty, affection and familiarity but not love, so again it was a marriage of convenience for Kathleen.

  After so short a time in the luxury of living in Millcourt she found herself back in her old house, now the mother to two children. She also had to be mother to Arnold as she nursed him through his depressions. She looked back with some longing to the days when she had only seen Arnold twice a week.