Octavia

by Beryl Kingston

  ‘Ah yes,’ J-J said. ‘But we loved them.’

  ‘Yes,’ Octavia said, remembering.

  ‘All marriages are different,’ J-J said, answering her thoughts. ‘We can’t judge from our own experience. We’ve always known that.’

  ‘I’m not sure she’ll even go into mourning,’ Octavia said. ‘It makes me wonder what we ought to wear at the funeral.’

  ‘Whatever we think proper,’ her father advised. ‘Don’t worry, my dear. She won’t let the side down in public no matter what her private feelings might be.’

  He was right. Emmeline had always been a stickler for correct public behaviour and she presided over her husband’s funeral in suitable and dignified black, looking stout and solemn and reminding Octavia of old Queen Victoria, accepting condolences, agreeing with her less knowledgeable guests that Ernest was a fine dependable man and a pillar of the establishment. But as soon as the contingent from the bank had finally left, and Ernest’s distant cousins and even more distant brother and sister-in-law had made their last commiserating noises and been driven away, she went upstairs and changed her clothes and returned as her old self.

  ‘Well that’s that,’ she said, fluffing up the ruffles on her pretty white blouse. ‘Now there’s only the solicitor to see and the will to sort out and then we can get on with our lives.’

  Six days later she was sitting in Octavia’s dining room, crying her heart out.

  Octavia had driven home from school that afternoon through a sudden shower of spring rain and had been concentrating so hard to avoid the half-hidden shapes of the traffic all around her that her neck was quite sore by the time she stopped in the drive. She was relieved to be home and couldn’t wait to make a nice pot of tea and drink it beside the fire. When she saw Emmeline’s hat and gloves on the hallstand she strode into the parlour to greet her, smiling happily. It was a shock to find her crouched by the fire, her plump face blotchy with weeping, talking to her uncle J-J in a low frightened voice. And another to see how old and anxious J-J looked. The new electric light was harsher than the gaslight had been and showed every line and crease in his face with revealing clarity. Octavia saw at once that this was a problem beyond his powers and that he knew it and felt worn and distressed in consequence. She walked briskly into the room, ready to take over.

  ‘Em, my dear,’ she said. ‘What is the matter?’

  ‘Oh, Tavy,’ Emmeline wept. ‘We’re ruined. He’s lost all our money. I’ve just come from the solicitor’s. I’ve been telling your father. There’s nothing left. We’re bankrupt.’

  Octavia was shocked but she wasn’t surprised. It was what she would have expected from a man like Ernest. She drew up another chair beside the fire. ‘Tell me all about it,’ she said.

  ‘He’s been buying shares in the American market,’ J-J explained, giving his beard a little tug. ‘For three years, according to the solicitor. When the crash came he lost the lot.’

  ‘And you didn’t know?’ Octavia said to Emmeline.

  ‘How would I?’ Emmeline said wildly. ‘He never told me anything. He spent every penny of his salary on the dreadful things, except for the money he gave me for housekeeping, and he cashed in the insurance and all the money from Pa’s will. I thought there’d be a nice steady income from that if anything happened to him. But there isn’t a farthing. Not one single brass farthing. How could he do this to me?’

  ‘But you’ve got the house,’ Octavia tried to comfort. ‘He’ll have left you that.’

  ‘Don’t talk to me about the house,’ Emmeline said. ‘It’s mortgaged to the hilt. You should see the repayments they want. They’re terrifying. I couldn’t begin to pay them and there are two of them overdue and they say they’ll repossess the house if I don’t pay up and I can’t possibly do it. The girls say I can have their wages – dear girls – but that wouldn’t even begin to touch it. Oh, Tavy, I’m at my wits’ end. What am I going to do?’ Fat tears rolled out of her eyes and her nose was running but she let it run as if she wasn’t noticing it.

  Octavia found a clean handkerchief in her handbag and put it in her cousin’s trembling hands. ‘Dry your eyes,’ she said, ‘and I will tell you.’ And she waited while Emmeline made herself more presentable. ‘Now,’ she said. ‘First things first. You must put the house on the market. Tomorrow morning if you can face it on your own, or Saturday if you’d like me to come with you. But as soon as you possibly can. You won’t get the full market price – there are too many houses up for sale these days – but you must aim to get enough to pay off the mortgage, and cover the solicitor’s bills. That will deal with the repayments.’ She picked up the poker and gave one of the larger coals a thwack, so that it split in two and red sparks flew up the chimney.

  ‘But if I sell the house,’ Emmeline protested, ‘where will we live?’

  The answer was obvious but it would have to be given tactfully and with Pa’s involvement. Octavia was aware that he was feeling crushed by the weight of the problem and needed gentling and reinstatement. Dear Pa. ‘Well now,’ she said, ‘that will depend on Pa. One possible solution would be for you to live here with us. What do you think about that, Pa?’

  His agreement was relieved and immediate. ‘Of course,’ he said and leant forward to pat Emmeline’s shoulder. ‘Of course. I should have thought of it myself. Didn’t I tell you Tavy would know what to do?’ He smiled at them both and the smile rounded his cheeks and restored his face to its more familiar contours.

  The split coal was hissing and emitting a stream of gas. Its neighbours shifted as if to accommodate its energy. ‘But there are so many of us,’ Emmeline said. ‘You couldn’t take us all in, surely.’

  ‘Why ever not?’ Octavia said. She was brisk with purpose, now that her father had agreed, solutions slotting into place in her mind, as neatly as the pieces of a jigsaw. ‘There’s plenty of room. We’ve got four bedrooms on the first floor, five if we use the dressing room, and then there are the two rooms on the second floor. You could have one of those. It’s not furnished, but furniture’s not going to be a problem is it? We shall all do very well here.’

  ‘But think of the cost,’ Emmeline said. ‘Even the housekeeping…’

  ‘I’m sure the girls will pay their own housekeeping,’ Octavia said. ‘That’s only right and fair and it will make them feel independent. Johnnie won’t be able to if he’s to take up an apprenticeship – and no, you mustn’t deny him that, Em, not when he wants it so much. Once he’s articled he’ll pay us back and I daresay we can feed and clothe him between us in the meantime. Your keep will come out of the usual housekeeping because I shall expect you to run the house. You’ll make a much better fist of it than I can or ever could. Now dry your eyes and let’s have tea. I wonder if there’s any cake?’

  ‘There is,’ her father said, ‘but before you tackle it there is something else I would like you to consider.’

  The two women waited.

  ‘It’s the matter of my study,’ he told them and there was a hint of the old impish quality about his expression. ‘I’ve been giving it consideration for some time now, Tavy, and I’ve come to the conclusion that a room at the top of the house is a little too much for my legs. Perhaps this would be a good time to move. I could have the dressing room. That would be quite big enough for me and my books, given how very little I do these days, and it would leave both the rooms on the second floor. That way we could have a bedroom for the girls to share and a bedroom each for the rest of us. What do you think?’

  You’re giving up your special room, Octavia thought, leaving your special wallpaper and you know I can’t replace it. What a love you are!

  Emmeline leapt from her chair, knelt at his feet and threw her arms round his neck. ‘You are the dearest uncle anyone could have,’ she cried. ‘The very, very dearest. There’s more good in your little finger than Ernest had in the whole of his body.’

  So the matter was settled and her house was put on the market on Saturday morning. It took five
extremely anxious months before a buyer could be found, but just after the start of the new autumn term a builder made an offer for it and the nightmare of the mortgage was finally dealt with. Then it was just a matter of moving J-J’s study, calling in the decorators and deciding which furniture Emmeline wanted to bring with her.

  ‘I thought I’d never get rid of this house, you know,’ she said to Octavia, one quiet Sunday afternoon when the two of them were sorting out the china. ‘It’s been weighing me down for such a long time I thought it would go on for ever, with that dreadful mortgage mounting up and up and nobody coming to see it. And the longer it went on the more I hated it, poor house.’

  ‘Well, it’s over now,’ Octavia said, speaking briskly because she didn’t want her cousin to get tearful, ‘and in a few weeks you can put all your worries behind you.’

  ‘Thank God,’ Emmeline said. ‘It’ll be such a relief.’

  ‘And once you’ve moved and settled in,’ Octavia went on, ‘we shall have to start thinking about Christmas. We must invite both the young men to tea, don’t you think?’

  But Emmeline was stuck in her anxiety about the house and didn’t hear what she’d said. ‘It’ll be such a relief,’ she repeated.

  ‘Exactly so,’ Octavia said firmly. ‘Christmas is going to be the start of better times. You’ll see, my darling.’

  It was certainly a very good time, even though the move had been rushed and difficult and reduced Emmeline to private tears. But by Christmas morning, her family was settled and she was quite herself again, down in the kitchen, slippered and aproned, preparing the meal and chattering with Tavy and her daughters. With four women to share the chores, dinner was a great success and high tea was going to be even better because as Octavia had suggested, they’d invited Dora and Edith’s young men to join them. The two girls were so tremulously happy about it, and so ridiculously nervous, with their cheeks perpetually flushed, their brown eyes shining and their thick hair bouncing with every turn of their heads, that it did them all good just to see them.

  Edith’s young man arrived as the hall clock was striking four, having waited at the end of the road until it was exactly the right time. He stood on the doorstep, wearing his brother’s best suit and beaming hopefully. He was short and slight – only a couple of inches taller than Edith – but there was a sharp-eyed, perky honesty about him which endeared him to Octavia in seconds. She and Emmeline greeted him together and Edith, who was lurking behind her mother’s wide skirts, introduced him breathlessly to her aunt as ‘Arthur-Ames-I-told-you-about’. Then they dragged him into the parlour to be introduced to J-J, after which there was another knock at the door and John Erskine arrived.

  It was the happiest meal, for Arthur-Ames-I-told-you-about settled in easily and was soon telling them about the work he was doing in the garage – ‘the internal combustion engine is a giddy marvel’ – about his father who was injured in the war – ‘and never complains’ – and his brothers and sisters – ‘all working I’m glad to say’ – and confessing that he thought Edith was the finest girl a man could hope to find. His open admiration for her was too touching to be missed or misinterpreted.

  ‘They will marry,’ Octavia said to Emmeline when the two of them were in the kitchen, washing the tea things. ‘And he will be very good to her.’

  ‘Oh, I do hope so,’ Emmeline said. ‘And my Dora too. John is so quiet I sometimes wonder.’

  ‘He may be quiet,’ Octavia said, ‘but he loves her. You’ve only got to see them together to know that. If I’m any judge, you’ve got two very happy marriages to look forward to.’

  The afternoon eased into a gossipy evening. The two girls played a selection of popular songs arranged as piano duets, and, after Edith had thrown out several very broad hints, Arthur offered to sing for them. To J-J’s amusement, the song he chose was an old one from the music halls, called ‘If it wasn’t fer the ’ouses in between’. He sang it well, suiting actions to the words, and the more they laughed at him, the better his performance became. Afterwards, they gathered around the fire to smoke cigarettes and cigars, drink port and eat nuts and marrons glacés, and were simply and effortlessly happy together. Dora and John sat comfortably side by side on the sofa, and Edith dared to sit on a cushion at Arthur’s feet and leant against his legs, which was a delight to them both. And warmed by port and good food and the blaze of the fire, Emmeline drifted into reminiscence.

  ‘Do you remember the day you moved to South Park Hill?’ she asked Octavia.

  ‘Never to be forgotten,’ Octavia said.

  ‘I can remember as if it were yesterday,’ Emmeline said. ‘How old would we have been? Nine? Ten? Algy was a baby, I do know that, sitting in his pram. We used to call him Podge. Do you remember? I wonder what he’s doing now. It’s such a long time since he went away and yes, I know he writes but it’s not the same as seeing him. He was such a pretty baby.’ The memory made her sigh and for a minute she was quiet, lost in her thoughts.

  ‘Maybe we could get him to come home again, Ma,’ Dora said and it seemed to Octavia that her tone was artful.

  Emmeline was still too stuck in nostalgia to notice. ‘He went for good,’ she said dolefully. ‘No, no, I shan’t see him again.’

  ‘What if we were to write and tell him there was going to be a wedding?’ Dora said, and now the expression on her face was too bright to be missed.

  ‘Or two?’ her sister put in, beaming beside her. ‘That would bring him back, Ma, surely to goodness. Two weddings.’

  Their mother’s gloom was lifted in an instant. ‘My darling girls!’ she said, rushing to gather them into her arms. ‘How perfectly wonderful! Oh, I’m so happy for you. I did so hope you would, now we’re settled, but I didn’t like to ask. When will it be? I mean, when will they be? Oh, you know what I mean.’

  The two young men were blushing but nobody noticed. They were too caught up in the joy of the moment. ‘I’d marry your Dora tomorrow if it was up to me,’ John offered. ‘Yes, I would, Dolly. I’d marry you like a shot. You know I would. I’ve been asking and asking. Ever since…’ Then he stopped, looked at Emmeline, blushed even more deeply and tried to put it more delicately. ‘Ever since we could, if you know what I mean. She’s only just made up her mind.’

  ‘She was waiting for Edith,’ Arthur explained. ‘They always have to do everything together. You know how they are. Well, I don’t have to tell you, Mrs Thompson, do I? They’ll probably get married together.’

  Emmeline was enraptured by such an idea. ‘A double wedding,’ she said. ‘But of course. What could be better?’

  ‘This,’ J-J said, ‘calls for champagne.’

  * * *

  That night, when John and Arthur had finally gone home, and her father had taken himself off to bed, when the table had been cleared and set ready for breakfast, and her new extended family were all upstairs, Octavia sat at her desk in her quiet bedroom and wrote up her journal. She ought to have been tired after such a long day but her mind was so full of old memories and new plans that when she finally got into bed she was too wakeful to sleep. She lay on her back under her familiar eiderdown, and gave herself up to reflection, and, as the hall clock marked off the quarters, past and present merged and blurred in her too-active brain.

  During the last few months she’d been so busy it had been enough of an effort simply to cope with all the things that needed her attention. But now, lying there in the darkness of that deep winter night, she realised that the pattern of her life had changed again, that she was the one who had been making all the decisions, telling Emmeline what to do, encouraging Johnnie – and paying all the bills. I suppose I am the head of the family now, she thought. The idea didn’t daunt her. It was something that had been bound to happen sooner or later, simply in the nature of things. Pa had been relinquishing responsibilities for quite a long time, stepping away from decisions that he found too difficult to make, just as he avoided activities that were beyond his strength, like the long walk d
own to the post office or a lengthy stroll across the common, but the process had been so gradual she’d barely been aware of it. Now the change was not only unmistakable but virtually complete. Head of the family, she thought, gazing at the impenetrable blackness of the winter sky. It’s not a position I ever thought I’d hold. But it’s a natural progression. I’ve been leading the school for so many years, I ought to be able to head a family, even when it’s a family of six adults as complicated as we are. I wonder when Dora and Edith will get married. It will be fun to organise the weddings. There hasn’t been a wedding in the family for such a long time. Not since Emmeline’s. I shall write to Algy tomorrow and tell him he simply must come home for it. It would be wonderful to see him again and Emmeline does miss him. I like young Arthur. He may not be much to look at but he’s very fond of Edith. He’ll make a good husband, if I’m any judge. A darn sight better than Ernest. And John is a darling, a nice quiet dependable man. I wonder where they’ll all live and how many children they’ll have?

  It was an unalloyed pleasure to look into their future and, gratifying it, she finally drifted to sleep.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  The bridal car smoothed to a halt before the church door, be-ribboned and important, the summer sun polishing its black roof until it gleamed as white as water. A pale hand appeared at the window, there was a strong scent of lilies and roses, and two faces peered out, one above the other, their auburn hair crowned with orange blossom, their veils put back.

  ‘Well?’ Edith asked her mother. ‘Is he here?’

  ‘Not yet,’ Emmeline said, stepping forward. She was looking very grand in a green silk dress with a long straight matching coat, which the shop girl had assured her was very slimming. But at that moment she really didn’t care about her outfit, for it wasn’t just her new corset that was pinching her. Even the huge brim of her fashionable straw hat couldn’t hide the fact that her face was creased with worry. ‘Could you bear to take another little turn around the block?’