‘Ah, we were forgetting that … He could have bettered himself, couldn’t he, by a more—advantageous match.’
‘Do you suggest,’ said Mrs Burkett after a pregnant pause, ‘that cynicism was even possible to Rickie?’ A violence in which some threat, some accusation of betrayal thrashed like a half-glimpsed subterranean monster began to swell in her. She kept her eyes fixed on her knitting needles, thinking: ‘For two pins I would get up and beat to a jelly my own flesh and blood.’ And as if the suppressed image had been formulated she heard Dinah murmur in a thin exhausted voice:
‘No. He was on the side of the betrayed more than the betrayers … It’s still in the Henry James genre though, if one could follow out the threads.’
Re-orientated by the further check of this apparently gratuitous irrelevance Mrs Burkett was able to continue:
‘Be that as it may, he came to your father for advice, on his engagement. How old would he have been? Twenty-three? Not more.’ She heaved a heavy sigh. ‘You would not remember that.’
‘Of course I remember their engagement. I wasn’t in the nursery, or mad.’
‘The practical aspect, I mean, you would not have realized. He wanted to fall in with Madeleine’s preference for London life … And then money, as I said … In fact he was looking for an opening in business. Through your uncles, your father was able to procure him the very thing. He had great faith in Rickie’s judgement and common sense. So had your uncles. In the end.’
Silence fell. Presently Dinah said in a drowsy voice:
‘I remember Rickie telling me once about his twenty-first birthday party. The celebrations.’
‘Ah, no doubt there would have been,’ agreed Mrs Burkett, with enthusiasm, taken off her guard. ‘Madeleine went down to Norfolk for that party, I think? I rather fancy it was then that they first got to know one another. Or would that have been some other house party?’
‘That I couldn’t say. He didn’t mention that aspect. But if so,’ said Dinah, yawning, ‘it was a closer shave for Madeleine than she realized. Touch and go, if he was to be credited. I know we’re not worldly, but he was a catch, wasn’t he? Not the catch of the season of course, but by no means to be sneezed at.’
‘What are you talking about?’ said Mrs Burkett sharply.
‘About that coming-of-age party. He told me such a curious thing, I’ve never forgotten it.’
‘And what may that have been?’
‘Well, only that in the middle of it he had a sudden—crisis, explosion, brainstorm. When all the speech-making and health-drinking and fireworks display was over and everyone had retired to sleep it off, he suddenly had an awful come-over. And he got up in the dead of night and crept downstairs and got his gun and loaded it …’
‘Hmm, yes, what nonsense. No doubt,’ cut in Mrs Burkett, knitting in rapid jerks, ‘he had taken a great deal too much to drink.’
‘That’s what he thought must have accounted for it—the sudden attack of depression. He was convinced he wanted to blow his brains out.’
‘Young people get these turns,’ said Mrs Burkett after a second’s silence. ‘Particularly young men. It is mostly moodiness and playacting.’
‘That’s what he finally concluded—at the time—it must be. Anyway, after sitting in the gun-room for about twenty minutes working out the most elaborate sort of cat’s cradle of string from his big toe to the trigger, he undid the whole thing and went back to bed.’
Brusquely Mrs Burkett glanced towards the window, then apparently detecting a chink between the curtains, got up and hurried towards it. Standing there twitching at the black-out material, she said with her back turned:
‘Perhaps you would prefer not to discuss Rickie any more. I think I would prefer it.’
Dinah stirred on the sofa: her look of amusement faded; her hands clenched, relaxed.
‘Just as you choose.’
‘How is it, I wonder, that you have never learnt humility.’
It was less a query than a statement, made in the resolutely uncomplaining tone of one taking up a cross, one more, unmerited.
‘If you don’t mind,’ said Dinah, ‘we won’t go into that.’ Pause. ‘If you think what you seem to think, you’re wrong—and stupid too. I haven’t forgotten Rickie. Or what we did to him.’
Returning at a brisk blind march, Mrs Burkett stooped to grasp the poker, pushed it between the logs, tossed them noisily, muttered: ‘Damp wood again,’ seized Dinah’s ash-tray, shook out its contents with evident disgust, then said:
‘Speak for yourself.’ Planted stiff upon the hearthrug, she fought audibly for control of breath. ‘I did what lay in my power to prevent a terrible tragedy.’
‘Oh, we all did that, you know. Having done what lay in our power to cause it. Still, let’s not bring it into court, now that Rickie’s dead … I haven’t forgotten him, or what I did to him. Is that better?’
‘Parvenus … We! Juggernauts …’ She struck her chest. ‘An old old elephant in a circus would be more apt. You may have noticed their gait and their expression.’ Her voice started to expand, daemonic, harsh. ‘Oh, right and wrong are old-fashioned terms no doubt you’ll tell me, but they come home to roost. We had our point of view, your father and I, though we were sneered at for old fogies …’
‘Oh Ma, we never!’ Fearing to see her mother’s face contorted, she closed her eyes.
‘Oh yes! You need not sigh at me so patiently. I was perfectly aware of it. Well do I remember, though his name has mercifully escaped me, some youth, I believe he styled himself a writer, one of you girls, I dare say it would be you, brought down one Sunday. “You see, Mrs Burkett,” he said to me—so gracious of him!—in the course of conversation, I was trying, I dare say, to discover his aims and interests—“You see, Mrs Burkett, the fact is Western civilization is in decline and those of us like myself who are aware of it must reflect it in our lives before crystallizing it in our work. We cannot be expected to behave.”’
A stifled laugh sounded from the sofa; the ensuing pause was ominous; Dinah said with more lightness than she felt:
‘What a ghastly ass—who can it have been? To think of you chalking that up against him all these years. I expect he only wanted to be mothered.’
The pause prolonged itself; then suddenly became the end of the expended storm. Presently Mrs Burkett said with an approach to mildness:
‘I always loathed a prig. So did your father. And what with the chatter-chatter and the effeteness and nothing but bottle parties bottle parties and those cynical sexy novels …’
‘Oh, you haven’t been reading them again, have you?’
‘I have not been reading them again. In war-time, no indeed! Though I am at a loss to know what authors you understand to be in question. No. I have been glued to the Great Victorians and shall continue so to be. Yes. But no wonder that we asked ourselves … However … that is in the past. You and I must never quarrel, Dinah, it would be unthinkable. What I should have said, and no more, is …’ She hesitated, fastening upon her daughter the remote yet piercing gaze of her long-sighted aquamarine eyes, ‘a terrible tragedy was prevented. Or at all events its bitterest fruits.’
But Dinah lay unresponsive, one arm flung over her eyes; and turning away, her mother addressed an invisible audience at the other end of the room.
‘I did not take it upon myself to judge. I never apportioned blame. Such matters are in God’s province, not mine. Naturally I—though I struggled not to … how a girl of your bringing-up and a man with his code—responsibilities—I shall never understand. But one must not measure the temptations of others by one’s own. And the greater the height the greater the fall. And Madeleine, poor child, with all her splendid qualities was not the right wife for him. The same applies on his side. It was not one of those partnerships one could call truly right. As for you …’
She turned agai
n, to see Dinah’s arm drop down and lie along her side with strange inertia; as if to imply an added weight to her passivity. Listening? Bored? Mocking? Sullen? Wounded? Or mere rejection? For the first time, and with a pang whose edge bewildered her, it struck her that she could trace a family likeness in Dinah after all: to her little sister Alice, fifth among the brood of nine—plain child (quaint was the word used then), the only sallow one; when she was six they cut her hair short because it grew in rats’ tails; once tamed a hedgehog for a pet; loved newts and toads; once dug a tunnel under asparagus bed hoping to reach Australia, got into trouble; always in trouble; once after disobedience punished by governess, ran away from home, was brought back mud-and-rain-drenched after dark by postman; died in her tenth year of meningitis … What trick of feature, facial angle or proportion, accidental pose, expression, could have summoned back that long-forgotten child?
‘As for you, dear …’ This time it was clearly an appeal.
‘Well?’ Dinah’s eyebrows went up. She appeared to smile.
‘I always had such faith in you—your moral stamina—even at the worst.’ She laughed briefly with a quaver. ‘You had to find your own way out, I wished not to interfere, though it was sad for us when you so completely cut adrift from us, we missed you … I have led a comparatively sheltered life, but I have always understood the need to choose the hardest way. Ah, more than understood!—felt the temptation of it. Yes. I remember saying to Aunt Lilian when you children were all babies—Oh, you were in your cradle: “if there is one blessing above all others I would wish for them,” I said, “it is that they should grow up to discover a vocation. Because that means happiness,” I said. Oh, not to have you all in nunneries and monasteries—vocation in the broad sense, whatever form it took—medicine, nursing, the arts—I have often thought now botany, what could be more delightful?—or possibly marine biology … However it was not to be. Charles’s bent for farming, Henry’s for engineering, much to be thankful for, but not what I … You were the only one, in fact, who ever showed a sign of it, though I must say at one time I was hard put to it to … Well, never mind. I detest what I know of the political views you have come to hold, but I admire you greatly, Dinah. Rickie fought his fight too in another way—none knew it better than I, though it was never spoken of—he has left a fair name and a good report behind him. And when your time comes so will you. Though, dear me, that won’t be, I trust, for many and many a year.’
‘The same to you,’ said Dinah in a strangled voice. ‘Ditto ditto in fact. Because if there’s one thing certain, so will you.’
At this moment an eldritch and imperious clamour arose outside the door.
‘Oh, now hush! Wait! I am coming,’ called Mrs Burkett, and adding joyfully: ‘He will not be kept waiting,’ thrust away her handkerchief and sped with the lightness of a girl to admit an exceptionally large masterful-looking neuter cat, smooth-coated, black with a white dickie, white paws and whiskers, and a white imperial.
‘Oh, Griswold, noisy fellow,’ she exclaimed with pride, crouching to stroke him in strong sweeps from nape to stern; while behind her on the sofa Dinah stealthily wiped her eyes. ‘Bad boy. What have you been getting up to? That particular pealing or tolling note—did you notice it?—is apt to mean he has brought in his kill. Let us hope not. Should it have been a young rabbit he will have left it on the kitchen table for Mrs Hobbs to cook for him. He will not eat them raw, as for mice and rats he merely casts them at my feet—a tribute one might think, if tributes seemed more in keeping with his character. Now Griswold, you know quite well who is here. Call him, Dinah.’
Dinah emitted a high muted call from the back of her throat and immediately he underwent a functional adjustment, pared out a stream-lined track towards her and, expressing nothing but studied rejection of the goal in view, leaped upon her stomach.
‘There!’ cried Mrs Burkett, elated. ‘I thought so! The whole thing was planned. I have never known him to fail to appear from nowhere for a member of the family. This time I was dubious, I must confess; I regret to state that his hunting season is at the peak. Besides he has not seen you for a year.’ She watched him wreathe and pour himself, his eyes lambent, abstracted, yet lunatically intent, around Dinah’s enfolding arms. ‘Don’t let him start that dreadful kneading. On the other hand, if you correct him he will only take offence. Better nerve yourself. He will soon stop and settle down and we can all be cosy.’
‘I’m afraid you’re putty in his paws,’ said Dinah, nerving herself without flinching to endure the ritual trampling.
‘Oh, but his cleverness! The cleverest cat I have ever had.’ Mrs Burkett resumed her chair with a look of contemplative happiness.
‘He looks prosperous.’
‘Oh yes, he is in tiptop form. I can get all the milk he can swallow. So lucky.’
Gradually, softly he collapsed and lay along Dinah’s thighs, voluptuously at ease. He bowed his head and slipped his lower lids up. One ear gave a rapid shiver; then another. His purr expanded, reverberating like the rhythmic snore of a flight of bombers passing high, in the distance.
Having missed the nine o’clock news, Mrs Burkett switched on punctually for the ten o’clock, listened to the headlines, switched off again, made her comments upon the military situation, reported those of a retired naval captain and a retired Indian Army colonel, both her neighbours. She glanced frequently at the clock, according to her habit. Life had taught her much, but not to tolerate the repose of others; and the spectacle of Dinah’s supine body, although the upper layer of her consciousness approved it, caused in her depths a disturbance, an increase of restlessness. So much to do, so little done. So much to say, to leave unsaid …
Presently she left the room and was absent for about fifteen minutes.
‘I was just heating up some milk,’ she announced on her return. ‘I know you will refuse it, but I find it such a comfort in the night. Two o’clock onwards is my wakeful time—so tiresome. I have a thermos by my bed and it soothes me off again. I have put one in your room. Do drink it. You and Griswold look quite settled for the night, but I think bed is the best place for you, so come dear.’ She lifted Griswold, limp as a hank of knitting wool, from Dinah’s lap and held him to her check. ‘I have just been telephoning to Madeleine,’ she remarked. ‘Colin has had week-end leave from Sandhurst, so that was nice. She sounded fairly cheerful. Clarissa has gone back to school, of course. Somerset. There is an excellent air-raid shelter but so far, touch wood, they have not so much as heard those abominable sirens. The Vicar here is very kind with lifts. He passes near Madeleine’s on his way to his county council meetings—of course he gets extra petrol. So I am hoping to pop over and spend the afternoon with her on Wednesday.’
‘Perhaps you could give her my love,’ said Dinah, slowly swinging her legs down and sitting up.
‘Now Griswold, which is it to be? The open spaces or your basket?’ She let him jump from her arms and watched him stand somnolent, collecting himself for action, on the hearthrug. ‘Sometimes the one, sometimes the other,’ she vaguely remarked. ‘He cannot be coerced … Yes, dearest, if I get the opportunity I will gladly give your message to Madeleine.’
‘I haven’t written to her.’
‘No?’
‘I wasn’t sure—what sort of gesture that would seem to her. After all, I’ve quite dropped out. To offer myself back—at his death …’
‘She might perhaps feel like taking the first step,’ said Mrs Burkett cautiously.
‘I suppose she hasn’t mentioned me.’
‘Not so far. There is still a state of considerable shock, you know, and a great many problems to be settled.’ Folding away her knitting, hunting for her spectacle case, she added: ‘But when the impulse comes, and I think it will, she will act upon it, you know. She would be unlikely to mention it to me beforehand.’
‘Curious, but true,’ said Dinah, still sitting on the sofa�
��s edge. ‘I did write to her, ten days ago. The morning after the night that Rickie died.’
‘Ah, you did. No, she has not mentioned it—so far. I thought you said … However, it seems to me most natural on your part. You felt you must send her a word. I am glad.’
‘Oh, I didn’t send it. It was curious because I didn’t know he was dead. I wrote before I got your wire. I wrote because I’d had a dream about him.’
Wheeling sharply, Mrs Burkett exposed to her an acute dismay. ‘Now what?’ said her fatigued face, braced for the supernatural.
‘Oh, nothing prophetic’ Dinah looked amused. ‘Not a relevant dream. Rather the kind I sometimes have about Papa. More an atmosphere … An atmosphere of being young; and him appearing, generally in the garden, and everything ordinary, so that though part of me knows in the dream that he’s dead I don’t feel a pang or a tremor. He says the 4.45 got in three and a half minutes late, or some remark of that sort … generally about time. This was the same kind of dream. He—Rickie—appeared, looking like himself, with no—emotion attached to him; and said—I forget what really—something perfectly trivial and polite, like: “Not just now, another time, I’m in a hurry.” But I had the dream about the time he actually did die. I was on duty at the Centre; I’d dropped off to sleep in my chair, in the early hours. I woke up feeling surprised to have dreamed about him, because I hadn’t—consciously—thought about him for years, I began to think about Madeleine. I wondered what kind of way she thought about me now—if she ever did—whether she found, like me, that the war and the bombing and all had ploughed up the past so thoroughly that nothing came back from it now but these—sort of stingless ghosts: as if things in the past were themselves now, with no trailing fringes left, and only a kind of mathematical pure density. I wanted to write and ask her—it seemed the obvious moment. So I did write. Then later that morning I got your wire. It was a shock, you can imagine. So the letter didn’t go.’
The Echoing Grove Page 19
