The Unknown Mr. Brown

by Sara Seale

  “Yes, it would, wouldn’t it?” she said. “And I could come clean with impunity as Mr. Brown is a stranger and doesn’t know any of us. I could confess without naming any names that I’d had the misfortune to fall for a man whose intentions were none too clear and would he please see fit to remove me from temptation.”

  “Very masterly! I can see your imagination will never let you down in a crisis,” he said with some dryness, and her eyes immediately became grave.

  “It isn’t all imagination,” she told him frankly. “I have a horrid feeling that if the week-end hadn’t ended as it did, I might have been persuaded to whatever course Robert had in mind for the future. Now you know what I wouldn’t confess to another living soul, John, but doctors are safe, like priests and lawyers, aren’t they?”

  “Yes, my dear, and I’m honoured by your confidence,” he said a shade formally, and wondered for the first time if he had misjudged Robert Farmer. For all his dislike, he did not think he was the type of man who would seduce a young girl in his cousin’s employ. It was more likely that he realised the child was becoming fonder of him than he wished and for that very reason was keeping away.

  “Thank you,” she said, and reached up a hand to him. “Dear John ... I do hope things turn out well for you. Even if Kate is still fond of Robert in that way, she’s very practical when it comes to deciding what’s best for Timmy, and a doctor would be far more satisfactory as a father than an up-and-coming barrister with his nose forever stuck in his briefs from morning to night.”

  At this he burst out laughing and got into his car.

  “Well, I don’t know that that’s a very encouraging comparison, but I’ll take it in the spirit in which it was meant. Look after yourself, Victoria, and remember the world is seldom well lost for love,” he said, turning on the ignition.

  “Kate said the same thing to me once, so you must think alike on certain matters, mustn’t you?” she replied, sounding suddenly quite gay, and he made a wry face out of the window and drove away without comment.

  July brought a return of more settled weather and Victoria, when Timmy did not need her, found compensation for the rejection of her plans by working in the garden, weeding and trying to catch up on the vigorous signs of Sam’s neglect. But if the warm summer days restored her to an acceptance of her situation, they did little to soothe Elspeth’s temper and she remarked rather acidly after some trivial domestic argument one morning that it was high time Mr. Rab paid them a visit and put an end to moods and contrariness, for, said she, it was plain as the nose on your face that the house hadn’t been the same since he was last down and if Mrs. Allen was too stiff-necked to invite him then Victoria should do it instead.

  “Oh, no, it’s not my place,” Victoria answered primly, but received a withering look in exchange.

  “Hoots! Do you think I don’t ken what goes on in this house, under my verra nose?” she retorted, her native burr becoming very apparent. “Since you saw fit to quarrel with the gentleman and send him from the house without his supper it’s for you to swallow your pride and call him back. You can tell Mr. Rab that Mrs. Allen is missing him and it’s time Timmy had that present he was promised a long time since.”

  Victoria obediently wrote to Robert, adopting Elspeth’s suggestions and rather overdoing Kate’s need of his company. She also wrote to Mr. Brown reiterating her desire to leave Farthings and remembering the doctor’s advice, set down a candid analysis of the regrettable state of her heart. It was not, she thought upon re-reading this effusion, a very lucid explanation of the situation, since Robert must necessarily remain anonymous and it was difficult to bare one’s soul to a perfect stranger who, for all she knew, might not even trouble to read the letter.

  It was Kate who heard first, and as she passed the letter to Victoria across the breakfast table it seemed plain from her expression that she was both hurt and displeased.

  “I thought we had agreed to forget this business and carry on as before,” she said. “Why have you stirred up fresh trouble?”

  Victoria made no reply until she had digested the ambiguous contents of Mr. Chappie’s careful communication, then she skid quietly:

  “I suppose they wanted to be sure I wasn’t just romancing. There’s no suggestion of blame where you’re concerned, Kate. They only want assuring that you consider the situation warrants the inconvenience of making other arrangements.”

  “And were you romancing? Since, with typical legal caution, they are careful to avoid direct accusations, it’s not very clear what the situation amounts to. Had you implied that you were being subjected to unwelcome attentions?”

  “No—no, of course not! I—I simply tried to explain my real reasons for wanting to leave without involving anyone.”

  “Which are?”

  “But you know, Kate. It clearly cut no ice to say the place didn’t suit me, so I thought I’d better come clean.”

  “And lay the blame at Robert’s door, I suppose, by way of clinching the matter. Why in that case, have you written asking him to come down?”

  “Have you heard from Robert, then?” Victoria asked.

  “He rang up last night about another matter and mentioned it in passing.”

  “Oh!”

  “Your invitation hardly accords very well with the tale you seem to have spun for Mr. Brown’s benefit, does it?”

  “Oh, Kate, can’t you see?” Victoria exclaimed, wishing she had never paid attention to either John Squires’ or Elspeth’s counsel. “I only tried to convince him that I’d got myself into an emotional tangle, and I wrote to Robert because I thought he might be stopping away on account of that and it wasn’t fair to you.”

  “Somewhat muddled reasoning, but I suppose I must accept it. Are you sure you’re not trying to deceive yourself because you’re still smarting from that unfortunate affair of the roses?”

  “Perhaps it wasn’t so unfortunate as it appeared at the time. Unkind practical jokes have a very salutary effect on emotional misconceptions,” Victoria replied with gentle evasion, and Kate sighed.

  “Yes,” she said, “I can understand that. Still, you’ve had time to reconsider, and though I hold no brief for silly pranks there must have been some good reason to trigger off that one.”

  “Such as?”

  Kate hesitated.

  “Well,” she replied a little lamely, “he probably thought roses from Mr. Brown would crown the birthday for you, as indeed it did, and if I hadn’t unwittingly caught him out and you hadn’t eavesdropped, you would have gone on living quite happily in your fool’s paradise, wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes, and that should answer you, Kate. No one but a complete moron is satisfied to go about in blinkers,” Victoria retorted, and Kate, regretting too late her choice of words, folded the lawyer’s letter back into its meticulous creases and sat tapping it irritably against her thumbnail.

  “Yes, of course. Well, what do you want me to answer to this?” she said, and her voice was cool and brisk again.

  “You could say,” Victoria suggested gravely, “that young girls are sometimes apt to mistake idle attentions for something deeper and you think, in the circumstances, a change would be advisable.”

  “And did you?”

  “If I did it’s all in the past, but it’s a good enough reason for the lawyers. They can hardly refuse to regard the matter seriously if you back me up.”

  “Very well. I wish, though, you could bring yourself to confide in me. Robert has a right to know where he slipped up, quite apart from those wretched roses.”

  “If he slipped up at all it was in thinking a proposal of marriage would cancel out other bad jokes,” Victoria answered, and Kate smiled, her resentment ebbing a little.

  “Poor Victoria,” she said softly, “I suspect that you care rather more than you’ll admit.”

  “I don’t care at all, and if I did I’m not so far gone that I couldn’t get over it.”

  “In that case you’ll have no objection if R
obert comes down again soon?”

  “Of course not. Would I have written to suggest it if I did?”

  “I don’t know. I gather you took great pains to put the onus on me.”

  “Well, you’ve missed him, haven’t you? He may or may not have stopped away on my account, but, as Elspeth pointed out, it’s not right that the mistress of the house should be deprived of visitors to suit the whims of a paid employee.”

  “Dear me!” said Kate quite mildly. “You do seem to have got yourself in a tangle! Who else has been proffering well-meaning advice?”

  “Only people who have your well-being at heart.”

  “I suppose you mean John. And what was his reason for wanting to get you out of the house? Has he, by any chance, fallen a victim to more youthful charms and distrusts Robert’s evil influence?” Kate spoke with such sudden bitterness that for a moment Victoria could only sit and blink at her.

  “Kate!” she exclaimed then, her own anger flaring up, “you know very well John’s only got eyes for you. He’s the sort of quixotic fool who’d hand you over to someone else without a struggle if he thought it would make you happier. He probably only wants me out of the way to ease the situation for you.”

  “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that,” Kate said a little stiffly. “All the same, I think you’ve probably been more honest with John than you have with me.”

  “And that was possible because he’s only concerned indirectly with my affairs. You should know better than to be jealous on that score, and if you want the truth, I think you treat him abominably! You use him so long as it suits you and trade on his dog-like devotion.”

  “Victoria—be careful!” warned Kate, going a little white. “I’ve allowed you the freedom of a friend and an equal since you’ve been here, but I won’t put up with impertinence. I’ll go and reply to that letter now and you can take it to the post when it’s ready. I shall have no difficulty this time in persuading the lawyers that a change is not only advisable but necessary—both from your employer’s point of view and your own. If they are still unwilling to make other arrangements for the little time that’s left, then I must demand an audience with the reluctant Mr. Brown in person—a demand you could well have insisted on yourself in the circumstances had you not been more content to dwell in your cloud-cuckoo-land.” She got up as she finished speaking, the letter in her hand, and left the room, closing the door behind her with a sharp click of finality.

  A gust of wind caught the curtains at the open casement windows and sent them spiralling out into the room while in the distance the first faint growl of thunder echoed over the downs, and Victoria, still sitting stiffly in her place at the breakfast table, suddenly bowed her face in her hands. She wept not only for the unthinking dissolution of a friendship, but for the lost felicity of her foolish dreams.

  CHAPTER NINE

  IT was to be a week of thundery weather with storms that threatened but never came to much, leaving the atmosphere sticky and oppressive. The heavy showers which punctuated the sultry closeness pressing down on the countryside were never long enough to relieve the thirsty earth and only beat down the tall flowers in Kate’s herbaceous border which Victoria had tied up and staked with such care only a week ago.

  “I wish,” she observed after days of exhausting heat, “we could have one good, cracking storm and have done with it.”

  “That, perhaps, is being held in reserve,” Kate answered ambiguously, using the polite, measured tones she had employed since their disastrous altercation, and Victoria’s enquiring glance held a modicum of wariness.

  “Was that a metaphorical observation?” she asked, trying to match Kate’s casual coolness.

  “You can take it how you like,” Kate replied, raising her eyebrows. “Perhaps I was simply anticipating a final clearing of the air.”

  Victoria, taking the remark literally, asked quickly: “Have you heard from the solicitors, then?”

  “Not yet, but I’ve heard from Robert. He’ll be down this week-end.”

  “Oh!”

  “Perhaps,” observed Kate, catching a suggestion of dismay in the exclamation, “you’ve had time to regret your hasty intervention on my behalf. It’s a pity your excellent Miss Scott lives so far away in Wales or you might have begged a bed for the week-end.”

  “I’m not,” replied Victoria, stung to retaliation, “in the least anxious to avoid a meeting with Robert, but if I’m going to be in the way I can quite well make myself scarce.”

  “What nonsense! If you’re going to be tiresomely tactful without any encouragement you’ll simply embarrass us both. Now, run along and get Timmy up from his rest. After tea we’ll play Happy Families and allow him to cheat a little because he’s being extra good.”

  As the week drew to a close, Victoria found herself looking forward to Robert’s visit with a mixture of anticipation and dread. Whatever his intentions might once have been he was, she knew, much too experienced and worldly-wise to allow awkwardness to spoil his week-end, neither was he likely to commit the folly of arriving with floral tributes as a peace-offering. She wondered whether he would allude at all to his last visit or whether absence and time for more sober reflection had turned his thoughts back to Kate. It was, she realised with a sudden sharp awareness, very likely the last time she would see him, for soon Mr. Brown must make his intentions known. When next he came she would be gone and life at Farthings would go on without her. For one panic-stricken moment she wished with all her heart that she could have been gone before the ordeal of another meeting, but by constantly reminding herself how successfully he had made a fool of her, she was able to whip up a comforting illusion of indifference.

  Robert was expected in time for dinner on Friday and all day the house had exuded an air of occasion. Elspeth, miraculously restored to good humour, was clearly determined to show her approval by excelling herself in culinary skill, and set Victoria to work washing the best china and polishing silver between numerous errands to the village for forgotten delicacies. Timmy, finding himself neglected in consequence, caused a minor panic by taking himself off unaccompanied down the hill, to be brought back by John Squires, who had chanced to spot him making a determined assault on a neighbour’s strawberry beds. The doctor was not unwilling, Victoria thought, to find a legitimate excuse for calling after his last unhappy visit and Kate could do no less than offer him a glass of sherry together with demure surprise at his absence. She seemed a little piqued when he observed that Victoria was looking washed out and airily blamed the weather, adding innocently that Elspeth was killing the fatted calf in honour of Robert’s arrival and poor Victoria was being run off her feet with last-minute preparations.

  “Oh, I see. And is it an occasion of any special significance? I thought, since he’s practically part of the family he’s used to just taking pot luck,” John said casually, but his eyes still rested thoughtfully on Victoria’s averted face and Kate gave a small, indecisive shrug.

  “Yes, well ... he hasn’t been down for some time and you know what Elspeth is. Nothing’s too good for Mr. Rab and we’re all of us a bit in need of cheering up,” she replied, and his eyebrows lifted.

  “Really? This young woman looks more in need of a tonic than a gay week-end. Come to my surgery next time you’re in the village, Victoria, and I’ll give you a prescription,” he said.

  “I’ve no doubt she’ll pick up once she’s away from here,” Kate observed before Victoria could reply, and he smiled, but his eyes were a little rueful as he said to Victoria:

  “So you took my advice, and it’s done the trick?”

  “I don’t know. We’re still waiting to hear,” Victoria replied, not caring very much for the trend the conversation was taking, and Kate said as she observed the doctor’s quick frown:

  “Don’t you think you were rather rash to meddle John? Whatever Victoria may have told you, she was settled enough here until her head was turned by a couple of well-intentioned admirers.” She spoke quite
pleasantly, even with a touch of amused indulgence, but Victoria sprang to her feet, the colour standing out sharply on her cheekbones.

  “If you’ll excuse me, Rate, I’ll go and get Timmy cleaned up for lunch. I don’t think John would be very interested in my hypothetical admirers,” she said.

  “Was that quite fair?” the doctor asked when the sound of her hurried flight up the corner staircase had died away, and Kate lowered her eyes.

  “No, it wasn’t,” she said, and got up to refill bath their glasses, spilling a few drops of sherry because her hand was not quite steady. “I don’t know what’s the matter with me, John, unless this oppressive heat is getting us all down. Perhaps it’s I and not Victoria who’s in need of medical advice.”

  “Would you take it, Kate?”

  “It would depend on the remedy, wouldn’t it?”

  “Perhaps the remedy is simpler and pleasanter than you think.”

  She sat down again, sipping her sherry rather quickly, and regarded him with troubled enquiry, but the old warmth was back in her eyes.

  “I—I’ve been unfair to you, John,” she said then. “Victoria took me to task and we quarrelled over you, since then we don’t seem able to get back on the old footing, but she was right. Is it possible to be jealous but heartwhole at the same time, do you suppose?”

  “One can feel possessive about a person without wishing to be possessed in return, I imagine, which might result in a sort of dog-in-the-manger form of jealousy,” he replied with some dryness, and she made a wry face at him.

  “Not a very attractive picture,” she said. “I’ve always prided myself on being free of the more obvious weaknesses of my sex, but it seems I am wrong.”

  “Dear Kate, don’t scorn your very natural imperfections—they make you so much more approachable,” he said, and she looked at him with startled eyes.

  “Approachable? But I’m the least self-satisfied of people!” she exclaimed, sounding quite hurt.