‘What relation was she to Simon?’
‘His sister.’
‘Well, then! It would be specially startling for him – and unpleasant! Shouldn’t you at least have warned him?’
‘Well, it was a long time ago, you know. I told you – when I first saw you the likeness struck me, but afterwards I forgot it. Perhaps I should have mentioned something to him, but I wasn’t even sure he would notice it. And this evening it never occurred to me.’
‘But isn’t that why Gregory connected me with him? Because I’m like Marion, who was Simon’s sister?’
‘Oh, no,’ Althea laughed and shook her head. ‘Marion died seven years ago. I doubt if Gregory ever saw her. I think it was just one of his fancies because you were arriving at about the same time.’
The gilt bindings of the rows of books grinned as Althea moved her lamp. Norah said: ‘How old was she? Marion, I mean. Quite young, I suppose?’
‘Twenty-three.’
‘But that’s my age now . . . !’
‘I know.’
‘How did she come to be drowned?’
‘It’s a long story. Not a happy one, as you can guess. She was just going away.’
‘Away?’
‘She had just been married. Less than a week.’
Norah waited. Presently she commented: ‘How awful. I’m very sorry.’
Althea said: ‘Yes, it was frightfully bad luck.’ As Norah was clearly expecting more she added: ‘It’s not a thing we really talk about even now, even though it’s so long ago.’
‘Well . . . no, I see that. But all the same, if I’m at all like Marion I think you should have warned Simon.’
‘I’ll apologize to him in the morning, if you wish. But don’t think any more about it. For Heaven’s sake don’t let it worry you. Every family has its tragedies, and I don’t want this one to depress you.’ Althea patted her shoulder. ‘I’m sorry if you think I should have told you more. Go and sleep on it. It’ll all look different in the morning.’
Upstairs in the bedroom Norah was a while getting undressed. It had been an eventful day, quite different from the first. She felt as if she had already been in the house a week. She thought of Gregory Syme and his blunt ugly face with its myopic glass shields, his sharp broken voice, his slender fingers delicately and precisely playing Mozart. She thought of Christopher Carew with his boisterous natural way, his sardonic humour, his casual smiling eyes looking over her figure and knowing pretty well. She thought of Simon Syme, old-young, worried, withdrawn, sensitive. ‘Merciful Christ!’ he had said. Why hadn’t Althea warned him?
She thought of Althea Syme, perhaps another enigma, and a new one. ‘You really have the most satiny shoulders. Really the most,’ with a little gentle squeeze to emphasize. There had never before been any signs of that. So ignore it this time. Of course Althea had always admired her, passed the occasional complimentary remark about her figure and her looks – but always with discretion, without any emotional loading to the words. In fact in their own ways they were fond of each other, admired each other; but not in an overt, physical way. Her chief reason for accepting Althea’s invitation to come here had not been her father’s death but her break-up with Robert Jenkin – Althea with her sharp perception probably guessed that now. It had offered her an opportunity to get right away; still more it was an opportunity to enjoy the companionship of someone who, because of her sex, would make no physical demands on her. So this was disconcerting, this development, disconcerting if it were anything more than a stupid misunderstanding. Admiration, of course, was quite another thing. There was no reason at all why one woman shouldn’t admire another.
Anyway it was unimportant – forget it. Althea had been at her best tonight. She seemed to have almost total recall. Once she had read, seen, done a thing it was there; could be quoted, remembered, described at will . . .
Before getting into bed she parted the curtains and looked out at the garden and the dark glower of the mountains. An hour ago there had been a first pared disc of moon but it was already set. Wind stirred against the window pane, trying it for strength. She blew out her lamp and got into bed.
Usually she went to sleep quickly and tonight would have been no exception, but just as she was drifting quietly off she heard the tapping. She opened her eyes again and lay still, listening. Tap-tap-tap. Tap-tap-tap-tap . . . Tap-tap-tap. Not loud. Just a faint noise. It wouldn’t so much have mattered but it seemed to come from her sitting-room. That was the disconcerting thing.
She took a few breaths, allowing the slight alarm to escape. The tapping stopped. There, it was nothing. Probably the pipes in her bathroom. Water produced the oddest effects. Except, of course, that her bathroom was the other way. But still . . .
The patter of little feet?
She drowsed, and then the tapping began again. Stopped . . . Irritating. Then something moved in her sitting-room.
She sat up in bed, in the dark, groped for the matches, half found them and then they slipped through her fingers to the floor, making a loud rattling noise. She got quickly out, felt about on the carpet for them. It was suddenly essential that she should not be in the dark. Matches found, one head broke, the second flared, she knelt up, took the still warm glass off the lamp and lit the wick. Yellow light sought out the corners of the room. The door into her sitting-room was closed.
But something had moved. She couldn’t be certain what but she was certain something. A footstep, or a cushion had fallen, or a book had moved on the table.
She took two or three more breaths. Ridiculous to get in such a panic. A mouse. Or even a bat. Not the most desirable thought but much to be preferred to her first ideas. Anyway, she’d never sleep if she didn’t find out.
Her dressing-gown was behind her own door. She fetched that, tied it tight as if for protection, picked up the lamp. God, for electricity . . . !
She got to the door and grasped the handle. Very quiet now. She was panicking in an old house. Every old house was full of creaks.
She took a breath and turned the handle and pushed open the door.
Her lamp flung its light uncertainly about the musty room. She held the lamp high above her shoulder and peered. The room was quite empty, the curtains undrawn, her own books unmoved on the table, no cushion disturbed. Then she saw something which at first she put down to the unsteadiness of her lamp, but presently knew had no such explanation. The rocking-horse was gently rocking backwards and forwards, its shadow moving against the wall behind.
CHAPTER FOUR
I
Another fine day dawned, though Mr Croome-Nichols said the barometer was dropping. Norah was up early, having eventually leaned a chair against the door leading to the sitting-room, so that if anyone opened the door the chair would fall. Thereafter she dozed fitfully. Twice when dropping off to sleep she had heard the tapping again. Now in the morning light, while she did not disbelieve the evidence of her own ears and eyes, it all looked less menacing. The sitting-room was just a sitting-room, musty smelling and poorly furnished, the rocking-horse rocked easily and quietly at her touch; it certainly didn’t make a tapping sound. The wind had been rising last night. Perhaps funnelling down the small chimney it had created a sufficient current of air . . .
At breakfast there were only three of them. Norah said: ‘Is Simon not well?’
‘Oh, yes. He’s gone out painting. He often spends his holidays that way.’
‘Did you say he had been abroad?’
‘Well, only to Ireland. That’s recently. But he has been quite a traveller.’
‘One of those young men,’ said Croome-Nichols, ‘who find it more pleasant to travel than to arrive.’ He opened his mouth and embedded a forkful of bacon.
Norah said: ‘What does he do? For a living, I mean.’
‘I’m afraid Simon hasn’t settled to very much,’ Althea said. ‘He’s constantly changing his field of interest, and as a result . . .’
‘Gathering no moss,’ said Mr Croome-
Nichols. ‘But then, does he need to? When I was a young chap of his age – and – er – hm . . .’
‘When you were a young chap of his age,’ said Althea, ‘you were already vicar of St Medwyn. Simon isn’t so young: he’s rising thirty-five. But he’ll never settle down. I predict he’ll be away again after a few weeks here.’
‘Has he never married?’ Norah asked.
There was a moment’s silence. ‘No,’ said Althea.
‘Nor ever likely to,’ said Croome-Nichols. ‘Or so I’d guess. Not that I know him,’ he added after a moment, disavowing responsibility. ‘Only came here myself three years ago, when I retired. Althea wanted a tutor for Gregory, and as my grandmother was a Nichols it all seemed very appropriate. Kept it in the family. Of course I know about Simon. Difficult not to. And – er – hm . . .’
After breakfast there was another article to take down and the first one to re-type – Mrs Syme had written in a number of alterations and corrected a couple of spelling mistakes – Norah could never spell ‘cholesterol’ – but by twelve she was free. It was much cooler today so she put on a light coat and went out.
The higher mountains were cloud-capped, and now and then a screen of white wool would detach itself and drift across the sun. There was little wind in the valley, and sheep could be heard lamenting across a field. It was a lonely sound. Norah walked in the garden towards the lake, and then drew back as she saw a man sitting at an easel near the water. Her first thought was to keep out of his way altogether.
Then she checked the impulse. She had liked Simon’s looks last night. His thin sensitive face was as quick to change its expression as a young boy’s, so unguarded and then so closely guarded. If they were to live in this house together for a couple of weeks it would be pretty silly to try to avoid him. Much better plunge in now. Deep end first and swim for the shallow.
Not liking herself much, she walked towards him. ‘Good morning, Mr Syme. Another lovely day!’
He started and put down his brush. She tried not to look at the picture but smiled directly at him, seeing his eyes go raw, go eager, go dull.
‘Morning . . . Yes . . . very fine.’
‘Mr Croome-Nichols is saying rain before nightfall. Perhaps he knows the signs.’
Simon Syme shook his head. ‘It won’t rain yet. Those clouds mean nothing.’
There was a pause. Out of the corner of her eye she saw that he was not painting the scene before him. He was painting a different-shaped lake bordered with silver birches, with reeds in the water and a windy sky.
She said: ‘I hope I’m not disturbing you.’ It wasn’t exactly scintillating stuff, but she could think of no other way of keeping the conversation going.
He looked down, and again she felt that relaxation of tension. ‘I’m afraid I don’t remember your name.’
‘Norah Faulkner.’
‘Miss – er – Faulkner. No, it’s time I stopped. Three hours at a stretch is long enough.’
‘Do you paint a lot?’
‘Yes – quite a lot.’
‘You mentioned Picasso last night. Did you study painting in France before the war?’
‘Very briefly. Afraid my father didn’t intend it should be my career.’
‘Well, it was through my father that I got to know Paris, because he worked there for a time.’
‘It’s a cold city, very unfriendly to the outsider. Like a cold beautiful woman.’
‘But unspoiled, thank Heaven,’ she said.
‘Unspoiled by the Germans, certainly.’
‘That’s what I meant.’
‘Yes.’ He smiled. ‘But the traffic’s very bad now, isn’t it? Very blatant and noisy. So I gather.’
‘It’s bad. When were you there last?’
‘Just before the war. What I meant, if I may explain, is that more cities are destroyed by their own inhabitants than by invaders.’
She said: ‘Mr Syme, I hope the fact that I look a bit like your sister – I hope it doesn’t upset you. Honestly, I’d no idea when I came that I was like anyone. Althea did mention something when we first met but she never spoke of it afterwards. It never occurred to me – obviously – that it might . . . upset anyone here.’
‘Oh?’ His stony hair looked less faded in the morning light; the lines of his face contributed to the charm of his smile.
She looked away from him, up towards Cader Morb. A thin wreath of cloud was moving off its tip like a scarf blowing in the wind.
‘And does it?’
‘Does it what?’
‘Does my resemblance to your sister Marion upset you?’
After a minute he said: ‘Listen to those sheep. “And full grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn.” That was Keats, wasn’t it? “And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.” I love the peace of this part of Wales, if one could only dissociate it from memories.’
‘You haven’t answered my question.’
‘I’m trying to. Two people grow up together and become very close – closer than an ordinary brother and sister. As children we played together for hours upstairs in the nursery. In the winter those are long hours, dark hours – no other children anywhere for miles. Can you wonder that our concern for each other becomes a little ingrown, preoccupied, that we know so much of each other’s thoughts?’
He stopped. He seemed plunged into solitary recollections on which it would be unseemly to intrude.
She ventured: ‘Like the Brontës perhaps?’
‘The . . . ? Well, yes. But there there were four. Here there were only two. Could you blame me or I blame you for feeling the loss of the other?’
She waited, but he didn’t go on. She watched him pick up a brush, dab it in green and touch his painting experimentally. She said: ‘So my being here brings it all back?’
‘No . . . I think your being here brings it all forward.’
‘Whichever way you like . . . Do you want me to leave?’
He said: ‘How can I want that?’
The whole conversation had been full of awkward pauses. She felt he was constantly evading the point.
‘Well, you’ve only to say, Mr Syme. I mean that. Your aunt may have told you that I’m here on a month’s trial. I may in any case leave then. But I’ll leave tomorrow if my being here still upsets you.’
He straightened up from the painting and smiled at her again. ‘No . . . I think we should all live more or less dangerously. It’s a good principle of life. The greater the trial the greater the triumph.’
Norah frowned. ‘I don’t quite see what you mean . . .’
‘Never mind. Never mind.’
‘But I do mind.’
‘Well, let me put it this way.’ He turned and looked back at the house. ‘There are too many Symes in that place, as I said at dinner last night. It’s not just the three of us, of course, Althea, Gregory and me. It’s all those who’ve lived there for the last century and longer. Althea’s made it so much worse, so much more pervasive – I’ve counted over thirty canvas faces hanging on the walls. That’s all been changed since I went away – most of them were shut away in cupboards where they more properly belong. It would be a mistake for you in any way, in any way, to become one of them – perhaps I should say one of us.’
‘I don’t intend to.’
‘No . . . no, well, that’s fine. Well, then, there’s no problem, is there?’
‘I don’t know.’
He put down his brush in a jar and stared for a minute over the lake, his lean, clever face contemplative.
‘I was always fond of Aunt Althea, you know.’
‘Were you? Aren’t you?’
He said: ‘But my fondness, if I analyse it, was slightly patronizing. Sorry for the egoism. Perhaps that was something of a fault. You see I always thought of her as having one of these acquisitive brains that gathered up nuts of information like a squirrel and hid them somewhere and then dug them up and pretended they were a discovery of her own – competent, second-rate, uninventive. But
now I’m not so sure . . . There is a creative ingenuity about . . . Will you tell her all this?’
‘Not if you don’t want me to.’
‘What I’m not certain about at this stage is whether she wishes me good or ill. What do you think, Miss – er – Faulkner?’
‘Good, surely. But how could I know? I know nothing of your family.’
‘So you say. This is what we have to discover, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t think I like being considered a liar,’ she said.
‘No . . . no, that wasn’t what I meant.’ He laughed pleasantly. ‘We’re not getting very far, are we? Sorry, it’s my fault. Let’s not fence any more. You asked me a question. Does your being here upset me? The answer is no.’
‘Thank you.’ Norah was still uncomfortable but she smiled back at him.
He quickly lowered his eyes. ‘Fine. That’s settled. Would you help me carry my things back to the house?’
She did so, and as she did so she saw the picture more clearly. In the rushes at the edge of the lake he had painted a woman’s figure, naked, lying face upwards in the water.
II
By the afternoon post came a flat package for Norah. She tore it open and found the photograph taken of her yesterday by Christopher Carew.
Well, there it was, the professionalism again, the composition of foreground and background, the fine detail, the differing shades and shadows. Even the foreground, she had to admit, was not altogether a failure. She knew that her parted lips and wide eyes were parted and wide from shock; but anyone looking at the picture and not knowing would see it only as an expression of enjoyable excitement. She looked as if any moment she might leap the gate.
On the back was written: ‘See what I mean? Please come again.’
She might have done that; but Mr Croome-Nichols was right and Simon wrong; by the time she had helped Mrs Syme with her bills it was raining.
She went up to her room and into her sitting-room and read a book for an hour. She used this room – indeed entered it – with a continuing reluctance. With its air of desuetude, its slightly acrid, disinfectant smell, its faded curtains and worn furniture and the memory of movements she fancied she had heard, it didn’t make her feel comfortable or at home. After a while she put her book down and stared about. This presumably had been the day nursery where twenty years ago Simon and Marion had played together – besides probably many generations before. They must have slept in her bedroom. These were the beads on the frame by which they had first learned to count. This was the rocking-horse Marion had ridden hour after hour as a child through the long winter afternoons. Marion had been drowned. So Simon painted her as he had once seen her lying naked face upwards in the lake was that it? – the lake as it had been before Althea turned it into a garden. Perhaps Marion still came up from the lake – sometimes and sat on this horse and rocked gently backwards and forwards, her long hair dripping and weedy. Perhaps she had been here last night, tapping with her foot on the floor.
Woman in the Mirror Page 5
