by Iris Murdoch
‘I’m to have Toby’s bedroom. I know what that means.’
‘What does it mean? More tea?’
‘Where’s Stephanie?’ said Henry, who had not seen her since his return.
‘Either in bed I imagine or gone out for a walk.’
‘I hope she’s gone for a walk,’ said Henry, ‘that will do her good.’ He hoped so much that she had gone for a walk. Each return to her now compressed his heart with pain, like a return to the cage of a sick animal. He dreaded going up and finding her lying in bed, dropping cigarette ash on the sheets and looking at the room with what seemed to him a simulated hollow stare. Christ, he thought, she’s going to marry me and that’s what she feels like! And that’s a bit what I feel like too. I expect everybody feels rather doomed when they get married. But when we are right away from this mess, when we are in Sperriton, it will be all different. And the prospect of seeing Russ and Bella lit for a moment like a golden spark.
‘Go and see if you can find her anywhere,’ said Gerda. ‘Ask her if she’d like some tea.’
Henry got up and went out into the hall. He saw on the hall table a letter from America, in Bella’s huge handwriting, and he put it into his pocket and walked out through the front door onto the terrace. The westering sun was striking full onto the façade of Queen Anne and was blotching the green slope to his right with the long rounded shadows of the big trees. The lake vibrated with blue and the warm air was spiced with flower smells and jumbled bird song. Henry looked about anxiously hoping to see Stephanie crossing the bridge or lingering beside the lake, wearing her floppy sun hat and carrying an ancient parasol which Henry had found for her and which had seemed to give her pleasure. Perhaps today she had, like his mother, put on a summer dress. But there was no sign of her. The great expanse of grass was empty, except for a few bounding squirrels. A trio of magpies was flying towards the wood, seeming like an omen. Now he must go and look for Stephanie upstairs. If only he could persuade her to open a window. Was that awful smell just cigarettes? In order to delay a moment longer he pulled Bella’s letter out of his pocket and began to read it.
Honey, listen, and don’t think we’re pigs. A hell of a lot has happened in the last few days. To put it in a nutshell, Russ has got a job at Santa Cruz, and we’re going at once. One of the faculty there killed himself accidentally with drugs, bless his heart, and they wanted someone at once and they rang long distance and asked if Russ would come and they more or less promised him tenure if he would and there’s even a house (not the deceased’s) and we had to decide instantly, and of course we just had to say yes and we sure do hope you’ll understand! So we’ll be gone when you get back to Sperriton. We’ve left your keys with Paul and May Horowitz and they’ll be sprucing up the house for you and your bride, and we’re hopping mad that we won’t be there to welcome you and of course we’re dying with curiosity—but we’ll see you before long won’t we? You must come to Santa Cruz soon with Mrs. M. and be our guests. Our new home faces the ocean and there’s a jungle garden and a Roman emperor-style swimming pool! You got to come, and soon, that’s for sure, or we’ll suspect you don’t forgive us! And of course we’ll be beavering away like crazy to find a job there for you. Write us soon, honey, we’re thinking of you all the time. You should have told us exactly when the great day is. And, darling, if you’re wondering if I’m jealous, of course I am! Write soon, care of the philosophy department, we won’t be in the house at once. (It’s heavenly Spanish like we always wanted, there’s a fountain.) And don’t forget we love you and you belong to us, married or not. Much love. Bella
Russell had scrawled at the bottom of the page.
‘Sorry kid. We love you but I guess we love ourselves more.’
Henry crumpled up the letter and returned it to his pocket. A cloud of blackness had formed before him and was slowly enveloping him. He stared at the sunlit scene and was blind. Everything he now realized, to do with taking Stephanie to Sperriton had been touched and enlightened and made possible by the idea of Russ and Bella. How unfair to Stephanie. And yet that had been the reality of the matter, perhaps its main reality, and not a bad one. Because Russ and Bella were brave and good they would all have been saved somehow. Only now—however bravely Bella talked it was over and things would never be as they were. In Sperriton, Russ and Bella could have swallowed Stephanie, swallowed her right down. At a distance of eighteen hundred miles Stephanie would be a curio. She would be a stranger, and he would soon become one. Russ and Bella would inhabit another world, make new friends, love and be loved elsewhere, adopt another Henry. When he and Stephanie went to visit them there would be parties and cries of joy and Bella would show off her new world and Henry would suffer agonies of jealousy and deprivation. As for getting him a job at Santa Cruz, they might as well try to get him a job as an astronaut, and they knew it. It was the end of the road with Russ and Bella: and there was no substitute, not May and Paul, not Franz and Rosina, not Bill and Emmy, not Ann and Minio, no one.
Henry turned round slowly and entered the house. He felt cold and there was an itchy stirring in his eyes as if he might cry. He thought for a crazy second of going to his mother, but turned towards the stairs. If only, in going now to Stephanie, he could feel that he was going where he could be held, not where he had to hold.
The house echoed oddly. The stored furniture had been removed from the gallery and the rugs were gone from the upper landing. Henry said ‘Hello’ and entered Stephanie’s bedroom but found it empty. He went across to the window and looked out towards the north to see if he could discover her anywhere on that side of the house. He scanned the overgrown drive which wound away into the conifers, hazy with weeds which were now in flower. He looked for Stephanie’s little figure, lingering near the shrubbery or emerging slowly from the birch wood. She always wore such unsuitable shoes and walked so maddeningly slowly. Thinking of her shoes it occurred to him that it was now many days since he had made love to her. The sprouting tops of the conifers merged with a reddish sheen into the sky. Looking away up the drive Henry sighed. The room was stuffy and smelt of tobacco smoke and cosmetics and of some other emanation of humanity, sweat, or underwear or something. Henry opened the window wide and smelt the warm spicy air and sighed again. He turned back, dazzled by the bright light, towards the room. Stephanie’s bed, a little tumbled and humpy, had been roughly pulled together. There was a white patch upon the counterpane on top of the pillow. Henry moved forward blinking and saw an envelope. A letter addressed to him.
As soon as Henry saw the letter he felt a prophetic ray of pure fear pass into his heart. He seized it and opened it.
Dear Henry,
I expect you will not be surprised to hear from me in this way, you must have expected it and wanted it and I feel you have not behaved squarely by me, you drove me to it yourself you know you did. You love somebody else, as I have reason to believe, and you have never considered what I want only what you want. There should be equality in marriage and you have rushed me into this. I wanted to live at the Hall and not go to America only you would not hear of this, you would not discuss it with me as an equal. I have been unhappy all my life and I thought when I met you I would be looked after and happy but it was not to be. I am so miserable as I write this and I do wish you would change your mind and make everything well so we could live at the Hall, and not go to America where there is this woman, you have expected me to put up with a lot and when I wanted to talk of it you just made jokes and I happen to know that you think I have no sense of humour. The only person who was really kind to me was Lucius, your mother did her best but she did regard me as inferior, as I think you do too. You don’t know how much you hurt me by your attitudes and by always laughing at me. I have gone back to London to think it over, but if you still want to sell everything and go to America I feel we are not right for each other. I wanted to live at the Hall and this was what I understood we were to do at the start when we were engaged. I know you think I am stupid and of course I
have always had bad luck and have been deserted and abandoned and other people have their own affairs and will not stop to help. You were only interested in me because you thought I was an easy woman and because of Sandy. I wish I had got to know Sandy properly as I would have done if he had not died, he was such a nice man and I feel we might have got on, at least it was a dream. If you want to see me and talk things over, I shall be at the flat, by the way you did say I could have the flat, anyway, you did say that at the start, but I don’t want to see you unless you are to keep the Hall and be as you ought to be in England. You know we have never really got on and I feel I could do better with somebody who understood me and really cared. I cannot face being hustled into marriage and taken away where I am not used to and your clever friends would laugh at me, I have had enough pain. You have never really tried to see me as I am, I feel you have used me. I am so sorry, Henry, but I have been so unhappy I thought I would die and you did not help me and I have got to run away, but do think about staying in England please, but I think it is best that we part if you will never do what I want.
We did like it in bed anyway and that is always something. Please try to see that I have to be myself and not just what you want. Oh I am so unhappy.
Yours with love
Stephanie
Henry was sitting on the bed reading the letter. The northern evening light made the room glow with a radiant clarity. The house was silent against the song of the birds. Henry felt a very pure strange pain, like an unmixed repentance pain such as one might feel when compelled to review one’s sins in the presence of God. It was not that there were no more concealments or illusions, but just for a moment there was for Henry a very narrow and clear vision of what he had been doing. Of course he had used Stephanie, of course he had been indifferent to her wishes and had expected her to obey him, of course he had not regarded her as an equal. He had expected her to be grateful for his notice. He had not imagined her. I have had enough pain. Of course he had known very well how much sheer incoherent muddle he was embracing when he embraced her. But in his orgy of will he had imagined that somehow if only he could rush along fast enough all would be well. Would he now pursue her to London? Quietly and clearly the answer formulated itself: no. In its funny way it was a brave letter. In her funny way she was a brave girl.
He sat still, dazed, breathless with emotion, entertaining that pure pain of loss and self-reproach. Funny little dear little Stephanie had gone, with an inventiveness, a sheer strength of self-preservation with which he would not have credited her. She had escaped; and now he would never look after her and educate her, never toil to make her happy and to compensate her for her rotten life. Had he ever really thought that he would? Henry sat rigid, holding on to the purity of the moment and blindly checking something that was also present: a profound sense of relief. He felt pity, that old familiar friend that had joined their hands together. ‘Poor old Steph,’ he said aloud, ‘Poor Steph, oh poor Steph.’ His love for her was with him, burning him, but condensed into a small awful ball, outside which he was quietly and disgracefully expanding. How absurd, he thought. I am absurd, she is absurd. I would never have left her, never. Yes, I am sure that’s true and it’s important. But now she has left me and …
He got up slowly, noticing everything in the room, the striped face powder dust on the empty dressing table, the grey cigarette ash marks on the sheets, a pair of Gerda’s slippers which Stephanie had borrowed. He walked slowly to the door, dropping Stephanie’s screwed up letter as he went, and crossed the echoing landing to the stairs, leaning hard on the banisters he marched down the stairs two at a time, then crossed the hall into the library. One of the tall windows was partly open and he ducked under it, raising it with his shoulders and strode over the terrace, leapt from there onto the grass, stumbled and began to run. It was slightly uphill and by the time he reached the north drive he was panting. He ran along the drive, the gravel was invisible, it was like running on a flower bed, and the wild flowers twisted round his feet. By the time he reached the conifers he had to slow to a walk. The iron gate onto the road was still padlocked, he had never remembered to ask Bellamy to open it. He pulled himself up onto the central bar and put one hand on the wall and thrust a long leg over the top. A spike pierced his trousers and there was a little rending sound. He felt the sun-warmed iron on his leg, detached himself and leapt down, slipping and jarring his hands on the stony edge of the road. He turned to the right towards Pennwood, dusting the pebbles off his palms and pulling down the tail of his jacket. As he came near to the turning he walked a little more slowly, attempting to think.
At that moment Colette emerged from the lane and turned towards the village ahead of him, walking slowly and not noticing him. Henry walked for a while quietly behind her at a distance of about twenty yards. The road was straight here, bordered on one side by the elders and on the other by a wide grassy verge and a line of elm trees. Among the elders and the foot of the trees a great many primroses were still in flower. Henry’s catlike footsteps were silent. The westering sun laid his long shadow down before him. He now increased his pace until his shadow head reached Colette and then passed her. Seeing the shadow at her feet Colette turned round, then stopped. Henry too stopped instantly and stared at her in silence.
‘Oh-hello, Henry.’
She was wearing the green knee breeches which she had had on when she had spoken to Henry and Stephanie in the Volvo, only now instead of the tweed jacket she was wearing a light brown Russian style shirt open at the neck. Her sea-brown hair was piled up behind her head, cunningly rolled under and pinned. She was carrying a basket. The bandage had been removed from her cheek revealing a long livid furrow.
‘Hello,’ said Henry. But he stood still.
Colette, who had not smiled, stared at him for a moment. Then when he did not speak she gave a vague wave of her hand and turned and walked on. Henry began to walk too, padding about ten yards behind her. A car passed them.
Colette stopped again and turned, stepping onto the grass verge. Henry stopped too, not yet near her. She looked at him frowning. ‘What’s the matter?’
Henry advanced a pace or two in the long grass. ‘Where are you going?’
‘To the village.’
‘What for?’
‘To get some beer and tobacco for Daddy.’
As Henry said nothing she began uncertainly to turn away.
‘Wait a moment,’ said Henry. He stepped through the grass until he stood before her. ‘Colette, listen. Last time I met you wearing those totally absurd but I must say rather fetching trousers you told me that you loved me. Later on you denied this proposition. I find it hard to believe however that you really changed your mind. Your first statement carried conviction, your second did not. Do you, please, still love me?’
Colette looked at him, narrowing her eyes against the sun. Then she threw her basket sideways into the grass. ‘Yes, of course, I still love you.’
‘In that case,’ said Henry, ‘we shall get married, because I love you too—Colette—’
‘Don’t you mind—my face?’
‘Oh God,’ said Henry, ‘you idiot!’ He took another step and fell on his knees at her feet in the long grass. As he stretched out his arms to the green breeches and the embroidered hem of the brown shirt she subsided towards him and he took her swaying shoulders and keeled over with her among the primroses. ‘Colette—forgive me—this is true, isn’t it—this is it—you do love me, don’t you? I know I don’t deserve it—but I couldn’t bear it if you didn’t any more, I should die and you’d have to shovel me into the ditch.’
‘I do love you, oh Henry, I’ve cried so about you, I thought I’d lost you—I only said I didn’t love you because—you know—what was the use—and I wished so much I hadn’t said that stupid thing about wanting the Hall, I don’t care about anything, I don’t want anything, except you, I’ll go with you anywhere, I don’t mind how poor we are—’
‘You don’t rate my earning
capacity very highly,’ said Henry, holding her rigidly and looking into her face, his head pillowed on her arm.
‘I’ll go away with you anywhere—’
‘Whither I go thou wilt go and my people shall be thy people and my God thy God?’
‘Yes, yes, yes.’
‘And you don’t want to marry that bloody man Giles Gosling?’
‘No! But what about—?’
‘I’ll tell you about that later,’ said Henry. ‘I’ll tell you about everything later, everything that I know, and you shall explain me to myself. I shall empty myself and your grace and your truth will fill me. May I kiss you?’
‘Yes, Henry.’
He pulled her closer and kissed her, gently, carefully.
‘Your lips taste of apples.’
‘Oh Henry, I love you so much, I’m so happy—’
‘This grass is bloody wet,’ said Henry. ‘I suppose it’s the dew. Is it the dew?’
Gerda, who had heard Henry’s rapid descent of the stairs, and who had followed him noiselessly into the library to observe his exit and leap from the terrace, watched him as he ran fast, long legged, across the lawn. She watched him until he had disappeared, still running, round the corner of the drive. Then she returned to the dining-room. She opened a cupboard.
Lucius came in still wearing his cloak. He took his top teeth out, scrutinized them, and put them in again. He said, ‘I don’t know what to do about that trunk I put my manuscripts into. If I leave it here it may just vanish, but it’s too big to go into the taxi. Perhaps I’d better unpack it and divide the stuff—’
‘I shouldn’t worry too much,’ said Gerda. ‘Look, I’m sorry I made you burn those poems.’
‘Oh that doesn’t matter,’ said Lucius. ‘I know them all by heart so I just wrote them out again.’
‘Clump, clump, the old girl. I wasn’t really angry. But I wish you’d write me something a little more romantic.’
