Nightingale Wood

by Stella Gibbons

  ‘And then there were clothes,’ she continued faintly. ‘He liked to look smart, you know. And – and of course he had to. For Business.’

  Mr Wither snorted. He knew all about that particular business.

  ‘And lots of other things …’ she ended hastily.

  Mr Wither nodded glumly, staring at her with his knees a little apart and his short red hands, darkly veined, spread over their caps. She looked quickly down at her shoes.

  ‘And so you haven’t anything,’ said Mr Wither at length, still glumly staring.

  She shook her head.

  He continued to gaze at her for a little while longer, shaking his head with compressed lips; then he bent forward abruptly and stood up.

  ‘Well, we shall have to see, that’s all,’ he observed.

  With which comforting remark he opened the door for her, and she escaped.

  When she had run quickly upstairs, he returned to the arm-chair and to his thoughts. They were not cheerful.

  She had no money, she ate a great deal of butter, she was only twenty-one, and she had come, at his express and urgent request, to reside at The Eagles for life.

  Viola ran all the way up to her bedroom, and flomped face downwards on the bed. She lay for a little while staring vacantly at the carpet and slowly clacking her shoes together while she waved her legs in the air. Then she got desperately up, put on her coat, and ran very quietly downstairs again.

  She slipped out through the back way by the garage (late stables). She liked this side of the house, which was directly under her bedroom window, because there was always more going on there than elsewhere at The Eagles. The maids did not make much noise, but there was often a comforting smell of cooking, and sometimes Saxon was there, doing things to the car. Viola considered Saxon to be very stuck-up and too handsome for a boy, but she could not help being pleased every time she saw him because he was the only other person at The Eagles who had no wrinkles. His presence made her feel less lost in a sea of ancients.

  He was there this afternoon, standing with his legs a little apart in shiny black gaiters, and a pair of very white shirt-sleeves rolled up over his arms while he polished the car. The brilliant sunlight of April, that made most faces look old, only increased the youth of his.

  He saw her coming through the window of the car, and gave her such a gay, mischievous, impudent smile that she could not believe her eyes. Well! what’s up with him this afternoon, she thought, her spirits soaring at the friendliness of it: but when she came round the car, and went past him, he was as correct as though the smile had never been.

  ‘Good afternoon,’ she said shyly, slowing her pace a very little. She had not quite the courage to call him Saxon.

  ‘Good afternoon, Madam,’ responded he, respectfully.

  ‘Isn’t it a lovely day!’ she observed, more faintly, almost over her shoulder as she left the yard.

  ‘Yes, Madam, beautiful.’ He gave her a direct, respectful look but did not smile.

  Feeling snubbed, and cross with him, she stuck her hands into her pockets and set out along the road beside the little wood.

  He doesn’t half think no small beer of himself; been drinking pearls out of a gold cup, I should think (quoting old Miss Cattyman at the shop). I only said it was a nice day—

  Don’t be so disagreeable!

  I’ve only come to say

  How do you do-dy, do-dy, do-dy

  do-dy, do-dy-day!

  That old song of Dad’s! I do think death’s awful; it’s like half of you gone away.

  P’raps Saxon’s people are rich, and he’s doing it for a joke, she mused, swinging along, kicking at little stones. None of the Withers had mentioned Saxon to her since she had been there. She was surprised to see a new chauffeur at the station when Mrs Wither met her; she had not known that they had one. There had not been the usual exchange of small items of family news, which goes on in most families, between Teddy and his wife and the people at The Eagles. Teddy felt that his parents and sisters disapproved of his marriage with a shopgirl, and he had seen even less of them after his marriage, so they were almost strangers to his wife. An ageing chauffeur, to match the ageing maids, had driven Viola on the few occasions when she had been in the Wither car. Saxon was a new one on her.

  No, she thought, he can’t be doing it for fun. No one ’ud come to live at The Eagles for fun.

  She recalled her own disagreeable situation; and sighed.

  She now wished with all her heart that she had been brave enough to take Shirley’s advice and refuse to live at The Eagles. Good lord, girl, you’ve had one marvellous escape; don’t go and tie yourself up with The Therms again, said Shirley. Besides, you know what old Therm is; it’s your money he wants. Only in this case want must be his master, because you haven’t got any.

  But I did have, thought Viola, walking with her head bent and her hair glittering like spun glass, only I spent such a lot. Nearly a hundred pounds. I am awful.

  It had not been easy to keep from spending money while staying with Shirley; the Davises had such a good time. They ran a little car, and danced a lot, and went to many parties, and gave them, with much drink, in their pretty little house.

  All this was done on what Shirley called The Plain Van system. The Plain Van, said Shirley, was the modern Fairy Godmother. You wished: and whoopee! It was at your door.

  Viola could not stand outside the parties, nor could she sponge on Shirley; besides, she welcomed this flow of Greater London’s gaieties; it took her mind away from her grief over her father (and Teddy, of course; she was sorry about poor Teddy). She paid her share; brought a bottle to this party and stood in with the eats for that, bought a new dress for another. She went often to the hairdresser, because her hair must look immaculate, like the hair of all Shirley’s crowd. The Crowd was six or seven young matrons, with jobs, and their husbands; all very smart, all very knowing, all just a little bored with the ones they were married to and wondering just a little what Jim or Roger, Anne or Chrissie, would be like to have a flaming affair with.

  In fact, Jim, Roger, Anne and Chrissie would have been exactly like Tom, Archie, Irene and Connie, but as they lived in different bodies, there was at least the promise of Romance. The Crowd, when it spoke of Love over its morning coffee, was cynical. Men – and women, said the husbands over their drinks – were out for what they could get. But in its secret heart, The Crowd was starving for Romance, more and more of it, so that the real world dissolved, and no effort need be made to adjust oneself to the real world. When The Crowd fell, it fell hard.

  Viola remained uncorrupted. Was it because, when she was eleven, her father used to declaim to her in his fine voice:

  The moon shines bright: in such a night as this

  When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees

  And they did make no noise, in such a night

  Troilus methinks mounted the Troyan walls,

  And sighed his soul toward the Grecian tents,

  Where Cressid lay that night.

  Probably not. She liked to watch her father as he read, and to listen to the smoothly rolling tones; she felt no curiosity about what the words meant. It was only Shakespeare, and she was used to him.

  But she did not like being kissed by Jim and Roger, Tom and Archie. When they whispered that they were crazy about her, she wriggled away and suggested that they should try to get to Paris. The Crowd liked her, summing her up as a funny little thing, under-sexed, but sweet.

  She had enjoyed her three months with The Crowd. Now, it seemed impossible that she had ever had such a lovely time.

  Yet nearly all her money was gone.

  She had been afraid to refuse to live at The Eagles. She felt, strongly if not clearly, that it was up to her to go there because she had not loved Teddy as much as he had loved her. Shirley had promised to find her a job, but Viola had not been sure that she could do the sort of job that Shirley would find; she was not clever.

  On the whole, what with b
eing afraid of Mr Wither, and her conscience, and having very little money, and not wanting to sponge on Shirley, and being firmly told to do her duty and be grateful for her luck by old Miss Cattyman and the aunts in Chesterbourne, she had decided that it would be best to go.

  Here she looked up, saw a little path going into the wood, and turned down it, still with bowed head and hands in her pockets. She was planning a long letter to Shirley that she would write that evening.

  The evenings at The Eagles were almost the worst part of the twenty-four hours, because, outside the house, all was so beautiful. The sunset slowly faded into a tender twilight, the stars shone out, and the young moon, and if anyone glanced up at the tall windows of the drawing-room, a big, slow-flying bird was crossing the flushed sky on its homeward way – a heron, perhaps, or a swan from the marshes.

  ‘What became of that piece of cold pork?’ would demand Mr Wither, looking up suddenly from his newspaper.

  ‘It’s all right, dear; Cook is making some patties.’

  Mr Wither would return to the journal.

  Viola would sit with a ten-year-old novel by Berta Ruck (a lovely story, lent to her by Tina, but it only made her feel worse because the young man in it was such a darling), wondering what Shirley and The Crowd were doing, and then at a quarter-past ten it was time to go to bed, and tomorrow evening would be exactly the same, for ever, unless some awful old thing about fifty came to dinner and what was the use of that?

  So this evening, for a change, she would write to Shirley and tell her how ghastly it was, and how mouldy were all the Therms, except Tina who was really very decent only she got on your nerves because she was simply dying to get married, and not a hope, my dear, she must be forty if she’s a day. And I daren’t take the bus into Chesterbourne to see Catty and the aunts because the Therms pull such a face if I even mention THE SHOP!

  It’s funny about being married, she thought, walking deeper into the wood. I didn’t mind it, but it all seemed so ordinary, somehow, not a bit like what you read in books, and even now I don’t feel like Mrs Wither (she smiled), I feel just the same as I did when I was at school, only not so happy. Well, you wouldn’t expect a widow and an orphan to be happy, of course.

  Here she stopped her soft whistling, realizing how quiet everything was, and stared vaguely about her.

  The broad light above the road had gradually gone, veiled away by branch after branch laden with transparent, rosy-dun leaves, stiff and fresh. Young birches, and dark festoons of vigorous ivy matted on the oak trunks, helped to make this gradual veil and seclusion, while a feeling of freshness, solitude and peace told her that she was in the heart of the little wood. She looked up into the delicate shades of a massive bough, thinking, ‘It’s lovely here.’ The path still sloped gently down, and under a hollow made by fern curling over and by hazel thickets, she heard water running.

  Down by the hidden stream, so piled over with dried branches that she only noticed it on her second glance, was a little lean-to made of rusty corrugated iron. It stood in a blackened patch of ground, where white ashes were gently spraying under the wind.

  As she looked, round the corner of the hut came a head covered to the shoulders with thick grey curls like a cavalier’s, and a dirty sturdy old man came out. He stared back at her, and presently called:

  ‘’Ullo, ducks,’ nodding in a satisfied way. His voice was low, hoarse and cautious, as though he were about to tell a secret, and he wore a coat and trousers of sacking, neatly sewn with little flat pads of dirty newspaper. On his feet were huge broken boots carefully tied together with string.

  Viola began to move away. She thought that he was mad. She knew who he was: The Hermit. Occasionally there was a paragraph about him in the Chesterbourne Record, but she had not known that he lived in this little wood; she was rather sorry he did.

  ‘Don’t you be afraid o’ me,’ he called, louder. ‘I know ’oo you are all right. Young Mrs Wither up The Eagles. Ain’t that right?’

  She nodded, reassured. His eyes were very small and their brightness made her think of an animal’s, but they were sane.

  ‘Knew you was,’ said the Hermit, whose conspirator voice and the wild logic of whose dress contrasted curiously with his gossiping tone. ‘Knew your Late by sight, too. Fat, weren’t ’e?’

  This was true; and, like most true remarks, rude. She said nothing.

  ‘You ever ’eard o’ me?’ he went on. ‘Up The Eagles, I mean?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘What, not from old Shak-per-swaw?’

  ‘Old who?’ She moved a little nearer down the slope forgetting her mistrust in curiosity.

  ‘Old Shak-per-Swaw. Your Late’s dad. All for Number One, see. Shak-per-Swaw.’

  She only saw that he meant Mr Wither.

  ‘’E knows me well enough, old Shak-per-Swaw does. Always on about me to the Council ’e is, wanting to ’ave me turned out. But bleshyer, they don’ take no notice of ’im. I don’t do no ’arm, and Mr Spring puts in a word for me now and again, so I’m all right. Like to come inside?’

  He jerked his head at the frowsy hut.

  She shook her head, smiling.

  ‘Ain’t much doin’ up The Eagles, is there?’ he asked suddenly, with such a violent wink that she thought it was a spasm of his eye.

  She shook her head again, still smiling.

  She had never been taught by her father that people must be kept in their places and that because A has enough to eat and enough to wear, B, who has not, must be respectful to him. She had not seriously caught the infection of snobbery from Miss Cattyman and her aunts, who had it chronically. Her father would have called the Hermit ‘A wonderful old bit of Shakespearian character, Viola, ripe and rare’; and though she did not like his wink, it did not occur to her to think him over-familiar.

  However, she felt an ashamed loyalty to Teddy and his relatives, so she answered with more reserve than was natural to her:

  ‘It’s a bit lonely.’

  ‘Ah. Not thinking o’ getting married again?’

  ‘No,’ laughing.

  ‘Not cold in bed o’ nights?’ and this time it was clear that the wink was not a spasm.

  But at that she really did move on, saying ‘Good afternoon’ in a prim voice and blushing.

  ‘Goo’-bye, ducks!’ called the Hermit, staring yearningly after her; then louder, ‘In a bit of a ’urry this afternoon, ain’t yer?’

  She hurried on, taking no notice though he called after her several times, and climbed the gentle slope until she found another path which led her to the road. The trees here were beeches, shooting up into the fairy blue of the sky and making a murmuring green cavern with their leaves. Here she was near Victor Spring’s house; the red and white turrets gleamed through the fence of quick-growing conifers which he had had planted to screen his residence, and presently she passed the white gates of the drive.

  She walked slowly, staring, and wondering what the people who lived there were doing. He would be in London, of course; but she could hear laughter and cries and the soft energetic thud! of balls on overstrung rackets coming from the tennis courts, the whirr of a mowing-machine and the joyous yelping of a young dog. Happy house! where everyone was busy and entertained all day long!

  This road was lonely, but presently she came to a crossroads, one of which led to the main road from Colchester to Bracing Bay, and here there was a settlement of iron shacks, kiosks and a filling-station, with one or two little cottages so plastered with TEA notices and NEW-LAID EGGS notices and CIGARETTE notices and LADIES and GENTLEMEN notices that their formerly decent faces could barely be seen. Two taller cottages, without any notices, standing half-retired in the green shades of the wood, caught her glance, and she sauntered along the path which led to them.

  They were joined together, two grey little buildings with peaked roofs and ‘St Edmunds Villas 1893’ on a scroll across their front. One was empty and falling to ruin, with broken windows and a sealed door round whic
h the spring grass was blowing. The front door of the other stood open before a patch of glowing green grass thinly sown with the cool purple-blue heads of bluebells.

  Viola lingered to admire the flowers, and to stare into the house’s little parlour. An attempt had been made there at elegance; the walls had recently been re-covered with a cheap buff-coloured paper, and two or three dim old watercolours and photographs were sparsely arranged on them as though someone had just learned that over-crowded walls are unfashionable. A shiny new wireless cabinet, made of cheapest varnished wood, stood in one corner and pieces of bright blue material had been arranged over the shabby seats of the horsehair chairs. Two rugs from Marks and Spencer’s, the colour of mud, covered the most worn parts of the carpet.

  Even to Viola’s casual glance the little parlour looked depressing and mean. The only pretty thing in it was a bunch of Solomon’s Seal stuffed into a Woolworth vase on the round Victorian table, and even the long leaves and thick white bells of these were limp, as though dying for water.

  As she lingered staring, the door into the parlour was jerked open. Someone came in, glanced sharply at her and slammed the front door. Embarrassed, she walked on.

  The woman who had slammed the door hurried back into the scullery, whence came a cloud of smelly steam; and presently a low dismal sound began, which gradually increased until words were distinguishable. Even at this stage the noise could hardly be called talking; it was rather a sort of grizzling through parted lips while the hands of the grizzler were hard at work.

  It was Mrs Caker, complaining about everything.

  ‘… proper mucky, they are, worse’n worse every week. If I weren’t afeared o’ losin’ the work, I’d speak to she. Aye, mingy owd cat, she is, sendin’ blankets out ter wash ’stead o’ to the larndry, and her dog’s pillow-covers … disgrace, that’s what they are, disgrace. Aye, if it weren’t for the money, that’s what I’d do, for sure, on’y how’m I ter know he won’t walk out of the house one day and leave maye wi’ on’y the washin’, an’ where’ll I be then? Proper hard he is, an’ cunnin’. Wish I know’d what he gets … ah, wish I knew! The maids up there might know; count I might ask ’em, on’y they’re soo high an’ mighty. He might tell maye, his own mother, aye, he might. ’Tis his dooty, for sure, to tell maye.’