“How old were you?” asked John.
“I was eight,” said Michael.
“It was as well the fear of poverty could obsess your conscious mind in boyhood,” said John. “It was some sort of anaesthetic. Were you poor?”
Michael told him about Mr. Davidson and the inkstains on the table, about his schooldays and his early struggles to write. He realized as he talked that he had never told anyone these things. He had never told Daphne. She had never shown any wish to enter into his house of life, to share his experience. He had wished sometimes, in the days when he had loved her, that she would ask him into hers, but she never had. He doubted if any couple in love could have known less about each other. He and John walked more and more slowly, taking no notice now of the beauty about them but unconsciously eased by it.
“Once your terror of wounds and death emerged you were probably one of the bravest men in the war,” said John. “For you had no serious failure of nerve, did you, until the final one?”
“What do you mean by failure of nerve?” asked Michael. “Good lord, my nerves were in ribbons the whole way through.”
“So were mine,” said John. “But you still fought and were considered an efficient officer?”
“Yes. I was considered efficient.”
“Which is more than I was,” said John, smiling. “After one naval engagement, and getting torpedoed once only, I kept seeing mutilated bodies where there were none, and that sort of thing, and any efficiency I might have had vanished. But complete failure of nerve didn’t happen to me until I spent all night on a makeshift raft roped to two men who became corpses overnight. Then they put me in a nerve hospital. I’ve never been so ashamed in my life. Had the means of self-destruction been at hand, as it was in your case, I might have done what you did.”
“I’ve only managed to make two great friends in my life,” said Michael. “One was Bill Harris and the other was a chap called Simon Matthews. He was killed beside me. It was that evening I couldn’t aim straight into my own head. I’ve never been much good at friendship.”
“I don’t think I have,” said John. “Too self-absorbed and introspective. We’re much alike. My childhood was not unlike yours, though far easier. My mother died young and my father was a drunkard. My God! How hard it was to fight the drink after I came out of hospital. I’ve often wondered how I dared to marry my wife. Yet one must dare these things. Even men like you and me who have no trust in ourselves. Without these desperate plunges we’d do nothing but gibber in a ditch.” He turned to Michael and smiled at him with extraordinary sweetness. “Yet I’m glad you funked Daphne. It meant I got her. But I think you treated her badly. If you felt yourself too much of a worm to marry her why didn’t you tell her what you’d done and leave the decision to her?”
“We’d never told each other things. And there was something else. I was afraid I couldn’t support her. After I got back from Crete I tried to take my mind off what had happened by writing. I couldn’t. I was in a panic then. No more best sellers might mean a lean time for my wife and kids as well as myself.”
“But surely, after all your success, you’d got some capital behind you?”
“No,” said Michael.
“What had you done with it all?” Michael hesitated. “Out with it. I want to know.”
“Given it to Bill Harris’s wife, for Bill and the kids. There are four kids.”
“Yes,” said John. “I hope I’d have done the same in your place. You fought well in Africa, later?”
“Yes, I think so. I felt less fear there. I was too wretched to care.”
“And after the war?”
“The solicitor I had been with before the war took me back into partnership. Then he died and I was in a panic I’d not make a success of things without him. The old fear of poverty started to play me up and I tried to write again. This time I found I could do it and I wrote a play that I thought was the best thing I’d ever done. But the powers that be were doubtful and no one would back it financially. I had in my hands at that time a sum of money that I was reinvesting for a client. I was so absolutely certain of the play’s success that I backed it with that. It was odd, but at the time I hardly realized what I was doing. I’d more or less lost all self-respect by that time, and that’s a sure way of blunting one’s integrity. The play failed. Mercifully my client was an exceedingly rich man and the loss to him was negligible. But he wanted his pound of flesh.”
“Surely, with your reputation, there must have been those who would have advanced the money to save you from prison even if they wouldn’t advance it to back your play?” asked John.
“Possibly,” said Michael. “I’d a host of acquaintances, if few friends. There might have been a few who’d have helped me.”
“Didn’t you ask them?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“I was not court-martialled for attempted suicide,” said Michael. “I thought it was time I paid the price.”
“I see,” said John. “Do you mind if we sit down? It’s amazingly warm, and I can never just walk through this bit here. I’m obliged to stop and take a look at it.”
A grass-covered bank sloped from the road to the river and here the rhododendrons grew thickly. John led the way to one that had wide spreading branches and sat down with it at his back, Michael beside him. Behind them was the hill upon which the manor house was built, wooded upon this side with mountain ash, silver birches and hawthorns, and a stream ran down through the wood, crossed the road under a bridge and ran out into the river quite close to them. Behind them in the wood there was a waterfall and they could hear its music clearly above the singing of the birds. In front of them the river widened out and a little further down it turned a corner before the last straight reach to the sea. The air was fresh here, with a tang of salt in it, but the sun was warm and there was still no wind. A rowing boat was anchored close to them and the small ripples slapped its sides. There were a few gold-colored clouds in the clear sky and the water mirrored them. Moorhens were scurrying about close to the banks, some ducks were standing on their heads, and a few gulls sailed slowly and gracefully overhead, but the great swan was motionless on the water. John gazed at it and Michael thought he was forgotten. He was thankful. He was also thankful that John had made no comment whatever upon his story. The relief of having told it was so great that he wanted no other. He did not want to be whitewashed or excused. Whitewash brought no comfort. The real comfort was to have one’s sins and weaknesses not explained away but understood and shared. John’s identification of himself with Michael in so much was what he needed. He found strength in it, as he had found strength in the shame that he had offered to Daphne and shared with her in the garden. It struck him that it can be as much by our weakness as by our virtue that we can serve each other. He lay back on the grass and looked up into the great cavern of cool green that he did not doubt was the white rhododendron, and he believed it was the yunnanense. He tried to imagine what it must be like covered with great white scented blossoms, the only white rhododendron among the flaming masses of crimson and orange and gold, each petal of each flower most delicately curved, like the feathers of the peerless white swan over there. As much at ease with John as though he were alone he began to speak the words of the poem he had commended to Mary.
“O silver-throated Swan
Struck, struck! a golden dart
Clear through thy breast has gone
Home to thy heart.
Thrill, thrill, O silver throat!
O silver trumpet, pour
Love for defiance back
On him who smote!
And brim, brim o’er
With love; and ruby-dye thy track
Down thy last living reach
Of river, sail the golden light. . .
Enter the sun’s heart. . . even teach,
O wondrous-gifted Pain, teach thou
The god to love, let him learn how.”
“Is the swan the symbol of death, John?” he asked.
“Of course,” said John.
“In these verses, surely of love?”
“Same thing,” said John. “A killing thing, love. The symbols are interchangeable. So far as I know a swan is the only bird, except the nightingale, who keeps the same mate for life. When I was a boy, sitting here with the whiteness of this bush in bloom blinding my eyes, I heard a swan singing. I did not see him for he was round the corner. But they found his dead body later. You can laugh if you like but I maintain that I heard him singing.”
“Why should I laugh?” asked Michael. “When I was a boy I could get inside a foxglove bell. Children do these things. What was the swan’s song like?”
“Can you imagine a Seraph singing?”
“No.”
“It was like that. Something you can’t imagine.”
“Imagination is much overrated,” said Michael. “It takes you nowhere really. ‘Enter the sun’s heart.’ I agree. I have ceased to think of death as irretrievable destruction. That is, invariably so. Is it conceivable that it could be?”
“The other day,” said John, “I was at the deathbed of a well-to-do, well-thought-of and respectable old lady. I thought her death the end. It was easy as deaths go but it was to me more horrible than any I witnessed in the war.”
“Why?”
“I don’t think anything existed for her but herself and her own comfort. She loved no one. ‘Charity. . . without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before Thee.’ It struck me she had died in that sense some while before dissolution came to her body. But how can I know? We know nothing.”
“How can one know if one lives?” asked Michael. “There are times when one feels made of ice.”
“A capacity to offer something,” said John. “If it’s only your shame. A willingness to pay the price. If you can do either of these things you’re very much alive, and very much in love.”
“In love?” asked Michael quickly.
“With whoever receives your offering and the payment of your debt. And when it is God to Whom they are willingly paid the debt becomes a free gift. That’s one of the particular mercies.”
Clear in the still air came the sound of the church clock striking seven and John leapt to his feet. “Good lord! And I’ve a meeting at half-past six!”
They hurried distressfully towards home, but presently John slackened speed.
“Why hurry?” he asked gloomily. “The meeting will be over long before I get there.”
“And why be distressed about it?” asked Michael. “Surely your parishioners know you by this time?”
“God help them, they surely do!” said John, and became more cheerful, telling Michael of the comic situations which had arisen through forgotten funerals and weddings. “And talking of weddings,” he said, “I think what I said about them just now was true.”
“Did you say anything about them?” asked Michael.
“I think I said a couple of things about marriage and women in general. I said, apropos of my marriage to Daphne, that utterly unworthy though I was, one must dare these things. If the woman loves you, or needs you, or both (for if she loves you she does need you) I think that’s true. Also it’s not your business to decide if a woman you love should, or should not, marry you. It’s her business. Tell her all about yourself and leave the decision to her. God knows it’s trouble enough having to make one’s own decisions in life without having to make other people’s too.”
“It’s much easier to make other people’s decisions,” said Michael, smiling. “Also isn’t it sometimes necessary to protect the young from making irreparable mistakes?”
“Certainly I should protect Winkle from deciding to see if the river would bear her weight,” said John. “But once men and women reach physical maturity it’s difficult to say who’s old and who’s young. Common sense and good judgment can develop early, in a man or girl of twenty for instance, or not at all, as with myself. Good lord, there’s old Arbourfield! He’s as late as I am. If I can catch him I’ll be in time to say the final prayer. Good-bye, Michael, see you tomorrow!”
His voice faded away as he raced down the river path. Beyond the field that sloped up to the vicarage Pizzle bridge spanned the river, and an ancient farmer in an ancient car could be seen surmounting it. John’s wild shout brought him to a standstill on the farther side of the bridge. Michael followed slowly, delighting in the spectacle of John hurling his loose-limbed body into the car. At such moments he seemed to have a greater number of arms and legs than most men.
“And in the end how easy it was,” thought Michael. “How easy he made it, even as Daphne did.”
He walked slowly back to the manor, walked into the drawing room, where Miss Wentworth was patching sheets, and said, “Miss Wentworth, would you mind if we asked Winkle’s form mistress to tea one day?”
“Certainly,” said Miss Wentworth calmly. “I’ve always heard good accounts of the young woman. She might like to see the pigs.”
“Yes,” said Michael. “That’s what I thought. Thank you.”
Chapter 17
1
Mrs. Belling’s nephew, a London business man whom she had not seen since his boyhood, hurried down for the funeral, arranged that the house and furniture should be auctioned and hurried off again. He had however been kindly. Hearing that Miss Giles was thinking of starting a school of her own he presented her with the children’s desks and other school furniture as a gift, shook her warmly by the hand and wished her well.
“He looked such a dried-up sort of stick you wouldn’t have thought he’d be so generous, would you?” said Mary.
They were engaged in the detested task of sorting and packing Mrs. Belling’s clothes, which were to be sent to a charity. The room had been thoroughly cleaned, and they had the windows open, but even so they hated it and did the job the two of them together, never one alone. For though the evil that had gathered about the focal point of Mrs. Belling was dispersed now it seemed to Mary that something of it still clung to her possessions. There was no question of a fight now, the fight was over, but there was still a taint in the air. She’d be thankful when she and Giles were out of Oaklands, staying at the farmhouse up in the hills where they had taken rooms, with Annie at her cousin’s not far away.
“People are generous,” said Miss Giles. “Look at yourself, Mary, selling your little pearl necklace to give us this holiday. And you can’t really like me at all.”
“Yes, I do,” said Mary. “I didn’t, but now I do.”
“Why?” asked Miss Giles.
“One doesn’t know why one suddenly, or perhaps gradually, likes people,” said Mary. “It’s all part of it, I suppose.”
“Part of what?”
“The interweaving.”
“I’ve never been able to see much pattern in life myself,” said Miss Giles.
“Nor have I,” said Mary. “But I do sometimes feel myself being pushed through the eye of a needle. I can’t describe the feeling, but I feel it. What about the blackboards? Did my cousin throw those in?”
“Anything to do with the school, he said.”
“The boarders’ beds had better go in the sale,” said Mary. “Thank heaven, there’ll be no room for boarders in a small house. We’ll have our evenings to ourselves. Think of the peace of it. Books, and good music on the radio. A small garden to look after, and a cat. You don’t mind if I have a cat, do you?”
“No. But I can’t expect to keep you long, Mary. You’ll get married.”
“Certainly I shall,” said Mary. “I’ve intended marriage for myself ever since I was old enough to intend anything. But until my wedding day I stay with you. And at the moment, Giles, Dickon has not proposed to me.”
/> “Do you think I take The Secret Garden, and the rest of the children’s storybooks?” asked Miss Giles. “They’re hardly school books.”
“You take them,” said Mary firmly. “There’s Undine among them, and Hans Andersen. They’re literature and you’re going to teach English literature.”
Miss Giles suddenly sat down on the floor in a panic. “O’Hara, how has it happened that I am to restart this school? Who’s idea was it?”
“No one seems to remember now,” said Mary. “But someone must have had the idea. I think it’s a very good idea.”
“But should a woman who is brutal to children have a school?”
“Certainly not,” said Mary. “I can think of nothing more frightful.”
Miss Giles smiled. “But O’Hara, it’s not very easy for a leopard to change his spots.”
“Your spots aren’t a part of the pelt,” said Mary. “They’re only accretions.” And then she blushed furiously. She could have kicked herself. There she went again. Poor old Giles would think she was referring to her acne. She stole a cautious glance at old Giles and found she was laughing; she also noticed that her acne was much better.
“How’s your indigestion?” she asked.
“Better since Annie has been taking more trouble over the cooking,” said Miss Giles. “And since I’ve been able to order what I like for lunch.”
Mary made a mental note that one of the chief causes of indigestion is frustration, and said aloud, “You shall always order what you like at Farthing Cottage.”
Miss Giles once more panicked. “O’Hara, we’ve not even seen Farthing Cottage yet.”
“Mr. Wentworth has got the order to view,” said Mary. “He’ll be here at three o’clock. It’s two-forty now.”
“But O’Hara, I’ve no capital,” lamented Miss Giles. “And nor have you. We can only buy the cottage on borrowed money, or on a mortgage. It’s most dangerous. The debt we’d have round our necks would be appalling. And how do we know we’d make a success of this school?”