`I wish I was strong and brave and going to be all right,' said Lily.
`Mind you don't step on the snails,' said Rose. 'There's a snails' dance going on after all that rain.'
The grass, illumined by the sunset light, was covered widi glossy worms and wandering snails.
`I love snails,' said Lily, 'my grandmother attracted them, they came into the house. Of' course snails do get in everywhere, I found one in my flat the other day. My grandmothci could tame wild things, they came to her. She used the snails for telepathy.'
`How did she do that?' said Rose, who had heard quite a lot, indeed enough, about Lily's horrible grandmother who had the evil eye and whose name nobody dared to utter.
`To send a message to someone at a distance, each of you has a snail, and you tell your snail what you want to say, and the person with the other snail gets the message. You have to put a spell on the snails of'course.'
Rose wondered how much of this nonsense Lily really believed. They went into the house.
They had supper in the kitchen at the big kitchen-table which Annushka had scrubbed so much that the grainy wood had become a pale waxen yellow. Rose let Lily cook. They had an omelette, and some spiced cabbage which Lily had felicitously improvised, then cheddar cheese, and Cox's Orange pippins whose wrinkled skins were now yellower than the table. During the two days which Lily had spent at Boyars they had eaten frugally, drinking quite a lot of wine however. Mousebrook, stretched out into a very long cat on the warm tiles at the back of the stove, watched them with his baleful golden stare. Rose pulled him out and set him on her knee, stroking him firmly, but he refused to purr and soon twisted away and returned to his warm shrine. His fur, usually so electrically smooth, had felt dry and stiffened. After supper they sat with whisky beside the wood fire in the drawing room. They were easy together. Rose felt increasingly fond of Lily, iliough her restlessness wearied her, and she was irked by Lily's continual attempts to prompt confidences. Lily had talked a lot to Rose about her childhood and about Gulliver. Rose had not reciprocated. But she was glad of Lily's company and touched by her affection. They retired to bed, at any rate to their bedrooms, early.
Alone in her room Rose stood at the window. A sick moon had risen among the rush of'ragged clouds. A car was passing along the Roman Road, its headlights creating faint flying impressions of walls and trees. Then it was gone and clouds covered the moon and the countryside was pitch dark and silent. Rose switched on the electric fire. In winter the central heating, switched off in much of the house when there were no guests, made little impression on the draughty spaces. Rose could feel the proximity of empty unheated rooms. She had been able to chatter with Lily but felt now, as she walked up and down, that the gift of speech had left her, a recurrent sensation as if her mouth were filled with stones. She was cut off, dumb, alone. The image of her stone-obstructed mouth and weighted tongue reminded her that that morning, visiting the stables to fetch apples, she had picked up one of Sinclair's stones. It was on the dressing table, a flat black stone banded with white lines with a long crack on one side, as if it were bursting open, showing a glittering gem-like interior. She held the stone in her hand and inspected it carefully. There was so much dense individuality, so much to notice, in the small thing. Sinclair, on some very distant day, had chosen it out of' thousands and millions of stones on some beach in Yorkshire, Norfolk, Dorset, Scotland, Ireland. The stone made her intensely sad as if it were demanding her protection and her pity. Was it glad to be chosen? How accidental' everything was, and how spirit was scattered everywhere, beautiful, and awful. She put the stone down and put her hands to her face, suddenly frightened of the darkness outside and of the quietness of the house. Suppose Annushka were to die? Suppose she is already dead, and the house knows it? The house was creaking in the wind like an old wooden ship. There were presences, footsteps.
I'm losing my nerve, thought Rose, I'm losing my courage, I'm losing my people. Jean has stopped loving me. How do I know that? Can it be true? Will I ever talk tojcan again, with openness and love, looking into each other's eyes? She said I was living in a dream world where everyone was nice and good and every year had the same pattern. I have never been deified by love. I could have married Gerard if I'd really tried. Then, as it had been suddenly sharply uttered in the room, she heard Crimond's voice say 'Rose!' as he had said it and so startled her when she came to him from Jean to make sure he had not shot himself. We've neither of us ever been married, love has to be awakened. Supposing I lose Gerard, Rose thought, suppose I have actually lost him? Can I lose him, after so many years? This is what this is all about, this press of ghosts.
In the last weeks, especially in the last days, it seemed that her relations with Gerard had simply broken down. Reeve, now back in Yorkshire, kept-ringing up, asking her to decide about the cruise. Rose kept giving evasive answers. Yet why should she, why did she feel she must consult Gerard's convenience, why should it matter to him if she were absent for four weeks with her family? Blood was thicker than water. But the thought of Gerard not minding what she did or where she was, touched her with deadly cold as if one of Lily's ghosts had brushed past her. Rose had not seen Gerard since the night when the book had been delivered. She had expected the usual chats by telephone, suggestions of a meeting. He must know how interested, how anxious, she must be about his reactions to the book. But Gerard had not telephoned, and when she telephoned him he had been cold and brief, not able to see her. She had not dared to ask him anything, about the cruise, about the book. Later his telephone did not answer, and she imagined him there frowning, letting it ring, knowing it was her. Supposing – oh supposing all sorts of things – supposing he had fallen in love with that boy who looked like Sinclair, supposing he were spending all his time with Crimond discussing the book, supposing…? I've lost him, thought Rose. Yes, perhaps, I could have married him if I'd been a different person, if I'd had more courage, if I'd had more luck, if I'd understood something particular (I don't know what) about sex, if I'd become a god. But how much I love him and have always loved him and will always love him.
`Rose, please come on the cruise, you will, won't you?' `Rose, do come, it'll make all the difference.'
`We'll have such fun, please!'
`All right,' said Rose, `I'll come.'
She could no more resist the entreaties of Reeve and Neville and Gillian, and was extremely touched by their urgent wish that she should accompany them. She was extremely grateful.
It was nearly two weeks since Lily's visit to Boyars, and during this time spring had made its tentative appearance, glorifying London, even in its shabbiest regions, with smells of earth and flowers and glimpses of leaves and sunshine. Gideon Fairfax was giving a party in the house at Notting Hill. Leonard Fairfax was home from America, bringing his friend Conrad Lomas with him. Gideon had asked Reeve and his children, said by Rose to be in town, and Neville had brought Francis Reckitt, son of their Yorkshire neighbour, who had travelled down with them. Gideon's favourite New York'art dealer, Albert Labowsky, from whom he had just acquired the coveted Beckmann drawings, was also present. Rose could hear the American voices, distinct like the cries of unusual birds. Tamar was there, and Violet, and some friends of Pat and Gideon unknown to Rose. Tamar was shepherding a Miss Luckhurst, a retired school teacher who wrote detective stories. There was also in tow a very thin very young man said to be not only a parson but Tamar's godfather. Rose was surprised to see Father McAlister, conspicuous in his black cassock. Pat was dispensing Gideon's special tangerine cocktail. Of course Gerard had been asked, but, although some people were already leaving, he had not appeared.