She was dozing off when he left her; he had to run over to Hampstead to see his mother; she had telephoned to him rather urgently. He promised Caroline to be back in time to take her out to dinner. Before he went he reminded her of the tape-recorder.
‘Don’t forget to press that lever if anything should happen,’ he said. ‘Sure you’ll be all right?’
‘Perfectly O.K.,’ said Caroline drowsily. ‘I could sleep for a fortnight.’
‘Good. Sleep well. And if you want anything, you know, just ring my mother. I’ll be over there myself in about twenty minutes.’
Caroline was very quickly asleep. And even as she slept, she felt herself appreciating her sleep; told herself, this was the best sleep she had had for six months. She told herself to sleep on, for she would wake up presently, and then she would mean business.
At this point in the narrative, it might be as well to state that the characters in this novel are all fictitious, and do not refer to any living persons whatsoever.
Tap-tappity-tap. At this point in the narrative … Caroline sprang up and pressed the lever on the dictaphone. Then she snatched the notebook and pencil which she had placed ready, and took down in shorthand the paragraph above; she did not start to tremble until after the chanting chorus had ended. She lay trembling in the darkening room, and considered the new form of her suffering, now that she was well again and committed to health.
FOUR
There were chrysanthemums and asters in the bowls, chrysanthemums and asters almost discernible on the faded loose upholstery in the drawing-room. They needed to be replaced, but Helena Manders had never replaced them, in order that the Knighthood, which had occurred when the covers were already past their best, should make no difference. The Manders put up with many discomforts so that the Knighthood should make no difference. The fire was lit because of Laurence coming. No fires till November, as a rule.
‘Are you in a hurry?’ Helena said, because now Laurence had arrived and was looking at his watch. He did this because he knew that when his mother wanted to see him about any particular business, she would usually forget the business until he was ready to go, causing him to stay for dinner or to stay the night; or she would forget the business until after he had gone, in which case she would ring him again and he would have to go again.
Laurence did not mind visiting his parents at Hampstead, he even enjoyed going there to stay for meals, or for days and weeks; only this had to be in his own time, when the time was ripe, when the time came round for him to say to himself, ‘I would like to go over to Hampstead.’ When he was summoned there, he couldn’t be bothered greatly.
And so he looked at his watch. He said, ‘I’ve only got an hour. I’m dining with Caroline. I would have brought her, only she’s resting.’
‘How is Caroline?’
‘She says she’s better. I think she is, really.’
‘Do you? And the hallucinations, have they disappeared? Poor girl, she wouldn’t tell me much.’
‘I don’t know,’ said Laurence. ‘I don’t know if she’s better. She says she feels better.’
‘Not going into a nursing home? That would be best.’
‘No. I’m taking her down to Grandmother’s tomorrow, in fact.’
‘I am worried, Laurence.’
She looked worried. Her face had no confidence. There was a ladder in her stocking. She had said she wanted to see him urgently, and within the first five minutes she was coming to the point. There were other signs that she was very worried.
‘I asked you to come, Laurence, because I’m so worried.’ He sat on the arm of her chair, he put his arm round her shoulder, and said, ‘Is it to do with Caroline and me?’
‘No,’ she said.
Laurence got up and poured himself a drink. His mother had not offered him a drink. She was worried.
‘Georgina Hogg came to see me yesterday.’
‘Oh! What did she want?’
‘I don’t know. She told me an extraordinary story. I’m so worried. ‘‘About Caroline? I told you Caroline had left St Philumena’s on Georgina Hogg’s account. Can you blame her?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘You shouldn’t have sent Caroline to that place. You know what Georgina’s like.’
‘Well, Father Jerome agreed —’
‘But he doesn’t know Georgina Hogg. You should never have given her that job. What took you to do that? She’s such a frightful advertisement for the Church.’
‘I just thought,’ said Helena. ‘One tries to be charitable. I thought. She said a miracle seemed to have brought her back to me. I thought, “Perhaps she has changed.” One never knows, in our Faith. Any-thing can happen to anyone.
‘Well, Georgina hasn’t changed apparently. Still the same psychological thug as she always was. I think honestly she’s to blame for Caroline’s relapse. She must have touched a raw nerve.
Helena said, ‘Pour me a drink, Laurence.’
‘What will you have?’
‘Same as you.
Laurence gave her a drink as strong as his own, which she didn’t object to on this occasion.
‘What’s on your mind, darling? What does Georgina want now?’
‘I don’t know. She came to tell me something.’
‘Felt it was her duty, as usual? What did she say about Caroline?’
‘That’s right, that’s what she said, about it being her duty. She didn’t say much about Caroline but she told me an extraordinary story about my mother going in for some terribly illegal business. She suggested that Mother was a receiver of stolen property.’
‘My dear, what made her say that?’
Helena was apologetic. She didn’t quite know how to tell Laurence what her protected servant had done.
‘I don’t quite know how to tell you, Laurence. I thought Georgina had changed. And of course she’s got a justification, an excuse. Caroline didn’t leave her address. She says a letter came for Caroline the day after she left. Georgina took upon herself to open it, just to see the address of the writer, she said, meaning to return it. Then she found the letter came from you. She read it, as she felt that was her duty to me. You see, Laurence, she has an excuse for everything.’
‘But that’s illegal. No one has any right to open a letter addressed to someone else. Only the Post Office can do that, when the person it’s addressed to can’t be traced. And even then, officially they only look at the signature and the address on the letter. No one at all has a right to read the substance of a letter addressed to someone else,’ Laurence said. He was fairly raging.
‘I told her that, Laurence. I’m worried, dear.’
‘What did she mean, she felt it was her duty to you to read my letter to Caroline?’
‘I don’t know. Perhaps she thought there was something between you of which I wasn’t aware. I put her right on that score.
‘Did you tell her it’s a serious crime to do what she’s done?’ Laurence was on his third whisky.
‘Hush, dear,’ said his mother, forgetting his size, ‘I don’t know if we’re in a position to talk about crime to Georgina Hogg. You must tell me all you know about Grandmother. You should have told me right away.’
‘Did the Hogg show you my letter, or did she only tell you what I wrote?’
‘She offered to let me read it. I refused.’
‘Good,’ said Laurence. ‘That keeps our own standards up.’
His mother smiled a little and looked at him. But she returned to her anxiety. ‘Georgina was very high-minded about what you wrote about her, whatever it was.’
‘She didn’t offer to return my letter to me, I suppose? It’s my property.’
‘No, she refused,’ said Helena.
‘And what’s her excuse for that?’