‘Nicky…’
‘Darling, it’s not the slightest use your saying Nicky to me in that tone of voice. The gloves are off and the sword is out of the scabbard, and any other nice mixed metaphors you can think of. In other words, we’re going to have the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Your mother started trying to separate us seven years ago. She made you believe that she had only a short time to live, and that it was your duty to stay with her. After this had gone on for two years there was a final blow-up. I’d been worn down to the point of saying we would live at Grove Hill and I’d go up and down to my job on the Janitor. Right at the end I lost my head to the extent of suggesting we should take over the top floor of the house. I must have been crazy, but she wouldn’t even have that. She threw a heart attack, and Barrington said she might die if she went on agitating herself about your getting married. Of course what he ought to have done was to tell us to get on with it and confront her with a fait accompli. She was, and is, much too fond of herself to take any serious risks once she knew the game was up.’
‘Nicky… Nicky… what is the use…’ She wasn’t crying now, just sitting there, her hands slack in her lap, her eyes imploring him.
‘Quite a lot. That is a statement of the situation up to date, just to make sure that we are both thinking on the same lines. Now we’ll get down to what we are going to do about it.’
‘There isn’t anything we can do. Everything is just the same as it was five years ago. Mother hasn’t changed, and she won’t.’
He laughed.
‘Don’t be nonsensical! Five years – no, as much as seven years ago – she was supposed to be going to die at any moment. Well, she didn’t, and she hasn’t and she isn’t going to. Ella says she takes a lot of care of herself and keeps you waiting on her hand and foot. She’ll probably live to an ornamental ninety, with everyone running her errands and saying how wonderful she is. I don’t want to say anything I oughtn’t to, but if people can only prolong their lives by being vampires and sucking the last drop of blood out of everyone round them they would be a great deal better dead.’
‘Nicky!’
‘Well, they would! But you needn’t worry – she’ll live as long as she can! And what we’re going to do is what we ought to have done five years ago – first find her a companion, next walk round the corner and get married. You can have three days to break the companion in, and then we go off on our honeymoon. If your mother behaves well, we’ll find something here. I’m writing a book and going on contributing to the Janitor. If she doesn’t behave well, we’ll go and live on the other side of London, and Barrington and the companion can have her all to themselves. My own feeling is that once she knows it’s no go she’ll be all out to make the best terms she can. You see, it’s really quite easy.’
She shook her head slowly.
‘She wants to sell the house,’ she said.
‘And go on a cruise. I know – Ella told me.’
‘We’ve had a very good offer. Mother seems to have told Mr Martin that she would like to go on a cruise, and he sent up a Mr and Mrs Blount with an order to view. Mr Blount says his wife has taken a fancy to the house, and every time I say we don’t want to sell he offers more. He has got up to seven thousand.’
‘That’s fantastic!’
‘I know. It worries me. There are two houses just round the corner in Linden Road, and they are practically the same as ours. Mr Martin says the Blounts won’t even go and look at them. And this morning a man came round with an order from Jones, the other agent. I told him about the Linden Road houses, and he said he wasn’t interested – what he wanted was The Lodge. He said he used to pass it when he was a boy and think he would like to live there.’
‘You don’t want to sell?’
‘No.’
‘Why?’
She looked distressed.
‘It would be so difficult. You see the house is mine, and that has always been a grievance. But as long as we’re living in it the grievance is more or less in the background and she can pretend that it isn’t there. But if the house was sold and the money was in the bank in my name it would be quite dreadful. She is already talking about using some of it for this cruise and saying of course the only thing to do with capital is to live on it.’
He said quickly, ‘She can’t do that if it’s yours.’
She moved her hands as if she was pushing something away.
‘If I once said that, it would be the end – it really would. There would be the most terrible scene. She would never forget it, and she would never forgive me. No, I shall just have to tell Mr Martin that I won’t sell, no matter what they offer, and leave it at that. I shall have to remind him that the house is mine, and ask him not to talk to my mother any more.’
He leaned forward and took her hands.
‘When will you marry me?’
‘Nicky, I can’t!’
‘I wish you wouldn’t talk nonsense! My Uncle Oswald has left me a competence. He is the one who was my guardian. I never liked him – nobody did. He used to quarrel with everyone and make a new will every six months or so. Owing to my being off the map I missed my turn in the quarrels, and the current will left me quite a lot of money. We can buy your mother a companion and be able to live very comfortably on what is left. We shall in fact be affluent, because every thing has been piling up whilst I was away.’
Just for a moment it all seemed possible. She and Nicky would have their own house. She would have her own life. There would be children. Her mother would be reasonable – she might even go on a cruise with the companion. The prison doors were opening – Nicky was opening them, and she could walk out. And then she woke up and knew that it was a dream. People don’t suddenly turn reasonable and unselfish. She had given way for too long to make a stand now. She said in an exhausted voice,
‘She won’t ever let me go.’
His grasp tightened until it hurt. He said in a vicious undertone,
‘She isn’t going to be asked. Five years ago I was a boy and a fool. This time it’s going to be different. She can like it, or she can lump it. If she wants to destroy herself she can. I’m going to get you away if I’ve got to smash her and everything else in sight.’
He had his back to the door, but Althea was facing it. She saw it opening and she pulled on her hands to get them away, but she was too late. The door swung in and Myra Hutchinson stood there. She was more like a poster than ever – bronze hair, scarlet lipstick, and a dress with a halter-neck in a surprising shade of green. She had been laughing, but the laugh had stopped half way. It had stopped because of what she had just heard Nicholas say. She said ‘Oh!’ and he looked over his shoulder and grinned at her.
‘See you later, darling. We’re having a private conversation.’
She did finish her laugh then, but it wasn’t quite as carefree as usual. She said, ‘So I see,’ and stepped back and shut the door again.
Nicholas laughed too. He hadn’t let go of Althea. He laughed and he got up, pulling her with him.
‘And now I’m going to kiss you,’ he said.
NINE
MISS MAUD SILVER did not as a rule accept invitations to cocktail-parties, a modern innovation which in her opinion compared unfavourably with the now practically extinct tea-party or At Home. In pre-war days one sat at one’s ease and conversed with one’s friends. At a cocktail-party you were very lucky indeed if you got a chair, and it was quite impossible to converse, the competition in voices being such as to produce a roar resembling that of a cataract or the passing of a procession of tanks. Yet she had come down by tube to Grove Hill in order to attend one of these disagreeable functions. She would not have done it for just anyone, but Mrs Justice was an old friend and her daughter had once had reason to be grateful for Miss Silver’s professional help. She was now comfortably and happily married in Barbados, and had been more than kind to Miss Silver’s niece by marriage, Dorothy Silver. There had been an emergency – Dorothy’s husband away, Dorothy taken suddenly ill – and nothing could have exceeded Sophy Harding’s kindness. It was now four years ago, but grateful recollection induced Miss Silver to take her way to Grove Hill. As was her wont, she dwelt upon the brighter side of the excursion. It would be pleasant to see Louisa Justice. They had not met for some little time, and she would be able to hear all about the latest addition to Sophy’s family, the twins. There was something very attractive about twins.