Absent in the Spring (13 page)

Your eldest daughter
– Averil? Averil of all people in the world?
Carrying on
(disgusting phrase)
with the Dr up at the Saniturum
. Dr Cargill? That eminent, distinguished specialist who had made such a success of his tubercular treatment, a man at least twenty years older than Averil, a man with a charming invalid wife.

What rubbish! What disgusting rubbish.

And at that moment, Averil herself had walked into the room and had asked, but with only mild curiosity, for Averil was never really curious, ‘Is anything the matter, Mother?'

Joan, the hand that held the letter shaking, had hardly been able to reply.

‘I don't think I had better even show it to you, Averil. It's – it's too disgusting.'

Her voice had trembled. Averil, raising those cool, delicate eyebrows of hers in surprise, said, ‘Something in a letter?'

‘Yes.'

‘About me?'

‘You'd better not even see it, dear.'

But Averil, walking across the room, had quietly taken the letter out of her hand.

Had stood there a minute reading it, then had handed it back, and had said in a reflective, detached voice, ‘Yes, not very nice.'

‘Nice? It's disgusting – quite disgusting. People should be punished by law for telling such lies.'

Averil said quietly, ‘It's a foul letter, but it's not a lie.'

The room had turned a somersault and revolved round and round. Joan had gasped out:

‘What do you mean – what can you mean?'

‘You needn't make such a fuss, Mother. I'm sorry this has come to you this way, but I suppose you would have been bound to know sooner or later.'

‘You mean it's
true
? That
you
and – and Dr Cargill –'

‘Yes.' Averil had just nodded her head.

‘But it's wicked – it's disgraceful. A man of that age, a married man – and a young girl like you –'

Averil said impatiently, ‘You needn't make a kind of village melodrama out of it. It's not in the least like that. It's all happened very gradually. Rupert's wife is an invalid – has been for years. We've – well, we've simply come to care for each other. That's all.'

‘That's all, indeed!' Joan had plenty to say, and said it. Averil merely shrugged her shoulders and let the storm play round her. In the end, when Joan had exhausted herself, Averil remarked:

‘I can quite appreciate your point of view, Mother. I daresay I should feel the same in your place – though I don't think I should have said some of the things you've chosen to say. But you can't alter facts. Rupert and I care for each other. And although I'm sorry, I really don't see what you can do about it.'

‘Do about it? I shall speak to your father – at once.'

‘Poor Father. Must you really worry him about it?'

‘I'm sure he'll know just what to do.'

‘He really can't do anything at all. And it will simply worry him dreadfully.'

That had been the beginning of a really shattering time.

Averil, at the heart of the storm, had remained cool and apparently unperturbed.

But also completely obdurate.

Joan had repeated to Rodney again and again, ‘I can't help feeling it's all a
pose
on her part. It's not as though Averil were given to really strong feelings of any kind.'

But Rodney had shaken his head.

‘You don't understand Averil. With Averil it is less her senses than her mind and heart. When she loves, she loves so deeply that I doubt if she will ever quite get over it.'

‘Oh, Rodney, I really do think that is nonsense! After all, I know Averil better than you do. I'm her mother.'

‘That doesn't mean that you really know the least thing about her. Averil has always understated things from choice – no, perhaps from necessity. Feeling a thing deeply she belittles it purposely in words.'

‘That sounds very far-fetched to me.'

Rodney said slowly, ‘Well, you can take it from me that it isn't. It's true.'

‘I can't help thinking that you are exaggerating what is simply a silly schoolgirl flirtation. She's been flattered and likes to imagine –'

Rodney had interrupted her.

‘Joan, my dear – it's no good trying to reassure yourself by saying things that you yourself don't believe. Averil's passion for Cargill is serious.'

‘Then it's disgraceful of
him
– absolutely disgraceful …'

‘Yes, that's what the world will say all right. But put yourself in the poor devil's place. A wife who's a permanent invalid and all the passion and beauty of Averil's young, generous heart offered to you on a platter. All the eagerness and freshness of her mind.'

‘Twenty years older than she is!'

‘I know, I know. If he were only ten years younger the temptation wouldn't be so great.'

‘He must be a horrid man – perfectly horrid.'

Rodney sighed.

‘He's not. He's a fine and very humane man – a man with an intense enthusiastic love for his profession – a man who has done outstanding work. Incidentally, a man who has always been unvaryingly kind and gentle to an ailing wife.'

‘Now you are trying to make him out a kind of saint.'

‘Far from it. And most saints, Joan, have had their passions. They were seldom bloodless men and women. No, Cargill's human enough. Human enough to fall in love and to suffer. Human enough, probably, to wreck his own life – and to nullify his lifework. It all depends.'

‘Depends on what?'

Rodney said slowly, ‘It depends on our daughter. On how strong she is – and how clear-sighted.'

Joan said energetically, ‘We must get her away from here. How about sending her on a cruise? To the northern capitals – or the Greek Islands? Something like that.'

Rodney smiled.

‘Aren't you thinking of the treatment applied to your old school friend, Blanche Haggard? It didn't work very well in her case, remember.'

‘Do you mean that Averil would come rushing back from some foreign port?'

‘I rather doubt whether Averil would even start.'

‘Nonsense. We would insist.'

‘Joan dear, do try and envisage realities. You cannot apply force to an adult young woman. We can neither lock Averil in her bedroom nor force her to leave Crayminster – and actually I don't want to do either. Those things are only palliatives. Averil can only be influenced by factors that she respects.'

‘And those are?'

‘Reality. Truth.'

‘Why don't you go to him – to Rupert Cargill. Threaten him with the scandal.'

Again Rodney sighed.

‘I'm afraid, terribly afraid, Joan, of precipitating matters.'

What do you mean?'

‘That Cargill will throw up everything and that they will go away together.'

‘Wouldn't that be the end of his career?'

‘Undoubtedly. I don't suppose it would come under the heading of unprofessional conduct, but it would completely alienate public opinion in his special circumstances.'

‘Then surely, if he realizes that –'

Rodney said impatiently, ‘He's not quite sane at the moment. Don't you understand anything at all about love, Joan?'

Which was a ridiculous question to ask! She said bitterly:

‘Not
that
kind of love, I'm thankful to say …'

And then Rodney had taken her quite by surprise. He had smiled at her, had said, ‘Poor little Joan' very gently, had kissed her and had gone quietly away.

It was nice of him, she thought, to realize how unhappy she was over the whole miserable business.

Yes, it had indeed been an anxious time. Averil silent, not speaking to anybody – sometimes not even replying when her mother spoke to her.

I did my best, thought Joan. But what are you to do with a girl who won't even listen?

Pale, wearily polite, Averil would say:

‘Really, Mother, must we go on like this? Talking and talking and talking? I do make allowances for your point of view, but won't you just accept the plain truth, that nothing you can say or do will make the least difference?'

So it had gone on, until that afternoon in September when Averil, her face a little paler than usual, had said to them both:

‘I think I'd better tell you. Rupert and I don't feel we can go on like this any longer. We are going away together. I hope his wife will divorce him. But if she won't it makes no difference.'

Joan had started on an energetic protest, but Rodney had stopped her.

‘Leave this to me, Joan, if you don't mind. Averil, I must talk to you. Come into my study.'

Averil had said with a very faint smile, ‘Quite like a headmaster, aren't you, Father.'

Joan burst out, ‘I'm Averil's mother, I insist –'

‘Please, Joan. I want to talk to Averil alone. Would you mind leaving us?'

There had been so much quiet decision in his tone that she had half turned to leave the room. It was Averil's low, clear voice that stopped her.

‘Don't go away, Mother. I don't want you to go away. Anything Father says to me I'd rather he said in front of you.'

Well, at least that showed, thought Joan, that being a mother had some importance.

What a very odd way Averil and her father had of looking at each other, a wary, measuring, unfriendly way, like two antagonists on the stage.

Then Rodney smiled slightly and said, ‘I see.
Afraid
!'

Averil's answer came cool and slightly surprised, ‘I don't know what you mean, Father.'

Rodney said, with sudden irrelevance, ‘A pity you weren't a boy, Averil. There are times when you are quite uncannily like your Great-Uncle Henry. He had a wonderful eye for the best way to conceal the weakness in his own case, or to expose the weakness of his opponent's case.'

Averil said quickly, ‘There isn't any weakness in my case.'

Rodney said deliberately, ‘I shall prove to you that there is.'

Joan exclaimed sharply,‘Of course you are not going to do anything so wicked or so foolish, Averil. Your father and I will not allow it.'

And at that Averil had smiled just a little and had looked not at her mother, but at her father, offering as it were her mother's remark to him.

Rodney said, ‘Please, Joan, leave this to me.'

‘I think,' said Averil, ‘that Mother is perfectly entitled to say just what she thinks.'

‘Thank you, Averil,' said Joan. ‘I am certainly going to do so. My dear child, you must see that what you propose is quite out of the question. You are young and romantic and you see everything in quite a false light. What you do on an impulse now you will bitterly regret later. And think of the sorrow you will cause your father and me. Have you thought of that? I'm sure you don't want to cause us pain – we have always loved you so dearly.'

Averil listened quite patiently, but she did not reply. She had never taken her eyes from her father's face.

When Joan finished, Averil was still looking at Rodney and there was still a faint, slightly mocking smile on her lips.

‘Well, Father,' she said. ‘Have you anything to add?'

‘Not to add,' said Rodney. ‘But I have something of my own to say.'

‘Averil looked at him inquiringly.

‘Averil,' said Rodney, ‘do you understand exactly what a marriage is?'

‘Averil's eyes opened slightly. She paused and then said, ‘Are you telling me that it is a sacrament?'

‘No,' said Rodney. ‘
I
may consider it as a sacrament, or I may not. What I am telling
you
is that marriage is a
contract
.'

‘Oh,' said Averil.

She seemed a little, just a little, taken aback.

‘Marriage,' said Rodney, ‘is a contract entered into by two people, both of adult years, in the full possession of their faculties, and with a full knowledge of what they are undertaking. It is a specification of partnership, and each partner binds himself and herself specifically to honour the terms of that contract – that is, to stand by each other in certain eventualities – in sickness and in health, for richer for poorer, for better for worse.

‘Because those words are uttered in a church, and with the approval and benediction of a priest, they are none the less a contract, just as any agreement entered into between two people in good faith is a contract. Because some of the obligations undertaken are not enforcible in a court of law, they are none the less binding on the persons who have assumed them. I think you will agree that, equitably, that is so.'

There was a pause and then Averil said, ‘That may have been true once. But marriage is looked upon differently nowadays and a great many people are not married in church and do not use the words of the church service.'

‘That may be so. But eighteen years ago Rupert Cargill did bind himself by using those words in a church, and I challenge you to say that he did not, at that time, utter those words in good faith and meaning to carry them out.'

Averil shrugged her shoulders.

Rodney said, ‘Will you admit that, although not legally enforcible, Rupert Cargill did enter into such a contract with the woman who is his wife? He envisaged, at the time, the possibilities of poverty and of sickness, and directly specified them as not affecting the permanence of the bond.'

Averil had gone very white. She said, ‘I don't know where you think you are getting by all this.'

‘I want an admission from you that marriage is, apart from all sentimental feeling and thinking, an ordinary business contract. Do you admit that, or don't you?'

‘I'll admit it.'

‘And Rupert Cargill proposes to break that contract with your connivance?'

‘Yes.'

‘With no regard for the due rights and privileges of the other party to the contract?'