Cluny Brown (10 page)

The village of Friars Carmel is large enough to give the name of Lesser Friars to an outlying hamlet, and to support three public houses—the Lion, the Artichoke, and the Load of Hay; it is also far enough (five miles) from Carmel to need half a dozen shops of its own. All these, when Cluny passed outside, had their shutters up, but she at once identified the chemist's by the three coloured jars appearing in the top part of the window. Above them a very neat fascia displayed the name of T. W
ILSON
in black letters on a white ground; the blind drawn behind the door repeated it in white on red. It was by far the sprucest shop in Friars Carmel.

Cluny rang the bell and waited, though with fading hopes: it was inconceivable to her that any one should voluntarily spend such an afternoon indoors. But this was what the whole population seemed to be doing: not a soul was in sight. The street was deserted, and so still that Cluny distinctly smelt her own mackintosh.

The sun went in and came out again. Cluny was just about to ring for the second time when the door was opened by a tall, youngish–middle-aged man who stood looking at her through horn-rimmed glasses.

“I'm sorry to trouble you,” said Cluny politely. “Are you the chemist?”

He nodded.

“I've come for Mrs. Maile's cough medicine. She's sorry to trouble you on a Thursday, but it's taking her in the chest.”

“Come in,” said Mr. Wilson.

He stepped back and Cluny followed him into the shop. She could see at once that it was very high-class. There were glass counters on each side, running up to a glass door at the back, curtained on the inside: the familiar names of P
EAR'S
, P
OND'S
, V
INOLIA
, O
DORONO
and C
OTY
met the eye on every hand. There was an upright weighing-machine, and one with a basket, for infants. A boxed-off corner accommodated various scientific-looking appliances on a white enamel shelf.

“What a lovely shop!” exclaimed Cluny impulsively.

“I try to keep up-to-date,” said Mr. Wilson.

He spoke with a certain sternness, as though implying that other people didn't. He had a very faint Scots accent.

“It's just like London,” went on Cluny—giving the Cockney's compliment.

“There'll be finer shops there by far.”

“Well, of course they're bigger. Some of them have libraries.”

“I consider libraries no part of a chemist's business,” said Mr. Wilson.

But he looked pleased. After a moment or two, while he was putting up Mrs. Maile's bottle, and Cluny stood about examining things, he observed thoughtfully:—

“So you come from London? That's a long way to be from home.”

“Oh, it wasn't home really,” said Cluny; and paused, for the truth was much too complex for any such simple expression. In one sense London, Paddington, was of course her home; she had lived there for eighteen years, and on the whole been quite happy; it was her home as much as anywhere. But it wasn't home inevitably; it hadn't the power that draws a grown person back to the scene of even an unhappy childhood. It made no claim on her. To Mr. Wilson, waiting with an earnest expression, Cluny added hastily, “I hadn't any mother or father, not since I was a baby.”

“That's a terrible thing,” said Mr. Wilson.

Cluny now felt she had been disloyal to Mr. Porritt, and though she loved sympathy, her conscience made her stand up for him.

“But Uncle Arn—and Aunt Floss—brought me up and everything. Uncle Arn would have kept me, he only sent me here because he thought good service might do me good.”

“I'm glad you had some one to think for you,” said the chemist.

Every word he spoke made Cluny feel more like an orphan. (Usually she did not feel like an orphan at all.) But his sympathetic interest was very agreeable, and she instinctively played up to it by looking sad. Cluny could look sad very easily, she had only to drop long dark lashes on a colourless cheek. Appropriately enough, a first spatter of rain just then struck against the windows; the shop grew dark, and away towards Carmel thunder rolled.

“You can't go back in this,” said Mr. Wilson.

“I don't mind,” said Cluny bravely. “Mrs. Maile's waiting …”

But they neither of them took this objection very seriously. The chemist, after a moment's reflection, came from behind the counter and threw open the door at the back of the shop. It was a very manly, no-nonsense gesture; and Cluny (still an orphan) submissively followed him through into a small cosy room.

Cluny liked this room at once. It reminded her of the Porritt kitchen, though it was not a kitchen but a parlour, and much neater and brighter than anything in String Street: the likeness lay chiefly in its unlikeness to the rooms at Friars Carmel. A dark red wall-paper was enlivened by many coloured pictures of gardens, ladies, children and pet animals; the round table was covered by a red cloth, on which stood a large brass lamp; the curtains were bright green. In the midst of all sat a very old lady whose white shawl made her quite restful to look at.

“Mother,” said Mr. Wilson loudly, “here's a young lady to see you.”

Mrs. Wilson slightly turned her head; she looked at Cluny without much change of expression, nor did she say anything; but out from under the shawl fumbled a little brown old hand like a rabbit's paw, and poked towards the chair on the opposite side of the hearth. Cluny obediently sat down on it. Mr. Wilson meanwhile lit the lamp. Its light made the room seem smaller and brighter, and the sky outside darker.

“I've got your place,” said Cluny.

“I'll sit here,” said the chemist, pulling out one of the four straight chairs that stood round the table.

He seemed to have run out of conversation, but the silence was not embarrassing, even when broken by a light snore from the old lady. This, in fact, by giving them a good reason not to talk, eased the whole situation. Mr. Wilson reached to the book shelf and pulled out a large illustrated volume of British Poets, for Cluny, and a
Blackwood's Magazine
for himself, and they settled down as for a quiet afternoon. But Cluny needed no steel engravings to keep her happy: it was so extraordinary to be sitting there at all, with these two perfect strangers, that the sensation was enough in itself. She felt like a doll that has been picked up and put into a doll's house: the doll at once looks completely at home, as though it had been there always. Cluny thought that if any one suddenly came in, he would take her for a relation.…

This peculiar situation lasted about fifteen minutes. Then the sky began to clear; a watery beam of sun mingled with the light from the lamp, making it look like a lamp that has been on all night. (Making Cluny feel as though she and Mr. Wilson had been sitting up all night.) He at once turned it out, glanced at the window, and gave Cluny an affirmatory nod. She put her book on the table and followed him back to the shop.

“You'll be all right now.”

“Thank you for letting me stay,” said Cluny, blinking.

“Mother's taken a liking to you,” said Mr. Wilson. “I can see that.”

Cluny wondered how he could tell. Several years before she had made quite a friend of an old man who took a tortoise into Kensington Gardens; and he told her he was never sure whether the tortoise enjoyed these outings or not, whether it didn't after all think, “Damn this grass.” However, Cluny supposed that from long experience Mr. Wilson could detect in his mother shades of expression, intimations of pleasure, unapparent to any one else.

“She likes to see a young lady who doesn't put stuff on her face,” said Mr. Wilson. “If I may say so, so do I.”

“Well, it wouldn't do any good,” said Cluny frankly. “I've tried it, but I look worse.”

“They all look worse,” said the chemist. “Only they haven't the sense to know it.” He did up the bottle very neatly, with white paper, thin pink string, and a blob of sealing-wax. “When you're passing this way again, perhaps on your afternoon off, I hope you'll look in on us.”

“Thank you very much indeed,” said Cluny.

III

This minute adventure pleased her so much that she thought about it all the way home. How different now was her mood from that in which she set out! A door had opened in Friars Carmel, a door of the most fascinating possibilities; for in retrospect the chemist's shop and the room behind appeared not only attractive, but mysterious. Who kept them so bright and clean? Who looked after Mrs. Wilson? (Not for one moment did Cluny visualize a Mrs. Wilson Junior.) Did Mr. Wilson spend all his spare time reading
Blackwood's
while his mother slept? And what was he doing there at all, keeping up-to-date in a place like Friars Carmel? “He can't be dodging the Police,” reflected Cluny, “he isn't that sort. I dare say he's had some dreadful tragedy.”

This heartening thought carried her along at a good pace, and having been delayed already she honourably refrained from stopping to pick things. But she had to pause just once, at the lane she had already named “The Gorge.” Rills and rivulets of rain-water were still running down its sides; against the dark red earth the newly washed ivy-trails stood out darker still, yet brighter too, like greenish jet. Every detail of stem, leaf, pebble, raindrop, showed brilliant and precise. Cluny stared and stared. She advanced just a step, and felt the ring of stone under her heel. The lane was paved in the centre for a width of about two feet. So it was used (or had been); it went somewhere. A beautiful smell of warm wet earth puffed out to meet her. A little farther on, where a sapling grew out of the bank, crinkled primrose leaves invited. Cluny took another long step forward, and as she did so something in her mackintosh pocket banged against her knee.

It was Mrs. Maile's cough cure. Cluny took it out and looked at it. So neatly wrapped, in its white paper and pink string, it seemed to retain something of Mr. Wilson's personality. It did not exactly rebuke, but it reminded. Cluny returned the bottle to her pocket and set her face towards home.

Chapter 10

I

Now Andrew's original plan had been to stay down at Friars Carmel as it were on guard; and when it became apparent that there was nothing to guard against, he naturally grew restless. He decided to go up to London and see John.

“You don't mind, Mother?” he said. “I mean, you and the Professor get on perfectly well without me?”

“Of course we do,” said Lady Carmel. “Really, dear, it's quite strange to me that you make all this fuss about the one friend who's no trouble at all.” (She had not really answered the question, but Andrew did not notice.) “Give my love to John, and I hope you'll have a gay time. I don't suppose there'll be very many dances yet—”

“I shouldn't go to them if there were,” said Andrew, rather sternly.

Lady Carmel sighed. She had taken great pains to keep up her London relations, so that Andrew should have nice houses open to him; but Andrew seemed to scorn nice houses as he scorned deb dances and garden-parties. He was too clever for them. Which was very odd, thought Lady Carmel, since for the exactly opposite reason his father hadn't liked parties either. He said all the girls were too clever for
him
. Sir Henry had been to precisely two dances in his life: at the first he met his future wife, at the second he proposed to her, and after that he cried off. But at least he had realized what dances were
for
.…

“Andrew,” said Lady Carmel suddenly, “do you ever think of getting married?”

“No,” said Andrew at once.

“We'd be very pleased.…”

He grinned at her.

“Yes, darling, if I married some one suitable. Like the Duff-Graham girl. Holy mackerel!”

“What a nice expression,” said Lady Carmel. “But I wasn't thinking of Cynthia. In fact, I don't think Cynthia would do at all. I think she'd bore you. Isn't there some one else?”

“No,” said Andrew.

His mother looked at him thoughtfully.

“Now, that's where we're so different,” she said. “You talk about war, dear, as though it were inevitable; and you think me rather foolish because I still hope we may have peace. But if you really think like that, you should marry immediately.”

“Even if there's no one I'm in love with?”

“That's not altogether the point—though of course your wife must be some one you are fond of, and respect. But this property has been in the family for three hundred years; you should at least get an heir,” said Lady Carmel.

Andrew considered her with attention.

“Is that how you really feel?”

“Yes, my dear, it is.”

His next words had a dreadful relevance.

“Do you remember Betty Cream?”

Lady Carmel instinctively closed her eyes, but bravely reopened them.

“Certainly I do. I think she's the most beautiful girl I've ever seen, and so does your father. Would she make you happy?”

“I shouldn't imagine so,” said Andrew. “But as you say, that's not the point. Not that she'd have me, of course.”

He looked at his mother, expecting to see her bristle; but Lady Carmel gazed blandly back.

“Then dear, we'd better start a few house-parties; and I shall expect you home before the end of the month.”

Before he left Andrew performed a last duty towards his guest which involved him in an interview with Cluny Brown. He had no difficulty in finding her, because she was singing—in the housemaid's pantry on the first floor—and her deep resonant tones, particularly when echoed back from beneath a draining-board, were very audible. Cluny was so absorbed in work and song that for a moment Andrew stood unperceived in the doorway; stood and stared, for the last time he had consciously seen her had been out of doors, striding along in her mackintosh as though she owned half Devonshire. Now she didn't look like the same person: her brown stuff frock, inherited from a predecessor, had been cleaned but not altered: it was much too short in both skirt and sleeves, and the waist only vaguely approximated her own. The stiff white cap had slipped forward over her nose, and her pony tail of hair, escaping from its pins, stuck out behind. But her manners remained easy.