Guilty: The Lost Classic Novel (5 page)

I’ve often wished since that I’d been even a few years older at this time, so that we could have understood one another, at least partly, and I could have given him some of the companionship he so badly needed. He must have been desperately lonely and miserable, alone with his heartbreaking interior struggle, loving my mother so much and seeing her so unhappy. I like to think that, on this last evening, she relented a little and that they came nearer together again – though then, in my child’s egotism, I resented even such tentative signs as they gave of a revival in understanding.

All this time, my father had kept the same crushed and despondent pose; now he suddenly sat up straight, his whole aspect changed, and gazed past me with an eager expectant look, as if a welcome visitor were appearing. So striking was the change in him that I looked around to see who was coming. There was nobody at the door, and though it opened a moment later only my mother came in to call us to supper.

He was already beside her before she had finished speaking, having crossed the little room with two or three rapid strides; and I heard him say, ‘That was generous of you’, while he stared into her face as if memorizing each feature.

‘Oh, well … it’s your last chance …’ Her words hung in the air, with a sense of incompleteness, as if she’d have liked to say something more but was unsure of herself or else
didn’t know what to say. I was amazed, being used only to hearing her speak to him shortly and indifferently or in tones of self-pity or disapproval. She didn’t move away at once either, as I expected, but for a few seconds returned his gaze; and though she was often uncertain and hesitant, this present hesitancy seemed different and more like shyness, almost like a young girl’s. I, of course, had no notion what their remarks meant (years passed before it dawned on me that he wouldn’t, even that night, have spoken to me without her permission), and the caprices of their adult behaviour were without interest to me. I was only concerned because I seemed to be losing my audience altogether. Determined to recapture and hold my mother’s attention at any rate, I rushed across to her and, loudly exclaiming that I was starving, seized her hand and dragged her off forcibly to the dining-room.

The three of us sat down at the table. I had no feeling about it being the last time we would eat together, entirely taken up with my own importance, my own return and the adventures that had preceded it, which I was determined to relate in full. Nor had I any cause to complain of interruptions or lack of attention, for both my parents were singularly silent, allowing me to chatter away to my heart’s content. Thanks to their quiescence and my exhilaration, this, my father’s last meal under our roof, was probably the most normal, to outward appearances anyhow, of all those we’d shared since his return. We might have been any family group, consisting of over-indulgent parents and spoiled only child monopolizing the conversation.

I was very proud of myself that evening, extremely vain. But the day had been long and tiring for me, with the early start and all the excitement of the long journey and my homecoming, and now I was sitting up long after my usual
bedtime. Suddenly, in the middle of a sentence, I was overcome by a tremendous desire to yawn, and, though I stifled it, another yawn soon followed, and this one was irresistible and could by no means be suppressed. I began to lose the thread of what I was saying, my tongue grew clumsy and stumbled over the words. Then my table napkin slid off my knees, and, diving after it, in the instant of semi-darkness under the table, I felt my eyes start to close, and I could no longer hide from myself the fact that I was terribly sleepy.

When I sat up again, the retrieved napkin dangling from one hand, everything seemed out of focus; the light pulsated with irregular beams, and every object conspired to elude and frustrate me. I thought I saw my parents exchange amused glances – a sign of friendly understanding so unprecedented that even then it caught my hazy attention. But I forgot to ask what the joke was, obliged to concentrate on the mechanics of eating. Though we were having some sweet I especially liked, I found an inexplicable difficulty in conveying it from the plate to my mouth. No sooner had I successfully captured a spoonful, the spoon immediately took flight and clattered down on the table some distance from me. I glanced at my mother to see whether she realized that it was the spoon not my clumsiness that was to blame, and suddenly I heard the strange sound, which I could hardly remember hearing, of my father’s laughter, followed by the words, ‘Take him off to bed quickly, for heaven’s sake, before he falls in his plate!’

Too sleepy to resent this affront to my dignity, I was led from the room. I remember that, as I went, I kept stumbling and looking back, out of the owlish gravity of my near-dream, at the likeable smiling face that had mysteriously replaced my father’s gravely remote one and wondering whether it belonged to the dream shapes around me.

I’ve a dim recollection of staggering drunkenly up the
stairs, sagging against my mother’s supporting arm as she heaved and dragged me along like a sack of potatoes, and then of standing passively in my little room, swaying and dead with sleep, while she undressed me, pulling off one garment after another, and finally tucked me up in bed as she’d done when I was a baby. I came awake just sufficiently then for a muddled memory of two different fathers and of my own unkind words, which I must unsay in case the nice brown smiling face were the real one. Dimly, after that, I remained aware of my mother collecting my scattered clothes but was sound asleep before she left the room.

I slept late the next morning and came down to find the hall full of luggage and my father at the telephone engaged in a cryptic one-sided conversation of which I heard not a word, as I stood staring at him, endeavouring to decide whether he could be the agreeable person of whom I’d caught sight the previous night. Anyhow, I could afford to be generous since he was going away; I would give him the benefit of the doubt and tell him I should have said ‘Yes’, not ‘No’, to his question about surf-riding. This I decided as my mother, in a disciplinary mood I’d almost forgotten (I welcomed it as an indication of how quickly things would go back to what they had been as soon as we two were alone again), took me off to the dining-room, sat me down, put my breakfast before me and left me to eat it alone in front of the window.

This window was the only one facing north, with a view of the road, winding across rough meadows, past our door and on to still more remote dwellings among the woodlands and hills, which was our one line of communication with the rest of the world. Glancing out with my mouth full, I saw a car in the distance and realized that it must be the taxi coming to fetch my father. I hadn’t known he was leaving so soon, and
my impulse was to rush to him immediately while there was still time to talk; for, during the last few moments, the idea of an explanation had established itself as an urgent necessity, as though, in the mysterious secret life that went on concurrently with my normal existence, I’d just found out that some disaster would happen if he were to go away thinking me rude and unkind.

I was actually half out of my seat when my muscles suddenly relaxed, I subsided again and sat still or, rather, spellbound, reality sinking into abeyance, as I crossed the frontier of my magic world (as in those days I quite often did) without noticeable transition.

The shapes of everyday life still in front of my eyes, I sat motionless, staring out of the open window, watching the car pass a group of cattle, which plunged into brief awkward flight, tails rigid and udders swinging. Nothing in the quiet cottage suggested that anyone but myself had observed the taxi’s approach. I was the only person, so far, who had seen it, which, in terms of magic, gave me absolute power over it. I could make it turn back, disappear – thus preventing my father’s departure – simply by giving the sign. What
this
was I no longer remember – if, indeed, I ever knew. But I’m perfectly certain I really believed in my own power. It made me feel rapturous and triumphant. But there was also some horror in it; even as I exulted, I felt responsibility heavy on me as a concrete weight. It was as though I’d caught sight of some fearful doom, which I alone of all the inhabitants of the globe had perceived and could avert.

I knew I ought to give the sign that would alter my father’s fate. But I didn’t want him to stay at home; on the contrary, I was rejoicing because he was about to leave me alone with my mother once more. As I saw where my magic power would lead if I exercised it, all trace of exultance left
me. Frightened and stupefied, I seemed to exist for a timeless moment in pure suspense, watching a race between his destiny and the car, relentlessly drawing nearer. Would I interfere before the taxi arrived, or let things take their course?

Just when the tension was becoming intolerable, it relaxed, releasing me from my entranced condition. Nor mality was restored, the material world re-established. All at once the flow of my natural everyday life continued. I was free to resume my usual activities and, jumping up, rushed out of the room, shouting, ‘Here comes the taxi!’ By running about and making a great deal of noise, I endeavoured to drown a lingering sense of havoc and fatality for which I was accountable on the other plane, in which attempt I was helped by the general bustling confusion.

The car had stopped outside the front door. Now the driver came in, joining my parents and the neighbour who was to stay with me, for I’d been told there wouldn’t be room for all three of us and the luggage – a ridiculous error, about which I loudly and persistently protested, though nobody listened to me. In the turmoil created by four adults and myself, all picking up suitcases and putting them down again, I was continually getting in someone’s way and being pushed aside. Suddenly I remembered what I had to say to my father but couldn’t catch his attention till he went out to help the driver tie the heavier pieces on to the roof-rack, at which point I ran after him and started a breathless, incoherent speech, which he could hardly have been expected to understand. In any case, he was now called away, and I stood watching the driver knotting the rope as securely as for a journey to Samarkand. Wondering how the porter would ever unfasten it in time to catch the train, I forgot how my own time was running out and, with a shock, saw my mother dressed and ready to leave.

Before I could reach her, she had stepped into the car, and I could only prevent my father from following by throwing both arms around him and hanging on like grim death. In his usual gentle way, he bent down to ask me to release him. And, while he was doing so, my mother doubtless made a sign I failed to see to the plump countrywoman, who had retired a little way into the background to let us say our goodbyes in private, for I felt myself attacked from the rear. Knowing I wouldn’t long be able to resist the strong arms that were pulling me back, I again began whispering urgent words, which probably made no sense at all to the harassed man. With a worried, perplexed look, he tried to follow what I was saying, in spite of the noise of the car, which had just started up, the scolding or loving cries of the woman tugging at me and my mother’s repeated warnings that he would miss the train.

Considering all he had on his mind, it seems unlikely that he even remembered my childish rudeness, though it had wounded him at the time. But I felt it was profoundly important that he should understand me; I had a desperate sense of failure when, in response to increasingly agitated exhortations, he finally detached himself with some kindly phrase appropriate to my age, leaving me to the soft heart and strong arms of my captor, who, thinking I’d been overcome by grief, pressed me so tightly to her big bosom that I could hardly breathe and crooned consolingly over my head.

Luck was on my side, for, as the taxi moved off, it back-fired so loudly that she was startled into relaxing her grip for a second. Twisting around, I managed to free myself, raced after it and, with a flying leap, landed on the running-board. The window was down, I leaned into the car, crying, ‘I didn’t mean it last night. I would like to come with you
to the waves …’ repeating, ‘I would, I would!’ with a wild vehemence that surprised me.

Even then I couldn’t be certain my father had understood. As far as I remember, he said nothing but, concerned, I suppose, for my safety, tried to get hold of me but was prevented by the jolting of the car and by that fact that he had to lean right across my mother, who further impeded him in her efforts to catch the attention of the driver. Oblivious of what was happening behind him, he drove faster and faster over the bumpy road.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. But before it could get a firm grip, the taxi lurched around one of the many bends. The centrifugal force that sent me flying tore my clothing from my father’s hand and made him stagger back, as I landed in the long grass at the roadside. The noise of the motor diminished, and I was aware for a second of a great stillness and of a great many things all happening at once. The woman at the cottage door gave a shrill scream and started running towards me; with a rasping squeal the taxi braked sharply to a halt, skidding in the white dust, three heads poking out of its windows like so many question marks; a colony of ants, disturbed by my descent among them, rushed madly in all directions through the forest of grass stems; while, unperturbed by it all, a bird’s song continued, minutely distinct, in the great inverted bowl of the sky.

Then I picked myself up, none the worse, for the thick summer grass had saved me from anything but minor bruises – and I’d learned as all children do, especially in the country, to fall painlessly. The three heads were still turned in my direction; but now the woman came up, running her hands over me, confirming that I’d suffered no serious damage, whereupon my parents waved their hands, their heads were withdrawn and the car drove on again.

I thought their behaviour heartless – they might at least have made sure for themselves that I’d broken no bones – and a slight resentment replaced my former anxiety. The shock of the fall had, in any case, already banished an obsession belonging more to my private inward existence than to my life in the outer world, to which I now wholeheartedly returned, taking advantage of the situation to play on the feelings of my temporary companion, who, always indulgent, could now deny me nothing, so that the time passed very pleasantly till my mother’s return.