The Chinese Shawl (2 page)

From the remainder of the evening two things stood out. They kept coming back into Laura’s mind whilst she was undressing and later when she had put out the light and lay there on Cousin Sophy’s spare-room bed, which was so much more comfortable than any of the beds at home. The darkness made a background against which her pictures of the evening came and went. All the pictures were lovely except those two at the end, and they would keep coming back. She tried to send them away, to remember only how lovely it had been, but the two pictures which troubled her just wouldn’t go. Tanis smiling at her and saying, “I haven’t really seen you at all. We must meet. Come and lunch with me tomorrow.” She could see herself standing there and colouring like a schoolgirl. “I’m afraid I can’t tomorrow.” What did she want to colour for?—and they were all looking at her. Then Carey Desborough said, “She’s lunching with me,” and that made it worse. But why—why? It was such an ordinary thing. Why was there that dreadful feeling of strain, as if she had made some terrible gaffe? Nothing could have been easier than Carey’s voice. Nothing could have been sweeter than Tanis’s smile. She had turned it on both of them, but especially on Carey. “Ah, but how nice of you! It’s her first visit to London—isn’t it, Laura—and we’ve got to give her as good a time as we can. But what about making a party of it—Alistair, and you, and me, and Laura?” Her glance went round the circle. “Robin and Petra too, if they’re not doing anything else.”

Robin and Petra— But it was Alistair and Petra who were “not officially engaged.” The picture kept on coming back— all of them standing there together in the lounge saying goodnight, and Tanis just blotting out an unofficial engagement with half a dozen effortless words and one of those brilliant smiles. Every time she looked back the smile seemed more brilliant, her own tongue-tied uncertainty more inept. Yet for the life of her she couldn’t think what she should have said. She hadn’t said anything—only stood there with the colour in her cheeks and a soft distressed look in her eyes. It was Carey Desborough who spoke. He laughed quite casually and said, “Oh, I don’t think so—not tomorrow. We’re doing a show, and we don’t want to be late.” The brilliant smile had turned on Alistair. His response was rapturous.

And then the good-nights were really said. Looking back, Laura thought that Helen had hurried them a little. The party broke up, but it was Alistair who took Laura home. Laura’s second picture was of Petra putting her hand on Robin’s arm and saying with smiling lips, “Wouldn’t you like to take me home?” They were so close that she couldn’t help knowing that Petra’s fingers were not just resting lightly on the black coat sleeve but gripping the arm inside it. She moved so that she was standing between them and the others. She didn’t want anyone else to see what she had seen. Alistair took her home. He never stopped talking about Tanis.

Those were the pictures. They didn’t spoil the evening, because it was too lovely to be spoiled, but they did spoil her remembrance of it. When she wanted to think about all the friendliness and kindness, she would hear Tanis thanking Carey Desborough for being kind to a little country cousin. Because that’s what it amounted to. Laura’s cheeks flamed again, all alone in the dark. He was kind. She had felt the kindness when he was talking to her. But to hear him thanked for it publicly by Tanis—well, it got worse every time she thought about it. And then all of a sudden she began to laugh at herself, because wasn’t she being just the kind of silly fool that Tanis was hoping she’d be? And if she just didn’t take any notice, well, Tanis wouldn’t have scored after all. She had wanted to get Laura all hot and bothered, to show her up as a gauche, inexperienced young person from the country, to make Carey Desborough see her like that. Well, he hadn’t taken any notice, and if Laura didn’t take any notice either, the whole thing would have fallen rather flat. Petra was different—Tanis had scored there. But that was because for the time being Alistair was practically off his head, and there just wasn’t anything to be done about it. She felt dreadfully sorry about Petra. Poor Petra. She began to wonder what it would be like to love someone very much, and to see him turn away from you and go mad about Tanis Lyle.

The pictures began to be blurred. Her thoughts blurred too. She slipped through the blur into a dream. The dream was not blurred at all. It was as sharp, and clear, and vivid as the image seen on the screen of a camera—sharper, clearer, and more vivid than reality. She was in a place she had never seen before, but she knew that it was a ruined aisle of the old Priory church. There was green grass underneath and a bright blue sky above. There were fallen blocks of masonry amongst the grass, and a lovely springing arch against the sky. She was standing at the bottom of a flight of narrow, curving steps which went up to a door in what looked like a solid wall. The sun was shining, and a great level shaft ran slanting down to Laura’s feet. She was dressed in the black dress she had worn at the Luxe, and she was wearing her jade peach and her Chinese shawl. She could see all the colours in it, as bright and clear as the colours in a stained-glass window. A turquoise butterfly and a grasshopper just the colour of her jade, sprays of blackberries embroidered in peach and primrose, wine-colour and all the lovely Chinese blues. The sun shone, and a bird was singing. And then all of a sudden like a thunderclap it was dark—everything gone, colour, and sight, and sound. It was dreadfully cold. A hand came out of the dark and plucked her shawl away. Her feet were bare on the stone. She went groping up to the door in the wall, and it was locked against her. She beat on it and tried to cry out, but her voice was choked in her throat. She woke up, beating against the headboard of the spare-room bed. It took her a minute or two to realize where she was. Even after she had switched on the light she felt as if part of her had been left behind in that dark ruined place. What a horrid dream.

She sat on the edge of the bed and looked with dismay at the twisted, dishevelled bedclothes. When she waked she had been kneeling up in bed beating on the walnut headboard. The eiderdown was on the floor, the blanket slipping. No wonder she had been cold in that horrid dream.

She made the bed, drank some water—nasty stuff, London water—and then lay down again. She went to sleep almost at once, and slept without dreams until the morning.

Mr. Metcalfe was a pleasant elderly gentleman with the kind of fatherly manner which hints at authority as well as kindness. By the time Laura had shaken hands with him and emerged from the polite preliminaries she was feeling much less grown-up than she had a right to feel considering she was twenty-one and her own mistress.

“Well now, Miss Laura, I have quite a lot of business for you, and a very important proposal.”

“Proposal?” She could have killed herself for it, but she changed colour.

But Mr. Metcalfe smiled indulgently.

“Oh, it’s not a proposal of marriage. I hope you’ll not be in too much of a hurry about that—it doesn’t always answer. There are other kinds of proposals, you know, and this is really a very important one.”

“What is it?”

“Well, it deserves your very serious consideration. It is a proposal from Miss Agnes Fane—” He paused, scanning Laura’s face. “Before I tell you about it, would you mind telling me just how much you know about the breach which arose out of your father’s marriage?”

Laura met his look frankly.

“I know that my father was engaged to Cousin Agnes, and that he ran away with my mother. That was what the quarrel was about, wasn’t it?”

“Yes—but there was a little more to it than that. I don’t know if you’re quite clear about your relations.”

“Not very. You see, I’ve never met any of them except Tanis Lyle.”

“Oh, you know Miss Lyle?”

“I met her last night. I don’t know any of the others.”

He took up a slip of paper and handed it to her.

“Well then, perhaps this will help you to get them straight.”

Laura looked at the paper with interest. It displayed a neatly typed family tree.

Mr. Metcalfe began to expound.

“It begins with your great-grandfather Thomas Fane and your great-grandmother Mary Ferrers. If you look at that paper you will see that they had four children, Walter, William, Barbara, and Ruth. Walter was your grandfather—William Miss Agnes Fane’s father. Barbara married a man called Adams. Her daughter, Miss Lucy Adams, lives at the Priory with Miss Fane. Ruth married Geoffrey Lyle. She was a good deal younger than the others, so her daughter, Miss Tanis Lyle, though a first cousin of your father and Miss Agnes and Miss Lucy, is really much nearer to you in age. Her parents died when she was a child, and she has been practically adopted by Miss Agnes Fane. She and Miss Lucy have brought her up and are quite devoted to her. Now, have you got all that quite clear?”

“Yes, quite.”

Laura was thinking that every time she met someone fresh the conversation always seemed to come round to Tanis and how devoted someone was to her. She did not, naturally, allow this thought to appear, but sat looking at Mr. Metcalfe and waiting for him to come to the point, because there was certainly going to be a point. The family tree and all this talk about the relations was just a sort of preliminary skirmish. Mr. Metcalfe was leading up to something. He had a proposal to lay before her, and she felt very curious to know what it was. He leaned forward now with his elbow on the table.

“When your father’s engagement to his cousin was broken off a very difficult position arose. He had not a sufficient income to make it possible for him to live at the Priory even if he could have brought himself to turn his cousin out. She was not a young girl. She must have been about thirty-five— she was actually a few years older than your father—and the Priory had always been her home. Her father rented it from your grandfather—no lease, just a family arrangement—and when he died she and her mother continued there. There had been talk of a marriage between her and your father on and off for years, but nothing settled. But when Mrs. William Fane died and your father came home from the Australian station, the engagement was formally given out. Mrs. William had been a considerable heiress, and the whole of her fortune passed to Miss Agnes. It seemed to be a most suitable arrangement, and not only because of the money—Miss Fane was a very handsome and accomplished woman. Well, you know what happened. Your mother was a distant cousin. She came to the Priory on a visit, and your father fell head over ears in love with her. Naturally he wished to make such amends to his cousin as he could. Miss Fane had a very serious riding accident, and for some months there was no certainty that she would live. It was nearly a year before she was able to attend to business. She then asked for a lease of the Priory. Your father instructed us to give her a twenty-one year lease from a date three months ahead. Now perhaps you see what I am coming to. You were born about a month after he gave us those instructions. The twenty-one year lease runs out in about two months from now.“

Laura said “Oh!” What came next? Another lease—or something else? She said aloud,

“What does she want—Cousin Agnes? There’s something she wants me to do, isn’t there?”

“Well, yes, there is.” Mr. Metcalfe took up a pencil and began to roll it to and fro between his fingers. A bright green pencil—the light caught it and the gold of his signet-ring.

“Does she want another lease?”

Mr. Metcalfe frowned thoughtfully at the pencil. Then he transferred the frown to Laura.

“Well, no—she does not suggest a lease. In point of fact, she is anxious to buy.”

Something pricked Laura sharply. She sat up and said, “Oh, no!” in a tone of dismay.

Mr. Metcalfe laid down the pencil and stopped frowning. His manner became extremely parental.

“Now Miss Laura, this is a proposal which you would do well to consider. It really is worth consideration. Miss Fane has been paying you a very good rent all these years. She has also spent a great deal of money on the house and grounds. Most of the land, as you probably know, was sold by your grandfather. What remained, which does not amount to much more than a fairly extensive garden, was in a state of utter neglect. Miss Fane has transformed it. She has installed central heating and electric light in the house. She has never come down on your trustees for a single penny for repairs. She has made the property her first and very nearly her only interest. She is an invalid—since her accident she has never walked—and you can imagine what an interest like this has meant to her.”

“But if she can’t walk—”

“She has one of those self-propelling chairs. She spends a great deal of time in the garden.”

Laura said, “I see—” She was bewildered and taken aback. She had the feeling that she was being unfairly pressed. She turned a clear gaze on Mr. Metcalfe’s face.

“You mustn’t talk as if I would turn her out. I would never do that.”

“Then you are prepared to consider the proposal?”

“No—I don’t think so. I don’t want—to sell—”

“Her offer is a very generous one. You have to consider that the rent she pays you amounts to three-quarters of your total income. She is not young, and she is an invalid. If she were to die, you would lose three hundred a year. You might let again, or you might not—that would depend largely on post-war conditions. You certainly could not hope for another tenant like Miss Fane.”

Laura gave her head a little impatient shake. The money didn’t come into it—there were other things. She said quickly,

“Why does she want to buy the Priory—after all these years?”

Mr. Metcalfe had a smiling answer to that.

“My dear Miss Laura, she has always wanted to buy it, but your father wouldn’t sell. He said he would never live there himself, but his son might be able to some day—anyhow he would leave the decision to him. That was shortly before you were born, and he had quite made up his mind that you were to be a boy. As long as he lived Miss Fane made him a periodical offer. After his death she was obliged to wait for your coming of age. She now repeats her offer— twelve thousand pounds for everything as it stands.”

Laura put out a protesting hand.

“It’s not the money, Mr. Metcalfe. I want to know why. She’s an invalid and she isn’t young, and I would never turn her out. It isn’t as if she had children to leave it to. Why does she want to buy the Priory?”

“Oh, she wants to leave it to Miss Tanis Lyle,” said Mr. Metcalfe.