The Truant Spirit (10 page)

“Yes, I do,” she said. “It’s only—well, like Marthe, I suppose I don’t quite understand.”

“Me, I understand very well,” Marthe interposed grimly, “It is only Madame who I think has taken leave of her senses. Very well, mam’zelle, you stay, and to you and to Madame I am no longer responsible. If M. Bergerac should later ask the questions, then I am not to blame.”

“M. Bergerac, we understand, is agreeable to the arrangement,” Brock observed smoothly, and the Frenchwoman uttered an exclamation of disgust and started to mount the stairs again.

Sabina watched the squat, angry figure ascending alone and tenderness suddenly flooded her face. Marthe was coarse and grasping and often not very kind, but she had been the familiar bulwark of years. Sabina ran up the stairs behind her and put an arm round the woman’s shoulders.

“Marthe .” she said softly, but Marthe shook her off with uncaring impatience and proceeded on her way to bed.

“Well,” said Brock with an impassive shrug. “It never pays to squander compassion. Now that little matter is settled, let’s return to the fire.”

Sabina was awake early the next morning listening for sounds of departure in the house. She heard the luggage being brought down and later Marthe’s heavy footsteps passed her door but did not pause.

Was she going without saying good-bye, Sabina wondered, hurt by the thought of such indifference. She flung back the bedclothes and, shivering in the cold of early morning, reached quickly for dressing-gown and slippers. She could not let Marthe go without bidding her Godspeed.

Brock and the two women were standing in the hall and they turned to watch her as she ran down the stairs, her hair flying. Bunny, who cherished memories of the pictures of her youth, thought she looked like the young Queen Victoria upon her accession as she stood at the foot of the stairs in her long robe, her eyes wide with questioning.

Marthe!” she cried. “Were you going without saying good-bye?”

“There is no need to say anything, mam’zelle. You have made your choice,” the Frenchwoman replied sullenly.

“But it’s only for a short time,” Sabina said. “And I, at any rate, would like to say
au revoir
. ”

Marthe shrugged and Brock, who already had the front door open, observed that there was no time for farewells; they would miss the train. The hall was very cold, for fires had not yet been lighted for the day, and Bunny said:

“Go back to bed, dear child. You may take cold again after the chill.”

“Marthe ...” Sabina said again, and her voice was coaxing. “You will send some clothes for me, won’t you? And a little money?”

“The money is Madame your aunt’s affair. I have nothing but what she chooses to send.”

Sabina tried to make a joke of it.

“But we always live on your savings till Tante returns— you know we do.”

“This time you must make other arrangements. Goodbye, mam’zelle,” Marthe replied, and left, without adding anything more.

Bunny glanced curiously at Sabina’s stricken face as Brock slammed the door behind him. It surely was not possible that the girl could have regrets for this unpleasant woman’s departure.

“Marthe is not very nice, I know,” Sabina said as though Bunny had spoken her thoughts aloud, “but, you see, to me she’s familiar, and one misses familiar things.”

“Well, I hope that my company and Brock’s may compensate for that,” Bunny returned a little dryly. “Personally, I do not think that any young girl should be left in the charge of such a woman.”

“She’s very loyal to Tante, really, and she’s been our standby for years. I wish she had come to say good-bye to me, though,” Sabina said.

“Well, go back to bed and I’ll bring you a cup of tea,” Bunny said. “This house is very chilly before the fires are lighted.”

Sabina went back to her room and stood for a moment at the window, looking out on the bleak countryside. It was a grey day, and the chill of a late dawn still lay over the neglected garden and the graves beyond. It was not surprising, she thought, that Marthe had disliked the place. Sabina climbed gratefully into bed and reflected for the first time upon the comfort of constant hot water and fires that warmed at the touch of a switch.

When Bunny came up with the tea she glanced shrewdly at her guest’s disconsolate face and observed:

“Have you changed your mind already about the rectory, Sabina? We live very plainly here, and there is little in the way of amusement.”

Sabina coloured, feeling that she had been caught out in ingratitude.

“Oh, no,” she said quickly. “It’s most kind of you to have me, and I—I expect when the sun comes out the country will look quite different.”

Even as she spoke she remembered Brock telling her that other day that you could see the first hint of spring in the colours of the moor.

“I expect it wants knowing—the moor, I mean,” she added. Bunny smiled.

“Some never come to know it,” she said. “The moor accepts and rejects as it chooses.”

“Like Mr. Brockman,” said Sabina, sipping her tea.

“Brock? Yes, perhaps you’re right. He was bred on the moor, so perhaps there’s an affinity.”

“But Cornwall’s no longer his home, is it?”

“Not now, but Brock’s had many homes in many lands. His business takes him far afield.”

Sabina did not ask what Brock’s business might be and Bunny did not tell her. She said instead, nodding to the photographs round the walls:

“Do you get tired of looking at them?”

“No—oh no, I love them. Sometimes I make up stories about them.”

“That’s fortunate, for Brock wants you to keep his room while you’re here.”

Sabina looked surprised and then embarrassed.

“Oh, I couldn’t possibly do that,” she said. “All his own things are here, aren’t they? Besides, he must miss his mountains.”

“Well, you must settle that between the two of you, but personally I think it mightn’t be a bad thing if Brock was separated from his mountains for a time. It’s no good hankering after what you can no longer have.”

“Does his stiff leg mean that he can never climb again?” asked Sabina.

“Oh, yes. Climbing was finished for him some time ago — long enough for him to have learnt resignation, anyway,” said Bunny.

Sabina’s eyes rested with gentle thoughtfulness on a magnificent photograph of the Matterhorn.

“But do you think one ever learns that?” she asked. “I mean, for someone who has known and conquered the heights, a physical handicap must seem like an insult.”

Bunny looked at her with surprise.

“How should you know that?” she said. “It is what he has tried to make me understand.”

“And you cannot?”

“Not entirely. It has always seemed to me that to resent an infirmity to such a degree is an admission of failure. One should be made strong by misfortune; one should have complete freedom of spirit.”

“Not at first,” Sabina said. “Not until there’s something else.”

Bunny looked at her with humility. How did she know, this ignorant child? How should she understand with such simplicity the truth which Bunny had been trying to preach for years? But already the awareness had gone from the girl’s face. She drew her knees up to her chin under the bedclothes and her expression was once more that of a shy child.

“How far is Penruthan from here?” she asked.

“Penruthan? Of course, that’s really why you are here, is it

not? It lies over the moor to the west.”

“Is it far? Could I walk there?”

“Oh, yes, if you’re not afraid of exercise, but the going can be rough. Brock should be back in half an hour for breakfast, so you had better get up now. I will put a can of hot water in the bathroom, but the bath water will not be hot, I fear, until the afternoon.”

Bunny picked up the empty cup, automatically straightened Sabina’s underclothes lying neatly folded on a chair, and left the room with no further speech.

After breakfast Sabina helped Bunny with the housework, for Mrs. Cheadle in the kitchen was suffering from her proverbial bad legs and drinking tea in vast quantities until such time when she could, with all honour, repair to her home in the village.

“I do not expect you to do this, my dear,” Bunny protested once with mild reproof. “Dusting and polishing cannot be very amusing for you.”

“Oh, but they are,” Sabina contradicted happily.

“There’s nothing to do like this living in hotels, and it’s really terribly fascinating making things shine and scrubbing something until you
know
it’s clean.”

“Well, it’s not the average taste,” Bunny smiled. “Still, I suppose if you’ve never done it there’s a novelty attached. Did they teach you nothing useful, your aunt and Marthe?”

“Needlework, of course,” Sabina said, feeling a little guilty that she possessed so small a knowledge of domestic matters. “I do all Tante’s mending and washing and I can make a
tisane
for almost any ailment, and I can market as cheaply as Marthe, though, of course, the hotels provide most of our food.”

“I see.” Bunny did not express any opinion as to whether she considered such things to be adequate, but she was thinking privately that Lucille Faivre had found yet another unpaid servant in her young niece.

Brock had gone out again soon after breakfast and was not expected back until the afternoon, so Sabina and Bunny had luncheon together on a small table by the fire in the living-room.

“It s an old-maidish habit, I suppose,” Bunny apologised, “but so much more cosy when one is alone—and I’m alone

for the most part in the winter, of course.”

“I like it, too,” Sabina said, enjoying the warmth of the fire on her legs and the unfamiliar intimacy of a species of indoor picnic. “Do you get lonely here, Bunny?”

“No, dear, I haven’t the time,” the governess replied. “When my husband was alive, of course, it was rather different, but although I no longer have much to do with the parish, the new vicar’s wife up on the hill is always glad of a little help.”

Sabina could not picture Bunny with a husband. It was easier, by far, to think of Marthe as a married woman.

“What was he like—Mr. Fennell, I mean?” she asked shyly, and Bunny smiled.

“You are wondering how I came to be married at all, are you not?” she said. “My husband was a widower. I came here as governess to his little boy who died not long after. He married me because—well, probably because he was lonely, and this is a big house for a man alone.”

Sabina was silent. It was rather a joyless little history, she thought, and understood how much Brock’s infrequent visits probably meant to his old governess.

“He was your favourite?” she asked, and Bunny gave her an amused look.

“You mean Brock? Yes, perhaps he was. He had a difficult childhood in many ways. His parents were separated, and that’s always sad for a child.”

“Sadder than having none?”

“Well, that would depend, I suppose. Do you not remember your own parents, Sabina?”

“My mother died soon after I was born and my father didn’t want to be bothered with a child, I think,” Sabina said. “Even then I used to go on visits to Tante. She hadn’t long been married to my uncle, and I remember we all thought her very gay and smart.”

“And she was willing to act as your guardian?”

“There was no one else. My uncle died the same year as my father and neither of them left much money. Tante has often said that if it hadn’t been for me she would undoubtedly have married again.”

“Indeed? But Penruthan, no doubt, seemed a safer proposition.”

“Penruthan?”

Bunny pursed her lips and looked embarrassed. “Forgive me, my dear, I should not have said that,” she said, “but both

you and Marthe have been a little free with your affairs.”

“Have we?” asked Sabina, who had never imagined that the reason for Tante’s adopting her had not been known to everyone. “Well, of course, if it had not been for Penruthan, I don’t suppose Tante would have been so hasty, but it was not unreasonable to suppose that by selling it we could both be more comfortably off, was it?”

“It was a pity, in that case, that the legal side of the matter was not gone into first,” remarked Bunny dryly, but Sabina only smiled at her.

“Yes; but, you see, Tante didn’t know much about English law then, and I, a schoolgirl, didn’t even know I had inherited a house.”

“I see,” said Bunny, and said no more. Indeed it was only too plain that the child Sabina had been used with scant regard for her own well-being.

It was Bunny’s afternoon for the Women’s Institute, so Sabina would be left by herself until Brock returned.

“I shall go out,” she said, and thought of Penruthan over the moor.

“Yes, dear, explore the garden,” Bunny said absently; “but wrap up warmly; there’s no sun today.”

Left alone in the big house, Sabina experienced that strange delight that follows the unexpected possession of someone else’s property. She ran from room to room, making herself familiar with hitherto unnoticed objects, examining books and pictures, picking up ornaments, and lingering longest over the framed snapshots of children, the only family Bunny had ever known. There were some quite recognisable as Brock at various ages, from sailor suit to the first rough tweeds of adolescence. Where were they now, Sabina wondered, these old-fashioned children with their dated clothes? Did any of them return as Brock did to keep faith with their childhood days, or had they forgotten?