A Winter's Child (10 page)

Now she could be free of all that.

‘It's over,' she said flatly. ‘And if they'd just stop talking about it … Well, I think it's positively morbid, don't you, the way they go on adding up the casualty figures and working out that at least three or four women in ten will have to stay single because there won't be enough men to go round.'

‘That happens to be true, Polly.'

‘Oh – that's what Nola says. She thinks we're moving towards a female dominated world – or says she does. But that's only because she used to be a suffragette.'

‘Nola? Was she really?' It was the first question she had asked, during her whole téte-à-téte with Polly, to which she really wished to know the answer.

‘Well, not
really,
I suppose. Just dabbled, as she does with everything. One year it was sculpture, the year after it was botany, then religion and Greek dancing and Lord knows what else – then votes for women. She never marched or threw bricks or anything like that because Benedict wouldn't let her. She just talked about it when mother particularly didn't want her to. None of it amounted to much.'

‘I wouldn't say that. It got the vote for women last year.'

‘Oh
that.'
All too clearly Polly was not impressed. ‘But only for women over thirty. And, I ask you, who'd want to admit it? I mean, to claim the vote you'd have to register, wouldn't you, so that everybody would know how old you were. And how many women would care to do that? Benedict says the government are banking on it not being many, which is why they set the limit at thirty in the first place.'

‘Very likely. But I'm not sure I think so poorly of women.'

It was not the answer Polly had expected. She did not really understand it, and it was with a certain defiance that she said, ‘Well – mother says a clever woman can get what she wants without voting for it or getting up a committee to pass a law about it. And for once I'm bound to agree. You were never a suffragette were you, Claire?'

Slowly, suddenly quite weary, Claire shook her head.

‘No. I was just too young for it. My mother wouldn't let me throw bricks either.'

Had she ever wanted to? Theoretically, idealistically, yes she had. But mainly she had wanted to be admired and courted by Jeremy, loved and needed by Paul. And what had she ever desired from life more urgently than the chance – the time – to bear Paul's child? Her aims had been no different from Polly's. And therefore she had no right to resent Polly or to be irritated by her because her own lovers were dead and her own youth had been stolen from her, while Polly's was still there, rich in hope and opportunity. Yet Polly
did
irritate her. She
was
resentful. And feeling that her exposure to so much youthful exuberance had lasted long enough she got to her feet and calmly, pleasantly, put an end to it.

‘Perhaps we should go down.'

‘Damn – I expect so. But we must see a lot of each other, Claire. And if Benedict should take it into his head to trust you with the car, as he absolutely never will trust me – I mean without the chauffeur – then we could absolutely go all over the place and no questions asked. Let's start by taking a trip over to Leeds and having a look at the shops. Tuesday? How's that?'

Agreeing sweetly, falsely, that Tuesday or any day next week would suit her perfectly, Claire enquired directions to the bathroom, needing a moment or two of her own company, and then went downstairs, reaching the hall as the gentlemen were coming out of the dining room, Edward still engaging Benedict Swanfield in what, to Edward, was evidently a most interesting conversation although Toby Hartwell looked thoroughly bored with it.

‘Oh –
hello,'
he said to Claire, not in the least flirtatious but simply relieved to be escaping from the weight or the chill of Benedict's company, until he glimpsed the presence of his wife standing like a sentinel in the shadows, which badly startled him.

‘Good God, Eunice – must you give a fellow such a fright?'

But her mission was not with her husband.

‘Benedict!'

‘Eunice?'

‘Could I have a word with you?'

‘Now?'

‘Yes.
Now.
Please.'

And it was evident to Claire, who had herself approached hospital matrons in that same dry-mouthed agony with requests for leave that meant the difference between seeing Paul for a few extra hours and perhaps never seeing him again, that it would have to be
now,
at once, before the courage she had screwed up so tight to face her brother should explode, evaporate, and be all done.

He glanced at his watch, his face entirely without expression.

‘Not the best moment, I'm afraid.'

And although his voice held no particular curtness or impatience, no threat, just words, in fact, spoken, with an empty clarity, in their correct grammatical order, he managed, nevertheless, to fluster her badly.

‘But I've had something to ask – something to
say,
that is, for days.'

‘Yes. I do know that, Eunice.'

‘And since you're going to London tonight …'

‘Exactly.'

‘Well then…'

‘Then I have three-quarters of an hour before train time and rather a lot to do. Claire, I wonder if you could spare me a moment? In the study perhaps? I won't detain you long.'

She paused on the bottom stair, her whole posture an enquiry. Why me?

‘Ah yes,' said Edward, answering for her in automatic self-importance. ‘You'll want me to be present, I daresay.'

‘Will I?' enquired Benedict Swanfield of his solicitor. ‘Should it become necessary, I will send for you.'

Did he ignore – Claire wondered – or did he simply not wish to see the helpless gesture Eunice made towards her husband and the brave smile, the jaunty ‘making the best of it'air with which he responded? Could he have failed to notice the obsequious manner in which pompous, easily offended Edward, knowing himself to have been dismissed like an errand boy with a snap of the fingers, had smiled and hurried away? Did he not realize that those whom he treated in this scornful, cat-and-mouse manner would be unlikely to forgive him for it?

Smiling very calmly, she walked through the door he held open and sat down in the chair he indicated in a room that was dark brown, male, meticulously tidy, as impersonal as the man who took the chair behind the desk, its solid mahogany and gold-tooled red leather presence creating a physical distance between them which his attitude seemed well able to match.

‘Very well, Claire –'

And once again he glanced at his watch, calculating with the thoroughness of a man of affairs who not only has a train to catch but to whom time is money in any case, the exact number of minutes available and how to employ them to their full.

‘There are certain matters to be explained, I think.'

‘Yes.' She was aware of it, did not welcome it, and now wished the matter over and done. ‘About my plans for the future, I suppose.'

‘Ah – you have made plans then, have you?'

‘No. Not exactly. Not quite yet, at any rate.'

It was not, she realized, an answer likely to please a man in a hurry although it did not appear to surprise him either, being the kind of reply, she supposed, to which he was accustomed from Polly and Eunice and Miriam. And, feeling no inclination whatsoever to be classed among the domestic herd of women who pleaded with him – or with any other man – for money or favours or attention, she felt her temper begin to stir a little, preparing itself to rise.

‘I am not sure what I intend to do, Mr Swanfield. I am in Faxby mainly to see my mother. Beyond that I am not yet certain.'

The room was not well-lit, his dark face even further darkened by shadow, but she thought he smiled, briefly and with the fleeting degree of humour one might extend to a child experimenting with adult words and situations beyond its scope or its abilities. He was watching her in fact as she herself half an hour ago, had watched Polly smoking a cigarette, his condescension infuriating her. For she was not a child. Far – very far – from that. And, most unwisely, she felt a great urge, which slie knew to be childish in itself, to tell him so.

‘Well then,' he said, clearly dismissing the matter as a formality which had already been decided. ‘Since your arrangements are uncertain and my time is limited, may I take it that you will be coming to live with us here at High Meadows, and make
my
arrangements accordingly? I know the suggestion has already been put to you. It seems perfectly satisfactory. Obvious, in fact.'

Could he compel her? Suddenly, sitting before him in the dark-panelled, close-curtained room, the fresh Spring evening decisively shut out, an airless silence within, she felt herself weaken, falling victim once again to the confused and often illusory oppressions of her childhood, the bonds of straw which, nevertheless, had been so very hard and slow to break. Were they truly broken now? Once – rather long ago – Edward Lyall had controlled her easily and unscrupulously through Dorothy because, accepting the values of Dorothy's world, she had believed it necessary to obey them in order to be loved. But that tense and narrow time was over. That stifling, tightly structured world of Dorothy's and Edward's and Miriam Swanfield's, if it had ever existed at all beyond the limits of their small imaginations, their petty authority, was no more. She had seen it crumble. What had she now to fear?

‘Mr Swanfield,' and she even smiled at him in her friendly, pleasant fashion, ‘I am sorry to appear ungrateful and I would certainly not wish to offend Jeremy's mother. But the arrangement does not seem obvious to me.'

‘Then – one assumes – you are considering the possibility of remaining at Upper Heaton with your own mother?'

‘Oh no.' And she smiled again, serene, good-humoured, doing rather better than she had expected. ‘It would not suit my mother's husband to have me for very long at Upper Heaton. It would not suit me either.'

‘I dare say.' Clearly the domestic tensions of Upper Heaton were not unknown to him. ‘Then where
do
you propose to go? Yes – yes – you have already told me you have not made up your mind. Then, may I suggest that while you are doing so – since the process may well be slow – that you accept Miriam's invitation? She seems keen to have your company, and since you have nothing else to do … Shall we consider it settled then – for the moment?'

How often, she wondered, had he used that phrase and then, rising to his feet, glancing at his watch, had walked away, cancelling out the resentment, the opposition, the will to fight back of those left behind him by the simple and lethal process of ignoring it? Many times, she supposed. And, in the face of his absolute conviction that others – particularly his female relations – would obey him, it was not easy to resist.

‘I'm sorry,' she said quietly.

‘For what?'

‘For being a nuisance.'

‘The remedy for that, my dear, is in your hands.'

‘You mean that I should do as I am told?'

Yes. That was his meaning exactly. They both knew it. And while she digested it, pondering the consequences of her disobedience, there was no need for him to speak.

‘I am in something of a hurry, Claire,' he reminded her.

‘Yes.' But she was in no hurry at all. No one waited or watched for her return and she could think of nothing for which she cared enough to label ‘Urgent'. ‘You are going to London, aren't you?'

What business was that of hers? His curtly raised eyebrow asked her the question and she smiled in reply, sensing the strength of his will, yet untroubled by it. What could he do to her? Many things, she supposed, which would have mattered to her once, as they mattered now to Dorothy and Eunice and Polly: which would probably matter to her still if she had her future with Jeremy or with Paul to fight for. If she was whole. Things which might matter to her again should the numbed and damaged part of herself ever heal enough to function. But, for the moment, perhaps for a long time to come, she was empty of needs and desires and therefore most amazingly at liberty.

‘We are not offering you charity,' he said tartly, ‘you do-as I am very sure you realize – have certain rights here.'

Had he misunderstood her reasons? Did he imagine that, far from refusing his offer of comfort and security, she was simply being devious? A scheming woman trying to put up her value? She believed he did and slowly, just a little sadly, shook her head.

‘Rights? No – no. I don't think so.'

‘My dear girl,' he said, curt, displeased, clearly suspecting himself to be face to face with a greedy woman but anticipating no real trouble in dealing with her. ‘I am not making suggestions. I am stating facts. You were my brother's legal wife. On his death you inherited both his place in this house and his share of the Swanfield estate. Of course you know that.'

Again she shook her head, not denying the fact itself, of which Edward Lyall and her mother, as his emissary, had made her only too well aware, but the substance, the justice of it.

‘I don't think so.' And the tone of her voice, the gesture of her hand, palm outward, seemed to be pushing something away rather than grasping it, not disputing the truth of his statement so much as refusing it.

He leaned forward as she took out a cigarette and deftly, brusquely, lit it for her. ‘I would be obliged to you, Claire, if you could explain – as briefly as possible – exactly what nonsense this is. Has Edward Lyall never made clear to you the terms of my father's will, as they affect you?'

‘He may have done.'

‘He
must
have done. Twice in fact. Once when you married and again when Jeremy was killed. Those were my instructions. Did he fail to carry them out?'

‘No. Of course not. He told me. And then he wrote to me to make sure I understood.'