Air and Angels (7 page)

‘Kitty is so unsettled
just now. You must surely have noticed. Her head is full of dreams.’

‘All fifteen-year-old heads are full of dreams, of one sort or another.’

‘And I do not want to have it turned too soon by some young man. She is very pretty.’

‘Well, it will be turned sooner or later. Perhaps she had better begin to get used to it.’

‘There
has
to be more to her life than …’

Than I have had. But she does
not say it. And it is not so clear as that. She herself has been happy, has wanted nothing more.

Uneasy with the way the conversation has turned, he smiles, comes across and puts his hands on her shoulders.

Says, ‘But I daresay when Miss Hartshorn has calmed down, she will decide to stay here, after all.’

For a moment, she is almost blinded by rage at his obtuseness.

Amelia Hartshorn lies,
stiff, still, wide-eyed. From the garden, through the shutters, the night sounds of India. And through her head, reeling endlessly, silently, terrifyingly, the events of the previous afternoon, every detail seen, heard again, every fibre of her body reacting, over and over.

They have been kindness itself. Lady Moorehead has sat with her, listened, murmured comforts. The servants have brought
fruit and iced tea, tiptoed about.

And the syce saved her life of course. And it is over, and perhaps they will not sympathise with her for very much longer.

It happens every day here, after all.

And through it all, she prays. Prays with a fervour she has not known herself capable of, a single-minded desperation. Prays for a place to be found for her on a boat soon, soon, to be gone from here.
Prays for Home.

She cannot sleep and so, will not dream. But beneath the endless repetition, running through her head, is Home, England. She catches glimpses of it and tries to grasp them But they fade. India is more powerful. India overcomes and obliterates, its appalling brightness, the blazing colours, the chattering, the smell, the horrors, the craziness, the bedlam of India, fill her head
like the terrible, inescapable cry of the brain-fever bird.

And so she lies rigid, praying her passionate prayer, and so the night passes.

Kitty sleeps and dreams no dreams. But, waking at dawn, has a vivid recollection of walking with her mother along a flat, hard, shining beach in the rain. Watches the line of her footprints fill up at once with water, hears the sound of the sea and the cry
of the gulls, remembers the joy she had in that great expanse. Remembers taking to her heels and running, running, running.

England, she supposes.

And turns, and sleeps again at once.

FLORENCE AND Thea Pontifex sat over tea in Thea’s room in the women’s college. They had been friends since girlhood but, in the face of opposition, Thea had attended the university, and so, gone on to teach. Florence had watched her without envy but rather, when she herself had married Chester Bowering at the age of twenty, with a considerable sense of superiority. She had treated Thea quite
patronisingly.

Thea, clear of mind and of purpose, fair and generous of heart, had gone on her way steadily, aware of, but unconcerned by, Florence’s airs.

Now, feeling herself to be a woman without a purpose in life, as well as grossly undereducated, Florence envied Thea.

She said, ‘You are the one person I know who is entirely contented, who has no dissatisfaction.’ Though even as she spoke,
she recognised that it was not entirely true, and added, ‘Or at any rate, the only woman.’

Thea smiled, poured more tea. The room seemed too small to contain all of Florence’s restless energy.

‘It is
perfect
here,’ Florence gestured. ‘You see, I am simply envious.’

And at that moment, meant it, and longed for what the college room represented, and which she herself had never known; attendance
at stimulating lectures, afternoons spent in serious private study, the intense loyalty among a group of like-minded young women, talk late into the night, earnest, engaging.

It was a room full of character and interest, she thought, with books, pictures, china, ornaments, journals, music, a crowded room, personal and supremely unfashionable.

‘Perhaps it is not too late. I should like to embark
upon some course of study. Learning is so important, you have shown me that.’

‘Have you some particular subject that interests you?’

Florence rose and began to pace about the room, tall and dramatic, between tables and chairs, the desk and the piano.

‘Oh, history perhaps … ancient history … the classics and early civilizations. Or then again, science … the new discoveries. Or something very
pure – philosophy.’

Thea bent her head and busied herself with the tray.

‘Well, perhaps it is best to be clear.’

‘Yes. Oh yes. I understand that, of course. You have always been so sure, and then simply gone ahead.’

‘Women are not indulged here. Any indecisiveness, any wavering, a suggestion that one is less than fully committed – and oh, it is so gleefully pounced upon. We have to be all
that men are, but doubly so. And yet …’

She stood, ‘Still women. Shall we walk outside a little before it gets quite dark? The rain has cleared now, I think, and you must see the viburnum in the far shrubbery, it is a mass of pink.’

They toured the paths. There was no one at all about.

‘Of course,’ Thea said, glancing sideways, ‘we are a very closed society here. We are so far out, and I daresay
we give off a slightly frumpish air – even conventual. We have very little male society.’

They reached the shrubbery and the bush, its branches starred with the sweet-smelling blossom. Thea sensed that Florence had a need to confide in her. But after a few moments of silence, nothing had been said, so that in the end, she herself asked more about the plans of the Committee for their Home in the
country.

‘Perhaps we could help in some way here. We are all so very fortunate …’

‘Perhaps.’

‘It must take up a good deal of your time.’

‘Yes.’

‘And energy.’

Florence reached out a hand and touched the blossom.

‘But I think that you are so good and right … and … and
brave
to do it. It is so very important.’

Thea’s round face shone, fresh and unblemished beneath the neatly plaited hair.
She was a short, compact woman.

Abruptly, Florence asked, ‘Is there nothing that you long for, quite passionately?
Want
?’

‘Oh, all human beings have aspirations!’

‘Aspirations! I was not talking of anything so elevated.
Wants
… Desires.’

Florence looked round the garden wildly. It was cold and almost dark and the rain had begun again. In the buildings behind them, she felt the presence of
studious, purposeful, dedicated young women.

‘This …’ she gestured. ‘I could never aspire to this.’

Nor ever want it, she realised. For the air would surely suffocate her.

‘I must go back. Mother is on her own.’

‘Oh do, please, give her my warmest greetings. I mean to come and see her once the term is over. We lead such full lives.’

They walked slowly to the gate. Shaking hands, Thea held
onto hers for a moment.

‘If there is anything … if I can be of some help? I felt sure there was something you wanted.’

‘Ah.’ Florence drew away her hand, smiled a sudden, dazzling, distant smile. ‘What are mere “wants” beside so many aspirations?’

And felt nothing but relief at leaving them behind, relief and a return of the old sense of superiority towards Thea, as well as – for she had told
the truth – envy.

But the outing had been for a purpose more considerable than friendship. It had been an exercise in keeping Thomas Cavendish from her mind, and as such, altogether unsuccessful.

Wants, she thought now, in the darkness of the cab. I want.

For she recognised that it was nothing so gentle or so honourable as love. She wanted him, and wanted to succeed in getting him to marry
her.

Like Thea Pontifex, his life was complete and satisfying to him, and he had not a moment’s need of her. She felt similarly towards them both, felt irritation, superiority, envy, anger.

In the case of Thea, none of it greatly mattered.

In the case of Thomas Cavendish, whom she wanted, it did.

Well, she would go home. She would play backgammon or rummy with her mother, who had been too
much alone, she would stay up late, as the old lady liked, would be companionable, affectionate. They would chat.

If I do this, if I am not neglectful, if I look after my mother tenderly and with complete devotion, then it will come out, like a game of patience, and I will be rewarded, I will have what I want. Or so the thinking ran.

At the corner, she stopped the cab. The driver was to wait.

The blinds of the house had already been drawn.

‘Oh, Alice …’

‘Good evening, madam?’

‘It’s quite all right. I know I’m not expected, but perhaps you would say …’

‘I’m very sorry, madam, but there is no one at home. Mr Cavendish is in college, and Miss Georgiana has gone out visiting.’

‘Well, never mind … it does not matter in the least.’

She did not know what she had hoped for. Only, on
the spur of the moment, had wanted to be here, to step inside the house again. Perhaps to talk to Georgiana, have his name mentioned.

Or he might have been at home.

‘But I would like just to leave some papers.’

‘Of course, I’ll put them on Miss Georgiana’s desk. She always goes to it when she gets in.’

But Florence had swept away from her, down the passage.

‘No, no, Alice, please don’t trouble,
I’ll do it. And they are for
Mr
Cavendish. Don’t let me interrupt you, I know where to go.’

She closed the door sharply behind her.

He was not there, of course. And yet he was, the room was full of him. The book he had been reading lay open on the arm of the chair. She went over to the desk.

Bird notes. His handwriting was spare, abbreviated, in black ink. Not easy to read. She stared at it,
trying to force it to yield up something of the man to her. She felt a curious flutter of excitement, as though she were gazing into some intensely private diary, learning secrets. But they were simply names, descriptions, measurements.

She lifted her eyes from the book, to look slowly round the room again, wanting to hoard every detail of it, to remember everything. Thought, this would be my
world. I would no longer be an intruder. But there was an acute, guilty pleasure in being in here alone, as though she had in some way caught and held something of him.

Across the room, the glass doors that led to the conservatory, and the other birds. She did not understand at all the appeal they held for him.

But she saw herself, seated in another chair, beside the lamp and opposite to him,
reading, belonging.

Absorbed, she had heard no sounds. Now, there was Alice’s voice, quite close, explaining, protesting, and the door had opened, Thomas came quickly, angrily, into the room.

‘BUT YOU can hardly blame Alice. You have heard what she told you, that Florence simply marched in. Alice could not stop her. You know what she is like.’

‘Incompetent.’

‘Florence.’

‘Oh, certainly. It is becoming all too clear. How
dare
she enter my room, and pry and poke about like that. What possible reason could she have?’

‘Alice said something about papers …’

‘Papers! She wanted to
push her way in, to …’

‘Oh, to
what
, Thomas?’

The door was ajar. From the hall, they heard the slightest of noises, instantly suppressed.

‘You had better lower your voice.’

They were in Georgiana’s small sitting-room. She had come in, soaked to the skin, from having walked down the avenue, to find her brother raging, as she had never seen him before, Alice stiffly self-defensive, Florence
gone.

‘Please sit down. If we must discuss this before I am even changed out of my wet clothes, then let us do so quietly and calmly.’

To her surprise, he did sit, and, looking at him, she saw that the anger had left him, and his face was pale, weary.

‘I am sorry. Of course you are uncomfortable. Don’t trouble about this, please.’

‘I do trouble.’

She sat opposite him. He asked where she had
been.

‘Being patient while Adèle Hemmings’s aunt shouted at me about fallen women. Why is it that those who cannot hear well themselves believe the rest of us are stone deaf too?’

He smiled. ‘Fallen women?’

‘Adèle Hemmings’s aunt is extremely rich.’

‘Ah–the Committee …’

‘But it was all a great mistake. I should never have gone. I had to shout my head off trying to explain what it was all
about, and then be harangued for an hour about Jezebel. It would have been a good deal more satisfactory if I had been appealing for money to rescue fallen cats. Really, the house does smell so.’

‘Perhaps Adèle Hemmings’s aunt has lost her olfactory sense too. We must be charitable, Georgiana.’

‘There, you are laughing now, so that is better.’

‘You are very brave to go off on your fund-raising.
Brave altogether, in such a cause.’

‘Not brave, no. But we are so needed.’

‘So I realise. It is all a great pity.’

‘Well. Shall I ask Alice to bring in a glass of madeira? I feel I need to be warmed.’ She reached for the bell. ‘And you were home earlier than I had expected.’

‘Yes. A pupil did not arrive. I was already concerned about him, he sent no excuse or apology. I left a message in his
rooms. The servant seemed to think he had gone home rather suddenly.’

‘Some family matter then?’

‘He is supposed to ask for leave of absence. But he has been disturbed, I know. Well, I shall have to get to the bottom of it.’

Alice came in with the tray. Thomas spoke at once.

‘Alice, I must apologise for my curtness earlier. Of course it was not your fault.’

Georgiana waited for some moments
after the door had closed, before saying, ‘Thank you. That was the right thing to do.’