I Capture the Castle (34 page)

And then misery came rushing back like a river that has been dammed up. I tried to open my heart to it, to welcome it as a part of my life’s experience,.

and at first that made it easier to bear. Then it got worse than ever before-it was physical as well as mental, my heart and ribs and shoulders and chest, even my arms, ached. I longed so desperately for someone to comfort me that I went and laid my head on Miss Blossom’s bust I thought of it as soft and Motherly, under a royal-blue satin blouse, and imagined her saying: “That’s right—go through it, not round it, duckie. It’s the best way for most of us in the end.” And then a different voice spoke in my head, a bitter, sarcastic voice—my own at its very nastiest. It said:

“You’ve sunk pretty low, my girl, clasping a dressmaker’s dummy.

And aren’t you a bit old for this Miss Blossom nonsense?” Then, for the first time in my life, I began to wonder how I “did” Miss Blossom. Was she like Stephen’s mother, but not so humble—or nearer to a charwoman of Aunt Millicent’s? Or had I taken her from some character in a book his Suddenly I saw her more vividly than ever before, standing behind the bar of an old-fashioned London pub. She looked at me most reproachfully, then put a sealskin jacket over her blue blouse, turned off all the lights, and went out into the night closing the door behind her. The next second, her bust was as hard as a board and smelt of dust and old glue.

And I knew she was gone for ever.

Luckily, Heloise came in then or I should have cried myself into a state beyond recovery before teatime. You can’t cry on Heloise; she thumps her tail sympathetically, but looks embarrassed and moves away. Anyhow, I had to get her long-overdue dinner.

I haven’t been able to bear looking at Miss Blossom since then.

It isn’t only that she is now nothing more than a dressmaker’s dummy—she makes me think of the corpse of a dressmaker’s dummy.

Religion, good works, strong drink-oh, but there is another way of escape, a wicked one, far worse than drink.

I tried it on my birthday a week ago.

When I woke up that morning the sun was shining—the first time for over a fortnight. I had barely taken this in when I heard music just outside my bedroom door. I sprang up and dashed out to the landing, and there on the floor was a small portable wireless, with a card on it saying: “Many happy returns from Stephen.” That was what he had been saving up for! That was why he had posed for Leda Fox-Cotton!

I yelled out: “Stephen, Stephen!”

Thomas shouted from the hall.

“He’s gone off to work early-I think he felt embarrassed about being thanked.

It’s quite a good little wireless. Get dressed quickly and we’ll play it over breakfast.”

He came bounding upstairs and had carried the wireless off before I had so much as turned the dials. I was just going to tell him to bring it back when I thought, “Heavens, what does it matter ?” The early morning weight had descended on my heart.

While I dressed, I worked it out that only two weeks and two days before, owning a wireless would have made me deliriously happy; and now it didn’t mean a thing. Then it struck me that I could at least do my suffering to music.

When I got down, I found that Stephen had set the breakfast table for me and put flowers on it.

“And there’s my present,” said Thomas.

“I

haven’t wrapped it up because I’m just in the middle of it.” It was a book on astronomy, which he is very much interested in; I was glad he had chosen some thing he wanted himself, because though he gets a little pocket money now, it will take a long time to make up for all the years he didn’t have any.

Father came down then; of course he hadn’t remembered my birthday.

“But Topaz will,” he said, cheerfully.

“She’ll send you something from me.” He was horrified to see the wireless —he has always said that being without one is one of the few pleasures of poverty; but he got interested during breakfast.

Only he couldn’t bear the music or voices-what he liked were the atmospherics.

“I suppose you wouldn’t care to lend it to me for an hour or so ?”

he said, after Thomas had gone off to school.

“These noises are splendid.”

I let him take it. All that really mattered to me was whether or not Simon would send me a present.

The parcel-post came at eleven. There was a dressing-gown from Topaz, a Shakespeare from Father (so tactful of Topaz to remember how he hates lending me his), a nightgown -real silk-from Rose, six pairs of silk stockings from Mrs. Cotton, and a big box of chocolates from Neil. Nothing from Simon.

Nothing from Simon, indeed! I was still sitting numbed with disappointment when a motor horn hooted in the lane. The next minute a van drew up and the driver plonked a crate down on the drawbridge. I yelled up asking Father to come down and between us we prized the lid off. Inside was a wireless and a gramophone combined—oh, the most wonderful thing! When shut, it is like a fat suitcase, with a handle to carry it by. The outside is a lovely blue, like linen but shiny. There was a record case to match.

Nobody ever had such a glorious present.

Simon had enclosed a note saying:

Dear Cassandra, I wanted to send you an electric one, but remembered you’ve no electricity. The radio works from batteries that can be re-charged at the garage in Scoatney, but the phonograph is only the old-fashioned type that has to be wound up—still, it’s better than nothing. I am sending you the Debussy you liked, but couldn’t get the Bach record I played to you. Borrow anything you want from Scoatney until you find out what your musical tastes really are and then I’ll buy you lots more records.

They swear the thing will get to you on the right day and I do hope it does. Many, many happy returns. I’ll be seeing you soon. Love from Simon It was in pencil, written at the shop, so I couldn’t expect it to be long or personal. And it did say “Love”—he might have put just “Yours” or “In haste” or something. Of course, I knew it didn’t mean my kind of love, but it was valuable.

I read the note again and again, while Father got the most agonizing noises out of the wireless.

“Oh, stop!” I cried at last.

“It can’t be good for it to shriek like that.”

“Sounds like the lost souls of sea gulls, doesn’t it?” he shouted above the din.

I pushed past him and turned it off. In the sudden quietness, we could just hear Stephen’s wireless playing away by itself up in the gatehouse room. Father said:

“Has it occurred to you what this thing is going to do to your swam ?”

All that I felt was resentment against Stephen because his being hurt was going to interfere with my pleasure in Simon’s present;

not very much though—nothing could do that.

Luckily Father didn’t wait for an answer.

“This is a much stronger wireless,” he went on. I’ll borrow it awhile.”

I shouted “No!” so loudly that he stared in astonishment.

“I’m longing to try the gramophone,” I added, trying to sound calm and reasonable. He suddenly smiled and said, “Well, well”-in an almost fatherly voice; then actually carried the machine indoors for me and left me alone with it. I got the records out of their corrugated paper and played them and played them. There were some Bach Preludes and Fugues as well as the Debussy album.

Simon hadn’t sent the “Lover” record.

By the time Stephen got home, my better nature had asserted itself and I was terribly worried about his feelings. I had his wireless in the kitchen (father had lost interest in it) and was careful to have it on full blast when he came in. I nearly burst myself thanking him for it and I don’t think I have ever seen him look so I had asked Father during lunch if it would be a good idea to Simon’s present for a day or two, but he thought that would harder for Stephen in the end.

“Just tell him how glad you are to have a really lightweight wireless you can carry around—and that you’ll probably only use Simon’s for the gramophone,” he suggested, and I thought it was very sensible of him; but the next minute record round and round as if he were reading the grooves, and surely a man who tries to read a gramophone record cannot be normal?

I did my best to break the news to Stephen tactfully—I said all Father had advised and a lot more besides.

“Yours has a real wooden case,” I told him, “with such a beautiful high polish.” But the light went out of his eyes. He asked if he could see Simon’s present I had carried it up to my bedroom. After staring at it a few seconds,” he said: “Yes, that’s very handsome”—and turned to go.

“The wireless part isn’t very good,” I called after him, untruthfully.

He went on downstairs. Oh, I was so sorry for him! After all the months he had been saving up! I ran after him and, from the top of the kitchen stairs, I could see him staring at his little brown wireless.

He turned it off, then went out into the garden with a most bitter expression on his face.

I caught up with him as he was crossing the drawbridge.

“Let’s go for a little walk,” I said.

“All right, if you want to.” He said it without looking at me.

We trudged down the lane. I felt as I did once when Rose had very bad toothache—that it was callous of me to be so separate from the pain, that just being sorry for suffering people isn’t enough. Yet when I asked myself if on Stephen’s account I would be willing not to have had Simon’s present, I knew that I wouldn’t.

I tried to talk naturally about the two machines, enlarging on how I could carry his little one from room to room and even take it out of doors (although I knew that unless Stephen was around I should lug Simon’s everywhere, even if it broke my back). I suppose I overdid it because he interrupted and said:

“It’s all right, you know.”

I looked at him quickly. He tried to smile reassuringly, but didn’t quite let his eyes meet mine.

“Oh, Stephen!” I cried.

“It was a much bigger present from you.

Simon didn’t have to save—or work for it.”

“No, that was my privilege,” he said quietly.

That seemed to me a most beautiful way for him to have put it.

It made me sorrier for him than ever—so sorry that I found myself almost wishing I had fallen in love with him instead of with Simon. Just then he added, very softly, “My dear.” And that second, a wild idea flashed into my mind. Oh, why did it his Was it something in his voice awoke that feeling in me? Or was it because we were passing the larch wood and I remembered how I once imagined going into it with him?

I stopped walking and stared at him. His face was golden from the sunset. He asked me if I wanted to turn back.

I said, “No. Let’s see if there are any late bluebells in the wood.”

He looked at me quickly, right into the eyes at last.

“Come on,” I said.

As we pushed aside the first green trails of larch I thought, “Well, this will disprove my theory that things I’ve imagined happening never really do happen.” But it didn’t-because everything was so different from my imagining. The wood had been thinned out, so it wasn’t cool and dark as I expected; the air was still warm and the rays of the sinking sun shone in from behind us. The tree trunks glowed redly. There was a hot, resinous smell instead of the scent of bluebells-the only ones left were shriveled and going to seed.

And instead of a still, waking feeling there was a choking excitement.

Stephen didn’t say any of the things I once invented for him; neither of us spoke a word. I led the way all the time and reached the little grassy clearing in the middle of the wood before he did. There I turned and waited for him. He came closer and closer to me, then stood still, staring at me questioningly. I nodded my head and then he took me in his arms and kissed me, very gently. It didn’t mean a thing to me—I know I didn’t kiss him in return. But suddenly he changed, and kissed me more and more, not gently at all-and I changed, too, and wanted him to go on and on. I didn’t even stop him when he pulled my dress down over my shoulder. It was he who stopped in the end.

“Don’t let me, don’t let me!” he gasped, and pushed me away so violently that I nearly fell over. As I staggered backwards I had a wild feeling of terror and the minute I regained my balance I plunged blindly back through the wood. He called after me, “Mind your eyes—it’s all right, I’m not coming after you.” But I went on thrusting my way through the larches, shielding my face with my arm. I ran all the way to the castle and dashed up the kitchen stairs meaning to lock myself in my room, but I slipped when I was half-way up, banging my knee badly, and then I burst into tears and just lay there, sobbing. The awful thing is that something in me hoped that if I stayed there long enough he would come in and see how wretched I was-though I still can’t make out why I wanted him to.

After a little while, I heard him at the kitchen door.

“Cassandra, please stop crying,” he called.

“I wasn’t coming in, but when I heard you Please, please stop.”

I still went on. He came to the foot of the stairs.

I began to pull myself up by the banisters, still crying. He said:

“But it’s all right-really it is. There’s nothing wrong in it if we love each other.”

I turned on him fiercely: “I don’t love you. I hate you.”

And then I saw the look in his eyes and realized how dreadful it all was for him—until then I had only been thinking of my own misery. I gasped out, “No, no-I don’t mean that but …. Oh, I’ll never be able to explain.” And then I dashed through to my room and locked both doors. I was just going to fling myself on the bed when I caught sight of Simon’s present, on the window-seat. I went over, closed the gramophone part and lay with my head and arms on it. And for the first time in my life I wished I were dead.

When it was quite dark I pulled myself together enough to light a candle and begin to go wretchedly to bed. A few minutes later, there was a knock on the door to the landing and Stephen called out:

“I don’t want to come in, but please read the note I’m pushing through to you.” I called back “All right,” and saw the note coming under the door. As I picked it up I heard his footsteps going downstairs, and then the noise of the front door shutting.