Justice Is a Woman (19 page)

“Ten o’clock.”

“Good Lord! ... Oh, I couldn’t face breakfast.” She waved away the tray that Betty was about to put

on the bed table.

“A cup of tea, that’s all ... where’sjoe?”

“Outside, I think; he’s been up and about for some time now.”

“He’s inhuman.”

“What time did you get in?”

“Two ... three, I don’t remember, I can’t remember.”

“Did you have a good time?”

“Yes, yes.” Elaine opened her eyes wide.

“Surprisingly yes. There were two nice men there. One was a doctor who turned out to be Lena

Levey’s brother.” She narrowed her eyes and squinted up at Betty, saying, “What’s the matter with

you? You look as if you too had a night out on the tiles. Didn’t you sleep?”

“Yes; yes, I slept, but I was up rather late’ she jerked her head backwards ‘playing cards with Mike.”

“Oh, fast and furious living, playing cards with Mike. How’s the master of the house?”

“Oh, happy, smiling. You’d think he knew it was Christmas.”

“Oh, here’s the second master, or is it the third?” Elaine flicked her fingers towards Joe, who was now

entering the room, and Betty, turning from the side table where she had just poured out a cup of tea,

asked him, “Do you want one?”

“No, no.” He shook his head; then, going to the bed, he sat on the side of it. He did not look at Elaine

as he groped for her hand, but he kept his eyes on Betty as he spoke, “I’ve just seen Father.”

“Oh yes?” Betty turned her head to the side and looked at him.

“He told me some news.”

“Did he?” Betty now came to the bed and handed a cup of tea to Elaine, and she, taking it, tried to

draw Joe’s attention to her as she demanded, “What news? What do you mean, news?”

Still Joe did not take any notice of his wife but, staring at Betty, he said, “If you need a blessing you have

mine.”

When the heat swept through her whole body, it brought the sweat oozing out of her

pores, and she

wetted her lips as she was about to say, “I don’t need your blessing, Joe, it’s misplaced,”

when Elaine,

putting the cup sharply down on the side table, demanded, “What is this? What’s

happening?”

i8z

Now Joe did turn towards her and, smiling, he said quietly, “Father’s asked Betty to

marry him.”

No-one could have adequately described the look on Elaine’s face at this announcement, for it was a

mixture of amazement, horror, disgust . and anger, yet when she spoke her tone in no way corresponded

with her expression, for her voice was flat, her words mundane:

“You’re joking,” she said.

Before Joe had time to reply, Betty, her face and manner as stiff as her voice now, cried,

“Why should

he be joking?” She had meant to laugh the whole thing off; that is, even if Mike

remembered what he

had said to her last night, for on awakening this morning it had taken her some time to recall the incident;

but the look on her sister’s face, in fact, her complete attitude, which spoke of furious anger, aroused in

herself a defensive bitterness, and she added now, from deep within her throat, “Is it so strange that a

man, any man, should ask me to marry him?”

They were staring at each other as if Joe weren’t present, and Elaine, her voice matching her expression

cried, “Yes, it is. In this case it is. He’s an old man and crippled and he’s ...”

“And what, Elly?” Joe had risen from the bed and was staring down at her. “ Go on, why don’t you

say it? He’s not your kind of man, no matter what age he is; he’s uncouth, rough, coarse.”

“Oh my God!” Elaine put her hands to her head, and lay back and closed her eyes, but

she had hardly

touched the pillows before she was sitting up again, staring at him and demanding, “Do you mean to say

you’re for this?”

“Yes, every step of the way. Betty, here’ he jerked his head over his shoulder ‘she needs someone, and

he needs someone, they both get on well together.” He now bent towards her and, his

face grim, he

said, “I can’t understand you;

there are things about you that simply amaze me. I thought you’d be delighted. Don’t go!

“ He swung

round as Betty made for the door, but she took no notice of him and as the door clashed behind her,

leaving the room filled with the expression of her feelings, he turned again to Elaine and, shaking his head

slowly, he said, “ You’re a cruel little bitch. “

“And you are a stupid, bull-headed fool.”

He had been standing stiffly, but now the upper part of his body moved slowly to the

side, rather like the

slow-motion action of a boxer about to deliver a side blow. However, his hand got no

further than the

second button of his coat, and gripping this he twisted it as he stared at her and listened to her hissing at

him: “Don’t you know what this means; haven’t you any fore sight? You have a son, you seem to forget

that. If they married it is not impossible that they might have children, and where would you stand then?

Have you thought about that?”

“You mercenary little bugger!” The way he said ‘bugger’ didn’t sound the same as when it came

through his father’s lips, and it was the first time he had used the word to her. Her head pressed deep

into the pillows, and her voice still coated with bitterness, she hissed at him, “I won’t have it. I won’t

stand for it; there can’t be two mistresses in this house. She’s angled for this. I should have known.”

He straightened up now, took in a deep breath, stretched his neck out of his collar, then said slowly,

“You’re right there: there could never be two mistresses; we’d have to move.” And on

this he turned

slowly about and left the room, leaving her sitting bolt upright in the bed, her large white teeth nipping

savagely on the long painted nail of her middle finger.

“You’re a fool.”

“Yes, I know I am, Mike.”

“You like me, don’t you?”

“There’s nobody I like better.”

“Well, I wouldn’t be difficult to live with and I wouldn’t ask much of you.”

“I know that. I know all that, but such a decision ... well, it would cause complications and

far—reaching consequences.”

“Aw! To hell with that for an excuse! As you likely know, I told our Joe and he was for it. He could

have said, “ My God! are you in your dotage, man? “ but he didn’t. Even knowing that

money-wise he

and his would stand to lose, he said nowt of the sort. What he said was, “ I hope it comes off. Dad, but

if it does, mind, I refuse to call her step-mother. “ You look het-up, lass; you’ve been having words.”

“Yes, you could say I’ve been having words.”

“Well, I needn’t ask who your opponent was;

and I bet it was about this very subject, because, if it had come off, she’d have her nose put out,

wouldn’t she? “

“Yes, she would. But what we both seem to forget is that what hurts her, in the end hurts Joe.”

“Aw, damn that for reasoning. Well He hobbled to the window, leaned on the sill with

one hand and

scratched his head with the other as he said, “ Nice Christmas box to be turned down flat on the second

proposal of me life. “

When he slowly turned his head to look at her, they both smiled, and he said, “Come

here,” and when

she was standing by his side he turned his back to the window-sill and leaned his buttocks against it for

support, then taking her hand, he said, “I want you to promise me one thing as a sort of compensation for

the dirty trick you’ve played on me.”

“What’s that?”

“You won’t go and leave us; you won’t go off to that Lady Mary, whatever her name is.

You said you

had a letter from her last month telling you she was looking for a house, and not too far away from here, I

understand. Well, I have me own ideas what she’s up to. The old are always selfish and she’s a

determined old faggot, if ever there was one; so I want you to promise me one thing: no matter what the

atmosphere is down below’ he made a face towards the floor ‘you’ll not leave here.”

“Oh, Mike, that’s a tall order. Anyway, when I wrote to her I half promised that I’d go and stay with

her for a week or two on my holiday.”

“Oh well, there’s nowt against that. Take all your holidays with her as long as you regard this as your

home.” He now jerked her hands and brought her nearer to him, and, staring into her

eyes, he said, “I

can’t do without you, lass. I look back and life seemed empty afore you came into it. I can’t explain me

feelings: I’m past passionate love; I would say I’m past love of all kinds; but then I’ve never laid such

stock on love as I have on liking, and by! I like you, lass.”

When she bowed her head and stood mute he whispered thickly, “Aw, don’t cry. Don’t

cry. And yet

in a way it’s good to see a woman cry because of something I’ve said to her. Do you

know some thing?

The last woman I saw cry over me was me mother. Come on. Come on, dry your eyes,

else if our Joe

sees you he’ll think we’re already married and I’ve been indulging in the privileges of wedlock and

hammerin’ you.”

“Oh Mike, Mike!” She sniffed, blew her nose, then added, “By the way, I never wished

you a Happy

Christmas.”

“Happy Christmas, lass.”

“Happy Christmas, Mike,” Slowly she bent towards him and placed her lips on his, and

for a moment

she was held against him so fiercely that they almost overbalanced.

Seconds later she was on the landing and making for the stairs. He had said he was still a man, and from

that brief embrace she could tell he was still very much a man.

She was a fool. Oh, she was a fool. She had thrown away the only chance she would

know in life of

being a wife, the mistress of a house . and of being held tightly in a man’s arms.

“Isn’t it a beautiful view?”

“Wonderful. Really wonderful.”

“Don’t you think I was clever to find this house?”

“You’re clever in all ways, Lady Mary.”

“Yes, yes I am. There’s no false modesty about me; yes, I’m clever in all ways, always have been. I

was clever in the buying of it. Because it was furnished I pretended I didn’t want it, not my style, I said;

and I knew they hadn’t time to clear it and get it to an auction because they were due to leave for South

Africa in ten days. Their idea had been to let it furnished, but they’d had no applicants. I must have

appeared to them at first like a godsend;

then’ she now bent towards Betty and slapped her knee as she ended “I was the last

resort. And then

there was Nancy, and their cook, Mrs. Bailey, from the village thrown in, so I bought Valley View

cottage:

beautiful outlook overlooking the Teviot;

that’s what they put in the advertisement. And here I intend to stay for the rest of my life .. that’s if I

have a good companion. “

Betty looked at the old lady, who was sitting in a wicker chair on the lawn that was

bordered on two

sides by a blaze of colour. Beyond these were banks of bushes and trees, and straight ahead, beyond a

long sloping grass meadow, flowed the river, not big as rivers went, but gleaming and twisting like a

gilding eel.

Behind them stood the house. Part of one gable was covered with Virginia creeper, its leaves pink with

the promise of scarlet here and there, and from the other gable were hanging great

festoons of wist aria

leaves indicating that the blossom must have weighed them down in the spring.

There were eight windows to the front of the house, two at each side of the front door and four above

door level, all deep set in the rough stone wall. Although it was called a cottage it had eight main rooms,

besides the kitchen quarters, and a long attic, whose windows looked out onto the back of the house.

Betty had arrived late the previous evening, her reception by the old lady not only

touching her heart, but

warming her and soothing her frayed nerves, and she had to admit that her nerves had

become frayed

over the past months. From that anything but joyful Christmas Day up till just a few

weeks ago there had

been a noticeable rift in the relationship between herself and Elaine, and she knew that if she hadn’t been

so useful to her sister, or if the child had been easy to rear, or, again, if there wasn’t the obstacle of the

real master of the house, Elaine would have politely given her her marching orders long before now.

Then a few weeks ago Elaine’s attitude had changed; in fact, there had been two or three times when it

seemed as if she was about to

apologise for her behaviour. Once she had grabbed hold of her hand and had begun to say some thing,

but before Betty could ask her what was wrong she had turned and rushed away into the garden. She

hadn’t followed her, for she recognised this as an echo of her sister’s childish strategy; as a child, when

she was at fault, she would attempt to apologise, then run off and lock herself in the schoolroom, and by

the time she was coaxed to come out, you would find yourself apologising to her.

She had thought that Elaine would greet her news that she was going to spend two or

three weeks with

Lady Mary with relief, yet, although she hadn’t openly stated that she didn’t want her to go, her manner

had spoken for her.

During the summer months, Elaine had fallen into the habit of travelling up to London on her own.

Sometimes she stayed with her Uncle Hughes—Burton, at other times with a school