Silence in Court (3 page)

The effect was one of light, brightness, and colour, and, over all, the dominant red of Cousin Honoria's hair.

The young man with the crutch had reached her chair and was standing beside her. On the other side of the hearth behind a massive tea equipage was the authentic white mouse of Mrs. Maquisten's description—a little pale creature with hair of a washed-out flaxen and eyes of a washed-out blue. She was childishly small, but she had no look of youth. She was pouring out tea from a bulging silver teapot which looked much too heavy for her, and when Carey came up and was introduced her hand shook and some of the tea went over the edge of the tray to stain a lacy cloth.

The large hand of Mr. Jefferson Stewart come over the slight shoulder and took hold of the teapot.

“You know, that's much too heavy for you,” he said. “Now I'm the world's best tea-pourer. You let me take this on.”

Honor King said “How do you do?” to Carey in a small, distracted voice and shot a nervous glance at her Aunt Honoria. She got a sarcastic one in reply.

“He can certainly do it a great deal better than you do—that doesn't set a very high standard.”

Jeff Stewart was pouring tea in the grand manner.

“You know, Cousin Honoria, this is a very interesting experience for me. All those yarns about the Victorian woman being so weak and delicate that she hardly ever came out of a swoon—I'll be in a position to go home and tell them that they're all ballyhoo. Apart from having families of a dozen or so, which they must have had to want a teapot this size, they'd need to have real good muscle to handle it.”

“You might give a lecture on the subject,” said Honoria Maquisten drily.

The young man with the crutch came over and took a chair by Carey.

“He's giving one,” he said. And then, “Nobody's introducing us, but I'm Dennis Harland.”

Magda Brayle was handing round the cups. She gave one to Carey now.

Dennis said, “You'll have to take saccharine—Mrs. Deeping keeps all the sugar to make jam with. When I'm eating the jam I think it's worth it, but when I'm drinking the tea I'm not so sure.” He had a pleasant voice, and so much charm that it didn't really matter what he said. You had the warm, delightful feeling that in talking to you he had achieved a life ambition. The hazel eyes which were so like Cousin Honoria's were bright with interest and admiration.

The voice, whatever words it used, was saying all the time, “I love to talk to you.”

When she looked back afterwards Carey had the strongest impression of intimacy with all these people. It wasn't that she felt at home with them, or comfortable, or happy in her mind, for she did not. There were moments when she felt most bleakly strange. There were moments when she had the lost-dog feeling and could, with shame be it said, have wept upon Jeff Stewart's solid tweed shoulder. But there were also moments when a terrifying sense of intimacy touched her. There was the moment when Nora called across the sofa in her light, high voice, “How did you get on at the hospital, Den? Weren't you to see some bigwig or other this morning? What did he say?”

Dennis shrugged and flung her one brief sentence.

“The usual rubbish.”

Curiously, and entirely, the charm was all gone. He looked dry and cold.

Nora again: “He doesn't want to take the foot off, does he?”

“Why should he?”

Nora went on talking about people who had had a foot off and people who hadn't had a foot off, and how wonderful artificial legs were and what a lot you could do with one.

Dennis Harland didn't appear to be listening. He began to tell Carey a story which might have been funny, only she couldn't attend to it.

It was a little after this that he looked across her to Honor King and said, dropping his voice,

“So the boy friend's back.”

She looked under her pale lashes and then down at her folded hands.

“I don't know what you mean, Dennis.”

“No, of course you don't. Nasty rough place, the Army—I don't suppose he liked it a bit. For the matter of that, I don't suppose they liked him either. How did they get rid of him?”

Honor said nothing. Her eyelids and the tip of her nose had turned quite pink. She really was dreadfully like a white mouse, but you can't stand by and see the poor little wretch tormented. Carey was casting about for something to say, when Nora came by and stood for a moment with her empty cup in her hand. She laughed and said to Honor in a light, contemptuous voice,

“Why don't you scratch his eyes out? What's it all about?”

To which Dennis responded darkly,

“Too, too Ernest. But hush—we are observed. To be continued in our next.”

From the other side of the hearth Honoria Maquisten's dominating voice:

“What are you whispering about? You haven't got a hap'orth of manners among you. Jeff Stewart, come over here and talk to me! Honor, get back to the tea-tray! I suppose you can lift the teapot now that it's nearly empty. And, Nora,
you
go and get out of that uniform as soon as you've finished—it swears at every single thing in the room! And when you've got back into civilized clothes again you'd better sit down and write to your husband.”

Nora's colour brightened dangerously, making her look so much like a little girl in a rage that Carey caught her breath. If she had really been six years old she might have thrown that empty cup at Cousin Honoria. But you don't throw cups at twenty-six. At least Carey hoped not, but for one of those revealing moments she wasn't any too sure.

As Jeff Stewart crossed over and Honor slipped back into her place, Dennis said in his agreeable low-pitched voice,

“Don't let your angry passions rise, or tears of temper fill your eyes.” Upon which Nora banged down her cup and ran out of the room.

“Pepperpot—isn't she? It goes with our disastrous hair. Ginger in the hair—pepper in the temper. And if you want the lid to blow right off, you can tell her that Aunt Honoria's hair is the one legacy that she can be absolutely sure about. On second thoughts, perhaps you'd better not do anything of the sort. I'm saving it up for a really serious row.”

Carey looked at him curiously. He had the same bright chestnut hair as Nora.

She laughed and said,

“But it isn't red.”

“Ssh—not a word! The idea that it is goes down awfully well, and we study to please. I've often advised Honor to try a good strong henna shampoo and see what it would do for her.” He had raised his voice sufficiently in order to allow this kind remark to reach the tea-table, where it was received with a sniff.

Carey said in a quick whisper,

“Why are you so unkind to her?”

Dennis burst out laughing.

“Honor, my precious, she wants to know why we're not being nice to you.”

Carey felt a most unregenerate desire to smack his face. After giving him a look which made this quite plain, she took her cup over to the tray and bent down with it in her hand.

“Is he always such a frightful tease?” she said in an easy, laughing voice.

Honor gave another small sniff. The tip of her nose was pink and shiny. The heavy teapot shook as she lifted it. When she had put it down again and added milk to Carey's cup she lifted her reddened eyelids and colourless lashes for a moment. They fell again immediately.

Carey went back to her seat disquieted. It wasn't possible that you could be disliked like that, right away in about five minutes, by a white mouse of a creature whom you'd never even thought of harming. She told herself that she must have imagined the cold repulsion in that pale lifted glance, but all through Dennis Harland's talk it kept coming back to her, and every time she liked it less. She found herself asking abruptly,

“Is Nora your sister? I haven't quite placed you all yet.”

He said, “No—we're all cousins. Aunt Honoria's papa married again and had a son and daughter—very annoying for Aunt Honoria. The daughter had Nora, and the son had me. Both of them piously bestowed their half-sister's name upon their brats. You see, grandpapa hadn't any money to leave—at least not as much as you'd really notice. But Aunt Honoria's mother was a most impressive heiress, so of course Honoria married Maquisten and about half a million more. Our darling Honor comes in on the Maquisten side. Her mama was Uncle James's sister—a great deal younger of course. She ran away with a chemist's assistant or something and got herself cut off without a sixpence. So here we are, a loving, united, hopeful family.”

Mrs. Maquisten's voice broke in on a threatening note.

“What are you stuffing Carey up with? I won't have it! Do you hear?”

He turned towards her, laughing and blowing her a kiss.

“Darling, I was telling her what dutiful nieces and nephews we are. Of course she hasn't met Robert yet. That's something for her to live for.”

As if the name had been his cue, Robert Maquisten opened the door and came in—a thickset man of middle height, dark, with the complexion which comes from a sedentary life. He had a forceful, businesslike air, and the manner of a man who is very much at home. He kissed his aunt, took the chair which Jeff Stewart had vacated, without appearing to notice him, and gave a nod and a casual “Hullo!” to the rest of the party. Introduced to Carey, he dismissed her with a quick uninterested glance. For Magda Brayle who brought him a cup of tea he had no glance at all. In a voice that dominated the conversation he made two remarks about the weather and three about the war, after which he disposed of his tea in rapid gulps and addressed Honoria Maquisten.

“I really came to have a word with you, if you can spare me the time.”

The tone was not quite so deferential as the words. Mrs. Maquisten's eyes sparkled in appreciation of this. There was mockery in her voice as she said,

“How very—businesslike!”

“Well, I want to talk to you about business, Aunt Honoria.”

“Mine, or yours, Robert?”

“Well—” he looked down the room—“I don't know that I'm prepared to go into that in a crowd.”

Mrs. Maquisten lifted her voice after the manner of a toast-master at a banquet.

“My lords, ladies, and gentlemen, pray silence for Mr. Robert Maquisten!” At sight of his stiffening face she broke into laughter. “All right, Bob, all right!” Her hands went out with a flash of all the rings. “Shoo, children—I've had enough of you!”

CHAPTER FIVE

As they came out into the corridor, Jeff Stewart put a hand on Carey's arm.

“I've got to go—I'm meeting a man about a gun, and I'm dining out after that. But you're lunching with me tomorrow.”

“Who told you that?”

“I'm telling you. I'll call for you at twelve, and we'll go shopping.”

“I haven't anything to shop.”

He sounded pained. “But I have, honey.”

She tapped her foot on the carpet.

“You're not to call me honey!”

“Sorry, darling—I forgot.”

The tap was repeated with energy.

“Or darling.”

“All right, honey.”

“Jeff Stewart!”

Dark blue sparkling eyes met lazy grey ones.

“All right, all right, let's start all over again. I call for you at twelve, and you come and help me choose a Christmas present.”

“People aren't giving presents.”

“I'm giving this one, and I'm liable to fall down over it if you don't come along and help. Maybe I won't keep it for Christmas. I'll get it first, and then we'll see. So there we are. Third time lucky. I'll be round at twelve.”

She let him go on, and went up to her room, where she unpacked her things. She wondered about Honor, about Nora, about Dennis. She liked Dennis. She thought he was an easy person to like—too easy? She thought that perhaps a lot of girls had liked him too easily. She thought, “He's horribly afraid about losing his leg.” It was horrible of Nora to talk about it like that. She didn't mean it of course—Nora never would mean anything. But she had her sore spot too. It was when Cousin Honoria told her to write to her husband that she had looked as if she might be going to throw a cup at her. She wondered about that.

And she wondered about Honor, whose eyelids and nose had turned pink when Dennis teased her, and who had looked at Carey with pale dislike. She seemed a most unlikely person to be having a love affair, but of course you never could tell. The teasing meant nothing at all if it didn't mean that. And the man had been in the Army and come out of it again. And either his name or his nature was Ernest. She thought it was his name. She began to think about going out with Jeff tomorrow. He was frightfully impudent and out of hand, and he would have to be shown. But he hadn't got any secret sorrows, and he hadn't taken a fancy to her because she was like her grandmother. She felt as if it might be rather a relief to get away from No. 13 for a little.

She took herself to task about this. She had only just come—she hadn't had time to settle down. The first day in a house full of strangers always had a world-without-end kind of feeling. She put the last of her things away, and told herself firmly how very, very lucky she was to have a roof over her head and a comfortable room, and a kind Cousin Honoria, because if it were not for these blessings, she would be in the really horrid position of having no more than three pounds to cover the three months during which she had been ordered not to work. Looked at in this way—and it was the only proper way to look at it—No. 13 Maitland Square was very definitely a Haven of Refuge. She must clamp on to that like mad. Suppose she had been coming out of hospital with three pounds in her pocket and nowhere to go.… She could get a job all right, but she wasn't sure about being able to keep it. She got so dreadfully tired. That was what was the matter with her now—she was tired. She lay down on the bed pulled the blue eider-down up to her chin. Rather to her own surprise, she fell asleep.