The Girl In The Cellar (12 page)

The train got into the terminus. Anne left it. She did not know where she was going. She did not know what she was going to do. She went and sat down in the waiting-room and tried to think. For a long time nothing came to her. Then she began to think.

She got up and walked out of the station. She had to buy a suitcase, and she had to find a room. She got the suitcase almost at once, and then bought herself a cheap nightgown, brush and comb, a cake of soap, and a towel. It was terrifying how much things cost, but no one would take her in without luggage. A curious feeling pushed up through her consciousness. These were not the sort of things she had ever bought before. She could do a sum in her head. She could know that she mustn’t spend more than the least possible, but all the time she knew in her own mind that these were not the sort of things she had ever bought before. It was all new to her, this considering of prices, this taking the cheapest thing that was offered.

In the first shop she went into she began to give her name. She got as far as Miss Anne, and stopped dead and bit her lip.

‘No, I’ll pay for it,’ she said.

The girl who was serving her with the nightdress looked up at her with a quick fleeting glance.

When she had got as much as she dared, she turned her attention to the question of a room. There was a policeman at the next crossing. She made her way to him, waited till he was disengaged from the traffic, and then put her request.

‘Can you tell me where I can get a room?’

The policeman was comfortable-looking. Ten years before, he had come up to London. The country burr still lingered in his voice. He said, ‘What kind of a room, miss?’

And Anne said, ‘A very cheap one.’

He directed her to a Young Woman’s Christian, and it sounded frightfully respectable and safe. She went on her way feeling very clever and encouraged. Nothing happened to you if you were sensible.

Nothing could possibly happen to you at a Young Woman’s Christian. It sounded too utterly respectable and safe. She would deposit her luggage—how safe and respectable to have luggage—and she would ask them about jobs. They would know. The mere fact that there was going to be someone whom she could ask was like light in a dark place—the dark place of her ignorance, of her not knowing.

But the Young Woman’s Christian was full. They gave her one or two addresses and said they might be able to take her in next week. She embarked on a long and weary hunt for a room. At last, too tired to be particular, she took what was offered by a woman whom she would have turned down flat at the beginning of her search, a little carneying person with untidy hair and a smooth ingratiating way of speech. She didn’t know how long she would want the room for, and she would leave her things there and go out and get something to eat. She was tired to the very bones of her, and she was so discouraged that there seemed to be no place left for her either to fall or to rise. The world was an empty place. There was no one who cared whether she was alive or dead. ‘Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die.’

She ate and drank in a dirty little shop, and then she went back to her room and undressed and went to bed. The day had begun early and there had not been much of the night. She put on her clean nightgown and lay down in the doubtful bed wondering if she would sleep, and that was the last thing she knew until the morning. She slept and slept, and when she woke she was conscious of nothing. The hours of sleep had passed over her and were gone.

Her depression was gone too. She must find a job. And she must write to Jim and Miss Silver. It wasn’t fair to leave them without a word. She had got away, and now that she was quite on her own she could see them again. It was a very heartening thought. She put on her coat and hat, considered whether she could ask Jim to get hold of her bag and her money from Chantreys, and set out first on a quest for a roll. and butter and a cup of tea, and then to look for a job.

Miss Silver got the letter with her breakfast next day. It was the second in a pile of letters. She opened it first. She read:

Dear Miss Silver,

I am writing to tell you that I had to come away. I couldn’t help it. When I see you I will tell you, but I don’t know when that will be. I’ve got to get work before I do anything else. I thought I must write to you because of Jim. I meant to write to him, but I couldn’t. He will be so very angry with me for coming away, and I don’t know whether I could tell him why. I must think it well over first. But if you see him, or if he comes to you, will you please tell him not to worry. He was so very good to me—as you were. It would be a bad return if I did anything that would make things difficult for him. I will send you an address when I have got one. This is only temporary. Dear Miss Silver, I feel so grateful to you. I can’t explain, but please, please do believe that I don’t mean to be ungrateful, and that I am all right.

The letter was signed ‘Anne’.

Miss Silver read it through twice, then she left the breakfast-table, went into her sitting-room, and rang up Jim Fancourt.

‘Mr Fancourt—’

‘Yes—who is it?’

‘It is Miss Silver. I have a letter from Anne.’

She read it aloud to him, and he received it in silence. After a moment she said, ‘Mr Fancourt, are you there?’

She got an angry laugh.

‘Oh, yes, I’m here—and a lot of use that seems to be! She says she writes from London?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why does she not write to me?’

Miss Silver looked at the letter again. She said, ‘I think there has been trouble with your aunt.’

‘What makes you think that?’

‘It is an impression.’

‘Something must have caused it.’

‘Yes. She says she had to come away, she could not help it. Then what she says of you—“He will be so very angry with me for coming away, and I don’t know whether I could tell him why. I must think it well over first.” ’ She read on to the end of the letter, and then returned to the sentence which said, ‘It would be a bad return if I did anything that would make things more difficult for him.’

‘That appears to me to be her motive—not to make things difficult for you.’

‘Damned little fool!’

Miss Silver turned a deaf ear. She could not approve of ‘language’, but she could ignore it. She said, ‘I will send you a copy of this letter. It will, I think, be a satisfaction to you to have it, and I will let you know at once when I hear from her again.’

When Jim received the letter he read it through more than enough times to know it by heart. She said, ‘I meant to write to him but I couldn’t.’ Why on earth couldn’t she? She could tell him anything—anything. Why could she tell Miss Silver what she couldn’t tell him? He went on reading. ‘He will be so very angry with me for coming away, and I don’t think I can tell him why. I must think it well over first.’ And what did she mean by that? What had she got to think over? ‘Will you please tell him not to worry.’ Not to worry—‘He was so very good to me. It would be a bad return if I did anything that would make things difficult for him.’ What was at the back of all this? And she had left her bag with the money in it. That was the real puzzle. You can’t get anywhere without money, but she had got to London. How? How had she gone? He could imagine ways, but they infuriated him. And where was she now? In London? She might be, or she might not.

He rang Miss Silver up.

‘Jim Fancourt speaking. You haven’t heard any more?’

‘No, Mr Fancourt. I will let you know as soon as I do.’

‘You think you will hear?’

‘I am sure I shall.’

Her quiet, firm voice was reassuring. He said, ‘I don’t know where to look for her—I don’t know what to do.’

Miss Silver said, ‘There is nothing you can do except wait.’

‘That’s the damnable thing.’

‘I will ring you up as soon as I hear anything.’

On the third day of her search for work Anne was obliged to contend with discouragement. People wanted to know what you had been doing, and she didn’t know herself. She began to wonder whether she couldn’t make up something, but really when you came to look into it there was altogether too much to make up. If it had only been her name—if she could only produce one person who could speak for her—She thought of Miss Silver, at first to feel that she couldn’t ask her for a reference, but with each successive day to come nearer and nearer to trying her. ‘But she doesn’t really know anything about me.’ And then, hard on that, ‘Nobody does—’ The thought took her into a sort of giddy spin. For a moment she was all alone with no one to help her. No one who knew who she was or where she was. It was like being giddy, only much, much worse. She was out in the street when it happened to her, and she had to stand still and let the crowd go by. She groped her way to a railing and stood there till her head cleared. She must never let herself think like that again. She would remember—some day. And meanwhile she must go on—

And then someone was speaking to her. A voice said, ‘Are you feeling ill?’ and she lifted her head and saw a girl of about her own age looking at her with concern.

‘No, I’m all right—now.’

The girl said in a deep, strong voice. ‘You don’t look all right to me. Come in and have a cup of tea. There’s a shop just here.’

Anne felt a curious relief. Here was someone else making a decision for her. The girl slipped a hand in a rather shabby dark brown glove inside her arm, and she turned and went with her no more than a dozen steps along the pavement, where they turned, and another dozen steps. There was an interval when she really didn’t know what was happening, and then her head cleared and she lifted it. She was sitting on a bench with a little marble-topped table in front of her. Her head was almost down upon her hands. The girl was speaking to her.

‘Are you better? I should keep my head down a little longer. Can you take cocoa—because that’s what I’ve ordered. You look as if it would do you good. Don’t bother to answer if it’s all right.’

Anne felt relaxed and relieved. A curious indifference seemed to have come over her. She didn’t know it, but she was almost at the end of her strength. This girl could take over for a time. There was nothing she herself could do.

When the cocoa came she drank it and came slowly back. The girl was looking at her with frank curiosity.

‘What on earth have you been doing to yourself?’

Anne said, ‘I don’t know.’

‘Do you mean that?’

‘Yes, I do. I don’t know who I am.’

The girl pursed her lips and whistled.

‘I say that’s bad! You don’t really mean that, do you?’

‘Yes, I do.’

‘But how?’

Anne found herself telling her. Not all of it. Not about the girl at the foot of the steps. She began where she got on to the bus and met Miss Silver. When she got to Chantreys, she found herself in difficulties. She had to leave Jim out. Curiously enough, that hurt. It hurt so much that she didn’t know how to do it. She stopped, and looked at the girl. She didn’t know what a hurt, shocked look it was, but the girl said quickly, ‘Just leave out anything you don’t want to say.’

Anne’s look melted in gratitude.

‘It’s difficult—’ she said under her breath.

The girl said quickly, ‘Don’t tell me anything you don’t want to.’

‘I—I had to come away again—in the middle of the night. It—it wasn’t my fault.’

‘What did you do?’

‘A girl took me in till the early morning. Then I came up to town.’

The round eyes gave her a searching look.

‘Had you anywhere to go?’

Anne shook her head.

The girl said, ‘Now you must eat something. Those are quite plain buns.’ And, when Anne had helped herself, ‘What did you do?’

‘I found a room. It took nearly all day’

The girl frowned.

‘You don’t sound enthusiastic’

Anne gave her the sort of smile which breaks into tears before you know where you are. She felt it going that way and bit her lip quickly.

‘It isn’t the sort of room that anyone could feel enthusiastic about. It was—dirty. So was the landlady.’

The girl frowned more deeply.

‘Don’t you know anyone?’

Anne said, ‘Miss Silver.’

The girl clapped her hands together.

‘Is that the same Miss Silver I know about? She’s better than dozens of references!’

Anne said, ‘15 Montague Mansions,’ and the girl clapped her hands again and burst out laughing.

‘That’s the one—the one and only! I’ve only met her once, but she did wonderful things for a cousin of mine, Evelyn Baring, so you see we’re introduced, all quite properly. My name is Janet Wells. And yours is Anne—Anne what?’

The colour rose in Anne’s face.

‘I’ve been calling myself Anne Fancourt. I think the Anne part of it is right. The other isn’t, but one must have a surname.’

Janet frowned.

‘Look here, you can’t stay in that horrid dirty room you’re in. I’ll come with you and get your things, and if you’d like to—well, there’s a room in the house we’re in. One of the girls went away last week, and the room wasn’t let when I came out this morning. So if you’d like—’

Anne put out a hand and half drew it back again. She didn’t know how her eyes lighted up.

‘You don’t know anything about me,’ she said in a shaking voice. ‘Miss Silver doesn’t either—not really—only since she met me.’

Janet Wells took the hand, held it firmly for a moment, patted it, and let it go again.

‘You’d do as much for me, I expect,’ she said in a plain matter-of-fact sort of voice.

It is much easier to be firm for somebody else than for oneself. Mrs Pink was all set to be disagreeable, and Anne hadn’t come out of feeling dazed. It was easier to give way, to pay what she asked, and have done with it. But Janet Wells wasn’t having any. She said just what she thought and she stuck to it, and in the end they got away.

When they were in a taxi with Anne’s suitcase, Janet turned to her.

‘That’s a nasty woman. You ought never to have gone there.’

‘I know. I’d been up half the night, and everywhere I went they seemed to be full. I—I must seem dreadfully stupid. I— I’m not always like this—I’m not really.’

‘Of course you’re not. Don’t worry about it. Don’t worry about anything.’

A sense of being looked after came comfortingly in upon Anne. She leaned back in the taxi and closed her eyes. She wasn’t sure whether she dropped off or not, she thought perhaps she had. But all of a sudden she came to with a start. The taxi had pulled up, and Janet’s hand was on her knee.

‘Anne—we’re here.’

She was still a little dazed as she paid the fare and followed Janet up the front steps of a big house in a square. There were names on brass plates. The hall had linoleum down, and there was linoleum on the stairs. Janet put a hand on the handle of the suitcase and said, ‘Come along up. We’re on the second floor. The room you can have is one floor higher up, but you can share our sitting-room if you like. Here, what’s the matter? Are you faint again?’

Artne was leaning against the banisters. She wasn’t holding the bag any more. It had slipped from her hand. Janet let go of the handle and put a firm, strong arm round her.

‘Sit down. Put your head down. I’ll get you up when you’re better. There’s no hurry.’

‘I’m so sorry.’ The words were only just audible. She heard the sound of running steps and fainted away.

When she came to she was on a sofa in what had been the drawing-room of the house, or the front half of it. There were voices in the room. One of them was saying, ‘Well, I think you’re mad.’ To which Janet answered, ‘All right, so I’m mad. And that’s the way I am.’

Anne turned oh to her side and saw the two girls over by the window. As she moved, Janet detached herself and came towards her.

‘Are you better? Don’t try and talk until you’ve had something to eat. You’ve been starving yourself. You’re going to have soup and custard pudding, and there’s an awfully good cheese—Oh, this is my cousin Lizabet.’

Anne began, ‘I’m so dreadfully sorry. You must think—’ Her voice failed her.

Lizabet had remained turned away. Now she swung round.

‘I want to say—’ she began, and Janet interrupted her. ‘You don’t want to say anything at all!’

Anne was conscious of a sharp disagreement. She struggled up on her elbow and said, ‘Oh!’ She looked at Lizabet and Lizabet looked at her. Anne didn’t know herself what she looked like. If she had thought about it she would have said untidy—dishevelled. That wasn’t what came into Janet’s mind, but defenceless—innocent. Anne went on looking at Lizabet as one does in those defenceless moments. ‘Why— why?’ And then, ‘How lovely she is.’

Lizabet said, ‘Why do you look at me like that?’

A little faint colour came into Anne’s face. She said, ‘I’m sorry. You’re so pretty.’

Lizabet turned colour. Janet said, ‘Yes, isn’t she? Come along, Lizabet, and help me with her lunch.’

Lizabet went.

Anne pulled herself up on the sofa and looked about her. She felt weak, and free. She felt that Janet was a tower of strength. And Lizabet—what was she—an enemy? The words came into her mind and she pushed them out again. Why should there be an enemy here?

The room was large and finely proportioned. There was a blue tea-set on the mantelpiece. Spode, blue de roi, lovely and bright. It came to her then that she could recognise a sort of china, and yet she didn’t know her own name. And she hadn’t the slightest doubt about the china—she knew it. Did that mean that she had lived with a set like that, known it intimately? She couldn’t answer that at all.

She went on looking about the room. There were rugs on the floor—oriental rugs, small and good. They didn’t touch each other, and the space between showed polished parquet. There were books—a great many books. There was a dear little walnut writing-table. And over the mantelpiece, where it reflected the blue china, there was a lovely walnut mirror.

She had got back to the mirror, when the door opened and Janet came in with a bowl of thick soup in her hand, Lizabet behind her with bread and butter. She had a rather wary expression. Her eyes darted at Anne and withdrew. At the sight of the food Anne realised how hungry she was. She had come out in the morning with nothing but a cup of tea. Everything in that house had tasted dirty, and the milk was sour. The soup smelled delicious. There was meat in it, and little suet balls. She took it all, Janet sitting beside her, talking just enough to make her feel at home. Lizabet had gone away, but she came back presently with the custard and the cheese. Every time she came into the room she looked at Anne in the same curious way. Anne thought she was like a spoiled child not accustomed to being crossed. She didn’t want to cross her. She only wanted to find a room and to find work. It wouldn’t do for her to come here and make trouble for Janet.

And then Lizabet was putting the custard pudding in front of her and saying in a curious pettish voice, ‘Janet says I have been rude. I’m sorry.’

There was something touching about it. Anne found herself putting out her hand and saying, ‘Don’t think of it. I’m not staying. Your cousin was so kind—but I’m not staying really.’

Janet was behind her. She didn’t move. Anne thought she looked upset, for Lizabet began to twist her fingers.

‘You mustn’t go away because of me. Janet will be so cross if you do.’ She was like a little girl. Anne wondered how old she was.

Janet came forward, and Lizabet ran out of the room. Janet said, ‘Don’t take any notice of her. She’s been spoilt. She’s my cousin, you know, and she had her home with my grandfather. He let her do anything she liked. When he died she had to come to me. I can manage her, but not if everyone else gives in to her. Do you feel better? Would you like to see your room? It’s one flight farther up. Lizabet’s up there too. Yours is the other front room.’

‘But—’ Anne checked herself, coloured, and said, ‘Who does the house belong to? Perhaps she won’t like to take me.’

‘The house belongs to me. That is, it belonged to my parents. When they died, and everything got so expensive, I realised that something would have to be done. Our old cook Mrs Bingham took the basement. Her husband is a watchman in a jeweller’s shop, so he’s out all night. There are two girls on the top floor, you and Lizabet on the next, and an old lady on the two ground floors. I am in the back half of this room. Another cousin of mine has been in the room you are to have, but she went out yesterday. She doesn’t like town, so she’s going down into Dorset to keep chickens with a friend. A frightful life, I should say, but it takes all sorts to make the world, and she hates town. Funny, isn’t it?’

It came on Anne that she didn’t know whether it was funny or not. It came to her that she didn’t know what her life had been. She put the tray down carefully and got up to follow Janet to the room she was to have.