The Quivering Tree (18 page)

Mr Denver went on, in a rather stumbling way, to say something about Miss Locke being so jolly, he could understand anyone enjoying her company; but she and Miss Gosse led such busy lives, there were so few hours left at the end of the school day in which to enjoy each other's companionship, and as a consequence – an astonishing note of appeal had come into his voice – if I could see my way to taking up a little less of Miss Locke's time –

‘But I don't!' I broke in: I could not help it. ‘I don't take up
any
of her time!' I nearly said, but choked it back as being too impolite, that, if anything, the boot was on the other foot: it was Miss Locke who took up mine – interrupting my music practice, for example, by insisting we play some of the awful duets in the piano stool, all mill wheels and cradle songs and stupid things like that; on top of which, more often than not, I was commanded to take the bass part whilst she made a hash of the treble. Me take up Miss Locke's time! The very thought made me go red.

I think, with hindsight, Mr Denver may have read my blush differently because, going red in the face himself, he muttered something about not wanting Miss Gosse to be hurt. I stared at him uncomprehendingly. Whatever was the man on about? It was quite a relief when, after one or two abortive attempts, he located the watch hanging from a chain draped across his abdomen, pressed the little knob at the side of the watch case which made the golden lid pop up, and announced that it was time for him to be going.

I got to my feet and went down the garden to find Miss Gosse and Miss Locke.

I didn't feel ike yoohoo-ing, so I didn't. Mr Denver had confused me, but I looked down at the four half-crowns still clasped in my palm, and felt better. Providing the two schoolmistresses were not anywhere in the vicinity I would take the opportunity to slip into the bothy and pop my share of the loot into the nest of drawers. What a lovely surprise for Mr Betts, when he next looked there, to find for once my funds did not need topping up!

Miss Gosse and Miss Locke weren't among the herbaceous borders, nor in the shrubbery, nor the vegetable garden. I wondered if they hadn't gone out of the back gate to say hello to Bagshaw. The greenhouse, though, was so full up with tomato-plant leaves that I thought they might be in there: a few of the tomatoes were almost ripe and, fresh from the vine, they tasted delicious, as I had reason to know. But they were not there.

The greenhouse being close to the bothy, I decided to put away Mr Denver's largesse whilst I was about it. The tiny building's creeper-covered roof was dazzling in the sun. The interior looked dark and cool. As I came up the narrow path which led to its half-open door, my crêpe-soled sandals making no sound, I heard a noise coming from inside, an animal noise but too loud for the mice who lived there. I was wondering what animal it might be when I heard Miss Locke laughing.

Annoyed that now I should not be able to hide away my half-crowns after all, I went back a little distance from the bothy and called out: ‘Yoohoo, Miss Gosse! Miss Locke! Mr Denver wants to go!'

In a little while the two came out of the bothy door, Miss Gosse with her hair half-down and looking rumpled, Miss Locke holding a spring onion, earth still clinging to its little roots.

Miss Locke said: ‘You see in front of you, Sylvia, a very naughty woman. She won't eat her spring onion. I tell her how good they are for the blood but she will not eat it.' Holding out to me the thin green shaft with its white bulb like a large pearl at its base: ‘Would
you
like to have a go at persuading her?'

‘Helen!' Miss Gosse was pinning up her hair, not making a very good job of it. Down and unplaited, the white hairs among the shiny black seemed to have multiplied. ‘Really!'

‘It's dirty,' I pointed out. ‘It's got earth on it.'

‘Just what
she
said! How horribly hygienic everybody is round here!'

After Mr Denver had gone, driving off like royalty in his Rolls-Royce whilst the three of us stood in the road waving, I went into the kitchen to give Mrs Benyon her money. She was standing at the table opening the little green net umbrella she fixed over the remains of a roast to keep the flies off. As much as her face ever registered a change of expression she looked annoyed to see me; but then, as she said often enough, she did not like anyone coming into her kitchen. Even Miss Gosse, whose house it was, got a ‘what-do-you-want' look.

I put the two half-crowns down next to the dish with the roast lamb on it and relayed Mr Denver's compliments and thanks, all of which she received with no apparent gratification. She was half-way to the larder, the covered dish in her hands, before she said over her shoulder, in her usual flat voice, heavy as lead: ‘You can keep that. On account.'

I goggled. I positively goggled. It seemed impossible that I had heard her aright. ‘You mean – my pound, you mean? You mean that will leave fifteen shillings you still owe me?'

‘The day I owe you, miss, that'll be the day,' said Mrs Benyon, pulling open the larder door.

‘But –'

‘Leave it if you want. It's all one to me.'

After a further stupefied moment I took it, scooping the lovely half-crowns into my palm, back with the other two before she changed her mind. I was unsure whether it was the done thing to say thank you to someone returning the proceeds of theft, but in the end I did say it – I suppose out of habit. I always seemed to be saying thank you to grownups for no particular reason except that that was what they were, the people with power it was only good sense to stay on the right side of.

‘Thank you very much,' I gushed, overdoing it.

Arranging the dish of lamb on the slate shelf reserved for things liable to go bad, the housekeeper said in that marbled voice of hers: ‘Put it away somewhere safe next time.'

Not long after Mr Denver's visit, the mistresses arranged to go to Ipswich for a weekend, to a seminar or conference. I was not sure what it was exactly: they never told me the details, but they seemed quite excited at the prospect. Miss Gosse, Miss Locke, Miss Malahide and Miss Barton, my house-mistress, were going to travel there together in Miss Malahide's Austin Seven. I was to be left with Mrs Benyon, who was to forgo her usual weekend time off in order to guard Chandos House in their absence and – Miss Locke's phrase – see that I didn't get into mischief.

On the Friday afternoon before they were due to leave – the plan was to make an early start on Saturday morning – Miss Malahide collared hold of me in the north quad to let me know that there had been a slight change of arrangements. Noreen, her niece, was so nervous at the thought of being left alone in the house overnight that Miss Gosse had agreed for me to go over there on Saturday evening and stay the night to keep the silly baby company. In that airy, grown-up way which took it for granted I could have no possible objection to being moved about like a piece on a chess board, the art mistress hoped that it was all right with me.

It wasn't, actually. I had been looking forward to a luxuriously sluttish weekend on my own, fortified with bought biscuits, whipped cream walnuts and lashings of good, swashbuckling literature. In preparation I had been to the library and got out
Scaramouche
by Rafael Sabatini and
Black Bartlemy's Treasure
by Jeffery Farnol, both writers I knew I could rely on in the swashbuckling line. I would never have taken Noreen for the nervous type. But what could I do? One day I would be free to arrange my own life instead of having it arranged for me. I couldn't wait.

‘Noreen's looking forward to seeing you again,' said Miss Malahide, which I took leave to doubt. She was miles too old for me: I was miles too young for her. I supposed it was just that none of her own friends was available.

I put on my winsome smile and told Miss Malahide that would be lovely.

It was the first time I had been to the art mistress's home – unless it was Noreen's. I never knew the truth of their domestic arrangements, never even knew which of the two actually owned the Austin Seven – which turned out to be one of a row of cottages in a rather slummy part of Norwich. I parked my bike against the dividing hedge, undid my attaché case with my toothbrush and pyjamas in it from the carrier, and banged on the brass knocker which was much too splendid for the mean little door. It was in the shape of a woman, obviously Medusa because she had serpents instead of hair. What made her unusual and a bit disconcerting was that the knocker came down as far as her bare breasts, and each breast had a serpent coming out of the nipple, which I certainly didn't remember from the myth of Perseus and Andromeda, though I was very fond of Greek and Roman myths and read a lot of them. But then, although I had a very good memory, one couldn't remember everything.

Noreen opened the door, looking neat and pretty and smelling very nice as I followed her into the narrow hall, too narrow even for a hallstand. I was a little surprised that she had dressed herself up the way she had, just for me – quite the reverse of myself in an old frock which, being made of Irish linen, creased when you so much as looked at it, and I had been wearing it all day. I was even more surprised when she turned, looked straight at me, and said: ‘Wuff, wuff! The watchdog's come!'

I must have looked as stupid as I felt, because Noreen went on: ‘Don't tell me you swallowed all that piffle about my being afraid to be left on my own in the dark? You're bright enough to know you're here to keep an eye on me, to make sure I don‘t get up to anything I shouldn't.'

At some cost to my self-esteem I assured her that I wasn't bright enough at all; adding, because I was quite fond of Miss Malahide really, that I had four aunties myself and they were just the same. They loved to fuss.

‘Aunties!' Noreen laughed, louder than she did as a rule. ‘Old Mallie's as much my auntie as I am yours!' Before I could settle on the right expression with which to receive this astonishing intelligence, she went on: ‘Will you promise to keep a secret?'

I promised, eagerly. It was a question I loved being asked. It brought you so close to the person who asked it, made you a friend, if not for life, then for twenty-four hours at least. Perhaps Noreen wasn't all that many miles too old for me after all.

The secret was that Noreen had a boyfriend called Graham, whom Miss Malahide knew nothing about and of whose very existence – for some reason not clear to me – it was important that she not be made aware. I wondered, but was too shy to ask, if the trouble was that Graham was common – which was to say that he had left school at fourteen and spoke with a Norfolk accent; because, otherwise, Noreen was quite of an age to have boyfriends. In fact, it would have been something to worry about if she hadn't any.

It appeared that, any minute now, I was to have the opportunity to pass my own personal judgement on Graham, because he was coming to supper, bringing with him his friend Geoffrey, with whom, so Noreen assured me, I was bound to get on like billy-o because he liked little girls.

When I protested vigorously that I was not a little girl, she merely remarked in an offhand manner: ‘Well, he'll have to make do, won't he?'

Noreen had prepared a lovely supper. There were salads, so beautifully arranged it was almost a pity to disturb them, and little pastry boats filled with delicious savoury messes, to say nothing of a chocolate cake and a sherry trifle for afters. Noreen had it all set out on the table at what I took to be the dining end of the living-room, which was a cheerfully shabby place with a large, lumpy sofa covered in what looked like sacking taking up most of the space, and splashy flower paintings on the walls, the canvases not even framed. Over the fireplace was a big painting of Noreen with no clothes on, which I told myself was no different, really, from having a print of
The Birth of Venus
or
The Judgement of Paris
– except that it
was
different, somehow, since it was someone you knew. When we sat down to eat I was glad to have my back to it.

We sat down as soon as Graham and Geoffrey arrived, which I was also glad of because, apart from being hungry, it gave us something to do and filled up the long silences. The minute I set eyes on the visitors I saw at once that, by my usual yardstick for measuring young men, they were not the kind my brother Alfred would have made friends with. They had, both of them, in my opinion, a cloddish look, and they had no conversation. I should have thought that Noreen could have done much better for herself, but then I had been briefed sufficiently by books and movies – it was one of the few chilling minuses that balanced the otherwise glorious plus of being grown-up – that people tended, as a general rule, to fall in love with the most unsuitable people.

By the time we came to the sherry trifle Noreen and Graham were conversing a lot, but only among themselves – whispering rather, giggling, and feeding each other titbits. It was deeply embarrassing. How I wished myself back at Chandos House with
Scaramouche
or
Black Bartlemy's Treasure
, the leaves rustling against the window the only sound! From the look of him, Geoffrey wasn't having all that good a time either. Less than me, in fact, because I had eaten hugely whereas he had hardly touched anything, just sat there looking brooding, which was easy for him because his eyebrows were joined together over the bridge of his nose without any space between. About the only thing he said was when I helped myself to a third slice of chocolate cake. ‘Have you in the house,' he observed coldly, ‘and you don't need a dustbin' – a remark which confirmed my estimate of his lack of breeding.

Somehow – it was skilfully done – whilst Noreen and Graham drifted entwined down the room to wind up the gramophone, the two of us were lumbered with the washing up; which, however, funnily enough, turned out to be the best part of the evening. It did us both good to be busy. Though the kitchen was tiny, Geoffrey contrived to stack plates, dry china and cutlery without knocking into me at the sink and with a calm efficiency of movement which surprised and pleased me. I began to wonder if he might not be less cloddish than I had at first thought.