A Song of Sixpence (24 page)

She smiled at me. Her eyes seemed bright and there was colour in her cheeks.

‘Oh, I don't know, dear. In a way it was really rather fun and goodness knows neither of us have had much of that lately.'

‘But Mother, it was all so … so cheap and nasty.'

‘Was it as bad as all that?'

‘
He
was, anyhow, the cigarette-maker.'

‘Well, perhaps he is rather officious, dear, but I think he means well, so we mustn't be too critical. Let's just remember we're here for the one holiday we've had in four years and try to make the most of it.'

This was not the kind of response I expected from my mother. Turning on my side I gave her a brusque good night.

However, next morning my sense of injury had gone and after breakfast, carrying my fishing-rod and a picnic lunch, I set out with Baillie Nicol for the Spean. Mother, seeing us off from the porch, promised to join me in almost an hour. The pool the Baillie showed me was not far upriver, a deep brown tarn among pine trees, fed by a rushing waterfall and contained by ledges. Having seen me settled he went off upstream to his own beat, having finally averred with a pessimistic survey of the clear blue sky that it was not an anglers' day.

Certainly I did not look like having much luck. In the space of two hours I caught a three-inch parr, which of course I unhooked carefully and returned. As nothing seemed to be taking, I began more and more to look for the appearance of Mother. What on earth was keeping her? Could my Ingersoll be wrong? No, from the sun, directly overhead, it must now be noon. My neck was stiff from craning towards the path through the wood and the roar of the waterfall had made my head swim. I reeled in, retreated to the pines and ate my share of the lunch. Still no sign of her. Angrily, after only a moment's hesitation, I ate her lunch as well. She would not deserve it when she did come.

With nothing else to do, I resumed my fishing, but in so spiritless a manner I permitted an eel to take my hook unnoticed and to digest my bait so thoroughly that it had to be destroyed, in a slimy mess, before I could recover my tackle. After that, as the afternoon was well advanced, I decided to give up.

I had trudged to the end of the wood and was on the road that led uphill from the river, when an approaching figure became visible against the skyline. It was she.

Immediately I threw off my despondency, set my expression to an injured and resentful coldness. Ignoring her too cheerful greeting, I said accusingly:

‘You didn't come.'

‘I'm so sorry, dear.' She smiled, breathlessly. ‘Our plans somehow seemed to get upset.'

Apparently, though I gave her no marks for that futile and belated effort, she'd been hurrying.

‘You see, there was such an interesting expedition arranged to Banavie. Somehow I was persuaded to go along.'

‘Who persuaded you?'

‘Why … Miss Baird.'

Had she hesitated before answering me? Miss Baird was the stout woman who liked Sommen.

‘So you and she went off all by yourselves.'

‘Good gracious, no, dear.' She made the idea seem ridiculous. ‘Two women, all alone! Your friend Mr Sommen went with us. In fact he organized the trip and took care of everything most handsomely.'

That evening at supper I studied him, viewing him after the manner of Scott-Hamilton with a critical, appraising eye. What a clown he was, or rather, what a cad, monopolizing the conversation—keeping things going I suppose he would have called it—and showing off in every direction. Why, at this moment, as Miss Kincaid, having sliced the boiled ham, seemed to be having trouble carving one of the chickens, and with a reproachful glance at Miss Ailie, had murmured that the carver was not sharp, he had the colossal cheek to interfere. I could scarcely believe my eyes when this bounder leaned over, with a ‘Permit me, madam', and taking the knife from her hand began to carve the bird. I longed for him to make some horrible gaffe that would draw down on him the laughter and contempt of everyone. I hoped the chicken would squirt off the platter to the floor or, better still, bounce up and hit him in the eye. But no, with unsuspected skill and a dexterity I believed impossible, he had it sliced and sectioned perfectly. This was too much for me and apparently for Baillie Nicol too. He kept muttering under his breath and glowering at our enemy. I was glad to accept his invitation to a game of draughts in the smoking-room; I felt I would do anything to avoid the entertainment in the parlour.

The Baillie was not of a talkative disposition, but as we set out our men on the chequered board, he fixed his gaze on me and said:

‘You seem a decent sort of boy, and your mother looks to me a sweet little woman. If I were you, I would just drop a word in her ear against the counter-jumper of a cockney. I may be wrong, but for my part, I wouldn't trust him as far as I could throw him.'

The warning alarmed me. And as the next few days passed, there was no longer the least possibility of doubt. This man, this Englishman, this tartaned Sommen, was—I sought a phrase that would not wound me too deeply—‘making up' to my mother. Despite the deceptive mildness of these two words they sent a hot flush over me. And it deepened at the thought of Mother's response. At first she had merely seemed flattered: a natural reaction which I had persuaded myself was pardonable in a woman whose life had lately been so dull and hard. But gradually she had warmed to these hateful attentions and now, in her glance, her gesture, in her whole being, she could not conceal from me, nor from others in the boarding-house whom I had heard whispering, the change that had come over her. She looked younger and prettier, with a strange attractiveness that exuded and bloomed upon her skin. She had a new liveliness, an unnatural vivacity, a sense of letting herself go that I had never known before. Worst of all was her change towards me: that excessive solicitude and open show of tenderness, which I felt to be propitiating, even insincere, since most of the time, to be free of my questioning eye, she kept avoiding me, or pushing me off to fish, so that she could go off with
him
.

At the start of the second week, as I sat at the Speen pool, I decided I wouldn't put up with it. I would not be cast off. Burning with indignation, I reeled in my neglected line, from which the worm had long ago been devoured, and set off for Ardshiel.

Mother was on the porch, but not as though expecting me.

‘Any luck?' she exclaimed with specious brightness.

‘No.'

‘Never mind, dear. I'm sure you'll catch something when you try again this afternoon.'

I didn't answer. My mind was made up. I ate my lunch with apparent calm. Immediately the meal ended I excused myself, got up, and disappeared. I had not returned to the river. I was in the shrubbery at the edge of the garden.

They did not keep me waiting long. My heart gave a big, extra thump as they emerged, Sommen in his idiotic tartan get-up, Mother wearing her brown tweed costume and a new gay scarf which she certainly had not bought and which therefore he must have given her. Together, yet discreetly separated, they sauntered down the hill towards the town. Gazing from between the laurel branches I allowed them a fair start, then, with a casual air, though my pulse was throbbing like mad, I cut round the side of the garden and went after them.

The bitter excitement of the chase made me want to run, but I knew I must keep a safe distance behind them. Out of sight of the boarding-house, they had drawn closer to each other. They reached the town and turned the corner into the main street. Trying not to hurry, I followed. It was market day and the town was busy. For a minute I couldn't pick them out, then I saw them on the opposite side of the street looking into the window of a shop that sold Gosse china and other tourist souvenirs. He was gabbing, as usual, and pointing in a persuasive manner, but Mother shook her head lightly and they moved off. A rush of traffic held me back, but when I crossed the street, out of the corner of my eye I saw them veer right into the Mealmarket, a narrow wynd leading to the old part of the town.

Now I increased my pace and swung into the Mealmarket. They were not in sight. With a catch of anxiety I pressed on, moving in and out of the stalls that crowded the narrow wynd, seeking everywhere, like a hound at fault. Minutes passed, five, ten. Not a sign of them. Had I lost them? And then, as I came out of the far end of the Mealmarket into the cobbled square that faced the open loch, my eye was caught by a rowboat moving easily on the sunlit water only a few hundred yards offshore.

I took a long breath. Now I had them, and I could wait. Slowly, without removing my gaze, I walked down to the stone jetty from which the boats were hired and took up my stand behind one of the bollards.

He was at the oars, alternatively sculling and drifting, while Mother sat facing him in the stern. When he leaned forward to make a stroke the intimacy of their positions stung me. I choked with jealous rage, invoking all the powers of light and darkness to work a miracle that would make this dandy, this bogus Clansman, this cigarette-maker, catch a crab and somersault backwards into the water, where, strangled by the strings of his balmoral and shouting vainly to me for aid, he would sink in all his finery to the bottom of the loch which I knew to be fabulously deep.

At last they came ashore. Instinctively I crouched low, hiding under the edge of the pier. Now, although I could not see, I could hear. I heard the bump of the boat against the jetty, his step ashore and then his voice as he assisted her to land.

‘Dear Grace, give me your hand.'

The words made me wince.

Now I heard footsteps on the stones above and judged it safe to raise my head. Mother had taken his arm and was smiling up at him as they moved off. I folded my arms and in that dramatic attitude, with the frozen immobility of the betrayed, watched them go.

When I returned to Ardshiel I revealed nothing of the treachery I had witnessed, merely maintaining an attitude of stoic coldness. All that evening I confronted Mother with my silence and hostility. She had now begun to look at me reproachfully, and after supper tried to induce me to come with her to the drawing-room on the pretext that there were to be parlour games. Games, indeed! I resisted, saying that I was tired, and went upstairs to bed where, as I lay awake, the misery of the afternoon was re-created by their intermingled voices ascending in another hateful duet. When she came up, quite late, I closed my eyes and pretended sleep.

Next morning came clear and sunny. Mother, eager for reconciliation and with the faintest hint of guilt in her manner, was all sweetness and light. After breakfast she came out to join me in the garden where already I had taken up a strategic position by the gate.

‘Darling,' she smiled placatingly—ah, I thought, the Judas smile! ‘Mr Sommen has suggested taking us for a drive this afternoon. Along the coast to visit Onich Castle. But I daresay you can't be bothered with sightseeing.'

‘Why not?' I inquired.

‘Well … you're such a fisherman I thought you'd surely want to go to your pool again.'

‘Considering that I've gone to my pool for the past week and caught nothing, doesn't it occur to you that I might prefer to go sightseeing? Especially,' I added, with a heavy emphasis, ‘ as there will probably be plenty to
see
.'

She flushed slightly and was silent.

‘Then you'd … you'd really like to come?'

‘Yes,' I said, not looking at her. ‘ I definitely and positively would.'

The carriage arrived at two o'clock. The cigarette-maker who, while we waited in the porch, had been jocular with me in his best ‘old chap' manner, through which I detected a strain of unease, now gave me a hand up beside the coachman before taking his place with Mother behind. We set off with a slow clip-clop of hooves. I could not observe the pair at my back but at least I was with them and I swore that this time they would not get away. Never again would Mother have the chance to be alone with all that charm.

Partially reassured, I almost enjoyed the drive. The sun shone, the sky was a duck-egg blue, the little waves lapped along the shore. It was good to be seated so high, and the coachman was friendly, pointing out places of interest with his whip. If only this interloper had not been with us. His intrusion was a profanation of our existence.

Too soon we arrived at the clachan of Onich and drew up at the little harbour where a few small blistered fishing-smacks lay moored against the pier. In the foreground, high up on a cliff, was the castle. As I climbed off my perch the cigarette-maker assisted Mother to alight.

‘I say,' he suddenly exclaimed, looking down, ‘what a spiffing day for a cruise!'

Two fisher boys in rubber boots and blue jerseys were hoisting a lug sail.

‘Would you like it, young-fellow-me-lad?' he said, turning to me. ‘Don't you think it a good idea?'

I thought it an excellent idea. How better could I keep them under my eagle eye? I nodded stiffly.

‘Come on then,' he cried gaily, leaping down and speaking to the boys. When I followed he helped me aboard solicitously, then, still on the pier, and before I knew what he was about or could collect my scattered wits, he had pushed the boat off, the sail caught the wind and I was put of the harbour and away while Mother, with a despicable pretence of affection, took out her handkerchief and waved to me from the shore.

I turned wildly to the bigger of the two boys.

‘Go back. Go back to the pier.'

He shook his head. The ‘ gentlemans' had hired him ‘py the oor'. He let out more sail and the boat took an unbalancing heave. Weak with rage and distress I collapsed in the thwarts. Yesterday they had been in the boat and I on shore. Now, precisely, the positions were reversed. This was the final treachery. They had begun to walk arm-in-arm along the cliff towards the castle. Yes, I had always thought him a cad, and now I knew him to be a cheat as well. As for Mother's … duplicity … oh, dear, the wind was making my eyes water.