Dolly (17 page)

I also saw that Dolly would make quite a superior business woman, and that if she married this Harry Dean would run his car-hire business without prejudice, exchanging her afternoon bridge parties for regular spells in his office. In time she would own the business and make quite a prosperous
concern out of it, Harry Dean being relegated to the golf course and sundry leisure pursuits. She would look after his interests, she would look after him, but quite possibly she would once more be disappointed, for the promise of glamour would have evaporated and been replaced by a security which she found humdrum. For the essence of Dolly was her longing: it was expressed in that ardent hopeful smile which had captivated my uncle on the dance floor long ago, and which, before that, had left so many American soldiers with a disarming, and disarmingly misleading, impression of a typical French girl. Led by her need for money she had perhaps overlooked or even buried that longing, that desire for fulfilment, for obedience, for a man’s protection, archaic female longings which will not be banished, but which survive long after compromises have been reached and reality acknowledged. Many a woman knows that on the level of her most basic imaginings she has not been satisfied; hence the look of cheerful forbearance which is the most recognisable expression on the face of the average woman, whereas if questioned she would confess to a certain mystification. Why must it be like this? A more romantic way would have been so much better.

I doubt whether Dolly was aware of the buried layers of her make-up. It was entirely to her credit that she refused to make a fairy story of her life, that she accepted each successive phase of it without question, that she adapted to each new set of circumstances with such remarkable facility that one tended to forget her previous incarnation. She now believed herself to be living the life of an average Englishwoman, although in fact her life was far from typical. Her
accent was English, her good sense was English, her endurance was English. Yet she had a look of readiness, of adroitness, that was not English, and which led back to her early need to make her way in the world. Above all it was easy to discern from Dolly’s now evasive, now conspiratorial gaze that she was a woman of passion, whose senses, long dormant or long diverted to other goals, had been stirred, and who was living the experience of a new excitement as if it were the bliss of fulfillment itself, and in whom the old archaic tremulous longings had been reborn, in the hope, the last and final anticipation, of a happy end.

My mother noticed nothing of this. I could see that she was concentrating all her resources, by now drastically diminished, on giving an impression of normality. To this end she made vague routine enquiries, of the kind she had made many times in the past, to which Dolly gave abstracted answers, her mind evidently elsewhere. Their meeting was a dialogue of the deaf, for Dolly was too preoccupied to see that there was anything wrong with my mother or with our little household, which, in the light of her new awakening, must have struck her as intolerably lifeless. I viewed this incompatibility with despair, for it seemed to me that I was too young to bear the burden of what I knew was to come. If I had placed any faith in Dolly’s seniority, which I thought must endow her with a certain wisdom, I was to be disappointed, for she now appeared to me as undeniably frivolous, with her mysterious smiles and her ill-concealed excitement. I cannot, in my defence, say that my attitude towards her was changed by this last manifestation. She had always made me feel uncomfortable, as if proposing for my benefit a
model of behaviour which I had no desire to emulate. I was always aware, in her presence, of a subtlety, an astuteness, which nevertheless failed to disguise an emotional clumsiness. She was a heavyweight, a demanding presence, a force to be reckoned with, yet I was never entirely on her side. Indeed I felt myself resisting her, as I did now, when she returned briefly to the matter in hand and asked me whether I liked my job.

‘I love it,’ I said truthfully, for I could not wait to get back to it, and to the comforting presence of Margaret and Wendy.

‘Any men?’ she asked, as I could see she would now never fail to ask, since as far as she was concerned I had reached the age of consent, when more recognisable behaviour could be expected of me.

‘No, we are four women,’ I replied, at which she looked at me curiously, and remarked, ‘Then perhaps you should look for something a bit more promising. You’ll never get anywhere in a roomful of women.’

We were a roomful of women and we were not getting anywhere. It was a dreary Saturday, the day Miss Lawlor did not come, although she usually looked in on a Sunday after church, and my mother was left to my ministrations. I had managed to cook lunch, had put the chicken in the oven at the time Miss Lawlor had indicated in the page of instructions she had left for me, and had added creamed potato and a salad. My mother had eaten with application, as I had; the food tasted of metal in my mouth. Then my mother had drifted towards her bedroom, saying, with a return to something like her usual manner, ‘If Dolly is coming I shall need a
rest.’ I had been left alone, as I so often was these days, and for this reason had perhaps entertained unrealistic hopes of Dolly’s visit. And it had come to nothing; worse, it had merely ushered in a new chapter in Dolly’s life which rendered us invisible to her. If she turned her attention momentarily to my mother it was to deplore her appearance, as if detecting in her some unbecoming act of wilfulness.

‘Such a pity you’ve let your hair go, Etty. It does so age a woman. Why not have a rinse like mine? Or you could have a proper tint. I would if I could afford it.’ As always at the mention of money she gave an annoyed little laugh. ‘And you really shouldn’t let yourself get so thin.’

But my mother merely said, ‘I’m well enough, Dolly. And my darling looks after me.’

This was how she had always referred to my father, and I felt the old heart-soreness and fear, but she got up from the sofa and put her arm round my waist. ‘My darling daughter,’ she said. So the afternoon was not entirely wasted.

At the door Dolly said to me, in an undertone which was clearly audible to my mother, ‘She has no business to let herself go like that, Jane. She is
giving way.
’ It was in her eyes the worst crime a woman could commit. Then, with an intake of breath, which seemed to be indicative of appetite, and a lifting of the head, she sailed off to the possibility of new adventures. She had been with us a little less than an hour.

It was November and the afternoons were dark. After Dolly’s departure my mother drifted off again in the direction of her bedroom, where I found her half an hour later sitting motionless in front of her dressing-table. When she saw my ghostly presence in the twilit glass of the mirror she
picked up a pearl necklace and said, ‘This is for you.’ I took it from her and kept it coiled in my hand, ready to return it when she was not looking, for these days she hated any break with routine and let her hands stray to her possessions as if seeking an assurance that they would not change. Then she got up quite calmly, and said, ‘You must be tired. Shall we sit quietly for a little while?’

‘Do you want to watch television?’ I asked.

She merely smiled and shook her head. Then she took my arm in hers, and together we walked back into the drawing-room, and sat in the dark. I moved to put on the lights but she restrained me, and I was grateful even for this show of authority. I was reading
David Copperfield
at the time and was aware that my mother, like Barkis, was going out with the tide. I felt no more fear, only sorrow. When the afternoon expired into evening she stirred and said, almost normally, ‘I’m rather tired. Dolly has tired me. I think I’ll go to bed now. Will you come and say goodnight to me?’

I left her at her bedroom door, then went back and gathered the dirty cups and plates. In the kitchen I poured away my mother’s untouched tea, and washed up. Then I opened the window and leaned out into the darkness of the park. A late bird was singing, unusual for that time of the year. ‘Why haven’t you gone away like everyone else?’ I wanted to say, but I was aware of giving way, as Dolly would have said, and composed myself into that state of impassivity which was almost natural to me. Thus I frequently gave rise to the accusation that I was unfeeling, which has persisted into my adult life, so that people constantly wonder how I can identify so closely with children, as I do in my stories. Then I went into
my mother’s bedroom and slid the pearl necklace back into the glass tray on the dressing-table. I kissed her, and she smiled at me. I was aware that a long night was beginning. I went into my own bedroom, and lay down on my bed. That night I slept the deepest sleep of my entire life.

With perfect symmetry my mother died while I slept. I found her in the morning, Sunday morning, when I took in her tea. I was not surprised: it seemed fitting. She had died in her sleep, as I would have wished her to do. I felt quite sober, and sat in the drawing-room, in her place on the sofa, until I heard Miss Lawlor’s key in the door. I went into the hall to meet her, but I had no need to tell her what had happened. ‘She’s gone, then?’ Miss Lawlor enquired, her lips pale. I nodded. She took off her hat and coat and went in to my mother.

Miss Lawlor was a religious woman, with a profound faith in the world to come. I had no such faith myself, nor did I see any point in a spiritual sanction for what had happened. Indeed I fought against such an interpretation. As far as I could see what had happened was in nature, and therefore subject to a superior law. I had always known that my mother would not long survive my father; therefore it seemed entirely natural that she should die. I was aware only of a deeper silence than I had ever known before; I was aware too that the silence would deepen throughout my life. In this I have not been wrong.

After a while Miss Lawlor came back into the drawing-room, where I was sitting, still in my mother’s place. I felt no desire to say an elaborate farewell, for Miss Lawlor’s benefit, or for mine. She made us a cup of tea, which we drank together.
Then she said, ‘You’ll telephone the doctor, Jane? And Mr Pickering?’ So I did that, and after a while people came, but I paid them no attention, for my mind had gone out to meet my mother’s, and for a brief blessed time we were at one again, as if few moments had passed since the days when I ran to her, and she was always there.

A
nd so I lost her. David Copperfield’s words, not mine, but never bettered. During the days which followed I read the book urgently, obsessively, in order to reassure myself of David’s eventual victory over circumstance. Every time he suffered a mishap or a reversal of fortune I suffered with him. I grew impatient with those who wasted his time: I saw nothing amusing in Mr Micawber, while Uriah Heep afflicted me with a sort of desolation, as if evil might just this once be allowed to triumph. But Dickens was on the side of Betsey Trotwood, and so was I. Had I had an aunt like her I should have been as valiant as David. But the likes of Betsey Trotwood were in exceedingly short supply—perhaps Marigold’s great-aunts came nearest to that ideal model—whereas all I had in the world now was Dolly. When this became borne in on me I realised why I was so impatient with Mr Micawber. And Dolly was not only Mr Micawber, she was Mrs Micawber as well, hinting that she had come down in the world, as she no doubt believed to be the case.
At this stage I knew little of Dolly’s inner life, but was merely acquainted with my mother’s account of her various misfortunes. My mother made allowances for her, as she did for everyone. But to reflect yet again on my mother was to invite pain, and I simply read on, willing myself to reach the end of the story, and promising myself an easing of the heart when David finally achieved happiness. When I got to the end I went back to the beginning. Miss Lawlor dusted silently around me, but took to leaving earlier than usual. She missed my mother’s modest companionship and found me cold in comparison.

The emptiness of the flat oppressed me, and I wished I could be out of doors, as I had been in the late days of summer, before the world turned dark. It was now physically dark as well, a mild dusky late November, leaves falling quietly in the windless air, evening setting in earlier and earlier. These evenings frightened me and found me at the window, which I opened wide to inhale the leaf smell of the park: I would stand there for as long as half an hour, my hands gingerly patting the hot radiator, until my face was numb with the cold. Then there was nothing left to do but go to bed, which I did earlier and earlier. I would get rid of the television; I would give it to Miss Lawlor. I would never watch it again. Sometimes I turned on the radio very softly, and it made me feel less lonely. I paid no attention to the programmes, but I found the sound of all those well-meaning voices comforting. But most of the time I slept, deeply, greedily, voluptuously, as if sleep were the only pleasure to which I could legitimately aspire. I now know that grief, like pain, is immensely tiring, and am less harsh on my eighteen-year-old
self than I was at the time. At the time I merely felt unworthy of the catastrophe which had befallen me and took refuge in sleep from the decisions which would have to be made.