The Ivy Tree (23 page)

‘Mm?' Julie had been laughing at some remark of Con's. ‘Who, me? As long as I can. I've got three weeks.'

‘Mrs Bates,' said Lisa, ‘there's the telephone, I think. Do you mind? . . . I'm sorry, Mr Seton, but she's been a member of the family for so long, and of course she's known Julie since she was very small . . . I think she puts all Julie's friends into the same age-group.'

‘And that,' said Julie cheerfully, ‘stays at about thirteen plus. Donald doesn't mind, do you, darling?'

‘Not in the least.' Mr Seton, who had, during the cross-examination, been handing sandwiches and scones round with unruffled good humour, now sat down, and took one himself. Somehow, I noticed, the stand of sandwiches and cakes had finished up in a position mid-way between his chair and mine, and within easy reach of both. No mean strategist, I thought, watching him finish his sandwich, and quietly take another. They were very good; I had made them myself.

‘Now,' said Grandfather, who, being a Winslow male, obviously thought it was time he was back in the centre of the stage, ‘about this Roman camp at West Woodburn . . .'

‘Fort, actually,' said Donald.

‘Fort, then. Habitancium, isn't that the Roman name for it?'

‘Habitancum.' Donald took another sandwich in an absent sort of way, while managing to keep a keenly interested gaze fixed on his questioner. ‘That's the name on the various inscriptions that have been uncovered. There are no other references, and the place is named solely from the inscriptions, so, in fact,' that sudden, charming smile, ‘your guess is as good as mine, sir.'

‘Oh. Ah. Well, what I want to know is this—'

But Mrs Bates, laden with more scones, and big with news, re-entered the room briskly.

‘The way things get around in these parts is like magic, it is that. Here's Julie only been at home five minutes before her young man's ringing her up on the phone. He's waiting.' She slapped the plate of scones down on the trolley, and stared pointedly at Julie.

The latter looked blank for a moment, then I saw the faintest tinge of pink slide up under her skin. ‘My – young man?'

‘Aye,' said Mrs Bates a little sourly. ‘Young Bill Fenwick from Nether Shields. Saw you pass, he says, when they was working up near the road.'

‘Young Fenwick?' said Grandfather. ‘Nether Shields? What's this? What's this?'

‘I've no idea.' Julie spoke airily, setting down her cup. ‘Did he say it was for me?'

‘He did, and well you know it. Never talked about anyone else since last time you were here, and if you ask me—'

‘Oh, Mrs Bates,
please
!' Julie, scarlet now, almost ran out of the drawing room. Mrs Bates gave a ferocious nod that was aimed somewhere between Grandfather and Donald. ‘He's a nice lad, Bill Fenwick is, but he's not for the likes of her, and
that's
the truth and no lie!'

‘Mrs Bates, you really mustn't—' began Lisa.

‘I speak as I find,' said that lady tartly.

‘Hm,' said Grandfather. ‘Pity you find such a lot. That'll do, now, Betsy. Go away.'

‘I'm going. Enjoy your teas, now, I made those scones meself. You'll not get the likes of
them
in London,' with a nod at Donald, ‘
nor
in Scotland, neither, let me tell you. Now, did I see that cat come in or did I not?'

‘Cat?' said Lisa. ‘Tommy? Oh, no, surely not, he's never allowed in here.'

‘I thought I seed him run past when I opened the door.'

‘Nonsense, Betsy, you're imagining things.' Grandfather was poking about testily under the sofa with his stick. ‘There's no cat in here. Don't make excuses, now, just go away, do. The scones are excellent. Perhaps you'll get Julie to bring the hot water in, when she's finished her telephone call?'

‘All right,' said Mrs Bates, unoffended. ‘There's nobody can say I can't take a hint as well as anyone.' But, pausing at the door, she fired her last shot. ‘Mr Forrest, too, did I tell you? He's back already. Didn't expect
him
till Friday, but he's flown. Maybe
he'll
be on the phone soon.' And, with a chuckle, she disappeared.

There was a pause.

‘Ah, well,' said Con, reaching out a lazy hand, ‘the scones are worth it.'

‘Hm,' said Grandfather, ‘she's all right. Trust Betsy with my last halfpenny, and that's a thing you can't say of many, nowadays. Now, Seton, where were we?'

‘Habitancum,' said Con, ‘just about to start digging.'

‘Ah, yes. Well, what are you going to find? Tell me that? If there's anything worth finding round here, I wish you digging Johnnies would find it at Whitescar. No likelihood of
that
, I suppose?'

I saw a sudden look of surprise flicker over Donald's face, to be followed by what looked like rather furtive embarrassment. Grandfather, drinking tea, hadn't noticed, but Con had. I saw his eyes narrow momentarily in a speculative look. Then I saw what was hidden from anyone else in the room. Donald's hand, with a portion of ham sandwich, had been hanging down over the arm of his chair while he talked. The skirts of his armchair almost touched the ground. From under the edge of this crept a stealthy, black and white paw, which once again patted the edge of the ham sandwich.

‘There's nothing marked hereabouts on any existing map,' said Donald, now serenely ignoring this phenomenon, ‘but that's not to say there
was
nothing here, of course. If you start turning up Roman coins with the plough, sir, I hope you'll send straight for me.' As he spoke, he had returned the sandwich to the plate, and then his hand went, oh, so idly, over the arm of the chair, holding a substantial portion broken off. The paw flashed out and took it, not too gently. Tommy, it appeared, had had to learn to snatch what bits he got.

‘And how long are you to be here?'

‘Possibly until August, on this particular job.'

‘I doubt,' said Con with a grin, ‘if we'll be doing much ploughing before you go, then.'

‘No?' said Donald, adding, apologetically, ‘I'm afraid I'm very ignorant. Your – er, Mrs Bates was perhaps not so far out in her judgement of Londoners.'

‘Well,' said Grandfather, ‘if you can tell wheat and barley apart, which I've no doubt you can, then you'll be one up on me and Connor. I wouldn't know a Roman inscription from a whisky advertisement, and neither would he.'

Con's protest, and my ‘Are you sure?' came simultaneously, and everyone laughed. Into the laughter came Julie, so blandly unconcerned, and so fussily careful of the hot-water-jug she was carrying, that the attention of everyone in the room switched straight to her with an almost audible click. It was all Con could do, I knew, not to ask her outright what Bill Fenwick had had to say.

‘Julie?' Old Mr Winslow had no such inhibitions. ‘What did the boy want?'

‘Oh, nothing much,' said Julie airily, ‘just how was I and how long was I here for, and – and all that.'

‘Hm. Well, now, let's have a look at you, child. Come and sit by me. Now, about this job of yours . . .'

Conversation began to flow again, Con and Lisa both listening with some interest to Julie's account of her first year's work at Broadcasting House. Beside me, the skirts of Donald's chair began to shake in a frustrated fashion. I said gently: ‘Won't you have another sandwich, Mr Seton? These are crab. They – er, go down rather well.'

I saw the glimmer in his eyes as he took one. Half a minute later I saw the paw field a piece, very smartly, and, in a matter of three quarters of a second, come out for more. Tommy, flown with good living, was getting reckless.

‘You're not eating anything,' Lisa said to me. ‘Have another sandwich. There's one left.'

Even as she turned to look, the paw shot out, and the last of the crab sandwiches vanished, whole, from the plate on the bottom tier of the trolley.

‘I'm so sorry,' said Donald, blandly, to me. ‘I took it myself. Have a macaroon.'

10

Julie and I went out together that evening. Lisa's eyes followed us to the door, but she said nothing. Donald, not to be moved from his decision, had driven off to West Woodburn soon after tea. Grandfather, whom the heat was tiring, I thought, more than he would admit, had gone early to bed. Con had not come in again. No doubt he would come back at dusk for a late supper. The sound of the tractor wound on and on through the soft evening into the dusk.

Though it would have seemed the natural pilgrimage to take her to see the mare, I had had enough of the lane. We went the other way, through the garden towards the wicket-gate and the river path that led towards West Lodge. In the half-light the rank borders looked and smelt heavy with flowers. The swifts were out, and flying high. Their screaming was thin and ecstatic, and exciting, like all the sounds that one feels one is not meant to hear; the singing of the grey seal and the squeak of a bat and the moaning of shearwaters under the ground at night on the wild sea's edge.

Now that we were alone together there still seemed curiously little to say. She had told the truth when she said that the major things of life had no need to be talked over. I supposed that for her the return of the idolised cousin from the dead was one of these. Never by word or look had she betrayed any consciousness that my advent might make the least difference to her future. It might not even have occurred to her . . . but it soon would; it must. If it didn't occur to her, it might occur to Donald.

We had been filling up the eight years' gap – I with completely truthful reminiscences of my life in Canada, and Julie with a lively and (it is to be hoped) scandalous account of the year she had spent in the Drama Department at Broadcasting House.

‘ . . . No,
honestly
, Annabel, it's gospel truth!'

‘I don't believe it. It sounds as if you wouldn't even know what “gospel” means.'

‘“Good tidings”.'

‘Heavens!'

‘I thought that'd shake you,' said Julie complacently.

‘I suppose you got that from Donald too?'

‘“All good things—?” I expect so.' Her voice had abruptly lost its sparkle.

I looked at her. ‘He's very nice,' I said, tentatively.

‘Yes, I know,' she spoke without enthusiasm. She had picked a dead dry stalk of last year's hedge-parsley, and switched it idly through the buttercups that lined the river-path where we walked.

‘You mustn't mind Mrs Bates, Julie. Marrying and burying is meat and drink to her.'

‘I know. I don't mind. I suppose I did let her jump to conclusions, rather.'

‘Here's the boundary. Shall we go on?'

‘No. Let's find somewhere to sit.'

‘The stile will do. It's quite dry.'

We climbed the two steps of the stile and sat side by side on the broad cross-bar, facing away from the house. It was another quiet evening, and the trees that edged the meadows were still in the dusky air. The path had left the river some way to our right; along it, here, the willows streamed un-trimmed, their long hair trailing in the water.

I said: ‘You know, I'm afraid I jumped to conclusions myself. I was hoping they were correct.'

‘Were you?'

I laughed. ‘I fell for your Donald, from a great height.'

Her face came alight for a moment. ‘One does. That's how it happened, with me. He's such a – a poppet. Even when I'm a bit foul to him, like today, he's just the same. He's – oh, he's so
safe
 . . . !' She finished on a note that sounded more despondent than anything else: ‘And I do adore him, I do, really.'

‘Then what's wrong?'

‘I don't know.'

I waited.

She extended a sandalled foot, and regarded it. ‘It's true; I do want to marry him. And most times I want nothing better than to marry him soon. And then, sometimes, suddenly . . .' A little pause. ‘He hasn't asked me, actually.'

I smiled. ‘Well, you've got three weeks.'

‘Yes.' She dimpled, then sighed. ‘Oh, Annabel, it's all such
hell
, isn't it? If only one could
tell
, like
that
, the way they do in books, but when it comes to the real thing it's actually quite
different
. I mean—'

‘I wouldn't have thought you need worry quite so hard. You've loads of time, after all. You're only nineteen.'

‘I know.' Another sigh, and a despondent silence.

I said, after a minute: ‘Would you rather talk about something else? You don't need to tell me anything you don't want to.'

‘Oh, but I do. In a way it was one of the things I was so longing to see you again for. I thought you'd know, you see.'

‘My dear,' I said helplessly.

‘Oh, I know you don't know him yet. But when you do—'

‘That wasn't what I meant. I meant why the blazes should you imagine I could be of any help to you? I – I made a pretty fair mess of my own life, you know.'

I half expected the routine and automatic response of kindness and reassurance, but it didn't come. She said immediately: ‘That's why. It isn't the people who've had things their own way who – well, who get wisdom. And they haven't the time to think about what life does to other people, either. But if you've been hurt yourself, you can imagine it. You come alive to it. It's the only use I can ever see that pain has. All that stuff about welcoming suffering because it lifts up the soul is rot. People ought to avoid pain if they can, like disease . . . but if they have to stand it, its best use might be that it makes them kinder. Being kind's the main thing, isn't it?'