The Feast Read online

  ‘I think Mr. Gerry is chopping wood, Mrs. Paley. In the stable yard. We offered to do the pumping to-night.’

  Mrs. Paley retraced her steps, glad to think that Nancibel had got such a well-favoured boy. Poor Gerry, chopping wood in the stable yard, had no lovely girl to sing with him. He smiled when he saw Mrs. Paley, but he did not expect her to speak because he did not know that she could. Few people at Pendizack had ever heard her do so. Changed she might be, but she did not look it, and to Gerry’s eyes she appeared as grey, as pinched, as unsmiling as ever. He was quite astonished when she came up and asked if he would do her a favour. Might she borrow two lilo mattresses from the garden shed for herself and Miss Wraxton. They were planning, she explained, to sleep out in the cliff shelter.

  ‘Of course,’ said Gerry. ‘I’ll take them up for you. Will after supper do?’

  ‘Oh no. You mustn’t trouble to do that,’ said Mrs. Paley, who had every intention that he should. ‘We can carry them.’

  ‘They’re quite heavy. I’ll take them. Anything else you’d like? Rugs? Cushions?’

  ‘We’ve taken up rugs and cushions. Mr Siddal … I think that Miss Wraxton is very much worried about staying here. Naturally she wants to go, but she can’t when her father won’t. I told her I was sure that you understood.’

  Gerry looked sulky, for he had Evangeline on his conscience.

  ‘I don’t,’ he said. ‘In her shoes I should go, whatever my father did.’

  ‘She has no money. Only half a crown.’

  ‘Oh!’ said Gerry.

  ‘She feels she ought not to have had hysterics, but one can’t wonder, can one? The shock of her father’s behaviour made a good many people behave … as they wouldn’t otherwise have done. Personally I think we should be grateful to her, for she did get him out of church, even if she was noisy. Nothing else would have got him out, and I hate to think what would have happened if he’d stayed.’

  ‘You mean …’ said Gerry, ‘she wasn’t laughing deliberately?’

  Mrs. Paley opened her eyes.

  ‘But of course not. You’re a doctor. You must know hysterics when you hear them.’

  ‘I didn’t realize,’ he muttered.

  ‘You were some distance away. I was quite close.’

  ‘I’m afraid I was rude to her, yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter, as long as I can tell her that you—that you feel differently now.’

  ‘Oh I do,’ said Gerry. ‘Indeed I do.’

  Mrs. Paley gave him her pinched smile and departed.

  He went back to his chopping with a lighter heart. The memory of Evangeline’s stricken face as she crawled up the stairs would no longer torment him. Mrs. Paley had put it right. She might look like a sour lemon, but she wasn’t a bad old trout when you came to talk to her. He would take the mattresses up to the shelter for them, and he would make a point of saying something friendly to that unfortunate girl. Half a crown! Somebody ought to do something about a thing like that!

  6. The Bleeding Branch

  There had been no overt explosion when Mrs. Siddal came back from her shopping expedition to find that the garden room had been let to Anna Lechene. It had been done, as she well knew, to annoy her; but she held her peace and asked mildly where the chauffeur was to eat. With Fred or in the dining-room?

  ‘In the dining-room,’ said Siddal. ‘At a cosy little table with Anna. He’s a secretary-chauffeur. Very high class.’

  ‘Very refained, except when he forgets,’ said Duff, who had taken a dislike to Bruce. ‘And he looks like a bit part actor.’

  ‘He’s done all the pumping for us,’ said Gerry.

  ‘Well, that was nice of him,’ conceded Mrs. Siddal.

  ‘It was for love of Nancibel,’ said Robin. ‘He’s fallen for her in a big way. He peeled the potatoes for her this afternoon. And now she’s taken him home to supper.’

  ‘Has she?’ exclaimed Mr. Siddal. ‘But how intriguing! Where was Anna?’

  ‘She was in her room writing her book.’

  ‘What fun! I think I’ll join the company to-night and see how they are all getting on.’

  Shaving always took Siddal a long time, and when he went to find Anna she was already established on the terrace, with Duff, Robin and Bruce sitting on cushions at her feet. None of them much wanted to be there, but she wished it and her will was stronger than theirs.

  ‘I’ve come to chaperone the boys,’ said Siddal, pulling up a deck chair, ‘and to ask what your new book is called, Anna.’

  ‘The Bleeding Branch,’ said Anna, in her slow, deep voice.

  ‘Thank you. It was the only detail I wasn’t sure of, and even that I should have guessed: There! Let thy bleeding branch atone, For every tortured tear! Shall my young sins … Now I know exactly what your book will be, as well as if I’d written it myself.’

  ‘Really,’ said Anna. ‘Then how does it begin?’

  ‘It begins with the innocent, or quasi-innocent (because you couldn’t depict true innocence, Anna) little Brontës carving their names on trees. I don’t know why they chose branches rather than trunks, but they did. It’s possible they then climbed the trees and sat in them, playing Gondals.’

  ‘Dick! What a devil you are!’

  ‘And it ends with a moribund and remorseful Emily hacking a branch out with an axe. And in between we have “a wildering maze of mad years left behind,” in which Bramwell writes Wuthering Heights and she pinches it and rewrites it. Bramwell’s was a far greater book, but she murders it because she can’t stand the Truth. She will not allow Cathy to be Heathcliffe’s mistress. She will not allow the young Catherine to be their daughter, palmed off on Linton. Young Catherine, of course, was the heroine of Bramwell’s book and her half-brother, young Linton, the hero. But Emily changed all that. She pushed him right out of the picture, because of course he was a self portrait.’

  ‘There’s plenty of evidence,’ began Anna.

  ‘Oh, plenty. The build-up of young Catherine in the opening chapter, for instance. But you see, my dear Anna, I know it all. I know exactly what poor Emily’s young sins are going to be, and you shan’t tell me about them.’

  ‘I blame her for nothing,’ said Anna sententiously, ‘except for murdering that book. If there is a Last Judgment she’ll have to answer for that.’

  ‘I do hope there will be,’ said Siddal. ‘I shall enjoy hearing you answering for your books, Anna.’

  ‘I know you hate them. At heart you know, Dick, you’re a bit of a Puritan.’

  ‘And what do you mean by a Puritan? enquired Siddal.

  ‘You hate Sex.’

  ‘No, I don’t. I think sex is very funny.’

  ‘That’s a sign of frustration.’

  ‘Maybe. But I don’t think food is funny, and I don’t get enough of it nowadays.’

  ‘We all talk about food a great deal,’ said Robin.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said his father, ‘we are immensely preoccupied with it. And sex-starved people are immensely preoccupied with sex. Much cry, little wool. I always suspect people who boast of their rich and various sexual experiences. I find myself doubting if they ever had any worth speaking of. Satisfied people hold their tongues. They know it’s an unlucky subject to discuss.’

  ‘What do you mean? Unlucky!’ asked Anna.

  ‘Terribly unlucky. When Psyche turned on the light, Eros flew out of the window. He’s a very touchy god and he can’t bear publicity. And that,’ he said to the three young men, ‘is why you boys will never be able to pick up much information at second hand. Those who know won’t talk. Those who talk don’t know.’

  ‘I talk,’ boomed Anna, ‘and I know. I’ve never rejected an experience.’

  ‘I never rejected a brief,’ said Siddal, getting up.

  He shuffled over to the terrace parapet to look at the sunset on the water. The tide was half out and the sea as calm as glass, flecked here and there with gulls who seemed to sleep as they floated. In the wide tract
s of wet sand the rosy sky was reflected. Nearer the cliffs, where it was dry, three figures crossed the bay. Gerry was staggering under a load of two mattresses, Evangeline carried a picnic basket, Mrs. Paley some pillows. They took the path up to the headland.

  A cormorant came flying low over the water, its long neck outstretched. It flew inland, and Robin turned to watch it.

  ‘Look!’ he said. ‘It’s perched on the roof! There’s a whole row of them. Six or seven!’

  But Anna was not interested in birds.

  ‘You know,’ she said, ‘I think your father would have been perfectly different if that affair with Phœbe Mason hadn’t ended so unhappily. He was so astonishingly brilliant, as a young man. Everyone thought he’d set the Thames on fire. And then, when he didn’t, you’d hear all sorts of explanations. People said he shouldn’t have gone in for the law, that it wasn’t the right profession, and he should have stayed in Oxford. But everyone knew it was that he couldn’t be bothered to do any work. Now why?’

  ‘Who’s Phœbe Mason?’ asked Robin, pop-eyed.

  ‘Didn’t you know?’

  ‘Never heard of her,’ declared Robin.

  ‘How queer! It just shows what a queer frustrated family yours is. Everything hushed up, I suppose. But that’s probably Barbara’s … your mother’s doing.’

  Duff stirred uneasily on his cushion. He had at last made up his mind what he thought of Anna.

  ‘If only she’d had more generosity … more frankness … if she’d let the affair run its course instead of parting them….’

  At this point Siddal returned from his stroll and passed them, observing:

  ‘Whatever you’re saying, Anna, it’s a lie. No. I overheard nothing, but I protest that I wasn’t and I didn’t. And if you write books about me before I die I shall sue you for libel.’

  7. From Mr. Paley’s Diary

  Monday. August 18th. 9.30 p.m.

  I wrote nothing this morning, and I have been able to write nothing all day. Christina is to blame for this. Last night, when we were sitting in the lounge, she rose suddenly and went away. I did not see her again until eight o’clock this morning. I went to our room, at the usual hour, but she was not there. I sat up all night waiting for her. She did not return. She came in just before Nancibel brought our early tea. She did not tell me where she had been, and I did not ask. I dislike having to ask questions, a fact of which she is perfectly aware.

  We went, with our lunch, to our usual place over Rosegraille Bay. She continued to act strangely. She left me for a while to talk to the Cove children who were crossing the cliff. And after lunch she lay down in the bracken and slept all the afternoon. She has never done so before. At four o’clock, our hour for return, I was obliged to wake her. Some pieces of bracken were caught in her hair which made her look very foolish; but she did not seem to mind this when I told her of it. She then said casually that she had not slept much last night because she had been on the cliff with Miss Wraxton. This was not said in any tone of apology. On the contrary: she gave me to understand that she means to repeat this performance again to-night.

  I told her, quite plainly, that I don’t choose she should do this. It is an affront to me. Her place is with me, not with Miss Wraxton. Her reply was curious. I will try to report our conversation verbatim, as far as I can recollect it. But Christina is difficult to report. Her ideas are confused and her powers of expression are limited. It may be that I shall give her credit for better arguments than she really produced. I find it hard not to make some sense out of the silliest reasoning.

  Christina: I cannot stay beside you, Paul, because I now believe what you have been saying for the last twenty years.

  Myself: And what is that?

  Christina: I believe that you are in Hell. You have often told me that you were, but I would not believe it.

  Myself: Wherever I may be, you are my wife. Your place is with me.

  Christina: My place is not in Hell. It is not my duty to be there with you. I used to think you were mad, and I was very sorry for you. But now I know that it is in your power to recover and you will not.

  Myself: Do I understand from this that you wish to leave me?

  Christina: I will do all I can to make life comfortable for you. And I shall be at hand if ever you want me. But I will not share your prison any more, for it is a bad prison which you have made for yourself.

  Myself: You have never understood. My integrity means more to me than happiness.

  Christina: You have none. There is no such thing. You are not a whole person. Nobody is. We are members one of another. An arm has no integrity if it is amputated. It is nothing unless it is part of a body, with a heart to pump the blood through it and a brain to guide it. You have no more integrity than a severed arm might have.

  This reply surprised me. She does not usually express herself so clearly. I told her that, by integrity, I mean self-respect.

  I do not know how this will affect me. She has changed. I must have wished her to do so, since I have consistently rejected all her attempts at reconciliation.

  We were late for tea.

  8. Strange Beds

  The Pendizack booby trap shut up with a crash, and Bruce’s oaths rang across the stable yard. He had forgotten Nancibel’s warning.

  The noise woke the occupants of the big loft. Robin sat up with a start to hear chuckles from Duff’s bed.

  ‘It’s the high-class chauffeur,’ said Duff. ‘He didn’t know … or else he forgot.’

  ‘But what time is it?’ asked Robin, looking at the luminous dial of his watch. ‘Why … it’s half-past four!’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Where on earth can he have been?’

  ‘I can guess.’

  Robin reflected.

  ‘Not,’ he said at last, ‘… not with …?’

  ‘Of course. It’s obvious.’

  ‘Well! I call it pretty thick.’

  There were violent bumps next door as Bruce extricated himself from the bed, opened it out again, and climbed in the proper way. Then there was silence.

  ‘It puts me,’ said Robin at last, ‘off the whole idea.’

  Duff grunted non-committally and turned on his hard mattress. He disliked Anna, but he could understand her attraction and in part he responded to it. Her lure was that of Circe. In her company a man had leave to be as big a brute as he liked. She imposed no sanctions, asked for no loyalty, no delicacy, no tender considerations. She offered freedom of a sort. The brute in Duff yawned hungrily.

  ‘I say,’ exclaimed Robin, ‘where’s Gerry?’

  ‘Isn’t he here?’

  Robin flashed a torch for a minute on Gerry’s bed. It was empty.

  ‘This,’ he said, ‘is a much stiffer guess.’

  ‘I shouldn’t wonder,’ said Duff, ‘if he’s cleared out. He was in a black rage before supper. I expect he’s so furious he’s just gone.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘He had a row with Mother.’

  ‘Gerry did?’

  ‘Mother gets a bit tired of advice from Gerry. He’s always telling her what she ought to do.’

  ‘Tells all of us,’ agreed Robin.

  ‘He was trying to dictate about Father’s Law Library. Mother got a letter from the people in his old Chambers. It seems it’s still there, and they’ve been writing and writing to know what he wants done with it. But you know him. He never even opens his letters. So at last they wrote to her. It was none of Gerry’s business. Mother was livid.’

  ‘Do they want it moved?’

  ‘Yes. They’ve no room for it. He just left it there when he gave up practice. Mother’s giving orders to have it stored. She would before if she’d known anything about it. But Gerry wants to sell it. A good Law Library is very valuable nowadays, and it’s worth about five hundred pounds. Somebody did offer to buy it, apparently, but that’s off, because Father never answered the letters.’

  ‘Five hundred pounds would be very useful,’ said R
obin.

  ‘If I go to the Bar I might like to have it myself. It’s no concern of Gerry’s. Infernal cheek of him to say what’s to be done with Father’s books. Mother told him she’s storing it for me, and he proceeded to go right off the deep end. Just because he gives her fourpence halfpenny a week out of his screw he thinks he’s got the right to boss the whole family. He said he should go to South Africa and never come back.’

  Robin considered this, and then said:

  ‘We should be in quite a hole if he did.’

  But Duff was growing sleepy again, and did not answer.

  ‘I don’t see why you should have five hundred pounds,’ said Robin more loudly.

  ‘Wha-at?’ said Duff, rousing.

  ‘If all this family has left is books worth five hundred pounds, I don’t see why you should get it all.’

  ‘I’ll have to have a library if I go to the Bar.’

  ‘What about me?’

  ‘You aren’t going to the Bar.’

  ‘How am I to get educated?’

  ‘Get a brain specialist to operate on you, I should think. Do shut up. I want to go to sleep.’

  ‘I think Gerry’s absolutely right.’

  ‘You take a flying …’

  There were thumps on the wall from Bruce, who was trying to go to sleep.

  ‘Thump back,’ said Duff indignantly. ‘What blasted cheek! He wakes us all up falling about in his bloody bed.’

  Robin thumped and yelled: ‘Shut up!’ through the wood partition.

  ‘Shut up yourself,’ came in a faint answering yell from Bruce.

  Robin and Duff continued to talk in voices aggressively raised until Bruce, losing patience, got out of his bed. There was another crash as it shut up. Yells of laughter came through the partition. Gerry, who was cautiously climbing the ladder, thought that everybody in the loft must have gone mad.

  But the noise died down when he joined his brothers. Duff and Robin stopped laughing and stared at him.