The Oracles Read online

  ‘Though I was almost sure she wasn’t, Mrs. Pattison. She sounded like the sort that thinks only of themselves, and it’s plain to see he never got a decent meal. Not that he ever complained. But when that person next door told me she’d gone and deserted the children, I didn’t feel she had any more claim. What they’d have done without you! Which reminds me, about the expense. We can’t ever repay your kindness, but we ought to repay the expense they’ve been. He thinks he’s got some things here that he could sell, perhaps. Some of these little statue things that he does. He seems to have been able to sell them in the past.’

  ‘Why, yes‚’ said Christina. ‘He … he’s quite a famous sculptor, you know. Supposed to be a genius.’

  ‘I’m not surprised,’ said Ivy. ‘Though I didn’t know how famous. But it’s very good, what he does. You mean he’s been in the papers?’

  ‘Oh yes. He got a prize in Venice.’

  ‘He never thought to tell me that. Well, anyway, you mustn’t refuse to let us know exactly what we owe you, Mrs. Pattison. I know you’ll understand how we feel about that.’

  ‘It’s been no expense to us,’ said Christina. ‘Mr. Archer took care of all that. He came down here, you know, and took his own children away, and fixed up with me to look after the little Swanns for a bit.’

  ‘Mr. Archer? Frank? He’s been here?’

  ‘Why, yes. And I must write to him, the very next post, and tell him Mr. Swann is all right. You must give me the address. He’s been so worried. They’re great friends, you know. In spite of …’

  ‘Oh, Mrs. Pattison! That’s wonderful. Oh, that will make a difference to Conrad. All the difference in the world. Losing Frank was like losing half of himself.’

  ‘Why should that awful woman part two friends?’

  ‘That’s what I say! Why should she?’

  They went to work on Elizabeth again and were still at it when the children returned with Bobbins, over whom Ivy had the manners to exclaim before attempting to make friends with Joe and Serafina.

  Joe, to whom she presented a fish to float in his bath, heard with unconcern the news that in a fortnight he would be removed to another home. Dinah demanded to be taken there at once. Their ready desertion to the newcomer was a little mortifying to Christina; neither of them displayed the slightest reluctance to leave her, although she had done so much for them. Only Serafina held aloof, scowling slightly and accepting a plastic purse with no more than a mutter of thanks.

  The interview was a short one, as Ivy had a train to catch. No sooner had she gone down the path, with the faithless Dinah and Joe fondly hanging upon her, than Serafina turned on Christina.

  ‘Is that Conrad’s new woman?’ she demanded furiously.

  ‘Serafina! That’s not a very nice way to put it. They’re going to be married.’

  ‘So we have to go and live with them?’

  ‘I’m sure she’s very kind and nice and ready to be a mother to you.’

  ‘I liked Elizabeth better.’

  ‘Well! Really! After the way she treated you?’

  ‘She didn’t treat me badly. She used to talk to me and tell me things. She’d read books and met all sorts of people. This one … she won’t know anything. There won’t be any books to read. Oh, I wish I could stay here.’

  Christina kissed her, touched by the compliment.

  ‘I never was in a house with so many books,’ lamented Serafina. ‘When shall I ever get to know anything? I’m not a baby. I can’t bear to leave you and Bobbins and Uncle Dickie. He’s such a wonderful man. He lets me take his books and tells me things when I ask. He showed me how to read a dictionary. I do so love him. I perfectly worship him.’

  ‘Well, dear, he’s very busy now, and very sad.’

  ‘I know. Till after the funeral. But I’ve got a whole lot of things to ask him that I’ve saved up till he’s happy again. When do I have to go? Will I have time to finish the book I’m reading before I go?’

  ‘I expect so. What is it?’

  ‘Paradise Lost.’

  ‘Good gracious! I should have thought that was rather difficult for you, with all those long words. You can’t understand it, surely?’

  ‘Oh, I like long words. And I hate understanding things; that’s so dull. And if I don’t know a word I can always poke my proboscis into a dictionary.’

  ‘Your what?’

  ‘My nose,’ cried Serafina gleefully. ‘That’s a lovely long word for a nose. I asked Uncle Dickie what a proboscis meant, and he gave me a little dictionary and showed me how to read it. He said in future I could poke my proboscis into that and not ask him quite so many questions.’

  3

  THE little handful of earth felt cold in Dickie’s palm. As he scattered it upon the coffin it seemed to him as though he was consigning himself to the grave, that he too lay down there.

  He put the thought from him and stood erect, staring across the heads of the crowd and seeing nothing. Now was not the moment to think of the future; there would be plenty of time for that when this ritual was over and all these people had gone away. But the small trickling noise of the earth falling continued to whisper in his ears as he listened to the final prayers and bent, with Christina, to take a last meaningless look at the coffin, far below, before they turned away and abandoned the dead.

  She took his arm and they walked slowly together towards the cemetery gate. The path was lined with faces, well-known faces; there was hardly one which had not been familiar to him since childhood. Since all bore the same expression they all looked alike—one face upon several hundreds of shoulders, one face over several hundreds of years. This face had looked upon his father once, as he came from paying a son’s last tribute. Bobbins, in his turn, must see it: the face of East Head burying a well-loved townsman.

  Christina was doing it all very well. She gave pale half-smiles of recognition to right and left, as if thanking people for their presence and sympathy. He realised that he too ought to have looked about rather more on this walk to the gate. And he ought perhaps to have done something—he did not know what—about Sam Dale in his Mayor’s rig; bowed to him in some civic way before quitting the graveside. But it was too late now. He was handing Christina into the first of the waiting cars. They were driving back to The Rowans, where hospitality was to be provided for kinsfolk and intimate friends.

  The streets looked quiet and empty. Most of the shops were shut, out of respect. As soon as their car had passed these would open again and the brief, solemn hush would lift from the little town.

  ‘The wreaths!’ exclaimed Dickie suddenly. ‘Thousands of them! And we don’t know who …’

  ‘That’s all taken care of,’ said Christina. ‘Mrs. Selby and Mrs. Browning are getting a list made of all the names on the cards, and notes about who sent what kind of flowers, so we can write and thank people appreciatively.’

  Not for the first time did he wonder what on earth he would have done without her. She thought of everything.

  They had reached The Rowans. She walked in the same slow way beside him up to the door, but as soon as she was inside she ran off to the kitchen, calling to the housekeeper. He was left, for a moment or two, alone in the hall of his new abode.

  Of course this was to be his house, and he would spend the rest of his life in it until he left it, decently, in his coffin. There was no point in going anywhere else, since he would be obliged to take Christina with him wherever he went. He would be no less miserable elsewhere, and she much more so. It had been madness to dream of escape, or to suppose that this marriage could terminate with his father’s death. He could not possibly leave her. She had done nothing to deserve it, save bore him intolerably and exhibit justifiable resentment when that fact became apparent. No wife could have behaved better than she had during the last few days. He pitied and honoured her for the efforts that she was making, but he had ceased to love her. At some point during their estrangement that slender thread of continuity had snapped—the thread whic
h runs through every happy marriage, from the first vows to the final parting, which survives changes, storms, surprises, hazards, discoveries, quarrels and reconciliations, blending all into a single experience. There was, for him, no link between the past and the present. They had made a disastrous mistake, but he had no right to leave her unless she wished it, which she never would. Their union, no longer nourished by love, must be preserved in kindness, compassion and mutual forbearance.

  Black figures were creeping up the path. He went into the dining-room, where substantial refreshments were set out. All this, too, had been very well done.

  Soon the house was filled with a subdued yet festive murmur. It was, in its way, a pleasant funeral. The prevailing sentiment was warm and not too painful. Everybody had loved old Mr. Pattison, but he could be mourned without extreme disconcertment, for there was nothing insufferable about his death, no sudden shock, no desolate widow, no helpless orphans, no work left half finished, no life cut off in its prime. Since all must die, this was the best way to do it.

  Dickie and Christina went about dispensing hospitality and hearing the same things said again and again. A few old men looked glum, as if listening to their own knell, until Dickie had filled them up with his father’s whisky; after that they brightened and put more faith in their individual constitutions. Pattison relatives who had not met one another for years got into corners and exchanged family news. It seemed to go on for hours, but Dickie was spared the latter part of it, for he was employed in driving convoys of guests, who had come from far afield, to catch their several trains.

  From the last of these trips he came back to a silent house. Some rattling, splashing and chatter were going on in the kitchen regions: Christina was alone in the drawing-room. They were to have a drawing-room now; The Rowans was that kind of house. She had kicked off her shoes and was drinking a final cup of tea. They exchanged a look which meant: Well! It went off all right.

  ‘Were your shoes comfortable?’ she asked anxiously. ‘I got them a whole size larger than the others.’

  ‘Perfectly, thanks. Did yours hurt?’

  ‘Agony! Oooooh! I’m tired.’

  ‘Let’s go home.’

  ‘Goodness no! There’s all the washing up and the good china and plate to be put away. Allie and Mrs. Hughes stayed … I ought to be in the scullery now. You go home, though, and hold the fort, because Mrs. Simpson may want to be getting away. Take the car. I’ll drive back with Allie.’

  The Bay Hill house, when he reached it, looked small and reproachful. He supposed that he must set about selling it. Christina wanted to move into The Rowans immediately. By the New Year other people would be living here and nothing would be left of the life begun two years ago, when he and Christina returned from Italy.

  Serafina was in the lounge, reading with her customary fierce concentration. She looked up as he came in and asked if it had been a nice funeral.

  ‘How can a funeral be nice?’ he retorted, throwing himself into a chair.

  ‘I mean, were the people satisfied?’

  He considered it and said that he thought they were.

  ‘They don’t say dead in this town‚’ observed Serafina. ‘They say passed away. I don’t like it. It sounds like bath water.’

  He did not answer. She got up, adding:

  ‘I’ll go away. You’re still sad and I mustn’t be a nuisance.’

  ‘That’s all right. I just don’t want to talk.’

  ‘I know. We shan’t talk any more, because you’ll still be feeling sad when I go away. It’s a pity.’

  He felt some compunction, remembering what Christina had told him of the child’s reluctance to leave them and her strong attachment to himself. He had done little to deserve it, and was sorry that he had not taken more trouble to talk to her, had not given her more advice about books to read. No particular impulse of benevolence had inspired him; he had merely found her amusing, and had snubbed her without mercy as soon as she bored him. It was agreeable to be heard with such respectful adoration; her eagerness, her ignorance, her untrammelled imagination, her frantic hunger for mental nourishment, had not been without pathos. His curiosity had been aroused when he discovered that she genuinely preferred poetry to prose, but his interest in her had flagged when it appeared that she set more store by sound than sense. She did not really enquire into the meaning of what she read; her questions arose from her feeling for rhythm and metre. She mispronounced many words, but she never made mistakes in the scanning of a line. She had a voice of considerable range, and the unspeakable Elizabeth seemed to have taken some pains to train it.

  ‘I’ll send you some books‚’ he said. ‘I’ll send you the Oxford Book of English Verse.’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll read it.’

  She spoke sadly. He surmised that there would be few books in the new Swannery, and nobody to tell Serafina what anything meant. For everyone else it would be a change for the better, to judge from Christina’s account of Mrs. Wright.

  ‘You’ll go to school,’ he said encouragingly, ‘and get books there and learn a lot of things.’

  ‘That’s not the same as talking to you. You know what I want to find out.’

  ‘And what is that?’

  She gave him a blank, puzzled look.

  ‘How can I know till you’ve told me? Something! When we are talking I always keep feeling you’ll say something. If I knew what it was, I’d ask you. If you could guess, you’d tell me. So that’s why I keep on asking questions. It might come out someday. Something that explains why we were born.’

  ‘My dear Serafina! I don’t know why we were born.’

  ‘I know. But you are the only person I’ve met who wonders about it.’

  ‘Do I wonder?’

  ‘Oh yes. Don’t you remember what you said when you explained that poetry to me? That poetry that says it isn’t safe to ask too many questions?’

  ‘I don’t remember. What poetry?’

  She glanced at him reproachfully and said:

  ‘But ask not bodies doomed to die

  To what abode they go.

  Since Knowledge is but Sorrow’s spy,

  It is not safe to know.’

  When he had recovered from his astonishment she was gone. Her voice and her eyes had moved him deeply. She could not possibly have understood what she was saying, but he thought that he had never encountered such a gift of utterance. Nothing said that day would remain with him save this. Yet she had merely repeated a verse which blew through her haphazard mind, delivering words to their target because she could speak, not because she understood them.

  Later that evening he told Christina that he doubted whether the new Swannery would be congenial to Serafina.

  ‘Of course it won’t,’ said Christina. ‘She’ll be bored to tears.’

  ‘She ought to get a first-rate education. She ought to go to Oxford.’

  ‘Oxford? H’m!’

  Oxford, thought Christina, was Dickie’s solution for every human ill, because he had been unable to go there himself. Bobbins was to be sent there, at all costs, in order to be happy ever after and never get toothache.

  ‘Now I think,’ she said, ‘that Serafina ought to go to one of those schools that teach children how to act. I believe she might have a real talent. They look after them very well at those schools and give them a proper, ordinary education, as well as training them for the stage. She has a way of looking at you and saying things: she puts it over, as Mr. Prescott says. She does it even when she doesn’t know what she’s saying.’

  ‘There’s something in that,’ agreed Dickie. ‘But I don’t know who’d pay for it.’

  ‘Mr. Archer will. Sometime or other I’m going to write to him about it. He owes a lot to Serafina. You see, she’s tough. Nobody has ever treated her like a child. I think it would be better for her to start earning her living rather young. She’s got a lot of far-fetched, fanciful ideas. If you gave her a very … well … intellectual education, I think she’d
just go floating off out of this world and turn into a crank. But if she has to get down to a good hard job, with a lot of strictness, but using her gifts at the same time, she might turn out very well. I’ve thought about it a great deal.’

  ‘It’s a brilliant solution,’ he exclaimed. ‘Very, very clever of you to have thought of it, Tina!’

  His surprise was a little too obvious. She felt tempted to say: Thank you for a nut, a sarcasm current at the High School when overpatronising compliments had been paid. But she refrained. He had grown so touchy lately that she had to be careful what she said. A few months ago he would have laughed.

  In a spasm of anxiety she wondered just how long it would be before they laughed again. How long must she watch her tongue and encounter this impersonal courtesy? Until he had got over his father’s death, she supposed. It must be that which made him seem so distant, for he surely knew by now that everything had blown over as far as she was concerned.

  In any case, it was not, perhaps, an evening for laughter.

  4

  AS SOON as the children had been despatched to the New Swannery Christina set about moving house. She began briskly. After a while she fell into a kind of languor, disheartened by Dickie’s lack of interest. In vain did she endeavour to consult his taste at every point; he was determined to leave everything to her, was sure that he would approve her decisions, and did not care in the least what curtains he had in his new study. Nor would he go near The Rowans unless she commanded his help in some task of heavy lifting or moving.

  Sometimes she tried to believe that they were getting along better than they used to do. Over the Bay Hill house they had bickered a good deal. Their tastes had clashed. Now there was no occasion for argument. Their conversation was cautious and neutral; they had become unnaturally considerate of one another’s susceptibilities. If this meant that they were getting along better she could not like it. The joy and zest of the move began to evaporate. She asked herself occasionally why she should be taking so much trouble. This question had never occurred to her before and she found it dismaying.