After Such Kindness (8 page)

‘How can it be possible and impossible all at once? That’s nonsense.’ Her voice was rising now, and I was afraid Mrs Baxter would hear this time and put an end to our conversation.

‘Life is frequently nonsensical,’ I said. Then, aware that this remark was unlikely to quell her tears, I adopted as calm a voice as I could, and fell back on the well-known phrases that always come to hand in situations of grief. ‘But you have to believe, Daisy dear, that everything is for the good in the end. We have to believe that. Life will become clear eventually, at the time of reckoning, when all doubts will be set at rest and all suffering assuaged.’

‘When we die, you mean?’

‘Indeed. Exactly so.’ Faced by the child’s straightforward questions, I was feeling less and less fit for my task as sermonizer, and could think of no more to say. After a few minutes, during which she continued to weep, I took out my pocket-handkerchief and handed it to her. ‘You will cry a whole puddle-full of tears at this rate,’ I ventured. ‘If you carry on, you may even cry a lake-full, and you and I will be up to our necks and will have to start swimming for the shore.’

She smiled wanly. ‘I can’t swim – at least not very well.’

‘All the more reason for stopping now. You may keep the handkerchief and return it when it is laundered. I always carry a spare, and I have three hundred and sixty-five of them in college so they last me a whole year. I find a good pocket-handkerchief an essential item which can be put to no end of uses. In fact, I am infinitely surprised you do not have one yourself.’

‘Nettie always made sure I had a fresh one every day. But I couldn’t find any at all this morning and Hannah said I’d have to do without as she was too busy to go looking. I couldn’t even find the ones my sisters gave me for my birthday and I’ve never even
used
them. They’ve always said I lose everything I’m given, and I thought they were wrong, but maybe they’re right after all.’ She looked at the point of tears again.

‘Not at all,’ I said gaily. ‘Handkerchiefs have a habit of going for walks. I often see mine walking hand in hand around my chest of drawers or taking a promenade along the mantelpiece as airily as if they were at the seaside. Of course, when they see me coming, they fold themselves up and get into the smallest possible space under the coal scuttle or in the butter dish. And, if they can, they delight in getting themselves lost in the laundry. In fact, every washerwoman in the world must have several bedrooms-full of pocket-handkerchiefs that refuse to go back to their owners, and I rather think the poor women have had to put their children to sleep at the next-door neighbour’s on account of the lack of space in their own establishments.’

Daisy laughed. ‘You
are
funny, Mr Jameson,’ she said.

‘Well,’ I said, ‘I don’t want to boast, but my sister Mary used to say that if she had a cough or a cold, all she needed was for me to come along and she’d quite forget her wretchedness. And if you could be persuaded to spend time with me in your spare afternoons, I could be very funny indeed. I’d make you forget all your woes. Would you like that, Daisy?’ I queried.

She looked up at me again, the tear stains on her face as charming as the face itself, and her wild, untidy hair the most fetching it had ever been. She considered me for a long time. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I think I would like that very much.’

I had never been happier than at that moment. It was as much as I could do not to shout with joy. But instead I put out my hand and said, ‘Is it a bargain, then? I will tell you stories and cheer you up, and you will give me your pretty smiles in return. And maybe a kiss or two if you wish. Only if you wish,’ I added, afraid I may have gone too far.

She held out her little hand and I took it in mine. It was warm and slightly damp from the hot weather and her own tears. I almost shivered with delight. ‘In fact,’ I said, trying hard to keep my voice light, ‘we could be meeting sooner than you think. I am to take some more photographs of the little fairies and I hope you and your friends will come along and have tea with me afterwards. Your mama is to arrange it very soon.’

She considered. ‘Papa says you live in one of the colleges. Are children allowed to have tea there?’

‘Yes, indeed. You are more than allowed; you are actively encouraged. People in colleges spend a great deal of their time having tea. Sometimes I think life in college is one great tea party that goes on for ever. But you and your friends will be my guests in my own private rooms. I have a very nice set on the first floor and a very nice servant who looks after me. He is called a “scout” and he will see to the tea. He is quite old, so I hope that all you little girls will eat up what he brings you and not send him up and down stairs for extra jam or milk.’

‘Oh, no. We’ll be very good.’

‘I am sure you will all light up my old bachelor rooms with your happy faces.’

She hesitated.
‘“
Bachelor” means that you aren’t married, doesn’t it?’

‘Indeed. As I said, there is only myself and the college servant. And Benson is responsible for the whole staircase, so I have only one-sixth of his services. And he has to wait at Hall table too, so I have even less of his time. He makes but a poor wife, I fear.’

‘Would you like to be married? To a lady, I mean?’ She looked at me with such earnest sweetness I could hardly forbear to kiss her on the spot, but I inwardly recited pi to the twentieth decimal place and managed to retain my sangfroid.

‘I prefer to have friends instead. The general rule – unless you are the Caliph of Baghdad – is that you may marry only one person at a time – but you can have as many friends as you like. I think that is a far better arrangement.’

‘You may marry and have friends too,’ she persisted. ‘After all, Papa is married, and you are his friend.’

‘True,’ I said. ‘But I especially like to have child-friends, and I cannot marry a child-wife. So, all in all, it is better the way it is. I can give you and your friends all my attention when you come a-visiting. I find many adult people don’t pay much attention to children, except to scold them or tell them what to do, whereas I prefer their company to that of anyone else, and hardly ever tell them what to do. Now don’t you look forward to being my friend on such advantageous terms?’

She nodded, her grey eyes almost lively now. Then, at that precise moment, Benjy woke up and started to howl. Daisy’s attention was immediately upon him and she flew down the path, her hair spreading behind her. By the time I had come back to the garden chair where Mrs Baxter was ensconced, she was already playing with him and diverting his attention with a rattle she had picked up from the ground. The child was so glad to see her that I felt almost sorry for him, to be deprived of his substitute mother and his best playfellow in one fell swoop. The Baxters had been cruelly obtuse in the matter, I thought. Sometimes it is as if adults have no idea of the feelings of children; as if they forget their own childhood once they pass into the years of so-called discretion. I sincerely hope that will never be my fate.

The servant Hannah, alerted by the infant’s cries, came hastening down the lawn and bore him off for nursery tea, Daisy following in their wake. ‘I shall see you very soon, then, Mr Jameson,’ she said, giving me a very nice curtsey as she passed.

‘I hope she has not incommoded you,’ said Mrs Baxter. ‘She is rather an intense child and latches on excessively to adult company. We feel her reliance on Nettie was somewhat unhealthy and we’re hoping she will develop a closer relationship with her sisters soon. Once the new nursemaid has arrived, she will be moving down to her own room next to them.’

I could have said something then, but I didn’t. If there were to be an adult that Daisy would latch onto, I wanted it to be me.

I tuck my skirts around me to ward off the chill. Now I have started Daisy’s journal, I cannot leave off reading it. I have time, I think. Robert won’t come for at least another hour.

Monday 16th June

Everything is so
upside-down
at the moment that it’s hard to find time to write and I don’t want Hannah to see me doing it as I am sure she would read what I had written and it must be Secret. But I have found a good place to hide this journal which is in a little cupboard under the eves. You have to stoop really low to get at it, and it is painted the same colour as the walls so that it is hard to see. It has a little keyhole but there is no key and Nettie told me there hadn’t been one all the time she’d lived in the nursery, and what would anyone want to put there anyway as it was so small and dark and full of cobwebs? To make quite sure Hannah doesn’t see it I have pulled the washstand in front, which was quite easy as it is on casters. I think Hannah noticed something was different in the way the furniture was arranged but she couldn’t remember what, and decided not to bother about it.

I thought the best time to write would be when Hannah is taking Benjy out in his perambulater but she usually takes him in the mornings when I am at Miss Prentiss’s. Then in the afternoon Mama often has Benjy in the drawing room with her and she wants me there too so I can fetch and carry while Hannah has other things to do, so I don’t have much time to myself. It’s strange to be in the drawing room at that time of day and even stranger that Mr Jameson is there when Papa is out. He sits on the very edge of the sofa and Mama says over and over again how grateful she is for him saving Benjy’s life and he says he is glad to do anything for such a delightful family as ourselves. Then he asks, Is Benjy quite recovered? and Mama says Dr Lawrence is still coming every day but can see no ill effects. It’s all very dull and Mama must think so too as usually she goes to play on the piano after a while and we both have to sit quietly and listen. Once when she was playing Mr Jameson asked if he could make a drawing of her and took out his sketchbook and made a very nice portrait of her with her head back and her eyes closed. He then asked if he could draw me as well and did a picture of a daisy flower with my face in the middle where the yellow bit should go and wrote The Prettiest Flower in the Garden underneath. And Mama said, Don’t turn her head, Mr Jameson, and he said he certainly wouldn’t as it was the right way on as it was. He says the funniest things but all with a straight face. I don’t want to laugh as I am sad about Nettie but sometimes it is hard not to. DEB

I’d forgotten those awkward afternoons. Indeed, I’ve only a partial recollection of the days immediately following Nettie’s abrupt departure. I know that I was very angry with the world and – although I was surrounded by a whole houseful of people – I felt as isolated and lonely as if I were an orphan. Nettie didn’t write; or, if she did, I never saw her letters. Hannah was a most unsatisfactory replacement – not very much older than Christiana, and far too busy and brisk – and without Nettie to help me, I felt strangely uncomfortable in my clothes; seeming either to have one too many petticoats, or a tickly collar, or an apron that wouldn’t sit straight. And the darns on my stockings, so painstakingly executed by Nettie, seemed always to be showing at my heels. Hannah, who did my sisters’ hair so beautifully, had little patience with mine, saying she had never known hair like it. It was forever in my eyes which annoyed me considerably, and I carried my comb around in my pocket and tried to scrape it back into place whenever I had a moment to myself. But it had a will of its own and refused to stay in ribbons, so I usually ended up throwing the comb down in a fury. Truth to tell, I felt neglected and sorry for myself. I even had fantasies of running away from home and being found dead in a ditch; my parents only then realizing the enormity of the pain they had inflicted on me. I pictured them in deep mourning bending over my coffin, while Christiana and Sarah wept in the background. For some reason, I also imagined Mr Jameson giving the funeral sermon and saying what a lovely little flower I was, and how badly looked-after I had been in my short life.

Tuesday 17th June

Today Mr Jameson brought us the photographs he had taken at the picnic. He had put them into a lovely Album and everybody thought they were very lifelike and Papa said that he would like the one of Mama to put in a frame on the mantelpiece.

Christiana and Sarah thought their portraits were very good too and they were quite nice to Mr Jameson for once, saying how clever he was. It made me sad to see Nettie in the family picture, sitting to the side with Benjy on her lap and none of us knowing what was going to happen just a few minutes later.

Although I am mainly sad, I am also a little bit excited because Mr Jameson is going to take some more photographs of me with Enid and Emma and Annie pretending to be fairies like before but this time with costumes. He has asked us to go to tea with him at his college with his old servant Benson who is like a wife to him. Mr Jameson is not married, which he told me today but which I knew must be the case as he has never brought his wife to call on Mama. Papa says lots of University Men can’t get married while they live in college which seems very strange and unfair. But I think almost everything about life is unfair at the moment. Even Mr Jameson agrees that is the case, although when I begged him to talk to my parents about Nettie coming back he said it was impossible so I suppose I have to stop thinking about it. I still remember her in my prayers, though, and hope she is happy with her new family in London. DEB

How easily one switches allegiances as a child! Although I felt so passionately about my loss of Nettie (weeping quietly into my pillow every night), yet I couldn’t help responding with pleasure to Mr Jameson’s growing interest in me. It was the first time any adult had noticed me in that particular kind of way – listening to my questions and giving me proper answers. I didn’t count Nettie, of course, because she was with me every day and was required to take an interest, but it seemed that Mr Jameson had specially chosen me, and I was flattered, especially as Christiana or Sarah would have been a more obvious choice of companion. They were so much more elegant and grown up – and much more accomplished. They had art lessons and music lessons and archery lessons and sometimes spoke spontaneously in French or German, which impressed me mightily. And my parents – my father in particular – were always singing their praises. Indeed, I had the impression Papa had hoped Mr Jameson might show a romantic interest in Christiana. He hadn’t heard my sisters mimicking him behind his back, parodying his stammer and his awkward manner.

Naturally, the gift of the parasol was the first inkling that Mr Jameson might value my company. And then, on the picnic, he gave me such kind looks, and I noticed that whenever he made one of his funny remarks he always looked at me to see if I was smiling. Although Annie was more forward and delighted him with her bold answers, I somehow knew in my heart that it wasn’t Annie he liked best. Of course, the catastrophe with Benjy overshadowed all our jollity that day, and on the silent journey home Mr Jameson had said very little. But he’d stood up for me when Nettie had suggested that my opening the parasol might be to blame for the whole affair. I’d given him a quick smile of thanks then, and he’d smiled back at me very warmly indeed.

And so I became attracted to him, not because of his looks (which were plain), but because he was kind and took trouble with me, and noticed things about me that no one else had noticed. In saying I was ‘attracted’, I use a phrase common in romantic love, but I am, of course, talking about friendship. At the age of eleven, having lost the one person I could truly rely on, I was open to tenderness, understanding and good humour.

So, I began to look forward to the times when he visited us, and then to the times when I visited him. The first time I called on him in his college was quite an adventure for me and I drove Hannah half mad with my demands that she should curl my hair extremely tightly and starch my dress extremely crisply. The prospect of a grown-up tea in the private rooms of a grown-up gentleman – combined with a chance to dress up and have my photograph taken yet again, seemed the most wonderful opportunity: a debut into a different, more adult world. I spurned my childish playthings, especially poor Nettie’s rubber ball, which now seemed far too infantile for me in my new, exalted role. I was indeed in danger of having my head turned.

Thursday 19th June

Today Annie, Emma, Enid and I all went to tea with Mr Jameson. Hannah walked us through the centre of Oxford and said she had never been inside any of the colleges before. None of the rest of us had either, and we were excited when we came to the one where Mr Jameson lived, which was apparently one of the oldest. Hannah took us into a kind of lodge by the entrance gate and said we were looking for a Mr Jameson. The porter said Reverend John Jameson you mean? And when Hannah said yes, he asked a younger porter to show us where to go. He said we needed Staircase Five Three (which is different from fifty-three) and then we crossed a big quadrangle where there were undergraduits walking about in their gowns reading and laughing and then the porter’s boy showed us up some stone stairs under a pointed archway which was marked V (that is five in Roman numbers). We went up one flight of stairs and the boy knocked on a door marked III (which is three in Roman numbers). It was a big heavy door, with old, cracked wood and large metal hinges. I heard Mr Jameson call out ‘Come in’ and the boy opened the latch. It was a very nice room with windows that overlooked some gardens at the back, and there was a big fireplace with a looking-glass over the mantelpiece and a nice carpet and two comfortable chairs. Mr Jameson was sitting in one and a white cat was sitting in the other. When the cat saw us all come in, she leaped down and fled and Mr Jameson said, ‘Oh you have frightened Dinah away – but she will come back when she knows there is milk to be had.’ And then he got up and shook each of us by the hand and nodded respectfully to Hannah, who curtseyed. Then he asked us to take off our hats and gloves and he hung them on some hooks behind the door, putting the gloves very neatly inside the hats.

Then we looked around at all the books in the bookcases, and the beetles and butterflies in the glass cases and he let us peep under the white cloths that were covering the sandwiches. Then he said he would show us where he kept his Photographic Equipment as we had to earn our tea before we could eat so much as a crust. But first he said that we should go with Hannah and put on the fairy costumes which were laid out ready on his bed. His bedroom was next to the drawing room, through a door in the corner, which was very odd but colleges are not the same as ordinary houses. As well as having lots of staircases, they are more like monastries with carved stone and cloisters, and each one has its own chapel. I don’t know why, but Hannah didn’t like the idea of going into Mr Jameson’s bedroom, although she goes into my parents’ room every day to do Mama’s hair. ‘I hope you are not coming too,’ she said rather rudely, and he looked upset and said ‘Oh no’ except he wanted to point out where the costumes were. Hannah said she thought she could manage to dress us without his help and I felt quite sorry for him as his stammer started to get very bad and he said it was all right and he’d leave it to her – except that we had to take our shoes and stockings off as fairies were always barefoot.

His bedroom was very plain and rather dark and his bed was a narrow one like mine. He had laid out four sets of fairy dresses in a row on top of the counterpane. They were made of white muslin and had muslin wings attached to the backs which looped over our fingers at the other end. The skirts had silk petals around the waist pointing downwards. And there were four head-dresses made of silk flowers. The dresses didn’t fit very well, but luckily Hannah had her needle and thread with her so she tacked them to fit. When Mr Jameson saw us come out he was very excited and said we were just how he imagined. Hannah said she hoped he’d be quick as although it was summer we weren’t used to going without stockings and shoes and she didn’t want the blame if we all caught our deaths. So we went straight in to Mr Jameson’s studio which was on the same bit of staircase, but more like a large dark pantry with no windows. Then he showed us all how we should stand, pretending we were moving our wings but not really moving at all. He put my arms higher and Annie’s lower, and told Emma she should look at the ground and Enid should look at the ceiling. When he was satisfied he put in the plates and took the photographs. Then he explained how everything worked and showed us how he developed the pictures from the plates. It was like magic watching the shapes gradually appear – all four of us looking like real fairies, almost transparent against the dark background. Then we dressed again and Mr Benson brought up the tea and Hannah drank a cup standing up before going home to attend to Benjy. Then the rest of us sat down around the table and Mr Jameson asked Annie if she would like more tea and she said she couldn’t have
more
as she hadn’t had
any
yet. And he said what she really meant was she couldn’t have
less
. And we all laughed because it was true, although Annie looked annoyed.

We had a very nice tea with cucumber sandwiches and Mr Benson did not have to go for more milk or jam, but he put a saucer of milk in the grate for Dinah, and she came back from wherever she was hiding and lapped it up. We all wanted to stroke her but Mr Jameson said she was an old cat and set in her ways and those ways were of an old Oxford don and not the ways of sprightly young ladies and so she was best left alone. Annie asked Mr Jameson why, if his ways were those of an old don, he had invited us to his rooms in the first place, and he said he was the opposite of Dinah as he loved sprightly young ladies more than anything. And after tea he said would we like to know how to turn a cat into a dog and we all said yes, thinking he was going to do magic with Dinah. And then he gave each of us a small notepad with our names written on very neatly and a very sharp pencil, and showed us how to change one letter at a time of the word
cat
so it changed to
cot
, then
lot
, then
log
and lastly
dog
. He said we could change
pig
into
sty
the same way and suggested we wrote down as many others as we could think of. Enid thought up fourteen and I did twelve and Annie and Emma both did ten. The he asked us to make up the first line of a poem and he would carry on with it. And he made up the funniest Limericks and put us all in them, including Benson and Miss Prentiss and Dinah, and we all laughed until we were red in the face. Then Benson cleared away the dishes and Mr Jameson said he would take us all home, and he handed us down our hats and gloves and put on his top hat. He held my hand on one side and Annie’s on the other, and Emma and Enid held on to us in turn. When we walked out through the quadrangle some of the undergraduits seemed to be laughing behind their hands and making comments which we couldn’t hear but which seemed to be rather condersending but he took no notice and nor did we. We walked back along the High past the colleges, and he pointed out all sorts of interesting things and where famous poets and other important people had once been students. He said the poet Shelley had been sent away for aitheyism and serve him right – but when I asked what aitheyism was he said never mind, my fault for mentioning it. When I got home I asked Hannah and she said it was not believing in God, which I don’t understand as everybody knows there is a God, except the Heathen, of course. I don’t understand how a great poet can be a Heathen when he has grown up in this country and has read the Bible. I shall have to ask Mr Jameson. He has arranged for Hannah to take me to tea again next week, but this time with only one friend as four young ladies are far too trying for Dinah’s nerves. But no doubt I shall see him here tomorrow in the drawing room as usual. I shall be disappointed if he does not come. DEB