Casting Off (71 page)

So he told her – some of it. That he was in love with a girl so young that he did not know how to approach her. He was very careful to keep her anonymous – was very general, and lame.

She put down her teacup and regarded him thoughtfully.

‘I was far too young when I married,’ she said. ‘I knew nothing. I suppose you could have described me as an overgrown child. And William seemed incredibly old to me then. He was only seven years older than I, but it seemed like a generation.’ A faint smile, and she added, ‘It has done me no harm. I grew up in the due course. I have even achieved old age.’ She was still looking at him with that disarming frankness; then her eyes gleamed in a way that reminded him of Neville, although he had never before perceived a likeness between them, as she said: ‘You don’t value yourself enough. In my day you would have been described as a
great
catch.’

That night he went to sleep feeling better than he had for weeks.

He was nearly late for the church, and by the time he got there it seemed almost full. He looked to see whether she was sitting with Rupert and Zoe, but she wasn’t.

‘There’s a bit of pew next to Neville,’ Teddy said: he was being an usher. When he had found it and Neville had greeted him – ‘We wouldn’t
have
weddings if girls were allowed to dress up in ordinary life’ – he saw her sitting with Louise and a thin dark girl diagonally across the church from him.

‘We’re this side because Lord Fake hasn’t got so many friends as Poll,’ Neville said, lowering his voice because the organist had begun the entrance of the bride – not Wagner, thank goodness, he thought. Then everybody stood up and he could not see her at all.

Afterwards, as she walked down the aisle Polly saw him, and he got a quick little smile and he thought that anyone who was clearly as happy as that would look dazzling.

‘Do let’s get out,’ Neville was saying. ‘You never know how much food there’s going to be at parties these days.’

He waited, outside the church while the photographs were being taken, for her to emerge.

‘Have you got your car?’ Neville was asking.

‘Yes.’

‘I’ll come with you, then.’

‘Well, you’ll have to wait, I might want to give other people a lift.’

She came out with Louise and the other girl. She was wearing a green dress with a rounded neck and tight sleeves to her elbows, the slightly full skirt falling well below her knees, and what looked like brand new, pretty but rather painful shoes. The outfit was spoiled by a ridiculous hat – a small boater with green ribbon in a streamer at the back. There was nothing wrong with the hat, it was just that hats did not suit her. She seemed to know this, because as soon as she got outside she pulled it off, looked round and deposited it on the spike of a railing. He saw Louise laugh and pick it off. Then they all seemed to see him at once. He knew from the Duchy that Louise had left her husband. ‘I fear she may be embarking upon a desert,’ the Duchy had said, ‘and, as we know, they are full of wild tribesmen.’

So he greeted Louise first, who introduced the thin girl as Stella Rose. ‘We’re going to share Polly’s old flat together,’ she said. All the while, she stood a little behind the other two, and when he caught her eye, he sensed that she had been looking at him.

‘Hello,’ he said, nerving himself to go and give her a noncommittal kiss. ‘You’re looking pretty splendid, I must say.’

‘Zoë chose it for me. But she made me wear the hat.’ She had gone faintly pink, and now he was near her, she didn’t look at him. Pride, he thought, she’s not going to admit that she’s missed me.

‘I missed you,’ she said in an off-hand voice. ‘But I must say it has been very good for work. You know – no distractions like cooking and all that.’

‘Oh, come on!’ Neville was saying. ‘Honestly, we really ought to get there.’

He took all four of them squashed in his car. Neville sat in front, because Louise said if he sat with them he would spoil their clothes.

There will be plenty of time, he thought, as he drove to Claridges Hotel, for us to talk after the reception. And he began to imagine driving down to the cottage with her that evening. So he made no particular effort to talk to her while they were at the reception, and neither did she.

After he had been received and met Gerald for the first time, he concentrated upon doing the rounds, or covering the ground or whatever they called it.

Miss Milliment was arrayed in a jersey suit the colour of blackberry fool, which did not look its best backed by the salmon pink damask of the large chair she had been parked upon. ‘What a happy day!’ she said, when he greeted her. ‘It’s Archie, isn’t it? My eyes are not quite what they were.’ And later, ‘Oh Archie, I fear a little piece of bridge roll, or possibly just the filling of it has escaped my clutches and may perhaps be visible to you down the side of the chair? Thank you so much. I was pretty sure I was right.’

Lydia – in a bridesmaid’s dress – and Villy.

‘Mummy, if it’s at all possible I want never to see Judy again in my life. Hello, Archie! Do you like my dress? I was just telling Mummy about my ghastliest cousin. She’s furious because she’s not a bridesmaid and if you ask me she’s most unlikely ever to be a bride because I can’t think of anyone stupid enough to marry her.’

‘That will do,’ Villy was saying. ‘Go and hand some things round to people.’

‘How are you, dear Villy?’

‘Better, I think. Busy, anyway. Zoë and I are trying to start a small dancing school, as we both have different skills in that field. I’m not sure of it, but it will be very good for Zoë to have something constructive to do.’

Rachel and Sid.

‘The Duchy simply loved having you to herself,’ Rachel said. ‘We suggested going down, didn’t we, Sid, but she wouldn’t hear of it.’

‘No, she wanted you to herself. But we’re taking her down this evening and staying the weekend to soften the blow of your departure.’

‘Sid is teaching me to drive,’ Rachel said, ‘and I’m afraid it has emerged that I don’t know my right from my left.’

‘She’s pretty shaky,’ Sid said fondly, ‘and has about as much sense of direction as a gadfly.’

‘Oh, darling! I think that’s a little unkind!’

But nothing between them was unkind, he thought.

Zoë, looking exquisite in a very pale pink suit with a nipped-in waist and long skirt and a broad pink straw hat that lit her complexion to yet another delicious pink. ‘Archie!’ She kissed him. ‘Isn’t it a lovely party!’

‘I hear you and Villy are starting a dancing school.’

‘A small one. I don’t know if it will work, but the idea of it has cheered Villy, which is the main thing.’

‘Archie, let me introduce you to Jemima Leaf.’ It was Hugh with a very small, neat blonde lady.

When he had asked was she a friend of the bridegroom, ‘She’s a friend of mine,’ Hugh said, before she could reply. He said it, he thought, as though it was extraordinary to have one. Hugh got called away and he stayed talking to her. She had two children, she said, and she was working for Cazalets’ – for Hugh, in fact. He wondered afterwards about that. But eventually Polly went away to change, and fewer people remained, to say what good speeches they had been and how well everything had gone. He had been seeing her out of the corner of his eye for some time: she had been talking to Christopher, wasn’t it, the cousin who’d had the breakdown and who owned a devoted dog? He went over.

‘It’s Christopher, isn’t it? It’s so long since I’ve seen you.’

‘It’s very long since anybody’s seen him,’ Clary said.

‘How’s your dog?’ he asked, after a pause when neither of them said anything and he began to wonder whether he had interrupted something.

‘He died.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry.’

But with a smile of singular sweetness, Christopher answered, ‘He had a very good life and I’m sure he’s all right now.’

‘Christopher believes in a dog heaven,’ Clary said, ‘but I don’t think they would enjoy it much without their people.’

‘Perhaps one day I’ll have to join him, then. I must go,’ Christopher said a moment later, ‘got a train to catch.’

‘Well,’ he said, when they were alone. ‘Shall we have some supper before we drive down?’

‘We must see Poll off first,’ she said quickly, and began to go to the door of the large room. ‘We have to go outside,’ she called. He followed her.

But when all that was over, when the small crowd of them were left waving and then turning to one another, she said, ‘Could we talk in the car?’

‘Why not?’

He put her in the front seat and went round and got in beside her.

‘The thing is’, she said, still not looking at him, ‘that I have very very nearly finished my book and I think I’d better be on my own until I have. If you don’t mind?’

He was taken aback. ‘You haven’t stopped working because I’ve been around before. Why now?’

‘Oh, well . . . The end is quite difficult, and I think I would be better off really concentrating on it. It’ll only be about two weeks.’

‘All right. If that’s how you want it.’

‘It is. If that’s all right.’

‘Don’t keep saying if that’s all right if you know you’re going to do it anyway.’

‘All right. I won’t. What I would like’, she went on, ‘would be if you could get me a taxi and I’ll be off. I wouldn’t have come at all, only I knew Poll would mind.’

‘I’ll drive you.’

‘I can easily get a cab.’

‘I dare say, but here I am. I’ll drive you.’

The drive was curiously uncomfortable. At one point he said, ‘What’s up?’

‘Nothing’s up. I just want to get back to my work.’

‘Everything all right at the cottage?’

‘Everything’s the same, if that’s what you mean.’

He was almost glad when they got to Paddington. She slipped out of the car, waved to him, said, ‘Thanks for the lift,’ and was turned to go when he called, ‘Clary! How will I know when you’ve finished?’

‘I’ll send you a postcard to the flat,’ she said, and was gone without a backward glance.

So, during that fortnight, he thought almost bitterly, that if he’d wanted her to be independent, he’d certainly got his wish. She hadn’t even seemed especially pleased to see him. She’d always gone for extremes, he thought at intervals: she was an extreme person – nothing happened by halves. Anyway, if he faced up to it, he had to recognize that he would not be proposing to a sick or frightened little girl: she’d acquired poise in the last six weeks and a passion for her work which, though admirable, was slightly daunting.

He thought everything about her during that time. He thought about her passionate nature, her determination, the way her hair sprang off centre from the widow’s peak, her endless curiosity that could apply itself to anything and hung on until she got some satisfaction, the glimpse he had had of her small round perfectly white breasts, her marvellous eyes, which when he looked into them were such a mirror to her self – only there had been no chance of that at the wedding, so really he did not know what she was feeling. It was as though he’d lost a part of her. The trust? Was that what had gone with her dependence? Or had she changed in some other mysterious way? It even crossed his mind, during those days, that she had fallen in love. God forbid, and who with, after all? They knew nobody down there; there could have been a walker – people did walk along the towpath at weekends – but if she’d been working so hard, she would not have had time to meet anyone. Anyway, she would have told him. She did not tell lies, had never withheld anything that mattered to her from him. It was madness even to think of such a thing.

By the time he got her postcard – a full fourteen days later on a Friday morning, the very day, as his morning paper informed him, that ‘The Sun sets on the British Raj’ – he felt that perhaps he was a little mad.

Deliberately, for reasons not clear to himself, he did not arrive at the cottage until mid-afternoon. It was another hot, sunny day, and when he got out of the car, it was wonderful to smell the warm clean air – a hint of caramel from drying hay, and the peppery sweet smell of the phlox she had planted beside the mossy path to the kitchen door. He called her, once, but there was no answer. He unpacked the car, the food he had bought that morning and his painting gear, and carried it in several trips into the kitchen: the door was unlocked, so she must be somewhere.

The door to the sitting room that led on to the garden was also open, and he could see her now, lying on the lawn with one of the old sofa pillows under her head. When he got near he saw that she was asleep, but nearer, some sound he must have made wakened her, as she sat up with a start. She was wearing her old black cotton skirt and a sleeveless white camisole thing that he’d never seen before.

‘Here I am at last,’ he said, and got down on the grass to give her a greeting kiss. He did not get the customary hug in return, and felt vaguely alarmed.

‘Aren’t you pleased to see me?’

‘I am – in a way.’

‘I’m glad your book’s done.’

‘Yes. So am I. In a way.’

‘How not?’

‘Well, it’s a kind of farewell to the people in it. Saying goodbye to them. I’d got used to them. And I hate saying goodbye to people anyway.’ Her hands were locked round her knees, and he began to feel the tension.