Return to Night (36 page)

The ivory hook had stopped. “I told you, at the time, we would never refer to that again. Those are my wishes, Julian. Will you please respect them; you seem to have very little respect tonight for yourself.”

“It’s taken me—what is it?—seven years, to collect the little I’ve got, starting from scratch. Didn’t it strike you at all that what you were talking about wasn’t something that had just happened; it was me; not now of course, there wasn’t anything left, I just had to begin again. I don’t think you know what that means.”

“I know what it means, Julian, a great deal better than you do. Please don’t use these wild exaggerations; it’s hysterical, and it doesn’t impress me. If something’s happened to upset you, tell me about it straightforwardly. I should be sorry to let you go to bed in this state.”

“It shouldn’t have upset me, of course, being sliced to nothing after my first proper part. Sort of thing one ought not to notice. But people do mind, in some extraordinary way.”

He looked up; he could manage it now. As always when she shut him out, he could read nothing in her face except exclusion; yet he felt the surface brittle; unknown movements of the will were going on behind it.

“I think I must take you to see Mr. Sanderson again. I’ve noticed, of course, that you’ve never been the same since that operation. I told Dr. Lowe so, but he considered that it was nerves and that it would be better to ignore it, so I said nothing. Try, please, to control yourself, and remember that you’re speaking about a little entertainment given by schoolboys, not about some important step in your career.”

“You could hardly call it a step, I suppose; no.”

“Since you’ve let yourself dwell on it, I’ll say this, and then we’ll talk of something else. I didn’t want to hurt your feelings; you should have known that I’ve always put your interests first. You know how delighted I was, for instance, when you were made a prefect, and when you got your House colors, don’t you?” She paused, commanding a reply. He forced himself to withhold it. As if he had answered, she said, “Well, then, you see. But this was quite different. It was a cheap success of the wrong kind; it brought out traits in you which I’d always feared, and which I knew could bring nothing but misery to you or other people. It would have been mistaken kindness to encourage you, and very wrong. I was sorry to have to speak to you about it at a celebration, but I couldn’t let it pass. One can’t choose one’s own time.”

“I shouldn’t worry about the timing,” he said slowly. “That was one hundred percent.” In a kind of detached incredulity, he heard his voice go on, “You didn’t meet Malcolm Blake, did you? No, of course, I was going to have brought him along afterward.”

“I may have met him; I met a great many of your friends.” She picked up the crochet again.

“Not Malcolm, he was finishing in the Sixth, we only got together over the play. He produced it, and took Hotspur.”

“Oh, yes. I thought that was one of the younger masters.”

“No, that was Malcolm. He knew his stuff all right. In fact he was the only person whose opinion was worth anything, and he’d been pretty decent to me, so I was rather keen to know what he thought. He came along just before I saw you, while I was changing.”

“If he wasn’t satisfied with you, I dare say it was very disappointing. But doesn’t that bear out what I said?”

“We never quite got around to that. He’d had a better idea in the meantime.”

“Do say what you mean, Julian. I should like to get this discussion over.”

“I was trying to put it delicately. But if you want it in words of one syllable, he just made what’s vulgarly known as a dirty pass.”

Her hands sank into her lap. After so much calm, the horror in her face gave him a convulsive impulse to laugh. He said. “That isn’t the point of the story. I hadn’t got to it yet.”

“Julian. I can’t believe—I simply can’t believe you should have kept such a thing from me. When I think that I left you in that horrible place for another two years—”

“Well, it isn’t usual.”

“Usual! I’m appalled beyond words that it should have happened at all.”

“I mean, it isn’t usual to retail it at home along with your batting average. You learn to cope with that sort of thing down in the Fourths. It was a bit of a jar coming from Malcolm, I admit, especially just then, and I suppose I let him see it. Anyhow, he told me I wasn’t worth the trouble he’d taken over me, and he’d always known he was a fool to do it. He was a bit wrought up, of course. I thought he meant it, at the time.”

“He should have been expelled. It was very wrong of you not to tell me. A man like that should be stopped, before he has time to do harm.”

“Who, Malcolm? He wasn’t a man like that, he’d gone a bit temperamental over the play. I doubt if the idea had ever occurred to him before that afternoon. However, if it does you good to know, I hit him as hard as I could.”

“I’m very glad to hear it.”

“Yes, I thought you would be. He could have beaten me up one-handed, but he just gave me a look and walked out. It was his last day, I never saw him again. Well, that disposed of Malcolm. After that I had a shower and dressed, and came round to see you. Taking one thing with another, you can imagine all that about chorus girls and flashy charm went down pretty big with me.”

He got up from beside the fire, straightened himself, and waited. He had rehearsed it so often, though differently, in his mind, never for a moment believing that he would ever play it. He knew that, even now, a black wall would be split and light would enter, if after all she would take it back.

“I hope it was a lesson to you, Julian.”

He looked at her. At last he said carefully, “You mean you’re still quite happy about it, you don’t regret it at all?”

“‘Happy’ is a very frivolous and cruel word to use. I scarcely know you this evening; I can’t imagine who’s been influencing you. I suppose it must be this Communist you know in London, who sent you that play you were ashamed to let me read.”

“If you mean Chris, he isn’t a Communist, he’s Labor.”

“Please don’t split hairs, this is much too serious.”

“Let’s say, then, you’d do the same again?”

“If you’d been open with me, and told me what a shocking thing had just happened, naturally I should have dealt with the matter in a different way. But later on, when you were feeling calmer, I should certainly have pointed out to you that displays of that kind do attract these unwholesome people. Besides, I told you how much it upset me that you’d been so secretive about the play, and told me nothing till I arrived at the school. To say you meant it for a surprise was such a weak excuse. You must have known it couldn’t possibly please me.”

“In God’s name, why should I have known? Why?”

“When you’ve apologized for swearing at me, I’ll listen to what you have to say.”

“I’m sorry, Mother. But—”

“Very well; I hope it will never happen again. What is it you want to tell me?”

“I was asking you—why? Why should I have known? We’re not living in the first half of the nineteenth century. How was I to know you felt like that about acting, as if it were like prostitution or something? Sorry, but you know what I mean. I’ve met some actors, you do in Ouds, they’re just human beings doing a job. Why do you feel like this about it? I’m sorry if—if it’s something you’d rather not talk about; but you must have known I’d have to ask you sooner or later.”

“I see no reason for discussing it. I’m well aware that some people on the stage are quite pleasant and moral; they’re fortunate in having strong characters, I suppose. In any case, they’re professionals. Why drag in such a side issue?”

“You don’t really believe it’s a side issue, do you?”

“All I understand in that remark is its rudeness.” But she was pulling the white wool through her fingers, so that its pile turned to a thread.

“I could have been a professional for the last couple of years. I mean I was offered a job, at money one could live on if one had to. I can’t go on like this. Acting’s my thing, I’ve known that since the first time I was inside a theater. Why do you think I’ve dragged on since I came down, doing nothing; because I wanted to settle down into a local lad, like Tony? Whatever else I do, I’ll only rot.”

He realized, when he came to a stop, that he scarcely wanted all this to end, without knowing that what he feared was the physical reaction afterward. She was looking down; he glanced at her quickly, to gain an instant’s preparation. But all he could perceive was that she seemed to be emptied, to have become leaden and null, so that her face looked, strangely and frighteningly, more a thing of flesh than of mind. Then she laughed. It was not emotional laughter; it was, in intention, humorous, forgiving. It was like something cold creeping over his skin.

“Really, my dearest child, you’re so absurd that I shan’t trouble to be cross with you any longer. You’ll be telling me next that you want to be an engine driver. Now stop talking like a big baby, and getting excited about things that are over and done with. Just kiss me good night and go to bed, and we’ll say no more about it. Come along, dear.” She held out her hand with the palm upward, and lifted her cheek.

His face must have shown her, almost at once, her own reflection as clearly as a mirror. He felt this as their eyes met, and it was more than ever shocking that she continued to hold, with desperate fixity, the generous consoling look and the winning smile. Not only their falseness was horrible, because she had never in his life held out to him an insincere cajolement; but also their inexpertness, and the fact that she was afraid. While he was thinking what to say, his memory showed him the comparison which instinct had been thrusting off, his own thought so appalled him that he made a sharp movement of bodily withdrawal from it; but he could still see the woman’s face. After he had walked past her, it had occurred to him that she was perhaps hungry (she was ageing, and shabbily dressed) and he had gone back and given her something; on which, like an automaton, she had begun all over again.
I must be going mad,
he thought; and tried to black out the image with a convulsion of will. Then he remembered; she had said, “Come along, dear,” too.

Forcing his voice, he said, “We’d better get this over, Mother. I mean what I said, you know.”

“Nonsense, dear. You’re simply havering.” It was a word she had used in his childhood, a nursery joke. “I think when those doctors opened your head they must have filled in the hole with rubbish, I really think they must.”

The words pointed his mind to a refuge. The thought of Hilary possessed him suddenly; but it brought no comfort, for his struggling emotions twisted it to physical desire. He turned away; but this confronted him with his own face in the mantel glass. Hoping she would not see in the reflection that he had shut his eyes, he said, “I’m sorry you feel that way about it. But if you don’t care to give me any reason, I’m afraid I shall just have to use my own judgment, and go ahead.”

“You don’t know what you’re saying.”

He swung round; at the change in her voice, everything in him had sprung on guard. It was as if he saw opening before him the precipice of his dreams, and a kind of vertigo were spinning him toward it. Better to leap than to fall.

“No, I don’t. How should I? Why haven’t you ever told me? Do you think I haven’t the guts to take it? I think it’s time I knew what my father did. I mean, besides dying for king and country and being photographed in a Sam Browne. What’s the other thing you think I shall take after?” The dead blankness of her face heightened in him the sense of pitching down into vacancy. He gripped the edge of the mantelshelf. “Did he dope, or keep half the Folies Bergère, or die of syphilis, or what? You couldn’t tell me anything that wouldn’t be a relief.”

He saw her turn white, and tried to be sorry; but he was feeling too sick to focus his mind.

“If I were a man, Julian, grown-up as you are, I should thrash you for that. How dare you? How
dare
you stand here in his house, and use this—this filthy language about a man who was better than you’ll ever be? Yes, I won’t deceive myself, I know it now.” Feeling her voice slipping out of control, she waited to govern it. “He never did a disgraceful thing in his life. I wish I thought anyone would ever respect you as I respected him. But I’ve given up hoping for that. Every day of your life, I have wished that you had been—” She checked herself again, and finished, more evenly, “I have prayed every night that you might grow up to be something like him.”

He said dully, “But I didn’t?”

“If you had, you wouldn’t be making me so ashamed of you now.”

“But then, what has it all been?” He tried to say, “What is it that makes you hate me?” but, even now, the locks had not been loosened as deeply as that. “Was acting against his religion or something, did he tell you I wasn’t to have anything to do with it?”

“He certainly didn’t consider it an occupation for a man.”

“Of course not. I could have told you that. You’ve only got to look at his face. No, there’s something more, there must be.”

“Julian, I’ve put up with a great deal tonight. I really have no more to say. When you’ve slept, you’ll be sorry you made this scene; but you need not tell me so. We’ll both agree to forget all about it. Good night.”

Suddenly the thing with which he had planned to begin presented itself to his mind as a safe and easy retreat.
There’s something different I had to tell you, Mother; I’m getting engaged.
Why had it seemed so difficult? It beckoned now like a heaven-sent bolthole. He could hardly believe he had rejected it, till he heard his own voice.

“Very well, Mother. If that’s really all you want to say, I’m afraid what will happen tomorrow, among other things, is that I get out the car and go after a job. I’d rather know whatever it is you won’t tell me. But that’s for you to decide.”

He saw her gather herself together; but he could tell, before she began to speak, that she was putting up a last screen, so he let himself relax for a little, to be ready when it was over.

“You’re my son, Julian, and I only say this because you force me to it. But if you think, you’ll realize that you have all the faults which would make that kind of life absolutely fatal to you. I’ve tried to train you out of them; but I’m afraid under the surface most of them are still there. You lack balance and self-control. You love admiration, though you cover it over; see how you’ve brooded over a criticism I made so many years ago. Without some discipline in your life, you’d become hopelessly neurotic. There’s another thing I’m sorry to remind you of, since I think we’ve conquered it; you were very untruthful, as a little boy. Such an artificial life would certainly bring that back again. And there’s this, too; though you’re not personally to blame for it, I’m afraid you must face this. Your looks are—no, perhaps it wouldn’t be fair to say effeminate. But they would certainly confine you in a class that—well, a few years ago one talked about matinee idols. The type that shopgirls wait for at the stage door, and no one else takes very seriously. They grow to live for that sort of public; and so, I’m afraid, would you; you lack the character to rise above it. You should have been a woman; I’ve wished, often, that you had been one.”