The Numbered Account (44 page)

Mrs. Hathaway laughed. ‘Very well.' As she spoke the train at last pulled out; the blessed air came in at the window as the express began to roar across a darkened Europe, in fact soon Julia had to climb down and raise the shutter so that Mrs. Hathaway should not get chilled as she undressed. ‘Are you coming to bed?' that lady asked, when she herself was comfortably installed.

‘Not just yet, if you don't mind; I thought I'd stay up till the frontier, in case there's any bother over June's travel-paper—that attendant man pulled rather a face when I gave it to him. But are you dying to have the lights out and go to sleep? If so I'll undress now; I don't a bit mind confronting officials in my nightgown.'

Mrs. Hathaway laughed again.

‘No, I'm not at all sleepy; I'd like to talk for a little.'

‘Good.' Julia climbed down from her bunk and perched on the little pull-down snap-up seat attached to the wall; there she lit another cigarette.

‘I had a letter from Edina in Berne,' Mrs. Hathaway said. ‘She asks us both to Glentoran—she was dreadfully disappointed that I dragged you away the moment you arrived, and so was Philip. So you will come up with me, my dear child, as soon as we have resettled your protégée in her detestable employment—where she must remain while her hair grows—I see that. But I think you need a rest,' the older woman said firmly.

Julia began to feel nervous.

‘I've just been having a holiday', she protested.

‘No, dear child; not a holiday at all. First you were nursing me, and then having some very wearing experiences. Now you ought to have a change; and one can really rest at Glentoran. It is so peaceful there.'

Julia nodded. There was always peace at Glentoran, as there was at La Cure; a different
ambience
, but the same peace. Only what did Mrs. H. mean by ‘wearing experiences'? She looked at her old friend's wise, kind face, framed between the white pillows and the mahogany panels, and saw there what made any attempt at concealment useless. Suddenly she burst into tears. Mrs. Hathaway leaned out and stroked her hand.

‘You had every excuse, but I am sorry that it should have happened,' she said presently. ‘A most charming man, but a
coureur'.

‘Was that why you said he was
capable de tout?'
Julia asked, wiping her eyes.

‘Yes. I mean that I said it because I thought it; I wasn't warning you—one doesn't warn people of your age, it wouldn't be any good if one did. But I did recognise both his quality—which is great—and his charm, and I became rather alarmed on your account.'

This speech was immensely comforting to Julia; it made her feel less of a fool.

‘There really
is
good in him, don't you think?' she asked. ‘As well as all his gifts and his interests, like birds and flowers and climbing?'

‘Yes, I think so. Only at his age he should be less self-indulgent and more scrupulous,' Mrs. Hathaway pronounced. ‘His fatal weakness is that he hasn't realised this. But you may have taught him something.'

‘I felt such a beast, not going to see him, or taking him flowers or anything,' Julia said, immensely relieved at getting all this secret trouble at last presented before the incorruptible tribunal of Mrs. Hathaway's standards.

‘Oh no, you were quite right. When I telephoned from Beatenberg he was always begging to see you, but I said
that you were too busy. I think he took it in, in the end,' the old lady said.

The train slowed to a halt; from the darkness outside, farther down the platform, came the demand ‘
Les passeports, s'il vous plaît,'
addressed to the non-
Wagons-Lits
passengers. Julia got up, her little seat flipping up behind her.

‘I think I'll just go and lurk,' she said.

‘Leave it to the man, unless there is trouble—but I feel sure there won't be,' Mrs. Hathaway said.

In the corridor Julia found Watkins lurking too, but for a different reason.

‘I said I'd just let her get undressed and into bed,' the maid said, with a nod towards her and June's compartment. ‘Is Madam in bed? She ought to be.'

‘Yes, all tucked up some time ago,' Julia replied.

‘That's right. I didn't like to come in and disturb you. Has she got her Fishy Water?' Watkins asked, with an old servant's jealous interest in her mistress's welfare.

‘Yes—and with a cork in the bottle, so it won't spill. Would you like some Vichy, Watkins?' Julia asked.

‘Oh no thank you, Miss. I only tried it once, and fishy it tasted to me! There's a water-jug in that wash-stand affair, if we're thirsty.' She tried to peer out of the window. ‘Why are we stopping? Is this a town?'

‘Not really—it's the frontier, where they do the passports.'

‘Ah. Will
she
be all right?' Watkins asked, with another nod in the direction of the sleeper door. ‘She seemed a bit worried about her passport—something wrong with it, I gathered.'

‘She's got a new one,' Julia said. Oh, dear foolish gabbling June!—how much else had she told Watkins? She soon learned some of it.

‘You know, Miss, she's really a very decent little girl, if she is a bit flighty and silly,' the maid pursued. ‘She gives a lot of her pay to her mother, to help her out—a widow's pension isn't much. But I don't fancy the idea of her going on doing all this modelling, or whatever they call it. It's
my belief that these agencies lead young girls astray, as often as not—I mean I think they're often agencies for other things than adverts! And she's silly enough, in a way, to be taken in by anyone. Couldn't you get her into some decent job, where she'd be safe? She'll take anything
you
say, that I'm positive of; she thinks the world of you.'

Julia, glancing down the corridor, saw the frontier officials in a huddle outside the
Wagons-Lits
man's little cubby-hole, going through the passports of the sleeper passengers—she watched them, and was immensely relieved when they went out to by-pass the sleeping-car on their way to the next coach.

‘Good!' she muttered. ‘Yes, Watkins, I think there is a chance that I might find quite a nice job for Miss Phillips, and I mean to try, presently. Good-night.'

‘Good-night, Miss,' the maid said, and after a tap on the door re-entered her compartment.

Julia stood a moment longer in the corridor. First the Pastor; then Mrs.H.; now Watkins! Undoubtedly June was her neighbour; there was no escaping that fact. But June's pretty, silly face was not the memory that she must carry home from this journey, whether she would or no; it was the memory of a gothic face, with triangular eyelids and a twisted smile. Tears smarted again behind her eyes; she brushed them away angrily—goodness, what a fool she was! Anyhow there would be peace at darling Glentoran, and in time she would forget. Like Watkins she tapped on a polished wooden door, and went in and rejoined Mrs. Hathaway.

This electronic edition published in July 2011 by Bloomsbury Reader

Bloomsbury Reader is a division of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 50 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DP

Copyright © Ann Bridge

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ISBN: 9781448204953
eISBN: 9781448204519

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