The Watch Tower (24 page)

‘No. I can’t read.’ The curtains flew out like wings from the open windows. The silence lengthened. From lying inert, lids lowered, Bernard suddenly heaved round in the bed and turned to the wall.

Surprised and repelled, Clare stared at his back. ‘Oh, Bernard—’ She looked about in the hope of
finding that someone had materialised who was more interested in him, who would allow her to disappear. ‘Bernard,’ she said again gingerly, leaning forward but taking no steps towards the bed. Really, she had not misled him by pretending any great concern! Yet no one would act like this without confidence in his witness. ‘Bernard—What’s the matter?’

There was a long silence. Clare grimaced and looked about for help. The curtains billowed.

‘I’m sorry I talked so much. I told you things I don’t want to remember.’

Had he? She could hardly say she didn’t care when he so obviously thought she did, and blamed himself for his frankness so disproportionately.

‘People have to—talk to each other,’ she said, awkwardly, staring at his brown hair, at the seams of Felix’s pale-blue pyjama jacket. ‘Everything will be—better soon.’ In his expectation of her interest and kindness, in his apparent sorrow, alleged illness, in his breath, flesh, foreignness, intensity, he was ever so slightly repulsive to her.

‘I wanted you to know.’

‘Oh.’ Wanted her to know what? That any of this mattered so was astounding. No doubt she was brutal and heartless, but she felt a faint internal recession of sympathy, and her respect for that look of experience worn by a boy who knew more than she did, was ousted by a faint contempt for this sticky display of emotion,
the ludicrous esteem in which he had decided to hold her. Several sentences framed themselves in her mind. She said, ‘Well. I won’t tell anyone else,’ and Bernard looked at her at last with an expression that made her shrink again with caution and disdain. She eyed him dubiously, saying, ‘There’s your tablet.’

‘I’m sorry you have to go away.’

Clare looked at him, half-indignant. ‘I
want
to go. It’s not a matter of being obliged to.’ She gave him an impatient smile, though it seemed unreasonable to dislike him so because he had decided to think she was better than she was. He made unfair statements. But he was desperate. But that was repellent.

Mentally, Clare turned about in a last effort to locate some more reliable and buoyant piece of driftwood than herself for the boy to cling to. He ought to see she was the feeblest creature, incapable of action as a stone, dangerously indifferent to his troubles. No one else had ever made this peculiar mistake, insisting so blatantly on her presence and assistance. It occurred to her then, however, that the worst that ever happened to Laura’s and Felix’s acquaintances was a temporary shortage of capital for investment, a loss at the races or a hangover; among her own acquaintances suffering tended to be on a smaller scale—girls quarrelled with their boyfriends, and never owned enough dresses; they caught colds, and their skin peeled after the first harsh dose of summer sun; the men would have
liked more money and promotion, but no extra work; they brooded about their cars’ performances and their own liquor-holding capacities.

Even as these reflections were filtering through her mind, Clare was saying, ‘I can easily stay. Yes. I’ll stay.’

Bernard was not surprised. Clare was. She felt as though someone else had made use of her voice. Her sense of her own identity diminished increasingly, and more attention, more concentration than she had ever known she possessed, focused, as though directed, on the boy.

It was almost inconceivable to her that mere persistence had been able to penetrate the sunless calm she lived in. Yet she felt extraordinarily light-hearted—like a scientist at the very moment of discovery. Of course she couldn’t leave him. She looked at him in surprise to think she could ever have intended to. It seemed self-evident that the attention had to focus on the boy.

She and Bernard had traversed the same extreme country. Because the details of his life were so removed from hers she had judged him with airy contempt as excessive, bogus, as if he had invented a life spiked with tortuous incidents to win favours and interest and pity, when all the time—The complacency with which she had been able to accept his hard situation as his ‘destiny’ smote her. This was how she and Laura had
been judged by Blanche Parkes and her kind:
Well
,
well
,
poor things
.
It
’
s their own fault
,
of course
.
Nothing like that ever happens to me
.
Yet fellow-feeling had nothing to do with the decision to stay.

Five minutes ago she could have sprinkled petals on his grave, her heart and eyes as cold as cement. Now she saw him with deep amazement and wonder. No, she thought, slightly shaking her head. Heavens. He had to be—all right. Let someone of such value sink from sight? What had the world been thinking of?

She marvelled somehow. Her nature surged with life. Like everyone, she was quite innocent in a way. She would do anything, spend all her untampered wealth of action, longing and virtue. It never occurred to her that what she offered might not be enough. The attention that had claimed her was in touch with the cause of things, and she did believe that it would be able to intervene.

Clare had needed help always, craved understanding and, above all, had longed to appreciate. When it was manifest that she was not to receive these blessings, her resolution to survive was adamant. She would
not
be disposed of. However, she had to remain a person whose entire strength was required to maintain her own equilibrium. She stood upright without support; in the circumstances, it was the best she could do. She did apprehend other people and feel them with clarity and depth, receiving information about them involuntarily
from her intuition. She had never known what this gratuitous news was for. She wished her fellows well, but it had never entered her head that she—pusillanimous, vicious, sustained only by a peculiar sort of pride and insurmountable determination—could be useful to anyone. If it had been suggested, it would have seemed the cruellest joke. Interest and sympathy she had given easily, but acts had always, obviously, been impossible. She had no authority.

Now everything was reversed. Simply. Suddenly. As if a river diverted for decades by man-made dams and channels had violently returned to its own course in the space of a single storm and raced on its way with an energy and power not to be overborne.

There was the attention. There was a torrent of strength. There was a fine edge of life on which to tread, a sensation of fitness and certainty, of force bounteously and somehow justly given by the universe. There was a boundless vitality of the spirit, a thoughtfulness beyond words. She could encourage someone to stay alive. And this was what she was for.

‘What? Has your nurse run off and left you ‘ Felix said critically from the doorway. ‘All alone, are you?’

‘She’s gone to the university again.’

‘Still trying to lose us our presser, is she? She won’t do any good, you know. They’re not going to take you in for free.’

‘I know.’

‘Why doesn’t she stop wearing out her shoe-leather, then? She’s supposed to be home keeping you company. She’s just about haunted that place these last two weeks. And even if they’re mug enough to listen to her, they’re not going to keep your whole family. How does she think you’re going to get round that?’

Bernard rubbed one eye severely to escape from Mr. Shaw’s persistent gaze. ‘She won’t take any notice.’

‘Huh!’ Felix gave a short laugh. ‘We’ll soon have you back on the job. That’s what you need. Bit of pressing. The work’s piling up for you. What’s the old sawbones say? When’s he going to let you start?’

‘He wouldn’t tell me, but I could go back now. Tomorrow.’ Bernard threw back the bedclothes and began to climb out of bed.

Laura rushed in. ‘Bernard. Get back to bed. Felix. Fancy letting him do that. Dear, dear, dear.’ Intimidating as any matron, she shepherded Felix out of the way and tucked her patient in.

Felix blustered, ‘It’s all right. He might be coming back to work in the morning.’

‘Who said so? What an idea! He certainly is not. Really, Felix! He’s only joking, Bernard. He knows perfectly well that Dr. Bell wants you to do nothing but concentrate on getting better. You’re still a sick boy for all that you can stand up now without collapsing.’

Embarrassed, Bernard looked away from the over
hanging faces—Mrs. Shaw worried and kind, her curly hair standing up excitedly, Mr. Shaw dark, enigmatic and still. He said, ‘But I should move back to my own room.’

Laura turned to Felix in consternation.

‘Now, whoa there, young fella. You’re staying right here. No arguments. Besides, we’ve given your room up.’

‘What would Clare say when she comes home if we told her you were leaving? Heavens, she’d never forgive us.’

‘What’s it got to do with her?’ Felix asked smoothly.

‘Nothing!—Except that she’s chief nurse. Anyway, she’s left dinner ready for us, so if you want to wash or change, Felix—And I’ll just fix these pillows, Bernard, then I’ll have your’s in in a jiffy.’

Left alone, Bernard rolled about in the bed groaning; he pulled a pillow over his face.

‘Oh!’ Laura whispered reproachfully. ‘You made him feel like a—a malingerer, Felix.’

They went side by side down the hall.

‘What’s eating her, rushing out every afternoon to see the Lord Chief Justice about him?’

‘She only wants to see if there are any scholarships. If he’s eligible for any. But you evidently have to make appointments with a lot of different people to find these things out.’

‘Bunch of red-tape artists. He’s all right with us.
They’re not going to keep his whole clan, anyway.
He
doesn’t give a damn about his bloody old botany. Might as well be a gardener! He knows there’s no scholarship. Didn’t he check with these characters himself?’

‘With two jobs? Look at all the time Clare’s spent on it—writing letters and ringing up to see these men. It’s a fulltime occupation. It’s only because she’s on holiday that she’s been able to do it.’

‘Yeah. Well. What’s she taking such an interest for?’

They stood facing each other in the soft apricot lamplight at the end of the hall, and Felix’s quizzical smile with closed lips was very set.

‘We wanted her to stay home and look after Bernard.’

‘She didn’t have to go the whole hog, did she?’

‘What do you mean?’ If he would only blink, or at least say what he meant.

‘She doesn’t need to spend her savings on fancy food and presents, does she? She doesn’t need to sit at his bedside
reading
to him.’

It did sound obscene. Laura could have torn her hair out by the roots. She said pacifically, ‘That doesn’t do any harm. Bernard likes it. It passes the time for him. And I don’t think she’s spent much money. She’s only enjoying cooking nice meals for him during the day. The company’s done him good. Dr. Bell said so.’

‘Do you reckon?’ Felix reflected into her eyes. ‘He
probably thinks he’s on a good wicket. Her running after him.’

‘I’m sure he thinks nothing of the kind. Though being the sort of boy he is he no doubt appreciates—’ A look of immensely diffused and triumphant scorn on Felix’s face truncated Laura’s thought. For he seemed to know something deadly that would controvert for all time not merely her tenuous
belief
in the existence of grace, but in some more fundamental way its very existence. His anarchic eyes had watched the murder.

Felix began to chuckle, looking at her, and chuckled for a long time. Finally he managed to gasp through his merriment, ‘I’ve left my cigarettes in the car.’

‘There might be some in the sitting-room.’

He went off humming. Laura surged into the kitchen muttering fervently, ‘Some day, some day, I will go to Alaska and never come back.’

‘Hullo, Felix. Hullo, Bernard.’

Felix looked round. Bernard had already seen her. He breathed and gave the impression that he had been holding his breath since she left.

‘So the professors chucked you out, did they?’ Felix grinned so that it seemed his face must surely ache.

‘Not really. He was very interested. Everyone’s been full of useful suggestions. There must be fifty letters floating about Sydney this minute on Bernard’s behalf. I have to ring this man next Tuesday.’

She and Bernard smiled at each other as if they were speaking.

To his own surprise, Felix remarked, ‘You look radioactive in that dress.’

Clare looked down at it. ‘Don’t you like it?’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that. I wouldn’t say that.’

But she was electric, electrifying, like a fiery avenger or angel, like someone alive twice over, and it had nothing to do with the colour of her dress.

Felix swept his hands over his thick hair. ‘Laura’s around somewhere—’

‘I’ll find her.’ Clare started off amiably.

‘Get her to tell you about the little obstacle you’ve overlooked,’ Felix called cheerily after her.

‘I’ll do that.’

‘It’s insuperable,’ Laura said grimly, watching her sister chop parsley for an omelette. ‘You’d forgotten all about his poor family.’

Clare tossed the parsley over her omelette with a carefree hand. ‘Nothing’s insuperable. We’ll think of something.’ Picking up a fork from the table, she began to eat.

‘At least sit down to have your dinner!’

‘Oh?’ She slid into a chair, continuing to eat and think rapidly.

Laura liked to eat with exceeding slowness. She liked to see other people eat the same way. She put aside the desire to mention these facts while she wiped
the stove, the work bench and that part of the kitchen table not covered by Clare’s plate. ‘What do these people think when you go to see them?’

‘Think? I suppose they think: what can we do for this—’ she breathed and looked back at her dinner, ‘—nice, intelligent boy we’ve been hearing about.’

‘Mustn’t they think it’s funny? You taking all this trouble?’

Clare raised her eyebrows very high and looked about the kitchen. ‘No-o,’ she said, somehow stalwartly, on two notes. In its impression of renouncing stupefaction where stupefaction might well have been called for, the effect was extraordinarily reassuring. But she wanted Laura to expect the best, the very best behaviour from everyone, since she had discovered that this was exactly what everyone required. Doors opened. Walls were symbols merely, ready to fall when expected. People were harmless, diffident, sweet-natured, earnest, with energy and deeds banked up and ready for use. People said
yes
.
None of this seemed surprising.