The Stranger's Child Read online

  Cecil looked at him narrowly. ‘You didn’t invent this sighting of your sister, did you, Georgie, just to put me off a bit of Oxford with you? Because you know that sort of trick never, ever works.’

  ‘No, my darling Cess, I did not,’ with momentary anger. ‘For heaven’s sake, I’m losing you tomorrow, I want as much of you as . . . as I can manage.’

  ‘Well . . . good,’ said Cecil, faintly abashed, standing up and stretching, then reaching down again to help him up.

  When they were back in their shoes and jackets, Cecil said, ‘Allow me,’ and as he kissed him quickly on the lips he snatched off their two hats and switched them round, cocking George’s boater on his own damp curly head, and whisking his green tweed cap on to George’s bigger, rounder bonce – it perched there in a way he clearly found amusing. They scrambled up, past the pond, the little trickling stream, its noise quickly lost. George started talking quite loudly about College matters, virtually nonsense, but as they regained the path they had caught the stride of two friends out walking, with the woods to themselves. When they spotted Daphne, it was clear that in her solitary way she was doing the same, pretending to be merely out for some air, but hoping above all to find them and tag along. She knew enough not to search for them openly. Where the path she had been following crossed their own she turned down demurely towards them, red hat among the bushes, like a girl in a fairytale. George felt furious with her, but felt also the need for exceptional tact. Something in her demeanour told him that she hadn’t seen them in the grass. Cecil called out, ‘Daphne!’ and waved pleasantly. Daphne looked up in surely genuine surprise, waved back, and hurried towards them. ‘What do you think?’ muttered Cecil.

  ‘I think we’re fine,’ said George. ‘Anyway, she knows nothing about these things.’ His anxiety was not that she’d have known what they were doing, but that in her general astonishing innocence she wouldn’t have had the first idea. He saw her talking to their mother about it, and their mother taking a colder and cannier guess.

  ‘Miss Sawle . . . !’ said Cecil, raising his borrowed boater as she approached.

  ‘Daphne!’ said George and touched the peak of Cecil’s cap, with a facetious smile.

  Daphne stopped three yards off and looked at them. ‘This is nice,’ she said. ‘There’s something funny about you.’

  ‘Oh . . .’ – the two boys gaped comically at each other, patted themselves, George tense with worry that something else funny might show. Surely Cecil’s whole person glowed with unmentionable lust; but Daphne simply gaped back at him, and then looked away in the warm uncertainty of being teased. ‘Well, I don’t know,’ she said. It was very strange, and in its way reassuring, that she couldn’t work out the obvious thing.

  ‘What an exceptionally pretty hat, if I may say so,’ said Cecil, as they started back together up the path.

  Daphne looked up at him with an idiotic smile. ‘Oh, thank you, Cecil!’ she said. ‘Thank you.’ And as they walked on: ‘Yes, I’ve received any number of compliments on this hat.’

  To George it was entirely irksome having Daphne with them for the walk home – twenty minutes that he and Cecil might have spent alone. He wondered what further chances they would have before the van came in the morning. After supper, perhaps, they might slip outside for a cigar. And of course they could start very early indeed and walk to the station, and Jonah could go in the van with Cecil’s bags. He thought intently about how to propose these arrangements, only sharing in the chatter with a tone of wan good cheer. Wherever they paused to let one another go ahead through a gap in the undergrowth George patted Cecil, and sometimes Cecil abstractedly patted him back. Soon they left the woods by a different path, and then they were out in the lane . . . a high load of straw creaking past on a wagon, a motor-car caught behind it, banging and fuming. It seemed to him Cecil was taking quite unnecessary interest in Daphne, bending to her, shielding her as they scooted past the smelly car; but he had a picture too of his own silly jealousy, scuffing along behind this comical couple, the tall dark athlete with his ears curled outwards by an oversized boater and the little girl in a bright red hat trotting eagerly beside him.

  And there, already, was the steep red roof of ‘Two Acres’, the low wall, the front gate, the row of dark-leaved cherry-trees outside the dining-room window. The front door stood open, in the summer way, into the shadowy hall. Beyond it, the garden door too stood open, the afternoon light glinting softly on polished oak, a china bowl – one could pass right through the house, like a breeze. Over the door was the nailed-up horseshoe, and beneath it the old palm cross. George felt the unseen jostling of different magics, varying systems of good luck. It was something extraordinary they were doing, he and Cecil, a mad vertiginous adventure. On the hall-stand hung Hubert’s irreproachable bowler, and their father’s old billycock hat that was always left there, as if he might return or, having returned, feel the need to go out again. Cecil looked round, with George’s boater in his hand, and tossed it with a slight spin through the air so that it landed on a free peg. ‘Ha!’ he said, with a little smirk of satisfaction at George and at himself. George found his hand was trembling as he hung up Cecil’s cap beside it.

  12

  ‘Cecil, you’ve performed a miracle,’ said Daphne.

  ‘My dear girl . . .’ said Cecil complacently.

  ‘You’ve turned water into wine.’

  ‘Well,’ murmured Hubert, with a quick glance at his mother, ‘a special occasion.’

  ‘We not infrequently have wine on Sunday,’ said George.

  ‘A very sad occasion,’ said their mother, shaking her head as she raised her glass. ‘We can’t have Cecil drinking water on his last night with us. Whatever would he think.’

  ‘I should think you jolly insensitive,’ said Cecil, knocking back his glass of hock.

  ‘Indeed!’ said Daphne, who was still forced to keep their normal Sunday commons. Sunday was Cook’s night off, and they had sat down to a bare supper of jellied chicken and salad. They had given up the festive style, there was a sense of looking ahead – after the champagne and Tennyson of their earlier dinners, the table tonight seemed tactfully to prepare them for the prose of Monday morning.

  ‘Yes, we’ll be sorry to see you go, old chap,’ said George.

  ‘Such a pity . . .’ said his mother, with an uncertain little smile at Daphne.

  Daphne in turn peered at George, who did look oddly wretched – she knew the way his face went stiff with feeling, just as she knew his irritable frown when he found he was being stared at. ‘You’ll be back in Cambridge in a fortnight,’ she said.

  ‘Oh, I think we’ll get by,’ said Cecil absently.

  Daphne said, ‘I mean, George is all right, but we won’t see Cecil for ages, perhaps never again!’

  Cecil seemed pleased by this histrionic claim, and his dark eyes held hers as he laughed, and said, ‘You must come to Cambridge too. Mustn’t she, Georgie?’

  ‘Oh, rather . . .’ said George dully.

  ‘Hmm . . .’ said Daphne.

  ‘No, of course you must,’ said George in a sincere tone; though she knew that George didn’t want her in Cambridge, ‘tagging along’, breaking in on his important discussions with Cecil, and all the other things she was prone to do.

  ‘You might all come up for the French play,’ said Cecil.

  ‘I suppose so,’ said Daphne, though she felt she heard in this general invitation a note that she hadn’t suspected before, the note of a general boredom.

  ‘What are you doing?’ said her mother.

  ‘The Dom Juan of Molière,’ said Cecil, as if it was something they all knew well. Daphne knew enough to know what it was about – a lady’s man – a womanizer, in fact! ‘I’m taking Sganarelle – rather a fine part, though of course a great deal to learn.’

  ‘It’s in French, you know,’ said George, which if it was meant to put his sister off was fairly effective.

  ‘I see,’ said Daphne. ‘I’m not sure I
’d be able to follow a whole play in French.’ She hardly thought it worth it just to watch Cecil prancing around, with a cloak and sword, probably. But at once she had a pang at the thought of missing it.

  ‘How marvellous,’ said her mother graciously, excusing herself as well.

  A little later Cecil said to George, as if the others weren’t there, ‘I’ll have to get ahead with my paper on Havelock this week,’ so that Daphne had a clear sense that he had already left them, might even have preferred to go today, after lunch.

  When supper was over, George was sent round to the Cosgroves’ on some mission he clearly thought beneath him, Hubert claimed he had letters to write, and their mother, trailing into the drawing-room, paused, raised a finger, and went out again. Cecil and Daphne were left for a minute on the hearth-rug. Daphne saw this as the threshold to the grownup end of the evening, with social requirements she wasn’t quite sure of.

  ‘I don’t suppose you want to hear the gramophone,’ she said. She had a sense of opportunity, made more incoherent by her new fear of boring Cecil.

  ‘Not specially,’ he said, casually but kindly, with a smile she hadn’t seen before, a candid gape that slightly startled her, and was probably a Cambridge thing: it was hard to work out, but at Cambridge it seemed it was almost a sign of respect to be disrespectful, to say just what you felt at any time. Well, candour was their watchword! Cecil was fingering in his waistcoat pocket, then brought out his little clipper. He said, ‘I wonder if Miss Sawle would care to keep me company while I enjoy my cigar?’

  ‘Oh, yes!’ said Daphne. ‘Oh, I’ll get a coat,’ and she ran to the cloakroom under the stairs. It was such an exciting idea that there were bound to be strenuous arguments against it. But that was part of Cecil’s atmosphere and appeal. She came back, not with her own dull coat, but with one of George’s old tweed jackets round her shoulders. She liked the air of improvisation, a man’s jacket seemed to show she was up for a lark, and to carry some chivalrous hint of her need for protection. ‘It’s a little bit smelly,’ she said; though she hardly imagined that would worry Cecil.

  ‘Well, I’m going to make a smell too.’

  ‘Well, quite.’

  ‘I may be being too sensitive,’ said Cecil, glancing towards the door. ‘The General’s so down on smoke, at home we all sneak off to the smoking-room. She’s made it into quite a guilty pleasure.’

  ‘No, no,’ said Daphne.

  Cecil drew out a cigar case from a surprising pocket. ‘I’ve got two, if you’re tempted to try again,’ he said, and uncapped the stiff leather sheath to show her the tops of them. They made her think of soldiers, or the cartridges in Hubert’s rifle. She saw it might be wittier not to answer, and he seemed amused by her condescending smile. She knew she should call to her mother, but sighed just to think of the objections, and followed Cecil out into the garden, leaving the french window ajar.

  It was quite a bit colder than last night, though she was not going to mention it. She said, ‘Cecil, I think I shall always associate In Memoriam with you!’

  ‘Well . . .’ – Cecil was fussing with a lighted match and making impatient appreciative noises as he drew on the cigar. Then the newly conjured smoke was all around them.

  ‘Shall we sit here?’

  ‘Let’s walk on,’ said Cecil, moving her along past the windows of the sitting-room. ‘We’ll see what the stars are up to, shall we?’

  ‘All right,’ said Daphne, and as he crooked his arm she reached up to slip her hand through it. As well as everything else, there was something entirely proper about Cecil; he perhaps wasn’t even aware of her happy sense of play-acting, her toss of the head in the dark as she took his arm. Then George’s jacket, merely slung round her shoulders, slipped off.

  ‘Here, let me help you.’ In the gloom on the edge of the lawn Cecil held the coat and patted her shoulders when she’d got it on.

  ‘I must look like a tramp,’ she said, her hands covered by the sleeves, silky linings cold for a moment on bare arms, the weight and smell of the thing hugged round her.

  ‘Do it up,’ said Cecil, his cigar between his teeth. And again his large hands seemed to take care of her, to be larger and more capable than ever. Then he offered his arm once more.

  They went on a few leisurely paces, Daphne happily self-conscious, Cecil a touch reserved, though she wasn’t sure of his face, and perhaps he was merely working out the stars. She wondered if he was thinking of the hammock again – and was embarrassed to think of it herself after what had happened. She knew he’d had three or four glasses of wine; decisions would come easily to him, though to a sober person they might seem whimsical and delayed. She looked up, above the silhouette of the tree-tops. ‘I fear it’s too cloudy tonight, Cecil,’ she said.

  Cecil huffed out another cloud of rich, sour smoke, and cackled vaguely. ‘Were you in the woods for long this afternoon?’ he said.

  ‘This afternoon, oh, not really.’

  ‘You didn’t get much of a walk.’

  ‘Well, when I met you I came home, of course.’

  She felt him press her arm more tightly against his side, and the beautiful grown-up presence of Cecil, his height and his muscular warmth under evening dress, and even his voice, which she’d once thought so cutting and grand, slightly turned her head. ‘It must have been someone else we saw earlier on. I said to Georgie, “Isn’t that Daph?” but by the time he looked whoever it was had gone.’

  ‘Well, it could have been. Did you call?’

  ‘You know, I wasn’t sure.’

  ‘Lots of people do walk there.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Cecil. ‘Anyway, you didn’t see us.’

  Daphne felt again she was missing something, but was carried along by the excitement of making conversation, and squeezed his arm reassuringly. ‘I would have said hello if I had.’

  ‘I thought you would.’

  ‘To be honest, it’s George. He doesn’t want me tagging along.’

  Cecil made a low disparaging murmur, and they turned round. ‘You can see a bit better now,’ he said. ‘There’s the famous rockery!’

  ‘I know . . .’ She felt he was still rather mocking the rockery, and it emboldened her. ‘Cecil,’ she said, ‘when may I come to Corley?’

  ‘Mm . . . ? To Corley?’ – it was as though he’d never heard of such a place, and certainly had no memory of his earlier invitation. Then he laughed. ‘My dear girl, whenever you like.’

  ‘Oh . . . thank you.’

  ‘Whenever you like . . .’ he said again, expanding into his decision in a tone which seemed oddly to undermine it. ‘I suppose it won’t be till the Christmas vac now, will it, probably.’

  This seemed as good as never to Daphne. ‘No, I suppose.’

  ‘Get Georgie to bring you over.’

  They moved on, towards the dark outline of the rockery, which at night might truly have been taken for a greater and more distant outcrop. Daphne said, huskily casual, ‘I imagine I could come by myself.’

  ‘Would your mother allow that?’

  ‘I am quite grown up, you know,’ said Daphne.

  Cecil said nothing. He pressed forward with his usual confidence; she thought she should say, ‘There’s a step there’ – she half-yelled it as he stumbled and lurched down hard on his right leg, caught himself but pulled her with him, and then lurched again to save her and grip her.

  ‘Oh Christ, are you all right?’

  ‘I’m fine . . . !’ – wincing where he’d trodden heavily on the edge of her foot.

  ‘Whenever we go out, we seem to end up taking a tumble, don’t we!’

  ‘I know!’

  ‘And now I’ve lost my dratted cigar.’

  They were face to face, her heart still lively from the shock, and he put his arms round her waist and pulled her against him, so that she had to turn her cheek to his cold lapel. He moved a hand up and down on her back, over the warm tweed of George’s jacket. ‘Blasted steps . . .’ he said.
/>   ‘I’m all right,’ said Daphne. She rather dreaded looking at her shoe, when they got in, but Cecil was at a disadvantage, and she knew at once that he could never be blamed for anything. She said quietly, ‘I can’t think how those steps got there;’ then went one better, ‘Those bloody steps!’

  Cecil gave a sigh of a laugh across her hair. ‘Oh child, child . . .’ he said, with a softness and a sadness she had never heard before, even from her mother. ‘What are we going to do?’

  Daphne eased herself a fraction freer. She wanted to play her part, felt the privilege of Cecil’s attention, it was awfully nice being held so tightly by him, but there was something in his tone that worried her. ‘Well, I suppose you’re going to have to pack.’

  ‘Hah . . .’ said Cecil, again with a strange despairing note, like his poetry voice.

  ‘I think . . . shall we go back in?’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ he said. ‘Can you keep a secret, Daph?’

  ‘As a rule,’ said Daphne.

  ‘Let’s keep this a secret.’

  ‘All right.’ She wasn’t sure if she understood. Falling over a step wasn’t much of a secret, but Cecil was clearly embarrassed by it.

  His hands relaxed slightly, and travelled down almost to her bottom as he smiled and murmured, ‘You know, it’s been splendid getting to know you.’

  ‘Oh . . . well . . .’ she said, somehow paralysed by his hands. ‘That’s what we’re all saying about you. There’s never been anything like it!’

  He bent his head and kissed her on the forehead, like sending her to bed, but then the tip of his nose moved down her cheek and he kissed her beside her mouth, in his cigar breath, and then, completely without expression, on her lips. ‘There,’ he said.

  ‘Cecil, don’t be silly,’ she said, ‘you’ve been drinking,’ and he tilted his face sideways and pushed his open mouth over hers, and worked his tongue against her teeth in a quite idiotic and unpleasant way. She pushed herself half-free of him; she was alarmed but kept her composure, even laughed rather sarcastically.