The Happy Prisoner Read online

  A second honeymoon, and everyone thought it so wonderful. ‘You’ll always have that to remember,’ Ma, said. She was right. I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. To start with, it rained all the time. That was nothing. We could have been blissful in the rain. Ridiculous—the first thing I can think of that annoyed me was the sort of water-chute cape on the back of John’s raincoat. It shows how neurotic I was getting. It was a perfectly ordinary Army one, I suppose, but it annoyed me in the same way as those little woolly hoods on golf clubs. Frightfully practical, but somehow old-maidish. We used to walk a lot in the rain—there was nothing else to do up there if you didn’t fish. I was still feeling tired, but I never gave myself a chance to be anything else. Instead of taking it easy at first and gradually working up to longer walks, I forced myself on for the masochistic pleasure of being able to feel resentful with John for having dragged me all those miles, although he spent most of them urging me to turn back. In the evenings, long, long evenings they were, he thought he’d read to me while I knitted. Cosy idea, but he chose something above my head and was disappointed that I didn’t appreciate it. I tried to pretend that I did, but he knew, because I never remembered where we’d got to, and I’d interrupt him in what was apparently a key passage to go upstairs for more wool.

  That’s another thing—he’s so polite. I mean, I’m his wife and we’d been married more than a year, yet he’d still leap up like a scalded cat if I got up and dashed upstairs for something I could have found much easier myself. It’s rather nice, but somehow in an Englishman it isn’t normal, and I can tell you, it makes a girl feel uncomfortable.

  I was worrying about David, of course. John was worrying too, but I used to make out I was the only one.

  Of course, we did have some happy times up at Doraig. I was still in love with him—I am now, only somehow it doesn’t work. I loved him for being so good with the Scots. The old boy who ran the hotel was a real Highlander. You know—cinnamon-coloured tweeds an inch thick and photographs of clan gatherings all over the walls, and very courteous. John knew just how to talk to him and they used to spend hours standing outside the hotel in a drizzle discussing life with people who came along driving cows. I was proud of the way he looked too, and thought we made a nice pair in the dining-room. Oh yes; that was another thing, so silly really. The food was lovely, but they only knew one way of cooking potatoes—in their jackets. The first meal, we both said: ‘What nice potatoes’; the second meal, we said: ‘Ah good, those nice potatoes again’; the third and fourth meal I didn’t say anything, and after the fifth I never ate one, but John was still bravely saying: ‘Ah, baked potatoes!’ for the benefit of the waitress, who was deaf, anyway.

  On the way home, I tried to talk to Johnny. There we were, shut up in our little coffin of a sleeper, rushing through the night eating venison sandwiches and oatcakes. One could have got very close, but each time I approached the subject he sheered away, patted my hand and told me I was tired. I thought him obtuse at the time, but I see now it was because he’d longed so much for this holiday alone with me that he wouldn’t admit, even to himself, that it hadn’t been much of a success.

  Well, then he went away, and my God, I missed him. I got to thinking about myself, and how it was all my fault and I was just ripe for meeting someone like Blanche Aubrey, who seemed to have such peace of mind.

  She was in the nursing home where I had Susan—not Burley House. She was up, and she used to come into my room and talk and talk, and she was such a sweet person herself, I thought perhaps it made you like that, being a Roman Catholic. Well, you know the rest. I thought I might find the answer to everything. As you’ve probably gathered, I haven’t, so it’s made things worse. I can tell from his letters that John doesn’t like the idea; its only excuse for him will be if it has made me easier to live with, but he’ll find it hasn’t. I haven’t had time. I haven’t understood it properly yet, or got it straight in my mind, and I need to be on my own to do it. I’m not ready for John to come home. I’m a wretched creature, Ollie. I do all the things you’re supposed to do, and I pray, and I struggle and struggle to find what Blanche has found, but nothing happens.”

  .…

  “Perhaps you try too hard,” said Oliver.

  Heather suddenly regretted her confidences, went red in the face and stood up. “You don’t understand. What do you know about it, anyway? No one likes me being a Catholic. You’re bigoted, the lot of you. Sorry I’ve bored you so—I don’t know why I did. You and Elizabeth can have a good laugh about it.”

  Elizabeth, who had come in as Heather banged out, asked: “What can we laugh about?”

  “Nothing. We can cry if you like. I feel just ripe for a good howl.”

  “Save it for tomorrow, then. It’s my week-end off.”

  “So it is. Oh Lord, two days of Mary Brewer in that dreadful little hat.”

  Elizabeth looked slightly superior, as she always did when Mary was mentioned. “There’s really not much need for her to come twice a day,” she said, “now that your leg’s so much better.”

  “Poor girl,” Oliver said. “Don’t deprive her of her only fun.”

  “She can’t go on nursing you for the rest of your life,” said Elizabeth quite acidly, “any more than I can. Don’t forget to ask her where she put the surgical spirit; I can’t find it anywhere, If she’s taken it, she must get us some more. There was exactly half a bottle. And tell her not to change that dressing. I don’t want all my good work undone.”

  “You certainly have done a good job of nursing on that leg,” Oliver said. “If only Hugo would let me up, I’d be able to get fitted for a cork one. I must say it would be nice to be out of here by the spring.”

  “Don’t count on that too much,” said Elizabeth, “after what he said last time he came. I wish I had a stethoscope like his,” she mused. “I could hear all sorts of tiny little things in your heart when he let me listen.” She went over to the fire to warm her hands, for it was cold by the bed with the window open. Oliver wore a sweater and a brightly checked lumber jacket, which his mother had brought back for him years ago when she last visited America. He had worn it for winter sports and then forgotten about it until Mrs. North had fished it triumphantly out of a trunk in the attic when he scorned her offer of a shawl to wear in bed.

  “Ah,” he said gallantly, “no wonder my heart said all sorts of little things with you bending over it.”

  “Don’t be silly,” Elizabeth said coldly, leaning with one arm laid along the mantelpiece, and kicking gently at a log. “That’s the kind of thing senile old men say in hospital.”

  “Sorry. It was rather. I feel a bit senile tonight, though. Life seems to be passing me by.”

  “I thought you were quite happy here,” she said. “You always say you are.” She had taken lately to talking at him in rather a defiant tone. He wondered sometimes if she were getting sick of him and tired of the job.

  “I am really,” he assured her. “It’s just that one gets to feel a bit static sometimes. You see people in here and they talk to you and you think you know them. Then you realise their existence only begins when they get outside this room, and you want to follow them and meddle in their lives; but because you can’t, you lie here and give sententious advice, which they never take even if they’ve asked for it.”

  “So long as you don’t start meddling in my life,” said Elizabeth defensively.

  “I’d love to. I’m sure you’re running it all wrong, but I don’t get a chance because you never tell me anything. What are you doing this week-end? Meeting your boy friend?”

  “I might.”

  “Going home?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Your father doesn’t see much of his only daughter, does he?” Oliver said experimentally. “You know, don’t you, that you could have him to stay here any time you liked if he’d care to come.”

  “Oh no,” she said quickly, “he wouldn’t. I mean, he wouldn’t be able to, thank you all
the same.”

  “It was Ma’s idea. She’s very fond of you, Ma is, for some reason. I believe she imagines you’re the kind of girl she’d like to have had for a daughter. Satisfactory, you know—turns out right every time, like a blancmange. I don’t know what she’ll do when you go. What will you do, by the way?”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” Elizabeth turned and looked into the fire. “Take on another case, I suppose. Unless I get married.”

  “To Arnold Clitheroe? Don’t kid yourself. You’ll never marry him.”

  “What do you mean?” He enjoyed seeing her get angry. Although she controlled her features, her forehead became bright pink and her eyes opened very wide.

  “You don’t love him.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I do. If you loved him, you’d want to talk about him. You couldn’t help yourself. Simple. Anyway, he’s too old for you.”

  “You don’t even know how old he is.”

  “I can guess from the kind of places he takes you to dinner. I bet he often says he wishes he could take you to the dear old Kit Kat, doesn’t he?”

  “I haven’t the slightest idea where the old Kit Kat is.”

  “There you are!” said Oliver illogically. “That proves he’s a different generation. What’s he look like?” he asked, and then, as she did not answer: “As bad as that? You must give him up, Elizabeth, and find some nice young man with less money and less paunch.” He knew he was being horrid, but when he got wound up like this he could not stop. “Elizabeth Clitheroe. How would you like saying that in shops?” She was very cross with him. He was suddenly smitten by the narrowness of her shoulders as she stood with her back to him, kicking the brick kerb of the hearth.

  “Don’t do anything foolish, Liz,” he said gently, “just for the sake of being married. It might be even worse than being a nurse.”

  She turned round and put up a hand to tidy her tidy roll of hair. “Please don’t bother about me,” she said. “I can look after myself.”

  “Ah, but can you? That’s just the point. Just because you know how to look after me, Liz, you think—”

  “And please don’t call me Liz.”

  “What does Arnold Clitheroe call you? I bet he calls you Liz when he’s being bearishly affectionate.” She went out without answering. People who were not bedridden had the unfair advantage of being able to break off any conversation that was getting too much for them. He rang the cow-bell, but Elizabeth did not come back. He didn’t blame her.

  .…

  On the following day, Violet was seen to have powder on her nose. Even Mrs. North, who needed a new prescription for her glasses as soon as she could find time to go to her oculist in London, noticed it. The powder was not clinging very well, because there was no vanishing cream underneath, and Violet, who had a cold, had soon blown and wiped a clear area round her nostrils, so that there was a line across her nose between the chalky top and the red tip. Heather had probably remarked on this at breakfast-time, because Oliver noticed when Violet came to take away his tray that she had rubbed off the rest of the powder and looked normal again.

  “Hullo,” he said. “Where’s Elizabeth?”

  “I said I’d do it so she can get on with the washing up and catch her train—ouch!” Everything on the tray slid down to one end and the coffee-pot fell to the floor, its lid rolling away under the furniture.

  “Good job you’d drunk all your coffee,” said Violet with satisfaction as she picked up the pot.

  “But I hadn’t quite. Look, there on the rug.”

  “Where?” Violet stooped and peered. “Oh cripes, Ma’ll think it’s one of the dogs.” This made her laugh. She rubbed the little pool into the rug with her foot. “Good for carpets.”

  “That’s cigarette ash. Aren’t you working today?”

  “Not with this filthy cold.” She sniffed juicily at the thought of it. “I thought I’d take a day off.”

  “Well, that’s a change,” Oliver said, “considering last time you had ‘flu it was all Ma could do to stop you going harrowing in an east wind with a temperature of a hundred and one. What’ll Fred say?”

  “Oh, he can manage,” she said casually. “I told him yesterday I wasn’t coming. They’re whitewashing the cow barns this week-end.”

  “But, Vi, I thought whitewashing was one of your favourite sports. How can you bear to miss it? It wouldn’t hurt you, you’ll be indoors.”

  “Oh, shut up, Ollie,” she said in her cold-thickened voice. “I’ve said T’m not going. Why does everyone keep on so?”

  At lunchtime, Evelyn, looking like a skewbald pony, with whitewash on her hair and clothes, reported that she had just seen Violet making her bed.

  “She was turning the mattress,” she told him in an awed voice. “She never does that. She never does more than just pull the clothes up usually. I know because of when I’ve slept with her when there’s been visitors in my room.”

  “Say, whatever’s bitten your eldest sister?” asked Mrs. North, coming in with Oliver’s lunch. “I’ve just seen her shaking her bedroom rug out of the window.”

  “There, you see,” said Evelyn darkly. “D’you think she’s ill, Aunt Hattie? Fred wasn’t half wild she didn’t come down to the farm this morning. D’you know what he said to me? He said women are the devil. I think that’s rude.”

  “She should have gone,” Mrs. North said to Oliver. “After all, he does pay her. Go and wash for lunch, Evelyn.”

  “I have,” she said cheerfully. “It doesn’t come off.”

  “There’s some turpentine in the coal shed. Try that.” She automatically picked up Evelyn’s dangling forelock and slid the bow back into place. “I shall have to wash your hair tonight, childie.”

  “Oh, not tonight.” Evelyn pulled away. “What’s the use? We shan’t nearly have finished the whitewashing, specially if Vi doesn’t come this afternoon. Fred’s wild, you know, because the cows have to go in the old sheds till the stink’s worn off and you can’t use the electric milker in there. Fred says he reckons to lose five gallons over this week-end. He says I can do some milking tonight, though; that’ll help.”

  “We’re going to tea with the Fosters,” Mrs. North reminded her.

  “Aunt Hattie, I can’t!” she wailed. “Fred said I could milk. He said I could milk Bonny and Alice and Serene—Serene’s difficult, but he said I could try her—”

  “Stop telling me what Fred said,” her aunt told her, “and go and use that turpentine. I’ve ironed your red dress. You can wear that this afternoon. You’d better put it on after lunch and not go out again, or I shall never get you in.”

  Evelyn kicked a chair. “Don’t be that way,” said Mrs. North. “It isn’t pretty. You’ll have to start learning to act like a lady soon. What are they going to think of you in New York?”

  “Not going there,” Evelyn said sulkily. “Daddy’s going to buy a ranch. He said so in his last letter.”

  “I wouldn’t count on that too much, dear. Grown-ups make foolish promises sometimes that they don’t always keep.”

  “Daddy doesn’t,” retorted Evelyn fiercely. “He’s going to buy a ranch and live there and I’m going to have a horse and a three-speed bike and a heifer calf of my own to breed from, and a pair of chaps. I think that’s a kind of trousers,” she told Oliver.

  “Oh dear,” sighed Mrs. North when she had gone out, “I do hope Bob doesn’t let her down, but I don’t think he means it. I’m sure he’d never live anywhere but in the city. We shall have to spruce Evie up a bit before he comes for her. She’s been too much with Vi.”

  “I shouldn’t worry about her,” said Oliver. “She’ll be all right.”

  “I’m not worrying about Evie,” said his mother. “Right now, I’m worrying about Vi. I can’t think what’s bitten her. It’s so unlike her to take any account of a cold, but she’s just been hanging around the house all morning blowing her nose on those enormous khaki handkerchiefs you gave her.
I do hope she isn’t sickening for anything. You might catch it.”

  Oliver laughed. “It wouldn’t matter about poor old Vi, I suppose.”

  “Oh, she’s all right. She’s as strong as an ox; she’d weather anything. Look dear, I want you to start with soup today, and I’ve opened a bottle of stout. It won’t do any harm to try and build up your resistance, just in case.”

  .…

  “How comes it, then,” asked Cowlin, when he limped in with a bucketful of logs in each hand, “that Miss Violet idn’t down to the farm today? I seen ’er in the hall just now, so I thought I’d see what she talks about, and—Ha!” He had a way of giving a staccato, toothless laugh in the middle of his sentences. “Didn’t she bite my yead off!”

  “She has a cold,’ said Oliver patiently. “She doesn’t feel well.”

  “Ha! If you ask me, I’d say her and Mr. Williams ’ave ’ad words.” Having put down his buckets, he bent to transfer the logs carefully, one by one, to the log basket. His breeches were very baggy at the seat and his legs, in leather gaiters, spindled into enormous boots.

  “What about?” shouted Oliver. Cowlin had been deaf for years. Indeed, not one of his five senses was intact, for he had lost an eye in the last war, had no feeling in four fingers of one hand, and untreated sinusitis had left him unable to taste all but the most strongly flavoured food. Mrs. North seldom let his wife help with the cooking because a pinch of salt to her meant a fistful, and a few drops of essence was half a bottle. Occasionally, if the wind was right, Cowlin could smell decaying cabbage stalks, but he could smell none of the flowers he grew so lovingly, nor could he even see them properly, for his one eye was colourblind. Having acquired all these infirmities by the age of sixty, he looked forward to an old age in which there could be no further decay. He was already half crippled with rheumatism.