The Happy Prisoner Read online

  “Oh, ask him,” said Heather, “she’ll never notice. He’ll only make trouble if he doesn’t come, because he’s sure to hear all about it.”

  “What about Lady Salter? Vi’s still sore about that rat poison one of the dogs picked up. I should die of shame if she was rude to her.”

  “Risk it,” Heather said. “She probably won’t talk to a soul, anyway. If we had only the people Vi wants, the place would be like the farmer’s tea tent at an agricultural show.”

  “Joan Elliot I bar,” put in Oliver.

  “We must have her,” wailed his mother, “she’s Violet’s best friend. She talks about her being a bridesmaid.”

  Oliver groaned. “In corduroy knickers and a leather waistcoat.”

  Violet did not really care whom they asked. All that concerned her was that she was going to marry Fred Williams. Someone would see that it came about; they had always seen to things for her. She was not so much selfish as like a child who takes it for granted that cooked meals and clean clothes appear and that his toys get put away and his socks mended. Domestic details are none of his business, and they were none of hers.

  “But, Violet, you must have a bed at least,” said Mrs. North despairingly, after fruitless attempts to make her discuss furniture. “You can’t sleep on the floor, even if you do insist on wearing those terrible pyjamas.”

  “Fred’s got a bed, hasn’t he? What’s wrong with that?”

  “But, dear, that ugly old bed—not really a proper double—”

  Mrs. North looked helplessly at Oliver and he made a face. The thought of Fred Williams and Violet in that sagging brass bed was impossible, but no more impossible than the thought of them sitting up side by side in little twin divans from Heal’s with reading lamps and chintz flounces.

  Mrs. North changed the subject. “Say, how would it be, Violet, if you let your hair grow a little before the wedding? It would be much more becoming.”

  Violet ran a hand through her bristly crop and snorted. “Heck no, it wouldn’t grow now if I tried. Fred likes it all right like this, anyway.” She fell into a rumination and came out of it with a hoarse chuckle. “Coo, fancy me being married, you know.” This was one of her stock remarks, which she produced at intervals during the day.

  “Fancy,” Oliver said.

  “Violet has quite come out of her shell,” announced Mrs. Ogilvie after a Sunday lunch during which Violet’s conversation had consisted mostly of Fred says and Fred thinks, while Fred, who always had to come to Sunday lunch nowadays, had sat looking like a Punch doll when the Punch-and-Judy man’s hand is not inside, saying, and apparently thinking, nothing. “I suppose you’re very happy about it, Hattie?” This was not one of her rhetorical questions. She had been trying for a long time to find out what Mrs. North felt about her prospective son-in-law.

  “Why, surely. I think Violet and Fred will be very happy.” Oliver recognised his mother’s acting voice. “He’s such a—” She searched in vain for something she could say about Fred.

  “Yes, isn’t he?” cried Mrs. Ogilvie with automatic enthusiasm. “I can’t tell you how glad I am you’re having the wedding here and not at Shrewsbury, like the Gibson girls did. You’ll never believe what they had to pay for the reception, with those bogus cocktails and the sandwiches obviously cut the night before and curling up at the corners. I ate something bad there too, I was terribly ill next day. I didn’t want to hurt Sybil’s feelings, but I had to tell her, so that she could make a complaint. Poor Mr. Norris will be so pleased. He hasn’t had a wedding in the church for years. I shall cry, of course; I always do. You mustn’t think I mean anything by it, but it’s just the idea of the bride all in white, you know, so sacrificial.”

  “Violet doesn’t want to be married in white,” said Mrs. North. “She couldn’t, anyway. She’s spent all her coupons on a new riding-coat and a pair of boots.”

  “But she can’t get married in those!” shrieked Mrs. Ogilvie. Mrs. North did not mention that she had only just weaned Violet from the idea of going to the church on horseback and coming out under an archway of riding-crops and hoes. “They’re having a riding honeymoon,” she murmured, but Mrs. Ogilvie was not listening. “She positively must get married in white. My dear Hattie, it’s the one day in a girl’s life—the one day in yours too, really, since Heather had such a quiet wedding. Let me help you with the coupons. I know a man”—she glanced hastily round, although there was no one in the room but Mrs. North and Oliver—“who sells them at two shillings each. Can you believe such a price, but what can one do? I got this that way!” She plucked at a dun-coloured jersey suit, which could have saved at least one coupon if the skirt had not dipped six inches at the back.

  “I don’t know that I care about black market—” began Mrs. North, but Mrs. Ogilvie cracked her fingers like a stockwhip. “Nonsense! It’s the duty of people like us to diddle the Government all we can. They’re doing it to us. I happen to know for a fact they’ve got bales and bales of cloth stored in that American depot near Reading. You can see it from the train, six hangars full of it. Socialism gone mad.” This was her latest battle-cry, applicable to everything from bus strikes to no more dried eggs.

  She continued to pace the room. She seldom sat down, and conversation with her was as tiring to the eyes as following the play at Wimbledon. “That’s settled then. Violet shall be a white bride, and I’ll get Lady Salter to lend her that lace veil that’s been in their family for generations. It’ll cover up her hair. Who’s going to give the girl away?” She drew up opposite Oliver. “You going, to get this young man out and about by then? High time he was off that bed, if you ask me. One of these days, old chap, I’m going to take you in my two hands”—he flinched as she lunged at him—“and pull you out of bed”—she strained backwards with stiffened arms—“and hop you into the fresh air. That’s all that’s wrong with you now. You’re coddled.”

  “I get plenty of air,” said Oliver sourly. “I haven’t got T.B.”

  “You will have if you stay here much longer,” said Mrs. Ogilvie cheerfully. “Let’s see what your chest expansion is. Got a tape measure, Hattie?”

  “No,” lied Mrs. North. She manœuvred herself protectingly between them and remained there until Mrs. Ogilvie puttered away on her bicycle with a little outboard motor fixed to the rear wheel, on which she went everywhere, even to London wearing A.R.P. overalls and a leather helmet.

  “She’s still talking about coupons,” said Mrs. North, coming back from the front door. “I couldn’t get a word in to say we don’t want them. If she does get them, I shall use them to buy 4 new dressing-gown and slippers for you when you get up. And Lady Salter’s priceless veil! I saw it when her grandchild was christened. Can you see her lending it? And can you see it after Violet had worn it half an hour? It’s just as well she doesn’t want to wear white; she wouldn’t look well in it, and I should never get her to go for fittings. I can’t even get her as far a the linen cupboard to look at sheets.”

  “She’s worse than she ever used to be,” said Oliver. “She’s forgotten all about training Evelyn’s pony while the kid’s at school. He’s simply running wild up in the top field, half broken, and she’s fused my electric razor, doing the hairs at the back of her neck.” There were times when he regretted having given the advice which had helped to put Violet into her present state!

  “So long as she’s happy,” sighed his mother. “I should have hated her not to marry, but oh dear, if only it had been anyone but Fred. Do you suppose I shall have to go on making conversation to him for the rest of my life? I wish your father were alive, dear. He could have taken him into his study sometimes and it wouldn’t matter Fred not talking because your father never cared to talk much either. Only this wouldn’t have been his study now that you’re in here. How should we have managed? Your father could have had the telephone room, or you could have had my bedroom and I could have had the spare room. I’ve always liked those built-in cupboards in there. We could have had the
electric fire in my room changed for an open grate. The chimney may be blocked up, though; I don’t know.”

  “Stop making hypothetical plans,” said Oliver. “You’ve got trouble enough with real ones.”

  “But at least your father could have saved me that awful interview with Fred, when he came to tell me he wanted to marry Vi. I knew what he wanted to say, because she’d already told us, and I wanted to help him, but he would say it by himself, although he just couldn’t get it out. I’ve never been so embar rassed. Poor Fred, I was in the kitchen baking, and he came to the front door and rang the bell as if he were a formal caller I had him come into the kitchen, because I thought it would make him feel more homey, but it didn’t seem to. He tried to shake hands with me; and when he realised mine were all doughy, he pretended he’d only been holding out his hand to look at his watch, although it was on the other wrist.

  He wouldn’t sit down. He would wander around the kitchen always between me and the stove when I wanted to get to the oven, poor little man. He couldn’t get to the point. He started off by telling me there were three new calves, which I knew although I didn’t say so, then he got round to the farm, and from there to saying how much he liked it and how he appreciated knowing us and what a pleasure it always was to come here because we made him feel so at home. At home! Did you see him at lunch? If that’s being at home, my goodness, what’s he like with strangers? I daren’t think about the wedding. I tried to help him out, but each time I thought he was coming to the point, he’d shy off and go back to something safe like the weather, or the state of the hedges, and he warned me a dozen times he’d put rat poison down in the big barn, as if I was in the habit of pecking around in there for something to eat.”

  “Why didn’t you say: ‘I hear you want to marry my daughter’?”

  “I couldn’t, dear. He wanted to say it himself. Besides, I suppose he really had only come about the rat poison? Violet’s so funny, it might have been her idea of a joke when she told us the day before. He went and fiddled with the curtains, and of course he pulled that one that’s always coming down. I let him fix it, although I was itching to do it myself, because I thought it might help him to have something to do with his hands, as he never knows where to put them, and while he was doing it, with his back to me and the curtain draped round one ear, he kind of mumbled: ‘I want to ask you something.’ I haven’t much of an ear for English brogues, but his accent does seem a bit strong sometimes, doesn’t it? That shows you how English I’ve become; a good American wouldn’t even think about it.

  I told him to go ahead, and he was just starting to mumble again when I smelled my scones burning and had to rush to the oven, and he came to help me, letting the curtain fall down again, and of course made things worse by setting fire to a tea-cloth. I must say he and Violet are well matched. By the time the excitement had died down he’d lost the courage to finish what he was going to say. He was too busy apologising for the tea-cloth, anyway, and for the burned scones, which he seemed to think must be his fault too. It was one of my best tea-cloths, although I told him it was only an old rag. No one can say I’m not good to that man.

  He couldn’t get out of my kitchen fast enough. I guess he was scared to think what he’d nearly done, like a man who works himself up to shoot someone and then runs a mile screaming when the gun doesn’t go off. I tried to ask him again what he wanted, but he pretended not to hear. He muttered something about having an appointment and ran for it, and since then he’s scared to death every time he sees me in case I should reopen the subject. I suppose they really are engaged? For all I’ve heard about it from him, it might be just some crazy invention of Violet’s.”

  “He’s given her a ring,” Oliver reminded her.

  “Oh yes, of course. Poor Fred, I wonder where on earth he got it. I really ought to talk to him about money, I guess, though he seems to be doing all right with the farm. I will say that for him; he knows his job.”

  “If I work in with him later on,” Oliver said, “I’ll be able to check up on all that. The place may make quite a bit of money in a few years. Fred’s got all sorts of ideas, if only we could get the labour and materials.”

  “Yes, well, we’ll have to see how you are before you commit yourself, darling,” said Mrs. North in the soothing voice which she always turned onto his suggestions of working. “I don’t know that farm work will be very suitable.”

  “I’ve told you a hundred times,” he said exasperatedly, “I’m not going to do manual labour. I’m going to potter. What else do you suggest I should do, anyway? I’m not trained for anything, and if I’m not fit to farm, I’m certainly not fit to prop myself on a wooden leg in the gutter all day, selling matches.”

  “Don’t be bitter, dear,” said his mother. “Why don’t you try and write something? I’ve often thought since you were wounded that would be a nice career for you, to be an author.”

  “All right,” said Oliver, “go and buy me some paper and a pencil with a hard point and I’ll lie here and write a nice long novel and the first publisher I send it to will fall on it, baying.”

  “You might be a free-lance journalist,” she said, still hopefully.

  “I might,” said Oliver, “if I could write.”

  “You don’t have to worry about earning money, anyway, darling. I’ve got plenty for both of us, and when I die you’ll have even more.” He knew she wanted him to say: “Don’t talk like that. I can’t bear it,’ but instead he asked: “What if I want to get married? I suppose you support my wife as well?”

  “Oh well—no need to think about that just now.” It was plain she never considered the possibility. To her he was out of the running, finished with the things that everyone else did. He must always be kept apart, protected from the world like an idiot child, nurtured in cotton-wool like china too fragile to be used. Later, when he was up and about and able to argue without his head splitting open, he would have it cut with her.

  “Anyway,” his mother said brightly, “Fred’s gotten himself a cheap wife. Violet doesn’t need much to live on; I believe she’s a throwback to my pioneer ancestors. She asked me the other day whether Fred had come to talk to me, and I hadn’t the heart to tell her how hopeless he’d been, because she really does seem quite fond of him. Oh dear,” she sighed, and the folds of her face sagged sadly. “I only hope she’s happy.”

  “She’s happy all right,” Oliver said. “It’s running out of her ears. She was like a two-year-old the day it was fixed up, don’t you remember? To please me, she took Jenny out and went over and over the jump in the pouring rain for me to see, and! all the time I was asleep.”

  “She’s never got rid of the catarrh that settled on her that day,” said Mrs. North.

  Evelyn was disgusted with Violet. “It’s a good thing Dandy’s got me,” she said, “for all the interest she takes in him now.” Violet did not even do much work on the farm nowadays. She mooned about with a cigarette or a straw or sometimes both between her lips, giving a lazy hand here and there with one of the hundreds of jobs into which she had once thrown herself so strenuously. She drove with Fred when he went out in the lorry or in the dilapidated little car upholstered with dogs’ hairs and corn seeds, sat about waiting for him on walls, drumming her heels, and plodded after him about the farm like some faithful domestic animal that does not need a halter. Sometimes, she came and sat in Oliver’s room, but she never stayed long. They never recaptured the isolated intimacy of that afternoon over the dripping toast. Oliver had been of use to her then, but she had progressed now beyond quiet sickrooms and invalid brothers. She had soared into a wider sphere whose shadow eclipsed everything else. Oliver found her very boring, and he gathered that she was as bored with him as with everything else not directly connected with her marriage.

  Heather did a lot of rather ostentatious church-going over Easter. On Sunday, Mrs. North and Elizabeth visited Mr. Morris’s cold little Gothic tabernacle, where he bleated like a heep in its pen, narrow-faced a
nd docile, from the pulpit. But Heather went to Mass every morning, and to Tenebrae on Good Friday and Benediction on Sunday, and left her missal lying prominently on the hall table in between. She told Elizabeth at east three times that she would not be wanting early morning ea, and became righteous when her mother protested mildly at he third request for late breakfast and someone to dress David.

  “Send him in to me,” Oliver said. “I’ll see he gets dressed,” but when Heather came back from Mass, David was still sitting in the hearthrug wearing a vest and one sock, with the rest of his clothes scattered on and under various bits of furniture. Heather was very cross, then remembered she had been to church and was cross with herself for being cross. Oliver often wondered what she was getting out of her strenuous search after Christianity, and wanted to ask her, but although she liked to parade her religion before the family, she resented discussion of it. He was interested in Roman Catholicism, but he knew nothing about it, and Heather had either forgotten most of what she had learned at the time of her conversion or would not answer his questions because she thought he was mocking her.

  John was expected home within the next fortnight. There was naturally a lot of talk about this, and, in the end, allusions to him began to affect Heather in the same way as allusions to the Catholic Church. She would flare and flounce and bang doors and cause her mother to say: “She’s all het up. It’s a nervy time for her, after all these months of waiting.”

  Elizabeth, who had less to do for Oliver now that his stump was healing and his heart strengthening, began to give Heather more help with the children, which she did on modern hospital lines, uncuddlesome, but extremely efficient. Heather, who was full of theories of her own, at first would not let her touch Susan. Now she let her do dull things like pushing her out in the pram, but she would not admit that Elizabeth was good with the children.

  “Listen!” she cried triumphantly, when everyone was saying how quickly David had got settled one night when Elizabeth had put him to bed. “There he is crying now. I knew it; it’s the minute you turn the light out, and the poor darling must have wondered what had happened to me tonight.”