Mary Olivier: a Life Part 66

"You may be sure he did."

Mamma didn't know. She never would know what it had been like, that night. But there were things you didn't know, either.

"What did Aunt Charlotte _do_?"

"Nothing. She just fell in love with every man she met. If she'd only seen him for five minutes she was off after him. Ordering her trousseau and dressing herself up. She was no more mad than I am except just on that one point."

"Aunt Lavvy said that was why Uncle Victor never married. He was afraid of something--something happening to his children. What do you think he thought would happen?"

Her mother's foot tapped on the floor.

"I'm sure I can't tell you what he thought. And I don't know what there was to be afraid of. I wish you wouldn't throw your stockings all about the room."

Mamma picked up the stockings and went away. You could see that she was annoyed. Annoyed with Uncle Victor for having been afraid to marry.

A dreadful thought came to her. "Does Mamma really think I'm like Aunt Charlotte? I won't be like her. I won't.... I'm not. There was Jimmy and there was Maurice Jourdain. But I didn't fall in love with the Proparts or the Manistys, or Norman Waugh, or Harry Craven, or Dr. Charles. Or Mr.

Sutcliffe.... She _said_ I was as bad as Aunt Charlotte. Because I said I'd go to Maurice.... I meant, just to see him. What did she think I meant?... Oh, not _that_.... Would I really have gone? Got into the train and gone? _Would_ I?"

She would never know.

"I wish I knew what Uncle Victor was afraid of."

Wondering what he had been afraid of, she felt afraid.

XXV

I.

She waited.

Mamma and Mark had turned their backs to her as they clung together. But there was his sparrow-brown hair, clipped close into the nape of his red-brown neck. If only Mamma wouldn't cry like that--

"Mark--"

"Is that Minky?"

They held each other and let go in one tick of the clock, but she had stood a long time seeing his eyes arrested in their rush of recognition.

Disappointed.

The square dinner-table stretched itself into an immense white s.p.a.ce between her and Mark. It made itself small again for Mark and Mamma.

Across the white s.p.a.ce she heard him saying things: about Dan meeting him at Tilbury, and poor Victor coming to Liverpool Street, and c.o.x's. Last night he had stayed at Ilford, he had seen Bella and Edward and Pidgeon and Mrs. Fisher and the Proparts. "Do you remember poor Edward and his sheep? And Mary's lamb!"

Mark hadn't changed, except that he was firmer and squarer, and thinner, because he had had fever. And his eyes--He was staring at her with his disappointed eyes.

She called to him. "You don't know me a bit, Mark."

He laughed. "I thought I'd see somebody grown up. Victor said Mary was dreadfully mature. What did he mean?"

Mamma said she was sure she didn't know.

"What do you do with yourself all day, Minky?"

"Nothing much. Read--work--play tennis with Mr. Sutcliffe."

"Mr.--Sutcliffe?"

"Never mind Mr. Sutcliffe. Mark doesn't want to hear about him."

"Is there a _Mrs._ Sutcliffe?"

"Yes."

"Does _she_ play?"

"No. She's too old. Much older than he is."

"That'll do, Mary."

Mamma's eyes blinked. Her forehead was pinched with vexation. Her foot tapped on the floor.

Mark's eyes kept up their puzzled stare.

"What's been happening?" he said. "What's the matter? Everywhere I go there's a mystery. There was a mystery at Ilford. About Dan. And about poor Charlotte. I come down here and there's a mystery about some people called Sutcliffe. And a mystery about Mary." He laughed again. "Minky seems to be in disgrace, as if she'd done something.... It's awfully queer. Mamma's the only person something hasn't happened to."

"I should have thought everything had happened to me," said Mamma.

"That makes it queerer."

Mamma went up with Mark into his room. Papa's room. You could hear her feet going up and down in it, and the squeaking wail of the wardrobe door as she opened and shut it.

She waited, listening. When she heard her mother come downstairs she went to him.

Mark didn't know that the room had been Papa's room. He didn't know that she s.h.i.+vered when she saw him sitting on the bed. She had stood just there where Mark's feet were and watched Papa die. She could feel the basin slipping, slipping from the edge of the bed.

Mark wasn't happy. There was something he missed, something he wanted.

She had meant to say, "It's all right. Nothing's happened. I haven't done anything," but she couldn't think about it when she saw him sitting there.

"Mark--what is it?"

"I don't know, Minky."

"_I_ know. You've come back, and it isn't like what you thought it would be."

"No," he said, "it isn't.... I didn't think it would be so awful without Papa."