Faster! Faster! (13 page)

Quarrendon came in by the window, blinking through his glasses at the light, and said vaguely that the sea had looked very beautiful. Then he said good-night and went away again.

“What very extraordinary manners he has,” Mrs Peel remarked coldly. “Why clever people so often think it necessary to behave like wild beasts, I shall never understand.”

“Hardly
wild
beasts, surely?” Sal Oliver suggested. “More like something timid, and clumsy, in a lair.”

Mrs Peel took no notice. She said her own good-nights with extra elaboration, shaking hands with each person in turn, and carrying up to bed with her a glass of cold water from a tray in the hall.

Everybody else went to bed too.

Claudia went along the passage and tapped at Sylvia's door.

“Come in!”

Sylvia was, unromantically, energetically brushing her teeth.

She completed the operation with great thoroughness and then smiled brilliantly at her mother.

“I'm terribly sorry about being late,” she said at once. “I know I ought to be shot. I meant to come along and tell you I was sorry.”

“It isn't good for Maurice to be up so late, and besides it vexed Daddy.”

“Naturally,” Sylvia agreed cordially. “Was he furious?”

“No, of course not. Didn't he say anything to you in the garage?”

“I wasn't there. I went to hang up the bathing things on the line.”

“I see.”

Claudia paused.

Sylvia powdered her nose lightly before the looking-glass and jumped into bed.

“Cuckoo! Why do you powder your nose just to get into bed?”

“I always do. There might be a fire in the night,” returned Sylvia very seriously. “Not that it would wake me up, most likely. I shall sleep like a log after that heavenly bathe.”

“Did you enjoy it?”

“Frightfully.”

“I wish I'd been there too,” said Claudia, after another pause.

“Did you do any work?”

“No.”

“Oh, that's good,” said Sylvia. “I wish you didn't work so fearfully hard, always.”

“I like it,” returned Claudia—her invariable answer when any of her children spoke as Sylvia had just spoken.

“Good-night, darling.”

She stooped and kissed Sylvia's soft, fresh cheek.

Sylvia hugged her in return like a child.

“Good-night, Mother.”

“Shall I put out the light as I go out?”

“Yes please.”

With her hand on the switch, Claudia stood for an instant on the threshold.

“By the way, what do you think of Andrew Quarrendon?” she asked, her voice carefully casual.

“He's very nice,” said Sylvia in a cordial, natural, and quite unmeaning tone.

“Good-night, dear.”

“Good-night, Mummie.”

Claudia turned off the light and gently shut the door. She felt as though something had struck her, hard and unexpectedly.

So that was how one's children deceived one—shut one out of their confidence—told one nothing at all of their real thoughts and feelings.

The idea shocked her profoundly, the more because she had felt completely sure of her relation with Sylvia, always. There had been no need, in thinking or speaking of Sylvia, to make those careful admissions of her own possible deficiencies as a mother that she had always made so readily in the case of Taffy.

Sylvia had been open with her, frank and affectionate and trusting. They had talked things over together. It had been Claudia's secret pride and joy to know that, contrary to every theory and to most experience, there had been no faintest hint of antagonism between her eldest child and herself.

But she must be fair.

There wasn't any antagonism now.

It was just that Sylvia didn't choose to share with her mother something that, Claudia was perfectly certain, had happened, or was now happening, to her. There had been an inward radiance shining through Sylvia's control, that her mother could not miss.

Claudia went to her own room in a turmoil. She felt suddenly tired almost beyond bearing. She had meant to go to Frances Ladislaw's room and say good-night, but it was too late and she was too tired.

She leant out of the window. It was still oppressively hot. But the garden below lay drenched in moonlight: there was no sign of a coming storm.

It has passed over, thought Claudia drearily.

There was a tap at the door, and Copper came in, a lean, slouching figure in his tussore pyjamas.

His first words followed her thought.

“The storm's passed over here. I expect they've had it somewhere. We shall have a scorcher again tomorrow.”

“I was just thinking the same thing.”

She sat down wearily before the looking-glass and began to brush her hair carefully. When she parted it in the middle, there was much more grey to be seen.

“What are you going to do with 'em all tomorrow?”

“Mother will go to church, and I dare say Frances will too. I should imagine the sea will be the best place for most people. I think I shall send the children off for the day. I can take them somewhere in the car directly after breakfast, and fetch them when it gets cooler.”

“Better let that fellow go with them.”

“Why?” she asked rather sharply. “If you mean Andrew Quarrendon.”

“You don't want him on your hands all day.”

“I don't mind,” said Claudia. “After all, he came here to talk to me.”

“Did he?” said Copper indifferently. “If you ask me, he's inclined to make himself a bit of a fool over Sylvia.”

How like Copper, reflected his wife, accidentally to hit on the truth, clothe it in foolish and inappropriate words, and miss altogether its real significance! There would be nothing at all to be gained by discussing it with Copper, and she felt, besides, a strong disinclination to enter on the subject at all.

In the morning I must find out
why
I don't like
the idea of discussing this problem of Sylvia, thought Claudia, conscientiously modern and analytical.

But I think I know. It's almost bound to end in unhappiness for her, poor little thing, and to-night I'm tired out, and I haven't the courage to face it all and decide what I'd better do. And it's hurt me—incredibly—that Sylvia should shut me away out of her confidence.

Claudia threw back her head with a very characteristic movement.

I'll look the thing straight in the face tomorrow, she told herself.

The next day a telephone message came through quite early in the morning.

Anna Zienszi and her husband suggested that they should drive down from London before lunch and spend the afternoon at Arling.

Mrs Peel, who had been moaning in a quiet, restrained manner all the week about Anna's utter neglect and indifference, now exclaimed in concern:

“Motoring from London on a day like this, in the middle of a Bank Holiday week-end! She must be mad. And it isn't considerate either. This house is full already, as she
must
know, and everything closed till Tuesday. Will your cook ever be able to manage, Claudia?”

“Certainly she will,” Claudia declared promptly. “Anna hasn't been here for ages. I'm delighted she's coming, and she especially wants to see Frances.”

“Yes, well,” Mrs Peel said reluctantly. “But I don't like all this American hustle.”

Nobody sought to find out what she meant.

“I scarcely know Anna's husband,” said Frances. “I should like to meet him.”

“He's
terribly
nice,” declared Taffy emphatically. She shot a glance at her mother as she spoke, and Frances received the impression that she
expected Claudia to disagree with her.

Claudia, however, said nothing.

She looked tired, with dark shadows beneath her eyes. But when Frances, later in the morning, ventured to remark upon this, Claudia replied rather brusquely that she was not tired in the least, she was never tired, and most tiredness was largely a matter of giving way to it.

A hint of the Spartan creed held by her friend had already reached Mrs Ladislaw. Mildly, but quite decidedly, she repudiated it.

“I don't agree with you. Tiredness is a physical fact, surely.”

“That's just what I mean. Most people—most women especially—are usually more or less tired all the time, after the age of forty anyway—and perhaps earlier. But if they don't stop and think about it, it needn't make any difference. I make a point of telling the people who work in my office that, and I only wish I could think they'd taken it in.”

“Haven't they?”

“Not really. They don't go all out on their work. They put other considerations first—the younger ones especially. Those two girls—Frayle and Collier—they
can
work splendidly, both of them. They've got intelligence, and initiative—Frayle especially—but either of them is perfectly capable of saying she feels ill, and must go home—when all she really means is that she was up dancing late the night before and feels mildly sleepy.”

“Claudia, you must be a kind of female Napoleon, I think.”

“Nonsense. I'm not in the least—but when I do a thing, I do try and do it thoroughly. If I didn't—well, frankly—where should we all be?”

She glanced round expressively.

“You work terribly hard, I know. I think all you do is wonderful,” said Frances humbly. “When I'm in London, looking for a tiny house, I wonder whether you mightn't be able to make me useful from time to time. I know you provide escorts for children—or I could do shopping for old ladies—or any odd jobs. You see, I'm quite unattached. I would,” said Frances with a smile, “put the work first—and I don't often get tired. And if I did, I'd promise not to say so.”

Claudia smiled also.

“You think me a brute, I expect,” she said good-humouredly. “Honestly, you don't know what it's like to see someone lying down on the job, as Sal calls it, when one
knows
it's just simply that they won't make the effort.”

“Like Mrs Dombey.”

“Very like Mrs Dombey,” Claudia agreed. “I'm sure I should have been very angry with Mrs Dombey—and then, I suppose, she'd have turned the tables on me by dying. That's one thing that none of my office people will ever do, whatever they may pretend to think.”

“Well, I'll undertake not to, either, if you'll find me an occasional job.”

“Of course I will. Look here—talk to Sal Oliver about it. She really sees to that side of things. And Frances—look in at the office one morning, and
we'll put you on our card-index, formally and in order.”

“Thank you,” said Frances. “Shall I see you if I come to the office?”

“Unless I've got a rush on. Sometimes I have —it's mostly writing-stuff. We advertise an expert staff of translators, research-workers, and so on—but actually I
am
the expert staff in person, with occasional help from Sal.”

“Couldn't Sylvia and Taffy do something to help you?”

“No,” returned Claudia very crisply and decisively. “Amateur help, for that kind of thing, is of no use whatever. Anyway, I don't want either of them in my office. Taffy's too young, of course, and it isn't in Sylvia's line. I sometimes think—” Claudia hesitated, “I sometimes think I ought to let Sylvia go abroad and get thoroughly at home with, say, French.”

“But why? It would be expensive, surely. And I thought she was going to some publishing firm in London.”

“I shall let her decide, of course, but I doubt if it's quite her line of country really. I've thought for some time,” said Claudia, “that it might be quite possible to find an opening for her in Paris. She's very clever with her fingers, and our old madame—you remember madame, don't you?—is running a most successful dressmaking business. She'd simply love to have Sylvia working there, and it would be a wonderful experience for Sylvia —or for any girl for that matter. Still, as I say, it's entirely for her to decide.”

Frances felt quite surprised.

She had somehow received the impression that Sylvia's initial step into the world of wage-earners had been to all intents and purposes decided upon already, and now depended only on her interview with the firm of publishers.

Evidently she had been mistaken.

The Zienszis arrived most unobtrusively and silently in a very large and perfect Rolls-Royce driven by a young, slim, grim-faced chauffeur.

Anna Zienszi's most noticeable quality was poise. Her unfailing taste, combined with enormous expenditure, in clothes was—like the Rolls-Royce—unobtrusive. One observed it consciously only after a little while.

Like her sister, she was tall. Although Claudia was slight, Anna was so slim and apparently boneless that she made Claudia seem almost sturdy. Her naturally fair hair had been artificially platinumed and suited her smooth, painted little face, her shaven eyebrows, and carefully-applied scarlet Cupid's-bow of a mouth. Nature, supplementing the successful efforts of art, had bestowed upon her very beautiful teeth and exquisitely-shaped hands.

Anna's personal appearance was the cause of continuous conflict in the mind of poor Mrs Peel. She was unable to resist a feeling of pleasure in possessing a daughter whose appearance attracted attention wherever she went, and she was equally
unable to overcome her conviction that Anna's cult of the fashionable was a subtle form of insult to her mother, her Creator, and the canons of good breeding as conceived by Mrs Peel's generation. Most people, however, greatly admired Anna, who had none of the affectations that her appearance suggested, and was generous, and in many ways simple.

Adolf Zienszi was small, dark, silent, and rather embittered-looking. He was slightly, quite genuinely, bored by most people, whom he found lacking in accuracy either of thought or of words. He was an American Jew and had made his fortune in Wall Street. He was still making money.