Read The Complete Short Stories Online
Authors: Muriel Spark
I thought it all over
for a while. Then I went into the dining-room and got out that last notebook.
Something else had been written since I had put it away, not half an hour before:
Why
don’t you get on with Chapter Eleven? We’re waiting for it.
I tore out the page, put
the book away and locked the door. I took the page to the fire and put it on to
burn. Then I went to bed.
This went on for a
month. My uncle always started the page afresh with ‘Chapter Eleven’, followed
by a new message. He even went so far as to put in that I had kept back bits of
the housekeeping money, although, he wrote, I was well paid enough. That’s a
matter of opinion, and who did the economising, anyway? Always, after reading
Uncle’s disrespectful comments, I burned the page, and we were getting near the
end of the notebook. He would say things to show he followed me round the
house, and even knew my dreams. When I went into Edinburgh for some shopping he
knew exactly where I had been and what I’d bought. He and Elaine listened in to
my conversations on the telephone if I rang up an old friend. I didn’t let
anyone in the house except Mrs Donaldson. No more Jaimie. He even knew if I
took a dose of salts and how long I had sat in the bathroom, the awful old man.
Mrs Donaldson one
morning said she was leaving. She said to me, ‘Why don’t you see a doctor?’ I
said, ‘Why?’ But she wouldn’t speak.
One day soon afterwards
a man rang me up from the Foundation. They didn’t want to bother me, they said,
but they were rather puzzled. They had found in Uncle’s letters many references
to a novel.
The Witch of the Pentlands,
which he had been writing just
before his death; and they had found among the papers a final chapter to this
novel, which he had evidently written on loose pages on a train, for a letter
of his, kindly provided by one of his many correspondents, proved this. Only
they had no idea where the rest of the manuscript could be. In the end the
witch Edith is condemned to be burned, but dies of her own will power before
the execution, he said, but there must be ten more chapters leading up to it.
This was Uncle’s most metaphysical work, and based on a true history, the man
said, and he must stress that it was very important.
I said that I would have
a look. I rang back that afternoon and said I had found the whole book in a
drawer in the dining-room.
So the man came to get
it. On the phone he sounded very suspicious, in case there were more
manuscripts. ‘Are you sure that’s everything? You know, the Foundation’s price
included the whole archive. No, don’t trust it to the mail, I’ll be there
tomorrow at two.
Just before he arrived I
took a good drink, whisky and soda, as, indeed, I had been taking from sheer
need all the past month. I had brought out the notebooks. On the blank page was
written:
Goodbye,
Susan. It’s lovely being a speck in the distance.
Your affec Uncle
I am the only son of parents old enough to
be grandparents. This has advantages and disadvantages, for although I was out
of touch with the intervening generation, my mother’s friends when I was born
being forty and upwards and my father’s contemporaries mostly over sixty, I
inherited a longer sense of living history than most people do. It was quite
natural for my elders to talk about the life of the early part of the century
to which they belonged, and I grew up knowing instinctively how things were
done in those days and how they thought.
My mother died aged
ninety-six, just after my fiftieth birthday. She had survived my father by
nearly thirty years. She was active almost to the last, the only difficulty
being her failing eyesight; her movements had slowed down a bit. But really she
was, as everyone said, wonderful for her age. She died quickly of a stroke. To
the last she was still wondering why I hadn’t found the right woman to marry.
Maybe she’s wondering even yet. She belonged to the wondering generation.
My mother, originally
mistress of a great house with countless servants, had moved down with the
times like everyone else, each move to a smaller house and fewer servants being
somewhat of a trauma to her. She called every new house poky, every domestic
arrangement makeshift. It was not till well after the First World War that she
got used to only four indoor servants including a manservant and three outdoor.
Somewhere about the end of the fifties she was reduced to a compact Georgian
house in Sussex with twelve bedrooms surrounded by woodland. It became more
and more enormous for one person as time went on. Her means were sufficient but
she couldn’t get the staff she needed. A few rooms were closed off entirely.
Some years before she died she was doing very well with a gardener to keep
going a token piece of lawn and some kitchen-garden patches, and, indoors, her
cook-housekeeper, Miss Spigot, and Winnie the maid. By the end of her life, two
years ago, she was left with only Winnie.
After Miss Spigot’s
death Winnie struggled on, in deep chaos, burning the food and quite unable to
shop and clean. My mother wouldn’t lift a finger beyond picking flowers; she
sat calmly with her eternal sewing, which she called ‘my work’, giving orders.
Up to then I had been accustomed to go down to spend Sunday and Monday with a
few friends to cheer Ma up, and she had always looked forward to these visits.
She had outlived her sisters and her friends, and she enjoyed company. My own
work, a regular theatre column, prevented me from spending much more time with
her. I don’t notice dust but I do notice bad food; I must say Miss Spigot, who
was already in her late seventies, had cooked very well. Our rooms had always
been ready and bright when we arrived during Miss Spigot’s lifetime. But
suddenly all that ended. Winnie was frantic. I could see that my mother would
have to move again. I begged her to let me get her a small flat in London. She
was very old but by no means infirm, especially of purpose. ‘Winnie can manage
alone. I shall have a Word with her,’ said Ma, and went on with her needlepoint
or whatever. I could have killed her, but Ma wasn’t the sort of person you
could easily be nasty to.
I decided to stop
bringing my friends to my mother’s. My own visits were hell. There was a
terrible smell everywhere of burnt food, unaired rooms and sheer neglect. My
mother’s tastes in food were simple and I dare say so were Winnie’s, but as for
me I like my square meals. The dining-room floor was littered with old bits of
toast and egg-shells. The table hadn’t been cleared for weeks, the place-mats were
greasy. I did my best to help clear up on my miserable Sundays and Mondays.
Personally, I’m quite used to shifting for myself in London; in fact, having
been brought up with servants, I hate them. Your life’s never your own. In
London I always managed with a morning woman.
But I wasn’t up to
coping with a vast house like Ma’s. Nothing would disturb Ma’s resolve to put
up with it or Winnie’s exasperating loyalty; she took my mother’s part. It went
on for a month. I spent all my spare time in employment agencies and on various
other means to get someone to replace Miss Spigot, but nothing came of my
efforts or those of my friends; nothing. ‘I am going to have a Word with
Winnie,’ said Ma.
On the fifth Sunday I
drove down to Sussex late intending to cut short the horror of it all.
Amazingly, there was no horror. Winnie had become a super-efficient
cook-housekeeper all in the course of a week. As I passed the dining-room I
could see the table was laid ready, sparkling with silver and glass, and the
table-linen was up to Ma’s best standard. The drawing-room was fresh and the
windows looked like glass once more.
Ma was knitting. It was
almost time to go in to dinner.
‘Have you found someone
to help?’ I said. ‘No,’ said Ma.
‘Well, how has Winnie
managed all this on her own?’
‘I had a Word with her,’
said my mother.
Winnie served an
excellent dinner on the whole; perhaps it wasn’t quite up to the late cook’s
quality but certainly ambitious enough to include a rather flat soufflé.
‘It’s her first soufflé,’
said Ma, when Winnie went to get the meat course. If she doesn’t improve I’ll
have a Word.’
But now something had
happened to Winnie. She was perfectly happy, indeed almost blissful. She went
around whispering to herself in a decidedly odd way. She served the vegetables
with great care, but whispering, whispering, all the time.
‘What did you say,
Winnie?’ I said.
‘The soufflé was flat,’
said Winnie.
‘Turn on the BBC news,’
said my mother.
For the whole of Monday
Winnie went round chattering to herself. Breakfast was, however, set out on the
table with nothing forgotten. The house was already in good order before
half-past eight, the fire new and crackling. And Winnie conversed with herself,
merrily, and quite a lot. I supposed that finding herself alone in the kitchen
was now showing. However, my mother seemed to have solved her domestic problem
which had fast been developing into mine. I didn’t give time to worrying lest
Winnie was turning a little funny.
I went back cheerfully to my own bachelor
life and regaled my friends with the news of the change that had come over
Winnie and of how well she was coping. They were quite eager to come and join
me in Sussex again, assuring me they would make their own beds, help with the
shopping and generally refrain from giving Winnie a hard time. I thought I’d
better wait a few weeks before making up a party as of old. These visitors to
my mother’s house were either unmarried and younger colleagues of mine who,
like myself, had to work on Saturdays for their newspapers, or middle-aged
widows who had nothing to tie them to any day of the week. All were very keen
to come, but I waited.
Winnie was even more
efficient the next week. I came to the conclusion that it was Winnie who had
been the guiding spirit in the kitchen all along; she was a good cook. Ma took
no notice of her whatsoever, as was always her way, preferring not to praise or
blame, just to give orders. Winnie was an unguessable age between fifty-five
and seventy, her face was big with a lot of folds, her body thin and angular,
her hair chocolate-rinsed. My mother who long ago had been used to picking and
choosing maids ‘of good appearance’ had taken some time to resign herself to
uncomely Winnie, and, having done so, she was not now inclined to waste
consideration on any further divergence from the norm that Winnie might
display.
Winnie in fact could now
be heard in the kitchen kicking up a dreadful racket. One evening the noise
filled the house for about ten minutes. My bed was turned down neatly. The
stair carpets were spotless as of old, and the furniture and banisters shone.
Winnie conducted a further brief altercation in the kitchen and then was quiet
till tea when my mother went to bed and so did she. I had a comfortable night.
In the morning Winnie started fighting with herself again, or so it seemed. On
investigation, I found her smiling while she argued. My mother’s breakfast
tray was all prepared and Winnie was about to carry it up to Ma’s room. ‘What’s
the matter, Winnie?’ I said.
‘Oh, the butter was
forgot to be put on the tray. Too old for the job.’
‘Would you like to
leave, Winnie?’ I said, somewhat desperately, but feeling that this was Winnie’s
way of saying just that.
‘How could I leave your
mother?’ said Winnie, marching off with the tray.
Well, my mother, aged
ninety-six, died suddenly during the following week. Winnie phoned me quite
calmly from Sussex and I went down right away. There was a little quiet
funeral. The house was to be sold. Winnie was still having occasional outbreaks
against herself, such as
‘The Times
didn’t get cancelled at the
newsagent like I said,’ and she muttered a bit as she went around. However, I
spent a last, comfortable night in the house and after breakfast prepared to
settle Winnie’s pay and pension. I believed she would be glad of a rest. She
had relations in Yorkshire and I thought she would probably want to return to
them.
‘I’m not leaving the
family,’ said Winnie.
She didn’t mean her
family, she meant me.
‘Well, Winnie, the house
will be sold. There’s no family left, is there?’
‘I’m coming with you,’
Winnie said. ‘I’ve no doubt it’s a pigsty but I can live in the basement.’
My pigsty, my paradise.
It was a small narrow house in a Hampstead lane, which I had acquired over
twelve years ago. I never got round to putting it straight. It was so much my
life to be out late at night at the theatre, then usually some sort of supper
after the theatre with friends; in the morning doing my notes for the theatre
column, shuffling about in my dressing-gown; then after a quick lunch I would
work in my study, or maybe go out to a cinema or an art show, or if not attend
to something bureaucratic; or I would play some music on the piano. I worked
hardest Fridays and Saturdays, for my last show was Friday and the column had
to be in on Saturday at three in the afternoon. And since, until Ma died, I
would go down to Sussex for Sunday and Monday with my friends, there was no
time to put things straight. Sometimes there were people staying at my house
and they would try to help. But it was better when they didn’t, for after one
of those friendly tidy-ups I couldn’t find anything. Never, on any occasion,
did I allow anyone into my little study upstairs. A sullen and lady-like
domestic help called Ida came mincing in three mornings a week for a couple of
hours, painful all round; that is, to herself, to me and to my cat Francis. Ida
took the clean dishes out of the dishwasher and stacked them away; she changed
the towels and bedsheets and left them at the laundry. She swept the kitchen
floor, making short work of Francis with her broom, and sometimes she dusted
the sitting-room and vacuumed the carpet. Francis cowered in the basement three
mornings a week till she had gone.