The Diamond Waterfall (41 page)

The girl who looked like Teddy was still singing. Now they all joined in:

“Mademoiselle in the family way,
Après la guerre finie …”

Some of the tommies had gotten French girls into trouble. The thing to do, they said, was to get a transfer elsewhere as quick as you could. And never, never give your real name. He couldn't imagine behaving like that. If I loved somebody, I'd
want
them to have my child. If I loved … If he didn't, he couldn't imagine in spite of what the others said and told him—couldn't imagine doing it. Lectures at the base on the clap, on places to go where it was
probably
all right, on prophylactics (to give them their grand name). But if you kept out of all that, it was easy to go to the grave never having … When he had that thought, he often blushed. But the blushing was a sort of sadness.

Leave came suddenly, unexpectedly, near the end of August. They were just waiting to go up into reserve trenches again when the orderly corporal called, “Greenwood—you're for leave.” He was sent then to find Gus and Snowy and three others. But although they got a lift to the nearest station as soon as they'd collected their passes, they missed the leave train for that day. They slept in some goods wagon till nightfall. When eventually they arrived at Boulogne they felt they'd been traveling a week—at this rate it would be time to turn around as soon as they arrived. Even then, he decided to go up through Leeds so that, with Snowy and Gus, he could visit Winnie.

Home again—and the biggest surprise: Teddy married. Married to
Gib.
It shook him.

“What about Alice?” he asked. “I thought …”

But there seemed almost a conspiracy of silence. Mother remarked only on how romantic it all was. Father, Nan-Nan—all said they were pleased. “It's wartime,” he heard. “What does one expect but hasty marriages?” Only Sylvia seemed a little bewildered still.

It had happened only two days ago. The letter about it must have been still on its way. Now they were on a short honeymoon, in Sussex.

A whole week. After the first polite day hanging around The Towers, he spent all his time at the farm. The second day he came the nearest to fighting with Olive since the unhappy days of the Stephen affair. And of course it was over Tom.

He said outright, as they walked together through the gap in the cross wall (he didn't know why, because he had determined before coming up, on the way over, that it was the one thing he would
not
say):

“I suppose you'd rather be talking with Tom—staying in with him, than coming out now, with me.”

“If that isn't the stupidest …” she began. Her voice quite angry. Then she broke into laughter.

“Hal Firth—when I
think
… Me writing all those letters—three a week sometimes. Couldn't I be chattering to Tom then? Most nights I'm sat at the table—“That'll be your sweetheart again?” Tom says. I reckon, Hal, even if he wanted—” She hesitated. Then, taking hold of his hands:

“No, I'll be honest. He
has
courted me, Hal. I mean, he has asked. He asked—”

“I knew it,” Hal shouted, almost triumphantly. Distressed and yet at the same time vindicated. “I knew all the while, it's really him. Suitable. He's suitable.” He added despairingly, “It's just because you're a kind person, because of your kind nature that you go on like this—friendship and letters and … If I get killed. When I'm killed—”

It was her turn to cry out. “What's all this nonsense? Have you gone
daft?”

“No. No,” he said feebly. “I just want—you.”

“Well, have me then,” she said. “In any way you want. Like this, for a beginning.” She had hold of his hands still. Now she leaned forward and, on tiptoe, kissed him on the lips.

He didn't speak. He couldn't.
I
should have done that, he kept thinking. I've wanted to, for how long? She was back smiling at him now. He took her then in his arms, holding her tightly, tighter, squashing the breath out of her. He did the kissing now. Again and again. As his lips twisted on hers, his heart pounding, he remembered, from far away, that out there he'd had a dream once. About Olive.

“I dreamed,” he said. “When I was in the trenches. Only I'd forgotten. You tasted just like that in the dream. I've wanted for so long—”

“I don't know why you didn't,” she said robustly. “It's so much better than lots of words. Isn't it?”

Later she said, “I think you should grow a moustache. Would you, then? You'd really suit it, Hal.”

Little brown bird. So much happiness. So short a time.

Fourth Christmas now, in a war that was to have been over before the first one. Sometimes, Lily thought, I can hardly remember that world—the one which changed so abruptly, forever, between our toasting Christopher's birth, rejoicing—and the newspaper placards, mad enthusiasm, the “We'll teach them …” Whatever might have been taught, what had been learned was— terrifying.

To think that once I worried about
love.
How did I find the time? Dr. Sowerby, himself more than ready for retirement, telling me to do less, hinting that at my time of life … a forty-seven-year-old woman. But I have noticed nothing, except natural enough fatigue. And worry. (A son, son-in-law, and stepdaughter, all in France.)

Hal might have been safe in England, she thought, if that wound in September had been a little more severe. Had not healed so quickly and easily. He had only been a week or two back from leave when it happened. The left shoulder, high up, but clean and uncomplicated. He had written cheerfully enough from a French hospital “Not a Blighty one as I'd rather hoped. My friend Snowy's had even less luck—his was so light he's back with the platoon already.” He seemed to like his stay there. The hospital not too overworked—and the nurses making a fuss of him because they liked his imitations. He entertained the whole ward. Sister had come along to see what all the noise was about. There had even been a Chaplin film (one soldier burst his stitches laughing) projected on the ceiling of the ward.

If, when, he does come home, she thought sadly, he won't be around. He will be over “helping” at Lane Top Farm. He likes to sit there and remember happier times, reminisce with the daughter—funny little mouse of a girl.

And of course I have no time to entertain him. I have so little time. Whenever did I
love?

Love. And Teddy. Was there, I wonder, some vacuum that sent me, incurably romantic, conniving with that most hurried and exciting (yes, exciting) of wartime marriages. A girl, only just seventeen—tied for life to a schoolmaster. To a person I had thought
Alice
was to marry. (What was it about those two? It never seemed to me anything but habit—mistaking a childhood friendship for something else. Robert never approved.)

Why then his easy acquiescence in Teddy's marriage? Because she is not
his,
he does not care.
The vicar's son is good enough since if he survives the war he will remove her from the scene. No, it is my own behavior and feelings that need examining.

When she came to tell me, when I saw her face lit by love, I thought—it does not matter, seventeen or seventy, she
loves.
(At seventeen I too was in love—with the Theater.) And after all that he, Gib, had been through, and the long years in which I'd grown fond of him, always kind, reliable, polite, almost another son—it was he who had brought this change to her face, texture of skin, hair, voice. She is
altered by love,
I thought.

Also, did I not think at the same time, she is Val's daughter? Mine, too, of course. But how uneasy the blend. How restless she looks already. Sometimes, those slanted eyes beneath the bushy brows—and she has no obvious beauty, only vivacity—how I used to be (and still am) so suddenly, irrationally exasperated by her. Once I used to dream of telling her the whole story. But why? It would, alas, be only for my own comfort.

She looked so happy—I was happy for her. She has a good man, I thought, whom she loves and who will take care of her. The haven of marriage so early will save her from complications, torments of her own nature. That hungry look which
I
have noticed if others haven't. Which shows itself in overexcited rushing about, “ministering” to the officers. (And yet Gib, who so obviously needed peace, found it in her.) Whatever happens later, I thought, she will have had this. I thought, too, of myself: If
I'd
followed, been able to follow, my heart? Was some of it vicarious, did I live through her?

When I saw her face—when she came back from the honeymoon … I knew. So tremblingly happy at first. Then just as suddenly, within hours of arrival, white, tearful, shocked almost. Why? I think she realized suddenly, truly realized, that he must
go
again. Leave her.

But what of Alice—and her suffering? When Teddy first told me, I said, “But
Alice … ?”

“Oh,” Teddy said then, “that has been over some time. After it went wrong you know, last year. When he was called back. Now she scarcely writes. He doesn't think them at all suited. Yes, of
course
he writes to tell her.”

Poor Alice. Poor, poor Alice. I wrote to her too, not at once, not as soon as I should have done. I said, “I don't wish to interfere, I don't know what happened, but Teddy tells me it was all over anyway.” Alice never answered. But then, she is busy, and cut off from us now.

Robert's only comment: “I was never happy it should be Alice.” And a little later: “Perhaps someone could keep me up to date with this game of musical chairs?”

Two bad attacks of bronchitis with the coming of the cold weather. Worry about his heart—it was apparent that Robert was not well. And he was doing
too much. Although he had partial help with the hospital administration, he had added the North Riding Distress to his committees, as well as becoming involved with the Prince of Wales Fund. Dr. Sowerby threatened that if he didn't slow down he would be a permanent invalid. She took a second opinion from the army doctor working at The Towers. He could not answer for the consequences, he said, were Robert to continue at this rate.

Officialdom informed them a replacement would arrive in the next few weeks. Lily, remembering the impossibility of tracing Hal (but also, to be honest, the speed with which Alice had been able to return to France) had not expected such prompt action.

Accommodation, she thought. The Towers once so enormous, could not now in the main body of the house provide what was needed. One more
problem,
she'd thought, only to find that conveniently Berthe and her mother, who had been three years in the cottage just beyond the stables, wanted to take up an offer of work in Harrogate.

The cottage, small but pleasant, as warm as anywhere in these days of scarce fuel. She had not decided if he would eat with them or have meals sent to the cottage. Perhaps there would be a wife? They had not said.

February 1918. She was sitting in the small paneled room she used now as her private office when one of the maids, after three attempts, announced a visitor. Lily, used to interesting versions of Belgian names, took little notice.

“A Mr. Heartfelt Levissey, m'lady.”

He was about her age, of medium height, with receding brown hair and deep-set eyes.

“I must apologize, Lady Firth, for causing this difficulty with my name.” Bowing, clicking of heels.

She said in a cool voice, “It's for
us
to apologize. We have several Belgian families in the village.” Her smile was cool also. “There have been some interesting versions of
those
names.”

He smiled. “The correct name is Ahlefeldt-Levetzau. Erik. You will know the purpose I am sent here. If you should wish to show me now?”

“Oh please,” she said, “please, Mr. Ahlefeldt, although the work is urgent, I hardly think—”

“But I should wish to work immediately, I am told everything is much in arrears—”

“An exaggeration. Sir Robert, in spite of his health, has been perfectly in control.” That I should be driven to defending Robert, she thought.

“I am sorry. I have been misinformed.”

That phrase—“to rub someone the wrong way.” She felt exactly as if the skin of her body—pinpoints of irritation. I am tired, she thought. She had already forgotten his name. She could not wait for documents to inform her, so (and it must humiliate him) she had to ask. When he told her, she said, “I am sure you see the difficulty. If I hadn't known better I would have thought
it a—German one.” My conduct is unpardonable, she thought. Fatigue, not an excuse.

She was not sure if he was angry or insulted, or both. “Ahlefeldt-Levetzau—if the documents concerning me have not reached you,
Ahlefeldt-Levetzau.
It is a Danish name. I am from Denmark, Lady Firth.”

It is laughable, she thought. They would hardly send a German, even one living in England. But although he is nothing to do with the enemy, I have
made
an enemy. She saw nothing to do now but to explain as briefly as possible what her own work entailed, and to arrange what he should discuss with Robert on Robert's return. All the while she felt this prickling of the skin, gooseflesh almost. It is positive dislike. And what does that often lead to? The man who in the next few months I shall see most of. Proximity. And a husband who is one in name only now. (And thank God that it is not likely I shall ever again have to submit to that degradation. Ornate Egyptian necklace pressing against my flesh. Ringed, belted, fettered. The
Waterfall.)
She thought tiredly, I suppose it may well end in an
affaire.

It was this thought, and also perhaps crossness with herself, that caused her to say, when the bell was answered:

“Would you arrange, please, for
Herr
Ahlefeldt's luggage to be taken to the cottage?”