Guilty: The Lost Classic Novel Page 5

  In these circumstances, I was glad to start studying under the clergyman of our parish. The rectory being some distance away, I had my lunch there and only came home in the late afternoon after I’d finished work. This odd little wiry man, with a fluff of saintly white hair, was something of an eccentric, an authority on the Roman occupation of our district, of which many traces remained, some of them already excavated under his supervision. He taught me Latin with enthusiasm, so that I soon became very good for a boy of my age and could even converse with him in this language at lunchtime. In our other subjects he took no interest, frequently abandoning them in favour of inspecting the site of some ancient villa or encampment, where I would take a hand with the digging or search the undergrowth for a rare species of edible snail, said to be descended from those the Roman legionaries had imported.

  I was grateful to the rector for not talking down to me and treating me like a grown-up person – which probably made me rather precocious but saved me from wasting several years in overprolonged adolescence, like most of my contemporaries. He also gave me the run of his library, and I am indebted to him for my love of reading – one of the few pleasures not likely to be taken away from one in this life – though probably I wouldn’t have become such an ardent reader all at once if it hadn’t been winter when I was forced to spend the long evenings indoors, or if my mother had been more companionable.

  Seeing me bent over the turning pages for hours on end, she would emerge from her meditations to ask what I found so absorbing. I’d have gladly given a detailed account of each book in turn, but she wasn’t really interested, and, asking only from ulterior motives, her attention soon wandered. I think she half knew I used the books to replace the affection she no longer gave me and that this somehow made her dislike them. In her determination to stop me reading she displayed more interest in me than she’d done for some time, so that I was almost glad to be scolded, thinking it meant a revival of our lost warmth. That winter happened to be particularly severe, and I couldn’t help feeling there must be some connection between the desolate frozen landscape outside and the coldness growing indoors. But though I tried to build up an interior glow as I built up the fires, an occasional scolding was insufficient fuel. She soon returned to her melancholy moods, when she seemed to want only to be left alone, and I had to resort to my books.

  Our old trustful affection had already been left so far behind that I didn’t hesitate to deceive her by keeping them hidden, doing my reading in secret, in bed, by the light of a carefully shaded candle or, in the daytime, in a private retreat of my childhood, behind the blackish foliage of an old yew tree. This treehouse, built for me by my father years before, had, since I ceased to play there, fallen into decay and its very existence been almost forgotten, totally concealed as it was by dense growth, so that, wrapped in rugs and blankets, I could read here without fear of discovery while I was supposed to be skating or engaged in some other healthy sport – I’d been told it was ‘unmanly’ to be such a bookworm and that I ought to get out more in the open air.

  But, as the days shortened and the weather grew worse, I could avail myself less and less of this refuge. Inevitably, my pernicious habit of reading in bed was discovered and led to a scene, my mother accusing me of ruining my health and eyesight and endangering our lives – sooner or later, I was bound to set the place on fire with my candle. I think she would have gone on to forbid me to read at all if Mr Spector, who happened to be there at the time, hadn’t interceded for me and persuaded her to adopt a more moderate attitude.

  He’d been visiting us regularly ever since my father left, but as I was always at the rectory when he came, only returning when he would be on the point of departure, we’d done little so far but exchange greetings. Now, however, by openly siding with me he won my gratitude, and I admired his tactful handling of the whole affair, which actually left my mother in a better mood. He stayed late that day on purpose to talk to me, and I was flattered – almost dazzled, indeed – by his friendliness and understanding, so that much of my original feeling for him revived on the spot. Afterwards this interview seemed very important, marking an irrevocable step, and from then onwards our intimacy progressed rapidly.

  He now made a point of coming to see us at weekends when I was at home and also of spending some time alone with me on each visit, realizing my need to let off steam and encouraging me to speak of whatever was on my mind. He thus acted as a sort of emotional safety valve, for I trusted him implicitly and told him everything without hesitation.

  At this time I was mainly worried about not going to school. Being the only pupil of an eccentric rector wasn’t at all the same thing and seemed to single me out and make me undesirably conspicuous, so that I was not only conscious of my isolation but slightly ashamed of it. Now, to my great relief, I could tell him all this, in the triumphant knowledge that no sense of inferiority or loneliness could survive the fact that he – this powerful, wonderful, magnificent personage – was my friend.

  The understanding between us even enabled me to speak of my mother. On one occasion I remember saying that, as she was unhappy herself, she didn’t want anyone else to be happy and stopped me reading because she knew it was what gave me most pleasure. And I remember, too, how oddly he looked at me then. It has since occurred to me that it was a somewhat strange observation in view of my age and an instance of the precociousness I have mentioned. Possibly he looked upon it as a sign of intelligence and therefore increased his interest in me; but this is only a guess, for he merely nodded wisely, saying that there was something in my remark but that I must always be patient and gentle with her, and with all women, as they didn’t have our resources. The last words, of course, puffed me up with pride, and I nodded back, sagely complacent, linking myself with him in a closed circle of superior masculine wisdom.

  What I most appreciated about him was the impression he always gave of understanding everything and having everything under control, so that nothing disturbing could happen while he was there. He shared with his great black car the reassuring quality of infinite reliability, always arriving at the time arranged, no matter how bad the weather conditions, so that I began to believe them both immune from the tiresome impediments so frustrating to ordinary people.

  Though he never took me out alone, I enjoyed driving with him more than anything else, particularly at this time of the year. There was a special thrill about being carried along by the powerful machine, so warm in this bitter weather that it really might have been an extension of its owner’s self and warmed with his blood. To be borne with such speed, warmth and comfort across the bleak icebound landscape gave me a godlike feeling of superiority to the everyday world, which was the basis of countless fantasies, taking their changing form from the ever-moving vista before my eyes. I didn’t resent my mother’s occupation of the front seat but actually preferred this arrangement, where I could remain alone at the back without fear of being interrupted in my daydream. I would become so lost in my imaginings that I was completely oblivious of my companions’ conversation, and even of their existence, sometimes brought back to earth with a start to find them laughing at my ‘wool-gathering’ and repeating some question or remark already made several times.

  At the start, it rather surprised me that my mother, who had so little to say to me, always seemed cheerful and talkative on these outings. But I soon realized it was only another manifestation of Mr Spector’s singular powers of controlling and directing all situations according to his will and prohibiting all that might be embarrassing or alarming. So convinced was I that his presence formed a guarantee against unpleasantness that it was a considerable shock to find this wasn’t invariably the case.

  The Sunday I’m thinking of was one of the coldest days in the whole winter. I was very keen on skating just then, but I rather envied the pair, whom I’d left sitting comfortably by the fire when I set off for the ponds. A biting northeast wind soon drove me off the ice, and I returned to find the cottag
e so silent that I assumed it was deserted and that they must have changed their minds about going out. As I dutifully took off my snow-caked boots in the porch, I told myself they wouldn’t stay out long on such a day, feeling slightly peeved because they’d gone without me. Suddenly, then, I remembered a book I’d left by the fire and, to avoid restarting old arguments, hurried to fetch it, just as I was, in my stockinged feet, before they returned.

  Convinced of being alone in the house, I was quite startled, on opening the door, to see the two of them still sitting there, though not precisely as I had left them, for my mother had abandoned her favourite seat to share the visitor’s sofa – or so I thought, for I hardly had time to see anything before she sprang up, pushing the hair back from her face with a distraught gesture, and, in a voice trembling with anger or some other emotion, accused me of creeping about the house and spying on her. I was still blocking the door, too astounded to move, when she rushed up and thrust me aside and then fled from the room.

  Speechless in my hurt amazement, I turned to Mr Spector, who hadn’t stirred, quite unmoved, it appeared, by her extraordinary conduct. He might have been half asleep, lounging there in a relaxed pose, absolutely detached and calm. I was beyond reach of further surprise; but if anything could have astonished me more it was to hear him say dreamily, ‘You’ve got a very beautiful mother, Mark’, as though nothing else had struck him about her now. Yet I, too, in the midst of my confused feelings, had been not unaware of her usually pale cheeks flushed pink by anger or the heat of the fire and making her look extremely pretty – not that I saw any need to comment on it.

  While I stood there, hopelessly at a loss, the man now signed to me amicably to sit beside him, which I did more or less in a daze. He slid his arm around my shoulders and drew me into a comfortable position, leaning against him, implying that nothing untoward could have occurred while we were sitting so pleasantly side by side.

  ‘There’s nothing to get upset about. She didn’t mean it,’ he said kindly, adding, ‘I’m going to talk to you now as if you were grown-up.’ After this flattering start, he went on to tell me that, in a few years’ time, I’d find out for myself that all women were liable to caprices and nerve storms at certain times, irrational moments, when it was useless to reason with them, and they just had to be humoured, being, far more than men, at the mercy of the delicate mechanism of their bodies, which had the supreme gift of bestowing life.

  I was already recovering, for his total composure made nonsense of the idea that anything disturbing could have happened. The fire’s heat was almost stupefying after the icy cold out of doors. Staring into its glowing heart, I began to feel drowsy, as though this were all a dream, and when he next spoke his voice seemed to come from somewhere a long way off, far above me. ‘You’re a country boy, and you don’t go about with your eyes shut; you’ve got a good idea, I expect, of the way nature works. But your father wanted me to have a talk with you at the right time, and this seems as good a time as any.’

  He had a real gift, Mr Spector, of explaining difficult or obscure matters in terms suited to his audience, and I’m sure any parent or schoolmaster would have admired his presentation of the facts of life for my benefit, getting them forth without prudery or sentiment but simply and with delicacy of feeling. At first I listened sleepily, only half attending, but by degrees my interest was engaged, as it was bound to be by so absorbing a subject. He could have chosen no better way of diverting my thoughts from my mother’s extraordinary attack. And when she came back after being out of the room a long time, we were talking as if nothing out of the usual had happened.

  Whether she took her cue from us or had already decided to ignore the incident, I don’t know, but anyhow she, too, acted as if everything were perfectly normal for the rest of the visit. Nor did she refer to her accusation when the two of us were alone, either that evening or at any time subsequently.

  In a way her silence was a relief, yet in another way I resented it, as indicating my unimportance to her, not even worth an explanation of such hurtful, insulting words. I was more aware after this of the coldness, and the gap between us seemed wider.

  We were both on edge during the next few days, and once, when she called me Marko (she still occasionally, to my annoyance, used this babyish name, originally given to tell me apart from my father, whose name was Mark, too), I lost my temper completely, said it sounded as if she were calling a dog and that I refused to answer to it any more. Why should I, after all, when there was no longer anyone to distinguish me from?

  I can still see the little nervous jerky movement she made only when she was upset, glancing over her shoulder, as if some imp might have heard, exclaiming, ‘How can you speak like that? Do you want to bring your father bad luck?’

  Though I knew it was rude and heartless, I only laughed. Surely she wasn’t so superstitious? She said no more, but, giving me a reproachful look, went out of the room – though not before I’d caught the glint of tears in her eyes.

  I felt mean and ashamed. But I also felt she had taken an unfair advantage of me. Why couldn’t she have got angry instead of crying, so that I could have answered back?

  My thoughts kept reverting to her unwithdrawn accusation, and the unmistakably genuine agitation she’d shown while making it, which for some reason I could not fathom, disturbed me almost as much. Nor could I understand why my mind, as if of its own accord, had arrived at the conclusion that Mr Spector was much more closely connected with the incident than his judicial calm would have had me believe. In fact, the whole thing was a complete puzzle to me and a weight on my spirit.

  No doubt I’d have forgotten it in due course. But before there was time for this, after an interval much shorter than usual, he reappeared. For the first time I felt slightly uncomfortable before him and was glad that he took my mother off at once to talk business, while I, the day being windless and sunny, though still very cold, announced that I’d go for a walk and retired to the privacy of the treehouse.

  The word ‘business’ had for me lifelong associations with dullness and exclusively adult mysteries I neither wished, nor was expected, to understand, so that I felt excused from further attention and could relax with my unreal characters and their adventures, unperplexed by problems of grown-up behaviour. I became so absorbed in what I was reading that I didn’t notice the two familiar figures emerge from the cottage till it was too late to think of escape. Now I was in an awkward dilemma, unable to declare my presence without declaring myself a liar and giving away my secret refuge as well. I could only keep quiet and try to escape the guilt of eavesdropping by making myself deaf to the conversation below, becoming so immersed in my book that I ceased to be aware of the speakers, as I did in the car.

  All the same, I disliked extremely the idea of deceiving Mr Spector, particularly as, with the superstition I’d ridiculed in my mother, I was half afraid he would not be deceived but would somehow detect my presence, though I knew I couldn’t be seen from below. I tried unsuccessfully to persuade myself that he’d excuse me in the circumstances, growing more and more nervous, as to become oblivious proved beyond me – there was no car noise to help me now, and the speakers, unaware of the need for caution, didn’t lower their voices. In the quiet garden, my mother’s emotional tones rang out so distinctly that I couldn’t fail to hear every word.

  ‘I might as well be a widow. I wish I were. At least I’d be free then, not in this impossible position, neither married nor unmarried but simply tied. Why should I have all the responsibility of marriage and nothing else while he goes about perfectly free? It’s so unfair, leaving me here to bear it all alone. A boy needs a father; Mark’s growing up without knowing his father at all. And what about me? I’m still young, but I won’t be young for ever. Time keeps passing. Am I never to have a husband? Love? A real marriage?’

  They had passed now and, their backs towards me, were walking away. But her complaining voice still hung on the hushed winter air, though I could no longer
make out the words. Those I’d already heard, striking at the roots of all that was safe and settled in life, caused me a moment of childish panic. Their two figures had reached the shadow of the cottage crossing the sunlit grass like dark water. For a second I had the illusion of watching two strangers on the bank of a river, towards which the man seemed to be urging his reluctant companion, as if urging her to take the plunge. Growing more composed as they turned back to approach me again, I saw with my normal vision that my mother was calmer, Mr Spector doing most of the talking.

  My heart gave a sudden jump at the sound of my name. Yes, it was my future he was now speaking about so earnestly, recommending that I should be sent to the school originally chosen for me, where an unexpected vacancy had come up at half-term. This was what I wanted more than anything, and my rather negative feelings for him swung to the other extreme: wonderful, kind, omnipotent Mr Spector, for whom the word ‘impossible’ didn’t exist! I could hardly listen to my mother objecting that it wouldn’t be fair to me or my father, that I’d be teased and bullied because of his views till I began to hate him. What rubbish! And why couldn’t she see that if Mr Spector wished it to be so, so it would be? Never doubting that he was acting out of kindness and for my good, I identified myself with him completely, first impatient, then irritated, finally alarmed, by her persistent opposition. Suppose he took offence at her unusual obstinacy or simply got bored and abandoned the subject, abandoning me to my fate? He’d already carried on the argument on my behalf longer than could reasonably be expected of him.