Thalia Read online

  A sudden surge of excitement so great that it threatened to burst my lungs assailed me. I turned back to Terence Mourne.

  ‘Isn’t it wonderful?’

  ‘Think so?’ he said dryly. ‘Wait until you live here—it’s pretty dull.’

  Dull? I thought he must be a very stupid person to find this place dull.

  ‘Why d’you live here then?’ I asked tartly.

  ‘For the same reason that the Pembertons and the rest of the Anglo-American colony do—because it’s cheap.’

  The gangway was now in position and we were being pushed down it by the surge of passengers. An enormous sailor hoisted my trunk and suitcases on to his back and was bawling something to me from the quay.

  Come along. He’s telling you he’ll see you in the Customs shed. I’ll see you through.’

  I didn’t think that Mrs. Pemberton was very pleased at finding that I had already made a friend on the journey. She greeted me warmly enough, introducing me to her husband and the children, then turning to my companion she paused, held out her hand and said formally, ‘My brother wrote me that you are living here now. I’ve already met several friends who were in India. Tom, isn’t this a surprise? Who would have expected to meet Terence here?’

  To me she said: ‘We were once all stationed in the same place in India.’

  The two men, both very tall, shook hands stiffly. They were eyeing each other as my aunt’s spaniels eyed strange canines. I sensed immediately that whereas to Colonel Pemberton this meeting with Terence Mourne was completely unexpected, to his wife it was, in spite of her words, no surprise. And yet she was momentarily disconcerted. I was intrigued that this woman who, in London, had been so cool, poised and distant that she had put me at an immediate disadvantage was now herself uncertain and at a loss. But it was only for a moment. She recovered herself quickly and thanked Terence Mourne for having looked after me on the boat. He looked at her with the same suppressed cynical amusement with which he regarded me—but said nothing.

  Colonel Pemberton said stiffly: ‘It’ll be nice for Cynthia to have you here, Terence. I’m off in a few days—back to the regiment. My leave’s almost up.’

  ‘Thank God I’ve finished with all that,’ Terence Mourne said lightly, and he and Colonel Pemberton busied themselves with the baggage.

  I had turned to the two children, who were staring at me with unabashed interest. Thalia shook hands formally. She was, as my aunt had said, a very plain girl, and at the worst age. She had dull mousy hair worn in two thin, untidy tails, eyes which didn’t stay quiet, a long but straight nose and a sulky mouth. She was covered in freckles—not the pretty powdery kind but ugly brown patchy ones, and was all arms and legs like a spider, and had a stoop as if she were afraid of her height. But when, after studying me gravely, she suddenly smiled, her whole face changed as if a high-light had transformed a dull patch of colour.

  The little boy, Claude, offered me a demure hand. He looked an angel with his mother’s golden hair in tangled curls and her violet-blue eyes, but his chin and mouth were astonishingly firm, and the look with which he appraised me from under sweeping black lashes showed me that he was already a person with whom one would have to reckon. A disturbing child—and in spite of his striking beauty he sent a little shiver through me.

  We stood on the quay waiting for the porters to bring the baggage. Before we turned to board the vedette which the children told me would take us to Dinard I saw as in one of those hyper-sharp silhouettes this family group. Lovely mother, lovely son, plain father and the still plainer daughter who was somehow out of focus. Against the grey ramparts and the swirling wings of the gulls they looked curiously out of place—even alien; whereas the tall lounging form and amused sardonic face of Terence Mourne fitted into this background quite perfectly.

  When we were all piled in the vedette with the baggage, waiting to set off across the bay, I saw that Terence Mourne had been claimed by a gay party of French people and was in the other vedette.

  ‘He’s gone in the green one,’ screamed Claude. ‘I hope we’ll race him! I hope we’ll win.’ He was jumping up and down with excitement. A strong wind was rising and the water was quite choppy. The little boat rocked like a cockleshell and Mrs. Pemberton looked pale and uneasy.

  ‘She’s going to be sick,’ announced Claude hopefully. ‘She almost was coming. Are you sick too, Rachel? I’m not, but when I see Mummy sick then it makes me sick and that makes Thalia sick . . .’ He paused for breath and I said firmly that I was never sick.

  ‘But you’ve never been on big boats to India, so you don’t know.’

  I said I’d been often on small yachts and Channel steamers and that as they didn’t make me sick I saw no reason why big liners should.

  Claude was unconvinced. ‘Can you sail a boat?’ he demanded.

  ‘If it’s a small one, yes.’

  ‘All by yourself?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Can you row?’

  ‘I can get along.’

  ‘And swim. Can you swim?’

  I said I’d been able to swim since I was six.

  ‘I’m six and a half and I can’t swim,’ he said resentfully. Can you teach me? Mummy can’t swim and there were sharks and crocodiles in India so we couldn’t learn. You’ve never seen sharks and crocodiles, have you?’

  ‘Only in the Zoo,’ I said mildly.

  ‘If you were in India and you went swimming you’d soon be eaten up. They’d scrunch you up bones and all—nothing left but your wrist-watch which they couldn’t digest!’

  ‘Shut up, Claude, you’re enough to make us sick. . . . Don’t talk like that—it’s babyish.’ Thalia was looking determinedly away from her mother, who was holding smelling salts under her nose.

  They pointed out the landmarks as we went across the bay. The sun was now out strongly and the water the clear, translucent green of my favourite colour, emerald oxide of chromium. Waves were splashing right over the small vedette as, rocking violently, she chugged her way through them.

  ‘There’s St. Servan! There’s Paramé! There’s the Rance up there on your left! Up there is La Vicomté. It’s lovely. You’ll see it to-morrow.’ Thalia was pointing out the lovely wooded slopes of the Rance.

  ‘Here’s Dinard! Here’s where we get off. See the lift up from the vedettes?’ screamed Claude excitedly. ‘Ooh! Look, we’re racing the green vedette. Go it, white one! Come on, white one! Good! We’ve won.’

  And so, with both children hanging on my arm, and the parents following slowly behind, we stepped on to the Bee at Dinard—one minute ahead of our green pursuer. From the gangway of the other vedette Terence Mourne waved good-bye.

  II

  THE villa was right above the sea on the St. Enogat side of the coast. Standing well back from the road it was almost hidden behind a great hedge of fuchsias and hydrangeas. Amongst the wealth of tamarisks, oleanders and mimosas in the garden I was surprised and enchanted to see palm trees. The house itself, of grey stone, was rather ugly, but mimosas climbed all over it and even now on September 1st were mingled with tea roses, both blooming as if it were early summer. The path to the front door was of white pebbles. At the back—the sea side of the house—were terraces of white pebbles with clumps of yuccas and more palms. The lowest terrace ended in a stone wall with an iron gate set in it. From this gate steps had been cut in the living rock down to the beach below.

  It was to this last terrace that the children led me as soon as I’d been shown all over the villa.

  ‘The steps are always slippery,’ warned Thalia, holding on to Claude, who was struggling to free himself from her grip. ‘At high tide the waves come right over them—and when there’s a storm they dash right over this wall!’

  ‘Thalia! Thalia!’ called Cynthia’s voice. ‘How many times have I told you that you’re not allowed on those steps?’

  Thalia was holding the great iron key of the gate in her hand and Claude suddenly snatched it from her.

  �
��Give it back. At once. Give it back.’ Thalia launched herself upon Claude and they began struggling violently. I caught Thalia by the arm. ‘Stop it. You’ll both slip.’ But as Colonel Pemberton had come to the gate I let her go.

  ‘Claude, give me that key. At once!’ His voice was stern. The child swallowed back something he was about to shout at his sister, and giving her a push ran up the steps to his father. Thalia staggered on the slippery step, recovered her balance and, very pale, with her freckles standing out like livid stains, clung to me. For one awful moment I felt myself swaying—then I recovered my balance too.

  I expected to see Claude punished for this. Thalia had all but fallen below, taking me with her—and as I looked down at the savage rocks I felt sick and faint. It would have been an unpleasant introduction to the beach. I pulled her down on to a seat as we regained the terrace. She was still pale and upset. Colonel Pemberton was rebuking Claude sharply until the studiedly dulcet tones of his wife cut him short. ‘He doesn’t understand how dangerous it is—how can he? Don’t say too much, Tom. He didn’t mean to push her. He just wanted the key.’

  ‘He did it on purpose. You saw him. So did Rachel.’ Thalia’s voice was shaky. ‘You always defend him. Little beast.’

  ‘Rachel, I’m sorry about this. I’m going to leave this key in your charge. Neither Thalia nor Claude is to touch it. If you use the steps—and at low tide you’ll want to—I trust to your good sense to see that this gate is always kept locked.’ He locked the gate and handed the great key to me. I didn’t like being made responsible for it. ‘I’ll find somewhere where it shall be hung. Somewhere high and out of reach,’ I said. ‘It’s too heavy to carry about—and I might lose it.’

  We found an old hook in the hall so high up that I could only reach it standing on a chair.

  ‘No one may take down this key except your mother and Rachel—d’you understand, Claude?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then give me your word that you’ll never try and unlock this gate.’

  ‘I won’t.’

  ‘You mean you won’t promise?’

  ‘No. It’s silly to ask me. You know I can’t reach that key—not even on two chairs one on top of th’other.’

  Cynthia Pemberton laughed delightedly.

  His father didn’t look so pleased.

  ‘Thalia,’ he said, ‘this applies to you too. You’re not to use these steps to the beach unless Rachel is with you. Will you give me your word?’

  Thalia hesitated, then she said slowly and pointedly, ‘I’ll give my word to you—but to no one else.’

  Her mother merely shrugged her shoulders impatiently. ‘If you’ve given your word to your father that’s sufficient. There’s no need to dramatize it.’

  The gong sounded, and we all went in to lunch.

  The salon and the salle-à-manger were on the ground floor, separated by sliding doors of glass. The salon was papered in hideous broad stripes of crimson and pale blue and had gilt furniture. The walls of the salle-à-manger were even uglier in bilious citrous yellow and purple, but its huge windows opened on to the lawn of the overgrown front garden. We sat around a heavy oak table and a bold-eyed young girl handed the plates and dishes. She had been introduced to me as Madeleine and was for the moment the ‘bonne à tout faire’.

  ‘We shall have to teach her to do this properly,’ Cynthia Pemberton said to me as Madeleine served us all familiarly with a nudge and giggle for Thalia and a pat on the head for Claude. I thought it charming after Janet’s stiff prim service at my aunt’s.

  ‘It was very clever of you to find her, she does very well. It’s no use your trying to get the same service here as you had in India,’ said Colonel Pemberton.

  The food seemed excellent to me, but Cynthia found fault with it—so did Claude.

  ‘It’s not cooked in the way he’s accustomed to,’ excused his mother. ‘To-morrow I’ll get you to have a talk with Madeleine for me, Rachel. It’ll be such a help having you to speak the language for me. I don’t know a word of French. Hindustani’s quite another matter, I can get along in that.’

  Madeleine came in at that moment to say that my baggage had arrived and Colonel Pemberton and I went into the hall. There stood the old man with the wide black hat I’d seen when we’d stepped from the vedette. He had a horse and cart and had offered to bring up my things. There were only two taxis on the quay and both had been taken. He immediately began a long conversation with me. Had we all the help we needed in the villa?

  ‘No,’ said Colonel Pemberton. ‘Cynthia really needs a cook. Madeleine’s only cooking to oblige.’ He explained to me how difficult it was to get service in the villas. In addition to the large Anglo-American colony there were so many hotels and pensions.

  ‘The best cook in Dinard is my sister Marie,’ said the old man, ‘but she’ll only work for those she likes.’

  ‘Where is she?’ I asked.

  ‘At home—where else would she be on a Sunday?’ he said simply.

  ‘Tell her to come up as soon as she can so that we can talk to her,’ said the Colonel in his halting French.

  He said he would tell his sister. His name was Yves Duro and his sister was Marie Duro.

  ‘Is she old?’ I asked.

  ‘Compared with you, mademoiselle, she is old—but not too old to do a good day’s cleaning and cook a perfect meal.’

  ‘I want to see the horse, I want to see the horse,’ shouted Claude, escaping from the dining table.

  ‘I’m afraid his manners are pretty awful,’ apologized his father. ‘He’s been brought up by an Indian ayah and Indian servants and he’s very spoiled.’

  I liked old Yves. He had a wrinkled face like a chimpanzee and spoke in a curious way, mixing some strange words with the French ones. I supposed they were Breton. He was devoted to his horse, Napoleon, who could count up to twelve and would knock with his hoof the correct number of times.

  When we returned to the dining-room, Madeleine was placing cheese and fruit on the table.

  ‘Ask her where Claude’s milk pudding is,’ said Cynthia. I asked. Madeleine looked astonished. ‘I didn’t know what she meant so I didn’t do it,’ she said. She went out and began shouting at Yves. Shrieks of laughter amidst loud bumps came from the hall as they carried my trunks up the stairs.

  Just as we were emerging from the room to go into the garden we saw Yves kissing Madeleine most efficiently on the bend of the staircase.

  ‘These French!’ said Cynthia disgustedly. ‘Rachel, tell her we’ll have coffee on the terrace and I don’t want to see that sort of behaviour in my house.’

  I looked up at the laughing rosy face of Madeleine. She had a teasing, taunting look in her dark eyes. It seemed a pity to interrupt her flirtation.

  ‘Please bring the coffee on the terrace—and Madeleine—Madame doesn’t approve of what you are doing. . . .’

  ‘No?’ she called, still laughing. ‘She needn’t envy me. Yves is a dirty old man!’

  His answer to this was to seize her again until he realized that we were all watching in the hall. Then, with a hurried apology, he came down the stairs. As he passed us he said to the Colonel, ‘You must excuse me, Monsieur, but if you have a girl like that in the house you must expect it.’

  ‘Like what?’ I asked.

  ‘Like her,’ he said cryptically, and taking the money for the baggage he went out of the gate.

  It was very hot and still in the September sun, and to sit on the stone terrace under the palm trees with white pebbles under our feet and drinking our coffee to the rhythmic sound of the waves beating against the steps below seemed unbelievable to me. I looked at the water—blue now—as blue as the Mediterranean was on postcards—as blue surely as the Nile to which I was not going because of my behaviour. Well, not only my aunt had palm trees! I had them too—and yuccas. It was glorious!

  Claude came dashing on to the terrace. ‘I don’t want to rest on my bed. I want Rachel to tell me a story.’

&nbs
p; ‘Rachel’s tired. She’s travelled all night.’

  ‘I’m not tired, Mrs. Pemberton,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell him a story.’

  ‘And Rachel, I think you’d better call me Cynthia—after all, I’m not so much older than you!’

  I looked at her in amazement. She was incredibly beautiful—but not old? Her daughter was over fifteen. I was only eighteen. She could easily be my mother.

  ‘Very well,’ I said. ‘If you like it that way.’

  ‘And my husband. Call him Tom.’

  He looked at me whimsically: ‘Rachel can address me as she likes.’

  He looked much older than Cynthia—but his figure was spare and upright like my father’s. They are the sort of men who have no age because they’ve never grown up.

  On the afternoon of his last day in Dinard, Tom Pemberton asked me to go for a walk with him. When Thalia wanted to accompany us he refused her gently. ‘I wanted to have a talk with Rachel.’

  I wondered if all Englishmen found it necessary to take exercise while discussing serious or emotional matters. I remembered how my father invariably took us fishing whenever he had anything unpleasant to say to us. The last expedition after the affair of the portrait had been particularly memorable. He had been talking to me while leaping from rock to rock casting upstream. His eyes had been far out following his fly, his hands busy with his reel. In spite of the difficulty of hearing what he said I could recall every one of his biting remarks.

  We went this afternoon along the cliff walk round the steep sheer cliffs and up to a wild piece of ground, where under pines the bracken was thick and harebells and wild cornflowers grew. Here the path wound round the rock face with a sheer drop of thirty or forty feet to the beach below.

  It was difficult to talk against the wind and watch one’s feet carefully on the rough path, and when at last we sat down on some rocks, looking straight out to sea, Tom Pemberton said: ‘I hope you’re going to be happy here, Rachel, and that you’ll look after Cynthia for me. She’s not very strong, you know. That’s the reason why she’s not coming back with me to India this year. And don’t spoil Claude. He’s a headstrong child and needs a firm rein.’