Does your Greta know youre meeting me?
She knows Im meeting someone. Thats all. She doesnt ask questions. She knows Im happy.
After that there was a week when I didnt see Ellie. Her stepmother had come back from Paris, also someone whom she called Uncle Frank, and she explained almost casually that she was having a birthday, and that they were giving a big party for her in London.
I shant be able to get away, she said. Not for the next week. But after that after that, itll be different.
Why will it be different after that?
I shall be able to do what I like then.
With Gretas help as usual? I said.
It used to make Ellie laugh the way I talked about Greta. Shed say, Youre so silly to be jealous of her. One day you must meet her. Youll like her.
I dont like bossy girls, I said obstinately.
Why do you think shes bossy?
By the way you talk about her. Shes always busy arranging something.
Shes very efficient, said Ellie. She arranges things very well. Thats why my stepmother relies on her so much.
I asked what her Uncle Frank was like.
She said, I dont know him really so very well. He was my fathers sisters husband, not a real relation. I think hes always been rather a rolling stone and got into trouble once or twice. You know the way people talk about someone and sort of hint things.
Not socially acceptable? I asked. Bad lot?
Oh, nothing really bad I think, but he used to get into scrapes, I believe. Financial ones. And trustees and lawyers and people used to have to get him out of them. Pay up for things.
Thats it, I said. Hes the bad hat of the family. I expect Id get on better with him than I would with the paragon Greta.
He can make himself very agreeable when he likes, said Ellie. Hes good company.
But you dont really like him? I asked sharply.
I think I do Its just that sometimes, oh I cant explain it. I just feel I dont know what hes thinking or planning.
One of our planners, is he?
I dont know what hes really like, said Ellie again.
She didnt ever suggest that I should meet any of her family. I wondered sometimes if I ought to say something about it myself. I didnt know how she felt about the subject. I asked her straight out at last.
Look here, Ellie, I said, do you think I ought to meet your family or would you rather I didnt?
I dont want you to meet them, she said at once.
I know Im not much I said.
I dont mean it that way, not a bit! I mean theyd make a fuss. I cant stand a fuss.
I sometimes feel, I said, that this is rather a hole and corner business. It puts me in a rather bad light, dont you think?
Im old enough to have my own friends, said Ellie. Im nearly twenty-one. When I am twenty-one I can have my own friends and nobody can stop me. But now you see well, as I say thered be a terrible fuss and theyd cart me off somewhere so that I couldnt meet you. Thered be oh do, do lets go on as we are now.
Suits me if it suits you, I said. I just didnt want to be, well, too underhand about everything.
Its not being underhand. Its just having a friend one can talk to and say things to. Its someone one can she smiled suddenly, one can make-believe with. You dont know how wonderful that is.
Yes, there was a lot of that make-believe! More and more our times together were to turn out that way. Sometimes it was me. More often it was Ellie whod say, Lets suppose that weve bought Gipsys Acre and that were building a house there.
I had told her a lot about Santonix and about the houses hed built. I tried to describe to her the kind of houses they were and the way he thought about things. I dont think I described it very well because Im not good at describing things. Ellie no doubt had her own picture of the house our house. We didnt say our house but we knew thats what we meant
So for over a week I wasnt to see Ellie. I had taken out what savings I had (there werent many), and Id bought her a little green shamrock ring made of some Irish bog stone. Id given it to her for a birthday present and shed loved it and looked very happy.
Its beautiful, she said.
She didnt wear much jewellery and when she did I had no doubt it was real diamonds and emeralds and things like that but she liked my Irish ring.
It will be the birthday present I like best, she said.
Then I got a hurried note from her. She was going abroad with her family to the South of France immediately after her birthday.
But dont worry, she wrote, we shall be back again in two or three weeks time, on our way to America this time. But anyway well meet again then. Ive got something special I want to talk to you about.
I felt restless and ill at ease not seeing Ellie and knowing shed gone abroad to France. I had a bit of news about the Gipsys Acre property too. Apparently it had been sold by private treaty but there wasnt much information about whod bought it. Some firm of London solicitors apparently were named as the purchasers. I tried to get more information about it, but I couldnt. The firm in question were very cagey. Naturally I didnt approach the principals. I palled up to one of their clerks and so got a little vague information. It had been bought for a very rich client who was going to hold it as a good investment capable of appreciation when the land in that part of the country was becoming more developed.
Its very hard to find out about things when youre dealing with really exclusive firms. Everything is as much of a deadly secret as though they were M. I.5 or something! Everyone is always acting on behalf of someone else who cant be named or spoken of! Takeover bids[25] arent in it!
I got into a terrible state of restlessness. I stopped thinking about it all and I went and saw my mother.
I hadnt been to see her for a good long time.
Chapter 6
My mother lived in the same street she had lived in for the last twenty years, a street of drab houses all highly respectable and devoid of any kind of beauty or interest. The front doorstep was nicely whitened and it looked just the same as usual. It was No. 46. I pressed the frontdoor bell. My mother opened the door and stood there looking at me. She looked just the same as usual, too. Tall and, grey hair parted in the middle, mouth like a rat-trap, and eyes that were eternally suspicious. She looked hard as nails angular. But where I was concerned there was a core of softness somewhere in her. She never showed it, not if she could help it, but Id found out that it was there. Shed never stopped for a moment wanting me to be different but her wishes were never going to come true. There was a perpetual state of stalemate between us.
Oh, she said, so its you.
Yes, I said, its me.
She drew back a little to let me pass and I came into the house and went on past the sitting-room door and into the kitchen. She followed me and stood looking at me.
Its been quite a long time, she said. What have you been doing?
I shrugged my shoulders.
This and that, I said.
I shrugged my shoulders.
This and that, I said.
Ah, said my mother, as usual, eh?
As usual, I agreed.
How many jobs have you had since I saw you last?
I thought a minute. Five, I said.
I wish youd grow up.
Im fully adult, I said. I have chosen my way of life. How have things been with you? I added.
Also as usual, said my mother.
Quite well and all that?
Ive no time to waste being ill, said my mother. Then she said abruptly, What have you come for?
Should I have come for anything in particular?
You usually do.
I dont see why you should disapprove so strongly of my seeing the world, I said.
Driving luxurious cars all over the Continent! Is that your idea of seeing the world?
Certainly.
You wont make much of a success in that. Not if you throw up the job at a days notice[26] and go sick, dumping your clients in some heathen town.[27]
How did you know about that?
Your firm rang up. They wanted to know if I knew your address.
What did they want me for?
They wanted to re-employ you I suppose, said my mother. I cant think why.
Because Im a good driver and the clients like me. Anyway, I couldnt help it if I went sick, could I?
I dont know, said my mother.
Her view clearly was that I could have helped it.
Why didnt you report to them when you got back to England?
Because I had other fish to fry, I said.
She raised her eyebrows. More notions in your head? More wild ideas? What jobs have you been doing since?
Petrol pump. Mechanic in a garage. Temporary clerk, washer-up in a sleazy night-club restaurant.
Going down the hill in fact, said my mother with a kind of grim satisfaction.
Not at all, I said. Its all part of the plan. My plan!
She sighed. What would you like, tea or coffee? Ive got both.
I plumped for coffee. Ive grown out of the tea-drinking habit. We sat there with our cups in front of us and she took a home-made cake out of a tin and cut us each a slice.
Youre different, she said, suddenly.
Me, how?
I dont know, but youre different. Whats happened?
Nothings happened. What should have happened?
Youre excited, she said.
Im going to rob a bank, I said.
She was not in the mood to be amused. She merely said:
No, Im not afraid of your doing that.
Why not? Seems a very easy way of getting rich quickly nowadays.
It would need too much work, she said. And a lot of planning. More brainwork than youd like to have to do. Not safe enough, either.
You think you know all about me, I said.
No, I dont. I dont really know anything about you, because you and I are as different as chalk and cheese. But I know when youre up to something. Youre up to something now. What is it, Micky? Is it a girl?
Why should you think its a girl?
Ive always known it would happen some day.
What do you mean by some day? Ive had lots of girls.
Not the way I mean. Its only been the way of a young man with nothing to do. Youve kept your hand in with girls but youve never been really serious till now.
But you think Im serious now?
Is it a girl, Micky?
I didnt meet her eyes. I looked away and said, In a way.
What kind of a girl is she?
The right kind for me, I said.
Are you going to bring her to see me?
No, I said.
Its like that, is it?
No, it isnt. I dont want to hurt your feelings but
Youre not hurting my feelings. You dont want me to see her in case I should say to you Dont. Is that it?
I wouldnt pay any attention if you did.
Maybe not, but it would shake you. It would shake you somewhere inside because you take notice of what I say and think. There are things Ive guessed about you and maybe Ive guessed right and you know it. Im the only person in the world who can shake your confidence in yourself. Is this girl a bad lot whos got hold of you?
Bad lot? I said and laughed. If you only saw her! You make me laugh.
What do you want from me? You want something. You always do.
I want some money, I said.
You wont get it from me. What do you want it for to spend on this girl?
No, I said, I want to buy a first-class suit to get married in.
Youre going to marry her?
If shell have me.
That shook her.
If youd only tell me something! she said. Youve got it badly, I can see that. Its the thing I always feared, that youd choose the wrong girl.
Wrong girl! Hell! I shouted. I was angry.
I went out of the house and I banged the door.
Chapter 7
When I got home there was a telegram waiting for me it had been sent from Antibes.
Meet me tomorrow four-thirty usual place.
Ellie was different. I saw it at once. We met as always in Regents Park and at first we were a bit strange and awkward with each other. I had something I was going to say to her and I was in a bit of a state as to how to put it. I suppose any man is when he comes to the point of proposing marriage.
And she was strange about something too. Perhaps she was considering the nicest and kindest way of saying No to me. But somehow I didnt think that. My whole belief in life was based on the fact that Ellie loved me. But there was a new independence about her, a new confidence in herself which I could hardly feel was simply because she was a year older. One more birthday cant make that difference to a girl. She and her family had been in the South of France and she told me a little about it. And then rather shyly she said:
I I saw that house there, the one you told me about. The one that architect friend of yours had built.
What Santonix?
Yes. We went there to lunch one day.
How did you do that? Does your stepmother know the man who lives there?
Dmitri Constantine? Well not exactly but she met him and well Greta fixed it up for us to go there as a matter of fact.
Greta again, I said, allowing the usual exasperation to come into my voice.
I told you, she said, Greta is very good at arranging things.
Oh all right. So she arranged that you and your stepmother
And Uncle Frank, said Ellie.
Quite a family party, I said, and Greta too, I suppose.
Well, no, Greta didnt come because, well Ellie hesitated, Cora, my stepmother, doesnt treat Greta exactly like that.
Shes not one of the family, shes a poor relation, is she? I said. Just the au pair girl, in fact. Greta must resent being treated that way sometimes.
Shes not an au pair girl, shes a kind of companion to me.
A chaperone, I said, a cicerone, a duenna, a governess. There are lots of words.
Oh do be quiet, said Ellie, I want to tell you. I know now what you mean about your friend Santonix. Its a wonderful house. Its its quite different. I can see that if he built a house for us it would be a wonderful house.