Complete Short Stories (VMC) by Elizabeth Taylor Page B

chilling, the clay paths slippery in wet weather; the creaking trees were clotted with rooks’ nests, and the rooks themselves filled the air with commotion, restlessly calling, circling, dropping again and again to the branches.
    Robert had brought her here on her first day when he had shown her round; he had taken a key from his pocket and unlocked the door for her. The cave-smell was unpleasant to breathe, but she had marvelled aloud at the interior. The walls and domed roof were encrusted with shells in fan patterns set in cement. Light from the coloured glass in the windows shone in patches.
    Now she could only stand on tiptoe at the door and look through thewire-covered glass-panel. The piece of china from her pocket she forced through the wire and broken pane. It struck the stone floor inside.
    ‘Were you trying to get in?’ Hugh asked her; shouting rather, above the noise of the rooks.
    ‘No, it is always locked.’
    ‘Did I surprise you? I saw you come this way when I was down at the nets with some of the boys. I meant to ask you before dinner if you’d come for a walk, but there was all that rumpus about the ornament – put it out of my mind; I mean I hadn’t a chance. Of course, she has some nice things – Madam, Muriel, that is – and she thinks a lot of them: naturally.’
    ‘They were her mother’s.’
    ‘Nice diamonds, too, Rex was saying.’
    ‘Yes.’
    Hugh began to perceive that Hester lacked interest in Muriel’s possessions.
    ‘Never having had anything very valuable myself,’ he said, ‘it is hard for me to understand anyone being as upset as she was tonight.’
    ‘It is because she hasn’t anything valuable,’ Hester said. ‘And she knows it.’
    ‘Children, you mean?’
    ‘Partly.’
    They walked down the winding path. Two boys were kneeling by some flint steps, looking for lizards under the stones. Hugh had a little patronising chat with them, then he and Hester walked on again. The boys exchanged slow winks.
    ‘Did you ever see that horrible old baggage again?’ Hugh asked. ‘The one with the cat.’
    ‘No. Not again.’
    ‘Are you happy here?’
    ‘Not very.’
    This was so promising that he made no answer until they reached the seat in the laurel walk where Muriel and Beatrice had sat and talked; then, when he was sitting at Hester’s side, he asked, ‘Why aren’t you happy?’ Looking round carefully, he made sure there were no boys about, and took her hand.
    ‘I am in the way, you see,’ Hester said gravely. ‘I ought not to be here.’
    When he took her other hand and drew nearer to her, she seemed not to notice. Although her indifference was in a sense discouraging to him, it allowed him to proceed without hindrance. He kissed her, but still looking rather mopishly before her, she said: ‘I didn’t want to harm anyone. Not even someone I hate.’
    ‘You couldn’t harm anyone,’ he said. ‘You are so entirely gentle.’
    Some boys shouted in the distance, and he moved promptly aside, leant forward, his elbows on his knees, in an attitude of serious but impersonal discussion. But the voices faded and no one came. A bell rang, and he muttered, ‘Thank God for that,’ and turned again to Hester and took her in his arms.
    In the morning, Muriel questioned the maids, Lucy and Sylvia. One showed transparent surprise and concern; the other haughty offendedness: and since both reacted in their own ways as their innocence dictated, Muriel said no more. She often boasted that she knew at once when people were lying, not realising how little this endeared her to anyone, least of all to Hester who, never very honest in the easiest of times, was lately finding it almost impossible to tell the truth.
    One thing Hester was determined on and it was to avoid being left alone with Muriel. She managed this all morning and was about to manage it after lunch as she followed Robert to his study, when Muriel, letting her reach the door, said: ‘Oh, Hester! If you wouldn’t