The Beaufort Sisters Read online

  Tim fought his way to his feet, hitting out indiscriminately; a man he worked with every day, blind with rage, threw a punch at him and he just managed to duck under it. Choked with dust, blinded by sweat, gasping for breath in the stifling heat, he found himself being swept round in the mob as in a whirlpool. Suddenly he was on the edge of the big melée, but in a worse position; he thudded up against the railings of a yard, felt a searing pain across his belly as a steer’s horn swept by. He was spreadeagled against the fence, the fighting crowd behind him hammering him there; right in front of him the stampeding cattle thundered by, eyes white-wild, their bellowing as brutally bruising as if they were running him down. Their horns went dangerously close as some of them thudded into the fence; he fought to push himself away from the railings but the crowd threw its weight against him, unaware of him. For a moment he thought of trying to climb over the fence, but knew at once that that would mean almost certain death.

  He began to fight his way along the fence, punching and swiping at everyone in his way. He had almost reached the edge of the crowd when something hit him behind the ear; he went down, dazed, had no strength to pull himself up again. Then he felt someone lifting him, a black man who was faintly familiar; he clung to the man as the latter began to drag him out of the riot. He was dimly aware of a policeman appearing out of nowhere, baton raised; the black man let go of Tim with one hand, swung at the policeman and the latter went down. Tim was dragged over the fallen officer, then the black man picked him up in a fireman’s lift and carried him out of the yelling, struggling crush and down the road. He was dumped into the seat of a car that was also vaguely familiar, he felt someone kiss him, then he passed out.

  ‘Get going, Miz Nina!’

  Nina swung the MG round, ignoring the shouts of the police sergeant as he ran down towards them, and took the car down the road with a screech of tyres.

  9

  ‘Disgraceful!’ Lucas looked as if his bones wanted to blow him apart; all arms and legs and rigid body, he stalked up and down his study. ‘The papers have got on to the story! The two of you down there like damned agitators. And George hitting that policeman – Goddam it, what got into you?’

  ‘You can’t blame George for anything he did – he was just trying to rescue Tim.’

  Nina had never seen her father so angry; but she was surprised at her own total unconcern for his reaction. All she cared about at the moment was Tim, lying in their bedroom in the house across the lawns with twelve stitches in the wound in his belly, two broken ribs and a slight concussion. She was off-balance emotionally, as if there had been a subsidence within her, a breaking-up of levels that had sustained her all her life up till now. There had been worries and doubts in the sixteen months she had been married to Tim, all brought on by Tim’s sometimes prickly attitude towards her father: there had never been any open quarrel but at best his attitude had always been one of guarded geniality, his smile not hypocritical but a defence that neither of her parents had recognized as such and had never penetrated. The evidence had been growing in her mind for months, but only today had it all suddenly formed itself into a pattern that she acknowledged. It was no news to her that Tim had never really accepted her father, but it had come as a shock to learn that her father returned the attitude.

  ‘I’ve had to talk to the chief of police, get him to drop the charge against George. Damn it, you know what they could do to him – a Negro hitting a white officer! And you took George down there with you, let him get into that situation!’

  ‘I didn’t do any such thing!’ She never had fought with her father like this; she burned with both shame and temper. ‘George came of his own accord – to help me. And he went into the mob to help Tim because he had some spark of humanity in him – something I think you’ve forgotten!’

  She had hurt him, she could see that, but he wasn’t a weak man: he did not retreat behind a whine of reproach for her betrayal. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about. The company has always been fair with its workers – it isn’t inhumane to object to their greediness. They get a fair share in wages of the profits – ’

  ‘It’s nothing to the money we have!’

  ‘Don’t be naïve. You don’t run a business that way. The Cattle Company has to pay its own way – whatever else we have doesn’t enter into it. You’re talking like some woolly-minded socialist. If you got that from your husband – ’

  ‘I didn’t get it from my husband – he has a name or have you put it out of your mind? He’s never attempted any propaganda with me – I think he’d laugh his head off if you called him a socialist. I worked it out for myself – I think the men are entitled to what they’re asking for.’

  ‘They get a living wage – ’

  ‘A living wage isn’t enough! God, Daddy, you’re still in the last century – I don’t think I’ve ever looked at you properly. Grandfather must have put blinkers on you when you were born – ’

  Her voice had risen; she was almost shouting. The study door opened and Edith came in quickly, closing it behind her. ‘I told myself I was not going to interfere. But this has gone on long enough and loudly enough – too loud, all the servants can hear you. I think you had better apologize to your father, Nina, then go home and cool down. You’d better cool down, too, Lucas – your voice has been just as loud as hers.’

  ‘I’m not going to apologize! Tell your husband to come into the twentieth century – he just doesn’t know what’s going on in the world!’

  ‘My husband?’ said Edith.

  But Nina had already rushed out of the room, past George Biff standing in the hall, his face grey with pain and emotion; then she was running across the lawns, through the afternoon heat, like someone fleeing a catastrophe she couldn’t face. Margaret and Sally, coming up from the tennis court, called to her, but she didn’t hear them. She ran towards her own house, tears streaming down her face, but even in her distress she knew the house was no real haven, that it had never really belonged to her and Tim. It had been a gift from her parents and she ran now through the strings that bound it to the big house that dominated the park.

  Tim lay flat on his back in the bed, a low pillow under his head. He tried to sit up when she came into the room, but winced in pain and lay back at once. ‘What’s the matter? For Christ’s sake – Nina! What happened?’

  She had flopped on the foot of the bed, hand over her face, her head shaking from side to side. She struggled to control herself, the sobs coming up as great gobs of pain in her chest. He reached for her, but she got up and moved away, waving a dumb hand for him to remain lying down and not hurt himself. She should have stayed downstairs till she had composed herself, but she had come headlong up the stairs to the one true haven that was all her own, him.

  He waited impatiently for her to tell him what had happened. At last she was in control of herself, had cooled down, as her mother had advised; she was tearless now, dried-out and cold, more than just cool. She told herself she owed no more allegiance to her mother and father.

  ‘I got nowhere with Daddy.’ She told Tim all that had been said and argued in her father’s study; as she talked, she felt the distance increasing between her parents’ house and her own. ‘He’s hopeless – he’ll never see things our way.’

  He misunderstood her, thinking she was talking only about the strike. ‘Bumper phoned me – the men are going back to work. They haven’t announced it yet, but Bumper says they’ve all recognized now that they can’t win.’

  She had to concentrate to think about the events of the morning: she had been preoccupied with the wide empty horizon of the future. ‘Oh – you mean they’re giving up? So easily?’

  ‘Don’t criticize them. It’s too easy for us – ’

  ‘But you were hurt – for them! Daddy will laugh at us – ’

  ‘I don’t think he’s that heartless or undiplomatic.’

  She moved up closer to him on the bed, took one of his bandaged hands in hers. ‘Darling, let’s go
away.’

  He stared at her closely, his eyes wary in his bruised and grazed face. ‘You don’t mean just for a holiday, do you?’

  ‘No, I mean move away from here, go somewhere else to live. Anywhere – I don’t care – ’

  ‘I think you’d better sleep on it – ’

  ‘I don’t want to sleep on it! For God’s sake, stop being so damn careful of me – I’m not doing this just for you! I’m thinking of me – of us, both of us. And Michael – ’ She was infested with pessimism, was building fears on fears without any real foundation. She had been too well protected, even from the knowledge that her father had another set of loyalties, ones outside that to her and her sisters. ‘Let’s go to England! You’d like that – ’

  He searched her face as if it were strange territory: he had never known her to look and sound like this. He sensed the seriousness in her: what she had just suggested may have come off the top of her head, but she felt it deeply. The decision she had made was bigger than her decision to marry him. But he wasn’t hurt by it.

  ‘All right, we’ll go back to England. But you have to promise me – we tell your parents together and you have to make them understand it was a joint decision on our part.’

  ‘But it isn’t – ’

  ‘Yes, it is. You may have suggested it, but you’re not to tell them you did. You’ll hurt them enough just by going – you don’t have to rub it in by letting them know you had to talk me into it.’

  It was her turn to look searchingly. ‘Why are you being so careful of their feelings? They’ve never been that way about yours.’

  ‘I’m being careful for your sake, darling heart. You may want to come back here some day – ’

  ‘Never – ’

  He shook his head on the pillow. ‘You’ll want to come back. Perhaps not to live, but you’ll want to come back for visits, long ones. There’s not just your parents – there are your sisters. You’re too attached to them to want to turn your back on them.’

  10

  Lucas and Edith took the news as Nina had expected: as if she had turned a gun on them. Lucas did not speak to her for two days, going out of his way to avoid her. But Edith, after her initial shock, did not surrender her daughter without a fight.

  ‘If we’ve made mistakes, Nina, then all I can ask is that you forgive us. It won’t happen again.’

  ‘It will, Mother. Daddy will never change. He thinks he owns us. Not just all of us, but Tim, too.’

  ‘You’re mistaking love for ownership. Maybe he shows it the wrong way, but it is love. I know him better than you.’

  ‘That’s why you can make excuses for him. But I can’t, Mother – not any longer.’

  Then she tried to explain her departure to her sisters. She got them together in what had been the old nursery and was now a games and television room. But all the artefacts of their childhood were still there: dolls, toys, finger-paintings. It was a museum now for the older girls, but it was Prue’s retreat and domain. She was delighted to have her sisters as her guests. She sat playing with her dolls, only occasionally cocking an ear to the conversation. But Margaret and Sally were in tears.

  ‘Oh God!’ wailed Sally. ‘We’ll miss you terribly!’

  Margaret wiped her eyes. ‘I suppose I knew marriage was going to break us up some day. But not like this. Daddy is like a zombie.’

  ‘I think I’d like a zombie doll,’ said Prue.

  ‘Oh God,’ said Sally; then wiped her eyes. ‘If you go, Nina, can I have your MG?’

  ‘How mercenary can you get?’ said Margaret. ‘Nina, how does Tim feel? We’re going to miss him as much as you. He’s part of the family.’

  ‘That’s just what he’s not. Daddy doesn’t think so. Will you come and see us when we’re in England?’

  ‘Of course,’ said all three; then all four of them had another big weep. ‘God, it’s just awful!’

  Later Margaret walked back with Nina to the Davoren house. Purple clouds boiled above then and a wind whipped the trees to life. There were tornadoes further south, but so far no warnings had been issued for this area. It was a good day for being miserable.

  ‘If there’s anything I can do to help – ’

  ‘Better not take sides,’ said Nina, linking her arm in her sister’s. She had never been as close to Margaret as to Sally and Prue, but now she was grateful for Meg’s comfort and presence. She wanted someone to talk to, and her mother had failed her. ‘Just watch out when it comes time for you to fall in love. Please yourself, not Daddy. Is there anyone you’re serious about right now?’

  ‘No.’ But Margaret seemed to close up; Nina felt her arm stiffen slightly within her own. ‘Well, maybe. But we haven’t talked about it. I could be crazy about someone else this time next year. Did you fall in and out of love once a month when you were my age?’

  ‘I was crazy for half a dozen boys. It was a wonder I didn’t have half a dozen babies.’

  ‘You mean you went all the way with all of them?’

  Nina laughed, beginning to feel a little better. Her sisters were indeed a comfort, she really was going to miss them. ‘I always said No at the last moment. I must have been a terrible tease. But I was afraid of losing them. I’m – I don’t know, I used to fall in love too easily. I did with Tim, all in a weekend.’

  ‘You’re not sorry about that, for God’s sake?’ Margaret pulled up, her arm jerking Nina to a halt.

  ‘Of course not. But I break out in a cold sweat sometimes. I mean I might have missed him, never met him, if I’d married one of the others.’

  Margaret nodded. ‘I know what you mean. I’m trying to teach myself to be patient. But it’s hard, isn’t it? Oh, there’s Tim! I didn’t know he was up.’

  ‘He’s not supposed to be.’

  But Tim was sitting in an armchair on the wide rear porch, a book open on his knees, a pitcher of lemonade on the cane table beside him. Inger, the maid, hovered over him, a Swedish angel who would gladly have fallen if the master had tempted her. Nina had already decided that, if she and Tim had not been leaving, then Inger would have had to go.

  The maid went back into the house and Nina and Margaret sat down on either side of Tim. ‘Who helped you out of bed? Inger Nightingale?’

  ‘Only after she’d given me some Swedish massage. They have some marvellous ways with their hands – ’ He grinned at her, then at Margaret. ‘When you marry, Meg, don’t be jealous of your maids. No husband in his right mind would ever dally so close to home. What do you think of our news?’

  ‘I’m heart-broken. But I think you’re doing the right thing. I just wish you didn’t have to go all that way, to England.’

  Nina picked up the book from his lap. ‘All the King’s Men.’

  ‘I thought it was about your father.’ Then he pressed her hand. ‘Sorry. I shouldn’t make snide remarks like that.’

  She kissed him and went inside to supervise Michael’s lunch. Tim watched her go. ‘I hope she knows what she’s doing, Meg. It’s going to be a bigger wrench for her than she realizes.’

  Tears suddenly sprang into Margaret’s eyes, surprising him: she had always struck him as the least emotional of the sisters. ‘Oh Tim, why did it have to happen?’

  ‘I don’t really know. The fault isn’t all your father’s. Just learn from our mistakes. Be sure the man you marry will be one your father approves of. You may have to wait till the right one comes along, I mean a chap you love who also meets your father’s approval, but it’ll be worth it. Don’t let some chap bugger up things for you the way I have for Nina.’

  ‘You haven’t – buggered up things for her. She loves you – isn’t that all that matters? I just hope I’m as lucky as she is.’

  ‘You’re sweet.’ He put a finger against her cheek. ‘Just take care. You Beaufort girls have got everything in the world but a guarantee of happiness. And nobody has that.’

  Chapter Three

  Nina

  1

  By the time the Davorens
were ready to leave for England, Lucas had thawed out towards both of them. It was not in his nature to beg forgiveness and he could only go just so far in his rapprochement with them. He left it to Edith to make a last-minute effort to talk Nina and Tim into staying.

  ‘I’m sorry, Mother. I’m glad we’re friends again with Daddy, but I think we need to get away from him. For a while, anyway. Once we’re on the other side of the Atlantic, maybe he’ll learn not to be so possessive.’

  Edith, standing amidst the Sèvres china, the Persian rugs, the silk drapes, said, ‘I feel like a mother must have felt a hundred years ago when her family left her and headed West.’

  Nina laughed, a little too heartily; but it was a good excuse to let out some of the emotion in her. ‘You don’t really think you’re a pioneer woman!’

  Edith had not lost her sense of humour. She looked about her, then laughed and took her daughter, the pioneer sailing for England, in her arms. ‘You know what I mean. I never dreamed I’d be losing any of you – ’

  ‘You’re not losing us, Mother. You’ll just have to get used to the idea that the world has got bigger.’

  Even Lucas, when it came time to say goodbye, conceded that fact. ‘We’re investing overseas – in oil, for a start. I suppose it was inevitable. Can’t get used to it, though. I don’t like the thought of foreigners telling me what I can do with my money.’

  ‘Why are you doing it then?’ said Tim, more at ease with Lucas than Lucas was with him. ‘You don’t need the money.’

  ‘Washington approached us. I never thought I’d be doing that feller Truman a favour, but he is the President, God help us. They want us to expand over there in the Middle East before the Russians get in. Beaufort Oil is going into a place called Abu Sadar on the Persian Gulf.’