Mourning Doves. Helen Forrester
and it is difficult for us to know what we are signing – we can read it – but understanding is something different. Did you understand the papers that you signed for Mr Barnett and the estate agent the other day?’
Louise was frightened. ‘Not really; they both said they gave them permission to sell the house and for the agent to charge me a commission for doing it. Should I have had a solicitor of my own? Albert said I should sign – and he was once a solicitor himself.’ She looked helplessly up at Celia.
‘Try not to worry, Mama. The papers probably are all right.’ How could she say to her mother that it was Albert Gilmore himself about whom she felt doubtful? She finally replied carefully, ‘I know he was a solicitor. But he’s looking after the will – which is Father’s affair. You don’t have anybody. Perhaps there should be someone who is interested only in your affairs.’
‘Yes, dear. I see.’ Louise was trembling with apprehension as she began slowly to get out of bed. Her huge, lace-trimmed cotton nightgown caught in the bedclothes, and momentarily a fine pair of snow-white legs were exposed to the spring sunlight pouring through the windows.
She hastily hitched her gown more modestly round her, but not before Celia had the sudden realisation that, though her mother always appeared old to her and her face petulant, she was extremely well preserved, with a perfect skin and luxuriant hair.
She might marry again. And, if she did, where would I be? she asked herself fearfully.
She swallowed hard. She had enough to worry about without anything else.
She said carefully, as she moved out of Louise’s way, ‘Perhaps Mr Carruthers at the bank could recommend a solicitor to us. We could ask him.’
As Louise nodded agreement, they both heard the front door bell faintly tinkling in the kitchen.
‘I think that will be Phyllis. She left her card yesterday when we were out, and said she would come again today. There are some cards on the tray for you, too. Will you be all right, Mother, if I go down? We could walk round to the bank this afternoon. Phyllis won’t stay long.’
Louise was already on her way to the bathroom and in the distance they could hear Dorothy running across the hall to answer the front door. Over her shoulder, Louise agreed resignedly, and then said in a more normal voice, ‘Really, Phyllis should not be walking out in her condition.’
‘Times have changed, Mother. Ladies-in-waiting go about a lot more than they used to do.’
‘A true gentlewoman would not!’ The remark sounded so much more like her mother’s usual disapproval of Phyllis that Celia was quite relieved. Louise had disapproved of Phyllis ever since she had first appeared at the front door, when she was nine years old, to ask if Celia could come out to play hopscotch. In Louise’s opinion, the daughter of a carriage builder – a tradesman – was no companion for the granddaughter of a baronet and daughter of a prominent businessman in commerce. The girls had, however, clung to each other. Both were lonely and shy, great bookworms, and were over-protected – Phyllis because she was a precious only child and Celia because she was to be kept at home as a companion-help. Neither was allowed to mix very much with other children.
Celia let her mother cross the passage to the bathroom, and then ran lightly down the stairs, to be enveloped – as far as was possible – in her friend’s arms.
With a toddler clinging to her hand, Phyllis greeted her friend tenderly. ‘I’m so sad for you and for Mrs Gilmore. It must be terrible for you.’
‘Thank you, dear. How are you?’
The inquiry did not need a reply. Phyllis was her usual untidy self. Her hair below her wide-brimmed beige hat was threatening to fall down her back at any minute, and her face was drained of colour, except for black rings round her tired eyes. Her long black skirt, which had dog hairs on it, half-covered her swollen ankles. To disguise her pregnancy, she wore an out-of-fashion cheviot cape of her mother’s which barely met across her swollen stomach.
Phyllis simply grimaced in response to Celia’s mechanical inquiry, and then shrugged as if to convey that her well-being was of no consequence.
Celia went down on her knees to ask the toddler, ‘And how’s little Eric today?’
Eric turned away from her and buried his grubby, marmalade-smeared face in his mother’s skirt. Celia smiled and patted his flaxen head as she got up again.
‘Come into the breakfast room. There’s a good fire there. Dorothy hasn’t done the sitting room yet.’
Phyllis sighed with relief as she sank into Louise’s favourite chair. It was upholstered in faded green velveteen and was armless, which allowed space for the stout or pregnant to spread their skirts comfortably around them. She remarked with feeling, ‘I shall be thankful when my little burden arrives.’
‘It can’t be long now, can it?’ Celia asked. Though Phyllis had explained to her how dreadfully vulgar were the things a husband did to you which led to having a baby, Celia had never liked to inquire how long it took the baby to grow.
‘Any time now, the midwife thinks. This morning she advised that I should stay close to home.’ She shifted uneasily in her chair, and then went on, ‘You always get hours of warning, though, so I thought I should squeeze in a visit to you. You and Mrs Gilmore must be absolutely devastated.’
Celia nodded. She did not know how to explain what she was feeling, because after her little talk with Winnie in the basement kitchen she had sensed in herself a stirring of relief.
She had realised suddenly that she was not grieving for her father so much as she was upset at her own lack of competence in dealing with the disarray he had left behind him. He had been very hard to live with; and she had to admit that she had not, in the past week, missed his hectoring voice criticising some alleged fault in her behaviour.
To cover her confusion at Phyllis’s remark, she glanced round to check on little Eric.
She saw that he had discovered one of the household cats asleep on what had been Timothy Gilmore’s chair. He was nuzzling into the animal’s long black fur. It seemed to be tolerating him quite well, so she asked Phyllis if she was comfortable in the chair in which she was sitting. Having been assured ruefully that she was – as far as it was possible to be comfortable in her situation – Celia asked, ‘How many babies do you want to have, Phyllis?’
Phyllis laughed. She said cynically. ‘I don’t have any say in the matter. They simply come.’
‘Does it hurt?’
‘Yes – and it makes you so tired afterwards and you want to cry a lot. And husbands don’t like that, of course.’ Phyllis winced under her breath and straightened her back.
Celia drew a stool towards the fire, so that she could sit close to her friend. ‘Perhaps, when Mr Woodcock progresses in his career, you will be able to have a nanny as well as your maid?’ she suggested. She leaned forward to tug at the bell pull hanging beside the fireplace, to call Dorothy and ask her to bring some coffee.
Phyllis slowly drew off her black gloves, as she replied, ‘I hope so.’
Long ago, she had, when Celia had asked her, told her frankly the basic facts of sexual intercourse and that it was a right of a man to demand it of his wife. Poor Phyllis had gone into her marriage totally ignorant of what it implied, and had been so shocked and her husband so clumsy that she had never enjoyed it. She endured it as best she could – and the babies came, and her husband grew ever more irritable and hard to live with. Neither she nor Celia, therefore, had any idea that intercourse could be pleasurable. It was popular to coo over babies and forget what went beforehand.
Celia did not know the details of Phyllis’s marriage, but she did understand that her friend was worn out and unhappy, and she had long since