The Paying Guests(92)

Out in the hall, before she left, Frances saw her looking around in the same noticing way as before. This time the wistfulness in her expression was plain: she was gazing from thing to thing as if to imprint it on her memory. The thought made Frances feel sorry. It seemed to her that, all these years, she had been short-changing Edith slightly. On impulse, she said, ‘You’re going down to the station, I suppose? Let me walk with you.’

‘Oh, Frances, you needn’t.’

But, ‘Yes, do walk Edith to the station,’ said Frances’s mother; and from the manner in which she said it Frances guessed that she would be grateful for some time to herself. So she ran upstairs to change her shoes and to pull on a hat, and she and Edith started down the hill together.

As they passed the gate to the Lambs’, Edith smiled in a troubled way. ‘I remember making this walk with Jack,’ she said, ‘so many times. It doesn’t seem six years, does it, Frances? But then in other ways – I don’t know. They’ve been long years, too. It’s always funny to see these houses, all so unchanged. You’re still friends with the Playfairs, I hope?’

‘Yes, we see Mrs Playfair often. Mr Playfair died, of course. The year before last.’

‘Of course he did. How stupid of me! You told me, and I’d forgotten. A kind man.’

‘Yes, we all liked Mr Playfair.’

‘And how’s your friend? I’ve never asked you.’

‘My friend?’

‘You remember? Carrie, was it?’

Frances, surprised, said, ‘Chrissy, you mean?’

‘The clever girl with all the masses of fair hair. I remember meeting her with you – oh, three or four times. Once just here, on the hill. You don’t remember?’

‘No, I don’t remember that.’

‘But you still see her? You were such great friends. You used to frighten me, the two of you. You had an opinion on everything! I’ve always been so muddle-headed. Mr Pacey calls me his goose. What’s become of her? Did she marry?’

‘She’s living in Town, in a flat, with another girl. Working. She wears her hair very short now.’

‘Oh, what a pity! I used to envy her her hair. Yes, I must have seen her with you three or four times, at least.’

There was nothing behind the comment, Frances decided. The scandal over Christina had happened long after John Arthur’s death, and would never have been allowed to reach Edith. She was simply pulling out these memories in the same wistful way in which, a few minutes before, she had been gazing around the Wrays’ hall at the black oak furniture. She must be thinking still how strange it was that here was a life, a world, of which she might have been a part, a life she had had some claim on all this time, but from the clinging fibres of which she was finally being eased away.

As they drew near to the station entrance they heard the approach of a west-bound train. But there was no question of Edith’s running for it: she let the train go by, and they stood in the shade at the top of the platform steps, waiting for the next one.

Frances said, ‘It was good of you to come to us today, Edith. It was good of you to tell us about Mr Pacey – rather than writing it, I mean. I’m really happy for you.’

‘Are you? I wish I thought your mother was.’

‘Mother is happy for you, too. She will be, anyhow, once she’s had time to take it in.’

‘She was always so kind to me. She thinks I’ve let Jack down. You don’t think that, do you?’

‘Of course not.’

‘You know what he was to me. I shan’t ever forget him. I shall always wear his ring. Mr Pacey is very understanding about that.’ She brought her gloved hands together, as if to reassure herself of the solidity of the metal under the kid – though it was the new ring that her fingers strayed to, Frances noticed, rather than the old.

And she was blushing again – blushing with excitement, with delight, for her unlikely-sounding sweetheart. For, now that they were away from the repressions of the drawing-room, Frances saw the delight for the physical thing it was; she saw it, she recognised it, because it was like her own delight for Lilian. She felt fonder of Edith suddenly than she ever had before – an artificial fondness probably, produced by the currents of the moment, but she thought that Edith also felt the leap of intimacy between them, because she gazed into Frances’s face in a franker way and said, ‘It’s good to see you, Frances! I wish now that I’d kept up with you more. You, and your mother. Are you both all right? Your mother’s quite well? She’s aged, I think, since last year. And you —’

‘What?’ asked Frances, smiling. ‘I don’t look older too, I hope?’

‘Not older, exactly. But – perhaps as though you’re settling into your role?’

Frances was startled. ‘My role?’

‘I don’t mean it badly! But in the past – well, you’ve sometimes seemed not quite happy. Your mother, too. But you must be such a comfort to each other. I’m so glad. – Oh, but I must go!’ Another train was coming. ‘I’ve arranged to meet Herbert – Mr Pacey, I mean – and he fusses if I’m late. Thank you for being so nice to me!’

They shook hands, hurriedly, though she made a point of pressing Frances’s fingers. Then she turned and made her quick, smart way down the steps.