Mistress of the House (8 page)

“I’m not teasing you. If you think you’re going to love me for a long time, then why should
you
doubt my love for you?”

“You’re young, darling.”

“I’m twenty-five. That is old enough to know my own mind. I think you’re making a mountain out of a molehill, Max. And I think you’re a coward, too.”

“To think of your happiness first?”

“Not to think of my happiness at all, but to pander to these silly notions of yours.”

“It isn’t like that at all, darling.”

“Well,” she said, “I suppose the first thing for me to do is to move into the village?”

“Whatever for?”

“Well, can
you
endure the sight of me round the farm all the time? I can’t be so near to you and endure it. I want your arms round me and your voice talking to me. I want all the others out of the way so that you can kiss me. It’ll be bad enough in the village, but I couldn’t stay here.”

“Don’t go away. Don’t leave us altogether, Laurie.”

“There’s no need for me to leave you ever.”

They were silent. After a while, Max sighed and put an arm round her, pulling her close to him. Laurie rested her head on his shoulder, and took his other hand into her own. They thought their own thoughts, and Max struggled with temptation. At last, he freed his hand and turned up her face to kiss her, but when his cheek touched hers, he started back again.

“Laurie,” he said, “you’re crying.” For tears were streaming down her cheeks. “Darling, darling, don’t cry.” Laurie felt for her handkerchief and wiped away the tears.

“Why shouldn’t I cry?” she asked. “I’m so utterly miserable.”

“Oh lord,” said Max in despair. “I don’t want to make you unhappy, Laurie.”

“I know you don’t It doesn’t matter. Only we could so easily be so happy; and
I
know your scruples are quite unnecessary.”

“If I could feel that too, darling...”

She turned suddenly in his arms and faced him. She put both her arms round his neck and kissed him on the lips, pulling herself up against him. He held her tighter to him, and let caution go with the wind, kissing her with rapidly rising passion, crushing her with a strength that Laurie had guessed at, but could scarcely endure. She protested at last, “Darling, I can’t breathe.” He relaxed his hold enough to let her breathe again, but kept her close within the circle of his arms, kissing her lips and her still damp cheeks, rubbing his cheek against her hair. “Laurie, you’re lovely,” he said. And Laurie said nothing at all, relaxed and happy, so completely at home with him that she wondered he could doubt her for a moment.

At last, they moved, and began to walk away from the low wall and the garden. “I have some shutting up to do,” said Max, and Laurie slipped her hand into his arm to go with him. The night was calm and quiet with a sickle moon casting a pale light over the farm buildings and throwing thin shadows across the yard. An owl hooted several times, its cry echoing in the still night “I love it here,” said Laurie.

“But you like living in Town,” he reminded her.

“Only because I’ve always lived there.”

“That could be regarded as another obstacle.”

“If you’re looking for obstacles. I don’t regard it as one.”

“Also—if we married—you would have to live here with my family. I can’t see an alternative.”

“You couldn’t very well turn them out.”

“But it wouldn’t be fair to you.”

Laurie smiled to herself. He had got as far as that had he? She said softly: “That kind of problem can be worked out. That doesn’t frighten me at all. But
you
did.”

“Did?” he said. “In the past tense?”

“Yes. You did. I’m not quite so frightened now.”

“It’s easy to defeat my objections, Laurie. I love you so much.”

“Let’s not talk any more tonight.”

They walked slowly back to the house. In the kitchen the fire was dying, but still glowed red, and the room was warm after the chill of the night outside. The family had gathered in the sitting room, and here it was quiet, the red from the fire reflecting itself in the copper pans and dish covers. Suddenly, for the first time, Laurie thought of it as her home, and the strangeness of it halted her. It was so essentially the Lorneys’ home that she had wondered if she would ever come to think of it as hers.

Max was standing watching her. She turned to him with a smile, fitting into the side of him as his arm went round her. “I’ll go upstairs,” she whispered. “I don’t want to see the family, and I must look a sight.” He kissed her, reluctantly allowed her to go again, and when she had gone, sat down by the dying fire, to light his pipe and ponder on the wisdom of what he had done.

* * *

Next morning, Laurie did not see him until she was setting off for White Lodge. She had crossed the lane and was opening the gate into the wheat field, when his voice called her, and she looked back to see him coming from the side of the house, waving some letters. She paused, and watched him as he limped across to her.

“Good morning,” he said. “Roger met the postman and brought up the letters. Three for you. You’re lucky.” She put them into her pocket for later attention.

“Good morning, Max,” she said, her smile warm for him.

“Did you sleep well?” he asked her.

“Yes. Did you expect me to keep awake, thinking about you?”

“It was what I did.”

“What—lay awake thinking about me?”

“Thinking about us.”

“Oh. I hope they were pleasant thoughts.”

“They were rather worrying ones.”

She smiled at him so lovingly that he looked away quickly.

“Love me?” she asked softly.

He shook his head.

“No. Not a bit,” he told her.

“Oh, don’t joke about it.”

“Why not?”

“I’m not sure enough of it yet. When you’ve loved me for about ten years, and I’m quite certain about it, then you can joke as much as you like.”

“You’re a determined young woman, Laurie—taking everything as settled.”

“I’m not really. I’m just trying to make you think of it as settled.” She hesitated, and then added: “I’m not usually so pushing, Max, darling.” Another hesitation and then she laughed at him: “Usually,” she said, “I have to be discouraging, rather than encouraging.”

“It’s only,” he apologized, “the unusual circumstances.”

“I know. I wish I could kiss you, but somebody might see. I must go to work, or I shall be late. Goodbye, Max.”

“Goodbye, Laurie.”

He opened the gate for her and she went through. He stood and watched her for a few seconds and then went back to the house, still worried, feeling that he must think for Laurie, too, and decide what was best for her.

Laurie walked as far as the little wood, and then paused to read her letters. Two of them were chatty letters from friends, and having skimmed them, she put them away for the time being and turned to the one from her mother. As she read this one, she smiled with pleasure, for her mother had decided to come and see her at the weekend, staying at the village inn, the description of which in Laurie’s letters, had suggested that it would be a most suitable place. She did not want to burden the Lorneys, even if they wanted to have her, and she thought that she and her daughter would have more time to themselves than in the middle of a big family. Laurie immediately began to make plans. She would go back to the farm this afternoon via the village, and stop at the inn to arrange accommodation for herself and her mother, for she had at once decided to spend the weekend entirely with her. ‘And then, of course,’ she thought, ‘I can tell her about Max, and she can meet him and see how thoroughly nice and desirable he is.’ This pleased her immensely. She and Max could have gone to London, but this would have put Max at a disadvantage. Here, in his own place, he would be much more comfortable and natural. All day, she glowed with the happy feeling that everything was happening aright.

That evening, she held herself very still and quiet. She felt that she was swamping Max, and now she would not do anything until he had made a move. He must not feel that she was trying to manage him: now that he knew that she loved him, it was up to him. So she went to her room after tea and stayed there, occupied with odd jobs of mending, until supper time, and later, she sat with Aunt Hilda in the sitting room until the rest of the family joined them. Roger read a detective novel, oblivious to everything going on round him. Jessica was helping her mother with the mending, but stopped frequently to twiddle the knobs of the radio, trying to find dance music. Aunt Hilda sat majestically doing nothing, and Laurie worked on a tapestry chair seat and wondered what Max could be doing.

When she had almost given up hope of seeing him, and Mrs. Lorney was talking about a cup of coffee all round before bed, he suddenly put his head round the door.

“Laurie here?” he asked. “Oh, there you are. I wonder if you’d mind helping me out with a little typing? I’ve been doing it, but it’s going to take me all night.”

“Of course,” she said, very polite, a little distant, rising and folding up her embroidery.

“Oh, don’t worry Laurie at this time of the evening,” said his mother. “It’s almost bedtime.”

“I don’t mind a bit,” said Laurie, going to the door. “I was just going to make the coffee, too.”

“Well, save us some, darling,” said Max, and closed the door between Laurie and himself, and the rest of the family.

He had been copying an article, lent him by a farmer friend. Laurie had wondered if the article was a ruse, but there was quite a lot of it to type. She began to despatch it as speedily as possible.

“It’s a pleasure to watch you,” said Max, “you’re so efficient.”

“Why didn’t you fetch me before?”

“I almost did, but I thought if you wanted to see me, you would come.”

“I wanted to, but I was too shy.”

“Not you, Laurie.”

“Yes. Honestly.”

She pulled the last page out of the typewriter, and handed it to him. He put it down unheeded on the table and came to stand beside her. He put his hands on her shoulders and leaned over her shoulder to kiss her cheek. She rose and faced him, and he took her into his arms. “I’ve been thinking about you all day,” he said.

“Yes?”

“Laurie, I want to marry you. I’ve wanted it, actually, for some time past—without ever thinking of it as possible. I love you most sincerely. It’s only you that I’m worried about.”

“Please don’t be.”

“Do you really want to marry me—want to take me on in spite of the way things are.”

“I want to most terribly.”

“Then—will you, darling?”

“Oh Max. I will.”

They kissed, so gently and calmly that Laurie felt a deep peace and tranquility. She was convinced that this was the right thing for them both. “Max, I’m so happy,” she said in a low voice, her face against his shoulder.

After a while, they remembered the coffee waiting for them.

“Are we going to tell them?” asked Max.

“Must we? Do you think they will approve?”

“Why not?”

“Jessica will hate it. Let’s wait and tell your mother first—by herself.”

“Perhaps that would be better. Come along then.” They went back to the sitting room, to find that Jessica and Hilda had gone to bed. Laurie, feeling that she was having a difficulty in hiding her joy and happiness, was relieved. Roger, deep in his detective story, noticed nothing, but Mrs. Lorney was well aware that something was going on between them.

“I forgot to tell you,” said Laurie. “My mother is coming down for the weekend. You gave me her letter this morning, Max. So I went to the inn on my way back, and booked a nice double room. I thought I would stay there with her for the three nights.”

Max looked up quickly. Mrs. Lorney said: “Oh, but Laurie, you should have asked her to stay here.”

“But I didn’t want to give you still more work to do. Nor did mother. She suggested the inn. But I’m sure she would love to come up and meet you all.”

“Yes, you must bring her to tea and supper. Max will pick you up in the car, won’t you, Max?”

“Certainly,” said Max, worrying over a fresh problem. How would Laurie’s mother take to him as a son-in-law, he wondered. She could scarcely be expected to view his lameness with as lenient an eye as her daughter’s. Laurie saw immediately what worried him, and when Mrs. Lorney went out to the kitchen with the coffee cups, and Laurie followed to help wash them, she paused at Max’s chair.

“She’s
very
nice,” she whispered. “You’ll like her immensely.”

“What’s more important is whether she will like me.”

“She’ll love you, as I do. We always like the same people.”

He grimaced at her and she went out to the kitchen.

* * *

On Friday evening, Laurie went down to the village, carrying a small suitcase, and installed herself at the inn. Her mother arrived on the bus a little later, in time to have dinner with her daughter. At the farm, Max thought the place was disproportionately empty for her going, and found it difficult to realize that it had always been like this before her coming. But without her, it was obvious to all of them that Jess was a happier person. She felt lighter of heart, and they could all see it. She chattered all through supper and was brighter than she had been for weeks. Mrs. Lorney who had been told of the engagement between Max and Laurie, wondered how Jess would take that item of news. She, for her part, thoroughly approved of Laurie. She had intelligence, charm, gaiety, and, obviously a great love for Max and a willingness to fit herself in with the farm life. They had still to arrange many details, but Mrs. Lorney felt that Laurie would be entirely good for her son.