The Manticore

Not Caroline. She hardly touched her wine – the sneak! – but she was very busy guiding the conversation. We all missed Mother dreadfully, but we had to bear up and go on with life. That was what Mother would have wanted. She had been such a gay person; the last thing she would wish would be prolonged mourning. That is, she had been gay until five or six years ago. What had happened? Did Netty know? Mother had trusted Netty so, and of course she knew things that we were not thought old enough to know – certainly not when we had been quite small children, really. But that was long ago. We were older now.

Netty was not to be drawn.

Daddy was away so much. He couldn't avoid it, really, and the country needed him. Mummy must have felt the loneliness. Odd that she seemed to see so little of her friends during the last two or three years. The house had been gloomy. Netty must have felt it. Nobody came, really, except Dunstan Ramsay. But he was a very old friend, wasn't he? Hadn't Daddy and Mummy known him since before they were married?

Netty was a little more forthcoming. Yes, Mr. Ramsay had been a Deptford boy. Much older than Netty, of course, but she heard a few things about him as she grew up. Always a queer one.

Oh? Queer in what way? We had always remembered him coming to the house, so perhaps we didn't notice the queerness. Daddy always said he was deep and clever.

I felt that as host I should get into this conversation – which was really more like a monologue by Caroline, punctuated with occasional grunts from Netty. So I told a few stories about Ramsay as a schoolmaster, and confided that his nickname was Buggerlugs.

Netty said I should be ashamed to use a word like that in front of my sister.

Caroline put on a face of modesty, and then said she thought Mr. Ramsay was handsome in a kind of scary way, like Mr. Rochester in Jane Eyre, and she had always wondered why he never married.

Maybe he couldn't get the girl he wanted, said Netty.

Really? Caroline had never thought of that. Did Netty know any more? It sounded romantic.

Netty said it had seemed romantic to some people who had nothing better to do than fret about it.

Oh, Netty, don't tease! Who was it?

Netty underwent some sort of struggle, and then said if anybody had wanted to know they had only to use their eyes.

Caroline thought it must all have been terribly romantic when Daddy was young and just back from the war, and Mummy so lovely, and Daddy so handsome – as he Still was, didn't Netty think so?

The handsomest man she had ever seen, said Netty, with vehemence.

Had Netty ever seen him in those days?

Well, said Netty, she had been too young to pay much heed to such things when the war ended. After all, she wasn't exactly Methuselah. But when Boy Staunton married Leola Cruikshank in 1924 she had been ten, and everybody knew it was a great love-match, and they were the handsomest pair Deptford had ever seen or was ever likely to see. Nobody had eyes for anyone but the bride, and she guessed Ramsay was like all the rest. After all, he had been Father's best man.

Here Caroline pounced. Did Netty mean Mr. Ramsay had been in love with Mother?

Netty was torn between her natural discretion and the equally natural desire to tell what she knew. Well, there had been those that said as much.

So that was why he was always around our house! And why he had taken so much care of Mother when Father had to be away on war business. He was heart-broken but faithful. Caroline had never heard of anything so romantic. She thought Mr. Ramsay was sweet.

This word affected Netty and me in different ways. Old Buggerlugs sweet! I laughed much louder and longer than I would have done if I had not had two glasses of Burgundy. But Netty snorted with disdain, and there was that in her burning eyes that showed what she thought of such sweetness.

"Oh, but you'd never admit any man was attractive except Daddy," said Caroline. She even leaned over and put her hand on Netty's wrist.

What did Caroline mean by that, she demanded.

"It sticks out a mile. You adore him."

Netty said she hoped she knew her place. It was a simple remark, but extremely old-fashioned for 1942, and if ever I have seen a woman ruffled and shaken, it was Netty as she said it.

Caroline let things simmer down. Of course everybody adored Daddy. It was inescapable. He was so handsome, and attractive, and clever, and wonderful in every way that no woman could resist him. Didn't Netty think so?

Netty guessed that was about the size of it.

Later Caroline brought up another theme. Wasn't it extraordinary that Mother had taken that chill, when everybody knew it was the worst possible thing for her? How could those windows have been open on such a miserable day?

Netty thought nobody would ever know.