Elizabeth Bowen - The Little Girls

THE LITTLE GIRLS

ELIZABETH BOWEN

To Ursula Vernon

Lyrics from The Runaway Train copyright 1925 by Shapiro, Bernstein & Co., 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York. Copyright renewed 1952 and assigned to Shapiro, Bernstein & Co., Inc. International Copyright secured. Used by permission of the publisher.

AVON BOOKS

A division of

The Hearst Corporation

959 Eighth Avenue

New York, New York 10019

Copyright (c) 1963 by Elizabeth Bowen

PART I

One

A man came down the steps cut in the rock. By nature agile, he made the descent with unusual caution, placing each foot first tentatively then extra firmly. He did well tothe steps, inexpertly hewn at some unknown time, were no two alike, and were this evening slippery after rain; moreover, he carried, balanced against his midriff, a lidless white cardboard box toppling with a miscellany of objects.

He arrived on to the floor of a sort of bear pit; that was, a sunken circular court resembling those in which, in old-fashioned zoos, bears keep house and are displayed. This was, if anything, on the large and deep side; it lacked a pole in the middle and had no railing, being overhung round the top by beards of creeper and scrambling and sagging roses. Dahlias bloomed at the head of the steps. Across the uneven rock floor, facing the steps, was either a shallow cave or a deep recessor possibly, unadorned grotto?now fronted by looped-back tarpaulin curtains. Within were trestles, across which boards had been placed; and a woman, intent on what she was doing to the point of trance, could be seen in backview, moving her hands about among the objects crowding the rough table. A jotting-pad, which she from time to time attacked with a stub of pencil, caught such daylight as entered the cave. She may not have heard the man, who was wearing espadrillesshe did not, at any rate, look around.

He said: Here I am.

There you are, she assented, taking his word for it.

Getting on?

This time, instead of answering she came out to meet him, knocking hair back from her forehead with her wrist. Her sweater sleeves were rolled to above the elbows; out of a pocket of her slacks trailed a mans handkerchief with signs of being used as a duster. Shod as he was, she moved as soundlessly, lighting a cigarette as she came. To call her attention to his box, Frank Wilkins gave it a slight rattle. This acted: her fact lit up. Oh, you havel she cried.

What did you think I was up to?

Lets see! She made a grab at the box.

Steady! said he, protecting it. Taken me most of the day, getting these together. Made me quite introspective.

Took your mind off the telephone?

MmI suppose so.

Good.

Amicably going together into the cave, they cleared space on the table and put his box down. He eyed the exhibits already there, if not critically, with no great enthusiasm. Still all look to me very much the same.

Same as last time, or the same as each other?

Same as each other, in pretty much the same way as they did last time. Not had anything new in since?

One lot, but Im hardly surprised if you didnt notice. It is extraordinary, really, isnt it, Frank? I suppose the fact is, people are much the same, if one goes down deep. All the variety seems to be on the surface. When one comes to think, whats amazing is But she broke off, as she often did. She drew once more on her cigarette, let it drop, stamped on it. Look, though, she cried with renewed fervour, Ive been cataloguing, before I forget whats whose. Once I do, therell be little to tell meor indeed anyone.

How you expect posterity to make head or tail of it!

She smiled, otherwise took no notice. There are remarks which, having been once made, are repeated at intervals, on principle: Franks was one of them. Rightly or wrongly, she continued, I never have done a catalogue before; yet this ones beginning to be so exactly like one dont you think? She held the pad with the jottings out at extreme arms length, for admiration. He did not seem able to make sense of it. Oh, bother you, she grumbled, do put your specs on! (That he was known to be slow to do, being loth to.) He objected: Were right in our own light.

They were. Their two tall forms, backs to the entrance, not only overshadowed the table but further darkened the caveblocking away from it outdoor daylight, which, down here, was subdued at the best of times. Only round noon did sun strike the circular pits floor. It now was within an hour or so of sunsetunpent, brilliant after the rainstorm, long rays lay over the garden overhead, making wetness glitter, setting afire September dahlias and roses. Down here, however, it was some other hourpeculiar, perhaps no hour at all.

Why not rig up some sort of lamp? he wanted to know. Dont you see, Dinah, the days will be drawing in.

Dear, theyve begun to! She picked up a leather jerkin and, with his aid, slung it over her shoulders. Then Frank, whatever the visibility, could not resist giving a dig at his boxas nearly dispassionately as possible. A carved bone fan came slithering from the top. Dinah pounced on it, opened it, held it round to the light. This wont do, she declared sadly, its an antique!

It was my grandmothers.

But Frank, darlingno ancestors, we did say!

I should have thought, the fact that Id kept it always

Obsession about it, had you? she asked, more hopefully.

More, theres something of her in me, Ive sometimes thoughtthat is, from what Ive heard of her. In some way or another, a likeness. Though, mind you, I never set eyes on her: she died young.

At least you havent done that.

Looks, morepossibly.

Oh, then a beauty, was she?

Frank, opening his mouth, glanced at Dinah sideways: she looked so bland, he decided she must be mechante. Straightaway, he was furious. Youre going to look on the whole of it as a laugh, this box? As a give-awaythats how you see it, isnt it? he shouted, intercepting her hand on its way back to his box and holding it under arrest, by the wrist, in mid-air. She waited for him to quiet down, then, disengaging her wrist with a gentle tug, said. No; simply as what we agreeda clue for posterity. Or, poser?

Thats what you say, but

None of the others, she said plaintively, made this fuss.

I am not the others!

Oh, no. No, no.

I am not ? he insisted.

No, I tell you. They understood the idea.

Ho, they did, did they?

Before its quite dark, maynt we unpack your box?

So they set to work, racing against the fading of the lighttill, in the silence, a cough was heard from above. It was a compact, contained cough: no other followed. Dinah said: Im sure that is Mrs. Coral. They left the cave, one after the other, both looking up.

Mrs. Coral, cased in a mackintosh amid drippy dahlias, stood looking down at them. Soul of integrity, she as ever held herself wooden-straight. Her wide-boned face with wide eyes and strong, blunted features was like a Saxon carving outside a church; the childlike hat she wore was turned up all round. Stalwart as a fourteen-year-old, Mrs. Coral appeared a typical forty, though past that. She lived, at the other side of the village, in a semi-detached stone villa, and took in students (generally, foreign) from a nearby agricultural institute. Carrying a plastic mesh bag with magazines in it, she took one more step, now, towards the brink of the pit. Good evening, Mrs. Delacroix. Busy, are you?