Part 16 (1/2)

He asked my name, and thumbed down the list painstakingly. 'Daniel Roke to visit Miss Tarren, please show him her room. Yes, that's right. Come on, then.' He got down off his stool, came round from behind his desk, and breathing noisily began to lead me deeper into the building.

There were several twists in the corridors and I could see why it was necessary to have a guide. On every hand were doors with their occupant or purpose written up on small cards let into metal slots. After going up two flights of stairs and round a few more corners, the porter halted outside one more door just like the rest.

'Here you are,' he said unemotionally. 'This is Miss Tarren's room.' He turned away and started to shuffle back to his post.

The card on the door said Miss E. C. Tarren. I knocked. Miss E. C. Tarren opened it.

'Come in,' she said. No smile.

I went in. She shut the door behind me. I stood still, looking at her room. I was so accustomed to the starkness of the accommodation at Humber's that it was an odd, strange sensation to find myself again in a room with curtains, carpet, sprung chairs, cus.h.i.+ons and flowers. The colours were mostly blues and greens, mixed and blending, with a bowl of daffodils and red tulips blazing against them.

There was a big desk with books and papers scattered on it; a bookshelf, a bed with a blue cover, a wardrobe, a tall built-in cupboard, and two easy chairs. It looked warm and friendly. A very good room for working in. If I had had more than a moment to stand and think about it, I knew I would be envious: this was what my father and mother's death had robbed me of, the time and liberty to study.

'Please sit down.' She indicated one of the easy chairs.

'Thank you.' I sat, and she sat down opposite me, but looking at the floor, not at me. She was solemn and frowning, and I rather gloomily wondered if what October wanted her to say to me meant more trouble.

'I asked you to come here,' she started. 'I asked you to come here because...' She stopped and stood up abruptly, and walked round behind me and tried again.

'I asked you to come,' she said to the back of my head, 'Because I have to apologise to you, and I'm not finding it very easy.'

'Apologise?' I said, astonished. 'What for?'

'For my sister.'

I stood up and turned towards her. 'Don't,' I said vehemently. I had been too much humbled myself in the past weeks to want to see anyone else in the same position.

She shook her head. 'I'm afraid,' she swallowed, 'I'm afraid that my family has treated you very badly.'

The silver-blonde hair s.h.i.+mmered like a halo against the pale suns.h.i.+ne which slanted sideways through the window behind her. She was wearing a scarlet jersey under a sleeveless dark green dress. The whole effect was colourful and gorgeous, but it was clearly not going to help her if I went on looking at her. I sat down again in the chair and said with some light-heartedness, as it appeared October had not after all despatched a dressing-down, 'Please don't worry about it.'

'Worry,' she exclaimed. 'What else can I do? I knew of course why you were dismissed, and I've said several times to Father that he ought to have had you sent to prison, and now I find none of it is true at all. How can you say there is nothing to worry about when everyone thinks you are guilty of some dreadful crime, and you aren't?'

Her voice was full of concern. She really minded that anyone in her family should have behaved as unfairly as Patty had. She felt guilty just because she was her sister. I liked her for it: but then I already knew she was a thoroughly nice girl.

'How did you find out?' I asked.

'Patty told me last week-end. We were just gossiping together, as we often do. She had always refused to talk about you, but this time she laughed, and told me quite casually, as if it didn't matter any more. Of course I know she's... well... used to men. She's just built that way. But this... I was so shocked. I couldn't believe her at first.'

'What exactly did she tell you?'

There was a pause behind me, then her voice went on, a little shakily. 'She said she tried to make you make love to her, but you wouldn't. She said... she said she showed you her body, and all you did was to tell her to cover herself up. She said she was so flamingly angry about that that she thought all next day about what revenge she would have on you, and on Sunday morning she worked herself up into floods of tears, and went and told Father... told Father...'

'Well,' I said good humouredly, 'yes, that is, I suppose, a slightly more accurate picture of what took place.' I laughed.

'It isn't funny,' she protested.

'No. It's relief.'

She came round in front of me and sat down and looked at me.

'You did mind, then, didn't you?'

My distaste must have shown. 'Yes. I minded.'

'I told Father she had lied about you. I've never told him before about her love affairs, but this was different... anyway, I told him on Sunday after lunch.' She stopped, hesitating. I waited. At last she went on, 'It was very odd. He didn't seem surprised, really. Not utterly overthrown, like I was. He just seemed to get very tired, suddenly, as if he had heard bad news. As if a friend had died after a long illness, that sort of sadness. I didn't understand it. And when I said that of course the only fair thing to do would be to offer you your job back, he utterly refused. I argued, but I'm afraid he is adamant. He also refuses to tell Mr Inskip that you shouldn't have had to leave, and he made me promise not to repeat to him or anyone what Patty had said. It is so unfair,' she concluded pa.s.sionately, 'and I felt that even if no one else is to know, at least you should. I don't suppose it makes it any better for you that my father and I have at last found out what really happened, but I wanted you to know that I am sorry, very, very sorry for what my sister did.'

I smiled at her. It wasn't difficult. Her colouring was so blazingly fair that it didn't matter if her nose wasn't entirely straight. Her direct grey eyes were full of genuine, earnest regret, and I knew she felt Patty's misbehaviour all the more keenly because she thought it had affected a stable lad who had no means of defending himself. This also made it difficult to know what to say in reply.

I understood, of course, that October couldn't declare me an injured innocent, even if he wanted to, which I doubted, without a risk of it reaching Humber's ears, and that the last thing that either of us wanted was for him to have to offer to take me back at Inskip's. No one in their right mind would stay at Humber's if they could go to Inskip's.

'If you knew,' I said slowly, 'how much I have wanted your father to believe that I didn't harm your sister, you would realise that what you have just said is worth a dozen jobs to me. I like your father. I respect him. And he is quite right. He cannot possibly give me my old job back, because it would be as good as saying publicly that his daughter is at least a liar, if not more. You can't ask him to do that. You can't expect it. I don't. Things are best left as they are.'

She looked at me for some time without speaking. It seemed to me that there was relief in her expression, and surprise, and finally puzzlement.

'Don't you want any any compensation?' compensation?'

'No.'

'I don't understand you.'

'Look,' I said, getting up, away from her enquiring gaze. 'I'm not as blameless as the snow. I did kiss your sister. I suppose I led her on a bit. And then I was ashamed of myself and backed out, and that's the truth of it. It wasn't all her fault. I did behave very badly. So please... please don't feel so much guilt on my account.' I reached the window and looked out.

'People shouldn't be hung for murders they decide not to commit,' she said dryly. 'You are being very generous, and I didn't expect it.'

'Then you shouldn't have asked me here,' I said idly. 'You were taking too big a risk.' The window looked down on to a quadrangle, a neat square of gra.s.s surrounded by broad paths, peaceful and empty in the early spring suns.h.i.+ne.

'Risk... of what?' she said.

'Risk that I would raise a stink. Dishonour to the family. Tarnish to the Tarrens. That sort of thing. Lots of dirty linen and Sunday newspapers and your father losing face among his business a.s.sociates.'

She looked startled, but also determined. 'All the same, a wrong had been done, and it had to be put right.'

'And d.a.m.n the consequences?'

'And d.a.m.n the consequences,' she repeated faintly.

I grinned. She was a girl after my own heart. I had been d.a.m.ning a few consequences too.

'Well,' I said reluctantly, 'I'd better be off. Thank you for asking me to come. I do understand that you have had a horrible week s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g yourself up for this, and I appreciate it more than I can possibly say.'

She looked at her watch, and hesitated. 'I know it's an odd time of day, but would you like some coffee? I mean, you've come quite a long way...'

'I'd like some very much,' I said.

'Well... sit down, and I'll get it.'

I sat down. She opened the built-in cupboard, which proved to hold a wash basin and mirror on one side and a gas ring and shelves for crockery on the other. She filled a kettle, lit the gas, and put some cups and saucers on the low table between the two chairs, moving economically and gracefully. Unselfconscious, I thought. Sure enough of herself to drop her t.i.tle in a place where brains mattered more than birth. Sure enough of herself to have a man who looked like I did brought to her bed-sitting-room, and to ask him to stay for coffee when it was not necessary, but only polite.

I asked her what subject she was reading, and she said English. She a.s.sembled some milk, sugar, and biscuits on the table.