The Angel in the Corner - Monica Dickens [144]
He was snoring now. Virginia could hear him across the passage. Her father had never snored like that. But his bedroom was on the floor below; she would not have heard him. Yet sometimes, long after she had gone to bed, she had been able to hear his voice and her mother’s raised in argument. That was when they still shared a bedroom. When they went into separate bedrooms, Virginia used to hear first one door bang, then the other, then silence in the chill, unhappy house. Silence while she lay and watched the patch of lamplight and fought against sleep because she was afraid of nightmares.
She put her hand to her cheek and touched the tender, raised flesh. That nightmare was a reality, a million years away from childish dreams and fears. When she was a child, lying in bed wanting sleep and fearing sleep, she used to say to herself: Angel of God, my guardian dear, to whom His love commits me here, ever this night be at my side, to light and guard, to rule and guide. She said it like a parrot, without finding any meaning in the words. There was just the impression of an angel, and those soft, white wings like a swan.
Angel of God.… She stared at the patch of yellow light, and the light was the evening sun, and the corner was a wall, the wall of the garden where the tangled roses dropped their petals like tears on to the weeds. The peach tree waited with its arms outspread. The quiet garden waited with Virginia, as the tide of contentment flowed gently over her and the last piercing rays of the sun bathed her face with the light that held behind it the promise she had come so far to seek.
As the sun sank, the bright light mellowed, and was diffused into an atmosphere through which, with an instant’s clearness, she saw her angel smiling before her. The smile … the face.… With a lifting of the heart as if she were swept forward on wings, she reached out with a cry and became one with the vision.
The door flew open and the light snapped on. Mrs Benberg stood dishevelled in the doorway. Virginia was sitting up in bed with her arms flung out on the quilt in front of her. ‘What happened?’ she asked, staring at Mrs Benberg.
‘You called out. You must have been dreaming.’
‘No. I don’t know. Yes … a dream.’ But how could a mere dream leave you with this warmth and peace, this assurance of a quiet word spoken to dispel anxiety for ever?
‘I saw it,’ she said. ‘I saw the angel.’
‘Yes, dearie,’ Mrs Benberg said soothingly. ‘Sweet dreams. Lie down now and dream again. You’re not awake even now.’ She came forward to settle Virginia back on the pillows, but Virginia said: ‘I’m quite awake,’ and remained sitting upright, drawing up her knees and clasping her arms tightly round them.
‘I must tell you something,’ she said. ‘You’ll think I am insane, but I must tell you.’
‘Carry on.’ Mrs Benberg folded her arms. ‘I’m half insane myself, I often think, so you won’t surprise me.’
‘The angel … perhaps it was a dream, but how could I have dreamed it like that? You see’ – she searched the shadowless corner where the lamp had shone before the electric light conquered it, but the faded wallpaper kept its secret. ‘You see, the face –’ she looked up wonderingly. ‘It had my face.’
Mrs Benberg blinked her eyes several times, then raised her thick eyebrows, and lowered them again in thought.
‘An angel with your face,’ she said, as practically as if Virginia had described a common or garden sight. ‘That’s interesting. Most interesting. I would have never have thought of that, but now that you mention it – yes, yes, I see.’
‘See what? What did it mean?’
‘Why,’ said Mrs Benberg, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, ‘it means that you are your own angel. Too simple.’
‘You think it means that there is no one to help you – no one but yourself? But that’s a terrible thought.’
‘No, it’s wonderful. Simply superb. It fits, don’t you see? It fits!’ Mrs Benberg glowed with enthusiasm. She shifted her heavy weight from foot to foot, clasping her