The Children's Book - A. S. Byatt [253]
She raised her face to him. It was, briefly, the face of a madwoman, staring, puffed up, blotched with crimson stains. Her eyes were wet, and her face was wet, and even the collar of her shirt was damp. She caught her breath, heaving, and tried to say she was sorry.
“My dear—” said Prosper. He took two steps backwards, drew up the only other chair in the room, and sat down beside her. What was the matter? What had so distressed her?
“I can’t,” she said. “I can’t…”
She wept. Prosper offered his own perfectly folded handkerchief. “What can you not do?” he asked.
“I can’t go there. I can’t go back there.” She paused and sobbed, and was more explicit.
“I can’t sleep in that house. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.”
Prosper Cain did not ask why she could not. He drew back from the answer, which he thought it was better for her not to give. He said
“Then you must not. We will make other arrangements.”
Imogen murmured desperate liquid things about Geraint—and betraying Pomona—and dirt, dirt on the carpets, dirt in the kitchen. She began to wave her hands, agitatedly, and Major Cain caught them, and held them down, wet and hot, in his own.
“It must be possible for you to join the other young women, in the encampment? Or to remain with Florence and me in a comfortable hotel?”
“You don’t know—”
“I don’t need to know. You are part of my family. I care for you. I shall take care of you.”
“There is no reason. No need, not—not—not really.”
“There is clearly a need if you are reduced to this state. Perhaps we should say you are ill, and cannot attend this summer school at all? Maybe we should take a holiday.”
“Don’t. I must stop this nonsense.”
“You will soon be independent. Your work is good, as you know.
You will be able to earn a living, and, I hope, find someone to love, and a home of your own, where you will be safe.”
This caused renewed, quieter tears. Then Imogen said
“I must go away, now. But not back to that house. I don’t know what to do.”
“I hope you will let me look after you, until you have found,” he repeated his earlier phrase, “someone to love, to care for you—”
“I do love someone,” said Imogen. Her eyes were closed. There was an infinitesimal silence of decision: “I love you.” The silence went on. “So I must go away.”
They sat still, side by side. Then Imogen put out her arms and cast herself from her chair into Prosper Cain’s chair, her face against his, her body leaning into his.
His arms closed automatically around her, to save their balance. So long, so very long, without women, even though his small house felt full of them. He kissed her hair. He held her, and tried to stay stiff as a ramrod, which he found he was in a perfectly double sense.
“It isn’t possible,” he said, very gently. “For every reason we can think of. It is an impossible thing, in this world. It must be forgotten.”
“I know that. So I must go away. And instead, everything is conspiring to send me back into that house—”
He found he felt violently that she should not go back into that house. He said
“I will take care of everything. Dry your eyes, and tidy your hair, and let us go home.”
He did not know what he would do. But he imagined he would think of something, as he always did.
He found it hard to go to sleep, that night. He looked at himself in the mirror. A sable, silvered moustache elegantly clipped, a lined face, steady eyes, the right side of fifty, but not for much longer. And a young woman—a lovely young woman—had fallen into his arms and said she loved him. He stroked his moustache, and stood to attention. She was probably right, she should go away, but who would look after her, if he did not? He had made her happy, when she had been unhappy and at a loss. He was not her father. She had a father, of whom she was afraid. She loved him, he was sensible enough to see (he told himself) because she was afraid of her father. That could be described