Маргарет Миллар - The Iron Gates [= Taste of Fears]

“Edith would say I have repressions,” she said aloud. “Poor Edith.”

She went to the mirror and began to make up her face for Andrew.

“If you’re tired,” Martin said, “why not let me drive?”

Andrew did not take his eyes off the road.

“Gravel and snow,” he said. “I think I’d better keep the wheel.”

Polly’s voice came from the back seat, “You should know by this time, Martin, that Father thinks nobody can drive as well as he can.”

“Never saw one,” Andrew said.

“The trouble with you...” Polly said.

“The trouble with you,” Andrew said, “is you talk too much, my dear. You’re likely to give Giles the right impression.”

“Giles,” Polly said, “do I talk too much?”

The young man beside her stiffened in order to show her that he was alert and listening to her. But he hadn’t heard the question at all. A combination of circumstances had made him so ill at ease that he was aware only of his own problems and discomfort.

In the first place he didn’t feel quite at home yet in his officer’s uniform. He didn’t know what to do with his swagger stick, and though he felt that he should put his arm around Polly he didn’t want to lose the stick, or break it.

He was, moreover, nervous with Polly’s family. How could they talk like this after seeing the wreck and the bodies?

The wreck had affected him more than the others because he was not used to death and sickness and because it was a little bit like war and he was going to see a lot of things worse than this. The knowledge clutched his stomach like an iron hand.

He sat up straighter. In the headlights of an approaching car his face was stern and white, and the small fair moustache he was growing only emphasized his youth and helplessness.

“Forget about it, Giles,” Polly said, seeing the misery in his eyes.

“Forget about what?” he said stiffly.

“Everything.”

“Oh.”

She squeezed his hand. “You look awfully nice in your uniform.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m sorry we had to run into this today, darling.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Giles said. “I mean, it’s all right. I mean, it’s not your fault.”

“True,” Martin said dryly.

He rather liked Polly’s young man, but he was in no mood to go easy on him. He himself had been stirred by the wreck to pity and anger which, in Martin, turned at once into sarcasm.

“Martin doesn’t want anybody to know he’s human,” Polly said, “so he’ll be biting and snarling for a week now.”

“Like the cur I am,” Martin said.

“Martin loves snarling.”

“Don’t you both?” Andrew said, suddenly irritated with the road and his children and their endless wrangling and the young lieutenant who wasn’t good enough for Polly.

“I don’t,” Polly said. “I get along with everybody.”

“Lack of taste,” Martin said, slumping further on the seat. “Your chief fault.”

More uneasy than ever, Giles cleared his throat and tried to think of something very correct to say. By the time something occurred to him Polly and Martin were talking again. Frustrated, he began to beat his stick rhythmically against his knee.

The car glided over the treacherous road. On a curve the wheels slipped and lurched ahead and the car sprawled sideways in the middle of the highway.

“Better reconsider,” Martin said. “I’m a heller on snow and gravel.”

“Kindly shut up, Martin,” Andrew said, twisting the steering wheel furiously.

“I’m trying to save trouble,” Martin said. “Lucille will blame me if I don’t deliver you cosy and safe at the door.”

“See?” Polly said to Giles. “Now he’s biting Father. I think we should feed the poor mutt and walk him past a hydrant.”

“What?” Giles said, and blushed. “Oh. I see.”

Martin grinned into the darkness. “You can’t blame Polly for being earthy now and then. She’s had such a wide range of experience. Tell him the case of Mrs. Palienczski, Polly.”

“Not until after we’re married,” Polly said calmly.

Married, Andrew thought, and his fingers dug into the steering wheel. Polly getting married, staking her life on the chance that this young man was clean and decent and responsible and healthy...

I don’t like him, Andrew decided.

Once the words had formed in his head, the feeling which had been vague before became definite and irrevocable. “I don’t think I like him,” had become “I’m determined I’ll never like him.”

Andrew was not given to introspection or self-analysis — he had been too busy for it all his life — and so he thought his judgment of Giles was perfectly impartial and well-considered, and, of course, correct.

“It’s nearly midnight,” Martin said.

“Nearly midnight,” Giles echoed, and was conscious of a feeling of relief that the day was almost over and tomorrow could be no worse.

For the rest of the journey he was silent. Every now and then when they passed a lighted village he would glance down at Polly’s dark fur coat. He had never seen her wearing it before and it looked very expensive, like the car, and Martin’s hat, and Andrew’s watch. In addition to his other fears he began to be afraid that the Morrows were rich, that they might have servants who would intimidate him, that he wouldn’t know which fork to use. Or he might slip on a waxed floor, or break an antique chair...

Anyway, I’m a soldier, he thought. Anyway, that’s more than Martin is. I’m a lieutenant with a whole platoon of my own.

He closed his eyes and wished that he could be back where he belonged, with his platoon...

“Giles,” Polly said. “Darling, wake up. We’re here.”

He was awake immediately and reaching instinctively for his swagger stick. But his mind was confused and when the car jerked to a stop he had the impression that Andrew had driven right up on to a veranda, a spacious veranda with huge white pillars. He blinked slowly and looked out the window and saw that the car had stopped under a portico. Between the pillars he could see the dim sprawling hills of the park.

“You take the car in, Martin,” Andrew said wearily and climbed out of the car.

Martin slid over on the seat. “All right. Remove yourselves back there.”

“Come on, Giles,” Polly said. “We’ll get out here.”

He was still staring out the window at the park. A park, he thought, their park, a whole damn park in the middle of a city.

“Come on,” Polly said. “You can moon over the scenery some other time. I’m cold.”

Giles got out. There was a brisk clumsiness in his movements as if he hadn’t quite got used to his own size.

“Is it yours?” he said. “All that?”

“Of course not,” Andrew said brusquely.

“Really, Giles,” Polly said, laughing. “That’s High Park. We happen to live next to it. You’ll love it, Giles. Tomorrow we’ll walk through it...”

“No, you won’t,” Andrew said. He turned his back to them and pressed the doorbell. He spoke over his shoulder and his voice sounded thin and distant. “I don’t want to be tyrannical about this but I must insist that you stay out of the park.”

“I’m afraid you’ve caught a cold, Father,” Polly said.

“You must stay out of the park,” Andrew said. “It isn’t a nice place.”

“Of course, sir,” Giles said stiffly. “Of course, sir. I don’t like parks.”

“I’m afraid Father is overtired,” Polly said. “Martin and I often go into the park, especially in the winter to ski.”

“It isn’t a nice place,” Andrew said, and pressed the bell again.

Martin came running up the driveway. He had his hat off and his dark hair was feathered with snow. He threw his hat up in the air and caught it, and let out a shout that was an exultant challenge to the weather.