Iris Murdoch - The Sandcastle

Miss Handforth appeared. She was wearing a rather grubby apron and was clearly in the middle of washing up.

‘Can I take it now,’ she said, ‘or have I spoken out of turn?’ She sneezed. Nan ostentatiously averted her head while Handy busied herself pulling the curtains. Mor gulped his coffee down and the tray was removed.

Mor joined the conversation. He could see Nan looking restless and knew that she was now calculating how soon she could decently rise to go. He could almost hear her counting.

‘I think we ought to be starting for home,’ said Nan, after some little time. She looked at Mor.

‘Yes, I suppose so,’ said Mor. He did not want to go yet.

Nan rose with determination. Demoyte did not try to detain her. The company began to drift in a polite group towards the door.

‘I asked Handy to cut you some roses,’ said Demoyte, ‘but I have an uneasy feeling she’s forgotten. Handy!’ He shouted over the bannisters, ‘Roses for Mrs Mor!’

Mor was touched. He knew that the roses were really for him, in response to his having, a few days ago, expressed admiration for the rose garden.

Miss Handforth appeared from the kitchen with a loud clack of the green baise door. ‘I didn’t get down the garden today,’ she announced.

‘Well, get down now ,’ said Demoyte in an irritated tone. He was tired of the evening.

‘You know I can’t see in the dark,’ said Miss Handforth, well aware that Demoyte was not serious. ‘Besides, the dew is down.’

Nan said simultaneously, ‘Don’t bother, please. They would have been lovely , but now don’t bother.’ Mor knew that she was not interested in the roses. Nan thought on the whole that flowers were rather messy and insanitary things. But she was quite pleased all the same to be able to underline that Handy was in the wrong.

‘Let me go!’ said Miss Carter suddenly. ‘I can see in the dark. I know where the roses are. Let me cut some for Mrs Mor.’ She ran ahead of them down the wide staircase.

‘Capital!’ said Demoyte. ‘Handy, give her the big scissors from the hall drawer. You go with her, Mor, and see she really knows the way. I’ll entertain your lady. But for Christ’s sake don’t be long.

Miss Carter took the scissors and vanished through the front door. Mor ran after her, and closed the door behind him. The night was cool and very dark. He could not see, but knew the way without sight to the wooden door in the wall that led into the main garden. He heard the door clap before him, and in a moment he felt its surface under his hand, cool and yielding. He emerged on to the quiet dewy lawn. He heard the distant traffic and saw the interrupted flashes from the headlights, but all about him was dark and still. He blinked, and saw ahead of him the small figure hurrying away across the lawn.

‘Miss Carter!’ said Mor in a low voice, ‘wait for me, I’m coming too.’ After the brilliance of the house the garden was strange, pregnant with trees and bushes, open to the dew and the stars. He felt almost alarmed.

Miss Carter had stopped and was waiting for him. She seemed less tiny now that there were no objects with which to compare her. He saw her eyes glint in the darkness. ‘This way, she said.

Mor blundered after her. ‘Yes, you can see in the dark,’ he said. ‘I wish I could.’ They went through the yew hedge under the archway into the second garden.

They walked quietly across the lawn. Mor felt strangely breathless. Miss Carter was laying her feet very softly to the earth and made no sound at all as she walked. Mor tried to step softly too, but he could feel and hear under his feet the moisture in the close-cropped grass. An intense perfume of damp earth and darkened flowers surrounded them and quenched the noises of the world outside. Mor could see very little, but he continued to follow the dark moving shape of the girl ahead. He was still dazed by the swiftness of the transition.

They reached the steps which led up into the third garden. Miss Carter went up the steps like a bird and for a moment he saw the pallor of her bare arm exposed against the black holly bush as she turned to wait for him. Mor plunged forward, his foot seeking the lowest step. He stumbled and almost fell.

‘Here, come this way,’ she said from above him, ‘this way.’ She kept her voice soft, compelled to by the garden. Then she came back down the steps and he realized that she was reaching out her hand. Mor took her hand in his and let her guide him up the steps. Her grip was firm. They passed between the black holly bushes, and released each other. Mor felt a strong shock within him, as if very distantly something had subsided or given way. He had a confused feeling of surprise. The moon came out of the clouds for a moment and suddenly the sky was seen in motion.

The rose garden was about them now, narrowing towards the place where Demoyte’s estate ended in the avenue of mulberry trees. Mor had never seen it by night. It looked different now, as if the avenue were immensely long, and Mor had a strange momentary illusion that it was in that direction that the house lay, far off at the end of the avenue: Demoyte’s house, or else its double, where everything happened with a difference.

‘ Quelle merveille! ’ said Miss Carter in a low voice. She took a few quick steps across the grass, and then stopped, lifting her face to the moonlight. A moment later she began to run and threw her arms about the trunk of the first mulberry tree of the avenue. The branches above her were murmuring like a river.

Mor coughed. He was slightly embarrassed by these transports. ‘You know, we mustn’t be too long,’ he said.

‘Yes, yes,’ said Miss Carter, detaching herself from the tree, ‘we shall pick them very quickly now. She began to run between the beds, picking out the buds which were just partly open. The scissors snicked and the long-stemmed roses were cast on to the grass. The moon whitened the paler ones and made the dark ones more dark, like blood. Mor tried to pick a rose, but as he had nothing with which to cut it he only pricked himself and mangled the rose.

‘Leave all to me,’ said Miss Carter, coming to snip off the dangling blossom. ‘There, that should be enough.’

Mor was anxious to get back now. He had a vision of Nan and Demoyte waiting impatiently in the hall. Also, there was something which he wanted to think over. He hastened ahead down the stone steps, his eyes now accustomed to the dark, and ran noisily across the lawn to the yew hedge. Here he waited, and held the iron gate open for Miss Carter. It clinked to behind them, and now they could see the lighted windows of the house where already Miss Handforth had drawn back the curtains in preparation for the night. They passed the wooden gate, and in a moment they were blinking and rubbing their eyes in the bright light of the hall. Miss Carter clutched the great armful of roses to her breast.

‘What an age you were,’ said Nan. ‘Did you get lost?’

‘No,’ said Mor, ‘it was just very dark.’

‘Here are the roses,’ said Miss Carter, trying to detach them from where they had pinned themselves to her cotton blouse. ‘What about some paper to put them in?’

‘Here, have the Evening News ,’ said Demoyte, taking it from the table. ‘I haven’t read it, but to the devil with it, now the day is over.’

Nan spread out the paper on the table and Miss Carter laid the roses upon it, trying to order them as she did so. ‘How beautiful!’ said Nan. ‘Miss Carter must have one, don’t you think?’ She selected a deep red rose and held it out graciously to Miss Carter, who took it and fumbled awkwardly to fix it at her bosom. She failed, and held it in her hand, against her skirt.

‘Now take your flowers and be off with you,’ said Demoyte, who was yawning and clearly wanted to be in bed. ‘Good night!’