Lynda Plante - The Talisman

‘God, why couldn’t she have been a boy?’ The season would soon be upon them, and Harriet’s ‘coming-out’ dance would go ahead as arranged. Mrs Simpson was so immersed in her own thoughts that she jumped.

‘Hello, Ma, dreadful bumpy ride, pilot was terrific.’

Mrs Simpson pursed her lips and kissed her daughter frostily on the cheek, then took her suitcase. They walked to the car, which was waiting outside the terminal.

‘We are going straight to Harley Street, everything’s arranged.’

Harriet beamed, said there was absolutely no need, she felt wonderful.

‘That is not quite the point, dear. You will only have to stay overnight, I’ll collect you in the morning and no one will be any the wiser. Now get in the car and don’t talk about it, I don’t want the chauffeur to know — talk about anything but you-know-what.’

Harriet stopped short and folded her arms. ‘What you talking about, Ma?’

Mrs Simpson pursed her lips even tighter. ‘You know perfectly well, an abortion.’ She hissed the word, and Harriet’s mouth fell open. ‘Daddy and I have sent off all the invitations, get into the car, dear. So far we have got a jolly good set of replies.’

They got into the car and Mrs Simpson watched the chauffeur putting Harriet’s case into the boot.

‘Oh, God! You’re not serious, Ma, you haven’t arranged a dance, have you?’

Her mother gave a nod for the chauffeur to drive on, and settled back. ‘Well, of course we have, it’s your coming-out ball, you know perfectly well. We had to book our dates at the Dorchester ballroom weeks ago.’

Harriet giggled and leaned back in the seat. ‘Well, I’ll certainly be coming out in more ways than one, Ma.’

‘No you won’t, I won’t hear one word more. It is all arranged. Now then, do you want to see your guest lists?’

Harriet gazed out of the window, sighed and took her mother’s hand. ‘I’m truly sorry, Ma, about the dance, but I am not going to any clinic, I refuse... You see, I want him, want the baby more than anything else in the world, and I don’t think I have ever felt so happy in my whole life.’

Mrs Simpson thought she would faint, she had to wind down the window. ‘Please keep your voice down, please.’

Harriet looked at her mother, and then at the stiff-backed chauffeur. She leaned forward and dug him in the back. ‘I am going to have a baby, Henson, isn’t that wonderful?’

The car veered towards the centre of the road. Henson flicked a quick look into his mirror and then concentrated on driving.

‘Didn’t you hear me? I am going to have a baby.’

Mrs Simpson slapped her, said she was most certainly not and she was to stop this silliness at once.

‘It’s not silly, Ma, it’s the truth.’

‘I know it is, haven’t you been sent home in disgrace? Do you know how your father feels? Have you any consideration for your father, for Allard? Let alone myself, don’t you care what we think?’

Harriet tried to take her mother’s hand again, but she withdrew it. ‘Oh, Ma, don’t you care what I think, what I feel?’

Mrs Simpson took out her handkerchief, blew her nose, and said it was quite immaterial what Harriet felt. They had decided and it was final.

‘It’s my baby, mine, and I want him, and what’s more I am going to have him and I don’t care what any of you think or feel, he is my baby.’

The chauffeur swallowed and took another quick look in the driving mirror. The conversation going on behind him was riveting.

‘Who is the father, we want to know who did this — and my God, if I get my hands on him, if your father got his hands on him, he would tear him to pieces... How could you, dear, you are only sixteen.’

They argued for the rest of the journey, and the poor chauffeur kept being told to go to Harley Street, then Harriet would scream that he had to take them home, he didn’t know which way to turn.

‘Your father will settle this — Kensington, Henson! And you haven’t heard a word of our conversation, is that clear?’

Allard strode into the hall as they arrived, looked at his sister then at his mother. ‘I say, is it a joke, you been playing a joke on us, Harry?’

Mrs Simpson said that she most certainly had not, then looked with a glimmer of hope in her eyes. ‘It isn’t a joke, is it, Harriet?’

Harriet looked at the two of them and laughed, then asked if they wanted her to waddle for them or stick a cushion up her school tunic. ‘I am preggers, and I am delighted and happy, so stick that up your nose.’

‘Harriet, come down this instant, you hear me, I want you in my study now.’

She marched in and sat down in the big, black leather wing chair and swung her legs. He had his speech all prepared just as if he were in court, but suddenly the words disappeared and he got up and pulled her into his arms. ‘Oh, Harry, Harry, you silly, silly gel, what a mess you’ve got yourself into! But not to worry, we’ll get it all sorted out.’

She hugged her father, this show of emotion was so unlike him and she felt sorry, sorry for all the upset, but she was resolved, and would not be persuaded. ‘Pa, I want him so much, I want this baby, and I am going to have him. Please, please, don’t make me lose him, don’t let them take him away...’

The Judge tried everything, and in the end he had to admire his daughter. He asked her time and time again for the name of the father, did she love him?

‘I do, I love him with all my heart.’

The Judge sighed with relief. Well at least that was one thing in their favour. ‘Well, then, you’ll have to marry the chap, who is it?’

Harriet bowed her head and looked at her shoes.

‘Come on, gel, out with it, I’ll go round and see his family, is he foreign? You meet him in Switzerland?’

The Judge gulped down his Scotch and sat down next to his wife, took her hand. ‘Gel’s got a will of iron. She won’t have it aborted, and she won’t say who the father is, only that she loves the chap and she wants his brat. I don’t know what we are going to do, be a bloody rum do her coming out six months’ pregnant, be the laughing stock... Some birthday party, what?’

Mrs Simpson felt the tears rising again, and sniffed. ‘Now, now, don’t break the taps, old thing, we’ll sort something out. We can pack her off to the country — that cousin of yours, farm down in Dorset. Nobody’ll see her there, know her... she can have the thing and...’

The more they discussed it the more it became a vicious circle of problems. If she was allowed to have it and then returned to London everyone would know.

‘Don’t suppose we could farm it out, no, she wouldn’t accept that. We could say we’ve adopted it, lot of it going on nowadays.’

Harriet came in, downcast but unashamed, and repeated how sorry she was, and how sad to make the whole family so unhappy. ‘I’ll marry the father one day, I promise you. It’s just he has things to do. I don’t mind staying down on Auntie’s farm, I can even take my horse.’

Mrs Simpson told her that she was even more stupid than she had imagined. ‘You can’t ride in your condition, you silly gel. Who is the fellow, why won’t you tell us? I mean, if he needs money perhaps Daddy can help out.’

‘Bloody take a shotgun to him, more like it... whoever he is needs a ruddy thrashing. You’re only sixteen, for Gawd’s sake.’

Harriet got up and put her arms around both parents’ shoulders and kissed them. ‘Just know that I love him, I really do, and I want his son.’

At that moment she seemed so grown up, so much older than her parents even, and they looked at each other and gave in.

The Simpsons prepared a press release to the effect that Harriet Simpson’s forthcoming dance would be cancelled due to illness. Then they crossed it out — the Judge said it sounded better if they said, ‘due to a family bereavement’... In truth it felt like one, they had suddenly lost their little girl.