Black Narcissus Read online

  For her Son she chose.’

  Mr Dean kicked over a chair as he moved in near the door; Dilip, shocked and blushing, picked it up and set it on its legs. Sister Briony, still singing, stepped from her place and offered them the sheet of words, and Mr Dean began to sing. Sister Clodagh thought his voice was unnecessarily loud, but it gave impetus to the Sisters, who sang loudly too, their crosses rising and falling on their breasts as if they were panting. Now there was a warmth and rush in the singing, their faces reddened, the harmonium notes seemed to swell in the room and the boughs trembled. The meek familiar carols were almost shouted into the night.

  Mr Dean was enjoying himself, but Dilip’s eyes were full of wonder. He looked at the altar with its lace and holly, the candles shining on the brass cross and the statues above the boughs. Sister Clodagh watched his face as she sang.

  On that last Christmas, Con had given her a silver brooch. He was not good at giving things in proper season, but he had always bought her a great many presents. She remembered once, when they were in the High Street at Pantown, he had stopped and said: ‘I want to give you a hat.’

  Pantown! They always drove to Pantown in the lorry because there was usually a netted pig or a steer to take in. ‘It’s market day. We’re taking in the bull calf. Like a lift?’

  The lorry had no side windows, the wind blew in a hurricane, and the rain trickled to where she sat between the old man and Con, tweed shoulder to tweed shoulder. Often her cheek touched Con’s shoulder, the short gold hairs that were clipped on his neck were close to her lips. They swayed and bumped, hip to hip.

  ‘Do keep your skirt off the gears,’ said Con. ‘Listen to the brutes! You wouldn’t know it, but one day I’m going to have a Bentley,’ and he shot a glance at his father across her.

  In the High Street he said, ‘I want to buy you a hat.’

  ‘You can’t. Don’t be silly, Con.’

  ‘I want to. Come on.’

  The harmonium finished the last line, pelting ahead of the singers. In the silence she looked up. ‘Number six, on your sheets. “Once in Royal David’s city”.’

  The only hat shop was Strayne’s; it had cream blinds edged with lace and a tapestry chair in the window, and a bowl of anemones on the floor. Why on the floor?

  ‘He was gentle, meek and lowly,

  Tears and smiles like us he knew.’

  Tears and smiles! That was the year that hats were shaped like pudding basins and pails. Con was difficult over them.

  ‘That one’s like a bucket. Take it away. No, thank you, that’s too much of a flower-pot altogether.’

  ‘What kind of a hat do you want, sir?’

  ‘Well, I had in mind a very little one; grey with something bright and soft on it, like feathers and diamonds mixed.’

  But the brooch had come on Christmas Day. He gave it to her outside, after church. ‘Here’s something for you.’ He walked away to talk to the other men.

  ‘Con, come back. Come back for a moment. I want to speak to you.’

  The music had stopped again. They had come to the end of the carols and they were waiting for her. She knelt; they all knelt, she could see Sister Honey out of the corner of her eye, the soles of her feet in Mr Dean’s boots were turned upwards. Mr Dean sat down noisily and Dilip Rai very quietly, Kanchi looked through her fingers at them.

  Sister Clodagh was the last to leave the chapel; she put out the candles dreamily. As they went out one by one and the room grew dim, the night and the stars seemed to come closer to the windows, pressing cloud and gold against the glass. Now only the red lamp was burning in front of the altar; it was the colour of cherries; Dilip would have called it the colour of rhododendrons, he always said ‘red as rhododendrons’, ‘white as rhododendrons’. He had been taking lessons for ten days now.

  She knelt down before leaving the chapel. ‘Con, come back. Come back for a moment. I want to speak to you.’

  There was a scuffle outside and a small scream, and steps ran past into the house. She went to the door but there was no one there, only the young General and Mr Dean a little way off, standing with their ponies under the porch.

  Dilip Rai came up to her at once and said: ‘Sister, may I congratulate you on the birth of Christ?’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, not knowing what else to say. She saw Mr Dean smile in the light of the porch lantern.

  ‘I was so glad to come,’ Dilip said. ‘I heard the music, and went down to ask Dean what it was, and he brought me to see. I hope you did not mind. I am very much interested in Jesus Christ.’ Sister Clodagh stiffened and he said quickly: ‘Have I said anything wrong?’

  ‘No-o,’ she answered, ‘but we don’t usually speak of Him so casually.’

  ‘Then you should,’ said Mr Dean loudly. ‘He should be casual, and as much a part of life as – hic – your d-daily bread.’

  She ignored that. ‘We want to thank you for the boots,’ she said. ‘Sister Briony will tell you, far more eloquently than I can, how very much we needed them; and now we have a present for you. Real holly sent to us by our Mother General at Canstead. It was picked from our hedge there; we have only a few sprays, but we kept them for the chapel and for you, because you have been so good to us.’

  The young General, who had been thinking, asked: ‘You have a feast to commemorate His death, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yes, at Easter. His death and resurrection,’ said Sister Clodagh, holding out the holly to Mr Dean who made no movement to take it.

  ‘In the history of my country,’ said Dilip gravely, ‘there is a superstition that, if a man asks for his shoes and umbrella when he is dying, he will come back from the dead.’

  Mr Dean gave a loud guffaw, and Sister Clodagh saw that he was very drunk, holding on to his saddle and watching her and Dilip with affectionate amusement. She was shocked to her very bones, and for a moment could only stand there, staring at him. Dilip, with his head bent, was drawing a circle on the gravel with his toe; he was quivering with shame because Mr Dean had laughed at him.

  His laugh had broken the silence. Though the house was quiet it seemed to be full of people; behind Dilip Rai it lay with a teeming life of its own. She had a sudden sense of dismay that came from the house and not from Mr Dean, a sense that she was an interloper in it and the Convent life no more than a cobweb that would be brushed away. The house had its own people, strange bare-footed people who had never had a Christmas, nor a star, nor a Christ. Dilip fitted them, standing in the porch with his horse as if he had just come through the forest. ‘The grandfather kept his women here.’

  She seemed to hear the door opened in the night, and hear them coming, running, gauze hurriedly twisted round their bosoms, flowers seized and pinned in the hair, feet with anklets chiming, hastening to the door. She heard them come and she heard their voices, whispering as they gathered their finery, coming to the door to welcome Dilip Rai. ‘This house used to be not good. I give you until the rains break.’ The Brothers had left their ruins in the grass.

  The holly pricked her hand. Dilip was looking at Mr Dean now, with an interested face.

  She said: ‘How dare you come here – like this?’ He only smiled, holding on to his pony. ‘How dare you be with that boy – or come here to our service to-night?’

  Still he smiled and she saw that he wore a sprig of holly in his buttonhole, and at once she remembered the scuffle she had heard outside the chapel and the faint scream. Could it have been – couldn’t it have been Kanchi? She put out a hand to push him away, trembling with disgust.

  ‘You’re –’ she said furiously. ‘You’re – you’re unforgivable.’ Then she said vindictively, between her teeth: ‘You’re objectionable when you’re sober, and abominable when you’re drunk.’

  ‘I quite agree,’ he said, and taking his pony went down the hill. They saw Phuba rise out of the shadows and take his other arm. Presently they heard him loudly singing.

  ‘I sing of a maiden

  That is matchless, />
  King of all Kings

  For her Son she chose –’

  The words shivered the shadows, mocking their Christmas; even the rustling of the leaves seemed a titter and the house whispered, insinuating whispers, under that bawdy singing.

  ‘Don’t listen. Don’t listen,’ she cried.

  But Dilip was listening attentively. ‘I do like his voice,’ he said. ‘It’s so nice and loud. I think it’s lovely, don’t you?’

  17

  When Sister Ruth answered Sister Clodagh’s bell she found her standing in front of the window, throwing crumbs to the birds. These January days were as quiet and sombre as if there were a Lent in the hills and they were fasting of their colours. Even the grass had turned to a grey-green, but the bamboo stems shone as yellow as a blackbird’s bill.

  The blackbird had come to Sister Ruth’s mind when she saw Sister Clodagh feeding the birds; now the earth was so stiff and hard, their cries sounded all the short day. They were strange birds, she thought, minahs and Himalayan thrushes and hoopoes, bolder than starlings at home. Sister Clodagh threw the crumbs farther and farther until the hoopoes were on the lawn in the shape of the crest they wore on their own heads, and their voices filled the air as they pounced and jostled and choked and fed.

  ‘Aren’t they hungry!’ said Sister Clodagh. She had heard the door open, but she spoke out of the window and her breath steamed on the air.

  ‘I’ve tried them with a coconut,’ she said, ‘but they don’t like it. They love this mutton fat.’

  She was only talking for time; over and over in her mind she was thinking of what she must try to say. She did not know in the least how she was going to begin, how she could put it, and she stayed by the window throwing the crumbs and talking; just talking. Sister Ruth stood by her without speaking. ‘What do you want me for? What have you got to say?’

  At last, Sister Clodagh shut the window and said: ‘I want to speak to you. Come and sit down.’

  Now they were facing each other across the desk and Sister Ruth sat on the edge of her chair, upright, plainly on the defensive. Sister Clodagh looked at her, trying to find some clue that would show her how to begin. If only she could light on something to say that would make the Sister’s body relax and the hands in her lap unclench themselves, and take that stony expression off her face. She was so strung, so rigid, so still and filled with fear that Sister Clodagh said, almost without having to think: ‘I’ve been worried about you for some time. I feel that things are not right with you.’

  A wary look slid into Sister Ruth’s eyes. ‘In what way?’ she asked.

  ‘You look so ill.’ Sister Clodagh seemed almost to be pleading. ‘You’ve got terribly thin. I know you’re trying to keep up for all our sakes, but I think you really must go in with Sister Briony and see the doctor.’

  ‘I shan’t see the doctor,’ cried Sister Ruth violently. She had sprung to her feet and stood over the desk. ‘I’m perfectly well, I’m stronger than I’ve ever been and you know it. You know it but you’re trying to make out –’ she choked and then stood still. ‘I’m sorry, Sister,’ she said, dropping back into her chair. ‘I didn’t mean – to be rude, but really I’m perfectly well. I – I haven’t been sleeping, that’s all.’

  ‘If you haven’t been sleeping,’ said Sister Clodagh watching her, ‘there must be some reason for it. Can’t you tell me? Is something worrying you?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, that’s it.’ Sister Ruth wet her lips. ‘I – I am worried.’

  ‘Don’t you think you could tell me about it?’ For a moment it seemed to hang on the air; Sister Clodagh waited breathless, not daring to speak; then she leant forward across the desk and said: ‘I’d like you to tell me if you can.’

  At once the eyes flickered away from hers. ‘I can’t speak of it – to anyone,’ said Sister Ruth.

  It was like trying to catch hold of something slippery, that slipped out of your hand. Sister Clodagh tried to keep her voice kind and even. ‘Won’t you try?’ she said. ‘I’d like to help you. You know you can trust me.’

  ‘You didn’t want me to come here,’ said Sister Ruth. For the first time she looked directly at Sister Clodagh. ‘You’d use anything I told you to get me away. How can I trust you?’

  ‘That’s absurd, Sister.’ In spite of herself Sister Clodagh’s voice rose. ‘I only want to feel that you are well and content.’

  ‘How can I be content? All of you, wherever I’ve been, have been against me. None of you have ever wanted me.’

  ‘Don’t you think that’s your fault as well as ours? If it’s everywhere you’ve been? It must be in yourself, Sister. Won’t you let us examine it and find out –’

  ‘At St Helen’s they didn’t want to lose me.’ Sister Ruth said it loudly. ‘It was just that I felt I couldn’t stay. You can write and ask them if you don’t believe me. And Reverend Mother said to me herself before I left, that she was sending me with you because I was so quick to learn the language and because she liked my methods in the school.’

  ‘Of course she did,’ said Sister Clodagh, groping carefully after her. Then she asked warily: ‘But knowing all this, what makes you say that none of us want you?’

  ‘You don’t want me,’ cried Sister Ruth. ‘Don’t pretend you do. From the very first minute –’ she pulled herself up sharply.

  ‘Don’t you think,’ asked Sister Clodagh carefully, ‘that you’re letting things run away with you? I feel that you’re letting yourself give in to this idea. You know, you must know, it isn’t true. I feel the same for you as I do for all my Sisters, that you are more to me than myself –’

  Sister Ruth said nothing; she looked at the carpet, but a faint smile crept round her lips. There was a pause and then Sister Clodagh said: ‘I think this is really all to do with somebody else. I think you have let yourself fall into thinking too much of Mr Dean.’

  Sister Ruth started and then set her lips. She looked at Sister Clodagh in obstinate silence.

  ‘Please answer me carefully. Why did you give that holly buttonhole to Mr Dean on Christmas night?

  ‘Why did you?’

  Sister Ruth shivered suddenly. She tried not to, but as she sat on the chair she shook violently. Sister Clodagh pressed her. ‘You must answer me. Why did you give it to him?’

  ‘I didn’t.’

  A look of intense relief made Sister Clodagh’s face almost luminous; then, as she looked at the Sister it faded. ‘I think you did,’ she said.

  ‘I didn’t. You can’t make me say that I did. I haven’t given him anything.’

  ‘What can I say to you?’ asked Sister Clodagh. ‘Sister, what is the use of talking to me like this? You gave it to him outside the chapel on Christmas night. Sister, don’t you realize what you’re doing? What you’re running the risk of losing in yourself? Sister, you must, I must, make you see before it’s too late.’

  Again that indescribably baffling look came into her face. ‘All the same, I’ve noticed that you’re very pleased to see him yourself!’ she flung at Sister Clodagh.

  Sister Clodagh’s face blazed. She half rose in her chair and then she sank back into it again, holding her desk.

  ‘You’re trying to tell me I’m not fit to be a nun,’ cried Sister Ruth. ‘Well, let me tell you that no more are you. You should never have entered either, and you know it for all your honours and success. Wonderful Sister Clodagh. Clever Sister Clodagh. Admirable Sister Clodagh,’ she mocked, ‘and all the time you’re worse than I am and that’s why you’re trying to bully me.’

  She stopped for breath and then, staring at Sister Clodagh, a horrified amazement came into her face. ‘What – what have I been saying?’ she said in a small wondering voice. ‘What have I said? What have I been saying?’

  ‘If that was in your mind, it’s better said,’ said Sister Clodagh. ‘I think you’re out of your senses.’

  Sister Ruth cowered away in her chair. ‘I lost my temper,’ she said. ‘Sister, I lost my temper. Forgive me
. Please, please forgive me.’ She began to weep, silently, without a handkerchief, letting the tears pour down her face, not wiping them away. There was something theatrical in those tears, pouring down her thin white face, and her thin body that might have been whipped, curled in the chair; yet Sister Clodagh had a feeling that at any minute it might rise and sting her again, and she had a sudden shudder of repulsion.

  ‘Listen to me,’ she said at last, when she could trust herself to speak calmly. ‘I don’t know, I can’t decide now, what to make of you. The very fact that you could speak like that, even in temper, shows that there is something very wrong somewhere. It isn’t what you said of me, but the state of your mind that worries me. I shall have to think, and I want you to think too; if there’s any way that you feel you could be helped, will you come and tell me? Try to take more time every day for prayer; try and forget yourself and not to brood.’ There was still no expression on Sister Ruth’s face, only the tears falling helplessly down; Sister Clodagh felt she was not even listening. ‘Would you like to write to Reverend Mother?’ she asked.

  She waited but there was no answer. ‘Think it over and come and let me know. At least you must feel, with her, that she has no personal feelings against you. Try and believe the same of me; that you are as much to me as any of the others; in fact I have been thinking far more of you than any of them.’ As she said it the words seemed to have a double meaning. ‘As for Mr Dean, there can be no need and you have no business to speak to him at all; you must see that it’s all-important that you should get over this feeling for him. When you came to us, Sister, you were very young and inexperienced, or you’d see what’s plain to us all. In spite of his charm and his kindliness, Mr Dean isn’t a good man; you must take him for what he is and not try to glorify him into someone he is not. When he speaks to you he has a way of making you think he’s interested in you, but that’s only a manner, he doesn’t really mean it. When he came to chapel on Christmas night he was drunk.’

  At that Sister Ruth’s whole face flamed; she put her hand up to her wimple as if she were choking and shut her eyes while the tears ran under her lids. ‘May – may I go?’ she whispered.