was a further pause.
‘Mummy’s gotaheadacheanlyingdown,’ proceeded Vernon.
‘I know.’
‘Have you said goodbye to her?’
‘No.’
‘Are you going to? Because you’ll have to be quick. That’s the dogcart coming round now.’
‘I expect I shan’t have time.’
Vernon nodded wisely.
‘I daresay that would be a good plan. I don’t like having to kiss people when they’re crying. I don’t like Mummy kissing me much anyway. She squeezes too hard and she talks in your ear. I think I’d almost rather kiss Winnie. Which would you, Father?’
He was disconcerted by his father’s abrupt withdrawal from the room. Nurse had come in a moment before. She stood respectfully aside to let the master pass, and Vernon had a vague idea that she had managed to make his father uncomfortable.
Katie, the under-housemaid, came in to lay tea. Vernon built bricks in the corner. The old peaceful nursery atmosphere closed round him again.
There was a sudden interruption. His mother stood in the doorway. Her eyes were swollen with crying. She dabbed them with a handkerchief. She stood there theatrically miserable.
‘He’s gone,’ she cried. ‘Without a word to me. Without a word. Oh, my little son. My little son.’
She swept across the floor and gathered Vernon in her arms. The tower, at least one storey higher than any he had ever built before, crashed into ruins. His mother’s voice, loud and distraught, burrowed into his ear.
‘My child—my little son—swear that you’ll never forsake me—swear it—swear it—’
Nurse came across to them.
‘There, Ma’am, there, Ma’am, don’t take on so. You’d better get back to bed. Edith shall bring you a nice cup of hot tea.’
Her tone was authoritative—severe.
His mother still sobbed and clasped him closer. Vernon’s whole body began to stiffen in resistance. He could bear it a little while longer—a very little while longer—and he’d do anything Mummy wanted if only she’d let go of him.
‘You must make up to me, Vernon—make up to me for the suffering your father has caused me—Oh, my God, what shall I do?’
Somewhere, in the back of his mind, Vernon was aware of Katie, silent, ecstatic, enjoying the scene.
‘Come along, Ma’am,’ said Nurse. ‘You’ll only upset the child.’
The authority in her voice was so marked this time that Vernon’s mother succumbed to it. Leaning weakly on Nurse’s arm, she allowed herself to be led from the room.
Nurse returned a few minutes later very red in the face.
‘My,’ said Katie, ‘didn’t she take on? Regular hysterics—that’s what they call it! Well, this has been a to do! You don’t think she’ll do a mischief to herself, do you? Those nasty ponds in the garden. The Master is a one—not that he hasn’t a lot to put up with from Her. All them scenes and tantrums—’
‘That’ll do, my girl,’ said Nurse. ‘You can get back to your work, and under-servants discussing a matter of this kind with their betters is a thing that I’ve never known take place in a gentleman’s house. Your mother ought to have trained you better.’
With a toss of her head, Katie withdrew. Nurse moved round the nursery table, shifting cups and plates with unwonted sharpness. Her lips moved, muttering to herself.
‘Putting ideas into the child’s head. I’ve no patience with it …’
A new nursemaid came, a thin white girl with protruding eyes. Her name was Isabel, but she was called Susan as being ‘more suitable’. This puzzled Vernon very much. He asked Nurse for an explanation.
‘There are names that are suitable to the gentry, Master Vernon, and names that are suitable for servants. That’s all there is to it.’
‘Then why is her real name Isabel?’
‘There are people who when they christen their children set themselves up to ape their betters.’
The word ape had a distracting influence on Vernon. Apes were monkeys. Did people christen their children at the zoo?
‘I thought people were christened in church.’
‘So they are, Master Vernon.’
Very puzzling—why was everything so puzzling? Why were things more puzzling than they used to be? Why did one person tell you one thing and another person something quite different?
‘Nurse, how do babies come?’
‘You’ve asked me that before, Master Vernon. The little angels bring them in the night through the window.’
‘That Am-am-am—’
‘Don’t stammer, Master Vernon.’
‘Amenkun lady who came—she said I was found under a gooseberry bush.’
‘That’s the way they do with American babies,’ said Nurse serenely.
Vernon heaved a sigh of relief. Of course! He felt a throb of gratitude to Nurse. She always knew. She made the unsteady swaying universe stand still again. And she never laughed. His mother did. He had heard her say to other ladies, ‘He asks me the quaintest questions. Just listen to this. Aren’t children funny and adorable?’
But Vernon couldn’t see that he was funny or adorable at all. He just wanted to know. You’d got to know. That was part of growing up. When you were grown up you knew everything and had gold sovereigns in your purse.
The world went on widening.
There were, for instance, uncles and aunts.
Uncle Sydney was Mummy’s brother. He was short and stout and had rather a red face. He had a habit of humming tunes and of rattling the money in his trouser pockets. He was fond of making jokes, but Vernon did not always think his jokes very funny.
‘Supposing,’ Uncle Sydney would say, ‘I were to put on your hat? Hey? What should I look like, do you think?’
Curious, the questions grown up people asked! Curious—and also difficult, because if there was one thing that Nurse was always impressing upon Vernon, it was that little boys must never make personal remarks.
‘Come now,’ said Uncle Sydney perseveringly. ‘What should I look like? There—’ he snatched up the linen affair in question and balanced it on top
