The Children's Book

“I shall have to go and see Papa. I am horribly afraid of what will happen then. I had better start packing, now.”

Griselda said “No, don’t do that, don’t. I can pack, with the bedders, later, when you know where … I can happily do that. I’ll make us all some cocoa. Settle your stomach with pasteurised milk and sugar.”

They sat, companionably, and put more coal, and some wood Florence had collected, on the fire.

“I was always in two minds about this place,” said Florence. “I thought it was a fortress of irredeemable innocence—and experience was outside, and was all shiny and tempting. Now I’d give anything to be able to stay here, and learn to think clearly. Which I obviously don’t. I followed my feelings and they were bad, and worse, they were silly. So the angel will close the gates and wave me goodbye with her sword. I think it’s a female angel, in a women’s college.

“Griselda, I have a huge favour to ask of you.”

“Ask,” said Griselda.

“Will you come with me to face Papa? I am afraid of someone—Papa, me—saying something unforgivable, or doing something silly … mad…”

“Are you sure?” said Griselda.

“I think so. Would you anyway come to London, and see how I feel there?”

The two young women stood in Prosper Cain’s study, amongst the fake Palissys and under a fake Lorenzo Lotto Annunciation. Prosper sat behind his desk and said it was a pleasant surprise to see them. He could see that whatever it was was not pleasant. He thought Florence must be in money trouble. He asked them to sit down. The room was small—he had to stay behind his desk, like a judge.

Florence said “I asked Griselda to come because I need—I need this talk to stay—to stay formal—I need you to think.”

“It sounds very dreadful,” said Prosper, lightly.

“It is,” said Florence. “I’m afraid I’m pregnant.” Prosper’s face tightened into a mask. Florence had never seen it like this, though his soldiers had, once or twice. He said “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Have you seen a doctor?”

“Not exactly. I dared not. I asked Dorothy. She’s passed all her exams … in that area…”

“Well,” said Prosper Cain. “He must marry you. Now, immediately. If he’s worried about money, I must help.”

“It’s not Geraint,” said Florence. She added, miserably, “I must send his ring back. I should have done that already. I feel—I feel—”

“In that case,” said Prosper, “who?”

He was a soldier. He knew how to kill people, and he wanted to kill. Florence saw yet another face she had never seen. Her own face tightened into a mask, not unlike his.

“I don’t want you to know. It was only once. I don’t want… the person … to know. I was very silly.” She flinched. Her father, who had never done so, looked as though he was about to hit her. She watched him decide not to. Griselda, watching both of them, thought their hard faces were like masks in a Greek tragedy. Prosper gave a kind of gasp.

“I need to think. Let me think.”

Things raced through his mind like hunted animals in a dark wood. He would stand by Florence. For most of his life she was the creature he had most loved and delighted in. This caused him to think of Imogen, and the expected child. He knew, without putting it into words, that the inconvenient child was there in some way because of the loved and welcomed child. He could not, therefore, think of—yes, of killing—this child who was, or would be, the grandchild of his Giulia. He thought: I must take her in, and face—expect her, expect them to face—the opprobrium, and worse. He thought, and then, almost in a whisper, said

“I must leave the Museum, and take a house in the country, somewhere quiet, where we can all—”

“You can’t do that,” said Florence. “I can’t bear it if you do that. I’d rather be dead.”

She said “What we must arrange, is for me to go away somewhere—until—and find someone to take—the …”

She could not say, child. Prosper’s imagination chewed at the unmanageable facts. How could his daughter ever now be in his house, with his new wife and his new child? He did not want her to give away her child—it was his flesh and blood, and did not deserve to be pushed into the dark. He was at a loss. His new mask was that of an old man, indecisive.

Griselda said “Perhaps Florence could go abroad—to Italy, say—as a young widow maybe—to a clinic, until the birth—and then decide what to do? It is too hard to decide now what to do. But it does seem clear Florence should go away. People are always going away to clinics—Frances Darwin spent two years in one when she had a breakdown when her mother died. My brother is always going to Ascona where there is a whole colony of artists and philosophers who believe in free love and wouldn’t ask questions. There is a new clinic there. It’s a beautiful place. Mountains, Lake Maggiore, Italian farms. Florence might be peaceful there.”

Prosper and Florence sat still and silent, as though exhausted. Florence said

“I’m sorry. You can’t know how sorry …”

Imogen Cain chose this moment to tap at the door and come in, her waist already thicker under a loose dress. She took in the stricken faces and her smile died.

“I’m sorry. I’ll go.”

“No,” said Florence. “Don’t. You will have to know, so you may as well stay. I’m expecting a child. We are making plans for me to leave the country.”