menu_book Chapter 2

chapter two of consequences by e m delafield this librivox recording is in the public domain school alex's school days were marked by a series of emotional episodes In her scale of values, only the personal element counted for anything. She was intelligent and industrious at her classes when she wished to gain the approbation of an attractive class mistress, and idle and inattentive when she wanted to please the pretty girl with yellow hair who sat next to her and read a storybook under cover of a French grammar. Alex did not read. She wanted to make the yellow-haired girl look at her and smile at her.

she thought queenie torrance beautiful though her beauty did not strike alex until after she had fallen a helpless victim to one of those violent irrational attractions for one of her own sex that are apt to assail feminine adolescence i hope that you will find some nice little companions at liege sir francis had gravely told his daughter in valediction but remember that exclusive friendships are not to be desired friendly with all familiar with none said sir francis voicing the ideal of his class and of his period as well tell a stream not to flow down hill nothing but the most exclusive and inordinate of attachments lay within the scope of alex's emotional capacities she was incapable alike of asking or of bestowing in moderation theoretically she would tell herself that she would give all trust confidence love friendship and ask for nothing in return practically she suffered tortures of jealousy if the loved one addressed a word or smile to any but herself and cried herself to sleep night after night in the certainty of loving infinitely more than she was loved the material side of her life as a pensionnaire at the liege convent made very little impression upon her excepting in relation to the emotional aspect of which she was never unaware

to the end of her days the clean pungent smell of a certain polish used upon the immense spaces of bare parquet-sire all over the building would serve to recall the vivid presentment of the tall belgian postulante whose duty it was to apply it with a huge mop and whom from a distance only to be appreciated by those who know the immensity of the gulf that in the convent world separates the novice from the pupils alex had worshipped blindly and the acrid yet not unpleasant taste of confiture thinly spread over thick slices of brown bread would remind her with equal vividness of the daily three o'clock interval for goutte with queenie torrents pacing beside her in the garden quadrangle one hand of each rolled into her black stuff apron to try and keep warm and the other grasping the enormous double tartines that formed the afternoon's refection even the slight steady sound of hissing escaping from a gas-jet of which the flame is turned as high as it will go stood to alex for the noisy evening recreation spent in the enforced and detested amusement of la

when her only preoccupation was to place herself by the object of her adoration for the grasp of her hand in its regulation cotton glove as the circle of girls moved drearily round and round singing perfunctorily the tuneless tune of those randes remained with alex long after the words had lost the savour of irony with which novelty had once invested them quelle horrible attente d'être postulante quelle supplice d'être une novice ah quel comble d'horreur de venir soeur de coeur alex's symbols were not romantic ones but there was no romance in the life of the liege convent save what she brought to it herself even the memory of the great square verger in the middle of gravelled alleys brought to mind for sole token of summer only her horror of the immense pale-red slugs that crawled slowly and interminably out and across the paths in the eternal rains of the belgian climate nothing mattered but people and of all the people in the world only those whom one loved thus alex's sweeping unformulated conviction holding in it all a misapplication of an essential force squandered for lack of a sense of proportion

she despised herself secretly both for her intense craving for affection and for her prodigality in bestowing it she was like a child endeavouring to pour a great pail full of water into a very little cup water and disaster were the inevitable results the real love of alex's young enthusiasm fair-haired queenie torrence was preceded by her inarticulate unreasoned adoration for the belgian postulante but the belgian postulante was never visible save at a distance so that even alex's unreasonable affections found nothing to feed upon there was a french girl much older than herself for whom alex then conceived an enthusiasm marie angele smiled on her and encouraged the infatuation of the curiously un-english little english girl but she gave her nothing in return alex knew it and recklessly spent all her weekly pocket-money on flowers and sweets for marie angele thinking that the gifts would touch her and awaken in her an affection that it was not her nature to bestow least of all on an ardent and ungainly child six years her junior alex shed many tears for marie angele and years later read some words that suddenly and swiftly recalled the girl who passed in and out of her life in less than a year i love you for your few caresses i love you for my many tears

the lines indeed were curiously typical of the one-sided relations into which alex entered so rashly and so inevitably throughout her school days she was fifteen and had been nearly three years at liege when queenie torrance came she was alex's senior by a year and the only other english girl in the school at that time alex was told to look after her and went to the task with a certain naive eagerness that she always brought to bear upon any personal equation in an hour she was secretly combating an enraptured certainty of which she felt nevertheless ashamed that she had found at last the ideal object on whom to expend the vehement powers of affection for which she was always seeking an outlet queenie was slight very fair with a full serious oval face innocent gray eyes set very far apart and the high rounded forehead and small full-lipped mouth of a type much in vogue in england at the time of the regency this was the more marked by the thick flaxen hair which fell back from her face and over her shoulders into natural heavy ringlets she was not very pretty although she was often thought so but she was charged with a certain animal magnetism almost inseparable from her type

half the girls in the school adored her queenie already attractive to men and sent to the convent in belgium in reality on that account nominally for a year's finishing before her dbut in london society was for the most part scornful of these girlish admirers but alex she admitted to her friendship she was precociously aware that intimacy with lady isabel clare's daughter was likely to accrue to her own advantage later on in london the genius for sympathy which led alex to innumerable small sacrifices and tender smoothings of difficulties for her idol queenie at first received with a graceful gratitude which yet held in it something of suspicion as though she wondered what return would presently be exacted of her but it became obvious that alex expected nothing and received with eager thankfulness the slightest recognition of her devotion queenie despised her but was lavish of gentle thanks and caressing exclamations hers was not a nature ever to make the mistake of killing the goose that laid the golden eggs finding to her concealed astonishment that alex only asked toleration or at the most acceptance of her ardent devotion and was transported at the slightest occasional token of affection in return queenie stinted her of neither it would have seemed to her the most irrational folly to discourage a love however one sided that found its expression in tireless sympathy

endless championship and unlimited material gifts and help of any or every description alex did all that she could of queenie's lessons made her bed and mended her clothes for her whenever she could do so undetected by the authorities spent her pocket-money on gratifying queenie's shameless and inordinate passion for sweet things and once or twice told lies badly and unsuccessfully to shield queenie from the effects of her own laziness and constant evasion of regulations alex had been taught in common with every other child of her upbringing and nationality that to tell a lie was the worst crime to which a self-respecting human being can stoop she also believed that a person who has told a lie is a liar and that all liars go to hell yet by some utterly illogical perversity of which she was hardly even aware it did not shock or very much distress her to find that queenie torrance told lies and told them moreover with an air of quiet and convincing candour that placed them in a very different category to alex's own halting improbable fibs delivered with a scarlet face and a manifest air of hunting for further corroboration as she spoke in the extraordinary scale of moral values unconsciously held by alex there were apparently no abstract standards of right and wrong where she loved though she might against her own will see defects she was incapable of condemning

queenie took a curious detached interest in coldly gratifying her vanity by seeking to test the lengths of extravagance to which alex's admiration would go supposing i quarrelled with every one here and they all sent me to coventry whose part would you take yours of course but if i were in the wrong that wouldn't make any difference in fact you'd need it more if you were in the wrong i don't see that queenie exclaimed if i were in the wrong i should have deserved it but that would make it all the worse for you it's always the people who are in the wrong who need most to have their part taken alex explained confusedly yet voicing an intimate conviction i don't think

you have much idea of justice alex said queenie dryly the conversation made alex very miserable it was characteristic of her want of logic that while she reproached herself secretly for her own impiety in setting the objects of her affection far above what she conceived to be the abstract standard of right and wrong yet she never questioned but that any love bestowed upon herself would be measured out in direct proportion to her merits and despairingly did alex sometimes review the smallness of her deserts she was disobedient untruthful quarrelsome irreligious it seemed to alex that there was no fault to which she could not lay claim her lack of elementary religious teaching put her at a disadvantage in the convent atmosphere and made its frequent religious services and instructions so tedious to her that she was in constant disgrace for her weary inattentive attitudes not unjustly designated as irreverent in the chapel she was not at all popular with the nuns the influence which her class-mistress wielded over so many of the pupils or the interest which the english assistant superior would so willingly have extended to her youthful compatriot were alike without effect upon alex

she was not drawn to any of these wholly black-clad women to one or other of whom almost all her french and belgian and american contemporaries devoted a rather stereotyped enthusiasm had the vagrant fancy of alex lighted upon any one of the elder nuns charged with the direction of the school the attraction would have been discreetly permitted if not admittedly sanctioned by the authorities it would almost inevitably have led alex to an awakening of religious sensibilities and the desirability of this result would have outweighed even if it did not absolutely obscure in the eyes of the nuns the excessive danger of obtaining such a result by such means but the stars in their courses had designed that alex should regard the mesdames marie baptiste and marie evangeliste of her convent days with indifference and devote her ardent temperament and precocious sensibilities to the worship of queenie torrence the enthusiasm was smiled upon by no one and thereby became the more inflamed je n'aime pas ces amitiés particulières said the class mistress of queenie torrence severely to which miss torrence replied with polite distress that she was powerless in the matter

it made her ridiculous she disliked the constant infringement of rules to which alex's pursuit exposed her but one could not be unkind she did not know why alex clare showed her especial affection she herself had done nothing to encourage these indiscreet displays of course it was pleasant to be liked but one wished only to do right about it queenie mingled candour with perplexity and succeeded in convincing every one with perfect completeness of her entire innocence of anything but a too potent attraction ce n'est donc même pas une amitié c'est alex qui vous recherche malgré vous exclaimed the class mistress under this aspect the question soon presented itself alike to the pensionnat and its authorities rendering alex ridiculous in a system of surveillance which admitted of no loophole for open defiance or outspoken rebuke alex's evasions of that law of detachment which is the primary one in convent legislation became the mark of every blue-ribboned enfant de marie who wished to obtain a reputation for zeal by reporting the defection of a companion to her class mistress it was orwix alex who was reported

Queenie never sought opportunities to snatch a hurried colloquy during recreation, or manoeuvred to obtain Alex's companion at La Ronde, or when they played games in the garden. She never infringed one of the strictest rules of the establishment by giving presents unpermitted, or purchasing forbidden sweets and chocolate to be given away at the afternoon goutte. Queenie accepted the presents, wrote tiny notes to Alex, and skillfully gave them to her unperceived, and cut Alex to the heart by telling her sometimes that she made it very hard for one to try and be good and keep all the rules, and perhaps get one's blue ribbon next term.

These speeches were to Queenie's credit, and made Alex cry and worship her more admiringly than ever, but they did not tend to lower the transparent dog-like devotion with which alex would gaze at queenie's bent profile in the chapel utterly unconscious of the scandal which her manifest idolatry was creating for the severe nun in the carved stall opposite she was scolded placed under strict observation and every obstacle placed in the way of her exchanging any word with queenie until she grew to see herself as a martyr to an affection which every fresh prohibition increased almost to frenzy one day she was made the victim of a former rebuke much dreaded by the pensionnaire a monthly convocation of the school and mistresses officially known as la rcleme du mois and nicknamed by the children the last judgment was held in the grande salle downstairs with the superior making her state entry after the children had been decorously seated in rows at the end of the long room and all the other nuns who had anything to do with the school had placed themselves gravely and with folded hands against the walls

they all stood when the superior came in followed by the first mistress carrying a sheaf of notes and a great book which each pupil firmly believed to be devoted principally to the record of her own progress through the school then the superior with inclined head and low distinct voice spoke a few words of prayer and settled herself in the large chair behind which the nuns clustered in orderly rows the children sat down at the signal given and listened at first with smiles as the record of the baby class were read aloud and each mite stood up in her place for all the universe to gaze at her while the analysis of her month's work mental and moral sounded with appalling distinctness through the silence de la lande première en catechisme première en géographie calcul beaucoup mieux elle y met beaucoup de bonne volonté a la bonne heure the superior is smiling everyone is smiling bebe de la lande her brown curls bobbing over her face is pink with gratification her young class mistress leans forward the white veil of novice falling over her black habit

ma mère supérieure pour le mois de saint joseph elle se corrige de cette vilaine habitude de mordre ses ongles elle a fait de vrais efforts c'est bien faites voir venez ma petite up the long room marches bébé two freshly washed tiny pink hands thrust out proudly for the supérieure's inspection très bien très bien vous ferez bien attention au pouce droit n'est-ce pas the superior is quite grave however every one laughs and then the serious part of the proceedings begins the very little ones are not nervous most of them are good even the naughty ones only get a very gentle homily from the superior then their class mistress claps her hands smartly and they get up and file out of the room it not being considered politic to let les petites hear the record of that pen of black sheep les moyennes the indictments become more serious marie therese twice impertinent to a mistress taking no trouble over her lessons worst of all taking no trouble to cure that trick of which we have complained so often sitting with her knees crossed even in the chapel ma

this is very bad it is unladylike it is against all rules it is extremely immodest and what an example marie therese says the superior decisively can abandon all hope of obtaining the green ribbon of an aspirante enfant de marie until she has reformed her ways the mention of a premiere in literature gains no approving smile from any one and marie-thrse sits down in tears gabrielle marthe cdille all through the three classes of the moyenne division of the school with very few stainless reports and two or three disastrous ones then les grandes the first of these in the lowest section is a name to which the reader a frenchwoman always takes exception she finally compresses her lips and renders it as kevinie queenie is always cruel and unmoved as she stands up and alex always looks at her at this particular seance the april one she took her glances more or less surreptitiously miserably aware that she had not enough self-control to refrain from them and so avoid risking a rebuke later on queenie held no premiere she was always lost in her form undistinguished at music drawing needlework anything requiring application or talent alike

but her perfectly serene complacency was more or less justified by the exaggerated applause of her companions at her faultless conduct marks and the assurance of her class mistress always given readily that she was queenie's popularity was independent of anything extraneous to herself the superior leant forward and asked a question in a low voice non ma mère supérieure non the denial of a possible accusation of which alex guessed the purport was emphatic she felt glad and relieved but had no suspicions as to the indictment following on her own name alexandre claire said maire alphonsine sonorously and alex stood up she no longer felt self-conscious over the ordeal and was indifferent to the habitual litany of complaints as to her unlearned lessons disregard of the rule of silence and frequent bad marks for disorder and unpunctuality but to the accusations which she knew by heart and shared with the majority of the moyenne classe came a quite unexpected addition hissed out with a sort of dramatic horror by maire alphonsine alex recherche clavigny sans cesse ma maire

only those familiar with the code of pensionnaire discipline in belgium during the years when alex clare and her contemporaries were at school can gauge the full heinousness of the offence gravest in the conventual even alex although she had been scolded and punished and made the subject of innumerable homilies some of them pityingly reproachful and others explanatorily so on the same question felt as though she had never before realized the extent of her own perversion she stood up her hands in the regulation position pushed under the hideous black stuff pelerine that fell from her stiff hard white collar to the shapeless waistband of her skirt the whole uniform carefully designed to conceal and obscure the lines of the figure beneath it overwhelmed with uncomprehending misery and acute shame she heard two or three of the mistresses add each her quota for the most part regretfully and with an evident sense of duty overcoming reluctance to the evidence against her she seeks opportunity to place herself next to queenie at almost every recreation ma mère supérieure i am afraid that even in the chapel she lets this folly get the better of her one can see how she lets herself go to distractions all the time so the charges went on

the summing up of ma mère supérieure was icily condemnatory she had tried every means with alex had spoken to her with kindness and tenderness in private had reasoned with her and finally threatened her and now a public denouncement must be tried since all these means had proved to be without effect alex was principally conscious of the single lightning-swift flash of reproach that had shot from the eyes of queenie torrance into hers how silently and viciously queenie would resent this public coupling of her immaculate reputation with alex's idiotic infatuation only alex knew with the frantic finality of youth she wondered whether she could go on living oh if only she might die at once without hearing further blame or reproach without encountering the ridicule of her companions or the cold withdrawal of queenie's precariously held friendship alex cried herself sick with terror and shame and utterly ineffectual remorse the despair that invades an undeveloped being is the blackest in the world because of its utter want of perspective alex could see nothing beyond the present she felt all the weight of an inexpressible guilt upon her and all the utter isolation of spirit which surrounds the sinner who stands exposed and condemned

she knew that nobody would take her part she was young enough to reflect forlornly that an accusation mattered nothing if unjust since the consciousness of innocence would sustain one serene and unfaltering through any ordeal but she had no consciousness of innocence she saw herself eternally different from her companions eternally destined to lose her way wickedly and shamefully she supposed without volition of her own she knew amongst those standards to which the right thinking conformed and which she only failed to recognize with sick wistfulness alex sought queenie's glance as they came one by one into the refectory after the reclame was over queenie's fair opaque face was as colourless as ever her eyes were cast down frantically alex willed her to cast one look of pity or forgiveness in her direction but queenie passed on to the refectory where the children's midday meal was waiting for them without a sign amidst all the blur of emotions passionate remorse and hopeless loneliness which made up alex's school days that saturday midday meal stood out in its black despair

the choking attempts to swallow a mass of vegetable cooking made salt and sodden with her own streaming tears the sobs that strangled her and broke in spite of all her efforts into the decorous silence of the refectory even the awed and scandalized glances that the younger children cast at her distorted face remained saliently before her memory for years at last the nun in charge rose from her place at the end of the room and came down and told alex that she might leave the table the long progress down the endless length of the refectory destroyed the last remnants of alex's self-control the tide of emotional agony that swept over her was to ebb and flow again and many times again but only once or twice was that high-water mark to be reached that bitter wave to engulf her and each time add to the undermining of that small stability of spirit with which alex had been endowed she left the misery of that black saturday behind her and was left with her childish nerves a little shattered her childish confidence of outlook rather more overshadowed her childish strength less steady and above all set fast in her childish mind

the ineradicable unexplained conviction that because she had loved queenie torrance and had been punished and rebuked for it therefore to love was wrong chapter two