Life and Death of Harriett Frean | Page 3

Madeira cake lest people should see she was thinking
of it. Mrs. Hancock had given her somebody else's crumby plate. She
thought: I'm not greedy. I'm really and truly hungry. She could draw

herself in at the waist with a flat, exhausted feeling, like the two ends of
a concertina coming together.
She was doing this when she saw her mother standing on the other side
of the table, looking at her and making signs.
"If you've finished, Hatty, you'd better get up and let that little boy have
something."
They were all turning round and looking at her. And there was the
crumby plate before her. They were thinking: "That greedy little girl
has gone on and on eating." She got up suddenly, not speaking, and left
the table, the Madeira cake and the raspberries and cream. She could
feel her skin all hot and wet with shame.
And now she was sitting up in the drawing-room at home. Her mother
had brought her a piece of seed-cake and a cup of milk with the cream
on it. Mamma's soft eyes kissed her as they watched her eating her cake
with short crumbly bites, like a little cat. Mamma's eyes made her feel
so good, so good.
"Why didn't you tell me you hadn't finished?"
"Finished? I hadn't even begun"
"Oh-h, darling, why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I--I don't know."
"Well, I'm glad my little girl didn't snatch and push. It's better to go
without than to take from other people. That's ugly."
Ugly. Being naughty was just that. Doing ugly things. Being good was
being beautiful like Mamma. She wanted to be like her mother. Sitting
up there and being good felt delicious. And the smooth cream with the
milk running under it, thin and cold, was delicious too.
Suddenly a thought came rushing at her. There was God and there was
Jesus. But even God and Jesus were not more beautiful than Mamma.
They couldn't be.
"You mustn't say things like that, Hatty; you mustn't, really. It might
make something happen."
"Oh, no, it won't. You don't suppose they're listening all the time."
Saying things like that made you feel good and at the same time
naughty, which was more exciting than only being one or the other. But
Mamma's frightened face spoiled it. What did she think--what did she
think God would do?
Red campion----

At the bottom of the orchard a door in the wall opened into Black's
Lane, below the three tall elms.
She couldn't believe she was really walking there by herself. It had
come all of a sudden, the thought that she must do it, that she must go
out into the lane; and when she found the door unlatched, something
seemed to take hold of her and push her out. She was forbidden to go
into Black's Lane; she was not even allowed to walk there with Annie.
She kept on saying to herself: "I'm in the lane. I'm in the lane. I'm
disobeying Mamma."
Nothing could undo that. She had disobeyed by just standing outside
the orchard door. Disobedience was such a big and awful thing that it
was waste not to do something big and awful with it. So she went on,
up and up, past the three tall elms. She was a big girl, wearing black
silk aprons and learning French. Walking by herself. When she arched
her back and stuck her stomach out she felt like a tall lady in a crinoline
and shawl. She swung her hips and made her skirts fly out. That was
her grown-up crinoline, swing-swinging as she went.
At the turn the cow's parsley and rose campion began; on each side a
long trail of white froth with the red tops of the campion pricking
through. She made herself a nosegay.
Past the second turn you came to the waste ground covered with old
boots and rusted, crumpled tins. The little dirty brown house stood
there behind the rickety blue palings; narrow, like the piece of a house
that has been cut in two. It hid, stooping under the ivy bush on its roof.
It was not like the houses people live in; there was something queer,
some secret, frightening thing about it.
The man came out and went to the gate and stood there. He was the
frightening thing. When he saw her he stepped back and crouched
behind the palings, ready to jump out.
She turned slowly, as if she had thought of something. She mustn't run.
She must not run. If she ran he would come after her.
Her mother was coming down the garden walk, tall and beautiful in her
silver-gray gown with the bands of black velvet on the flounces and the
sleeves; her wide, hooped skirts swung,