Half of the Human Race by Anthony Quinn

Author:Anthony Quinn
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781448112951
Publisher: Random House

13

IN THE WEEKS following her release, Connie frequently found herself at a loss, so disabling had been the habits of prison life. Things that she had once been inclined to do almost without thinking now required a careful negotiation. Even the simple process of leaving the house gave her pause: she would tell her mother that she was about to go out, and then would look for a reply, as if awaiting her permission. In her bedroom at night she found the quiet unnerving, and would stay awake listening for a wardress’s footfall that never came. At mealtimes she was distracted by the absence of the prison grace she had heard recited daily, and would mutter it under her breath. She had also become neurotic about the laying of the table, and would surprise Fred and her mother by suddenly standing up and rearranging plates and cutlery before anyone was allowed to eat. She thought of this repetitive behaviour as ‘Holloway-itis’.

Yet Connie was not the only one to have changed. Mrs Callaway seemed at last to slough off the lassitude of her widowhood, put aside her phantom illnesses, and devoted herself to her daughter’s recuperation as though in apology for her own habits of neediness. Nothing was said on the matter between them, but Connie wondered if her mother had sensed that the dark secret of her husband’s demise was now shared equally among her children. It was as if they had pledged one another to a vow of silence. Whenever his name was mentioned, they would tread carefully and watch each other like spies in possession of the same terrible knowledge. And yet it seemed to Connie that they behaved this way not out of fear, but out of love.

Olivia also appeared to notice this change, and some weeks after their momentous encounter at Thornhill Crescent she did something quite out of character by inviting Connie to dinner. No mention was made of her heated exchange with Lionel, though Connie sensed that Olivia at some level approved of her sister’s refusal to be cowed by him: perhaps she had belatedly recognised a strain of defiance that reflected well on the Callaways. She shook her head at the pompous invitation card Olivia had seen fit to send, but she was pleased by it nevertheless. The spirit of conciliation was not everywhere apparent. At the bookshop her position as manager had been usurped in her absence, and Mr Hignett’s letter in response to Connie’s enquiry about her old job was, though polite in tone, unequivocal in its rebuff.

Yet no sooner had one door closed than another quite unexpectedly swung open. Among the stack of correspondence that had gathered during her detention at Holloway was a letter from Henry Cluett, the surgeon to whom Brigstock had introduced her last year, expressing a hope that she may wish to act as his assistant – unofficially, of course – in his new post at St Thomas’s Hospital. He regretted that the emolument would be small, but it would afford her useful experience in ‘theatre’.

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