Many years after The Last Battle, Susan searches for the wardrobe.
“Hope deferred makes the heart sick, but a longing fulfilled makes a tree of life.”
Proverbs 13:12
Six years. Six years after the crash, a beautiful, pale woman stepped off a train and onto the platform of a quiet country station.
No one was there to meet her. She’d hesitated to take the train – even after six years, the creaks and groans along the rail made her flinch with remembered pain, though not with fear.
But she had another memory of trains, of four children sent away from London during the war because of the air-raids and of a train ride where she’d traded glances with an older brother as the younger sulked, bored, and her youngest sister bravely blinked away tears during the first half hour and looked out the window.
Susan had taken her younger sister’s place at the window this time, blinking back her own tears. The countryside was changed, smaller, and with a few more houses and fewer stone ledges.
The ride was disappointing – long and hard. Much the way everything was now.
But this time, too, was different. This time she knew what she was going towards: what she hardly dared hope for, but what she could not keep herself from hoping for. And now, in the middle of the morning, she had arrived at the first step: the platform where she and her siblings had first arrived when going to the Professor’s. She could almost see their ghosts, small suitcases in hand, standing bewildered as they looked for someone to fetch them. They had been so, so young.
Susan closed her eyes against the ghosts, shook herself, and held her head up as she descended the platform. She was not worried about getting a ride; the Professor’s old home was still a landmark, and all the townspeople would know it. She was sure she’d have no problem with her request to view the house.
But first, to get there. “Excuse me,” she said in her clear voice to one of the men sitting in a horse-drawn wagon, talking with the stationmaster. “Would you be able to take me to the old house, mentioned in the histories and guidebooks, where an old Professor Digory Kirk used to live?” The men looked at her, glanced at each other in one of those glances that define who was an outsider and who is known.
“Toff o’ some sort, no doubt,” the man in the wagon said in a low voice to the stationmaster.
“Aye, here for the old ‘ouse,” the stationmaster agreed. “How about it?”
“Right, I can take you, miss,” the man in the wagon said to Susan. “My name’s Jeremy, and if you’ll hop up, we’ll be off.” Despite his words, he was already standing and extending a hand to the younger woman. Susan, after all those years, again walked, spoke, and watched with the queenly grace that had once defined her, and many felt compelled to help her with what courtesy their hearts could hold. She had learned not to compare their rough efforts with the joyous refinement of Narnia, knowing they offered what they could, and the courtesy of the offer was a well-meant gift.
And she might not have to ache for the old courtesy much longer. For both these reasons, she willingly took Jeremy’s hand and allowed him to pull her up onto the wooden wagon seat.
“Thank you,” she said quietly, folding her hands on her lap. Through the rough, jolting ride, she maintained her silence, and Jeremy was content to let her, though he stole glances at her occasionally, perhaps seeing more than her upright stance which implied more grace than constraint. Perhaps he saw her pale face lined with a pain that had never ceased, and the heart-piercing look of beauty so sorrowful.
Susan was seeing ghosts again. She heard her young voice telling Edmund not to push, Peter warning Lucy away from the edge, and even heard the rustling of the suitcases rubbing against each other. She had been so worried during that trip that the patches holding in their few items would give way. Such silly fears, she’d had. But fear had too often found her a listener. She was so tired of ghosts. She wanted, she ached, with all the remaining depth of her wounded heart, for real things again.
Closer. Closer. Yes, this was the drive they had walked over and over, recalling things of Narnia, through the rest of that summer. Professor Kirk had come with them (to the bemusement of his staff), and his wisdom had eased their path to being children again, to being English again.
Two of the trees were gone. Susan supposed it improved the view, but she wished, oh how she wished, with all the desire of a child for the familiar, that they had still been in place.
She had the desires of a child again. She’d fought them for so long; but she did not fight them now. Perhaps only children could enter. She had been told she was too old. But if she had the heart of a child again – would it work?
Jeremy glanced at her again as her breath quickened, and perhaps the sorrow breaking through her demeanor spoke, for he cleared his throat as they stopped at the door.
“Will you be needin’ a ride back, miss?”
Would she? She did not know. She hoped – oh, Aslan, how she hoped – she would not. But it was all too likely she would; they had, after all, always come back. “I do not know,” she answered, for she always told the truth now.
“Right, miss, I can wait for a bit. Today’s m’day off. Be kind of ye to send someone out, though, if you’re stayin’.”
Susan took his hand, gracefully stepped down, released it, and turned back to look at him. “It is kind of you to offer, and I thank you very much for it,” she said softly. “As soon as I know myself, I will certainly ask them to pass the message on.” She turned quickly – kindness could be upsetting, she’d learned, when she was hurting, and this visit, with hope and the past so intertwined, hurt. Yes, there were the steps up to the house. Surely, surely, the new owner would have known the worth of the house, and would let her-
There was only one way to know, Susan reminded herself, and raised her hand, knocking firmly.
A maid answered it. Susan’s hands trembled; a maid, costumed much as Ivy, Margaret, and Betty had been, answering with that helpful, inquiring look of maids everywhere.
“My name is Susan, and I wish to see the house, if it is convenient for those who live here,” she requested, stepping inside after the maid and unpinning her hat. She handed it into the maid’s outstretched hand, and thanked her when the maid spoke of getting the housekeeper, Mrs. Richards. The maid left, and Susan pressed her hands to her eyes. She would not cry; she wouldn’t. But she knew this room, knew it, and the memories, the dust-and-polish smell, the picture above the fireplace of a stuffy-looking, knighted man, the sunlight falling on the rug – she knew this place.
“Ah, yes, my lady, come to see the house?” a kind, busy, mothering voice inquired, and Susan hastily uncovered her eyes. “Why, my dear, what’s wrong?” Susan became aware of cool air hitting streaks on her cheeks, and hastily wiped away the water.
“I was here as a girl,” she explained, allowing nostalgia to explain her emotion. The plump housekeeper, hair pulled back in a much messier gray bun than Mrs. Macready would ever have worn, hesitated.
“Forgive me, my dear, but I don’t recall children being here? The man before these owners was an old bachelor professor, and you’d be too young for the man before him.”
Intelligent, Susan realised, smiling a bit ruefully. She would have to explain a bit more. “I came here with my siblings, three of them, during the war. Professor Kirk took us in-”
“Oh, the war children? Why, my dear, I’ve heard stories! They say you quite brought the old Professor out of his books and back into the real world with your visit here. Took him to the creek up in the woods and dunked him in accidentally, they told me, him an old man and still recreating battle scenes with your brothers. He came back soaking wet, white hair plastered to his face, and the boys helping him along. Nine days wonder in the village and all that, even as eccentric as I heard he was. Let me see, the younger one was fair-haired and laughing, they said-”
Susan went white, but the woman was too caught up in remembering to notice.
“-so you must be the older one. Susan, was it?”
“Susan Pevensie,” Susan supplied, curtsying. Her mask was back in place. It had to be; she had to be strong.
“There, now, that’s nice and proper. Come back to see the place again?”
“Yes, please, if it’s not too much trouble. And could you please send someone out to tell the man with the wagon – Jeremy – that I’ll be viewing the house?”
“Why, no trouble at all! You know most of the things about it, I shouldn’t wonder, but we’ll go through and you can have a look at the old place just the same. Perhaps you’ll tell me some of the stories,” she said, opening the door to the hall – one the Pevensies had not run down, as it was too close to the servants’ hall and the sharp ears of Mrs. Macready – and Susan smiled, painfully.
Susan did end up telling stories. They were too powerful, too present, not to be told; there was the suit of armor Peter and Edmund had ended up taking apart, and when the Professor had found them at it they’d shown him the various differences between Dwarf-make and English (not that she mentioned the last part to Mrs. Richards), and he’d sat on that chest, there, and asked intelligent questions, and Peter and Edmund had ended up debating the various strengths and weaknesses of both, till a giggling Ivy had found them and reminded them that being half an hour late for supper was “not conducive to the peace of the house, as she says, Professor, begging your pardon.” There stood the painting Susan had sought to recapture and even improve, and Peter, not watching where he was going, had run headlong into her and the paint, creating a mess. The four of them cleaned it up before the maids noticed, but there – yes, and tears were again fighting to fall as Susan touched the tiniest bit of blue on the back of the original painting’s frame that they’d never been able to clean out. The housekeeper laughed so hard she sat down on a nearby chair, telling her the servants had noticed it and had taken to telling wilder and wilder tales of how it got there, in this strange, adventurous old house. One of the servants, Sarah, had sworn it was all that was left of a secret message that had warned stowaways of approaching enemy soldiers, and the rest of the servants had teased her, telling her painting secret messages in bright blue was a perfect way to make sure they weren’t noticed, get off it!
So many stories. So many rooms, and passages, and everywhere, everywhere, her siblings. All three of them. Young, and living, and nothing she could touch or call to. Nothing she could be loved by.
But finally, they went in the narrow passage leading to the empty room – the passage was filled with woven tapestries now, though nothing like beautiful, colorful Narnian ones – and then Mrs. Richard’s hand was on the knob – the door was opening – more, now, she could see the room – they went in –
And Susan nearly tripped over the rolled-up carpet on the floor. “This room is just storage now, but I thought you might have played in here, a nice empty space it was-”
“Where is the wardrobe?” Susan asked, her heart pounding so hard she could feel it in her fingertips and fear choking her throat. “Where is the wardrobe?”
“A wardrobe?” Mrs. Richards asked, face filled with surprise. “That’s right – I remember it now. A handsome old thing, filled with fur coats and moth-balls!” Susan smelled them instantly, felt the fur under her fingertips as she handed out coats to her siblings – but where was it? “Let’s see – it was gone before my time, but Mrs. Macready told me about it – something the Professor made, I think it was, from a childhood tree. A large one, with a looking-glass in the door?”
“Yes,” Susan choked. “Where is it?”
“Why, I don’t know, my dear. Gone before my time.” Mrs. Richards paused, and looked a little harder at Susan. “It means a lot to you, doesn’t it?”
Susan nodded; how could she explain how much? How could she explain the need that devastated her, when left unmet? Could she ever find it? Where had it gone?
“Well, my dear, I’ve no idea where to send you, but-” Mrs. Richards hesitated.
“But?” Susan asked, almost, almost begging. “Please, my siblings – it meant so much to us, when we were here. It held our whole world inside it.” Bigger on the inside; the mystery none of them had known how to understand.
“Someplace safe, after the bombs of London,” Mrs. Richards sympathised. Kindness was in her tone again; the kindness that met Susan everywhere and still wasn’t enough to touch the hole where she’d lost everything. “Well, I can tell you nothing, but Mrs. Macready was the kind of housekeeper who knew everything, and I don’t think she’d mind me giving you her address – she’s two stops over, on the train, back towards London. She’s not far from the station – she’s the sort that will get around and do things, as long as she’s still walking, and she’ll still be walking as long as she’s alive. She’s in a big brown apartment lodging, you can see it from the platform, to the left of it. I still go up, sometimes, and she quizzes my memory on all the things in the house and makes sure I’ve got them right.” She gave a short laugh. “Old enough to be your mother, I am, and not much younger than her, but I still feel like a child before a headmistress – that’s what we had in my day – when I go to her house. But it pleases her, and it helps me to make sure someone remembers all of this. She might know where the wardrobe went, my dear.” Susan dried her tears. She hadn’t been able to stop herself from crying again, after these hopes were dashed.
“Thank you,” she whispered. She stopped; she wanted nothing more than to leave right now, find Mrs. Macready – and wouldn’t that be odd, Susan realised – but Mrs. Richards had been far too kind for Susan to just leave her now.
But Mrs. Richards was also quite intelligent, and had been watching Susan closely. “You want to go now, dear, don’t you?” Susan nodded. “Jeremy won’t have left yet; he’s sweet on one of the maids, and good for her, I say, for he’s a kind man and a good one. He can drive you back, and you’ll be in time for the 2:05 train. Come, let’s be off.”
Susan didn’t see much of the house on the way down – listening to the thud of her heart, which seemed to ask Where? Where? Where? and crying, and trying not to cry. Kindness was quite upsetting, and she’d been given much of it here. Mrs. Richards sent a maid for Jeremy, asking him to hook his horse up again (he had stayed), and then the housekeeper settled Susan into a chair in one of the front rooms with a handkerchief and cup of tea while they waited. Susan, in thanks, told her a few more stories till the wagon came rumbling into sight in the window, and Susan set aside her cup of tea and stood. She held out her hands to Mrs. Richards, who had more slowly and lumberingly stood. Mrs. Richards took them on her own, squeezing them gently and firmly.
“Thank you,” Susan said, looking into the motherly face a few inches below her own. “Thank you, truly. You are – you have the kindness of the heart of the Lion, and I cannot thank you enough for it.”
“Why, that’s a strange thing to say, and yet I can’t say I’ve had a nicer compliment,” Mrs. Richards responded. “There, now, take care. I’ll see you out. Down you go! Goodbye! Goodbye, and take care!” Susan, pulled up into the wagon by Jeremy’s hand as he nodded a greeting, sat on the seat and twisted to wave goodbye to Mrs. Richards till she was out of sight.
The trip back to the station was another quiet one, as Susan’s nerves had settled somewhat with the tea. Jeremy spoke a little about the maid he’d seen – said she was having a rough day, what with a party coming in two days and all the chairs needing polishing. Susan smiled, listened, nodded, and said little till they were back in town. Jeremy helped her down, and the stationmaster – still at his post – reached down to help her up the stairs to the platform. She turned on it, back to Jeremy.
“It’s not my place, but if you would allow me the freedom – we passed a field with lovely flowers on the way here. If you wanted to take some to one of the maids back at that house, I think you might make her day much better.”
“Much obliged, miss, that’s a grand idea,” Jeremy said, tipping his hat. Susan smiled, turned to the stationmaster, bought her ticket gracefully, and retreated a safe distance away so the two men could talk comfortably.
She had bought a ticket for two stops away.
Hope deferred makes the heart sick.
She got back on the train. The trip, not as long this time, still whispered to Susan’s fears and remembered pain, but the hope she still steadily held drowned it out. She refused to think about what would happen if Mrs. Macready did not know – or would not see her. The idea did not bear thinking about, and that was that.
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