Encounters: stories (8 page)

HE was a pale little man, with big teeth and prominent eyes; sitting opposite to him in a bus one would have found it incredible that there could be a woman to love him. As a matter of fact there were two, one dead, not counting a mother whose inarticulate devotion he resented, and a pale sister, also dead.

The only woman of value to him came down every evening to meet the 5.20, and stood very near the edge of the platform with her eyes flickering along the moving carriages. She never knew from which end of the train he would alight, because, as he told her, it was only by the skin of his teeth that he caught it at all, and he often had to jump in at the nearest open door and stand the whole way down among other men's feet, with his hand against the rack to steady himself. He could have come down easily and luxuriously by the 6.5, in the corner of a smoking carriage, but he gave himself this trouble for the sake of three-quarters

of an hour more with her. It was the consciousness of this, and of many other things, w^hich made her so speechless when they met. Often they were through the barrier and half-way down the road before she found a word to say. She was young, with thin features and light hair and eyes, and they had been married less than a year.

When they turned from the road down the tree-shadowed lane he would shift his bag from one hand to the other and steal an arm round her shoulders. He loved her shy tremor, and the little embarrassed way she would lean down to make a snatch at his bag, which he would sometimes allow her to carry. Their house was among the first two or three on a new estate, and overlooked rolling country from the western windows, from the east the house-backs of new roads. It had been built for him at the time of his first marriage, four years ago, and still smelt a little of plaster, and was coldly distempered, which he hated, but they said it was not yet safe to paper the walls.

To-day she said,"Come down and have a look at the garden, Martin; I've been 142

planting things."So he put down his bag and they walked to the end of the garden, where a new flower-bed looked scratched-up and disordered, and was edged with little drooping plants.

"Very pretty,"he said, looking at her and absently prodding at the mould with his umbrella."I suppose they'll grow?"

"Oh yes, Martin, they're going to grow right up and hide the board-fence; it's so ugly."

"If they're going to be so tall you should have planted them at the back and put the smaller things in front. As it is, everything else would be hidden."

"Why, yes,"she cried, disheartened,"I never thought of that—oh, Martin! It seemed such a pity to go walking over the new flower-bed, leaving foot marks; that's why I put them near the edge—and now I can't unplant them. What a lot there is to learn! Will you take me to the Gardening Exhibition next summer? I was reading about it—there are corners of gardens by all the famous people, and stone seats, and fountains—we might buy a sundial there,

and there are lectures you can go to, and prize roses. We should learn a lot."

"Next summer? Well, we'll see,"he said."Meanwhile don't overdo it—all this gardening."They skirted the flower-bed and went to lean up against the fence, resting their elbows on the top. She was half an inch taller than he, and her high heels gave her a further advantage. A little wind blew in their faces as they looked out towards the fading distance. The fields were dotted here and there with clumps of elm; with here and there a farmhouse roof, the long roofs and gleaming windows of a factory.

"This open country stretches for such miles,"she said dreamily."Sometimes, on these quiet misty days, I begin to think the sea's over there, and that if the clouds along the distance lifted I should see it suddenly, shining. And, with this wind, I could be sure I smell and hear it."

"Yes, I know. One often gets that feeling."

''Do you?''

"Well, no,"he said confusedly,"but Tm sure one does. I can imagine it."Someone 

had said the same thing to him, just here, three or four years ago.

"You often understand before I say things, don't you, Martin? Isn't it curious? All sorts of woman's discoveries that I've made about this house were nothing new at all to you. Like my idea about a fitment cupboard for that corner of the landing. Fancy that having occurred to you!"

He did not answer. He had taken off his hat, and she watched the wind blowing through his fair hair, as soft and fine as a baby's. Little wrinkles were coming in the forehead that she thought so noble, and his face—well, one could not analyse it, but it was a lovely face. She pictured him swaying for forty minutes in the train, with his hand against the luggage-rack, in order to be with her now, and said,"Oh, Martin, Martin!"

"Let's come into the house."

"No, not into the house."

"Why not? It's cold, you're cold, little woman."He drew her arm through his and chafed her hand.

"Let's stay out,"she begged. "It isn't

time for supper. It isn't beginning to get dark yet. Do stay out—dear Martin!"

"Why,"he said, looking round at her,"one would think you were afraid of the house."

"Hoo!"she laughed,"afraid of our house!"

But he was still dissatisfied. Something was making her restless; she was out in the garden too much. And when she was not in the garden she was always walking about the house. One or two days, when he had stayed at home to work, he had heard her on the stairs and up and down the passages; up and down, up and down. He knew that women in her state of health were abnormal, had strange fancies. Still

Now she was talking about the new sundial; where they were going to put it. Nasturtiums were to be planted round the foot, she said, because nasturtiums grew so fast and made a show. Her mind had a curious way of edging away from the immediate future. Next summer! Why, she would have other things besides sundials to think of then. What a funny little woman she was!

"I wonder you never thought of having a sundial before,"she insisted."Did Anybody ever think of it?"

"Well, no,"he said,"I don't think it ever occurred to me."

"Or Anybody?"

"No, nor anybody."

She looked up at the house, silhouetted against the evening sky."It's funny living in such a new house,—I never had. I wonder who will come after us."

"We're not likely to move for some time,"he said sharply.

"Oh no—only if we did. It seems so very much our house; I can't imagine anybody else at home here, we have made it so entirely—you and I. What was it like the first month or two?"

"Very damp,"he said, now wishing to return to the sundial.

"Did you have the drawing-room very pretty?"

"Oh yes, there were a great many curtains and things. I had to take down all the pictures, they were going mouldy on the walls. It was always a pretty room, even

with nothing in it at all. But it's nothing without you in it, Pussy."

"You didn't miss me for a long time,"she said, with her cheek against his.

"Always,"he said,"always, always, always."

"Oh no,"she said seriously,"you know you couldn't have been lonely."

"Lonely —I was wretched!"

"Oh, hush!"she cried with a start, putting her hand over his lips.

"Anyway"—he kissed her fingers—"nobody is lonely now. Come into the house."

She hung back on his arm a little but did not again protest; they went in by a glass door into the kitchen passage. As they passed through the archway into the hall he put out his hand to sweep something aside; then smiled shamefacedly. It was funny how he always expected that portiere. She had declared that a draught came through from the kitchen, and insisted on putting it up. She had filled the house with draperies, and Pussy had taken them down. When the portiere was there he had always been 148

forgetting it, and darting through to change his boots in the evening would envelop his head and shoulders ridiculously in the musty velvet folds. Funny how he could never accustom himself to the changes; the house as it had been was always in his mind, more present than the house as it v:as. He could never get used to the silence half-way up the stairs, where the grandfather clock used to be. Often he found himself half-way across the hall to see what was the matter with it; it had been a tiresome clock, more trouble than it was worth, with,a most reverberating tick. Pussy had put a bracket of china there in its place.

Because it was a chilly autumn evening they had lighted a fire in the drawing-room, the curtains were drawn; what an evening they would spend together after supper! An armchair had been pulled forward and a workbasket gaped beside it; he wondered what Pussy had been sewing. He stood in the hall, looking in through the open door, and remembered Her making baby-clothes by the fire and holding them up in her fingers for him to see. Sometimes he had 149

barely raised his eyes from his book—she had never been able to understand his passion for self-education. As she finished the things she had taken them upstairs and locked them away, and sometimes she would put dow^n her sewing and rattle her work-box maddeningly, and look at him across the fire and sigh. ... It would be wonderful to watch Pussy sewing. He could hear her moving about in the hall—such a Pussy!— hanging up his overcoat, then opening the oak chest and rattling things about in it for all the world as though she were after a mouse.

"I found some pictures,"she said, coming up behind him with a stack of something in her arms."Come into the drawing-room and we'll look."The young fire gave out a fitful light, and they knelt down on the hearthrug and put their heads together over the pictures."Nursery pictures,"said Puss? —she must have been up in the attic, he wished he had cleared the contents of it oul of his house. He stared at the smiling shepherdesses, farmer-boys and woolly lambs"They are nursery pictures, aren't they

Martin? I didn't know you'd actually bought the pictures. Had—had Anybody chosen the curtains, too? Did you get as far as that?"

"I don't know,"he said."I don't really, Pussy, I don't remember."

"And did you take it all to pieces again? Did you alone, or did Anybody help you? I wonder you didn't leave it, Martin; you didn't want the room for anything else. But I suppose it would have made you sad, or other people sad."

"Have you done anything to the room yet. Pussy?"

"I just pulled the furniture about a little, then I went to look for a fender in the attic and found these pictures. I don't know if there were any curtains, Martin; shall I buy some more? I saw some cretonnes specially for that kind of room, all over clowns and rabbits and little scarlet moons."

"I'll bring some patterns—or come up to town some day and we'll choose them together."

She did not answer, she was looking at the pictures.

"Martin, was that one going to have been called Martin too, Martin Ralph?"

"I don't know, it hadn't been decided.'*

"Didn't Anybody choose a name for him, although he didn't live? He was a real person."

"It had never been decided, Pussy. I'm going to get you a longer sofa, so that you can put your feet up. We can choose it when we choose the chintzes."

"Oh, you mustn't. This one is very comfortable; I never sit in it, but that's because I just don't take to it."

"I hate the look of it."

"Well, get rid of it,"she said, smiling,"as neither of us wants a sofa. Did Anybody ever sit on that one?"

As far as he remembered, it was the only thing in the room that she had ever sat on. She had never looked comfortable on it. She had a way of sitting with her head at the darkest end and straining her eyes over her work, then blinking up at him when he spoke. Of course she ought to have worn glasses; he hated women in glasses, and she knew it, but her short-sightedness annoyed

him and he had frequently said so. She used to come and meet him at the station—he came back by the 6.5 in those days, sometimes by the 6.43—and it had so greatly irritated him to watch her grimacing and screwing up her eyes at the carriages that he had slipped through the barrier behind her and pretended when she came home that he had not known she was there. Perhaps the little chap would have been short-sighted if he had lived. . . .

The maid came in to say that supper was ready, and they went into the dining-room. Here the curtains were undrawn and they could see the lights twinkling out in the windows of the other houses. He often felt as though those windows were watching him; their gaze was hostile, full of comment and criticism. The sound of the wind among the bushes in the garden was like whispered comparisons. He said they saw a good deal too much of the neighbours, and Pussy said she liked the friendly lights."I wouldn't like to be shut in all round, but I couldn't live without any people. The next-doors have been so kind. She came in with some

plants this morning, and stayed talking quite a long time, and said if there was ever anything she could do. . . . She spoke so nicely of you, Martin. She's known you by sight ever since you were a little boy."

"Oh, it's funny to have lived in the same place all one's life. All these people—well, they're sometimes rather tiresome."

"Tiresome?"

"One gets tired of their being the same. Would you like to travel, Pussy?"

"Oh, Martin!"Her eyes grew wistful; the prospect seemed remote.

"Well, we will,"he said, with energy. "We'll go to Switzerland—some summer."

"I'd rather go to Italy—Venice."

"Oh, not Venice. I don't think you'd care for Venice. It's nothing very much really."

"Have you been there?"

"Yes, for a bit. I didn't care about it."

"You never told me!"Her eyes that had been looking into his looked suddenly away, the colour surged up under her clear skin. She began to fidget with the spoons on the table.

"More, Martin?"

"Yes, please—I say, Pussy, you're not eating. You must eat, darling."

"Oh, I am, don't bother. I want to talk."She lifted her eyes again and glanced at him, the light ghnting on her golden eyelashes and on her hair."I've been so lonely all day—well, not lonely, but the house was so quiet, I could hear myself think. I went into the east room and sat on the window-seat. It is a cold room; I don't know how we'll ever make it warm enough."