To the Dark Tower (24 page)

Doris got up, stretched, and went across to her mother. Leaning over her with that peculiar persuasiveness which always infuriated Shirley she murmured, "Red knave on black queen."

"Oh, Doris, don’t! It makes the game absolutely pointless if you help me. If you’re really interested, take these cards and begin on your own." But already Doris had moved away sulkily and gone to the window. Turning back the blind she stared into the humid twilight. "It’s still raining," she sighed.

"Does it
ever
do anything else? Rain, rain, rain. I’m sick of it." She yawned and stretched, in so exaggerated a fashion that her blouse came away from her skirt and showed beneath the pink vest which she herself had knitted. "This time next week we’ll be back in the old hole again."

Shirley looked up, "Oh, don’t! Must you be so gloomy?"

"I don’t know that I shall be so sorry. It gives one something to do."

"There’s plenty to do here," said Mrs. Humber grimly.

Doris took no notice of her. "If it goes on raining like this for the rest of the time God knows how we shall amuse ourselves. I’m sick of reading, and knitting bores me stiff."

"It doesn’t really worry me."

"Of course, it doesn’t—at the moment. Not while you’ve got the Petrels. But after to-morrow—"

"After to-morrow?"

Something in Shirley’s manner made Doris hesitate. "Haven’t you heard?" she asked. "Didn’t he tell you?"

"Tell me? Tell me what?"

"Well, it may just be hearsay," Doris said hurriedly. "Mrs. Nibbs, who does for them, told me when I was down in the village. Apparently Mr. Petrel had a row with his cousin last night, and they’ve decided to leave."

"But it can’t be true. Why, I—I saw him only this morning. We went for a walk together."

"Then, in that case—" Doris shrugged her shoulders.

Mrs. Humber looked up crossly. "Really, Doris, I don’t know how you get hold of half these stories. You’re becoming an awful little gossip."

But Shirley was thinking, a nausea filling her until she could hardly bear it. Somehow, she had known all along that he was leaving. Even this morning she had known it. But the idea had been dismissed by her as fanciful. So he had decided to go without telling her. It was the only conclusion she could come to. He had decided to sneak off.

In sudden decision she rose to her feet and went into the hall. Mrs. Humber called after her: "Where are you off to, dear?" "I’m just going for a stroll." No one said anything further. Turning up the collar of her mackintosh she walked into the rain.

It was dark, and at first she lost her way. But eventually she succeeded in blundering up the drive of Ash Farm and knocking on the door. Everything was silent except for the monotonous hush-hushing of the rain and the scrape of her shoes. She stood under an ornamental porch from which ivy dripped water with the sound of invisible kissing. She was shivering, but whether with cold or anticipation she could not tell.

There was no answer, and again she knocked, so that the sound reverberated dully. A window opened above and a head appeared. "Who’s that?" a voice asked crossly. It was Claude Petrel.

"Me—Shirley Forsdike."

"Shirley Forsdike!"

The rain trickled down her face as she turned it up to look at him. "Could you please come down?" she asked. "I must see you."

"No, really," he protested. "We’re all in bed. We were all asleep. I really can’t come down at this hour. Can’t you wait till to-morrow?"

"Oh, please come down!"

The window slammed shut; there was the sound of someone descending. Then the door was unbolted and he stood before her in pyjamas and dressing-gown. His hair was dishevelled, he rubbed his eyes and yawned. "What is it?" he asked.

"I had to see you," she said. "I simply had to see you. They told me you were going away—to-morrow."

He did not ask her in. From the lighted hall he spoke to her as she stood out hi the rain. "Yes," he said. "My cousin and I—a final flare-up... We’ve been getting on each other’s nerves quite a lot recently."

"But why didn’t you tell me?"

"Tell you?" He looked at her with surprise. Then he changed rapidly: "But what would have been the use?" he asked. "What would have been the use? I hate good-byes. They’re horrible. Far better to behave as if nothing were going to happen. Don’t you see, it’s so much easier for all concerned." He took her moist hand in his own. "Believe me when I say that I was thinking of you in this. I shouldn’t like to see you unhappy. As it is, we had such a lovely last walk... It’ll make a much better memory than if we had both been lachrymose."

"Where are you going?"

"Back to the university. My wife will be home to-morrow."

"You’ll write?"

Drawing her into the hall he said: "Now look, Shirley, my dear. This has been an idyll. I’m going to be sentimental and call it that. It
has
been an idyll, in this lovely spot, away from it all. But like most idylls it must be brief. It must finish now. If it dragged on it would lose its idyllic quality. It would merely become a sordid
affaire
. Let’s keep it as it is."

Tearfully she protested: "But I
must
see you again. I can’t bear it if—"

"Shirley! Shirley please! Try to see it as I see it. You wouldn’t like a hole-in-the-corner
affaire
—?"

"Anything! Anything! I can’t lose you! I can’t!" She clutched on to his arm, desperately, while a pool of water widened at her feet.

"Steady, Shirley! ... If you don’t mind my saying it, it’s rather different for you. You see, I’ve got my children—my career—"

In sudden contempt she shouted: "If that’s all you think about—!"

"Sh!" He gripped her wrist, his patience at an end. Then with deliberate restraint he countered: "My children and my career may not seem awfully important to you. But to me... I’m sorry, but they are. I love my children... And my wife... I’m very attached to her. I’m too old now and too settled to think of breaking loose."

"Not to break loose!" she protested. "But couldn’t we see each other—sometimes..."

"No," he said firmly. "No. That’s exactly what we mustn’t do. That would be worse than if we lived together. Then the whole thing would peter out, horribly. No. We must make an end now. I shall always be grateful to you: I shall always remember you. Bu—" Her head had fallen on to his arm; she was weeping loudly, without restraint. For a while he let her be: then gently, decisively, he made her straighten up. "I think you’ll see in the end that this way is best. Really it is."

"I—can’t—bear—it!" she sobbed again.

"Good-bye, Shirley."

She stiffened, choked, was silent. "Good-bye."

Stooping down he kissed her wet face, on the forehead, cupping it in both hands. Then he turned away, with a gesture of resignation, and began to mount the stairs. Without his knowing it she watched him. At the landing, before going into his room, he did something which filled her with a grim and devouring nausea: he yawned and stretched.

Doris met her at the door. "You do look done in, dear. Come up to bed." She helped her off with her things and then, arm-in-arm, they ascended together. Without mentioning the matter Doris had guessed what had happened. "Do you feel very bad?" she asked, when Shirley had thrown herself on to her bed. "Do you?" There was no answer but a muffled sob. Outside the rain still swished downwards. "Here—I’ll get you something to put you right." She went out to her own room and returned with a pill: she collected patent medicines. "Swallow this, dear," she said, stooping over Shirley, a tumbler of water in her hand. "You’ll feel much better afterwards."

Shirley drew away. But Doris put an arm round her and drew her up to a sitting posture, and turned the red and tear-stained face to the light. "Do swallow it," she pleaded. And Shirley, simply because it seemed the best way to get rid of her, took what she offered and swallowed it.

Then a strange thing happened. At the touch of the pill on her tongue she was transferred, backwards, into childhood; and she was in Barbizon; and Cousin Maurice had given her a menthol tablet; and her father was just dead.

Was it worthwhile? His predecessor had thought not. Was it worth enduring these hours of limitless boredom, merely for the sake of a room to oneself, and physical comfort, and regular meals? The conversational"Have-you-read’s", and"Have-you-seen’s"; the"Of-course,-he’s-extraordinarily-brilliant"; the reminiscences of"When-I-saw-Isadora-Duncan", and"It-really-was-rather-sordid"; the recuring Leavis-Eliot-Sitwell theme which might even become Coward-Maugham-Gershwin: was it really better than the bank, and the boy’s club that he had worked at, and starving among the gentilities of Edith Villas? Then there was Mrs. Maccabae herself. For how long would he tolerate that girlish archness? It was her habit to make sudden confessions which would throw her guests into paroxysms of"Did-you-ever","Oh-isn’t-Gugs-too-quaint". For example, when they were discussing Mr. Macarthy’s last article in the
Sunday Times
Mrs. Maccabae exclaimed:" Now I’m going to tell you all a secret—a rather shameful one", and everyone, in expectation of another of her notorious pieces of ‘wit’, followed the lead of her husband and cried:" What is it, Gugs? Oh,
do
tell us!
Do
tell us!" Coyly she looked round at the assembled guests."Well, you mustn’t think me very silly. But the person whose novels I’m simply crazy about at the moment is—Ruby M. Ayres!"" How
could
you? Oh, you
cant
, Gugs. No, really, Gugs..." Amid shrieks of laughter they savoured to the full this cultural impropriety."But I do," she insisted."The last one I read was
utterly
divine. It was called
Rose’s Secret
." (In actual fact she had never opened any of Miss Ayres’ books. She had seen
Rose’s Secret
on the housemaid’s chest of drawers.)

On another occasion it would be:"George’s friend, Lord Tavenham, sent us this salmon from Scotland.""And very good it is, too," murmured some appreciative guest."Yes, I suppose it is. But, do you know—it’s awful to say this—but really,
I prefer tinned salmon
." And again there would be the exclamations of laughter, an atmosphere of"What-will-she-do-next?"

Was it worth while? Was it really easier to write his book among these vulgarities than in discomfort? He often wondered.

Returning to his room he found his thread lost, he could not continue. In anger he looked about him, at the disordered table on which lay notes, letters from the General, the cheque which the General had surprisingly sent when he was ill and penniless in Glasgow and which something, some scruple, had prevented him cashing. Then he stood at the photograph beside his bed, the woman whom someone else had married, her head severed from her neck where he and the General had torn it, so long ago, at Dartmouth. Finally he gazed out of the window. His charges, the two sickly, flaxen-haired boys played their tranquil, adult games on the lawn. Did even they make it worth while?

Oh, damn, damn!

All that afternoon it had rained: she had taught the girls how to make raffia paper-rings, and later the headmistress had read from
The Wind in the Willows
. The net-ball match had had to be cancelled. But now, as she walked from Earl’s Court Underground station towards the Cromwell Road, a suit-case of exam papers in her hand, the sun was oozing thinly through a sieve of smoke, the pavements glistened, and a few birds chirped on blackened boughs in the gardens of squares. The air, too, was strangely sweet and fresh.

She lived in one of the many boarding-houses that flank the Cromwell Road. Three tall, Italianate houses had been knocked into one: and then, as though to bind them together, there had been fixed over their front, in round gold letters,"Bristol Hotel". The proprietress had been the wire of a tea-planter in Burma; but he had died or somehow got mislaid; and now she sat in her basement sitting-room, among brass ornaments, photographs of big-game parties, and Egyptian mats that were nailed to the walls. Her clients were young couples home on leave from the colonies, travellers, clerks, and professional women: there were also old ladies, retired Army officers, and a German student whom they all disliked.

As Shirley climbed the stairs she passed a bust of His Majesty King George the Fifth, which remained perpetually grey in spite of innumerable housemaids and innumerable feather dusters following each other through the years. On the landing Captain Timpson, coming out of the lavatory, winked at her broadly: but she hurried on, not so much from disapproval as from boredom at a manœuvre which was repeated again and again without sequel. The lavatory had a stained-glass window and a notice:"Guests are asked not to put hair or tea-leaves down the closet."

Her room was at the top of the house, with a view into somebody else’s room in an adjoining hotel. The net curtains were always kept drawn. She sat down on the bed, took off her shoes, and wriggled her toes. Then she yawned and stretched out at full length, forgetting that she was crumpling the bedspread. The proprietress had had to speak about this before.

At that moment the gong went, reverberating dismally down a whole scale as the maid thumped one of the dangling pipes and then another. She was about to begin again when the proprietress passed and said,"That will do, Ellen", in the same voice that she said"That will do" when Ellen made the helpings too big. Shirley sat up and then sank back again. Down the corridor she could hear a patter of feet, an opening and closing of doors."It’s the early bird..." as Captain Timpson was in the habit of remarking: and acting on this advice he was always seated in the dining-hall at least five minutes before time. He read the
Star
, drank water, and tried to break his roll. But for once Shirley did not join the genteel scurry, with polite"After you’s" and insidious short-cuts through the bedrooms of friends. She thought of descending, and how at each step the aroma of cabbage became stronger and stronger; and how, when she entered, Captain Timpson winked, from force of habit, and the proprietress fished into the casserole for a portion of rabbit, and one of the two old ladies with whom she had made friends patted a chair and chirruped:"This is my friend’s seat! This is my friend’s seat!" Oh, no, it was horrible; she could not face it. She put on her shoes again, and soaped the ladder which was lengthening in her stocking, and took a violet cachou; then she powdered her nose, pulled on a hat which had now been remodelled three times, and went out. She had no idea where she was going.