On Monday morning Hereward Vale left home in an unsettled state of mind.
That was putting it mildly. He was thoroughly unhappy. Something was up--he
couldn't tell what--or whether it was his own fault or Mary's. Anyhow, it
didn't seem to matter whose fault it was. The thing had happened. That was
the one overwhelming idea that concerned him. The first shadow had fallen;
their record of complete and perfect happiness was broken.
The road to the station was a long and particularly beautiful one. Hereward
had always appreciated every inch of it. But to-day he hated it. He hated
the way the yew-trees drooped, the leafless branches of the hazels, the
faded, crumpled blackberry, the scattered decaying leaves. It was really a
remarkable day for November--clear and frosty, with a bright blue sky and
scudding white clouds. A strong north-east wind tested one's vitality.
Hereward's was low. He buttoned his collar and hurried on.
Mary had never treated him quite like this before. She had always been
tender, sympathetic and understanding with his moods. True, he was trying;
but she had known that before she married him. He was an artist, and an
artist's work, he argued, depended largely on the state of his emotions. He
earned the family bread by the labour of his hands and his hand was the
servant of his mind, and his mind a tempest of moods. Mary had applied
herself to her task with creditable skill. She could always turn his
sullenness to a sort of creative melancholy of which he was rather proud;
his restlessness to energy and his discontent to something like
constructive thinking. How she achieved the miracle he did not know, nor
did he inquire. But he was guided by her as a child by its mother, still
constantly rebelling.
But to-day the machinery had broken down. Mary had been cool, pleasant and
crisply unemotional at breakfast-time. He had woken up cross and with a
headache. He had a muddled feeling and wanted sorting out. But Mary seemed
quite unaware of it. She had a preoccupied manner; she went about just too
cheerfully, chatting just too pleasantly about trivial things. It was
mechanical, Hereward decided, and, anyway, it wasn't at all what he wanted.
His monosyllabic responses were accepted as perfectly right and natural,
when they were nothing of the sort. She did not get up and pass her hand
lovingly and soothingly over his hair and say things appropriate to his
state of mind. She went on with her breakfast and looked after him kindly
enough, but without solicitude.
For instance, she made no comment on the fact that he had hardly touched
his bacon; she merely removed his plate and gave him marmalade and toast as
if he had left no bacon at all. She didn't even notice the lines of
suffering on his face, the dark circles under his eyes. He cast a glance in
the mirror when her back was turned to see if they were obvious. They were.
Why wasn't Mary catching his hump? She always did.
When finally he left the house, a little bent, with no spring in his step,
Mary didn't accompany him to the door. She didn't exchange with him one of
those rapid looks of complete understanding that he had grown so accustomed
to and found so sustaining and helpful. She kissed him firmly and coolly,
almost casually. Just so she might kiss an aunt.
The train journey was cold and lonely. Nobody he knew was travelling up to
town. He bought a daily paper, but the headlines put him off. They were
nearly all about divorce cases. There was one about a man who had lived for
three years in the same house with his wife without speaking to her. Such
things were possible! He gazed out of the window. The wonderful day had no
charm for him. The feeling of autumn only further increased his sense of
the loss of youth, of the decay of romance. He nursed and nourished his
grievance. He desired that Mary should know what a wreck she had made of
his day, possibly of his life.
He was in no mood for work. He went up to his studio in Fitzroy Square and
muddled about with pens and ink. He had what he called a good tidy up, and
firmly and consistently threw away every relic of sentiment he had
foolishly preserved. At one o'clock, through habit and not because he was
hungry, he went out and had a lonely lunch at a small restaurant, sitting
at a marble-topped table which imparted to him something of its chill.
After that he loafed about looking at things till dusk. Dusk was quite
unbearable. He fled back to the studio, made up a stupendous fire, lit a
pipe and mused.
He decided not to go home that night. He felt hurt and ill-used. He would
stay in town and have a thoroughly good time. As the idea struck him he
looked round the studio. The corners were dismal and shadowy. Everything
not in the immediate circle of the fire looked grey and cheerless. His
easel, with a bit of drapery thrown across it, was like a spectre with
outstretched arms. It suggested despair. He could think of no one whom he
wanted to see. There wasn't a soul he knew whom he would not in this crisis
deliberately have avoided.
So he went to the Russian Ballet and was bored. He had been excited about
_Cleopatra_ the first time he had seen it; he now decided that it was a
great mistake to try to repeat emotional experiences.
He left hurriedly before the programme was half over. His feet took him
mechanically to Waterloo Station. He looked up a train. The 9.30 was due
out; he sprinted and caught it. The carriage he managed to get into was
empty and warm. He slept; he slept all the way, and it did him good.
When he arrived at the other end the night was calm and the sky
star-spangled. The walk out exhilarated him; his exasperation was over.
He ran lightly down the leaf-strewn steps of the old garden and looked in
at the window. Mary was seated at the fire. She looked pensive, pretty
and a little sad. He whistled and she smiled up. "Hooray!" she said, "I'd
nearly given you up." She slipped round and had the door open before he
could get out his key and drew him in. She helped him off with his coat
and scanned his face with even more than her usual intentness and
interest. But she didn't ask him why he was late and he didn't tell her.
He thought that could wait.
Their extemporised supper was a great success, and they sat before the wood
fire far into the night.
"What was up this morning?" he finally asked. "You weren't quite yourself,
were you?"
"This morning?" she questioned, puzzled. "Oh, I remember. I woke with a
splitting headache. Did you notice it? You nice old thing!"
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Musician_ (_having bumped lady with 'cello_). "OH, I _AM_
SO SORRY."
_Lady._ "DON'T MENTION IT. I'M PASSIONATELY FOND OF MUSIC."]
* * * * *