"Tea is ready, Bernard," said Laura Clowes, coming in from the
garden.
It was five o'clock on a June afternoon, but the hall was so dark
that she had to grope her way. Wanhope was a large, old-fashioned
manor-house, a plain brick front unbroken except in the middle, where
its corniced roof was carried down by steps to an immense gateway of
weathered stone, carved with the escutcheon of the family and their
Motto: FORTIS ET FIDELIS. Wistarias rambled over both sides,
wreathing the stone window-frames in their grape-like clusters of
lilac bloom, and flagstones running from end to end, shallow, and so
worn that a delicate growth of stonecrop fringed them, shelved down
to a lawn.
Indoors in the great hall it was dark because floor and staircase
and wall and ceiling were all lined with Spanish chestnut-wood,
while the windows were full of Flemish glass in purple and sepia
and blue. There was nothing to reflect a glint of light except a
collection of weapons of all ages which occupied the wall behind
a bare stone hearth; suits of inlaid armour, coats of chainmail
as flexible as silk, assegais and blowpipes, Bornean parangs and
Gurkha kukris, Abyssinian shotels with their double blades,
Mexican knives in chert and chalcedony, damascened swords and
automatic pistols, a Chinese bronze drum, a Persian mace of the
date of Rustum, and an Austrian cavalry helmet marked with a
bullet-hole and a stain.
Gradually, as her eyes grew used to the gloom Laura found her way
to her husband's couch. She would have liked to kiss him, but
dared not: the narrow mocking smile, habitual on his lips, showed
no disposition to respond to advances. Dressed in an ordinary
suit of Irish tweed, Bernard Clowes lay at full length in an easy
attitude, his hands in his pockets and his legs decently extended
as Barry, his male nurse, had left them twenty minutes ago: a
big, powerful man, well over six feet in height, permanently
bronze and darkly handsome, his immense shoulders still held back
so flat that his coat fitted without a wrinkle--but a cripple
since the war.
Laura Clowes too was tall and slightly sunburnt, but thin for
her height, and rather plain except for her sweet eyes, her silky
brown hair, and--rarer gift!--the vague elegance which was a
prerogative of Selincourt women. She rarely wore expensive
clothes, her maid Catherine made most of her indoor dresses,
and yet she could still hold her own, as in old days, among
women who shopped in the Rue de la Paix. This afternoon, in her
silk muslin of the same shade as the trail of wistaria tucked
in where the frills crossed over her breast, she might have gone
astray out of the seventeenth century.
"Tea is in the parlour," said Mrs. Clowes. "Shall I wheel you
round through the garden? It's a lovely day and the roses are
in their perfection, I counted eighty blooms on the old Frau
Karl. I should like you to see her."
"I shouldn't. But you can drag me into the parlour if you like,"
said Bernard Clowes--a grudging concession: more often than not
he ate his food in the hall. His wife pushed his couch, which
ran on cycle wheels and so lightly that a child could propel it,
into her sitting-room and as near as she dared to the French
windows that opened without step or ledge on the terrace
flagstones and the verdure of the lawn. Out of doors, for some
obscure reason, he refused to go, though the garden was sweet
with the scent of clover and the gold sunlight was screened by
the milky branches of a great acacia. Still he was in the fresh
air, and Laura hastily busied herself with her flowered Dresden
teacups, pretending unconsciousness because if she had shown the
slightest satisfaction he would probably have demanded to be
taken back. Her mild duplicity was of course mere make believe:
the two understood each other only too well: but it was wiser to
keep a veil drawn in case Bernard Clowes should suddenly return
to his senses. For this reason Laura always spoke as if his
choice of a coffined life were only a day or two old. Had he
said--as he might say at any moment--"Laura, I should like to
go for a drive," Laura would have been able without inconsistency
to reply, "Yes, dear: what time shall I order the car?" as though
they had been driving together every evening of their married
life.
"What have you been doing today?" Clowes asked, sipping his tea
and looking out of the window. He had shut himself up in his
bedroom with a headache and his wife had not seen him since the
night before.
"This morning I motored into Amesbury to change the library
books and to enquire after Canon Bodington. I saw Mrs. Bodington
and Phoebe and George--,"
"Who's George?"
"Their son in the Navy, don't you remember? The Sapphire is in
dry dock--"
"How old is he?"
"Nineteen," said Mrs. Clowes.
"Oh. Go on."
"I don't remember doing anything else except get some stamps at
the post office. Stay, now I come to think of it, I met Mr.
Maturin, but I didn't speak to him. He only took off his hat to
me, Bernard. He is seventy-four."
"Dull sort of morning you seem to have had," said Bernard Clowes.
"What did you do after lunch?"
"With a great want of intelligence, I strolled down to Wharton to
see Yvonne, but she was out. They had all gone over to the big
garden party at Temple Brading. I forgot about it--"
"Why weren't you asked?"
"I was asked but I didn't care to go. Now that I am no longer in
my first youth these expensive crushes cease to amuse me."
Bernard gave an incredulous sniff but said nothing. "On my way
home I looked in at the vicarage to settle the day for the school
treat. Isabel has made Jack Bendish promise to help with the
cricket, and she seems to be under the impression that Yvonne
will join in the games. I can hardly believe that anything will
induce Yvonne to play Nuts and May, but if it is to be done that
energetic child will do it. No, I didn't see Val or Mr.
Stafford. Val was over at Red Springs and Mr. Stafford was
preparing his sermon."
"Have you written any letters?"
"I wrote to father and sent him fifty pounds. It was out of my
own allowance. He seems even harder up than usual. I'm afraid
the latest system is not profitable."
"I should not think it would be, for Mr. Selincourt," replied
Bernard Clowes politely. "Monte Carlo never does pay unless one's
pretty sharp, and your father hasn't the brains of a flea. Was
that the only letter you wrote?"
"Yes--will you have some more bread and butter?"
"And what letters did you get?" Clowes pursued his leisured
catechism while he helped himself daintily to a fragile sandwich.
This was all part of the daily routine, and Laura, if she felt
any resentment, had long since grown out of showing it.
"One from Lucian. He's in Paris--"
"With--?"
"No one, so far as I know," Laura replied, not affecting to
misunderstand his jibe. Lucian Selincourt was her only brother
and very dear to her, but there was no denying that his career
had its seamy side. He was not, like her father, a family
skeleton--he had never been warned off the Turf: but he was
rarely solitary and never out of debt. "Poor Lucian, he's hard
up too. I wish I could send him fifty pounds, but if I did he'd
send it back."
"What other letters did you have?"
Mrs. Clowes had had a sheaf of unimportant notes, which she was
made to describe in detail, her husband listening in his hard
patience. When they were exhausted Laura went on in a hesitating
voice, "And there was one more that I want to consult you about.
I know you'll say we can't have him, but I hardly liked to refuse
on my own imitative, as he's your cousin, not mine. It was from
Lawrence Hyde, offering to come here for a day or two."
"Lawrence Hyde? Why, I haven't seen or heard of him for years,"
Clowes raised his head with a gleam of interest. "I remember him
well enough though. Good-looking chap, six foot two or three and
as strong as a horse. Well-built chap, too. Women ran after
him. I haven't seen him since we were in the trenches together."
"Yes, Bernard. Don't you recollect his going to see you in
hospital?"
"So he did, by Jove! I'd forgotten that. He'd ten days' leave
and he chucked one of them away to look me up. Not such a bad
sort, old Lawrence."
"I liked him very much," said Laura quietly.
"Wants to come to us, does he? Why? Where does he write from?"
"Paris. It seems he ran across Lucian at Auteuil--"
"Let me see the letter."
Laura give it over. "Calls you Laura, does he?" Clowes read it
aloud with a running commentary of his own. "H'm: pleasant
relationship, cousins-in-law. . . 'Met Lucian . . . chat about
old times'--is he a bird of Lucian's feather, I wonder? He
wasn't keen on women in the old days, but people change a lot
in ten years . . . 'Like to come and see us while he's in
England . . . run over for the day'--bosh, he knows we should
have to put him up for a couple of nights! . . . 'Sorry to hear
such a bad account of Bernard'--Very kind of him, does he want
a cheque? Hallo! 'Lucian says he is leading you a deuce of a
life.' Upon my word!" He lowered the letter and burst out
laughing--the first hearty laugh she had heard from him for many
a long day. Laura, who had given him the letter in fear and
trembling and only because she could not help herself, was
exceedingly relieved and joined in merrily. But while she was
laughing she had to wink a sudden moisture from her eyelashes:
this glimpse of the natural self of the man she had married went
to her heart. "Is it true?" he said, still with that friendly
twinkle in his eyes. "Do I lead you the deuce of a life, poor
old Laura?"
"I don't mind," said Laura, smiling back at him. She could have
been more eloquent, but she dared not. Bernard's moods required
delicate handling.
"He's a cool hand anyhow to write like that to a woman about her
husband. But Lawrence always was a cool hand. I remember the
turn-up we had in the Farringay woods when I was twelve and he
was fourteen. He nearly murdered me. But I paid him out," said
Bernard in a glow of pleasurable reminiscence. "He was too
heavy for me. Old Andrew Hyde came and dragged him off. But
I marked him: he was banished from his mother's drawingroom for
a week--not that he minded that much . . . Aunt Helen was a
pretty woman. Gertrude and I never could think why she married
Uncle Andrew, but I believe they got on all right, though she was
a big handsome woman--a Clowes all over--while old Andrew
looked like any little scrub out of Houndsditch. Never can tell
why people marry each other, can you?" Bernard was becoming
philosophical. I suppose if you go to the bottom it's Nature
that takes them by the scruff of the neck and gives them a gentle
shove and says 'More babies, please.' She doesn't always bring it
off though, witness you and me, my love.-- But I say, Laura, I
like the way you handed over that letter! Thought it would do me
good, didn't you? Look here, I can't have my character taken
away behind my back! You tell him to come and judge for
himself."
"You'll get very tired of him, Berns," said Laura doubtfully.
"You always say you get sick of people in twenty-four hours: and
I can't take him entirely off your hands--you'll have to do your
share of entertaining him. He's your cousin, not mine, and it'll
be you he comes to see."
"I shan't see any more of him than I want to, my dear, on that
you may depend," said Bernard with easy emphasis. "If he
invites himself he'll have to put with what he can get. But
I can stand a good deal of him. Regimental shop is always
amusing, and Lawrence will know heaps of fellows I used to know,
and tell me what's become of them all. Besides, I'm sick to
death of the local gang and Lawrence will be a change. He's got
more brains than Jack Bendish, and from the style of his letter
he can't be so much like a curate as Val is." Val Stafford was
agent for the Wanhope property. "Oh, by George!"
"What's the matter?"
Bernard threw back his head and grinned broadly with half shut
eyes. "Ha, ha! by Gad, that's funny--that's very funny. Why,
Val knows him!"
"Knows Lawrence? I never heard Val mention his name."
"No, my love, but one can't get Val to open his lips on that
subject. Lawrence and I were in the same battalion. He was there
when Val got his ribbon."
"Really? That will be nice for Val, meeting him again."
"Oh rather!" said Bernard Clowes. "On my word it's a shame and
I've half a mind . . .. No, let him come: let him come and be
damned to the pair of them! Straighten me out, will you?" He was
liable like most paralytics to mechanical jerks and convulsions
which drove him mad with impatience. Laura drew down the
helplessly twitching knee, and ran one firm hand over him from
thigh to ankle. Her touch had a mesmeric effect on his nerves
when he could endure it, but nine times out of ten he struck it
away. He did so now. "Go to the devil! How often have I told
you not to paw me about? I wish you'd do as you're told. What
do you call him Lawrence for?"
"I always did. But I'll call him Captain Hyde if you like--"
"'Mr.,' you mean: he's probably dropped the 'Captain.' He was
only a 'temporary.'"
"For all that, he has stuck to his prefix," said Laura smiling.
"Lucian chaffed him about it. But Lawrence was always rather a
baby in some ways: clocked socks to match his ties, and
astonishing adventures in jewellery, and so on. Oh yes, I knew
him very well indeed when I was a girl. Mr. and Mrs. Hyde were
among the last of the old set who kept up with us after father
was turned out of his clubs. I've stayed at Farringay."
"You never told me that!"
"I never thought of telling you. Lawrence hasn't been near us
since we came to Wanhope and I don't recollect your ever
mentioning his name. You see I tell you now."
"How old were you when you stayed at Farringay?"
"Twenty-two. Lawrence and I are the same age."
"And you knew him well, did you?"
"We were great friends," said Mrs. Clowes, tossing a lump of
sugar out of the window to a lame jackdaw. She had many such
pensioners, alike in a community of misfortune. "And, yes,
Berns, you're right, we flirted a little--only a little: wasn't
it natural? It was only for fun, because we were both young and
it was such heavenly weather--it was the Easter before war broke
out. No, he didn't ask me to marry him! Nothing was farther
from his mind."
"Did he kiss you?"
Laura slowly and smilingly shook her head. "Am I, Yvonne?"
"But you liked the fellow?"
"Oh yes, he was charming. A little too much one of a class,
perhaps: there's a strong family likeness, isn't there, between
Cambridge undergraduates? But he was more cultivated than a good
many of his class. We used to go up the river together and read
--what did one read in the spring of 1914? Masefield, I suppose,
or was it Maeterlinck? Rupert Brooks came with the war. Imagine
reading 'Pelleas et Melisande' in a Canadian canoe! It makes one
want to be twenty-two again, so young and so delightfully
serious." It was hard to run on while the glow faded out of
Bernard's face and a cold gloom again came over it, but sad
experience had taught Laura that at all costs, under whatever
temptation, it was wiser to be frank. It would have been easier
for the moment to paint the boy and girl friendship in neutral
tints, but if its details came out later, trivial and innocent
as they were, the economy of today would cost her dear tomorrow,
Her own impression was that Clowes had never been jealous of her
in his life. But the pretence of jealousy was one of his few
diversions.
"I dare say you do wish you were twenty-two again," he said,
delicately setting down his tea cup on the tray--all his
movements, so far as he could control them, were delicate and
fastidious. "I dare say you would like a chance to play your
cards differently. Can't be done, my, girl, but what a good
fellow I am to ask Lawrence to Wanhope, ain't I? No one can say
I'm not an obliging husband. Lawrence isn't a jumping doll. He's
six and thirty and as strong as a horse. You'll have no end of a
good time knitting up your severed friendship .. 'Pon my word,
I've a good mind to put him off. . I shouldn't care to fall foul
of the King's Proctor."
"Will you have another cup of tea before I ring"
"No, thanks . . . Do I lead you the deuce of a life, Lally?"
"You do now and then," said his wife, smiling with pale lips.
"It isn't that I'm sensitive for myself, because I know you don't
mean a word of it, but I rather hate it for your own sake. It
isn't worthy of you, old boy. It's so--so ungentlemanly."
"So it is. But I do it because I'm bored. I am bored, you know.
Desperately!" He stretched out his hand to her with such haggard,
hunted eyes that Laura, reckless, threw herself down by him and
kissed the heavy eyelids. Clowes put his arm round her neck,
fondling her hair, and for a little while peace, the peace of
perfect mutual tenderness, fell on this hard-driven pair. But
soon, a great sigh bursting from his breast, Clowes pushed her
away, his features settling back into their old harsh lines of
savage pain and scorn.
"Get away! get up! do you want Parker to see you through the
window? If there's a thing on earth I hate it's a dishevelled
crying woman. Write to Lawrence. Say I shall be delighted to
see him and that I hope he'll give us at least a week. Stop.
Warn him that I shan't be able to see much of him because of
my invalid habits, and that I shall depute you to entertain
him. That ought to fetch him if he remembers you when you were
twenty-two."
Laura was neither dishevelled nor in tears: perhaps such scenes
were no novelty to her. She leant against the frame of the open
window, looking out over the sunlit garden full of flowers, over
the wide expanse of turf that sloped down to a wide, shallow
river all sparkling in western light, and over airy fields on
the other side of it to the roofs of the distant village strung
out under a break of woody hill.
"Are you sure you want him? He used to have a hot temper when he
was a young man, and you know, Berns, it would be tiresome if
there were any open scandal."
"Scandal be hanged," said Bernard Clowes. "You do as you're
told." His wife gave an almost imperceptible shrug of the
shoulders as if to disclaim further responsibility. She was
breathing rather hurriedly as if she had been running, and her
neck was so white that the shadow of her sunlit wistaria threw a
faint lilac stain on the warm, fine grain of her skin. And the
haggard look returned to Bernard's eyes as he watched her, and
with it a wistfulness, a weariness of desire, "hungry, and
barren, and sharp as the sea." Laura never saw that hunger in
his eyes. If he spared her nothing else he spared her that.
"You do as I tell you, old girl," his harsh voice had softened
again. "There won't be any row. Honestly I'd like to have old
Lawrence here for a bit, I'm not rotting now. He had almost four
years of it--almost as long as I had. I'll guarantee it put a
mark on him. It scarred us all. It'll amuse me to dine him and
Val together, and make them talk shop, our own old shop, and see
what the war's done for each of us: three retired veterans,
that's what we shall be, putting our legs under the same
mahogany: three old comrades in arms." He gave his strange,
jarring laugh. "Wonder which of us is scarred deepest?"