But why had it been Hester to come with the news? Why not Clive? This
question, which had lain latent in Monica’s mind during Hester’s visit,
rose to assail her during the long night, as she lay awake and listened
to the rain. Such news as that should have been brought by Clive. He had
sold the little Chelsea house that she had given him. She had given it
to him;—not to Hester. It was their transaction, his and hers; not hers
and Hester’s; and it could be only Hester who had made it so; thrusting
herself, with her bland assurance, between them.
‘She is straight,’ that phrase of Celia’s returned to her pleadingly
while her thoughts burned and brooded on her wound. But was Hester
straight? Was there not some surreptitious motive smouldering under the
fair appearance of her? She was hounded by the memory of her walking
away in the garden below the flat, leading Clive out of her life, her
hand stayed on the hem of his coat. Now she was leading him back, a
trophy; placing him there, tormentingly near but never to be reached
except on Hester’s terms. And Hester seemed to smile ominously behind
him and to say: ‘Hate me as much as you like:—but touch me at your
peril.’
‘But I don’t hate you; you are straight; you mean to be kind; I don’t
hate you,’ she felt herself repeating exorcisingly. And at last a
merciful cloud covered her mind and she fell asleep.
On waking she found herself thinking of Celia. Her thoughts of Hester
had run themselves dry and the obsessions of the night survived only in
her sense of weight and weariness. It was Celia she must think of now,
and Celia could hardly rejoice at the news she had to tell her. It was
news that had best be broken carefully. So, after her orders were given,
her letters written, she put on her hat and coat and took a stick and
went out, remembering as she always remembered on starting on a walk,
that Jeremy was not here to share it.
The rain had ceased but the day was blanketed in a thick mist that
might, later on, lift and reveal a summer sky. Monica’s spirits revived
a little as she walked, her feet slipping in mud, the hedgerow trees
pattering down drops on her shoulders. The weight was there, and the
sense of it was like a tendency to sickness underlying her vigour, but
she had an eye for what the day could give and found a certain charm in
the restricted world, seeing herself as a Noah’s Ark figure set on her
little circle of green, the circle moving with her as she went. There
was beauty, too; the glossy branches of the oaks above were like those
she had seen carved in deep relief on a dark, mysteriously lovely old
door in Bourges; in Norah’s field an arabesque of hens were scattered
like a spray of white chrysanthemums in a Chinese picture, and at the
door the old-fashioned little banksia rose, sweet and apricot coloured,
reminded her of her girlhood; one hardly ever saw these roses nowadays,
and she nipped one off, shook out the rain that clogged its tiny petals
and, while she waited for Bowditt, bent her face absently to its
fragrance, a deep, almost a crafty fragrance, overwhelming her in
memories of Aunt Janet and of Lockers, the old Sussex house under the
Downs where she and her brothers and sisters, she and Clive, had spent
so many happy holidays.
She saw Clive and Celia, the slender boy and girl—Celia, too, was
related to Aunt Janet—playing tennis on the lawn while the downs grew
grave and purple above the garden and Aunt Janet’s white cap appeared at
the French window summoning them all in to dress for dinner. The roses
grew against the wall round the window and she herself was sitting there
on the gravel path, her book on her knee, her thoughts busy with ways
and means, a harassed but happy woman. Little Jemima, Jeremy’s mother,
sat beside her, watching the players with a dog’s disinterested
melancholy. Monica was far, far away, deep in the fragrance of the
banksia rose when Bowditt came to let her in.
Bowditt had been Celia’s nurse, then her maid, and now with the aid of a
village girl she ran the little house for the two friends. She was a
gaunt, sad-eyed woman and Monica always felt that she held her in some
way responsible for the devastation of her young mistress’s life. All
the same, under the resentment, if that it were, she knew that she could
rely upon a fundamental sympathy in Bowditt, for she and Bowditt both
cherished Celia.
‘Is Miss Celia in the drawing-room?’ she asked.
‘She’s gone out, to Chelmsford, with Captain Ingpen,’ said Bowditt
surprisingly and with evident satisfaction. ‘Captain Ingpen said he
would do some shopping for us, and Miss Norah thought the drive would do
Miss Celia good.’
Monica now observed the various masculine belongings that altered the
aspect of the apple-green little entry. A faded silk scarf, russet
striped with grey, lay on the table beside the salver of visiting cards;
golf clubs leant beside the umbrella-stand, and a curious square box,
with brass corners and a brass handle in the lid, stood near the foot of
the stairs. She even savoured a new odour on the air; leather? tweed?
tobacco? and something added;—or was it merely her fancy that added
it?—something faintly yet sharply reminiscent of years ago in India; an
aromatic, bitter whiff. She had hated India; she turned her thoughts
away from it now as the pain of an old self-reproach visited her heart.
She had been the romance, the delight of her young husband’s life, yet
she knew that she had not made him happy during the two years they had
spent together. She had loved Charlie, but she had hated India and hated
his acceptance of the life she found so unbearable in its formulas of
empty gaiety, its heavy idle days and convivial nights. It had revealed
her to herself as a rebel, a bohemian. In her girlhood’s home they had
questioned everything; in Charlie’s India they questioned nothing.
‘Miss Norah’s uncle has come then?’ she said.
‘He came last night, Ma’am, unexpectedly. They had a wire from Dover to
say. It wasn’t till Saturday they had been looking for him. You will see
Miss Norah, Ma’am? She is just gathering the eggs.’
‘Don’t call her. I will wait till she comes in,’ said Monica, and
Bowditt showed her into the drawing-room.
Celia’s drawing-room was china-blue and white and grey, with touches of
lemon colour in the Iceland poppies set upon the mantelpiece and of
black in the cushions and picture frames. Monica went to the fireplace
where, because of Celia, a little knot of flame glimmered pleasantly,
and looked about her, seeing her own figure reflected in the old French
mirror on the other side of the room, a thickened yet youthful form in
pleated short grey skirt, short jacket, and black straw hat with a
velvet bow. Her figure went with the room and it seemed to her that the
room belonged more to her own past than to Celia’s. The mezzotints from
Reynolds and Gainsborough had been given to Celia’s father and mother as
a wedding-gift from her parents. She remembered the delicate Chippendale
chairs in Celia’s grandmother’s drawing-room and playing as a child
round the old Chesterfield, now covered in blue and white cretonne. This
was the sort of room she understood and loved; that understood and loved
her: here she was herself, her petals all unfolded.
Norah came trudging in almost at once, drawing off her muddy gloves, a
pleasant-faced young woman, ruddy, with prominent teeth and blue eyes.
She was the daughter of a country parson—as Hester was. Monica had never
seen, or heard of Hester’s father since her relegating allusion to him
on the day when the Registrar’s Office was announced; and the fact that
Hester had cast him off did not make him seem more obscure.
‘Hello! How jolly of you to come! You have heard of our excitements.
Celia carried off already.’
‘Just what Celia needs. She and your uncle have taken to each other,
have they?’
‘I don’t know about that; but he doesn’t frighten her and that disposes
him to kindness, I think. He rather frightens _me_.’
‘Is he old and sunburnt and crabbed? Has he always lived in India? I
really know nothing about your uncle, Norah.’
‘He’s sunburned all right; extraordinarily brown; but not crabbed
exactly, or old either; younger than you are I expect, Mrs. Wilmott. He
is my mother’s youngest brother. Yes, he has spent most of his life in
India; among queer warrior-tribes in wild places.’
‘On the Afghan frontier? Soldiering, do you mean?’
‘Not soldiering so much as studying; discovering;—their languages,
customs, religions. He’s lived among them in disguise; seen the sheep
sacrificed and worshipped it with them afterwards—or whatever it is they
do. I really don’t know him a bit, but I know his life has been
frightfully hairbreadth and exciting. And because of all his special
knowledge he was very useful during the war. He is rather an impressive
sort of person, but, if you ask me, he has a way of looking at us which
makes me feel as if he saw me as a hen and Celia as a kitten.—Not but
what he is kind enough to hens and kittens.’
Norah, laughing and good-humoured, was plumping up a cushion here,
emptying an ash tray there. ‘See what a state he is getting our room
into already,’ she said. ‘He took all the hot water in the bath this
morning.’
‘How long will you have this inconsiderate person quartered upon you?’
‘Oh, he’s safely in London till the Manor Farm is ready for him. He’s
going to make me useful and help him to furnish it I see. But that will
be rather fun and he’s willing to be useful to us, too. It’s really very
decent his offering to do our shopping this morning, and it _is_ good
for Celia to see outside people. It’s a quiet life here for her, isn’t
it, after the life she was used to in London?’
The allusion gave Monica her entry. ‘Yes, it is, but I always feel that
Celia is far more country than I am. I am an old Cockney at heart and to
me the quiet is almost suffocating sometimes.’
Norah’s face fell; she was aware of an approaching announcement. ‘Don’t
tell me you are thinking of going back to London? I don’t see how Celia
could get on without you and her music.’
‘Going back? No indeed. But London is coming to me. That’s my news,
Norah. I wanted to tell you and Celia at once. Clive and Hester have
been feeling that I must be lonely and they are coming down to be near
me. They have bought The Crofts. They will be here in six weeks’ time.’
Norah, sitting on the sofa opposite, stared at her, and slowly the
astonishment on her face gave way to reprobation.
‘They are coming to live here? All the year round?’
‘Yes. They are giving up London.’
Norah gazed heavily. ‘Why did they keep it dark?’
It was an unpleasant echo of her own thought, but Monica had her reply,
and Hester’s, ready.
‘They wanted to be sure. And they wanted to surprise me. Hester told me
only yesterday. You do see—don’t you, Norah—that it will be rather
wonderful for me.’
‘Yes; of course it will,’ said Norah slowly. ‘It’s only about Celia that
I am thinking.’
‘Well, I am too. Do you think, after all this time, that it will in any
way be difficult for her?’
‘It’s bound to bring it all back, isn’t it,’ said Norah; ‘seeing him all
the time and seeing that he has forgotten her, in every way; as only men
can forget.—Forgive me, Mrs. Wilmott; I do like Clive most awfully; I
always have, even when I saw that he was breaking Celia’s heart; but
it’s true, isn’t it?’
‘He hasn’t forgotten, Norah, it’s only that marriage crowds friendships
so completely out of a man’s life, and what I hope for now is that he
will remember enough for things to be happy again. After all they were
really like brother and sister;—he will remember back to that happy
time.’
‘It would be frightfully hard lines if he remembered the time that
wasn’t happy. It would be frightfully hard lines for Celia if he
remembered enough to be sorry for her. Celia, though she looks such a
wisp, is the bravest creature in the world and couldn’t help it if a
microbe _did_ get into her lungs.’
‘She’s so brave that no one could be sorry for her.—You mean it will be
a strain for her—showing them that she _is_ brave?’ Monica got up
restlessly. ‘After all, Norah, nobody knew except you and me and
Bowditt.’
‘Hester knew all right,’ said Norah with a short laugh. ‘And she knows
that you wanted him to marry Celia and that you are sorry he didn’t.’
‘My dear Norah!’ Monica gazed at her. ‘Do I make it so plain?’ she
asked.
‘How can you help making it plain? One only has to see them all
together—with you. Hester isn’t our sort, is she?’
Monica walked to a window as she heard this question. ‘She’s my son’s
wife. That’s all I have to remember,’ she said, standing there looking
out and wondering, if Norah had seen, how much Clive must have seen.
‘Yes, she’s his wife and he’s devoted to her; but the queer thing is
that if she’d been a man he wouldn’t have made a friend of her. Celia
would have been a friend, always; but not Hester. That’s just the
difference, isn’t it? That’s just where this queer falling in love comes
in; but I can’t help feeling that it’s happier when a man falls in love
with a friend; they do sometimes.’
‘I wonder.’ Monica stood looking out. ‘Perhaps difference and the
surprise of difference are needed for falling in love. It’s a different
kind of affinity.—Here they are, Norah.—Celia is looking amused—and
surprised.’
‘Celia shan’t fall in love with Uncle Godfrey;—I can promise you that,’
said Norah; ‘and he won’t fall in love with her. It’s not her kind of
difference that would attract him. He has no taste for paradise,’ and
Norah laughed with a certain grimness as she followed Monica out into
the hall.
A car, spattered with mud, stood before the door and a gaunt, heavily
built man, with close-cropped hair, was holding out a hand for Celia to
descend. No, Captain Ingpen had no taste for paradise, Monica in a swift
glance at him agreed, feeling something a little brutal in his air of
nonchalant kindness. Celia was more a disembodied spirit than a pretty
woman and Captain Ingpen’s taste would be for pretty women. Again he
recalled India and the men there, who were too stupid, or too busy, to
care for anything but pretty women.
Celia might not be pretty in the Indian sense, but she was the loveliest
creature, and all her little foibles were dear to Monica; her breathless
way of laughing, her gay yet melancholy inconsequence, even her tendency
to make rather pointless jokes when she was shy. There was something
arctic in her tints—blue and white and gold—but she did not look ill,
only fragile and flower-like; forget-me-nots and cowslips growing
strangely in fields of snow.
‘But Monica—you’re not going!’ she said, coming to embrace her friend.
Celia’s devotion always gave Monica a sense of establishment, security,
in a world of change. She had always been part of Celia’s world and
Celia understood her, better, she sometimes suspected, than she
understood herself; or perhaps it would be truer to say that she knew of
herself the evil of which she was capable and Celia the good. It was
reconstructing to be with anyone who saw the good—sometimes when one had
forgotten it oneself—and her eyes dwelt fondly on the girl as she said:
‘I only ran in for a moment—I must be back by twelve; Mrs. Fellows is
coming to see me about the nursing committee.—How well you look, my
darling.—Did you enjoy your drive?’
‘Ever so much.—I never knew anyone drive so fast as Captain Ingpen. He
was trying to frighten me, I believe;—but I wasn’t frightened. I liked
it!’ laughed Celia. She was seldom shy nowadays and Monica sometimes
grieved over this as a sign that girlhood was over.—She was not in the
least shy now.
‘This is Norah’s uncle,’ she said presenting him, and Monica found
Captain Ingpen’s eyes on her; light yet hot blue eyes—burned looking,
with a straight line of upper lid—that showed oddly in his dark face.
His stare might express surprise, discomposure, or admiration, and since
so many things to-day reminded her of the past, she now found Captain
Ingpen’s eyes reminding her of pursuing suitors. Yes, it was
unmistakable, though it had been so long since she had seen it, that
arrested, appraising look in a man’s eye; a tribute to her sex that, she
reflected ironically as she walked away, would never have been elicited
had not her close little hat, her upturned collar, so framed her
countenance as to lend it a misleadingly youthful aspect.