THE END OF BELINDA AND CO.
Lady Dashwood professed to be very much better the next morning when May
looked in to see how she had slept.
"I'm a new woman," she said to May; "I slept till seven, and then, my
dear, I began to think, and what do you think my thoughts were?"
May shook her head. "You thought it was Sunday morning."
"Quite true," said Lady Dashwood; "I heard the extra bells going on
round us. No, what I was thinking of was, what on earth Marian Potten
did with Gwendolen yesterday afternoon. I'm quite sure she will have
made her useful. I can picture Marian making her guest put on a big
apron and some old Potten gloves and taking her out into the garden to
gather beans. I can picture them gathering beans till tea-time. Marian
is sure to be storing beans, and she wouldn't let the one aged gardener
she has got left waste his time on gathering beans. I can see Marian
raking the pods into a heap and setting fire to the heap. I imagined
that after tea Gwendolen played the 'Reverie' by Slapovski. After
dinner: 'Patience.'"
May pondered.
"And now. May," said Lady Dashwood, looking tired in spite of her theory
that she had become a new woman, "it's a lovely day; even Louise allows
that the sun is shining, and I can't have you staying indoors on my
account. I won't allow you in my bedroom to-day. I shall be very busy."
"No!" said May, reproachfully. "I shall not allow business."
"I'm just going to write a letter to my dear old John, whom I've treated
shamefully for a week, only sending him a scrawl on half a page. Now, I
want you to go to church, or else for a walk. I can tell you what the
doctor says when you come back."
May said neither "Yes" nor "No." She laughed a little and went out of
the room.
In the breakfast-room the Warden was already there. They greeted each
other and sat down together, and talked strict commonplaces till the
meal was over. He did not ask May what she was going to do, neither did
she ask him any questions. They both were following a line of action
that they thought was the right one. Neither intended meeting the other
unless circumstances compelled the meeting; circumstances like
breakfast, lunch and dinner. It was clear to both of them that, except
on these occasions, they had no business with each other. The Warden was
clear about it because he was a man still ashamed.
May was clear that she had no business to see the Warden except when
necessity occasioned it, because each moment made her more unfaithful to
the memory of the dead, to the memory of the dead man who could no
longer claim her, who had given away his all at the call of duty and who
had no power to hold her now. So she, too, being honourably proud, felt
ashamed in the presence of the Warden.
All that morning was wasted. The doctor did not come, and May spent the
time waiting for him. Lady Dashwood sat up in bed and wrote an
apparently interminable letter to her husband. Whenever May appeared she
said: "Go away, May!" and then she looked long and wistfully at her
niece.
Two or three men came to lunch and went into the library afterwards with
the Warden, and May went to her Aunt Lena's room.
"The doctor won't come now till after three, May, so you must go out, or
you will really grieve me," said Lady Dashwood. "Jim will take you out.
He came in just after you left me before lunch, and I told him you would
go out."
"You are supposed to be resting," said May, "and I can't have you making
arrangements, dear Aunt Lena. I shall do exactly what I please, and
shall not even tell you what I please to do. I do believe," she added,
as she shook up the pillows, "that in the next world, dear, you will
want to make plans for God, and that will get you into serious trouble."
Lady Dashwood sighed deeply. "Oh dear, oh dear," she said, "I suppose I
must go on pretending I'm ill."
May shook her head at her and pulled down the blinds, and left her in
the darkness suitable for repose.
The Warden had not mentioned a walk. Perhaps he hadn't found an
opportunity with those men present! Should she go for a walk alone? She
found herself dressing, putting on her things with a feverish haste.
Then she took off her coat and sat down, and took her hat off and held
it on her knees.
She thought she heard the sound of a voice in the corridor outside, and
she put on her hat with trembling fingers and caught up the coat and
scarf and her gloves.
She went out into the corridor and found it empty and still. She went to
the head of the stairs. There was no sound coming from the library. But
even if the Warden were still there with the other men, she might not
hear any sounds of their talk. They might be there or they might not. It
was impossible to tell.
Perhaps he had gone to look for her in the drawing-room and, finding no
one there, had gone out.
The drawing-room door was open. She glanced in. The room was empty, of
course, and the afternoon sunshine was coming in through the windows,
falling across the floor towards the fireplace. It would soon creep up
to the portrait over the fireplace.
May waited several minutes, walking about the room and listening, and
then she went out and closed the door behind her. She went down the
staircase into the hall, opened the front door very slowly and went out.
An indescribable loneliness seized her as she walked over the gravelled
court to the gates. The afternoon sunshine was less friendly than rain
and bitter wind. She took the road to the parks, meeting the signs of
the war that had obliterated the old Sunday afternoons of Oxford in the
days of peace. Here was suffering, a deliberate preparation for more
suffering. Did all this world-suffering make her small personal grief
any less? Yes, it did; it would help her to get over the dreary space of
time, the days, months, years till she was a grey-haired woman and was
resigned, having learned patience and even become thankful!
Once she thought she saw the figure of the Warden in the distance, and
then her heart beat suffocatingly, but it was not he. Once she thought
she saw Bingham walking with some other man. He rounded the walk by the
river and--no, it was not Mr. Bingham--the face was different. She began
asking herself questions that had begun to disturb her. Was the real
tragedy of the Warden's engagement to him not the discovery that
Gwendolen was silly and weak, but that she was not honourable? Had he
suspected something of the kind before he received that letter? Wasn't
it a suspicion of the kind that had made him speak as he did in the
drawing-room after they had returned from Christ Church? Might he not
have been contented with Gwendolen if she had been straight and true,
however weak and foolish? Was he the sort of man who demands sympathy
and understanding from friends, men and women, but something very
different from a wife? Was the Warden one of those men who prefer a wife
to be shallow because they shrink from any permanent demand being made
upon their moral nature or their intellect? Perhaps the Warden craved a
wife who was thoughtless, and, choosing Gwendolen, was disappointed in
her, solely because he found she was not trustworthy. That suspicion was
a bitter one. Was it an unjust suspicion?
As May walked, the river beside her slipped along slowly under the
melancholy willows. The surface of the water was laden with fallen
leaves and the wreckage of an almost forgotten summer. It was strangely
sad, this river!
May turned away and began walking back to the Lodgings. There was a
deepening sunshine in the west, a glow was coming into the sky. Oh, the
sadness of that glorious sunset!
May was glad to hide away from it in the narrow streets. She was glad to
get back to the court and to enter the darkened house, and yet there was
no rest for her there. Soon, very soon, she would say good-bye to this
calm secluded home and go out alone into the wilderness!
She walked straight to her room and took off her things, and then went
into Lady Dashwood's room. Louise was arranging a little table for tea
between the bed and the windows.
"Well!" cried Lady Dashwood. "So you have had a good walk!"
"It was a lovely afternoon," said May. She looked out of the window and
could see the colour of the sunset reflected on the roof opposite.
Lady Dashwood watched Louise putting a cloth on the table, and remarked
that "poor Jim" would be having tea all alone!
"I think the Warden is out," said May, as she stood at the window.
"Oh!" exclaimed Lady Dashwood, but at that moment the doctor was ushered
into the room. He apologised for coming so late in the day, he had been
pressed with work. "I'm perfectly well," said Lady Dashwood; "I don't
need a doctor, you are simply wasted on me. I can come down to dinner."
There was no doubt that she was better. The doctor admitted it and
praised her, but he refused to let her get up till the next day, and
then only for tea in the drawing-room; and, strange to say, Lady
Dashwood did not argue the point, merely remarking that she wasn't sure
whether she could be trusted to remain in bed. She wouldn't promise that
she could be trusted.
When the doctor left May slipped out with him, and they went along the
corridor together.
"How much better is she?" she asked. "Is she really on the road to being
quite well?"
"She's all right," said the doctor, as they went down the staircase,
"but she mustn't be allowed to get as low as she was yesterday, or there
will be trouble."
"And," said May, "what about me?" and she explained to him that she was
only in Oxford on a visit and had work in London that oughtn't to be
left.
"Has she got a good maid?" asked the doctor.
"An excitable Frenchwoman, but otherwise useful." They were at the front
door now.
"And you really ought to go to-morrow?"
"I ought," said May, and her heart seemed to be sinking low down--lower
and lower.
"Very well," said the doctor, "I suppose we must let you go, Mrs.
Dashwood," and as he spoke he pulled the door wide open. "Here is the
Warden!" he said.
There was the Warden coming in at the gate. May was standing so that
she could not see into the court. She started at the doctor's remark.
"I'll speak to him," he said, and, bowing, he went down the steps,
leaving the door open behind him. May turned away and walked upstairs.
She wouldn't have to tell the Warden that she was going to-morrow; the
doctor would tell him, of course. Would he care?
She went back to the bedroom, and Lady Dashwood looked round eagerly at
her, but did not ask her any questions.
"Now, dear, pour out the tea," she said. "The doctor was a great
interruption. My dear May, I wish I wasn't such an egotist."
"You aren't," said May, sitting down and pouring out two cups of tea.
"I am," said Lady Dashwood.
"Why?" asked May.
"Well, you see," said Lady Dashwood, "I was terribly upset about Belinda
and Co., because Belinda and Co. had pushed her foot in at my front
door, or rather at Jim's front door; but she's gone now, as far as I'm
personally concerned. She's a thing of the past. But, and here it comes,
Belindas are still rampant in the world, and there are male as well as
female Belindas; and I bear it wonderfully. I shall quite enjoy a cup of
tea. Thanks, darling."
"If anybody were to come and say to you," said May, looking deeply into
her cup, "'Will you join a Society for the painless extermination of
Belindas--Belindas of both classes--Belindas in expensive furs, and
tattered Belindas,' wouldn't you become a member, or at least give a
guinea?"
Lady Dashwood smiled a little. "Dear May, how satirical you are with
your poor old aunt!"
"I'm not satirical," said May.
"I'm afraid," groaned Lady Dashwood, "it's mainly because we think
things will be made straight in the next world that we don't do enough
here. Now, I haven't that excuse, May, because you know I never have
looked forward to the next world. Somehow I can't!"
Something in her aunt's voice made May look round at her.
"Don't be sorrowful, dear," she said.
"Now that I've slanged Belinda," murmured Lady Dashwood, "I've begun to
think about my own short-comings."
"Nonsense, dear aunt," said May. "You are not accustomed to think about
yourself; it must be a sign that you are not feeling well. I shall ring
for Louise." May spoke in a bantering voice, but her eyes did not smile.
"For mercy's sake, don't," said Lady Dashwood.
The glow had faded from the roof of the college opposite, and had become
grey and cold when May got up and took the little tea tray from her Aunt
Lena's bed.
"Now, I've got just a few lines more to add to my letter to my old dear
one," said Lady Dashwood. "Suppose you go down and see what's
happening?"
"What's happening!" said May, but she did not ask a question, merely she
repeated her aunt's words.
"Yes, dear," said Lady Dashwood. "What's happening. All sorts of things
happen, you know; things go on! Please ring, I want Louise to clear
away. Now, go down into the drawing-room and, if you see Jim, give him
my love."
May went into the empty drawing-room and sat there till it grew dark,
doing nothing. Robinson came in to make up the fire and draw the
curtains. He apologised for his lateness, explaining that he did not
think any one was in the drawing-room.
"Will you have dinner with 'er ladyship?" he asked, "or in the
dining-room, m'm? The Warden is dining in 'all."
May walked to a little table and took up one of the books that were
lying there.
"Upstairs, please, Robinson," she answered.
She began looking through the book, turning over the pages, but the
print seemed unintelligible. She stood listening to Robinson's movements
in the room. Then the door opened and the Warden came in and startled
her so much that she dropped the book upon the table.
He was in his gown, just come back from chapel. He came some way into
the room and stood at a little distance from her. She did not look at
him, though she turned towards him in acknowledgment of his presence.
"Wasn't the sunset wonderful?" she said.
"It was a wonderful sunset!" he said.
Robinson was still busy in the room, and the Warden moved to the
fireplace and stood looking as if he was undecided whether to stay or to
go.
"I'm sorry I have to dine out this evening," said the Warden. "I have no
choice in the matter, unfortunately."
"Of course," said May. "Please don't think of me. I have Aunt Lena to
look after."
"You are very good to her," he said, and lingered for a moment.
Robinson was now going towards the door with his soft, light, though
rather shambling movements.
The Warden moved towards the door too, and then stopped and said--
"There isn't anything I can do for you, any book I can lend you for this
evening?"
"No, thanks very much," said May. "I have all I want," and she took up
the book she had dropped with an air of wanting it very much, and went
towards the chair she had been sitting in before Robinson disturbed her.
The Warden swung himself round. She could hear the sound of his robe
against the lintel of the door as he went out and left her alone. He
might have stayed a few minutes if he had wished! He didn't wish!
When she went to her Aunt Lena's bedroom, half an hour later, she found
that he had been there, sitting with her and talking, and had gone five
minutes ago. The Warden seemed to move like some one in a dream. He came
and went and never stayed.
During dinner Lady Dashwood said, not a propos of anything--
"Your poor Uncle John is beginning to get restive, and I suppose I shall
have to go back to him in a few days. Having done all the mischief that
I could, I suppose it is time I should leave Oxford. Louise will be glad
and Jim will be sorry, I am afraid. I haven't broken to him yet that my
time is coming to an end. I really dread telling him. It was different
when he was a college tutor--he had only rooms then. Now he has a house.
It's very dismal for him to be alone."
Here Lady Dashwood stopped abruptly and went on eating. About nine
o'clock she professed to be ready "to be put to bed," and May, who had
been knitting by her side, got up and prepared to leave her for the
night.
As she kissed her she wondered why her Aunt Lena had never asked her how
long she was going to stay. Why hadn't she told her after seeing the
doctor, and got it over? The Warden knew and yet did not say a word, but
that was different!
Should she tell her aunt now? She hesitated. No, it might perhaps make
her wakeful. It would be better to give her nothing to think about.
There would be time to-morrow. She would tell her before breakfast, on
the way downstairs. It would be giving her long enough notice if she put
off her journey till the late afternoon. And there _was_ no need to
leave on Monday till the late afternoon.
"You are going down into the drawing-room again?" said Lady Dashwood.
"Yes; you must sleep well, dear," said May, bending down and kissing
her.
"Oh, very well," said Lady Dashwood, closing her eyes.
Later on disturbing thoughts came to her. Why had May ceased to show any
emotion? Why had she become quiet and self-contained? That wasn't a good
sign. And what about to-morrow? Did she mean to go? She had said
nothing, but she might have made up her mind to go. And there was Jim
going in and out and doing _nothing_! Oh, why couldn't the dear things
see that they were made for one another? Why couldn't they go about
mysterious, blown up with self-importance--and engaged?
When Louise came in she found her mistress still awake.
"Louise, before you settle me, see if Mrs. Dashwood has gone to bed.
Don't disturb her, of course."
"Bien, Madame," said Louise; and she left the room with the air of one
who is going to fathom a mystery.
"What a nuisance Louise is," sighed Lady Dashwood, turning on her
pillow. She did not turn her head again when Louise came back.
"Madame is not in her room," said Louise, in a voice of profound
interest, and she waited to hear the result.
"Oh!" said Lady Dashwood, brightening a little. "Well, Louise, light a
night light and leave it at the other end of the room, so that the light
doesn't come on my face! I don't want to be in complete darkness or the
Warden will not come in. He will think I am asleep."
"Madame will not sleep?" demanded Louise.
"Of course I shall sleep," said Lady Dashwood, and she began thinking
again.