But Elise was not in love with the fellow. No, no. He was sure of Elise;
he knew the symptoms; you couldn't mistake them. But she might marry
Markham, all the same. Out of boredom, out of uncertainty, out of
desperation. He was not going to let that happen; he would make it
impossible; he would give Elise the certainty she wanted now.
"You said _I_ was different."
Playful reproach. But she would understand.
"So you are. You're a married man, too, aren't you?"
"I thought we'd agreed to forget it."
"Forget it? Forget Mrs. Waddington?"
"Yes, forget her. You knew me long before you knew Fanny. What has she
got to do with you and me?"
"Just this, that she's the only woman in the county who'll know _me_."
"Because you're my friend, Elise."
"You needn't remind me. I'm not likely to forget that any good thing
that's come to me here has come through you."
"I don't want anything but good to come to you through me"
He leaned forward.
"You're not very happy in Wyck, are you?"
"Happy? Oh, yes. But it's not what you'd call wildly exciting. And
Toby's worrying me. He says he can't stand it, and he wants to
emigrate."
"Well, why not?"
Mr. Waddington's heart gave a great thump of hope. He saw it all
clearly. Toby was the great obstruction. Elise might have held out for
ever as long as Toby lived with her. But if Toby went--She saw it
too; that was why she consented to his going.
"It isn't much of a job for him, Bostock's Bank."
"N-no," she assented, "n-no. I've told him he can go if he can get
anything."
He played, stroking the long tails of her fur. It lay between them like
a soft, supine animal.
"Would you like to live in Cheltenham, Elise?"
"Cheltenham?"
"If I took a little house for you?"
(He had calculated that he might just as well lose his rent in
Cheltenham as in Wyck. Better. Besides, he needn't lose it. He could let
the White House. It would partly pay for Cheltenham.)
"One of those little houses in Montpelier Place?"
"It's too sweet of you to think of it." She began playing too, stroking
the fur animal; their hands played together over the sleek softness,
consciously, shyly, without touching.
"But--why Cheltenham?"
"Cheltenham isn't Wyck."
"No. But it's just as dull and stuffy. Stuffier."
"Beautiful little town, Elise."
"What's the good of that when it's crammed full of school children and
school teachers, and decayed army people and old maids? I don't _know_
anybody in Cheltenham."
"Can't you see that that would be the advantage?"
"No. I can't see it. There's only one place I _want_ to live in."
"And that is--?"
"London. And I can't."
"Why not?" After all, London was not such a bad idea. He had thought of
it before now himself.
"Well--I don't know whether I told you that I'm not on very good terms
with my husband's people. They haven't been at all nice to me since poor
Frank's death."
"Poor Elise--"
"They live in London and they want to keep me out of it. My
father-in-law gives me a small allowance on condition I don't live
there. They hate me," she said, smiling, "as much as all that."
"Is it a large allowance?"
"No. It's a very small one. But they know I can't get on without it."
"You ought not to be dependent on such people.... Perhaps in a flat--or
one of those little houses in St. John's Wood--"
"It would be too heavenly. But what's the good of talking about it?"
"You must know what I want to do for you, Elise. I want to make you
happy, to put you safe above all these wretched worries, to take care of
you, dear. You _will_ let me, won't you?"
"My dear Mr. Waddington--my dear friend--" The dark eyes brightened.
She saw a clear prospect of the five hundred. Compared with what old
Waddy was proposing, such a sum, and a mere loan too, represented
moderation. The moment had come, very happily, for reopening this
question. "I can't let you do anything so--so extensive. Really and
truly, all I want is just a temporary loan. If you really could lend me
that five hundred. You said--"
"I didn't say I would. And I didn't say I wouldn't. I said it would
depend."
"I know. But you never said on what. If the securities I offered you
aren't good enough, there's the legacy."
He was silent. He knew now that his condition had had nothing to do with
the securities. He must know, he would know, where he stood.
"My aunt," said Elise gently, "is very old."
"I wouldn't dream of touching your poor little legacy." He said it with
passion. "Won't you drop all this sordid talk about business and trust
me?"
"I do trust you."
The little white hand left off stroking the dark fur and reached out to
him. He took it and held it tight. It struggled to withdraw itself.
"You aren't afraid of me?" he said.
"No, but I'm afraid of Partridge coming in and seeing us. He might think
it rather odd."
"He won't come in. It doesn't matter what Partridge thinks."
"Oh, _doesn't_ it!"
"He won't come in."
He drew a little closer to her.
"He will. He _will_. He'll come and clear away the things. I hear him
coming."
He got up and went to the door of the smoke-room, to the further door,
and looked out.
"There's no one there," he said. "They don't come 'till six and it isn't
five yet.... Elise--abstract your mind one moment from Partridge. If I
get that little house in London, will you live in it?"
"I can't let you. You make me ashamed, after all you've done for me.
It's too much."
"It isn't. If I take it, will you let me come and see you?"
"Oh, yes. But--" She shrank, so far as Elise could be said to shrink,
a little further back into her corner.
"It's rather far from Wyck," he said. "Still, I could run up once
in"--he became pensive--"in three weeks or so."
"For the day--I should be delighted."
"No. _Not_ for the day." He was irritated with this artificial
obtuseness. "For the week-end. For the week, sometimes, when I can
manage it. I shall say it's business."
She drew back and back, as if from his advance, her head tilted, her
eyes glinting at him under lowered lids, taking it all in yet pretending
a paralysis of ignorance. She wanted to see--to see how far he would go,
before she--She wanted him to think she didn't understand him even
now.
It was this half-fascinated, backward gesture that excited him. He drew
himself close, close.
"Elise, it's no use pretending. You know what I mean. You know I want
you."
He stooped over her, covering her with his great chest. He put his arms
round her.
"In my arms. You _know_ you want _me_--"
She felt his mouth pushed out to her mouth as it retreated, trying to
cover it, to press down. She gave a cry: "Oh--oh, you--" and struggled,
beating him off with one hand while the other fumbled madly for her
pocket-handkerchief. His grip slackened. He rose to his feet. But he
still stooped over her, penning her in with his outstretched arms, his
weight propped by his hands laid on the back of the sofa.
"You--old--imbecile--" she spurted.
She could afford it. In one rapid flash of intelligence she had seen
that, whatever happened, she could never get that five hundred pounds
_down_. And to surrender to old Waddy without it, to surrender to old
Waddy at all, when she could marry Freddy Markham, would be too
preposterous. Even if there hadn't been any Freddy Markham, it would
have been preposterous.
At that moment as she said it, while he still held her prisoned and they
stared into each other's faces, she spurting and he panting, Barbara
came in.
He started; jerked himself upright. Mrs. Levitt recovered herself.
"You silly cuckoo," she said. "You don't know how ridiculous you look."
She had found her pocket-handkerchief and was dabbing her eyes and mouth
with it, rubbing off the uncleanness of his impact. "How
ridic--Te-hee--Te-hee--te-hee!" She shook with laughter.
Barbara pretended not to see them. To have gone back at once, closing
the door on them, would have been to admit that she had seen them.
Instead she moved, quickly yet abstractedly, to the writing-table, took
up the photographs and went out again.
Mr. Waddington had turned away and stood leaning against the
chimneypiece, hiding his head ("Poor old ostrich!") in his hands. His
attitude expressed a dignified sorrow and a wronged integrity. Barbara
stood for a collected instant at the door and spoke:
"I'm sorry I forgot the photographs." As if she said: "Cheer up, old
thing. I didn't really see you."
Through the closed door she heard Mrs. Levitt's laughter let loose,
malignant, shrill, hysterical, a horrid sound.
"I'm sorry, Elise. But I thought you cared for me."
"You'd no business to think. And it wasn't likely I'd tell you."
"Oh, you didn't tell me, my dear. How could you? But you made me believe
you wanted me."
"Wanted? Do you suppose I wanted to be made ridiculous?"
"Love isn't ridiculous," said Mr. Waddington.
"It is. It's _the_ most ridiculous thing there is. And when _you_'re
making it.... If you could have seen your face--Oh, dear!"
"If you wouldn't laugh quite so loud. The servants will hear you."
"I mean them to hear me."
"Confound you, Elise!"
"That's right, swear at me. Swear at me."
"I'm sorry I swore. But, hang it all, it's every bit as bad for me as it
is for you."
"Worse, I fancy. You needn't think Miss Madden didn't see you, because
she did."
"It's a pity Miss Madden didn't come in a little sooner."
"Sooner? I think she chose her moment very well."
"If she had heard the whole of our conversation I think she'd have
realized there was something to be said for me."
"There isn't anything to be said for you. And until you've apologized
for insulting me--"
"You've heard me apologize. As for insulting you, no decent woman, in
the circumstances, ever tells a man his love insults her, even if she
can't return it."
"And even if he's another woman's husband?"
"Even if he's another woman's husband, if she's ever given him the
right--"
"Right? Do you think you bought the right to make love to me?" She rose,
confronting him.
"No. I thought you'd given it me.... I was mistaken."
He helped her to put on the coat that she wriggled into with clumsy,
irritated movements. Clumsy. The woman _was_ clumsy. He wondered how he
had never seen it. And vulgar. Noisy and vulgar. You never knew what a
woman was like till you'd seen her angry. He had answered her
appropriately and with admirable tact. He had scored every point; he was
scoring now with his cool, imperturbable politeness. He tried not to
think about Barbara.
"Your fur."
"Thank you."
He rang the bell. Partridge appeared.
"Tell Kimber to bring the car round and drive Mrs. Levitt home."
"Thank you, Mr. Waddington, I'd rather walk."
Partridge retired.
She held out her hand. Mr. Waddington bowed abruptly, not taking it. He
strode behind her to the door, through the smoke-room, to the further
door. In the hall Partridge hovered. He left her to him.
And, as she followed Partridge across the wide lamp-lighted space, he
noticed for the first time that Elise, in her agitation, waddled. Like a
duck--a greedy duck. Like that horrible sister of hers, Bertha
Rickards.
Then he thought of Barbara Madden.
3
When Ralph called for Barbara he told her, first thing, that he had
heard from Mackintyres, the publishers, about his book. He had sent it
them two-thirds finished, and Grevill Burton--"Grevill _Burton_,
Barbara!"--had read it and reported very favourably. Mackintyres had
agreed to publish it if the end was equal to the beginning and the
middle.
It was this exciting news, thrown at her before she could get her hat
on, that had caused Barbara to forget all about Mr. Waddington's
photographs and Mr. Waddington's book and Mr. Waddington, until she and
Ralph were half way between Wyck-on-the-Hill and Lower Speed. There was
nothing for it then but to go on, taking care to get back in time to
take the photographs to Pyecraft's before the shop closed. There hadn't
been very much time, but Barbara said she could just do it if she made a
dash, and it was the dash she made that precipitated her into the scene
of Mr. Waddington's affair.
Ralph waited for her at the white gate.
"We must sprint," she said, "if we're to be in time."
They sprinted.
As they walked slowly back, Barbara became thoughtful.
As long as she lived she would remember Waddington: the stretched-out
arms, the top-heavy body bowed to the caress; the inflamed and startled
face staring at her, like some strange fish, over Mrs. Levitt's
shoulder, the mouth dropping open as if it called out to her "Go back!"
What depths of fatuity he must have sunk to before he could have come to
that! And the sad figure leaning on the chimneypiece, whipped, beaten by
Mrs. Levitt's laughter--the high, coarse, malignant laughter that had
made her run to the smoke-room door to shield him, to shut it off.
What wouldn't Ralph have given to have seen him!
It was all very well for Ralph to talk about making a "study" of him; he
hadn't got further than the merest outside fringe of his great subject.
He didn't know the bare rudiments of Waddington. He had had brilliant
flashes of his own, but no sure sight of the reality. And it had been
given to her, Barbara, to see it, all at once. She had penetrated at one
bound into the thick of him. They had wondered how far he would go; and
he had gone so far, so incredibly far above and beyond himself that all
their estimates were falsified.
And she saw that her seeing was the end--the end of their game, hers
and Ralph's, the end of their compact, the end of the tie that bound
them. She found herself shut in with Waddington; the secret that she
shared with him shut Ralph out. It was intolerable that all this rich,
exciting material should be left on her hands, lodged with her useless,
when she thought of what she and Ralph could have made of it together.
If only she could have given it him. But of course she couldn't. She had
always known there would be things she couldn't give him. She would go
on seeing more and more of them.
Odd that she didn't feel any moral indignation. It had been too funny,
like catching a child in some amusing naughtiness; and, as poor Waddy's
eyes and open mouth had intimated, she had had no business to catch him,
to know anything about it, no business to be there.
"Ralph," she said, "you must let me off the compact."