MR. and Mrs. Montmorency were sitting on the steps as Lois drove up the
avenue. Francie waved, Hugo looked warily round the _Spectator_. “Well
...?” cried Francie, as Lois came into ear-shot. Above, twenty dark
windows stared over the fields aloofly out of the light grey face of
the house. The trees had rims of light round them; everything seemed a
long way away. With a sigh, Hugo put down the _Spectator_ and came to
lift Lois’s suitcase out of the trap.
“Well ...?”
“Oh, marvellous.... But what _do_ you think: we broke the gramophone!”
“Oh, the poor gramophone!”
“It was the Gunners’ gramophone.... Where are the others?”
“We have no idea.”
The Montmorencys now felt certain it must be a tiring day: even Lois
looked pale. They had been having an intimate conversation about the
future, both with a sense of courage as from sweeping aside some
decency. Why not, Hugo had said, build a bungalow somewhere? “With no
stairs?” Francie kindled at the idea, slipping a hand under Hugo’s.
“And live there always?” Certainly--why not?--they would un-store the
furniture. And at the thought of their tables and sofas coming again
out of limbo, Hugo’s face was illumined by a look of defiance.
“But where would we build?” said Francie, wrinkled up with delightful
anxiety. Hugo said they would motor round for a bit and no doubt some
idea would suggest itself. “We could choose the view,” said Francie.
But at this point, for some reason, he had taken up the _Spectator_.
The man came round for the pony: Lois sat down on the steps and began
to chatter. It was surprising, really, how much had occurred. And
fancy, the Colonel had been furious.... Even Hugo listened with some
attention. “Dear me,” he said when they heard about Mr. Daventry.
Francie expected it must be a great relief for a man in that state of
mind to meet a girl to whom he could really talk. “But he didn’t talk;
he really was most extraordinary. Of course, he was once a major.”
Francie wished she had seen her go off in that green frock--all, how
should she say? like a poppy, only a different colour. Would Lois put
it on for them all to-night?
“It’s not really a frock one sits in,” said Lois discouragingly.
Francie said it was almost a pity in some ways that Laurence was so
intellectual. “I know, we’ll make Hugo waltz with you, he waltzes
beautifully.” But the thought of Hugo waltzing--as Hugo suspected--made
Lois melancholy.
Laurence, disturbed by her voice, shut an upstairs window. His
industry nowadays was remarkable. He dragged at his hair and stared
at the trees through a flawed pane, across which Laura Naylor had
scratched her name with a diamond. At his elbows, books were in
toppling stacks; movement produced an avalanche. A wasp hung round him,
tentative, scrawling Z’s on the air. “Go away,” he muttered, “you are
superfluous.” Finally, he was obliged to open the door and shoo the
wasp out of it; it undulated across the landing and in at the half-open
door of Marda’s room, as though it had an appointment. Though he did
not care for the wasp, Laurence went in after it, to see if she had
not left _South Wind_ behind. She had indeed--which was like her. The
wasp dithered above the looking-glass in triumph; he took aim with the
book and almost hit it. An eight-day clock still ticked; it was five to
four, it would soon be tea-time.
As he came out, Lois appeared at the top of the stairs, carrying a
suitcase.
“Hullo! what have you brought _that_ up for?”
“Oh yes,” she said, putting it down in surprise. “I meant to have left
it half-way.”
“Well--?”
“Really,” she cried, unreasonably, “this house is nothing but
Montmorencys; they are an absolute state of mind.... I only wanted to
see if you were here.”
“Well, I’m not, practically: I’m working.”
“Oh--why do you work in the spare room?”
“I was dealing with a wasp.”
“Laurence, I had a marvellous dance.”
“Splendid!” He turned to his door, but she, in tremendous need of his
un-sympathy, brought out, imploringly: “They were all there, every one.
And, my dear, the wind; I thought the hut would be blown away. And we
broke the gramophone. There was a most sinister man called Daventry,
with shell-shock ...”
“Good,” said Laurence, “and _you_ look sleepy!”
Lois, lamblike under the force of suggestion, leaned back against the
banisters, yawning. “Livvy kicked all night, she will be a horrible
wife.... Laurence, I wish you would tell me something to read.”
“I should go to sleep.”
The idea seemed grateful: she thought of her room with the high
ceiling, the foreign touch to the cheeks of afternoon pillows,
the delicious crime of crossing one’s stockinged ankles over the
rucked-back quilt and the slow recession of fact down a long tunnel
till the windows stretched and faded. But, pulling at her fingers,
she said impatiently: “But I want to begin on something; I do think,
Laurence, you might understand. There must be some way for me to begin.
You keep on looking into rooms where I am with silent contempt--what do
you think I am for?”
He leaned against the frame of his doorway, looking at her with
surprise and a degree of humanity. To-day four weeks, Term would have
begun again; he did for a moment stretch to an effort of comprehension:
there was nothing for _her_ to go on with. The vacancy, more than
negative to him, which had succeeded Marda made the natural claims of a
life on his young cousin. With that concession to fancy one makes for
the doomed or the very weak, he suggested she should go on with her
German. He gave her two grammars, a dictionary and a novel of Mann’s,
which she took from him doubtfully. When he was back at his table, his
door ajar, she went across stealthily to the door opposite.
“There’s a wasp in there,” called out Lawrence.
“Oh, I just thought I’d see if ...”
But she went downstairs, defeated, forgetting her suitcase.
She had not seen Gerald again this morning, though all contracted
with apprehension she had waited in Mrs. Fogarty’s drawing-room--the
multiplicity of the photographed young men’s faces, candid and
vigorous, further appalling her. An orderly had come down with a
note from barracks. The crested envelope, handed in with its air of
a claim on her, had austerity, like some limb of an institution. She
lost her last sense of Gerald, she felt committed. Fumbling open the
envelope, asking: “What have I done?” she wondered what had become
of that last lonely disk of cucumber on the plate. After “My darling
darling”--she was reprieved, provisionally; Mrs. Fogarty, coming in
in a wrapper--greatly worn, she said, after last night’s gaiety--had
insisted that if she would not drink port she must drink milk--it was a
long morning--and eat some of this nice sponge cake.
And: “_I_ know who has been breaking hearts!” said Mrs. Fogarty,
knifing the sponge cake which was moist and eggy and “gave” to the
knife deliciously, like an eiderdown.
The ante-room chairs, now looking at Lois askance, knew also. What she
had done stretched everywhere, like a net. If she had taken a life,
the simplest objects could not more have been tinged with consequence.
The graded elephants on the bookcases were all fatality. She went into
her room hurriedly. “All the same,” she thought, looking round with
patronage at the virginal wall-paper, “it _is_ something definite.” And
with curiosity, with complicity almost, she looked at herself in the
glass.
Gerald’s straight, round writing had--to her imagination--a queer
totter, like some one running for life in tight shoes.
“--I have so much to say to you, though there is all time now there
seems to be no time. Lois, when I am with you you make me awfully dumb
with your darling wide-awake eyes, and when we are apart you seem so
close I feel you must understand, so why try to explain when I am so
stupid? So I won’t try to say what I feel; all that matters is that you
are beautifully beautiful. Sometimes, till now, I have felt you must
think me awfully stupid and introspective and dull; I have wondered so
much what you did think about all the time: it seems unbelievable now
that I am really to know. You seemed so complicated, it was cheek to
associate you with the sort of person that I am, and now you are lovely
and simple and all mine. Last night doesn’t seem like part of my life
at all--I can’t believe it was me who danced and drank whiskies and
tinkered about with the gramophone--and yet it’s the reallest thing
ever. And what I am doing this morning seems so important--although it
keeps me away from you--because I am doing it _for_ you. It is awful
to think of you here in Clonmore and not to be able to get to you, and
yet it is wonderful to think of you waiting, and of who you are waiting
for being me. Lois, your dear cold arms were so lovely, I mustn’t think
of them now. All your life I am going to keep you and wrap you up and
protect you and never let you be cold again. It is awful to think you
have ever been lonely and sad--you are so brave, you know, and I never
guessed--and yet I am almost glad of that, because it makes some reason
for me. Darling, I kiss the thought of you and feel so terribly humble.
I must not write more now. If you can, leave a letter for me at the
Fogartys’. Does she guess? I thought perhaps you might like to confide
in her. But of course I will tell nobody, as you wish. Good-bye, my
most beautiful woman; I cannot write how I love you.
“Gerald.”
Folding the sheets again in their order, she thought: “It is you who
are beautiful,” and later: “If this thing is so perfect to anyone,
can one be wrong?” An escape of sunshine, penetrating the pale sky in
the south-west, altered the room like a revelation. Noiselessly, a
sweet-pea moulted its petals on to the writing-table, leaving a bare
pistil. The pink butterfly flowers, transparently balancing, were
shadowed faintly with blue as by an intuition of death. Lois bowed
forward, her forehead against the edge of the table.
Steps in the ante-room; she slipped the letter under the blotter and
turned round consciously. “I hear you are back,” said Lady Naylor,
entering. “I hear it was such a success that they broke the gramophone.
Now I want to hear all about it.” She sat down.
“Well, to begin with--”
“One moment--have you unpacked your frock?”
“Oh! I left my suitcase.... I went up to Laurence to borrow a German
grammar.”
“Oh, I shouldn’t go on with German,” said Lady Naylor, “it still
offends so many people; Italian is prettier and more practical. I could
lend you _Il Piccolo Mondo Antico_, or Dante-- However, tell me about
the dance.”
“Well, first of all--”
“--By the way, I’ve just heard from Marda. She has arrived quite
safely, I’m glad to say. She says Kent is dull, which I dare say it
would be, but of course she is glad to be with Leslie.”
“Did she say so?”
“She naturally would be. You can read it; I’ve got the letter
downstairs.... Who broke the gramophone? I hope you weren’t anywhere
round when it happened: these things are always remembered. Were the
Raltes there? Did they look pretty? I wonder, really, at their mother
allowing them; she professes to have them in such control. However, I
dare say this will be the last of these dances.”
“Oh, why?”
“If you had heard what we heard at the Trents’.... There was a man
there from Kerry. He really made us feel quite uncomfortable. Though,
as your uncle said afterwards, one knows what the Trents’ friends
are: everything happens to them. However-- Were the Vermonts there?
_She_ would be quite in her element. And Mr. Armstrong? I have heard
he and Livvy were seen in Cork together at the Imperial, by Mrs.
Foxe-O’Connor. And the young man who was here to lunch, who talked so
much ... in the armoured car ... oh--Lesworth?”
“Yes, he was there.”
“I am surprised at them all having time,” said Lady Naylor. “However,
if they danced more and interfered less, I dare say there would be
less trouble in the country. It appears that in Kerry ...” Her voice
became colder with inattention and dwindled away. Lois was certain she
eyed the pink blotter. This zigzag approach to Gerald, this ultimate
vagueness, were sinister. Lady Naylor, after some moments of odd and
oppressive silence, observed that the sweet-peas were dying. “The water
must be unhealthy, it’s going green. In fact, all the flowers need
doing. Perhaps after tea-- How would you like to go to a school of
art?”
“Marvellous,” said Lois after reflection.
“Francie was very much struck by your drawings. And Marda said you
certainly needed an interest.”
“Oh. Was she discussing me?”
“We were all saying that girls needed interests and I thought she
seemed to agree particularly. _She_ has not made much of her life, so
far--though of course if she marries Leslie--and I’ve always thought
that music or drawing, or writing a little, or organization of some
kind--”
“Did Marda say what she thought of my drawings?”
“She seemed to think they were nice.... A quarter to five!” exclaimed
Lady Naylor reproachfully. “The tea will be cold.... You look sleepy,
Lois. Did you hear the Montmorencys are going to build a bungalow?”
“Here?”
“Don’t be silly-- Besides, according to that friend of the Trents,
it would be blown up or burnt in a month or two. Certainly,” added Lady
Naylor, looking out at the sky, “I call this a tiring day.” She got up
with a sigh.
Later that evening Lois, half-way up to the garden with scissors
and basket, overtook Mr. Montmorency walking all by himself up the
shrubbery path. Pulling leaves from the laurels he shredded them
carefully.
“I hear,” he said, as she came up alongside, “you are taking up German?”
“Unless Italian might be more practical.... I hear you are going to
build a bungalow?”
“Oh, I don’t know; that is chiefly Francie’s idea.” They walked in
silence, she dragging her basket against the laurels. They had not been
alone since the drive from Mount Isabel. She remembered how once she
had hoped so much, and how he had been infinitely disobliging. Now she
had a tenderness for him, devoid of attraction, as though they had been
a couple of widows.
“No stairs would be nice.”
“But it would be certain to have other disadvantages.”
“Apparently,” she said with effrontery, “Marda arrived quite safely.”
“It should be a surprise to us all,” said Hugo, sarcastic, “that she
has not fallen out of the train. Even she cannot think of anything
better to say to a hostess. And the information, I always feel certain,
leaves hostesses cold. Once one is clear of their gates, interest ends
with responsibility.”
“And she says Kent is dull.”
“I cannot believe _she_ finds it so.”
“She is frightfully philosophic. Perhaps she was dull here.” (She
thought: “Even now, shall we never be natural?”)
“Have you seen her letter?”
“No ... have you?”
“No, your aunt has lost it.”
He pushed open the door, then followed her into the garden which, deep
in its walls, seemed impossibly large, for one could not see to the end
of it: it was crossed by espaliers and crowded with apple-trees. Down
the borders, the September yellow and scarlets were metallic in unsunny
light. Dahlias, orange and wine-coloured, blazed and gloomed. He turned
down one path, she kept to the other; they silently parted. Here she
had come with Marda--never with Gerald--they had sat on the green seat,
pressed blisters out of the paint and spat out their plum-stones into
the box border opposite. Entered to-day, the usual breath of the garden
was cold to her face. The branches were quiet as though in anxiety,
the flowers appeared to be clamouring vainly, forgotten. Coming to
the hedge of sweet-peas she began at the purple end, diligently.
“Though myself,” she could not help saying, “I do not care for purple
sweet-peas.”
When she reached up to the top of the hedge her sleeves fell back from
her arms and she thought of Gerald. She felt him looking at her through
the thinning stems. The sweet-peas were practically over, and indeed
she was glad, she thought, snipping and tugging with blunt garden
scissors. In yesterday’s dusk the Square with its flitter of leaves
had been all autumnal; smoke was blue in the air and, later, the dark
where they kissed had a sharp intimation of autumn. She loved in
autumn a stronger, more shadowy keen spring, sweet shocks of good-bye,
transition. Summer meanwhile stayed on inside these walls, forgotten.
The fact was, that though one determined to-night to sit under the
lamp and learn verbs, her Italian or German would not dispose of last
night, which remained, like the tear in her green tulle dress, to be
dealt with practically. After an anxious glance at the possible, a pain
so sharp that it seemed her own forbade recantation. It was inevitable
that she should marry Gerald. Mrs. Montmorency at least--she thought
with relief as she came to the red sweet-peas--would be infinitely
sympathetic and pleased. The unbelievable future became fixed as the
past under the flutter and settling down of a flock of comments, which,
as she turned in imagination back to the house and steps and saw lips
forming themselves in unconscious readiness, seemed already uttered.
And as Mr. Montmorency came up a path at an angle, with the two garden
kittens toppling after him, she was surprised he did not repeat: “Well,
I hope of course that you may be happy. And decision of any kind is an
excellent thing in your mother’s daughter.”
Instead, he came to the other side of the hedge and, picking off some
bleaching tendrils, observed that the sweet-peas would soon be over.
The house flowers must keep her busy, he added. And taking out his
pocket-knife he cut three sweet-peas, with precision. Having made this
gesture of sympathy, he continued to move with her down his side of the
hedge.
“It is extraordinary,” said Lois. “I feel as if I had been away for a
week.”
“Yet you find us going on much the same?” He looked at her through
the stems ironically but without intelligence. And she could not try
to explain the magnetism they all exercised by their being static.
Or how, after every return--or awakening, even, from sleep or
preoccupation--she and those home surroundings still further penetrated
each other mutually in the discovery of a lack.