1
The Henderson party found Mr. Green and Mr. Parrow waiting in the dim
plank-floored corridor leading from the station to the main building of
the Crystal Palace. When the quiet greetings were over and they had
arranged a meeting-place at the end of the evening in case any of the
party should be lost, they all tramped on up the resounding corridor.
Miriam found herself bringing up the rear with Mr. Parrow. They were
going on up the corridor, through the Palace and out into the summer
evening. They had all come to go out into the summer evening and see the
fireworks. All but she had come meaning to get quite near to the ‘set
pieces’ and to look at them. She had not said anything about meaning to
get as far away from the fireworks as possible. She had been trusting to
Mr. Parrow for that. Now that she was with him she felt that perhaps it
was not quite fair. He had come meaning to see the fireworks. He would
be disappointed. She would be obliged to tell him presently, when they
got out into the night. They were all tramping quickly up along the
echoing corridor. No one seemed to be talking, just feet, tramp, tramp
on the planking, rather quickly. It was like the sound of workmen’s feet
on the inside scaffolding of a half-built house. The corridor was like
something in the Hospital for Incurables ... that strange old woman
sitting in the hall with bent head laughing over her crochet, and Miss
Garrett whom they had come to see sitting up in bed, a curtained bed in
a ward, with a pleated mob cap all over the top of her head and half-way
down her forehead, sitting back against large square pillows with her
hands clasped on the neat bed-clothes and a “sweet, patient” look on her
face, coughing gently and spitting, spitting herself to death ...
rushing away out of the ward to wait for mother downstairs in the hall
with the curious smells and the dreadful old woman.... What was it,
chick?... Sick, mother, I felt sick, I couldn’t stay. It was rage; rage
with that dreadful old woman. People probably told her she was patient
and sweet, and she had got that trick of putting her head on one side.
She was not sweet. She was one of the worst of those dreadful people who
would always make people believe in a particular way, all the time. She
had a great big frame. If she had done anything but sit as she sat, in
that particular way, one could have stayed.
They were all standing looking at some wonderful sort of clock, a
calendar-clock--‘a triumph of ingenuity,’ said Mr. Green’s bright reedy
voice. The building had opened out and rushed up, people were passing to
and fro. “We don’t want to stay inside; let’s go out,” said Gerald. The
group broke into couples again and passed on. Miriam found herself with
Mr. Parrow once more. Of course she would be with him all the evening.
She must tell him at once about the fireworks. She ought not to have
come, if she did not mean to see the fireworks. It was mean and feeble
to cheat him out of his evening. Why had she come; to wander about with
him, not seeing the fireworks. What an idiotic and abominable thing. Now
that she was here at his side it was quite clear that she must endure
the fireworks. Anything else would be like asking him to wander about
with her alone. She did not want to wander about with him alone. She
took an opportunity of joining Eve for a moment. They had just walked
through a winter garden and were standing at the door of a concert room,
all quite silent and looking very shy. “Eve,” she said hurriedly in a
low tone, “d’you want to see the beastly fireworks?”
“Beastly? Oh, of course, I do,” said Eve in a rather loud embarrassed
tone. How dreadfully self-conscious they all were. Somebody seemed to be
speaking. “What _sticks_ my family are--I had no idea,” muttered Miriam
furiously into Eve’s face. Eve’s eyes filled with tears, but she stood
perfectly still, saying nothing. Miriam wheeled round and stared into
the empty concert room. It was filled with a faint bluish light and
beyond the rows of waiting chairs and the empty platform a huge organ
stood piled up towards the roof. The party were moving on. What a queer
place the Crystal Palace is ... what a perfectly horrible place for a
concert ... pianissimo passages and those feet on those boards tramping
about outside.... What a silly muddle. Mr. Parrow was waiting for her to
join the others. They straggled along past booths and stalls, meeting
groups of people, silent and lost like themselves. Now they were passing
some kind of stonework things, reliefs, antique, roped off like the
seats in a church. Just in front of them a short man holding the red
cord in his hands was looking at a group with some ladies. “_Why_,” he
said suddenly in a loud cheerful voice, stretching an arm out across the
rope and pointing to one of the reliefs, “it’s Auntie and Grandma!”
Miriam stared at him as they passed, he was so short, shorter than any
of the ladies he was with. “It’s the only way to see these things,” he
said in the same loud harsh cheerful voice. Miriam laughed aloud. What a
clever man.
“Do you like statues?” said Mr. Parrow in a low gentle tone.
“I don’t know anything about them,” said Miriam.
“I can’t bear fireworks,” she said hurriedly.
They were in the open at last. In the deepening twilight many people
were going to and fro. In the distance soft dark masses of trees stood
out against the sky in every direction. Not far away the ghostly frames
of the set pieces reared against the sky made the open evening seem as
prison-like as the enclosure they had just left. Round about the
scaffolding of these pieces dense little crowds were collecting.
“Don’t you want to see the fireworks?”
“I want to get away from them.”
“All right, we’ll get lost at once.”
“It isn’t,” she explained a little breathlessly, in relief, suddenly
respecting him, allowing him to thread a way for her through the
increasing crowd towards the open evening, “that I don’t want to see the
fireworks, but I simply can’t stand the noise.”
“I see,” laughed Mr. Parrow gently. They were making towards the open
evening along a narrow gravel pathway, like a garden pathway. Miriam
hurried a little, fearing that the fireworks might begin before they got
to a safe distance.
“I never have been able to stand a sudden noise. It’s torture to me to
walk along a platform where a train may suddenly shriek.”
“I see. You’re afraid of the noise.”
“It isn’t fear--I can’t describe it. It’s agony. It’s like pain. But
much much worse than pain. It’s--it’s--annihilating.”
“I see; that’s very peculiar.”
Their long pathway was leading them towards a sweet-scented density, dim
bowers and leafy arches appeared just ahead.
“It was much worse even than it is now when I was a little thing. When
we went to the seaside I used to sit in the train nearly dead until it
had screamed and started. And there was a teacher who sneezed--a noise
like a hard scream--at school. She used to go on sneezing--twenty times
or so. I was only six and I dreaded going to school just for that. Once
I cried and they took me out of the room. I’ve never told anyone. Nobody
knows.”
“You’ve told me.”
“Yes.”
“It’s very interesting. You shan’t go anywhere near the fireworks.”
2
A large rosy flare, wavering steadily against the distant trees showed
up for a moment the shapes and traceries of climbing plants surrounding
their retreat. A moment afterwards with a dull boom a group of white
stars shot up into the air and hovered, melting one by one as the crowd
below moaned and crackled its applause.
Miriam laughed abruptly. “That’s jolly. How clever people are. But it’s
much better up here. It’s like not being too near at the theatre.”
“I think we’ve got the best view certainly.”
“But we shall miss the set pieces.”
“The people down there won’t see the rosary.”
“What’s that black thing on our left down there?”
“That’s the toboggan run. We ought to go on that.”
“What is it like?”
“It’s fine; you just rush down. We must try it.”
“Not for worlds.”
Mr. Parrow laughed. “Oh you must try the toboggan; there’s no noise
about that.”
“I really couldn’t.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely. I mean it. Nothing under the sun would induce me to go on a
toboggan.”
They sat watching the fireworks until they were tired of the whistling
rockets, showers of stars and golden rain, the flaming bolts that shot
up from the Battle of the Nile, the fizzlings and fire spurtings of the
set pieces and the recurrent moanings and faint patterings of applause
from the crowd.
“I wish they’d do some more coloured flares of light up the trees like
they did at first. It was beautiful--more real than these things. ‘Feu
d’artifice’ artificial fire--all these noisy things. Why do people
always like a noise? Men. All the things men have invented, trains and
cannons and things make a frightful noise.”
“The toboggan’s not noisy. Come and try the toboggan.”
“Oh no.”
“Well--there’s the lake down there. We might have a boat.”
“Do you know how to manage a boat?”
“I’ve been on once or twice; if you like to try I’ll manage.”
“No; it’s too dark.” What a plucky man. But the water looked cold. And
perhaps he would be really stupid.
A solitary uniformed man was yawning and whistling at the top of the
deserted toboggan run. The faint light of a lamp fell upon the square
platform and the little sled standing in place at the top of a shiny
slope which shot steeply down into blackness.
“We’d better get on,” said Miriam trembling.
“Well, you’re very graceful at giving in,” remarked Mr. Parrow, handing
her into the sled and settling with the man.
He got that sentence out of a book, thought Miriam wildly as she heard
the man behind them say “Ready? Off you go!” ... Out of a book a book a
book--_Oh_--_ooooh_--how ab_solutely_ glorious, she yelled as they shot
down through the darkness. _Oh_, she squealed into the face laughing and
talking beside her. She turned away, shouting, for the final rush, they
were flying--involuntarily her hand flung out, they were tearing
headlong into absolute darkness, and was met and firmly clasped. They
shot slackening up a short incline and stood up still hand in hand,
laughing incoherently.
“Let’s walk back and try again,” said Mr. Parrow.
“Oh no; I enjoyed it most frightfully; but we mustn’t go again. Besides,
it must be fearfully late.”
She pulled at her hand. The man was too near and too big. His hand was
not a bit uncertain like his speech, and for a moment she was glad that
she pulled in vain. “Very well,” said Mr. Parrow, “but we must find our
way off the grass and strike the pathway.” Drawing her gently along, he
peered about for the track. “Let me go,” said her hand dragging gently
at his. “No” said the firm enclosure, tightening “not yet.” What does it
matter? flashed her mind. Why should I be such a prude? The hand gave
her confidence. It was firm and strong and perfectly serious. It was a
hand like her own hand and comfortingly strange and different. Gently
and slowly he guided her over the dewy grass. The air that had rushed so
wildly by them a few minutes ago was still and calm and friendly; the
distant crowd harmless and insignificant. The fireworks were over. The
pathway they had missed appeared under their feet and down it they
walked soberly, well apart, but still hand in hand until they reached
the borders of the dispersing crowd.