"Has Her Ladyship breakfasted yet, Burton?"
"Her Ladyship breakfasted at eight, and left the house at half-past, Sir
Nicholas."
My heart sank. So I was going to have a lonely morning. She had said she
wanted to go to her mother, I remembered now. I did not hurry to get up.
The doctors were coming with the wonderful artist who is making my new
foot, at twelve o'clock, and I am to have it on to-day for the first
time. This would be a surprise for Alathea when she returned to lunch. I
read my journal in bed, and thought over the whole of our acquaintance.
Yes, certainly she has greatly changed in the last six weeks. And
possibly I am nearer my goal than I could have dared to hope.
Now my method must be to be sweet to her, and not tease her any more.
How wonderful it will be when she does love me. I have not thought much
about my own feelings lately. She has kept me so often irritated and
angry, but I know that there is a steady advance, and that I love her
more than ever.
To see her little mutinous rebellious face softening--?--it will be
worth all the waiting. But meanwhile she is out, and I had better get
up!
* * * * *
I wonder if all the hundreds of other fellows who lost a leg below the
knee and were cripples for eighteen months felt the same as I did when
the new limb was fixed, and they stood upon two feet again for the first
time.
A strange, almost mad sense of exaltation filled me. I could walk! I was
no longer a prisoner, dependent upon the devotion of attendants!
I should no longer have to have things placed within reach, and be made
to realize impotency!
It hurt and was awkward for a while.--But Oh! the joy, joy, joy!!
After the doctors and the specialist had gone with hearty
congratulations, my dear old faithful servant had tears in his eyes as
he dressed me.
"You must excuse me, Sir Nicholas, but I am so glad."
Excuse him! I could have hugged him in my own joy.
He arrayed me in one of Mr. Davies's pre-war masterpieces, and we both
stood in front of the long glass in my bedroom, and then we solemnly
shook hands!
It was too glorious!
I wanted to run about! I wanted to shout and sing. I played idiotic
tricks, walking backwards and forwards, like one of Shackleton's
penguins. Then I went back to the glass again, actually whistling a
tune! Except for the black patch over my eye, I appeared very much the
same as I used to do before the war. My shoulder is practically straight
now. I am a little thinner, and perhaps my face bears traces of
suffering, but in general I don't look much altered.
I wonder what Alathea will say when she sees me! I wonder if it will
make any difference to her?
To-morrow morning they are going to put in my eye.
I have not written all this in my journal, it seemed too good to be
true, and I had a kind of superstitious feeling that I must not even
think of it, much less write, in case it did not come off. But now the
moment has come! I am a man again on two feet. Hurrah!
I looked out of the window and kissed my hand to a young girl in the
street. I wanted to call to her, "I could walk with you now, perhaps
soon I could run!" She looked at me with the corner of her eye!
Then I planned how I would surprise Alathea! I would be in my bedroom
when I knew she was in the salon before lunch, and then I would walk in!
I became excited, there was about a quarter of an hour to wait. I tried
to sit down and settle to a book, but it was useless, the words conveyed
no sense. I could not even read the papers!
I began listening to every sound, there were not many things passing at
this time on a Sunday morning, but of course she was walking, not
driving. One o'clock struck. She had not returned. Burton came in to ask
if I would postpone lunch.
"Her Ladyship did not say when she would be back," he said.
"We had better not wait then. I believe now she told me she would not be
in."
Burton had opened a pint of champagne. On this tremendous occasion he
felt I should drink my own health!
I had begun to lose some of my joy.----I wished she had been here to
share it with me.----
* * * * *
I have walked up and down--up and down. It is four o'clock now, and she
has not returned. No doubt her mother is ill, perhaps,--perhaps--
_Midnight:_
I have spent a beastly day. My exhilaration has all evaporated now. I
have had no one to share it with me. Maurice and everyone is leaving me
discreetly alone, knowing I am supposed to be on my
honeymoon--Honeymoon!
I spent the afternoon waiting, waiting. And after tea when Alathea had
not arrived I began taking longer turns, walking up and down the broad
corridor, and at last I paused outside her room, and a desire came over
me to look in on it, and see how she had arranged it.
There was silence. I listened a moment, then I opened the door.
The fire was not lit, it all seemed cold and cheerless. I turned on the
light.
Except for the tortoise-shell and gold brushes and boxes I had had put
on the dressing table for her, there was not an indication that anyone
stayed there, none of the usual things women have about in their rooms.
One could see she looked upon it just as an hotel, and not a permanent
abode. There were no photographs of her family, no books of her own,
nothing.
Only the bracelets were on the table still in their case, and on looking
nearer, I saw there was a bottle of scent. It had no label, and when I
opened it I smelled the exquisite perfume of fresh roses that she uses.
Where does she get it? It is the purest I have ever smelt in my life.
I looked at the quaint little fourpost bed that I had found in that shop
at Bath, a perfect specimen of its date, about 1699, with the old deep
rose silk pressed over the shell carving.
I had an insane desire to open the drawers in the chest and touch her
stockings and gloves. I had a wild feeling altogether I wanted my love,
rebellious, unrelenting, anyhow! I just longed for her.
I resisted my stupidities and made myself leave the room, and then tried
to feel joy again in my leg.
Burton was turning on the lamps when I got back to the salon.
"There are rumours that something is going to happen, Sir
Nicholas,--talk of an Armistice I heard when I was out. Do you think
Foch will do it?"
But I know all these rumours and talks, we have heard them before, so
this did not affect me. I could feel nothing, as time went on, but a
passionate ache. Why, why must she be so cruel to me? Why does she leave
me all alone?
Alathea, I would never be so unkind to you. And yet I don't know, if I
were jealous and angry, as I suppose she is, I could of course be much
crueler.
Her Ladyship's maid had been given the day out by her mistress, Burton
informed me, so that we could gain no information from her. We waited
until half-past eight for dinner, but still my little girl did not come,
and in solemn state in a white tie and tail coat, I dined--alone!
In spite of the champagne, which Burton again handed, apprehension set
in. What can have happened to her? Has she had an accident? Does she
mean never to return? Are all my calculations of no sense, and has she
left me forever?
In despair, at ten o'clock I telephoned the Hotel de Courville.
Lady Thormonde had been there in the morning, I was told, but the
Duchesse had left for Hautevine at two o'clock.--No one was in the house
now.--No, they did not know Lady Hilda Bulteel's telephone number. She
had no telephone they supposed.--No, they did not know the address.
Auteuil, and the name Bulteel, that is all! Perhaps something could be
done on a week-day, but on a Sunday night, in war time, all was
impossible. And at last in an agony of doubt and apprehension, I
consented to retire to bed.
Had I made some mistake? I tried to remember. She had said she meant to
decide if she could bear the situation or no, and that she was going to
her mother. She wanted to be with her. She had been ill and could not
start. Yes, of course that is it. The mother is ill, and they have no
telephone. I must wait until the morning. She cannot really mean not to
come back. In any case she would have let me know.
But what an agony of suspense!
Burton came and gave me my medicine, when I was in bed, and although I
knew it was a camouflaged sleeping draught, I drank it. I just could not
bear it any longer.
But I only slept until four, and now I am sitting up writing this, and
I feel as if every queer force was abroad, and that all sorts of
momentous things are happening.--Oh, when will daylight come--
* * * * *