THE RIVER
After that there followed a period of unusual activity in the Coventry's
bungalow. Guns and rifles were overhauled, ammunition ordered, boxes and
cupboards were ransacked for garments suited to the jungle.
Trixie entered keenly into all the preparations. She seldom did anything
by halves; and she might almost have been joining in the expedition
herself so lively was her interest in every detail. She asked endless
questions concerning camps and elephants and tigers, and she listened
breathless to all that George could tell her of the fascinations of the
jungle. She dragged books on sport from the musty shelves of the club
library, and read them with genuine enjoyment during two long, hot
afternoons.
Coventry to the last was more or less reluctant to leave her; but she
ignored his hesitation, and when the hour of departure came she drove
with him gaily to the railway station, and with a cheerful, smiling face
saw him off by the night mail.
It was when she returned to the empty bungalow that her spirits sank.
The rooms were so silent, save for the tiny trumpeting of mosquitoes in
the corners; the atmosphere felt so close, and there was a smell of musk
rat that was nauseating. Until dawn brought comparative coolness she lay
awake, turning restlessly, hearing the desperate cry of the brain-fever
bird, and the monotonous thrumming of a stringed instrument in the
servants' quarters at the end of the compound. She wondered if natives
ever slept save during the spell of rest they claimed in the middle of
the day, when a drowsy peace descended everywhere.
With a sense of dismay that hitherto she had held in check, she
contemplated the coming fortnight. How boring it would be to have to
"think and remember" the whole time that she must be careful to give no
cause for gossip! True, she had her household and her livestock, and her
linen and store cupboards to occupy her mornings, and she could read and
sleep through the succeeding hot hours; but what of the evenings?
For the first week she got on well enough. She snubbed Guy Greaves and
other eager slaves who would willingly have placed their time, their
dog-carts, their ponies--everything that they possessed--at her
disposal. She played in "married" sets of tennis, and dined and
consorted with the most domesticated couples in the station, so nervous
was she of committing any indiscretion. Every day she wrote to George,
accounting for her time; this she felt to be a sort of safeguard against
the least false step; and so far there had been nothing connected with
her doings that she could not chronicle with a perfectly clear
conscience.
So the time dragged on until the evening before the day on which George
Coventry was expected to come home.
The heat was now terrific; even tennis had become an effort, and Trixie
left the bungalow to keep her engagement in the public gardens, feeling
listless and oppressed. The hot weather had begun early this year, there
had been no cooling storms to give temporary coolness and relief, and on
all sides Trixie heard ominous predictions that "the rains" were going
to fail. Not that the prospect disturbed her particularly, for as yet
she could not realise its gravity. Only those whose lives have been
bound up with India can understand the dread of such a visitation, the
anxious watching of the sky, the heaviness of heart when meteorological
reports look bad. For a failure, or even a weakness, of the monsoon
means grim combat with pestilence and famine, and most dire distress,
not only at the time, but afterwards, when fever takes its toll from an
enfeebled population. It means strain and over-work for the
long-suffering official; everywhere misery, death, and desolation.
After a languid game she dawdled late at the club with a group of people
who, like herself, felt unwilling to return to stuffy bungalows and food
that must inevitably prove untempting. To-night especially she shrank
from the prospect of a solitary dinner and the weary after hours, even
though supported by the knowledge that it was her last evening alone.
They all sat outside the club-house on a round masonry platform, talking
fitfully, fanned by a make-shift punkah slung between two poles.
Gradually two or three married couples bestirred themselves and drove
away; a few unattached men who had dinner engagements deserted also, and
presently Mrs. Coventry and Mrs. Roy were the only ladies left, with a
small attendance of young men--Guy Greaves, two other subalterns, and a
home-sick youth who had joined the Civil Service only last winter, and
still preserved pathetically a Bond Street air.
Mrs. Roy was young and pretty and light-hearted, but not entirely
without guile. Captain Roy had gone away that afternoon on duty, and she
did not intend to dine alone. She invited the company to join her at
dinner.
"There's lots of food, such as it is," she told them, "and even if we
can't eat we can drink champagne with plenty of ice in it."
"I'm afraid I can't come," said Trixie ruefully. She knew that George
disapproved of Mrs. Roy.
"Why not?" persisted Mrs. Roy. "Who are you dining with--the
missionaries?"
They all laughed.
"I'm not dining with anybody," admitted Trixie, obviously weakening. She
longed to join the party and have a little "fling," to laugh and talk
nonsense and be amused, as an antidote to all her good behaviour. No
letter would have to be written to-morrow to George. She could tell him
all about the evening, and make him understand that she had meant and
done no harm.
"Then why can't you come? Don't be unsociable," argued Mrs. Roy.
"To-morrow we may all be dead of heat apoplexy, or cholera, or
snake-bite, or something equally common to this delightful country, and
then you'd be sorry you hadn't enjoyed yourself while you had the
chance."
"Do say 'Yes,' Mrs. Coventry," sang a chorus of male voices. And after a
moment's further hesitation Trixie succumbed.
"I must go back and change, then," she said, and rose.
A little later they all met again in Mrs. Roy's pretty bungalow, and
despite the heat and the insects, and, according to Mrs. Roy, the
uncertainty of existence in India, they were a festive little party.
They chaffed and told stories, and drank iced champagne and smoked
cigarettes, and Trixie cast from her all thoughts of her husband's
displeasure. Until this evening she had conformed to his wishes with the
most strict consideration. She felt she deserved this innocent
enjoyment, that it would be really unreasonable of George if he grudged
it to her.
She had honestly intended to go home soon after dinner was over, but
Mrs. Roy refused to "hear of such a thing."
"Behold the moon!" she exclaimed, a good deal later, as they straggled
out into the veranda after a short and boisterous game of cards.
And, indeed, the moon was something to behold--huge, orange-coloured,
almost terrifying, hanging heavy in the dusty night. Its lurid light
filtered through the foliage of the trees and tinged the haze of the
atmosphere with an unearthly radiance.
"I ask you, who could go to bed whilst that great lantern blazes in the
sky?" cried Mrs. Roy with mock grandiloquence. "Let us all drive down to
the river and go for a row. Wouldn't it be simply perfect?"
And, with others, Trixie agreed. What did it matter? Who cared? There
was a sensuous influence in the hot, scented air that stilled her
scruples, rendered her reckless. For the moment all the careless,
irresponsible gaiety of her girlhood had returned.
The young civilian and one of the subalterns took charge of Mrs. Roy,
the other three climbed into Guy Greaves's dog-cart, and they all drove
hatless, wrapless, along the deserted, dusty road hedged with dry
mud-banks that were tipped with prickly pear and cactus, until the
ground began to slope, the wheels of the vehicles sank deep into the
heavy, sandy soil, and they were at the river's edge.
There was a little delay while two boats were got ready by sleepy
boatmen roused from their huts, a good deal of talk and laughter and
argument as to how the party should divide and how far they should row.
Finally it was agreed that in an hour's time they should land at the
grove of trees that sheltered the Mohammedan cemetery, and that the
syces with the traps, and a man to take back the boats, should meet them
there.
Trixie found herself afloat alone with Guy Greaves. She did not know if
this was due to an accident or to Guy's deliberate manoeuvring. She felt
as though she were in a dream as she took the rudder-lines. The second
boat shot past them, and the occupants called out foolish jokes and
gibes, sprinkled them with water, and left them far behind.
They slid slowly, silently, over the smooth bosom of the holy river,
that was burnished with the moonlight. From the distance came the sound
of native singing, a faint sound that rose and fell on the warm night
air, only to be drowned, as though in protest, by the yells of jackals
hunting, closely packed, across the plain.
Then all again was quiet, with a vast and dreamy peace that held the man
and woman speechless, like a spell, as the boat slipped through the
water, on and on.
Suddenly Guy Greaves stopped rowing. He leaned towards his companion,
his young face set and hard, his eyes dark in the moonlight; his hands,
holding the oars, were strained and trembling.
"Trixie!" he said in hoarse appeal.
His voice roused her. She looked at him, surprised.
"Why have you been so cruel to me lately? What have I done?"
She felt irritated, helpless. "Don't, Guy. Don't be so silly. I don't
know what you mean."
"Oh! I know it's no use. But I must say it; I must tell you." He spoke
with quick, nervous emotion. "It isn't as if I'd ever done or said
anything since you came out here married to deserve the way you've sat
on me lately--or if I have, I didn't know it. I thought I'd been so
jolly careful! It hasn't been easy--and it's no good pretending now that
I don't care for you, or for you to pretend that you don't know it. You
knew it when I was at home last year, and we had such ripping times
together. If only I'd been able to afford to marry, wouldn't you have
taken me--Trixie? Wouldn't you? Instead of marrying a man old enough to
be your great-grandfather!"
The boy had lost his head; his words came with passionate bitterness.
"Guy, be quiet!" Trixie broke in, distressed and alarmed. "You must be
mad to talk like this."
He paid no heed. "No, I'm not mad--unless, perhaps, with wretchedness. I
could stand it all as long as you treated me as a pal, and were kind,
and let me do things for you. But you suddenly kicked me off like an old
shoe, and, as far as I can see, for no reason whatever. I want to know,"
he went on doggedly, "what I've done."
"You haven't done anything," she hastened to tell him. "It's all your
silly imagination. Do, for goodness' sake, go on rowing; we shall never
catch up the others before they land."
He sat motionless, waiting.
"Guy--you _must_ row on. I'll tell you nothing while you behave like
this. It's beastly of you. Look--we're floating to the other side of the
river! Guy, do be sensible!"
That was what she had said to him last year at home, when he had "talked
nonsense" at a dance before he had to sail for India. They both
remembered it now. In her agitation she clutched at the rudder-lines
confusedly, and the boat almost swung round. He steadied it with the
oars, but he did not go on rowing.
"Would you have married me if it had been possible?" he persisted,
though now more calmly.
There was a long pause. The boat moved sideways, gravitating towards the
farther bank, nearing ridges of sand and islets of brushwood and
rubbish, mysterious shapes that stuck up sharp and fantastic in the
moonlight. Something swished past, rippling the water with swift
cleavage--a long, black water-snake hurrying to its refuge. And a mighty
splash broke the stillness--a crocodile disturbed from its stupor on a
sandbank.
"No," said Trixie in a low, tense voice, "I would not have married you.
I think I could never have married anybody but George."
The truth had come to her, here on the river in the moonlight, with
sudden and overpowering force. She loved her husband, loved him with all
her generous, impulsive heart--and this in spite of his strict views and
old-fashioned opinions, his tiresome jealousy, his age! And yet at this
very moment she was doing something that, if he could know of it, would
hurt and anger him and shake his trust in her, destroy all his pleasure
in his holiday, perhaps create a rupture between them that never could
be healed! What a fool she had been to dine with Mrs. Roy, to allow
herself to be dragged into this idiotic escapade. And here was Guy
behaving like a lunatic because she was alone with him on the river in
the middle of the night. How could she ever explain it all to George and
persuade him to forgive her?
Before her mental vision rose her husband's handsome, careworn face--the
keen grey eyes, the dark hair frosted at the temples; and with it came
remembrance, realisation of all he must have suffered in the past. How
often he had told her that she had restored to him his trust in
womanhood, had made him happy when all hope of happiness had seemed
denied him.
In a measure she had failed him, too. He would be certain to hear of
to-night's folly, even if she told him nothing about it herself. The
only thing to do was to get home as quickly as possible.
Guy Greaves sat opposite to her, obdurate, motionless, thinking only of
himself and his stupid, boyish adoration, which was nothing compared
with the love of a man experienced and tried. She felt she hated Guy,
and all the superficial view of life that he represented to her penitent
soul.
"Oh, go on--go on!" she cried in frightened desperation. "I must get
home. I ought never to have come. I can't bear it. If you don't row,
I'll never speak to you again."
He took up the oars with reluctance. She pulled the rudder-lines again,
first one, then the other. The boat shot crookedly, with a shivering
shock, on to a sandbank, and stuck fast.
Young Greaves said "Damn!" and Trixie screamed. She stood up.
"For God's sake sit down!" implored Guy, in fear that she might spring
from the boat, a hideous thought of lurking crocodiles flashing through
his mind.
She sank back to her seat, mute, apprehensive, while he tried vainly to
refloat the boat.
"Give me an oar. Let me help," she said. He passed it to her. They used
all their strength without avail.
"Shout!" she ordered him. "The others may hear you and come back."
He obeyed her, and the sound echoed wide and far across the water. But
the only answer was the hooting of an owl in some bushes on the bank,
and the scrambling of some startled little creature near them in the
sand.
"We shall be here all night!" she cried, despairing.
He did not answer. All his attention was concentrated on his efforts to
release the boat.
Actually how long it stuck there neither of them knew. The moon sank
lower, glowing, molten; myriads of mosquitoes beat about them, bit their
faces, hands, and feet; the river seemed as stagnant as a pool.
Trixie felt paralysed, as in a nightmare. What if they were kept
prisoners till the dawn--even longer--even till George should have
returned to the bungalow and found her absent?
All at once, with a lurch, the boat shot free, and Trixie burst into
tears of relief.
Guy Greaves felt almost hysterical himself. "It's all right now, Trixie.
Don't cry." He spoke with cheerful reassurance. "I'll row hard, and we
shall catch the others up in no time."
"They must have landed long ago," she quavered. "Can't we go back to the
starting-place? It must be nearer."
"But the traps were to meet us at the grove," he reminded her. "We
should have to walk all the way home if we went back, and that would
take ever so much longer."
"Supposing the others haven't waited," she suggested nervously. "It
would be just like them. They can't all get into the same trap, and
they'd take yours and leave us to fish for ourselves without caring
twopence!" Her agitation rendered her petulant and pessimistic. "You
know how thoughtless and inconsiderate Mrs. Roy can be. That is why
George can't bear her."
"Oh, nonsense! Mrs. Roy's dog-cart holds four at a pinch, if they let
the syce follow. Even if they did take my trap, they'd send it back to
meet us. Anyway, don't worry about that till we get there."
He rowed harder than ever, infected in spite of himself by Trixie's
forebodings; and he felt hardly surprised to see only the boatman
awaiting them on the rough little landing-stage.
"What did I tell you!" said Trixie, a catch of despair in her voice.
"They wouldn't wait down here," he said, as he helped her out of the
boat. "Are the sahibs up above in the grove?" he inquired of the man.
The answer was given with drowsy indifference. "I know not. The order
was given to wait for this boat, and take it back with the other."
They stumbled on up the slope that was steep and uneven, Trixie clinging
to Guy, her breath coming fast and audible. "Do coo-ee," she urged him,
"I feel I must know if they're there." He obeyed her. His voice rang
clear through the trees and over the river, but echo was all the reply
it received.
In disconsolate silence they reached the flat ground at the top of the
cliff, and plunged into the mysterious gloom of the grove. A weak little
breeze had arisen, wandering through the trees, like a sighing soul that
could not escape from the burial place; here and there they could see
the dim outlines of tombs, dome-shaped, or flat-topped and square,
touched by the light of the moon that filtered down through the foliage.
"They are not here. They have gone," said Trixie hopelessly.
"They are outside, waiting on the road," said Guy Greaves.
But they were not. When the pair emerged from the grove they found the
road empty and silent, not a sign of a trap or anything living, except a
great owl that swooped over the road and across the unfertile plain
beyond with an unearthly hoot, as though mocking their plight.
"Come along," said Trixie firmly, "we must walk. If they do send the
trap back to meet us so much the better, but we can't wait here on the
chance."
The road was unmetalled and the ruts were deep. Without further parley
they started, trudging through the dust, engrossed in their own
emotions. The boy felt that by his lack of self-control he had
jeopardised all future friendship with his idol, and his young heart was
heavy with distress, also with resentment; for it seemed to him that
Trixie thought he was to blame for their predicament. Barring that
asinine outburst of his, which he deeply regretted, he did not see why
she should be so perturbed--not only perturbed, but actually frightened.
If anyone should be spiteful enough to gossip, the whole thing could be
clearly explained in two minutes. Why, in the old days Trixie would have
been the first to enjoy such a harmless adventure. A question crept into
his mind and filled him with angry concern: Was she afraid of her
husband? He recalled certain tales of his colonel's first marriage,
chiefly the one that Coventry's jealous restrictions had goaded his wife
into bolting with some other fellow. Aunt Marion Greaves had once hinted
as much in his hearing, and others had said the same. He stepped along
burning with rage at the notion that Trixie was bullied, devising
impossible schemes to shield and defend her from trouble with Coventry
over to-night's escapade.
Trixie herself was practically oblivious of his presence. She did not
observe that he walked a little ahead, his motive being to make sure
that she trod on nothing suggestive of reptiles; once he did notice a
thin black line that wriggled from the dust in front and disappeared
beneath a cactus clump. Luckily she did not see it; she was absorbed in
her desire to find herself safe within her home, torn as she was with
repentance for her backsliding, dreading as she did the confession she
would have to make to George. Guy startled her presently by an abrupt
question:
"Why are you in such a funk?" he asked, as though the words had been
jerked from his lips against his will.
"What?" said Trixie, with an effort. "What did you say?" She only knew
he had spoken, without catching the words.
"I only said, why are you so awfully worried about--about all this?
There can't be any scandal when the whole thing was simply an accident."
"It wasn't an accident my going out with all you silly idiots in the
middle of the night!" said Trixie crossly. "And if people do talk and
say nasty things about our being left behind it will be my own fault,
and I shall deserve it. Anyhow, it has taught me a lesson I shan't
forget in a hurry."
"Oh, rot! What can they say? And why should you care. Look here,
Trixie," he burst out with imprudent impetuosity, "is it that you're in
a funk of what _the colonel_ will say or do? For God's sake, tell me if
he bullies you. We all know what happened about his first wife."
There was an ominous pause. His pulses beat quickly, the noise of their
footsteps crunching the dust sounded loud in his ears. He wished he had
let the subject alone.
Then he heard Trixie say in a cold, contemptuous voice: "Perhaps you
will tell me what you all know?"
In nervous excitement he stammered his answer. "Why, that he drove her
into--into leaving him. Never gave her a chance, wouldn't listen."
And in spite of the anger she felt towards Guy for his outrageous
presumption, Trixie's heart sank lower than ever. She knew so little of
the history of George's first marriage--had refused to hear when her
mother and "Gommie" had wanted to tell her. Never once had she
questioned her husband about the divorce, and naturally no one had
mentioned it to her in India, until now this blundering boy had raked up
the talk he had heard. A horrible doubt assailed her. Could it be true
that George had behaved without mercy, had not been entirely blameless
as she had always believed? If so, what might she expect herself when he
knew she had not only flown in the face of his wishes, but had been
absent nearly all night with Guy Greaves, the one individual, harmless
youth though he was, with whom he had begged her not to make herself
conspicuous during their separation--Guy, over whom they had almost
quarrelled! Hurt and annoyed she was sure her husband would be, but what
if, as well, he "would not listen, would not give her a chance?"
Her vexation of mind, her disturbance of conscience, the annoying delay,
the scene with Guy on the river, had all combined to harass her nerves
and distort her perceptions; and now her companion's perturbing
suggestion filled her with dread. Nevertheless her spirit rose up in
defence of her husband.
"You know nothing about it," she told Guy severely. "How dare you quote
gossip to me! And as to your insinuation about George's behaviour
towards me, it only just proves how little you know him."
"They why make such a fuss?" he argued morosely. He did not believe that
Trixie was telling the truth.
"Look here, Guy!" She stopped in the middle of the road, and compelled
him to turn and face her. "If you weren't such an old friend, and if I
didn't know you were a good sort, I should never speak to you again. As
it is, you must know we can't be on quite the same terms any more. But I
should like you to understand, once and for all, that I love my husband,
and because I love him it makes me wretched to think that I should have
done anything to vex him. I have broken a promise and behaved like a
senseless fool. Of course I shall tell him the whole thing, and I am not
in the least afraid that he won't forgive me. But that doesn't make me
feel any the less ashamed of myself."
All the same, despite her brave words, Trixie was frightened as well as
ashamed, and in her heart she knew that Guy had not only divined her
fear, but that he shared it himself acutely.
It was a blessed relief to them both to catch sight at this moment of a
dark object moving slowly towards them along the road--Guy Greaves's
trap, sent back by the rest of the party to meet them. In silence they
got into the trap and jolted along the uneven road till they reached the
metalled highway; then they spun swiftly, unhindered, towards the
station.