Peter awoke, and wondered where he was. Then his eye fell on a half-shut,
unfamiliar trunk across the room, and he heard splashing through the open
door of the bathroom. "Julie!" he called.
A gurgle of laughter came from the same direction and the splashing
ceased. Almost the next second Julie appeared in the doorway. She was
still half-wet from the water, and her sole dress was a rosebud which she
had just tucked into her hair. She stood there, laughing, a perfect
vision of unblushing natural loveliness, splendidly made from her little
head poised lightly on her white shoulders to her slim feet. "You lazy
creature!" she exclaimed; "you're awake at last, are you? Get up at
once," and she ran over to him just as she was, seizing the bed-clothes
and attempting to strip them off. Peter protested vehemently. "You're a
shameless baggage," he said, "and I don't want to get up yet. I want some
tea and a cigarette in bed. Go away!"
"You won't get up, won't you?" she said. "All right; I'll get into bed,
then," and she made as if to do so.
"Get away!" he shouted. "You're streaming wet! You'll soak everything."
"I don't care," she retorted, laughing and struggling at the same time,
and she succeeded in getting a foot between the sheets. Peter slipped out
on the other side, and she ran round to him. "Come on," she said; "now
for your bath. Not another moment. My water's steaming hot, and it's
quite good enough for you. You can smoke in your bath or after it. Come
on!"
She dragged him into the bathroom and into that bath, and then she filled
a sponge with cold water and trickled it on him, until he threatened to
jump out and give her a cold douche. Then, panting with her exertions and
dry now, she collapsed on the chair and began to fumble with her hair
and its solitary rose. It was exactly Julie who sat there unashamed in
her nakedness, Peter thought. She had kept the soul of a child through
everything, and it could burst through the outer covering of the woman
who had tasted of the tree of knowledge of good and evil and laugh in the
sun.
"Peter," she said, "wouldn't you love to live in the Fiji--no, not the
Fiji, because I expect that's civilised these days, but on an almost
desert island?--though not desert, of course. Why does one call Robinson
Crusoe sort of islands _desert_? Oh, I know, because it means deserted, I
suppose. But I don't want it quite deserted, for I want you, and three
or four huts of nice savages to cut up wood for the fire and that sort of
thing. And I should wear a rose--no, a hibiscus--in my hair all day long,
and nothing else at all. And you should wear--well, I don't know what you
should wear, but something picturesque that covered you up a bit, because
you're by no means so good-looking as I am, Peter." She jumped up and
stretched out her arms, "Am I not good-looking, Peter? Why isn't there a
good mirror in this horrid old bathroom? It's more necessary in a
bathroom than anywhere, I think."
"Well, I can see you without it," said Peter. "And I quite agree, Julie,
you're divine. You are like Aphrodite, sprung from the foam."
She laughed. "Well, spring from the foam yourself, old dear, and come and
dress. I'm getting cold. I'm going to put on the most thrilling set of
undies this morning that you ever saw. The cami-... "
Peter put his fingers in his ears. "Julie," he said, "in one minute I
shall blush for shame. Go and put on something, if you must, but don't
talk about it. You're like a Greek goddess just now, but if you begin to
quote advertisements you'll be like--well, I don't know what you'll be
like, but I won't have it, anyway. Go on; get away with you. I shall
throw the sponge at you if you don't."
She departed merrily, singing to herself, and Peter lay a little longer
in the soft warm water. He dwelt lovingly on the girl in the other room;
he told himself he was the happiest man alive; and yet he got out of the
bath, without apparent rhyme or reason, with a little sigh. But he was
only a little quicker than most men in that. Julie had attained and was
radiant; Peter had attained--and sighed.
She was entirely respectable by contrast when he rejoined her, shaven and
half-dressed, a little later, but just as delectable, as she stood in
soft white things putting up her hair with her bare arms. He went over
and kissed her. "You never said good-morning at all, you wretch," he
said.
She flung her arms round his neck and kissed him again many times.
"Purposely," she said. "I shall never say good-morning to you while
you're horribly unshaven--never. You can't help waking up like it, I
know, but it's your duty to get clean and decent as quickly as possible.
See?"
"I'll try _always_ to remember," said Peter, and stressed the word.
She held him for an appreciable second at that; then loosed him with a
quick movement. "Go, now," she said, "and order breakfast to be brought
up to our sitting-room. It must be a very nice breakfast. There must be
kippers and an omelette. Go quick; I'll be ready in half a minute."
"I believe that girl is sweeping the room," said Peter. "Am I to appear
like this? You must remember that we're not in France."
"Put on a dressing-gown then. You haven't got one here? Then put on my
kimono; you'll look exceedingly beautiful.... Really, Peter, you do. Our
island will have to be Japan, because kimonos suit you. But I shall never
live to reach it if you don't order that breakfast."
Peter departed, and had a satisfactory interview with the telephone in
the presence of the maid. He returned with a cigarette between his lips,
smiling, and Julie turned to survey him.
"Peter, come here. Have you kissed that girl? I believe you have! How
dare you? Talk about being shameless, with me here in the next room!"
"I thought you never minded such things, Julie. You've told me to kiss
girls before now. _And_ you said that you'd always allow your husband
complete liberty--now, didn't you?"
Julie sat down on the bed and heaved a mock sigh. "What incredible
creatures are men!" she exclaimed. "Must I mean everything I say,
Solomon? Is there no difference between this flat and that miserable old
hotel in Caudebec? And last, but not least, have you promised to forsake
all other and cleave unto me as long as we both shall live? If you had
promised it, I'd know you couldn't possibly keep it; but as it is, I have
hopes."
This was too much for Peter. He dropped into the position that she had
grown to love to see him in, and he put his arms round her waist, looking
up at her laughingly. "But you will marry me, Julie, won't you?" he
demanded.
Before his eyes, a lingering trace of that old look crept back into her
face. She put her hands beneath his chin, and said no word, till he could
stand it no longer.
"Julie, Julie, my darling," he said, "you must."
"Must, Peter?" she queried, a little wistfully he thought.
"Yes, must; but say you want to, say you will, Julie!"
"I want to, Peter," she said--"oh, my dear, you don't know, you can't
know, how much. The form is nothing to me, but I want _you_--if I can
keep you."
"If you can keep me!" echoed Peter, and it was as if an ice-cold finger
had suddenly been laid on his heart. For one second he saw what might be.
But he banished it. "What!" he exclaimed. "Cannot you trust me, Julie?
Don't you know I love you? Don't you know I want to make you the very
centre of my being, Julie?"
"I know, dearest," she whispered, and he had never heard her speak so
before. "You want, that is one thing; you can, that is another."
Peter stared up at her. He felt like a little child who kneels at the
feet of a mother whom it sees as infinitely loving, infinitely wise,
infinitely old. And, like a child, he buried his head in her lap. "Oh,
Julie," he said, "you must marry me. I want you so that I can't tell you
how much. I don't know what you mean. Say," he said, looking up again and
clasping her tightly--"say you'll marry me, Julie!"
She sprang up with a laugh. "Peter," she said, "you're Mid-Victorian. You
are actually proposing to me upon your knees. If I could curtsy or faint
I would, but I can't. Every scrap of me is modern, down to Venns'
cami-knickers that you wouldn't let me talk about. Let's go and eat
kippers; I'm dying for them. Come on, old Solomon."
He got up more slowly, half-smiling, for who could resist Julie in that
mood? But he made one more effort. He caught her hand. "But just say
'Yes' Julie," he said--"just 'Yes.'"
She snatched her hand away. "Maybe I will tell you on Monday morning,"
she said, and ran out of the room.
As he finished dressing, he heard her singing in the next room, and then
talking to the maid. When he entered the sitting-room the girl came out,
and he saw that there were tears in her eyes. He went in and looked
sharply at Julie; there was a suspicion of moisture in hers also. "Oh,
Peter," she said, and took him by the arm as the door closed, "why didn't
you tell me about Jack? I'm going out immediately after breakfast to buy
her the best silver photo-frame I can find, see? And now come and eat
your kippers. They're half-cold, I expect. I thought you were never
coming."
So began a dream-like day to Peter. Julie was the centre of it. He
followed her into shops, and paid for her purchases and carried her
parcels: he climbed with her on to buses, which she said she preferred to
taxis in the day-time; he listened to her talk, and he did his best to
find out what she wanted and get just that for her. They lunched, at her
request, at an old-fashioned, sober restaurant in Regent Street, that
gave one the impression of eating luncheon in a Georgian dining-room, in
some private house of great stolidity and decorum. When Julie had said
that she wanted such a place Peter had been tickled to think how she
would behave in it. But she speedily enlightened him. She drew off her
gloves with an air. She did not laugh once. She did not chat to the
waiter. She did not hurry in, nor demand the wine-list, nor call him
Solomon. She did not commit one single Colonial solecism at table, as
Peter had hated himself for half thinking that she might. Yet she never
had looked prettier, he thought, and even there he caught glances which
suggested that others might think so too. And if she talked less than
usual, so did he, for his mind was very busy. In the old days it was
almost just such a wife as Julie now that he would have wanted. But did
he want the old days? Could he go back to them? Could he don the clerical
frock coat and with it the clerical system and outlook of St. John's? He
knew, as he sat there, that not only he could not, but that he would not.
What, then? It was almost as if Julie suggested that the alternative was
madcap days, such as that little scene in the bathroom suggested. He
looked at her, and thought of it again, and smiled at the incongruity of
it, there. But even as he smiled the cold whisper of dread insinuated
itself again, small and slight as it was. Would such days fill his life?
Could they offer that which should seize on his heart, and hold it?
He roused himself with an effort of will, poured himself another glass of
wine, and drank it down. The generous, full-bodied stuff warmed him, and
he glanced at his wrist-watch. "I say," he said, "we shall be late,
Julie, and I don't want to miss one scrap of this show. Have you
finished? A little more wine?"
Julie was watching him, he thought, as he spoke, and she, too, seemed to
him to make a little effort. "I will, Peter," she said, not at all as she
had spoken there before--"a full glass too. One wants to be in a good
mood for the Coliseum. Well, dear old thing, cheerio!"
Outside he demanded a taxi. "I must have it, Julie," he said. "I want to
drive up, and have the old buffer in gold braid open the door for me.
Have a cigarette?"
She took one, and laughed as they settled into the car. "I know the
feeling, my dear," she said. "And you want to stroll languidly up the red
carpet, and pass by the pictures of chorus-girls as if you were so
accustomed to the real thing that really the pictures were rather borin',
don't you know. And you want to make eyes at the programme-girl, and give
a half-crown tip when they open the box, and take off your British warm
in full view of the audience, and...."
"Kiss you," said Peter uproariously, suiting the action to the word.
"Good Lord, Julie, you're a marvel! No more of those old restaurants for
me. We dine at our hotel to-night, in the big public room near the band,
and we drink champagne."
"And you put the cork in my stocking?" she queried, stretching out her
foot.
He pushed his hand up her skirt and down to the warm place beneath the
gay garter that she indicated, and he kissed her passionately again. "It
doesn't matter now," he said. "I have more of you than that. Why, that's
nothing to me now, Julie. Oh, how I love you!"
She pushed him off, and snatched her foot away also, laughing gaily. "I'm
getting cheap, am I?" she said. "We'll see. You're going to have a damned
rotten time in the theatre, my dear. Not another kiss, and I shall be as
prim as a Quaker."
The car stopped. "You couldn't," he laughed, helping her out. "And what
is more, I shan't let you be. I've got you, old darling, and I propose to
keep you, what's more." He took her arm resolutely. "Come along. We're
going to be confoundedly late."
Theirs was a snug little box, one of the new ones, placed as in a
French theatre. The great place was nearly dark as they entered, except
for the blaze of light that shone through the curtain. The odour of
cigarette-smoke and scent greeted them, with the rustle of dresses and
the subdued sound of gay talk. The band struck up. Then, after the
rolling overture, the curtain ran swiftly up, and a smart young person
tripped on the stage in the limelight and made great play of swinging
petticoats.
Julie had no remembrance of her promised severity at any rate. She hummed
airs, and sang choruses, and laughed, and was thrilled, exactly as she
should have been, while the music and the panorama went on and wrapped
them round with glamour, as it was meant to do. She cheered the patriotic
pictures and Peter with her, till he felt no end of a fellow to be in
uniform. The people in front of them glanced round amusedly now and
again, and as like as not Julie would be discovered sitting there
demurely, her child's face all innocence, and a big chocolate held
between her fingers at her mouth. Peter would lean back in his corner
convulsed at her, and without moving a muscle of her face she would put
her leg tip on his seat and push him. One scene they watched well back
in their dark box, his arm round her waist. It was a little pathetic
love-play and well done, and in the gloom he played with the curls at
her ears and neck with his lips, and held her hand.
When it was over they went out with the crowd. The January day was done,
but it was bewildering for all that to come out into real life. There was
no romance for the moment on the stained street, and in the passing
traffic. The gold braid of the hall commissionaire looked tawdry, and
the pictures of ballet-girls but vulgar. It is the common experience, but
each time one feels it there is a new surprise. Julie had her own remedy:
"The liveliest tea-room you can find, Peter," she demanded.
"It will be hard to beat our own," said Peter.
"Well, away there, then; let's get back to a band again, anyhow."
The great palm-lounge was full of people, and for a few minutes it did
not seem as if they would find seats; but then Julie espied a half-empty
table, and they made for it. It stood away back in a corner, with two
wicker armchairs before it, and, behind, a stationary lounge against the
wall overhung by a huge palm. The lounge was occupied. "We'll get in
there presently," whispered Peter, and they took the chairs, thankful in
the crowded place to get seated at all.
"Oh, it was topping, Peter," said Julie. "I love a great place like that.
I almost wish we had had dress-circle seats or stalls out amongst the
people. But I don't know; that box was delicious. Did you see how that
old fossil in front kept looking round? I made eyes at him once,
deliberately--you know, like this," and she looked sideways at Peter
with subtle invitation just hinted in her eyes. "I thought he would have
apoplexy--I did, really."
"It's a good thing I didn't notice, Julie. Even now I should hate to see
you look like that, say, at Donovan. You do it too well. Oh, here's the
tea. Praise the Lord! I'm dying for a cup. You can have all the cakes;
I've smoked too much."
"Wouldn't you prefer a whisky?"
"No, not now--afterwards. What's that they're playing?"
They listened, Julie seemingly intent, and Peter, who soon gave up the
attempt to recognise the piece, glanced sideways at the couple on the
lounge. They did not notice him. He took them both in and caught--he
could not help it--a few words.
She was thirty-five, he guessed, slightly made-up, but handsome and full
figured, a woman of whom any man might have been proud. He was an
officer, in Major's uniform, and he was smoking a cigarette impatiently
and staring down the lounge. She, on the other hand, had her eyes fixed
on him as if to read every expression on his face, which was heavy and
sullen and mutinous.
"Is that final, then, George?" she said.
"I tell you I can't help it; I promised I'd dine with Carstairs
to-night."
A look swept across her face. Peter could not altogether read it. It was
not merely anger, or pique, or disappointment; it certainly was not
merely grief. There was all that in it, but there was more. And she
said--he only just caught the sentence of any of their words, but there
was the world of bitter meaning in it:
"Quite alone, I suppose? And there will be no necessity for me to sit
up?"
"Peter," said Julie suddenly, "the tea's cold. Take me upstairs, will
you? we can have better sent up."
He turned to her in surprise, and then saw that she too had heard and
seen.
"Right, dear," he said, "It is beastly stuff. I think, after all, I'd
prefer a spot, and I believe you would too."
He rose carefully, not looking towards the lounge, like a man; and Julie
got up too, glancing at that other couple with such an ordinary merely
interested look that Peter smiled to himself to see it. They threaded
their way in necessary silence through the tables and chairs to the
doors, and said hardly a word in the lift. But in their sitting-room,
cosy as ever, Julie turned to him in a passion of emotion such as he had
scarcely dreamed could exist even in her.
"Oh, you darling," she said, "pick me up, and sit me in that chair on
your knee. Love me, Peter, love me as you've never loved me before. Hold
me tight, tight, Peter hurt me, kiss me, love me, say you love me..." and
she choked her own utterance, and buried her face on his shoulder,
straining her body to his, twining her slim foot and leg round his ankle.
In a moment she was up again, however, and glanced at the clock. "Peter,
we must dress early and dine early, mustn't we? The thing begins at
seven-forty-five. Now I know what we'll do. First, give me a drink,
a long one, Solomon, and take one yourself. Thanks. That'll do. Here's
the best.... Oh, that's good, Peter. Can't you feel it running through
you and electrifying you? Now, come"--she seized him by the arm--"come
on! I'll tell you what you've got to do."
Smiling, though a little astonished at this outburst, Peter allowed
himself to be pulled into the bedroom. She sat down on the bed and pushed
out a foot. "Take it off, you darling, while I take down my hair," she
said.
He knelt and undid the laces and took off the brown shoes one by one,
feeling her little foot through the silk as he did so. Then he looked up.
She had pulled out a comb or two, and her hair was hanging down. With
swift fingers she finished her work, and was waiting for him. He caught
her in his arms, and she buried her face again. "Oh, Peter, love me, love
me! Undress me, will you? I want you to. Play with me, own me, Peter.
See, I am yours, yours, Peter, all yours. Am I worth having, Peter? Do
you want more than me?" And she flung herself back on the bed in her
disorder, the little ribbons heaving at her breast, her eyes afire, her
cheeks aflame.
"Well," said Peter, an hour or two later, "we've got to get this dinner
through as quickly as we've ever eaten anything. You'll have to digest
like one of your South African ostriches. I say," he said to the waitress
in a confidential tone and with a smile, "do you think you can get us
stuff in ten minutes all told? We're late as it is, and we'll miss half
the theatre else."
"It depends what you order," said the girl, rather sharply. Then, after a
glance at them both: "See, if you'll have what I say, I'll get you
through quick. I know what's on easiest. Do you mind?"
"The very thing," said Peter; "and send the wine-man over on your way,
will you? How will that do?" he added to Julie.
"I'll risk everything to-night, Peter, except your smiling at the
waitress," she said. "But I must have that champagne. There's something
about champagne that inspires confidence. When a man gives you the gold
bottle you know that he is really serious, or as serious as he can be,
which isn't saying much for most men. And not half a bottle; I've had
half-bottles heaps of times at tête-à-tête dinners. It always means
indecision, which is a beastly thing in anyone, and especially in a man.
It's insulting, for one thing.... Oh, Peter, do look at that girl over
there. Do you suppose she has anything on underneath? I suppose I
couldn't ask her, but you might, you know, if you put on that smile of
yours. Do walk over, beg her pardon, and say very nicely: 'Excuse me, but
I'm a chaplain, and it's my business to know these things. I see you've
no stays on, but have you a bathing costume?'"
"Julie, do be quiet; someone will hear you. You must remember we're in
England, and that you're talking English."
"I don't care a damn if they do, Peter! Oh, here's the champagne, at any
rate. Oh, and some soup. Well, that's something."
"I've got the fish coming," said the girl, "if you can be ready at once."
Julie seized her spoon. "I suppose I mustn't drink it?" she said. "I
don't see why I shouldn't, as a matter of fact, but it might reflect on
you, Peter, and you're looking so immaculate to-night. By the way, you've
never had that manicure. Do send a note for the girl. I'd hide in the
bathroom. I'd love to hear you. Peter, if I only thought you would do it,
I'd like it better than the play. What is the play, by the way? _Zigzag?_
Oh, _Zigzag_" (She mimicked in a French accent.) "Well, it will be all
too sadly true if I leave you to that bottle of fizz all by yourself.
Give me another glass, please."
"What about you?" demanded Peter. "If you're like this now, Heaven knows
what you'll be by the time you've had half of this."
"Peter, you're an ignoramus. Girls like me never take too much. We began
early for one thing, and we're used to it. For another, the more a girl
talks, the soberer she is. She talks because she's thinking, and because
she doesn't want the man to talk. Now, if you talked to-night, I don't
know what you might not say. You'd probably be enormously sentimental,
and I hate sentimental people. I do, really. Sentiment is wishy-washy,
isn't it? I always associate it with comedians on the stage. Look over
there. Do you see that girl in the big droopy hat and the thin hands?
And the boy--one must say 'boy,' I suppose? He's a little fat and
slightly bald, and he's got three pips up, and has had them for a long
time. Well, look at them. He's searching her eyes, he is, Peter, really.
That's how it's done: you just watch. And he doesn't know if he's eating
pea-soup or oyster-sauce. And she's hoping her hat is drooping just
right, and that he'll notice her ring is on the wrong finger, and how
nice one would look in the right place. To do her justice, she isn't
thinking much about dinner, either; but that's sinful waste, Peter, in
the first place, and bad for one's tummy in the second. However, they're
sentimental, they are, and there's a fortune in it. If they could only
bring themselves to do just that for fifteen minutes at the Alhambra
every night, they'd be the most popular turn in London."
"That's all very well," said he; "but if you eat so fast and talk at the
same time, you'll pay for it very much as you think they will. Have you
finished?"
"No, I haven't. I want cheese-straws, and I shall sit here till I get
them or till the whole of London zigzags round me."
"I say," said Peter to their waitress, "if you possibly can, fetch us
cheese-straws now. Not too many, but quickly. Can you? The lady won't go
without them, and something must be done."
"Wouldn't the management wait if you telephoned, Peter dear?" inquired
Julie sarcastically. "Just say who you are, and they sure will. If the
chorus only knew, they'd go on strike against appearing before you came,
or tear their tights or something dreadful like that, so that they
couldn't come on. Yes, now I am ready. One wee last little drop of the
bubbly--I see it there--and I'll sacrifice coffee for your sake. Give me
a cigarette, though. Thanks. And now my wrap."
She rose, the cigarette in her fingers, smiling at him. Peter hastily
followed, walking on air. He was beginning to realise how often he failed
to understand Julie, and to see how completely she controlled her
apparently more frivolous moods; but he loved her in them. He little
knew, as he followed her out, the tumult of thoughts that raced through
that little head with its wealth of brown hair. He little guessed how
bravely she was already counting the fleeting minutes, how resolutely
keeping grip of herself in the flood which threatened to sweep her--how
gladly!--away.
A good revue must be a pageant of music, colour, scenery, song, dance,
humour, and the impossible. There must be good songs in it, but one does
not go for the songs, any more than one goes to see the working out of a
plot. Strung-up men, forty-eight hours out of the trenches, with every
nerve on edge, must come away with a smile of satisfaction on their
faces, to have a last drink at home and sleep like babies. Women who have
been on nervous tension for months must be able to go there, and allow
their tired senses to drink in the feast of it all, so that they too may
go home and sleep. And in a sense their evening meant all this to Peter
and Julie; but only in a sense.
They both of them bathed in the performance. The possible and impossible
scenes came and went in a bewildering variety, till one had the feeling
that one was asleep and dreaming the incomprehensible jumble of a dream,
and, as in a nice dream, one knew it was absurd, but did not care. The
magnificent, brilliant staging dazzled till one lay back in one's chair
and refused to name the colours to oneself or admire their blending any
more. The chorus-girls trooped on and off till they seemed countless, and
one abandoned any wish to pick the prettiest and follow her through. And
the gay palace of luxury, with its hundreds of splendidly dressed women,
its men in uniform, its height and width and gold and painting, and its
great arching roof, where, high above, the stirring of human hearts still
went on, took to itself an atmosphere and became sentient with humanity.
Julie and Peter were both emotional and imaginative, and they were
spellbound till the notes of the National Anthem roused them. Then, with
the commonplaces of departure, they left the place. "It's so near," said
Julie in the crowd outside; "let's walk again."
"The other pavement, then," said Peter, and they crossed. It was cold,
and Julie clung to him, and they walked swiftly.
At the entrance Peter suggested an hour under the palms, but Julie
pleaded against it. "Why, dear?" she said. "It's so cosy upstairs, and we
have all we want. Besides, the lounge would be an anti-climax; let's go
up."
They went up, and Julie dropped into her chair while Peter knelt to poke
the fire. Then he lit a cigarette, and she refused one for once, and he
stood there looking into the flame.
Julie drew a deep sigh. "Wasn't it gorgeous, Peter?" she said. "I can't
help it, but I always feel I want it to go on for ever and ever. Did you
ever see _Kismet?_ That was worse even than this. I wanted to get up and
walk into the play. These modern things are too clever; you know they're
unreal, and yet they seem to be real. You know you're dreaming, but you
hate to wake up. I could let all that music and dancing and colour go on
round me till I floated away and away, for ever."
Peter said nothing. He continued to stare into the fire.
"What do you feel?" demanded Julie.
Peter drew hard on his cigarette, and then he blew out the smoke. "I
don't know," he said. "Yes, I do," he added quickly; "I feel I want to
get up and preach a sermon."
"Good Lord, Peter! what a dreadful sensation that must be! Don't begin
now, will you? I'm beginning to wish we'd gone into the lounge after all;
you surely couldn't have preached there."
Peter did not smile. He went on as if she had not spoken, "Or write a
great novel, or, better still, a great play," he said.
"What would be the subject, then, you Solomon, or the title, anyway?"
"I don't know," said Peter dreamily. "_All Men are Grass_, _The Way of
all Flesh_--no, neither of those is good, and besides, one at least is
taken. I know," he added suddenly, "I would call it _Exchange_, that's
all. My word, Julie, I believe I could do it." He straightened himself,
and walked across the room and back again, once or twice. "I believe I
could: I feel it tingling in me; but it's all formless, if you
understand; I've no plot. It's just what I feel as I sit there in a
theatre, as we did just now."
Julie leaned forward and took the cigarette she had just refused. She lit
it herself with a half-burnt match, and Peter stood and watched her, but
hardly saw what she was doing. She was as conscious of his preoccupation
as if it were something physical about him.
"Explain, my dear," she said, leaning back and staring into the fire.
"I don't know that I can," he replied, and she felt as if he did not
speak to her. "It's the bigness of it all, the beauty, the triumphant
success. It's drawn that great house full, lured them in, the thousands
of them, and it does so night after night. Tired people go there to be
refreshed, and sad people to be made gay, and people sick of life to
laugh and forget it. It's the world's big anodyne. It offers a great
exchange. And all for a few shillings, Julie, and for a few hours. The
sensation lingers, but one has to go again and again. It tricks one into
thinking, almost, that it's the real thing, that one can dance like
mayflies in the sun. Only, Julie, there comes an hour when down sinks the
sun, and what of the mayflies then?"
Julie shifted her head ever so little. "Go on," she said, looking up
intently at him.
He did not notice her, but her words roused him. He began to pace up and
down again, and her eyes followed him. "Why," he said excitedly, "don't
you see that it's a fraudulent exchange? It's a fraudulent exchange that
it offers, and it itself is an exchange as fraudulent as that which our
modern world is making. No, not our modern world only. We talk so big of
our modernity, when it's all less than the dust--this year's leaves, no
better than last year's, and fallen to-morrow. Rome offered the same
exchange, and even a better one, I think--the blood and lust and conflict
of the amphitheatre. But they're both exchanges, offered instead of the
great thing, the only great thing."
"Which is, Peter?"
"God, of course--Almighty God; Jesus, if you will, but I'm not in a mood
for the tenderness of that. It's God Himself Who offers tired and sad
people, and people sick of life, no anodyne, no mere rest, but stir and
fight and the thrill of things nobly done--nobly tried, Julie, even if
nobly failed. Can't you see it? And you and I to-night have been looking
at what the world offers--in exchange."
He ceased and dropped into a chair the other side of the fire. A silence
fell on them. Then Julie gave a little shiver. "Peter, dear," she said
tenderly, "I'm a little tired and cold."
He was up at once and bending over her. "My darling, what a beast I am!
I clean forgot you for a minute. What will you have? What about a hot
toddy? Shall I make one?" he demanded, smiling. "Donovan taught me how,
and I'm really rather good at it."
She smiled back at him, and put her hand up to smooth his hair. "That
would be another exchange, Peter," she said, "and I don't want it. Only
one thing can warm me to-night and give me rest."
He read what she meant in her eyes, and knelt beside the chair to put his
arms around her. She leaned her face on his shoulder, and returned the
kisses that he showered upon her. "Poor mayflies," she said to herself,
"how they love to dance in the sun!"