For hours, it seemed, they had not spoken a word. The paddle fell now and again upon the water with a light musical clash, like the sound of the shattering of thinnest crystal. Now and again the moving blade woke the water to a rich and secret murmur; as if a voice half woke out of sleep to speak a tender word; then swooned into sleep again.
She saw his arm move and glimmer; his form was just discernible in the stern of the boat, shoulders bowed forward, head motionless. Once or twice he started to whistle a fragment of tune, and then was silent again.
She lay among cushions in the bows, and watched the dark yellow moon rise, bare of clouds, behind the poplar trees. The night was heavy and still.
The canoe slipped down towards the islands. Then she would move, if her limbs still remembered how to move: he would give her a hand to help her out and they would stand among the little willows and whisper together.
Mamma was fast asleep at home, her alien spirit lapped in unconsciousness. Her dreams would not divine that her daughter had stolen out to meet a lover.
And next door also they slept unawares, while one of them broke from the circle and came alone to clasp a stranger.
The boat hissed suddenly among willows, and came to rest against a shallow bank. The clustering thin light blades of the willow-leaves fell over them as they stepped out, bit them with infinitesimal teeth.
She followed him without will, or conscious movement, through nettles and long grass, to a clearing among the bushes, in the middle of the leafy little mound which was the island. In the old days they had often picnicked here, and thought the minute patch of earth a whole world and made themselves kings and queens of it. They had gathered blackberries from these low bushes in the hot sun; and come home again with purple mouths and fingers.
Now the little boy Roddy was this tall man whose shoulder touching hers was more bewildering than the moon-rise; whose head above hers was a barrier blocking out the world.
They stood side by side. He turned to her and whispered:
‘Well, Judy?’
‘Oh, Roddy!...’
‘Judy, I’m going to say good-bye to you here.’ His voice was low, grave, distinct.
‘For a long time, Roddy?’
She saw him nod his head; and she bowed her own and began to sob, but without tears.
He murmured some low inarticulate exclamation, and took her gently in his arms.
‘Don’t cry, Judy. Don’t cry.... Darling, don’t.’
The tenderness of his voice checked her in an instant. His hand moved up and down her bare arm, lingering over its curves, tracing the outline with a touch that made her shiver.
‘Lovely smooth arm,’ he whispered. ‘You are so lovely.’
‘No.’
‘Yes. I think so. I’ve always thought so.’
‘As long as you think so, then—that’s all I care about. You—can have it all.’
‘Oh, Judy!’
Now the moon rose, clear at last above the tree tops, andgleamed strangely into the eyes bent upon her face. His lips were smiling a faint fixed smile. His teeth glinted. The two faces gazed at one another, floating wan upon darkness.
The web had broken. Roddy had shaken himself free and come close at last. The whole of their past lives had led them inevitably to this hour.
‘Oh, Roddy, I love your hair....’ Her hand went up and stroked it; and he shut his eyes. ‘I love your eyes.’
‘I love you all—every bit of you.’
Breathless, sure of him at last, with a delicious last-minute postponement of his embrace she moved away, softly laughing.
‘Roddy, how much do you like me? This much?’
She held out her hands, parting them slowly.
‘More than that.’
‘This much?’
He copied her, laughing eagerly but silently.
‘This much?’
He held his arms out wide. She hesitated a moment and then came into them; and he was not laughing any more, but covering her face and neck with kisses.
It was a quivering darkness of all the senses, warm, melting, relentless, tender. This stranger was draining her of power; but underneath, the springs of life welled up and up with a strong new beat. He clung to her with all his force as if he could never let her go. He was a stranger, but she knew him and had known him always. She took his caressing hands and held them on her breast. In that moment he was her child; and she longed to lay his head where his hands quietly lay. He drew deep breaths, and now and then his rich voice murmured a broken word or two.
She raised her head from his shoulder and gazed in passionate detail at his face.
‘Speak, Roddy, speak.’
He shook his head and smiled—a ghost of his former smile, flickering on his lips alone. His half-shut eyesglittered as if with tears. In the moonlight she worshipped his dark head and moon-blanched features. Gradually he loosened his hold, threw his head back, and stood motionless, arms hanging at his sides, his face an unconscious, sleeping mask. If Roddy were to die young, this was how he would look.
‘Roddy—Roddy—Roddy—I love you—I love you—I love you.’
No answer. He stooped his head and fell to closer kissing.
‘Roddy—say——’
‘What do you want me to say?’ he whispered. Again the flickering smile.
‘I love you, Roddy.’
Ah, if he would whisper back those few words, there would be peace for ever.
She laid her cheek against his, murmuring endearments.
‘My dear, my darling, my little one, I love you. My dear, I’ve always loved you. Did you know it?’
He shook his head faintly.
‘I love you too much, I’m afraid.’
Oh, far too much, if she was to wait in vain for any response save kisses....
‘No, Judy, no.’ The words broke from him painfully. ‘You must forget about me now. Kiss me and say good-bye.’
‘Why, oh, why?’ She clutched him desperately.
‘I’m going away,’ he whispered.
‘But you’ll come back? You’ll come back, Roddy?’
He was silent, utterly silent.
‘I can’t. I can’t,’ he said at last.
‘I’ll wait, Roddy. I don’t care how long I wait. I shall never want anyone else. I’ll wait years.’ There was no answer; and after a while she added in a small laboured whisper: ‘If you love me a little.’
‘Oh!’ He threw up his head with a sort of groan. ‘Yes. Yes. Yes.’
‘You love me?’
He must, hemustsay it.
‘Yes, I love you.’ The words came out on a groaning breath. She put her lips on his, and stood silent, drinking in her bliss.
He tossed his head suddenly, as if waking up.
‘Oh, Judy, we must go back, we must go back.’
He sighed and sighed.
‘No. A little longer. We’ll talk a little before we go. We must talk.’
He laughed—a normal teasing laugh.
‘A little conversation,’ he said. ‘You’re a tiger for conversation, aren’t you?’
‘I don’t mind your laughing at me.’
They were going to laugh gaily at each other, with each other, for ever.
He put his hand beneath her chin and turned her face up to his.
‘Lovely Judy. Lovely dark eyes.... Oh, your mouth. I’ve wanted to kiss it for years.’
‘Oh, Roddy, you can kiss it whenever you want to. I love you to kiss me. All of me belongs to you.’
He muttered a brief ‘Oh!’ beneath his breath, and seized her, clasped her wildly. She could neither move nor breathe; her long hair broke from its last pins and fell down her back, and he lifted her up and carried her beneath the unstirring willow-trees.
He had brought her back home. Languorous and bemused she stepped out upon the bank in the breaking dawn, and turned to look at him beneath her heavy lids. She could not see him clearly, he seemed blurred, far away.
‘Good-bye,’ he said briefly.
‘I’ll see you before you go,’ she said mechanically.
Not that it really mattered now. Time was not any more and he would be with her for ever.
He nodded; and then abruptly turned the canoe downstream again: looked at her once, faintly smiled, waved his hand an instant and went on.
She walked through the waiting, clear pale-coloured garden, into the house, up to her bedroom; stared in the dim glass at her strange face; sank into bed at last.
It was on the next evening that she awoke to the realization that Roddy had not come—might not—certainly would not now. He was going away. He, who always found self-expression, explanations, so difficult, would be at a loss to know what to say when he too woke up. He who never made plans would be helpless when it came to making any which should include her too in the future. Last night he had been dumb, he had sighed and sighed, whispered inarticulately: he would find it hard to be the first to break silence, to endeavour to re-establish the balance of real life between them. She would write him a letter, tell him all; yes, she would tell him all. Her love for him need no longer be like a half-shameful secret. If she posted a letter to-night, he would get it to-morrow morning, just before he left.
She wrote:
Roddy, this is to say good-bye once more and to send you all my love till we meet again. I do love you, indeed, in every sort of way, and to any degree you can possibly imagine; and beyond that more, more, more, unimaginably. The more my love for you annihilates me, the more it becomes a sense of inexhaustible power.Do you love me, Roddy? Tell me again that you do; and don’t think me importunate.I am so wrapped round and rich in my thoughts of you that at the moment I feel I can endure your absence. I almost welcome it because it will give me time to sit alone, and begin to realise my happiness. So that when you come back—Oh, Roddy, come back soon!I have loved you ever since I first saw you when we were little, I suppose,—only you, always you. I’m not likely ever to stop loving you. Thank God I can tell you so at last. Will you go on loving me? Am I to go on loving you? Oh, but you won’t say no, after last night. If you don’t want to be tied quite yet, I shall understand. I can wait years quite happily, if you love me. Roddy, I am yours. Last night I gave you what has always belonged to you. But I can’t think about last night yet. It is too close and tremendous and shattering. I gasp and nearly faint when I try to recall it. I dissolve.When I came back to my room in the dawn I stared and stared at my face in the glass, wondering how it was I could recognize it. How is it I look the same, and move, eat, speak, much as usual?Ought I to have been more coy, more reluctant last night? Would it have been more fitting—would you have respected me more? Was I too bold? Oh, this is foolishness: I had no will but yours. But because I love you so much I am a little fearful. So write to me quickly and tell me what to think, feel, do. I shall dream till then.There is so much more to tell you, and yet it is all the same really. My darling, I love you!Judy.
Roddy, this is to say good-bye once more and to send you all my love till we meet again. I do love you, indeed, in every sort of way, and to any degree you can possibly imagine; and beyond that more, more, more, unimaginably. The more my love for you annihilates me, the more it becomes a sense of inexhaustible power.
Do you love me, Roddy? Tell me again that you do; and don’t think me importunate.
I am so wrapped round and rich in my thoughts of you that at the moment I feel I can endure your absence. I almost welcome it because it will give me time to sit alone, and begin to realise my happiness. So that when you come back—Oh, Roddy, come back soon!
I have loved you ever since I first saw you when we were little, I suppose,—only you, always you. I’m not likely ever to stop loving you. Thank God I can tell you so at last. Will you go on loving me? Am I to go on loving you? Oh, but you won’t say no, after last night. If you don’t want to be tied quite yet, I shall understand. I can wait years quite happily, if you love me. Roddy, I am yours. Last night I gave you what has always belonged to you. But I can’t think about last night yet. It is too close and tremendous and shattering. I gasp and nearly faint when I try to recall it. I dissolve.
When I came back to my room in the dawn I stared and stared at my face in the glass, wondering how it was I could recognize it. How is it I look the same, and move, eat, speak, much as usual?
Ought I to have been more coy, more reluctant last night? Would it have been more fitting—would you have respected me more? Was I too bold? Oh, this is foolishness: I had no will but yours. But because I love you so much I am a little fearful. So write to me quickly and tell me what to think, feel, do. I shall dream till then.
There is so much more to tell you, and yet it is all the same really. My darling, I love you!
Judy.
She posted it. Next morning she hurriedly dressed and ran downstairs in the sudden expectation of finding a letter from him; but there was none.
Now he would have got hers.... Now he would have read it.... Now he would be walking to the station....
She heard the train steam out; and doubt and sorrow came like a cloud upon her; but only for a little while.
In the cool of the evening she wandered down to the river and sat beside it dreaming. She dreamt happily of Jennifer. She would be able to love Jennifer peacefully now, think of her without that ache, see her again, perhaps, with all theold restlessness assuaged. Jennifer’s letter would surely come soon now....
If Roddy were to ask her to come away with him at once, for ever, she would take just the copper bowl from her table and spring to him, and leave all the rest of the past without a pang.
Perhaps Roddy had written her a letter just before he had gone away; and if so it might have come by the evening post. She left the river and went to seek it.
Who could it be coming towards her down the little pathway which led from the station to the bottom of the garden and then on to the blue gate in the wall of the garden next door? She stood still under the overhanging lilacs and may-trees, her heart pounding, her limbs melting. It was Roddy, in a white shirt and white flannels,—coming from the station. He caught sight of her, seemed to hesitate, came on till he was close to her; and she had the strangest feeling that he intended to pass right by her as if he did not see her.... What was the word for his face? Smooth: yes, smooth as a stone. She had never before noticed what a smooth face he had; but she could not see him clearly because of the beating of her pulses.
‘Roddy!’
He lifted his eyebrows.
‘Oh, hullo, Judith.’
‘I thought you’d gone away.’
‘I’m going to-morrow. A girl I know rang up this morning to suggest coming down for the day, so I waited. I’ve just seen her off.’
A girl he knew.... Roddy had always had this curious facility in the dealing of verbal wounds.
‘I see.... How nice.’
A face smooth and cold as a stone. Not the faintest expression in it. Had he bidden the girl he knew good-bye with a face like this? No, it had certainly been twinkling and teasing then.
‘Well, I must get on.’ He looked up the path as if meditating immediate escape; then said, without looking at her, and in a frozen voice: ‘I got a letter from you this morning.’
‘Oh, you did get it?’
There could never have been a more foolish-sounding bleat. In the ensuing silence she added feebly: ‘Shall you—answer it—some time?’
‘I thought the best thing I could do was to leave it unanswered.’
‘Oh....’
Because of course it had been so improper, so altogether monstrous to write like that....
‘Well,’ she said. ‘I thought.... I’m sorry.’
She ought to apologise to him, because he had meant to go away without saying anything, and she had come on him unawares and spoilt his escape.
‘I was very much surprised at the way you wrote,’ he said.
‘How do you mean, surprised, Roddy?’ she said timidly.
She had known all along in the deepest layer of her consciousness that something like this would happen. Permanent happiness had never been for her.
It was not much of a shock. In a moment that night was a far, unreal memory.
‘Well’—he hesitated. ‘If a man wants to ask a girl to—marry him he generally asks her himself—do you see?’
‘You mean—it was outrageous of me not to wait—to write like that?’
‘I thought it a little odd.’
‘Oh, but Roddy, surely—surely that’s one of those worn-out conventions.... Surely a woman has a perfect right to say she—loves a man—if she wants to—it’s simply a question of having the courage.... I can’t see why not.... I’ve always believed one should....’
It was no good trying to expostulate, to bluff like that, with his dead face confronting her. He would not be takenin by any such lying gallantries. How did one combat people whose features never gave way by so much as a quiver? She leaned against the wooden fence and tried to fix her eyes upon the may-tree opposite. Very far, but clear, she heard her mother at the other end of the garden, calling her name: but that was another Judith.
‘I’m afraid you’ve misunderstood me,’ he said.
‘Yes. I’ve misunderstood you. You see—this sort of thing has never happened to me before and I thought ... when a person said.... Why did you say.... I didn’t know people said that without meaning it.... I suppose we must mean different things by it. That’s what it is. Well....’ Her voice was terrible: a little panting whine.
‘I don’t know what you mean.’
Probably that was true: he had forgotten he had ever said: ‘I love you.’ She could not remind him; for in any case he would not be affected. What were three little words?... And after all, she had probably more or less forced him to say them: she had wanted to hear them so much, she had driven him to say them. Yes, he had groaned, and quickly repeated them to keep her quiet, stop her mouth so that he could go on kissing her. She said:
‘But why, Roddy,whydid you take me out ... behave as you did ... kiss me so—so.... I don’t understand why you bothered ... why you seemed....’
He was silent. O God! If only he would wound and wound with clean thrusts of truth, instead of standing there mute, deaf.
‘Roddy, after all these years, theseyearswe’ve known each other, can’t you tell me the truth? We were good friends once, weren’t we?’
‘Yes, I think so.’
‘Oh, I see! I see! And you could never feel like being—more than that.’
He shook his head.
‘I see, Roddy.’ The pain was sharp now, hard to fightdown. ‘I see. And you thought there had better be an end ... because you were never going to love me: and I obviously—was it obviously?—was becoming more and more—foolish—and tiresome. So you thought—you’d say good-bye—like that—and then go away for good. Was that it!’
He passed a hand across his forehead: his first gesture. Then he too was feeling, however slightly.
‘I thought that was what you wanted: what you were asking for,’ he said.
‘Oh, so you thought you’d oblige——’ No, no, not sarcasm. She waited a moment and added: ‘I see. You misunderstood me. I daresay it was quite natural. You thought I wanted what you wanted—just a little—a little passion—to round off a flirtation—and be done with it. Well....’
The lane was so still that she could hear the dull beat of oars in passing boats on the other side of the fence. The evening had become very cold.
She gave a little laugh and said:
‘I really am very sorry to make this fuss. It’s too laughable that I should—I!... I suppose you never dreamed I—wasn’t used to this sort of thing—from men?’
‘I thought you knew pretty well what you were about.’
‘And I didn’t! I didn’t! I was beingdeceived—like any.... Oh, it’s sovulgar!’ She shut her eyes, laughing weakly. ‘That’s why you didn’t make your meaning plainer, I suppose. You thought I was quite used to—that sort of thing—kissing—just for a lark. Just for a lark, Roddy—that was it, wasn’t it? And I got serious, and tried to—to let you in for more.... I tried tocatchyou. Poor Roddy! But you’d never get let in, would you? You know your own mind. You’re cautious. You’ll see—,’ she waved her hand slightly, ‘I’m not dangerous. I’ll never bother you any more. And I’m veryverysorry.’ She broke down with a gasp, but did not weep.
‘I’m sorry, Judith. I apologise. I——’ His voice had now the faintest trace of emotion.
‘Oh!’ She controlled herself. ‘Apologise! HaveIaccused you? This is just another damned muddle. I’m only trying to understand it.’
‘I really think I had better go,’ he said.
‘No!’ She put out a hand and clutched his arm in desperate protest. ‘Not yet, Roddy. Not for a moment. Can’t we—O God! I wish I’d never written that letter. Then there’d have been no need for all this.... You’d have gone away and said nothing—and gradually I’d have understood. I should have seen it all in its proper light. Things would have somehow come right again, perhaps. And now I suppose they never can.... Can they, Roddy, can they? Oh, if they could!’
How he was hating this scene! It was a shame to prolong it. He swallowed hard and said, rather nervously:
‘Do you suppose you really meant—all you said in your letter?’
It was her chance. She must say it was all nonsense, that letter, that it was written in a moment of madness; that she did not mean it now. Then they might somehow manage to laugh together and part friends. He was such a good laugher! She could go away and bury her disappointment; and next time they met, be to him what he wanted: a light flame of passion, blown out, relit again. He had given her the taste for his kisses. She would miss them, and desire them painfully. If she could act her part skilfully now, she need not be for ever without them.
But it was no good: the thing would not be lied about.
She nodded, gazing at him in utter despair. She went on nodding and nodding, asserting the truth in silence and with all her force, compelling him to believe it. She saw him flush faintly beneath his sallow skin.
‘I’m very sorry then,’ he said, in his frozen voice.
She cried out:
‘Oh,Roddy! Did you never like me? Didn’t you evenlikeme? All these years! It seemed as if you did.... I couldn’t have grown to—like you so much if you hadn’t given me a little—a little return....’
‘Of course I liked you very much,’ he said. ‘I always thought you were extremely attractive.’
‘Attractive!’ She bowed her face in her hands. ‘Yes. I was attractive to you. And so.... That you should have treated me so lightly, Roddy! Oh, did I really, really deserve that?’
He was silent.
‘If you’d warned me, Roddy ... given me some hint. I was so romantic and idealistic about you—you’ve no idea.... I thought youmustthink of me in the same sort of way I thought about you.... Couldn’t you have warned me?’
He said in a voice choked with exasperation:
‘I did try to shew you, I tell you. I should have thought I’d shewn you often enough. Didn’t I say I was never to be taken seriously?’
She sighed and nodded her head drearily. She was beaten.
‘Yes. Yes, you did. I wouldn’t be warned, I was such a fool. Oh, it’s all my fault. A good sell for me.’
‘Well, I’d better go now,’ he said after a pause.
He took a step or two and then turned back. She still leaned against the wall, and something in her attitude or expression seemed suddenly to move him. He lingered, hesitated. His face shewed a little trouble and confusion.
‘I suppose you’re all right?’ he said.
‘Oh, I shall be quite all right.’
‘Please forget all about me.’
‘I shan’t forget about you. But I shall forget all this—if you will do the same. We will meet in the future, Roddy, won’t we?—just as usual,—with all the others?’
‘I think it would be better not to. I think we’d better not write to each other or ever meet again.’
‘Not ever meet again, Roddy?’ How did he come to be master of such cold decisions? She felt like a child in futileconflict with the fixed and unalterable will of a grown-up person. ‘Why? Why? Why? Please do let me. Please do. I won’t ever be a nuisance again, I promise. You’ve said you liked me. Oh, I must see you! If I can’t see you, I can’t ever see any of them again. Don’t you see? And then I’d havenothing.... You wouldn’t tell them, would you, Roddy? Please let me see you again.’
It had lasted too long. In another moment she would be on her knees to him, hysterical, loathsome.
A nervous quiver of his lips checked her suddenly and made her quiet. In some obscure way he was suffering too. He looked like the little boy whose face had implored her not to cry that time of the rabbit’s death. Yes, the spectacle of other people’s pain had always affected him unpleasantly.
‘It’s all right, Roddy,’ she said. ‘Don’t worry about me. I’ll get on without you.’
‘I’m not worth wasting one moment’s regret on,’ he said, almost earnestly. ‘Believe me, Judith. It’s true.’ He looked at her for the last time. ‘I can only say again I’m very sorry and ask you to forget all about it.’
She took a deep breath.
‘One thing more,’ she said. ‘I’m not ashamed of anything I’ve done. There’s nothing to be ashamed of in loving a person and saying so.’
It was not true. The shame of her surrender, her letter, her unrequited love would go on gnawing, burning, till the end of her life.
He left her, walking away from her with a graceful and noiseless tread.
After all, it did not seem to hurt much: certainly not more than could be borne in secret, without a sign.
It had all been experience, and that was a salutary thing.
You might write a book now, and make him one of the characters; or take up music seriously; or kill yourself.
It was all so extraordinary.... That night had seemed to Roddy so insignificant that instead of hurryingaway quickly when he got that letter, he had had a girl he knew down for the day: and that was how he had spoilt his own escape.
Shut the door on Roddy and turn the key and never open that room again. Surely it would be quite easy. She saw herself as a tiny person walking firmly away and not once looking back. There were plenty of other things to think about.... What was there, safe and simple, to think about?
Strawberries and cream for supper. Good. Two new frocks: but he was to have admired her in them.... A visit to London next week, and a play.
She noticed suddenly that her hands were bleeding from slight abrasions. How had that happened? Best to go in now and arrange her face a little. This shivering had been going on for a long time.
Three weeks later she stepped out of the train at a little country station in Hampshire; and was there met by a beaming Martin, and conveyed swiftly in his car to his home.
The long drive wound through shrubbery and great beech trees, and opened in a wide sweep before the long low many-windowed house-front. It was an old manor, built of exquisitely time-tempered brick. The great porch was covered with clematis and jasmine; and here and there climbing bushes of yellow or white roses wove their way up the walls and coiled around the window-frames. Beyond it and on each side of it she caught or imagined glimpses of a rich old garden, lawns and a herbaceous border, cedar trees, yew hedges, and an espalier of peach-trees along a high wall.
A butler appeared, took her suitcase and slid away again.
Martin led the way through the oak-panelled hall into a large bright flowery chintz drawing-room. All the colours were blue and pink and white; and there were photographs everywhere, and vases full of delphiniums, roses and lilies. The French windows opened on to the sunny lawn, and, setin front of them, the tea-table shone with blue and white china, and silver, and glass jars of honey and jam. Behind the tea-table sat Martin’s mother, smiling.
She was as clean and fresh, as white and pink and blue as her drawing-room. Her erect and trim little figure was crowned with white hair; her blue rather prominent eyes held the wistful appeal of the short-sighted as she looked into Judith’s face to greet her. Her thin mouth smiled and went on smiling, happily, vaguely, with a kind of sweet and weak persistence. All the lines in her face ran upwards as if she had spent her life smiling. She had a white skin with a clear rose flush over each cheekbone. She was really very pretty in her white lace dress and fleecy pale blue wrap: a mother to take out to dine in her best black frock and all her diamonds and feel proud of.
‘So this is Judith that I’ve heard so much about,’ she said charmingly; and put a hand on her arm to lead her to the tea-table.
Three black spaniels begged and adored at her feet; or rolled over, waving limp self-conscious devotional paws.
Over the mantelpiece hung the portrait of Martin’s dead father. He had been Governor of somewhere: an important man. He looked reliable and kindly, with Martin’s brown eyes and untidy features.
On the opposite wall hung a sentimental pastel portrait, life-size, of Martin at the age of three: golden-brown curls, pink cheeks, a white silk blouse with a frilly collar. There were some books in glass-fronted book-cases, some goodish furniture and china; one or two good water-colours and some indifferent ones; abundant plump cushions in broad soft chairs and couches. It was a house that shewed in every detail the honourable, conventional, deeply-rooted English traditions of Martin’s people.
And yet not they, with their sober steadfastness, but that wild sister, the disgrace, Mariella’s mother, had prepared, it seemed, the strange mould for the next generations: for all, that is, save Martin himself.
He was in high spirits. He smiled with all his white teeth, and threw sandwiches to the dogs, and teased his mother, and stared in a sort of delighted astonishment to see her actually sitting at tea with him in his home. He looked almost handsome in his bright blue shirt, open to shew a white strong well-modeled throat rising cleanly from the broad shoulders.
He did not know that Judith was dead: that a dummy was sitting beside him. He had declared several times how well she was looking.
He said suddenly:
‘Heard from Roddy, Judith?’
She was not prepared for that name; and she felt a faintness sweep over her.
‘No, Martin, I haven’t.’
‘I had a letter from him this morning. It’s pure agony for Roddy to answer an invitation, even, so I was flattered. He and I and one or two other chaps are going to do some sailing next month, off the Isle of Wight, and he actually wrote to make arrangements.’
‘What fun that will be, Martin.’
She bowed her head over the plate in her lap, crumbling a scone to fragments.
‘Why don’t you come too, Judith? Do! It’d be perfectly proper wouldn’t it, Mummie? We’re her bachelor uncles.’
It was precisely at those words, at the unexpected recalling of all that light-heartedness, that happiest day of all, that the thing leapt to life within her, and fiercely, horribly pressed towards birth. Oh, now there was no hope. Roddy had arisen all in a moment from his false burial.
With a vast effort she prevented her eyes from closing quite; but to speak was impossible.
‘Roddy says——’ began Martin, glanced across at her, and stopped uncertainly, startled. He was silent, and then said:
‘Tired, Judith?’
‘A bit—after my journey—it’s so hot to travel. Isn’t it?’ She turned to his mother.
‘Yes, my dear, it is,’ she said cooingly. ‘Come, I’ll take you to your room and you shall rest till dinner.’
Martin had got up and was hovering over her, anxious and despondent. But she could smile at him now, and she said:
‘I’d rather go out if I may, and get cool. The garden looks so lovely.’
‘That’s right then,’ said Martin’s mother encouragingly. ‘Take her out, Martin darling, and shew her the rock-garden. Martin and I have been making a rock-garden, Judith—I may call you Judith, mayn’t I?’ She laid a hand again on Judith’s arm. ‘It’s such fun. Martin and I are both ridiculous potterers and experimenters. Are you like that?’
‘Not practically, I’m afraid.’
‘Ah, well, it’s a delightful hobby. It keeps me busy and healthy, doesn’t it, Martin?’ She looked up into his face, and he put a large hand upon her little shoulder. ‘There,’ she added, ‘Run along now. Don’t let Martin take you in the fields or up to his precious farm: you’ll spoil your pretty shoes. Aren’t they darling shoes, Martin? And such aprettyfrock.’
With little pats and handwavings and vague benevolence she saw them out of the French windows down the steps into the garden.
Martin said:
‘Wait. I’ll take a gun. We’re simply tripping over rabbits this year. It’s awful.’
She did not hear properly; nor, when Martin came back to her, did she grasp the significance of the gun over his shoulder.
He led her out of the garden by a wooden bridge over a stream half-hidden in forget-me-nots, kingcups and iris plants; through the meadow where grazed the pedigreecows which, so he said, were his mother’s pride; over a stile and up on to the chalky rabbit-pitted hillside.
She was standing among the willow trees, and out of the moonlight a voice was saying in a low hurry: ‘I love you’—and saying another thing damnably characteristic: ‘Lovely Judy! Lovely dark eyes!’ His teeth gleamed as he smiled in the moonlight.... He closed his eyes.... It was all in such bad taste, in such bad taste....
Martin was pointing out the marches of the estate. There were beech copses and farms and two gentle folds of sun-drenched sheep-strewn hill between them and its final hedgerows.
‘You know I do love it,’ said Martin shyly. ‘I worship the soil.’ He hesitated and then said with a laugh: ‘Funny: Sometimes I absolutely wish I were dead so that I could be buried in it and have it all over me and inside me for ever and ever.... Look at the way those slopes overlap....’ His eyes fastened on them, with a hungry expression.
Then this was Martin’s secret bread. It was his land that nourished him at the source, and made of him this man with an individual dignity and simplicity at the core of his ordinariness. She made an effort to come nearer to him in mind.
‘Yes ... I know Martin.’
He turned joyfully.
‘I always tell you everything, Judith. I suppose it’s because I know you’ll understand.’
‘Which bit do you want to be buried in, Martin?’
‘I don’t care—as long as I’m well inside it.’
‘Would you ever commit suicide?’
‘Would I what?’
‘Commit suicide. To—to get there quicker.’
He laughed and said comfortably:
‘Well, I’ve never been tempted to so far....’
‘It’s an old family place is it, Martin?’
‘Oh, yes. My father was born here, and all the others. Roddy’s father and Julian’s, and the only sister—Mariella’s mother. She was very beautiful you know—and absolutely wild—almost mad I should think. She ran away from her husband and goodness knows what sort of life she led. I believe it simply broke my grandfather’s heart. He died, and then Grannie—you remember Grannie?—couldn’t bear to go on living here alone. All the children were scattered or married or dead. So she moved to the little place on the river—next door to you.... Poor old lady, she didn’t have much of a time. She outlived all her children except Roddy’s father: and he was never much use to her. He quarrelled with his father when he was quite a boy and left home. I don’t know what about. Grandpapa was a terrible martinet.... Yes, they were an unlucky family.’
‘And they all died young, Martin?’
‘More or less. But we none of us ever live to be old,’ he said cheerfully.
They had reached the top of the hill; and, suddenly, up went Martin’s gun. Then, with an exclamation of disgust, he lowered it again.
‘Wasn’t ready for him. Once they get into that bracken——’
‘What’s that, Martin?’
‘Rabbit. Didn’t you see? Beastly vermin.... Never saw anything like them. Much as we can do to keep pace with them.’
He was muttering to himself in an annoyed way.
‘But, Martin—do you mean to shoot them?’
‘Shoot them? I should say I do, if I get the chance.’
‘I never have been able to understand how people can bear to shoot rabbits.’
‘Hum,’ said Martin, grim and indifferent. ‘You mustn’t expectmeto be sentimental about ’em.’
His eyes roved round alertly; his gun was ready to go up in a trice. He was not giving a thought now to Judith walking beside him.
Just over the crest of the hill came a sudden small kickingand flurry. A tiny pair of fur legs started away into the bracken, the white scut glancing and bobbing. But the bracken thinned away to nothing here: the small form was bound to emerge again in a moment.
There was a sharp crack.
‘Aha!’ said Martin; and he went forward to where something flipped in the air and fell back again, horribly twitching in a mechanical and aimless motion.
‘Oh! Oh! Oh!’ She stood rooted where he had left her, aghast.
He was stooping to examine it....
She knew how it was looking—laid on its flat side and shewing the tender and vulnerable whiteness beneath its frail stiff paws. He was stooping just as a figure had stooped above that other rabbit.... What years ago!... Roddy’s rabbit whose death and burial had started this awful loving. Who was it devilish enough to prepare these deliberate traps for memory, these malicious repetitions and agonizing contrasts?
Oh, this world!... No hope, no meaning in it; nothing but perversities, cruelties indulged in for sport, lickings of lips over helpless victims. Men treated each other just as Martin treated small animals. The most you could hope for was a little false security: they gave you that to sharpen their pleasure in the blow they were preparing: even the ones that looked kind: Martin for instance. As for Roddy—Roddy liked experimenting. He chose girls sometimes: that was more voluptuous. She saw his face, pallid and grinning, crowds of leering faces, all his. The hillside darkened. She sank on her knees, shaking and perspiring.
He was striding back.
‘I buried it,’ he called. ‘It was a little smashed about the head.’
She had to lift her face towards him; but she made it blind. He came and stood beside her—he dared to, red-handed as he was.
‘I’m afraid it wasn’t one of the cleanest shots,’ he saidcheerfully. ‘I got him at too long a range. Still,—that’s one less.... Come on.’
Her mind would frame only one sentence; and she tried over and over again to say it.
‘I will not be a witness of your butcheries. I will not be a witness of your butcheries.’
But he would not understand. Perhaps it did not make sense anyway.
‘Oh dear!’ She sat there, tearing up turf with shaking cold wet hands, face averted, eyes staring, mouth open and out of shape, impossible to control. ‘Oh dear! Oh dear! Oh dear!’ The repetition was a sort of whine or mew.
‘What’s the matter?’ he said sharply. He sank down beside her, and his astounded face came round her shoulder.
‘Oh, the poor little thing, the poor little thing!...’
‘Do you mean the rabbit?’
She nodded.
‘But, Judith—good heavens! A rabbit.... Judith. I’d never have shot it if I’d dreamed you’d mind.’
She went on staring and pulling up the grass.
‘Oh, this world!’
‘Judith....’ He was silent, completely at a loss.
‘Still—it can’t be helped.... I suppose one gets accustomed....’
Her mind grew black again with formless and colossal conceptions of torture, murder, lust: and Roddy’s face went on grinning among them. All was lost, lost.
‘I’m very sorry,’ said Martin helplessly.
‘Oh, I don’t blame....’
‘It didn’t suffer you know. Did you think it had? That kicking didn’t mean anything: it was simply reflex action.’ He thought he had found the clue; and added cheerfully: ‘You’d do the same if I shot you dead at the back of the head.’
‘I wish you had.’
She wept.
‘Good God! Really, Judith.... I’ve said I’m sorry.I can’t go on saying it, can I? I didn’t know you were so—you oughtn’t to be so—easily upset. Rabbits have to be kept down, you know. They destroy everything. Ask my mother.’
She went on weeping; and after a little while he got up and strode a few steps away, and stood with his back to her, shoulders hunched.
Worse and worse: he was deserting her.... She bit hard on her thumb till the pain of it steadied her, waited and then called tremblingly:
‘Martin!’
He turned, saw her hand held out and came quickly and knelt beside her.
‘What is it, Judy, what is it?’
‘Oh, Martin! Oh, it’s nothing. Don’t ask,don’t.... Only—just—only——’
His arms went round her and she abandoned herself against him, pressing her head into his shoulder, groping for comfort, sobbing vast sobs, while he knelt beside her quietly and let himself be wept on; and now and then gave her shoulder a little pat.
After a long time she was so empty of tears that their source seemed dry for ever. She would never in her life weep any more. In the thin crystalline buoyancy of exhaustion she lay back on his shoulder and observed the gold light lying tender and still in the folds of the hills; and two rabbits skipping unperturbed not so very far away; and blue butterflies swinging on the long grasses; and all the evening shadows slanting beautifully downwards. Peace and comfort dropped upon her. The heavy ache for Roddy was gone. Oh, now to make this no-pain permanent, to fix this languor and mindless calm, to smother the voice which cried and cried: ‘I am cheap and shameful. I have been used for sport!’ Now was the time to turn to Martin and see if he could save her.
She sat up and dried her eyes.
‘There!’ she said. ‘I’m sorry. Thank you, Martin. You are a dear. You’ve always been very kind to me, haven’t you?’
‘Kind to you! Oh, Judith, you know——’
‘I think you must rather like me, Martin.’
He said with a deep intake of breath:
‘Like you! You know I’ve loved you for years.’
She was silent, tasting a faint relief and satisfaction; and then said:
‘Well, what would you like me to do about it, Martin?’
She saw that his hands were trembling, and he answered shakily:
‘Do about it ... I.... What do you want to do about it?... I’ve said I——’
‘Would you like me to marry you?’ she asked softly.
‘God! If there was a chance!...’
‘Well—I might, Martin.’
She started to laugh and cry weakly at sight of the transfigured face he turned towards her; and a voice went on protesting inside her: ‘No! No! No! It isn’t true. I never will.’
‘Oh, I’m so tired, Martin, I’m so tired!’
‘Come home, my dear, come home.’
It was compassion and exultation and doubt and certainty, all mixed in an inarticulate eloquence.
He lifted her and brushed her skirt.
There was nothing to do but accompany him down the hill.
He left her at her bedroom door. His mother, he said, would come and give her aspirin and put her to bed, and see that dinner was brought up to her. His mother was splendid about headaches. To-morrow there would be plenty of time to talk.
He had behaved perfectly.
She fell asleep that night in her white room with its cretonne wreaths of pink roses tied up with blue ribbon,and dreamed of Roddy. He sat on the hill, close to where the rabbit had been shot, and conversed in friendly fashion. He had come back from abroad, from some remote island. He took a puff at his pipe and said with apparent irrelevance: ‘Not wives, my dear girl—mistresses. It’s more convenient. When I return I intend to take Martin as my partner.’
‘Martin wouldn’t come. Not if it’s mistresses....’
‘Oh, dear me, yes. He’ll soon forget you over there. It’s a very voluptuous clime.’
She said very humbly:
‘Would you care for me to come, Roddy?’
‘I fear you’re supered,’ he said with elaborate courtesy.
‘I suppose so.’
He studied a notebook.
‘Where do I come in your list, Roddy?’
‘You’re in the twenties, somewhere,’ he said indifferently.
‘Oh, miles down——’
He seemed suddenly bored or suspicious, and shifted his position. As he did so, she saw his face for an instant, heavy-lidded and dissipated. She understood that he was thinking of voluptuous climes.
It seemed then there was no use in hoping to win him back. He was, obviously, bored to death with her.
‘What’s in here?’ he said suddenly, and plunged his hand into the earth.
The rabbit!... the rabbit!... Everything shrieked,—and she started awake, sweating, in horror and desolation.
She leaned out of the window and saw the moon high in the sky. Beneath it, the trees had suffered their moon-change and were sculptured masses of dark marble, washed over with a silver-green phosphorescence. A tragic night, sleepless and staring beneath the urgent pressure of the moon: there was no comfort in it.
This house was full of ghosts.... Perhaps Roddy’s father had slept in this room as a small boy. He had grownup here and then shaken the dust of his home from his feet and gone away and begotten Roddy.... Charlie must have looked like the beautiful wild sister, and that was why the grandmother had given him all that anxious and painful love.
The sister had given birth to Mariella, and then run away and led God knows what sort of life. Poor Mariella! She had never had the sun on her: she had lived from birth—perhaps before birth—in the shadow cast by her bright mother; and when she grew up she had not emerged from it. That was the truth about Mariella.
The family portraits were in the dining-room. To-morrow she would see them, study and compare....
It was madness to have come to this haunted house.
Oh, Roddy! She could not live without him. He must, he must come back and take her for a year—a month even. Perhaps he had found out by now that he did love her after all, and was too proud to write and confess it. Martin had said it was agony to him to answer even an invitation. She must write to him again, give him an opening.
Where was he now? If she could be transported to him now, this minute, she could make him succumb utterly to loving her. She would think of such ways of delighting him with caresses that he would never be able to do without her again.... It was sheer stupidity to go on enduring this agony when it only needed a trifling effort to end it all. For instance, if you leaned a little further out of the window.... But one did not commit suicide in other people’s houses: that was the ultimate error of taste.
And then, poor Martin’s feelings at the inquest!