"You don't think his heart beats faster when he sees her coming?"
"I don't. Horatio's heart beats faster when he sees himself making love to her."
"I see. It's just middle age."
"Just middle age."
"Don't you think, perhaps, Fanny does see it?"
"No. Not that. Not that. At least I hope not."
1
Mr. Waddington'sRamblings Through the Cotswoldswere to be profusely illustrated. The question was: photographs or original drawings? And he had decided, after much consideration, on photographs taken by Pyecraft's man. For a book of such capital importance the work of an inferior or obscure illustrator was not to be thought of for an instant. But there were grave disadvantages in employing a distinguished artist. It would entail not only heavy expenses, but a disastrous rivalry. The illustrations, so far from drawing attention to the text and fixing it firmly there, would inevitably distract it. And the artist's celebrated name would have to figure conspicuously, in exact proportion to his celebrity, on the title page and in all the reviews and advertisements where, properly speaking, Horatio Bysshe Waddington should stand alone. It was even possible, as Fanny very intelligently pointed out, that a sufficiently distinguished illustrator might succeed in capturing the enthusiasm of the critics to the utter extinction of the author, who might consider himself lucky if he was mentioned at all.
But Fanny had shown rather less intelligence in using this argument to support her suggestion that Barbara Madden should illustrate the book. She had more than once come upon the child, sitting on a camp-stool above Mrs. Levitt's house, making a sketch of the steep street, all cream white and pink and grey, opening out on to the many-coloured fields and the blue eastern air. And she had conceived a preposterous admiration for Barbara Madden's work.
"It'll be an enchanting book if she illustrates it, Horatio."
"Ifshe illustrates it!"
But when he tried to show Fanny the absurdity of the idea—Horatio Bysshe Waddington illustrated by Barbara Madden—she laughed in his face and told him he was a conceited old thing. To which he replied, with dignified self-restraint, that he was writing a serious and important book. It would be foolish to pretend that it was not serious and important. He hoped he had no overweening opinion of its merits, but one must preserve some sense of proportion and propriety—some sanity.
"Poor little Barbara!"
"It isn't poor little Barbara's book, my dear."
"No," said Fanny. "It isn't."
Meanwhile, if the book was to be ready for publication in the spring, the photographs would have to be taken at once, before the light and the leaves were gone.
So Pyecraft and Pyecraft's man came with their best camera, and photographed and photographed, as long as the fine weather lasted. They photographed the Market Square, Wyck-on-the-Hill; they photographed the church; they photographed Lower Wyck village and the Manor House, the residence—corrected to seat—of Mr. Horatio Bysshe Waddington, the author. They photographed the Tudor porch, showing the figures of the author and of Mrs. Waddington, his wife, and Miss Barbara Madden, his secretary. They photographed the author sitting in his garden; they photographed him in his park, mounted on his mare, Speedwell; and they photographed him in his motor-car. Then they came in and looked at the library and photographed that, with Mr. Waddington sitting in it at his writing-table.
"I suppose, sir," Mr. Pyecraft said, "you'd wish it taken from one end to show the proportions?"
"Certainly," said Mr. Waddington.
And when Pyecraft came the next day with the proofs he said, "I think, sir, we've got the proportions very well."
Mr. Waddington stared at the proofs, holding them in a hand thattrembled slightly with emotion. With a just annoyance. For thoughPyecraft had certainly got the proportions of the library, Mr.Waddington's head was reduced to a mere black spot in the far corner.
Ifthatwas what Pyecraft meant by proportion—
"I think," he said, "the—er—the figure is not quite satisfactory."
"The—? I see, sir. I did not understand, sir, that you wished the figure."
"We-ell—" Mr. Waddington didn't like to appear as having wished the figure so ardently as he did indeed wish it. "If I'm to be there at all—"
"Quite so, sir. But if you wish the size of the library to be shown, I am afraid the figure must be sacrificed. We can't do you it both ways. But how would you think, sir, of being photographed yourself, somewhat larger, seated at your writing-table? We could do you that."
"I hadn't thought of it, Pyecraft."
As a matter of fact, he had thought of nothing else. He had the title of the picture in his mind: "The Author at Work in the Library, Lower Wyck Manor."
Pyecraft waited in deference to Mr. Waddington's hesitation. His man, less delicate but more discerning, was already preparing to adjust the camera.
Mr. Waddington turned, like a man torn between personal distaste and public duty, to Barbara.
"What doyouthink, Miss Madden?"
"I think the book would hardly be complete without you."
"Very well. You hear, Pyecraft, Miss Madden says I am to be photographed."
"Very good, sir."
He wheeled sportively. "Now how am I to sit?"
"If you would set yourself so, sir. With your papers before you, spread careless, so. And your pen in your hand, so…. A little nearer, Bateman. The figure is important this time….Now, sir, if you would be so good as to look up."
Mr. Waddington looked up with a face of such extraordinary solemnity that Mr. Pyecraft smiled in spite of his deference.
"A leetle brighter expression. As if you had just got an idea."
Mr. Waddington imagined himself getting an idea and tried to look like it.
"Perfect—perfect." Mr. Pyecraft almost danced with excitement. "Keep that look on your face, sir, half a moment…. Now, Bateman."
A click.
"That'sover, thank goodness," said Mr. Waddington, reluctant victim of Pyecraft's and Barbara's importunity.
After that Mr. Pyecraft and his man were driven about the country taking photographs. In one of them Mr. Waddington appeared standing outside the mediaeval Market Hall of Chipping Kingdon. In another, wearing fishing boots, and holding a fishing-rod in his hand, he waded knee deep in the trout stream between Upper and Lower Speed.
And after that he said firmly, "I will not be photographed any more.They've got enough of me."
2
In November, when the photographing was done, Fanny went away to London for a fortnight, leaving Barbara, as she said, to take care of Horatio, and Ralph Bevan to take care of Barbara.
It was then, in consequence of letters he received from Mrs. Levitt, that Mr. Waddington's visits in Sheep Street became noticeably frequent. Barbara, sitting on her camp-stool above the White House, noticed them.
She noticed, too, the singular abstraction of Mr. Waddington's manner in these days. There were even moments when he ceased to take any interest in his Ramblings, and left Barbara to continue them, as Ralph had continued them, alone, reserving to himself the authority of supervision. She had long stretches of time to herself, when she had reason to suspect that Mr. Waddington was driving Mrs. Leavitt to Cheltenham or Stratford-on-Avon in his car, while Ralph Bevan obeyed Fanny's parting charge to look after Barbara.
Every time Barbara did a piece of the Ramblings she showed it to Ralph Bevan. They would ride off together into the open country, and Barbara would read aloud to Ralph, sitting by the roadside where they lunched, or in some inn parlour where they had tea. They had decided that, though it would be dishonourable of Barbara to show him the bits that Mr. Waddington had written, there could be no earthly harm in trusting him with the bits she had done herself.
Not that you could tell the difference. Barbara had worked hard, knowing that the sooner Mr. Waddington's book was finished the sooner Ralph's book would come out; and under this agreeable stimulus she had developed into the perfect parodist of Waddington. She had wallowed in Waddington's style till she was saturated with it and wrote automatically about "bold escarpments" and "the rosy flush on the high forehead of Cleeve Cloud"; about "ivy-mantled houses resting in the shade of immemorial elms"; about the vale of the Windlode, "awash with the golden light of even," and "grey villages nestling in the beech-clad hollows of the hills."
"'Come with me,'" said Barbara, "'into the little sheltered valley of the Speed; let us follow the brown trout stream that goes purling—'"
"Barbara, it's priceless. What made you think of purling?"
"He'dhave thought of it. 'Purling through the lush green grass of the meadows.'"
Or, "'Let us away along the great high road that runs across the uplands that divide the valleys of the Windlode and the Thames. Let us rest a moment halfway and drink—no, quaff—a mug of good Gloucestershire ale with mine host of the Merry Mouth.'"
Not that Mr. Waddington had ever done such a thing in his life. But all the other ramblers through the Cotswolds did it, or said they did it; and he was saturated with their spirit, as Barbara was saturated with his. He could see them, robust and genial young men in tweed knickerbocker suits, tramping their thirty miles a day and quaffing mugs of ale in every tavern; and he desired to present himself, like those young men, as genial and robust. He couldn't get away from them and their books any more than he had got away from Sir Maurice Gedge and his prospectus.
And Barbara had invented all sorts of robust and genial things for him to do. She dressed him in pink, and mounted him on his mare Speedwell, and sent him flying over the stone walls and five-barred gates to the baying of "Ranter and Ranger and Bellman and True." He fished and he tramped and he quaffed and he tramped again. He did his thirty miles a day easily. She set down long conversations between Mr. Waddington and old Billy, the Cotswold shepherd, all about the good old Cotswold ways, in the good old days when the good old Squire, Mr. Waddington's father—no, his grandfather—was alive.
"'I do call to mind, zur, what old Squire did use to zay to me: "Billy," 'e zays, "your grandchildren won't be fed, nor they won't 'ave the cottages, nor yet the clothes as you 'ave and your children. As zure as God's in Gloucester" 'e zays. They was rare old times, zur, and they be gawn.'"
"Whatmade you think of it, Barbara? I don't suppose he ever said two words to old Billy in his life."
"Of course he didn't. 'But it's the sort of thing he'd like to think he did."
"Has he passed it?"
"Rather. He's as pleased as Punch. He thinks he's forming my style."
3
Mr. Waddington was rapidly acquiring the habit of going round to SheepStreet after dinner. But in those evenings that he did not devote toMrs. Levitt he applied himself to his task of supervision.
On the whole he was delighted with his secretary. There could be no doubt that the little thing was deeply attached to him. You could tell that by the way she worked, by her ardour and eagerness to please him. There could be only one explanation of the ease with which she had received the stamp of his personality.
Therefore he used tact. He used tact.
"I'm giving you a great deal of work, Barbara," he would say. "But you must look on it as part of your training. You're learning to write good English. There's nothing like clear, easy, flowing sentences. You can't have literature without 'em. I might have written those passages myself. In fact, I can hardly distinguish—" His face shook over it; she noticed the tremor of imminent revision. "Still, IthinkI should prefer 'babbling streams' here to 'purling streams.' Shakespearean."
"Ihad'babbling' first," said Barbara, "but I thought 'purling' would be nearer to what you'd have written yourself. I forgot about Shakespeare. And babbling isn't exactly purling, is it?"
"True—true. Babbling isnotpurling. We want the exact word. Purling let it be….
"And 'lush.' Good girl. You remembered that 'lush' was one of my words?"
"I thought itwouldbe."
"Good. You see," said Mr. Waddington, "how you learn. You're getting the sense, theflairfor style. I shall always be glad to think I trained you, Barbara…. And you may be very thankful itisI and not Ralph Bevan. Of all the jerky—eccentric—incoherent—"
1
It was Monday, the twenty-fourth day of November, in the last week ofFanny's fortnight in London.
Barbara had been busy all morning with Mr. Waddington's correspondence and accounts. And now, for the first time, she found herself definitely on the track of Mrs. Levitt. In checking Palmer and Hoskins's, the Cheltenham builders, bill for the White House she had come across two substantial items not included in their original estimate: no less than fifteen by eight feet of trellis for the garden and a hot water pipe rail for the bathroom. It turned out that Mrs. Levitt, desiring the comfort of hot towels, and objecting to the view of the kitchen yard as seen from the lawn, had incontinently ordered the hot water rail and the trellis.
There was that letter from Messrs. Jackson and Cleaver, Mr. Waddington'sagents, informing him that his tenant, Mrs. Levitt, of the White House,Wyck-on-the-Hill, had not yet paid her rent due on the twenty-fifth ofSeptember. Did Mr. Waddington wish them to apply again?
And there were other letters of which Barbara was requested to make copies from his dictation. Thus:
"My Dear Mrs. Levitt" (only he had written "My dear Elise"),—"With reference to your investments I do not recommend the purchase, at the present moment, of Government Housing Bonds.
"I shall be very glad to loan you the fifty pounds you require to make up the five hundred for the purchase of Parson's Provincial and London Bank Shares. But I am afraid I cannot definitely promise an advance of five hundred on the securities you name. That promise was conditional, and you must give me a little time to consider the matter. Meanwhile I will make inquiries; but, speaking off-hand, I should say that, owing to the present general depreciation of stock, it would be highly unadvisable for you to sell out, and my advice to you would be: Hold on to everything you've got.
"I am very glad you are pleased with your little house. We will let the matter of the rent stand over till your affairs are rather more in order than they are at present.—With kindest regards, very sincerely yours,
"P.S.—I have settled with Palmer and Hoskins for the trellis and hot water rail."
"ToMessrs. Lawson & Rutherford, Solicitors,
"9, Bedford Row, London, W.C.
"Dear Sirs,—Will you kindly advise me as to the current value of the following shares—namely:
"Fifty £5 5 per cent. New South American Rubber Syndicate;
"Fifty £10 10 per cent. B Preference Addison Railway, Nicaragua;
"One hundred £1 4 per cent. Welbeck Mutual Assurance Society.
"Would you recommend the holder to sell out at present prices? And should I be justified in accepting these shares as security for an immediate loan of five hundred?—Faithfully yours,
He was expecting Elise for tea at four o'clock on Wednesday, and Messrs. Lawson and Rutherford's reply reached him very opportunely that afternoon.
"Dear Sir,—Reyour inquiry in your letter of the twenty-fifth instant, as to the current value of 5 per cent. New South American Rubber Syndicate Shares, 10 per cent. B Preference Addison Railway, and 4 per cent. Welbeck Mutual Assurance Society, respectively, we beg to inform you that these stocks are seriously depreciated, and we doubt whether at the present moment the holder would find a purchaser. We certainly cannot advise you to accept them as security for the sum you name.—We are, faithfully,
"Lawson & Rutherford."
It was clear that poor Elise—who could never have had any head for business—was deceived as to the value of her securities. It might even be that with regard to all three of them she might have to cut her losses and estimate her income minus the dividends accruing from this source. But that only made it the more imperative that she should have at least a thousand pounds tucked snugly away in some safe investment. Nothing short of the addition of fifty pounds to her yearly income would enable Elise to pay her way. The dear woman's affairs ought to stand on a sound financial basis; and Mr. Waddington asked himself this question: Was he prepared to put them there? All that Elise could offer him, failing her depreciated securities, was the reversion of a legacy of five hundred pounds promised to her in her aunt's will. She had spoken very hopefully of this legacy. Was he prepared to fork out a whole five hundred pounds on the offchance of Elise's aunt dying within a reasonable time and making no alteration in her will? In a certain contingency hewasprepared. He was prepared to do all that and more for Elise. But it was not possible, it was not decent to state his conditions to Elise beforehand, and in any case Mr. Waddington did not state them openly as conditions to himself. He allowed his mind to be muzzy on this point. He had no doubt whatever about his passion, but he preferred to contemplate the possibility of its satisfaction through a decent veil of muzziness. When he said to himself that he would like to know where he stood before committing himself, it was as near as he could get to clarity and candour.
And when he wrote to Elise that his promise was conditional he really did mean that the loan would depend on the value of the securities offered; a condition that his integrity could face, a condition that, as things stood, he had a perfect right to make. While, all the time, deep inside him was the knowledge that, if Elise gave herself to him, he would not ask for security—he would not make any conditions at all. He saw Elise, tender and yielding, in his arms; he saw himself, tender and powerful, stooping over her, and he thought, with a qualm of disgust: "I wouldn't touch her poor little legacy."
Meanwhile he judged it well to let the correspondence pass, like any other business correspondence, through his secretary's hands. It was well to let Barbara see that his relations with Mrs. Levitt were on a strictly business footing, that he had nothing to hide. It was well to have copies of the letters. It was well—Mr. Waddington's instinct, not his reason, told him it WA well—to have a trustworthy witness to all these transactions. A witness who understood the precise nature of his conditions, in the event, the highly unlikely event, of trouble with Elise later on. (It was almost as if, secretly, he had a premonition.) Also, when his conscience reproached him, as it did, with making conditions, with asking the dear woman for security, he was able to persuade himself that he didn't really mean it, that all this was clever camouflage designed to turn Barbara's suspicions, if she ever had any, off the scent. And at the same time he was not sorry that Barbara should see him in his rôle of generous benefactor and shrewd adviser.
"I needn't tell you, Barbara, that all this business is strictly private. As my confidential secretary, you have to know a great many things it wouldn't do to have talked about. You understand?"
"Perfectly."
She understood, too, that it was an end of the compact with Ralph Bevan. She must have foreseen this affair when she said to him there would be things she simply couldn't tell. Only she had supposed they would be things she would see, reward of clear eyesight, not things she would be regularly let in for knowing.
And her clear eyes saw through the camouflage. She had a suspicion.
"I don't see," she said, "why you should have to go without your rent just because Mrs. Levitt doesn't want to pay it."
She was sorry for Waddy. He might be ever so wise about Mrs. Levitt's affairs; but he was a perfect goose about his own. No wonder Fanny had asked her to take care of him.
"I've no doubt," he said, "shewantsto pay it; but she's a war widow,Barbara, and she's hard up. I can't rush her for the rent."
"She's no business to rush you for trellis work and water pipes you didn't order."
"Well—well," he couldn't be angry with the child. She was so loyal, so careful of his interests. And he couldn't expect her to take kindly to Elise. There would be a natural jealousy. "That's Palmer and Hoskins's mistake. I can't haggle with a lady, Barbara.Noblesse oblige." But he winced under her clear eyes.
She thought: "How about the fifty and the five hundred? At this ratenoblessemightobligehim to do anything."
She could see through Mrs. Levitt.
Mr. Waddington kept on looking at the clock.
It was now ten minutes to four, and at any moment Elise might be there. His one idea was to get Barbara Madden out of the way. Those clear eyes were not the eyes he wanted to be looking at Elise, to be looking at him whentheireyes met. And he understood that that fellow Bevan was going to call for her at four. He didn't wanthimabout. "Where are you going for your walk?" he said.
"Oh, anywhere. Why?"
"Well, if you happen to be in Wyck, would you mind taking these photographs back to Pyecraft and showing him the ones I've chosen? Just see that he doesn't make any stupid mistake."
The photographs were staring her in the face on the writing-table, so that there was really no excuse for her forgetting them, as she did. But Mr. Waddington's experience was that if you wanted anything done you had to do it yourself.
2
Elise would be taken into the drawing-room. He went to wait for her there.
And as he walked up and down, restless, listening for the sound of her feet on the gravel drive and the ringing of the bell, at each turn of his steps he was arrested by his own portrait. It stared at him from its place above Fanny's writing-table; handsome, with its brilliant black and carmine, it gave him an uneasy sense of rivalry, as if he felt the disagreeable presence of a younger man in the room. He stared back at it; he stared at himself in the great looking-glass over the chimneypiece beside it.
He remembered Fanny saying that she liked the iron-grey of his moustache and hair; it was more becoming than all that hard, shiny black. Fanny was right. Itwasmore becoming. And his skin—the worn bloom of it, like a delicate sprinkling of powder. Better, more refined than that rich, high red of the younger man in the gilt frame. To be sure his eyes, blurred onyx, bulged out of creased pouches; but his nose—the Postlethwaite nose, a very handsome feature—lifted itself firmly above the fleshy sagging of the face. His lips pouted in pride. He could still console himself with the thought that mirrors were unfaithful; Elise would see him as he really was; not that discoloured and distorted image. He pushed out his great chest and drew a deep, robust breath. At the thought of Elise the pride, the rich, voluptuous, youthful pride of life mounted. And as he turned again he saw Fanny looking at him.
The twenty-year-old Fanny in her girl's white frock and blue sash; her tilted, Gainsborough face, mischievous and mocking, smiled as if she were making fun of him. His breath caught in his chest. Fanny—Fanny. His wife. Why hadn't his wife the loyalty and intelligence of Barbara, the enthusiasm, the seriousness of Elise? He needn't have any conscientious scruples on Fanny's account; she had driven him to Elise with her frivolity, her eternal smiling. Of course he knew that she cared for him, that he had power over her, that there had never been and never would be any other man for Fanny; but he couldn't go on with Fanny's levity for ever. He wanted something more; something sound and solid; something that Elise gave him and no other woman. Any man would want it.
And yet Fanny's image made him uneasy, watching him there, smiling, as if she knew all about Elise and smiled, pretending not to care. He didn't want Fanny to watch him with Elise. He didn't want Elise to see Fanny. When he looked at Fanny's portrait he felt again his old repugnance to their meeting. He didn't want Elise to sit in the same room with Fanny, to sit in Fanny's chair. The drawing-room was Fanny's room. The red dahlia and powder-blue parrot chintz was Fanny's choice; every table, cabinet and chair was in the place that Fanny had chosen for it. The book, the frivolous book she had been reading before she went away, lay on her little table. Fanny was Fanny and Elise was Elise.
He rang the bell and told Partridge to show Mrs. Levitt into the library and to bring tea there. The library washisroom. He could do what he liked in it. The girl Fanny laughed at him out of the corners of her eyes as he went. Suddenly he felt tender and gentle to her, because of Elise.
When Elise came she found him seated in his armchair absorbed in a book. He rose in a dreamy attitude, as if he were still dazed and abstracted with his reading.
Thus, at the very start, he gave himself the advantage; he showed himself superior to Elise. Intellectually and morally superior.
"You're deep in it? I'm interrupting?" she said.
He came down from his height instantly. He was all hers.
"No. I was only trying to pass the time till you came."
"I'm late then?"
"Ten minutes." He smiled, indulgent
Elise was looking handsomer than ever. The light November chill had whipped a thin flush into her face. He watched her as she took off her dark skunk furs and her coat.
How delightful to watch a woman taking off her things, the pretty gestures of abandonment; the form emerging, slimmer. That was one of the things you thought and couldn't say. Supposing he had said it to Elise? Would she have minded?
"What are you thinking of?" she said.
"How did you know I was thinking of anything?"
"Your face. It tells tales."
"Only nice ones to you, my dear lady."
"Ah, but youdidn'ttell—"
"Would you like me to?"
"Not if it's naughty. Your face looks naughty."
He wheeled, delighted. "Now, how does my face look when it's naughty?"
"Oh, thatwouldbe telling. It's just as well you shouldn't know."
"Was it as naughty as all that then?"
"Yes. Or as nice."
They kept it up, lightly, till Partridge and Annie Trinder came, tinkling and rattling with the tea-things outside the door. As if, Mr. Waddington thought, they meant to warn them.
"Partridge," he called, as the butler was going, "Partridge, if Sir John Corbett calls you can show him in here; but I'm not at home to anybody else."
(Clever idea, that.)
"He isn't coming, is he, the tiresome old thing?"
"No. He isn't. If I thought he was for one minute I wouldn't be at home."
"Then why—?"
"Why did I say I would be? Because I wanted to make it safe for you,Elise."
Thus tactfully he let it dawn on her that he might be dangerous.
"We don't want to be interrupted, do we?" he said.
"Not by Sir John Corbett."
He drew up the big, padded sofa square before the fire for Elise. All his movements were unconscious, innocent of deliberation and design. He seated himself top-heavily behind the diminutive gate-legged tea-table; the teapot and cups were like dolls' things in his great hands. She looked at him, at his slow fingers fumbling with the sugar tongs.
"Would you like me to pour out tea for you?" she said.
He started visibly. He wouldn't like it at all. He wasn't going to allow Elise to put herself into Fanny's place, pouring out tea for him as if she was his wife. She wouldn't have suggested it if she had had any tact or any delicacy.
"No," he said. The "No" sounded hard and ungracious. "You must really let me have the pleasure of waiting on you."
The sugar dropped from the tongs; he fumbled again, madly, and Elise smiled. "Damn the tongs," he thought; "damn the sugar."
"Take it in your fingers, goose," she said.
Goose! An endearment, a caress. It softened him. His tenderness forElise came back.
"My fingers are all thumbs," he said.
"Your thumbs, then. You don't suppose I mind?"
There was meaning in her voice, and Mr. Waddington conceived himself to be on the verge of the first exquisite intimacies of love. He left off thinking about Fanny. He poured out tea and handed bread and butter in a happy dream. He ate and drank without knowing what he ate and drank. His whole consciousness was one muzzy, heavy sense of the fullness and nearness of Elise. He could feel his ears go "vroom-vroom" and his voice thicken as if he were slightly, very slightly drunk. He wondered how Elise could go on eating bread and butter.
He heard himself sigh when at last he put her cup down.
He considered the position of the tea-table in relation to the sofa. It hemmed in that part of it where he was going to sit. Very cramping. He moved it well back and considered it again. It now stood in his direct line of retreat from the sofa to the armchair. An obstruction. If anybody were to come in. He moved it to one side.
"That's better," He said. "Now we can get a clear view of the fire. It isn't too much for you, Elise?"
He had persuaded himself that he had really moved the tea-table because of the fire. As yet he had no purpose and no plan. He didn't know what on earth he was going to say to Elise.
He sat down beside her and there was a sudden hushed pause. Elise had turned round in her seat and was looking at him; her eyes were steady behind the light tremor of their lashes, brilliant and profound. He reflected that her one weak point, the shortness of her legs, was not noticeable when she was sitting down. He also wondered how he could ever have thought her mouth hard. It moved with a little tender, sensitive twitch, like the flutter of her eyelids, and he conceived that she was drawn to him and held trembling by his fascination.
She spoke first.
"Mr. Waddington, I don't know how to thank you for your kindness about the rent. But you know it's safe, don't you?"
"Of course I know it. Don't talk about rent. Don't think about it."
"I can't help it. I can't think of anything else until it's paid."
"I'd rather you never paid any rent at all than that you should worry about it like this. I didn't ask you to come here to talk business, Elise."
"I'm afraid I must talk it. Just a little."
"Not now," he said firmly. "I won't listen."
It sounded exactly as if he said he wouldn't listen to any more talk about rent; but he thought: "I don't know what I shall do if she begins about that five hundred. But she hardly can, after that. Anyhow, I shall decline to discuss it."
"Tell me what you've been doing with yourself?"
"You can'tdomuch with yourself in Wyck. I trot about my house—my dear little house that you've made so nice for me. I do my marketing, and I go out to tea with the parson's wife, or the doctor's wife, or Mrs. Bostock, or Mrs. Grainger."
"I didn't know you went to the Graingers."
He thought that was not very loyal of Elise.
"You must go somewhere."
"Well?"
"And in the evenings we play bridge."
"Who plays bridge?"
"Mr. Hawtrey, or Mr. Thurston, or young Hawtrey, and Toby, and MajorMarkham and me."
"Always Major Markham?"
"Well, he comes a good deal. He likes coming."
"Doeshe?"
"Do you mind?"
"I should mind very much if I thought it would make any difference."
"Any difference?" She frowned and blinked, as though she were trying hard to see what he meant, what he possiblycouldmean by that. "Difference?" she said. "To what?"
"To you and me."
"Of course it doesn't. Not a scrap. How could it?"
"No. How could it? I don't really believe it could."
"But why should it?" she persisted.
"Why, indeed. Ours is a wonderful relation. A unique relation. And I think you want as much as I do to—to keep it intact."
"Of course I want to keep it intact. I wouldn't for worlds let anything come between us, certainly not bridge." She meditated. "I suppose I do play rather a lot. There's nothing else to do, you see, and you get carried away."
"I hope, my dear, you don't play for money."
"Oh, well, it isn't much fun for the others if we don't."
"You don't play high, I hope?"
"What do you call high?"
"Well, breaking into pound notes."
"Pound notes! Penny points—well, ten shillings is the very highest stake when we're reckless and going it. Besides, I always play against Markham and Hawtrey, because I knowtheywon't be hard on me if I lose."
"Now,that'swhat I don't like. I'd a thousand times rather pay your gambling debts than have you putting yourself under an obligation to those men."
He couldn't bear it. He couldn't bear to think that Elise could bear it.
"You should have come to me," he said.
"I have come to you, haven't I?" She thought of the five hundred pounds.
He thought of them too. "Ah, that's different. Now, about these debts toMarkham and Hawtrey. How much do they come to—about?"
"Oh, a five-pound note would cover all of it. But I shall only be in debt to you."
"We'll say nothing about that. If I pay it, Elise, will you promise me you'll never play higher than penny points again?"
"It's too angelic of you, really."
He smiled. He liked paying her gambling debts. He liked the power it gave him over her. He liked to think that he could make her promise. He liked to be told he was angelic. It was all very cheap at five pounds, and it would enable him to refuse the five hundred with a better grace.
"Come, on your word of honour, only penny points."
"On my word of honour…. But, oh, I don't think I can take it."
She thought of the five hundred. When you wanted five hundred it was pretty rotten to be put off with a fiver.
"If you can take it from Hawtrey and Markham—"
"That's it. Ican'ttake it from Markham. I haven't done that. I can't do it."
"Well, Hawtrey then."
"Hawtrey's different"
"Why is he different?"
A faint suspicion, relating to Markham, troubled him, and not for the first time.
"Well, you see, he's a middle-aged married man. He might be my uncle."
He thought: "And Markham—hemight be—"
But Elise was not in love with the fellow. No, no. He was sure of Elise; he knew the symptoms; you couldn't mistake them. But she might marry Markham, all the same. Out of boredom, out of uncertainty, out of desperation. He was not going to let that happen; he would make it impossible; he would give Elise the certainty she wanted now.
"You saidIwas different."
Playful reproach. But she would understand.
"So you are. You're a married man, too, aren't you?"
"I thought we'd agreed to forget it."
"Forget it? Forget Mrs. Waddington?"
"Yes, forget her. You knew me long before you knew Fanny. What has she got to do with you and me?"
"Just this, that she's the only woman in the county who'll knowme."
"Because you're my friend, Elise."
"You needn't remind me. I'm not likely to forget that any good thing that's come to me here has come through you."
"I don't want anything but good to come to you through me"
He leaned forward.
"You're not very happy in Wyck, are you?"
"Happy? Oh, yes. But it's not what you'd call wildly exciting. And Toby's worrying me. He says he can't stand it, and he wants to emigrate."
"Well, why not?"
Mr. Waddington's heart gave a great thump of hope. He saw it all clearly. Toby was the great obstruction. Elise might have held out for ever as long as Toby lived with her. But if Toby went—She saw it too; that was why she consented to his going.
"It isn't much of a job for him, Bostock's Bank."
"N-no," she assented, "n-no. I've told him he can go if he can get anything."
He played, stroking the long tails of her fur. It lay between them like a soft, supine animal.
"Would you like to live in Cheltenham, Elise?"
"Cheltenham?"
"If I took a little house for you?"
(He had calculated that he might just as well lose his rent in Cheltenham as in Wyck. Better. Besides, he needn't lose it. He could let the White House. It would partly pay for Cheltenham.)
"One of those little houses in Montpelier Place?"
"It's too sweet of you to think of it." She began playing too, stroking the fur animal; their hands played together over the sleek softness, consciously, shyly, without touching.
"But—why Cheltenham?"
"Cheltenham isn't Wyck."
"No. But it's just as dull and stuffy. Stuffier."
"Beautiful little town, Elise."
"What's the good of that when it's crammed full of school children and school teachers, and decayed army people and old maids? I don'tknowanybody in Cheltenham."
"Can't you see that that would be the advantage?"
"No. I can't see it. There's only one place Iwantto live in."
"And that is—?"
"London. And I can't."
"Why not?" After all, London was not such a bad idea. He had thought of it before now himself.
"Well—I don't know whether I told you that I'm not on very good terms with my husband's people. They haven't been at all nice to me since poor Frank's death."
"Poor Elise—"
"They live in London and they want to keep me out of it. My father-in-law gives me a small allowance on condition I don't live there. They hate me," she said, smiling, "as much as all that."
"Is it a large allowance?"
"No. It's a very small one. But they know I can't get on without it."
"You ought not to be dependent on such people…. Perhaps in a flat—or one of those little houses in St. John's Wood—"
"It would be too heavenly. But what's the good of talking about it?"
"You must know what I want to do for you, Elise. I want to make you happy, to put you safe above all these wretched worries, to take care of you, dear. Youwilllet me, won't you?"
"My dear Mr. Waddington—my dear friend—" The dark eyes brightened. She saw a clear prospect of the five hundred. Compared with what old Waddy was proposing, such a sum, and a mere loan too, represented moderation. The moment had come, very happily, for reopening this question. "I can't let you do anything so—so extensive. Really and truly, all I want is just a temporary loan. If you really could lend me that five hundred. You said—"
"I didn't say I would. And I didn't say I wouldn't. I said it would depend."
"I know. But you never said on what. If the securities I offered you aren't good enough, there's the legacy."
He was silent. He knew now that his condition had had nothing to do with the securities. He must know, he would know, where he stood.
"My aunt," said Elise gently, "is very old."
"I wouldn't dream of touching your poor little legacy." He said it with passion. "Won't you drop all this sordid talk about business and trust me?"
"I do trust you."
The little white hand left off stroking the dark fur and reached out to him. He took it and held it tight. It struggled to withdraw itself.
"You aren't afraid of me?" he said.
"No, but I'm afraid of Partridge coming in and seeing us. He might think it rather odd."
"He won't come in. It doesn't matter what Partridge thinks."
"Oh,doesn'tit!"
"He won't come in."
He drew a little closer to her.
"He will. Hewill. He'll come and clear away the things. I hear him coming."
He got up and went to the door of the smoke-room, to the further door, and looked out.
"There's no one there," he said. "They don't come 'till six and it isn't five yet…. Elise—abstract your mind one moment from Partridge. If I get that little house in London, will you live in it?"
"I can't let you. You make me ashamed, after all you've done for me.It's too much."
"It isn't. If I take it, will you let me come and see you?"
"Oh, yes. But—" She shrank, so far as Elise could be said to shrink, a little further back into her corner.
"It's rather far from Wyck," he said. "Still, I could run up once in"—he became pensive—"in three weeks or so."
"For the day—I should be delighted."
"No.Notfor the day." He was irritated with this artificial obtuseness. "For the week-end. For the week, sometimes, when I can manage it. I shall say it's business."
She drew back and back, as if from his advance, her head tilted, her eyes glinting at him under lowered lids, taking it all in yet pretending a paralysis of ignorance. She wanted to see—to see how far he would go, before she—She wanted him to think she didn't understand him even now.
It was this half-fascinated, backward gesture that excited him. He drew himself close, close.
"Elise, it's no use pretending. You know what I mean. You know I want you."
He stooped over her, covering her with his great chest. He put his arms round her.
"In my arms. Youknowyou wantme—"
She felt his mouth pushed out to her mouth as it retreated, trying to cover it, to press down. She gave a cry: "Oh—oh, you—" and struggled, beating him off with one hand while the other fumbled madly for her pocket-handkerchief. His grip slackened. He rose to his feet. But he still stooped over her, penning her in with his outstretched arms, his weight propped by his hands laid on the back of the sofa.
"You—old—imbecile—" she spurted.
She could afford it. In one rapid flash of intelligence she had seen that, whatever happened, she could never get that five hundred poundsdown. And to surrender to old Waddy without it, to surrender to old Waddy at all, when she could marry Freddy Markham, would be too preposterous. Even if there hadn't been any Freddy Markham, it would have been preposterous.
At that moment as she said it, while he still held her prisoned and they stared into each other's faces, she spurting and he panting, Barbara came in.
He started; jerked himself upright. Mrs. Levitt recovered herself.
"You silly cuckoo," she said. "You don't know how ridiculous you look."
She had found her pocket-handkerchief and was dabbing her eyes and mouth with it, rubbing off the uncleanness of his impact. "How ridic—Te-hee—Te-hee—te-hee!" She shook with laughter.
Barbara pretended not to see them. To have gone back at once, closing the door on them, would have been to admit that she had seen them. Instead she moved, quickly yet abstractedly, to the writing-table, took up the photographs and went out again.
Mr. Waddington had turned away and stood leaning against the chimneypiece, hiding his head ("Poor old ostrich!") in his hands. His attitude expressed a dignified sorrow and a wronged integrity. Barbara stood for a collected instant at the door and spoke:
"I'm sorry I forgot the photographs." As if she said: "Cheer up, old thing. I didn't really see you."
Through the closed door she heard Mrs. Levitt's laughter let loose, malignant, shrill, hysterical, a horrid sound.
"I'm sorry, Elise. But I thought you cared for me."
"You'd no business to think. And it wasn't likely I'd tell you."
"Oh, you didn't tell me, my dear. How could you? But you made me believe you wanted me."
"Wanted? Do you suppose I wanted to be made ridiculous?"
"Love isn't ridiculous," said Mr. Waddington.
"It is. It'sthemost ridiculous thing there is. And whenyou're making it…. If you could have seen your face—Oh, dear!"
"If you wouldn't laugh quite so loud. The servants will hear you."
"I mean them to hear me."
"Confound you, Elise!"
"That's right, swear at me. Swear at me."
"I'm sorry I swore. But, hang it all, it's every bit as bad for me as it is for you."
"Worse, I fancy. You needn't think Miss Madden didn't see you, because she did."
"It's a pity Miss Madden didn't come in a little sooner."
"Sooner? I think she chose her moment very well."
"If she had heard the whole of our conversation I think she'd have realized there was something to be said for me."
"There isn't anything to be said for you. And until you've apologized for insulting me—"
"You've heard me apologize. As for insulting you, no decent woman, in the circumstances, ever tells a man his love insults her, even if she can't return it."
"And even if he's another woman's husband?"
"Even if he's another woman's husband, if she's ever given him the right—"
"Right? Do you think you bought the right to make love to me?" She rose, confronting him.
"No. I thought you'd given it me…. I was mistaken."
He helped her to put on the coat that she wriggled into with clumsy, irritated movements. Clumsy. The womanwasclumsy. He wondered how he had never seen it. And vulgar. Noisy and vulgar. You never knew what a woman was like till you'd seen her angry. He had answered her appropriately and with admirable tact. He had scored every point; he was scoring now with his cool, imperturbable politeness. He tried not to think about Barbara.
"Your fur."
"Thank you."
He rang the bell. Partridge appeared.
"Tell Kimber to bring the car round and drive Mrs. Levitt home."
"Thank you, Mr. Waddington, I'd rather walk."
Partridge retired.
She held out her hand. Mr. Waddington bowed abruptly, not taking it. He strode behind her to the door, through the smoke-room, to the further door. In the hall Partridge hovered. He left her to him.
And, as she followed Partridge across the wide lamp-lighted space, he noticed for the first time that Elise, in her agitation, waddled. Like a duck—a greedy duck. Like that horrible sister of hers, Bertha Rickards.
Then he thought of Barbara Madden.
3
When Ralph called for Barbara he told her, first thing, that he had heard from Mackintyres, the publishers, about his book. He had sent it them two-thirds finished, and Grevill Burton—"GrevillBurton, Barbara!"—had read it and reported very favourably. Mackintyres had agreed to publish it if the end was equal to the beginning and the middle.
It was this exciting news, thrown at her before she could get her hat on, that had caused Barbara to forget all about Mr. Waddington's photographs and Mr. Waddington's book and Mr. Waddington, until she and Ralph were half way between Wyck-on-the-Hill and Lower Speed. There was nothing for it then but to go on, taking care to get back in time to take the photographs to Pyecraft's before the shop closed. There hadn't been very much time, but Barbara said she could just do it if she made a dash, and it was the dash she made that precipitated her into the scene of Mr. Waddington's affair.
Ralph waited for her at the white gate.
"We must sprint," she said, "if we're to be in time."
They sprinted.
As they walked slowly back, Barbara became thoughtful.
As long as she lived she would remember Waddington: the stretched-out arms, the top-heavy body bowed to the caress; the inflamed and startled face staring at her, like some strange fish, over Mrs. Levitt's shoulder, the mouth dropping open as if it called out to her "Go back!" What depths of fatuity he must have sunk to before he could have come to that! And the sad figure leaning on the chimneypiece, whipped, beaten by Mrs. Levitt's laughter—the high, coarse, malignant laughter that had made her run to the smoke-room door to shield him, to shut it off.
What wouldn't Ralph have given to have seen him!
It was all very well for Ralph to talk about making a "study" of him; he hadn't got further than the merest outside fringe of his great subject. He didn't know the bare rudiments of Waddington. He had had brilliant flashes of his own, but no sure sight of the reality. And it had been given to her, Barbara, to see it, all at once. She had penetrated at one bound into the thick of him. They had wondered how far he would go; and he had gone so far, so incredibly far above and beyond himself that all their estimates were falsified.
And she saw that her seeing was the end—the end of their game, hers and Ralph's, the end of their compact, the end of the tie that bound them. She found herself shut in with Waddington; the secret that she shared with him shut Ralph out. It was intolerable that all this rich, exciting material should be left on her hands, lodged with her useless, when she thought of what she and Ralph could have made of it together.
If only she could have given it him. But of course she couldn't. She had always known there would be things she couldn't give him. She would go on seeing more and more of them.
Odd that she didn't feel any moral indignation. It had been too funny, like catching a child in some amusing naughtiness; and, as poor Waddy's eyes and open mouth had intimated, she had had no business to catch him, to know anything about it, no business to be there.
"Ralph," she said, "you must let me off the compact."
He turned, laughing. "Why, have you seen something?"
"It doesn't matter whether I have or haven't."
"It was a sacred compact."
"But if I can only keep it by being a perfect pig—"
He looked down at her face, her troubled, unnaturally earnest face.
"Of course, if you feel like that about it—"
"You'd feel like that if you were his confidential secretary and had all his correspondence."
"Yes, yes. I see, Barbara, it won't work. I'll let you off the compact.We can go on with him just the same."
"We can't."
"What? Not make a study of him?"
"No. We don't know what we're doing. It isn't safe. We may come on things any day."
"Like the thing you came on just now."
"I didn't say I'd come on anything."
"All right, you didn't. He shall be our unfinished book, Barbara."
"He'll beyourunfinished book. I've finished mine all right. Anything else will be simply appendix."
"You think you've got him complete?"
"Fairly complete."
"Oh, Barbara—"
"Don't tempt me, Ralph."
"After all," he said, "we were only playing with him."
"Well, we mustn't do it again."
"Never any more?"
"Never any more. I know it's a game for gods; but it's a cruel game. We must give it up."
"You mean we must give him up?"
"Yes, we've hunted and hounded him enough. We must let him go."
"That's the compact, is it?"
"Yes."
"We shall break it, Barbara; see if we don't. We can't keep off him."
4
Mr. Waddington judged that, after all, owing to his consummate tact, he had scored in the disagreeable parting with Mrs. Levitt. But when he thought of Barbara, little Barbara, a flush mounted to his face, his ears, his forehead; he could feel it—wave after wave of hot, unpleasant shame.
He went slowly back to the library and shut himself in with the tea-table, and the sofa, and the cushions crushed, deeply hollowed with the large pressure of Elise. He wondered how much Barbara had taken in, at what precise moment she had appeared. He tried to reconstruct the scene. He had been leaning over Elise; he could see himself leaning over her, enclosing her, and Elise's head, stiffened, drawing back from his kiss. Worse than the sting of her repugnance was the thought that Barbara had seen it and his attitude, his really very compromising attitude. Had she? Had she? The door now, it was at right angles to the sofa; perhaps Barbara hadn't caught him fair. He went to the door and came in from it to make certain. Yes. Yes. From that point it was no good pretending that he couldn't be seen.
But Barbara had rushed in like a little whirlwind, and she had gone straight to the writing-table, turning her back. She wouldn't have had time to take it in. He was at the chimneypiece before she had turned again, before she could have seen him. He must have recovered himself when he heard her coming. She couldn't charge in like that without being heard. He must have been standing up, well apart from Elise, not leaning over her by the time Barbara came in.
He tried to remember what Barbara had said when she went out. She had said something. He couldn't remember what it was, but it had sounded reassuring. Now, surely if Barbara had seen anything she wouldn't have stopped at the door to say things. She would have gone straight out without a word. In fact, she wouldn't have come in at all. She would have drawn back the very instant that she saw. She would simply never have penetrated as far as the writing-table. He remembered how coolly she had taken up the photographs and gone out again as if nothing had happened.
Probably, then, as far as Barbara was concerned, nothing had happened.
Then he remembered the horrible laughing of Elise. Barbara must have heard that; she must have wondered. She might just have caught him with the tail of her eye, not enough to swear by, but enough to wonder; and afterwards she would have put that and that together.
And he would have to dine with her alone that evening, to face her young, clear, candid eyes.
He didn't know how he was going to get through with it, and yet he did get through.
To begin with, Barbara was very late for dinner.
She had thought of being late as a way of letting Mr. Waddington down easily. She would come in, smiling and apologetic, palpably in the wrong, having kept him waiting, and he would be gracious and forgive her, and his graciousnees and forgiveness would help to reinstate him. He would need, she reflected, a lot of reinstating. Barbara considered that, in the matter of punishment, he had had enough. Mrs. Levitt, with her "You old imbecile!" had done to him all, and more than all, that justice could require; there was a point of humiliation beyond which no human creature should be asked to suffer. To be caught making love to Mrs. Levitt and being called an old imbecile! And then to be pelted with indecent laughter. And, in any case, it was not her, Barbara's, place to punish him or judge him. She had had no business to catch him, no business, in the first instance, to forget the photographs.
Therefore, as she really wanted him not to know that she had caught him, she went on behaving as if nothing had happened. All through dinner she turned the conversation on to topics that would put him in a favourable or interesting light. She avoided the subject of Fanny. She asked him all sorts of questions about his war work.
"Tell me," she said, "some of the things you did when you were a special constable."
And he told her his great story. To be sure, she knew the best part of it already, because Ralph had told it—it had been one of his scores over her—but she wanted him to remember it. She judged that it was precisely the sort of memory that would reinstate him faster than anything. For really he had played a considerable part.
"Well"—you could see by his face that he was gratified—"one of the things we had to do was to drive about the villages and farms after dark to see that there weren't any lights showing. It was nineteen—yes—nineteen-sixteen, in the winter. Must have been winter, because I was wearing my British warm with the fur collar. And there was a regular scare on."
"Air raids?"
"No. Tramps. We'd been fairly terrorized by a nasty, dangerous sort of tramp. The police were looking for two of these fellows—discharged soldiers. We'd a warrant out for their arrest. Robbery and assault."
"With violence?"
"Well, you may call it violence. One of 'em had thrown a pint pot at the landlord of the King's Head and hurt him. And they'd bolted with two bottles of beer and a tin of Player's Navy Cut. They'd made off, goodness knows where. We couldn't find 'em.
"I was driving to Daunton on a very nasty, pitch-black night. You know how beastly dark it is between the woods at Byford Park? Well, I'd just got there when I passed two fellows skulking along under the wall. They stood back—it was rather a near shave with no proper lights on—and I flashed my electric torch full on them. Blest if they weren't the very chaps we were looking for. And I'd got to run 'em in somehow, all by myself. And two to one. It wasn't any joke, I can tell you. Goodness knows what nasty knives and things they might have had on 'em."
"Whatdidyou do?"
"Do? I drove on fifty yards ahead, and pulled up the car outside the porter's lodge at Byford. Then I got out and came on and met 'em. They were trying to bolt into the wood when I turned my torch on them again and shouted 'Halt!' in a parade voice.
"They halted, hands up to the salute. I thought the habit would be too much for 'em when they heard the word of command. I said, 'You've got to come along with me.' I didn't know how on earth I was going to take them if they wouldn't go. And they'd started dodging. So I tried it on again: 'Halt!' Regular parade stunt. And they halted again all right. Then I harangued them. I said, 'Shun, you blighters! I'm a special constable, and I've got a warrant here for your arrest.'
"I hadn't. I'd nothing but an Inland Revenue Income Tax form. But I whipped it out of my breast pocket and trained my light on the royal arms at the top. That was enough for 'em. Then I shouted again in my parade voice, 'Right about face! Quick march!'
"And I got them marching. I marched them the two miles from Byford, through Lower Speed, and up the hill to Wyck and into the police station. And we ran 'em in for robbery and assault."
"It was clever of you."
"No; nothing but presence of mind and bluff, and showing that you weren't going to stand any nonsense. But I don't suppose Corbett or Hawtrey or any of those chaps would have thought of it."
Barbara wondered: "Supposing I were to turn on him and say, 'You old humbug, you know I don't believe a word of it. You know you didn't march them a hundred yards.' Or 'Isaw you this afternoon.' What would he look like?" It was inconceivable that she should say these things. If she was to go on with her study of him alone she would go on in the spirit they had begun in, she and Ralph. That spirit admitted nothing but boundless amusement, boundless joy in him. Moral indignation would have been a false note; it would have been downright irreverence towards the God who made him.
What if he did omit to mention that the nasty, dangerous fellows turned out to be two feeble youths, half imbecile with shell-shock and half drunk, and that it was Mr. Hawtrey, arriving opportunely in his car, who took them over the last mile to the police station? As it happened Mr. Waddington had frankly forgotten these details as inessential to his story. (Hehadmarched them a mile.)
After telling it he was so far re-established in his own esteem as to propose their working together on the Ramblings after dinner. He even ordered coffee to be served in the library, as if nothing had happened there. Unfortunately, by some culpable oversight of Annie Trinder's, the cushions still bore the imprint of Elise. Awful realization came to him when Barbara, with a glance at the sofa, declined to sit on it. He had turned just in time to catch the flick of what in a bantering mood he had once called her "Barbaric smile." After all, she might have seen something. Not Mrs. Levitt's laughter but the thought of what Barbara might have seen was his punishment—that and being alone with her, knowing that she knew.