It was a golden summer’s evening. In his little temperamental car he was chugging through the Quantock Hills. His car was temperamental chiefly because he had picked it up as a bargain second hand. In his wanderings of the last month he had established a friendship with it which was almost human, as a man does with a piece of machinery when he is lonely.
When the tour had first been planned it had included Ruddy; but at the last moment Ruddy had joined a pierrot-troupe, leaving Teddy to set off by himself. That vacant place at his side reproached him; a two-seater is so obviously meant for two persons. He had told himself faery-tales about how he might fill it. Sometimes he had invented a companion for himself—a girl with gray eyes and bronze-black hair. She seemed especially real to him when night had fallen and the timid shadows of lovers pressed back into the hedges as his lamps discovered them on the road ahead.
For the past month his mind had been ablaze with an uplifted sense of beauty. He had come down from London by lazy stages, halting here a day and there a day to sketch. Every mile of the way the air had been summer-freighted; the freedom of it had got into his blood. Everywhere that he had gone he had encountered new surprises—gray cathedral cities, sleepy villages, the blue sea of Devon; places and things of which he had only heard, and others which he hadn’t known existed. Dreams were materializing and stepping out to meet him. Eden Row, with its recluse atmosphere, was ceasing to be all his world. His emotions gathered themselves up into an urgent longing—to be young, to live intensely, to miss nothing.
To-day he had crossed Exmoor, black with peat and purple with heather, and was proposing to spend the night at Nether Stowey. He had chosen Nether Stowey because Coleridge had lived there. He had sent word to his mother that it was one of the points to which letters could be forwarded. When he had written his name in the hotel book, the proprietress looked up. “Oh, so you’re the gentleman!”
“Why? Have you got such stacks of letters for me?”
“No. A telegram.”
He tore it open and read, “However late, push on to-night to The Pilgrims? Inn, Glastonbury.” The signature was “Madame Josephine.”
He looked to see at what time it had been received. It had arrived at three o’clock; so it had been waiting for him five hours.
“I’m sorry I shan’t need that room,” he said. “How far is it to Glastonbury?”
“About twenty-three miles. I suppose you’ll stay to dinner, sir? It’s being served.”
“I’m afraid not.”
Without loss of time, he cranked up his engine, jumped into his car and started.
“However late, push on to-night to Glastonbury.” Why on earth? What interest could Madame Josephine have in his going to Glastonbury, and why to-night so especially? He had planned to go there to-morrow—to make a dream-day of it, full of memories of King Arthur and reconstructions of chivalrous history and legend. He had intended readingThe Idyls of the Kingthat evening to key himself up to the proper pitch of enthusiasm. It seemed entirely too modern and not quite decent, to go racing at the bidding of an unexplained telegram into “The Island Valley of Avilion, where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow.”
As he hummed along through the green-gold country he gave himself up to the mood of enchantment. In the transforming light of the fading sunset it seemed certain that a bend in the road would bring to view champions of The Round Table riding together.
He smiled and shook his head at himself; he hadn’t grown much older since those old days at Ware. It was this sight that he and Desire had expected—the sight of knights in clanking armor and ladies with flowing raiment, sauntering together in a magic world. It had seemed to them that the enraptured land which their hearts-imagined, must lie just a little further beyond the hills and hedges. To find it, it was only necessary to go on and on.
He recalled how he had read to her those legends as they had lain side by side, hidden in tall meadow-grasses from Fanner Joseph. He remembered how they had quarreled when she had said, “I like Sir Launcelot best.”
“But you mustn’t. King Arthur was the good one. If Sir Launcelot hadn’t done wrong, everything would have been happy always.”
“Yes, but if everything had been happy always, there wouldn’t have been any story, Teddy. I know why you don’t like my loving Sir Launcelot: it’s because you’re a King Arthur yourself.”
He laughed. How hurt he had felt at her accusation that he was a proper person!
And there was another memory: how, after playing at knights and ladies, she had tried to make him declare that she was beautiful. “Do you think I’m beautiful, Teddy?” And he, intent on keeping her vanity hungry, “You have beautiful hands.”
He had always promised himself that some day, if they ever met, one of the first places they would visit should be Glastonbury. It would add a last chapter to those chivalrous games which they had played together as children.
Far away in the orchard valley lights were springing up. Out of the misty distance came the lowing of cattle. Like a cowled monk, with peaceful melancholy, the gloaming crept across the meadows.
As he approached the town, it came as something of a shock to notice that its outskirts bore signs of newness. But as he drove into the heart of it, medieval buildings loomed up: gray, night-shrouded towers; stooping houses with leaded windows; the dusky fragrance of ivy, and narrow lanes which turned off into the darkness abruptly. Somewhere in the shadows was Chalice Hill, where the cup of the Last Supper lay buried. Not far distant, within the Abbey walls, the coffin of King Arthur was said to have been found. His imagination thrilled to the antiquity of the legend.
With reluctance he swung his mind back to the present. Pulling up outside The Pilgrims’ Inn, he left his car and entered.
“If you please, has any one been inquiring for me? My name’s Gurney.”
The landlady inspected him through the office-window. She was a kind-faced, motherly woman; the result of her inspection pleased her. She laid down her pen.
“Gurney! No. Not that I remember.”
“Puzzling!” He took her into his confidence, handing her the telegram. “I received that at Nether Stowey. I was going to have stayed there, and should have come on here to-morrow. But you see what it says, ’However late, push on to-night to The Pilgrims’ Inn, Glastonbury.’ So—so I pushed on.” He laughed.
“This Madame Josephine who signs it,” the landlady was turning the telegram over, “d’you know her?”
“Oh, yes. I know her.”
“I asked because—— Well, ladies do play jokes cm gentlemen. And we’ve a lot of actor-folk in Glastonbury at present—larky kind of people. I don’t take much stock in them myself. Shouldn’t think you did by the look of you.”
“I don’t.”
The landlady put her elbows on the desk and crouched her face in her hands. “I didn’t think you would. These people, they’ve been here a week for the Arthurian pageant Some of them stay with me; I’ve seen all I want of ’em. Too free in their manners, that’s what I say. It don’t seem right for girls and men to be so friendly. I wasn’t brought up that way. It puts false notions into girls’ heads, that’s what I say. I suppose you’ve dined already?”
“I haven’t. I hope it won’t put you to too much trouble.”
She led the way through the low-ceilinged hostel, explaining its history as she went. How in the middle-ages it had been the guest-house of the Abbey and the pilgrims had stayed there at the Abbot’s expense. How they had two haunted rooms upstairs, in one of which Anne Boleyn had slept. How the walls were tunneled with secret stairways which led down to subterranean passages. When the meal had been spread she left him, promising to let him know if there were any inquiries.
Odd! All through dinner he kept thinking about it. To have found out where to reach him Madame Josephine must have inconvenienced herself. Probably she’d had to send to Orchid Lodge, and Orchid Lodge had had to send to his mother. She wouldn’t have done all that unless her reason had been important.
He went down to the office. “Has any one called yet?”
“Not yet.”
He glanced at the clock; it was ten. Nobody would come now. He walked out into the High Street to garage his car and to take a stroll before turning in to bed.
The town lay silent. Here and there a faint light, drifting from a street-lamp or from behind a curtained window, streaked the darkness. No people were about. Stars, wheeling high above embattled house-tops, were the only traffic.
“The Island Valley of Avilion, where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow.” The words sang themselves over as he wandered. What if the telegram had been a bait to lure him back into the past? What if the door of forgotten ages had opened to him and closed behind him, as in William Morris’s romance ofThe Hollow Land?
He played with the fancy, embroidering its extravagance. To-morrow he would awake in the ancient hostel to find that the landlady had changed into a fat old abbot. Pilgrims would be passing to and fro below his window; ladies on palfreys and palmers whose sandaled feet had brought them home from the Holy Land. What if he should remain a captive to the past and never find his way into the present?
He drew up sharply. Wailing music came to him, made by instruments that he had never heard before. It rose into a clamor and sank away sobbing. He tried to follow it, but it seemed to be everywhere and nowhere all in the same moment It lost itself in the echoing of overhanging walls. At last, turning down a passage, he traced it to a barnlike building. As he got there the doors were flung wide and people came pouring out.
He was amused; he had almost been persuaded that he had stumbled on the supernatural. Glancing in, he saw the orchestra gathering up their old-fashioned horns and wind-instruments. The curtain bad been partly raised; slipping from under it the performers, still in costume, were climbing down and mingling with the thinning audience. For the moment the audience seemed the unreal people and the performers the people of his world.
He went out into the darkness and stood back a little from the passage that he might retain the medieval illusion as they passed. He made guesses at their characters. Here came Sir Galahad in silver armor, joking with Merlin, who carried his beard across his arm to prevent it from sweeping the ground. King Arthur, with his sword rattling between his legs, was running to catch up with Sir Launcelot. The girls were more difficult to identify; in their long robes, with their bare arms and plaited hair, there was nothing to distinguish them. As he watched, he saw one with a crown upon her head. The stones in it glinted as she approached. Queen Guinevere, he thought.
She was supple and slight and tall. She walked unhurriedly, with an air of pride, as though she had not yet shaken off her part. A man accompanied her. He was speaking earnestly; she gazed straight before her, taking little notice of what he said. Her hair was brushed back from her forehead to reveal the curve of her ears and the gleam of her shoulders. Her garment was of green and gold, caught in at the waist with a golden girdle; on her feet were golden sandals, which twinkled. The white intensity of her face and throat shone in the darkness. There was an ardency about her that arrested attention.
“It can’t be helped,” she spoke shortly, “so there’s no use talking. I’ve got to get there, whatever happens.”
Teddy followed her down the street. At the sound of her voice his heart had quickened. He wished she would turn her head beneath a lamp that he might see her clearly. Before The Pilgrims’ Inn there was a crowd; when he came up to it she had vanished.
On entering, he found a scene which might have walked out of the brain of Chaucer, so utterly were the costumes in keeping with the hostel. He cast his eyes about, seeking for Queen Guinevere.
As he stood hesitating between pursuing his fancy further or going to bed, the landlady came out from her office. Catching sight of him, she elbowed her way towards him.
“News for me?” he asked.
“Not exactly.” She frowned slightly. “I thought you said you didn’t know any of these actor-folk?”
“I don’t.”
“Well, there’s one of them in there,” pointing back into the office, “who’s got a telegram. She says you’re the man she’s expecting, though she wouldn’t know you from Adam. She says she’s sure you’re the man because you’ve got a car.”
“I don’t think I am. But I’ll go and find out.”
The landlady smiled disapprovingly: “I begin to have my doubts about you, sir.”
In the office the girl who had played the part of Guinevere was standing. The moment he caught her eyes he was certain. Excitement ran through him like a sword.
He felt himself trembling. He wanted to rush forward and claim her. He wanted to go down on his knees to her. Most of all, he wanted to see her recognize him. But she stood there smilingly distant and gracious.
“I’m so sorry to trouble you,” she said. “I’m afraid our introduction’s a trifle unconventional, but I’m in rather a pickle. You see, I want to go to London to-night. In fact, I must go to London, and there are no trains till to-morrow. I have a friend who’s—— But there, read my telegram. It’ll save explan—— to London to-night. In fact, I must go to London, and there are no trains till to-morrow. I have a friend who’s—— But there, read my telegram. It’ll save explanations.”
He took it from her hand and read:
“Dear little D.—Got to sail New York to-morrow. Train leaves Euston at twelve. Have booked your berth. Ask for a man at Pilgrims’ Inn with telegram signed Madame Josephine. Madame Josephine says, if you ask him nicely, he’ll bring you to London in his car. Tell him she suggested. Awful sorry to rush you. Real reason Horace too pressing. My excuse engagement with Freelevy. Love and kisses. Fluffy.”
As he reached the end, she came close and took it from him. He could hear the circlet about her waist jingle; her breath touched him.
“Your hand’s trembling most awfully.” she laughed. “Is it too much of a shock?” And then, before he could answer: “Madame Josephine keeps The Beauty Palace. We go there to be glorified. You know Madame Josephine, don’t you?”
“Yes.” His voice hardly came above a whisper.
“Then, you are the man?”
Was he the man? He wanted to tell her. He had planned this meeting so often—staged it with such wealth of romance and tenderness. And this was how it had happened!
“Then, you are the man?”
Perhaps his nod didn’t carry sufficient enthusiasm. She began to explain and apologize. She made the babies come into her gray eyes, the way she used to as a child when she wanted anything. “I know it’s a lot to ask of a stranger, robbing him of his night’s rest and all. But you see I can’t help it. My friend, Fluffy, is an actress and—— Well, you know what actresses are—she’s very temperamental Of course that part about Freelevy may be true. He’s the great American producer. She wouldn’t tell a downright fib, I’m sure. But the part about Horace is truer; I expect he’s wanting to marry her and—and the only way she can think of escaping him and not hurting his feelings—— You understand what I mean, don’t you? As for me, I have a beautiful mother in America who let me come abroad with Fluffy; so of course I have to go back with her. You see, I’m not an actress yet—I’m only an amateur.” She rounded her eyes and made them very appealing. “If I don’t sail to-morrow, I’ll have to go back unchaperoned, and that—— Well, it wouldn’t be quite proper for a young girl. So you will take me to London to-night, won’t you?”
He burst out laughing. If this wasn’t Desire, it was some one extraordinarily like her—some one who knew how to use the same dear inconsequent coaxing arguments. Who but Desire would urge the propriety of a night ride to London with an unknown man to save the impropriety of an unchaperoned trip across the Atlantic?
She spread her fingers against the comers of her mouth to prevent her lips from smiling. “Why do you laugh? I rather like you when you laugh.”
He wasn’t going to tell her—at least, not yet. “I thought I’d strike a bargain with you. If you’ll promise not to change that dress, I’ll take you.”
“But why this dress?”
He hunched his shoulders. “A whim, perhaps.”
“All right. I’ll go up and pack.”
She walked slowly out of the office, her brows drawn together with thought. At the door she turned:
“You remind me of some one I once knew. I can’t remember who it was. He used to screw up his shoulders just like that.”
Before he could make up his mind whether or not to assist her memory, she was gone.
He had hurried so as not to keep her waiting. By the time he had brought his car round to the hotel the clocks were striking eleven. He throttled down his engine; it didn’t seem worth while shutting it off, since she might appear at any moment. Its muffled throbbing in the shadowy street seemed the panting of his heart How impatient he was to see her! Running up the steps, he peered into the hall.
The landlady approached him with a severe expression. “She sent word for me to tell you she’d be down directly. These—these are strange goings-on. Dangerous vagaries, I call them. It’s none of my business—me not being your mother nor related; but I do hope you know what you’re doing, young gentleman.”
The young gentleman laughed. “We shan’t come to any harm,” he assured her.
The company was breaking up. The vaulted hall and passages echoed with laughter, the jingling of armor and snatches of songs. Knights and ladies were bidding each other extravagant farewells, enacting the gallantries which went with their parts. Men dropped to one knee and pressed their lips to slender hands. Flower faces drooped above them mockingly—and not so mockingly after all, perhaps; for when the Pied Piper of Love makes his music, any heart that is hungry may follow. Those of them who were stopping at the inn caught up their lighted candles. By twos and threes, with backward glances, casting long shadows on the wall, they drifted up the wide carved stairs. Others, who had cheaper quarters, sauntered out into the summer stillness. The porter, like a relentless guardian of morals, stood with his hand upon the door, waiting sourly for the last of them to be gone.
Teddy followed them out. As the girls passed beneath the hotel windows, they dragged on their escorts’ arms, raising their faces and calling one final good-night to their friends who were getting into bed. Heads popped out, and stared down between the stars and the pavement. All kinds of heads. Heads with helmets on. Close-cropped ordinary heads. Heads which floated in a mist of trailing locks. Some one struck up a song; there, in the medieval moonlit street, these romance people danced. Away through the shadows they danced, the booming accompaniment of the men’s voices growing fainter, fainter, fainter, till at last even the clear eagerness of the girls’ singing was lost.
When Teddy turned to reenter the inn, the porter had barred the door. From the steep wall of windows which rose sheer to the stars all the different kinds of heads had been withdrawn. The only sound was the throb-throb-throbbing of the engine like the thump-thump-thumping of his heart.
He sat down on the steps to wait for her. She was a terribly long while in coming. It was nearly half-past eleven. Thirty minutes ago she had sent him word that she would be down “directly.”
“Of course,” he told himself, “there’s no need for hurry. It’s about a hundred and forty miles to London, and we’ve all the night before us.”
He was trying to decide to ring the bell, when the door opened noisily, and the porter stumbled out, bringing her luggage. As he helped Teddy strap it on the back of the car, he answered his questions gruffly: “Doin’! I don’t know wot she’s doin’. Said she’d be down direckly, which means whenever she chooses. The inkinsideration of these actresses beats all. Hurry ’er! Me hurry ’er! No, mister, she’s not the hurryin’ sort; she hurries other folk instead. I don’t know wot the world’s comin’ to, I’m sure. Thank you, sir.” He slipped the half-crown into his pocket “She’s a ’andsome lady; I will say that for ’er.”
And then she appeared, standing framed in the doorway, with the weak light from the hall throwing a golden mist about her. Over her head a hood was drawn, shadowing her features. Her cloak was gathered round her, so that beneath its folds she was recognizable only by her slightness. He felt that, however she had disguised herself, there would have been something in her presence that would have called to him.
“Have I kept you waiting long?” In the old days her apologies had always taken the interrogative form; now, as then, she hurried on, not risking an answer: “You see, I had to say ’good-by’ to everybody. It wouldn’t have been kind to have slipped off and left them. I felt sure you’d understand. And I did send down messages. You’re not cross?”
Cross! She spoke the word caressingly. Her voice sank into a trembling laugh, as though she herself was aware of the absurdity of such a question. Her explanation was totally inadequate, and yet how adorable in its childlike eagerness to conciliate and to avoid unpleasantness!
“Cross! Why, of course not. I was only anxious—a tiny bit afraid that you weren’t coming.”
He sounded so friendly that he convinced her. She sighed contentedly. “Has it seemedverylong?”
He looked up from inspecting his lamps. She had come down the steps to the pavement. The porter had entered the hotel; inside he was shooting the last bolt into its socket.
He held his breath. In the moon-washed street after all these years he was alone with her.
“Without you, waiting would always seem long.”
She started. Glanced back across her shoulder. The sounds on the other side of the door had stopped. There was no retreat. Turning to him with girlish dignity, she said: “It’s very kind of you to have offered to help me, but—— I don’t want you to say things like that. We’ll enjoy ourselves much better if we’re sensible.”
He felt a sudden shame, as though she had accused him of taking advantage of her defenselessness. All the things he had been on the point of telling her—he must postpone them. Presently she would remember; her own heart would tell her.
“It was foolish of me,” he said humbly.
She laughed softly and shook back her head. Her hair lay upon her shoulders like a schoolgirl’s. “There now, we understand each other. Why do men always spoil things before they’re started by making stupid love?”
“Do they?”
“Well, don’t they?” She smiled tolerantly. “Let’s be friends. If we’re sensible, we can have such a jolly trip to London—such a lark. No more sentimentals—promise—— Shake hands on it.”
As she held out both her hands, the cloak fell open, revealing her pageant costume. She noticed that his eyes rested on it. “Yes, I kept my bargain—even to the sandals.” The glimmer of her feet peeped out for a second beneath the hem of her skirt. “Now, how about making a start?”
He helped her into the seat which, up to now, had reproached him with its emptiness. He didn’t have to imagine any longer.
He climbed in beside her. “Are you warm?”
“Very comfy.”
“What time do you want to get there? I can get you there by seven or eight, doing twenty an hour—that’s to say, if nothing goes wrong.”
“Do me splendidly. I ought to tell you while I remember: I think this is awfully decent of you.”
“Not decent at all” He hesitated. “It’s not decent because—well, because I always told myself that I’d do something like this some day.”
“Remember your promise.” She held up a warning finger.
“You didn’t let me finish. What I meant to say was that, ever since I was a little kid, I’ve played at rescuing princesses.”
She looked up at him searchingly, then bit her lip to keep back her thoughts. “What a queer game to play!” That was all.
Like a robber bee, seeking honey while the garden of the world slept, the car sped humming through the silver town. Gray, shuttered houses faded upon the darkness like a dream that was spent. They were in the open country now, the white road before them, trees and hedges leaping to attention like lazy sentinels as the lamps flared on them, and throwing themselves down to rest again before the droning of the engine was gone.
“‘The Island Valley of Avilion, where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow.’ Know that?”
She nodded. “It sounds so peaceful, doesn’t it? Like a cold hand laid on an aching forehead. That’s the way those words have felt to me sometimes in the glare and bustle of New York. They’ve come to me when I’ve been walking up Fifth Avenue, and it’s been like a door opening into a green still orchard, somewhere inside my head.”
“You’re sorry to leave it? Why should we leave it? Let’s turn back.”
He slowed down the car.
“Oh, you foolish! I’ve got to catch my boat to-morrow. And besides——” She paused and reflected. “Besides, I’m never so very sorry to leave anything. I’m an odd girl” (The same old phrase, “D’you think I’m an odd child, Teddy?”) “I’m never too sorry to say good-by. I want to push on and on. I’m always looking ahead.”
“To what?”
“Things.” She glanced away into the vagueness of the ghostly meadows. “The kind of things that people do look forward to.”
He wanted to get her to talk about herself—about her past. He could make sure, then, and tell her—tell her everything without frightening her. So he said: “I don’t mean people. I mean girls. What kind of things do girls look forward to?”
Had she shared his hours of remembering? Had it really been her thoughts that had touched him in that little room in Eden Row? He stooped his head nearer to listen. It seemed to him that, above the throbbing of the engine, he could hear the blood dripping in his heart.
She stared into his eyes with her old suspicion—the veiled stare, half hostile, which a girl gives a man when she fears that he is going to kiss her.
“Girls look forward to—what kind of things?” she echoed. “I can’t tell. The same kind of things that men look forward to, I expect. The surprise things, and—yes, the excitements, most of all.”
“Like our meeting—it was a surprise thing, wasn’t it?”
“I suppose so.” She slipped back her cloak from her white shoulders. “Heaps of things are surprise things like that.”
It was as though she had said, “This meeting of ours—it’s of no importance.” He loved her for the way she was treating him. He knew now why she had dared to risk herself with a man who, so far as her knowledge went, was a complete stranger.
They both fell silent. He felt that there was only one thing that he could talk about, and he didn’t know when or where to start. He wanted above all things to say nothing only to take her in his arms; to kiss her lips, her hair, her hands and to kneel to the little sandaled feet that peeped out from below her queenly robe. He hardly dared to look at her lest, then and there, he should leave the wheel and do it. All that his heart asked was to be allowed to touch and reverence her.
As he stared between the rushing eyes of the car, watching the road ahead, his imagination painted pictures on the darkness. He saw her lifting her arms about his neck. He saw her lying close against his breast. He heard her whispering broken phrases—words which said so much by leaving so much unsaid. But whenever he stole a glance at her, he saw her gray eyes closed like a statue’s and her white hands folded.
He was wasting time—it would so soon be morning. She was going to America. She must not go, and yet he was helping her. If he could only find words to tell her. He had never thought it would be so difficult. Ah, but then he had imagined a child-Desire, just grown a little taller. But this Desire was different—so self-possessed and calm, with so many new interests and unknown friends estranging her from the faery-Desire of the farmhouse garden.
They passed through Wells, where the cathedral lay like a gigantic coffin beneath the stars. Having panted up the steep ascent beyond the town, they commenced the twenty-mile downhill run to Bath.
He heard a stirring beside him. Her eyes were open, quite near to his and shining with friendliness.
“What’s the matter? We’ve both gone silent.”
“I thought you were tired, so I didn’t disturb you.”
“Tired! Perhaps I was. But I’m all right now. Isn’t it magic with all the stars, and the mist and the being away from every one? Don’t you want to smoke? Here, I’ll hold the wheel while you light a cigarette. Yes, I know how.”
She leant across him to do it, her shoulder resting against his arm. The wind of their going fluttered her hair against his cheek. For a moment he was possessed with a mad longing to crush her to him.
“Haven’t you a match?”
She seemed utterly unconscious of her power to charm; yet instinctively she used it.
“All right?” she asked. “I wonder whether you’d mind——” Her finger went up to her mouth and her gray eyes coaxed him.
“I shouldn’t mind anything.”
She shook her head emphatically. “No. I won’t do it. People remember first impressions. You’d think me fast.”
“I shouldn’t I couldn’t ever think that.”
“Are you sure? Well, may I——?” She made a gesture imitative of withdrawing a cigarette from her lips. “I don’t smoke often—only when I feel like it. And, oh, I do feel so happy to-night.”
She lit her cigarette from his, steadying herself with her hand on his shoulder. Then she lay back, staring up at the fleecy sky where the moon tipped clouds to a silver glory. She began to sing softly between her puffs:
The night has a thousand eyes,
And the day but one;
Yet the light of a whole world dies
With the dying sun.”
She sang the same verse over three times, pausing between each singing as if she were repeating a question.
“Don’t you know the second verse?” he asked unsteadily.
“Yes, I know it.”
“Won’t you sing it? The whole meaning of life and everything is in the last two Unes.”
“D’you really want me to? I don’t care for it so much because it’s about love. I don’t think love ever made anybody happy.”
For a moment he was tempted to argue this heresy. “But sing it,” he urged.
In a soft sleepy voice she sang:
“The mind has a thousand eyes,
And the heart but one;
Yet the light of a whole world dies
When love is done.”
He waited for her to repeat it When she remained silent, he stopped the car. She turned to him lazily: “Something gone wrong with the engine?”
He was certain she knew what had gone wrong, and was equally certain that she was wilfully pretending to misunderstand him. Far below in the valley, like a faeryring, the lights of Bath winked and twinkled. The silence, after the sound of their going, breathed across the country like a prolonged sighing. How should he tell her? How did men speak to the women they loved? He turned aside from his purpose and procrastinated. “Sing it again,” he pleaded, “the last verse. Now, that everything’s quiet.”
“No.” She sat up determinedly. “It’s very beautiful; especially that part about light dying when love is done. But it isn’t true. People love heaps of times, and each new time they get more sensible. It’s like climbing a ladder: you see more as you go higher. Besides, that last verse makes me cry.”
“Love makes people happy.” His voice was low and trembling. “You shouldn’t pretend to be a cynic. You’re too beautiful.”
“Oh, well, perhaps you are right, but——” She threw away her cigarette. “Please be nice. You don’t know what things I’ve had done to me to make me talk like that” She touched him on the arm ever so lightly: “When we’re traveling, we talk so much better. Hadn’t we better be going?” And then, when they were again humming down the long hill, with the white lamps scything the shadows: “This really is fun. It’ll be something to remember.”
“Something to talk about together,” he said.
She cuddled herself down into the seat. “Not much time for that with me sailing for America. But you’ve not told me what you think of my telegram. Wasn’t it a quaint, jumpy message? That’s just like Fluffy to decide a problem in five minutes that other people would take five months over. If she finds that anything’s worrying her, she moves away from it This Horace, he’s Horace Overbridge, the playwright, and he’s in love with her. Ever since we landed in April they’ve been going about together, having motor-trips into the country and picnics on the river, and—oh, so many good times. Of course I’ve been there, too, to take care of her. But the trouble is he wants to marry her and, if he did, he’d never let her do what she likes. He can’t understand that it means just as much to her to be an actress as it does to him to be a playwright Men aren’t very understanding. Of course, while they’re not even engaged, he raves about her acting and helps her all he can. But she knows perfectly well that all that would end with marriage. And then she doesn’t love him. So you see——”
“But you said she’d let him take her about and give her good times.”
“Why, certainly. If a man chooses to do that it’s his own affair. And then Fluffy’s very dear and beautiful, and she wouldn’t let many men be in love with her. You did sound shocked when you said ‘But!’”
“I was thinking that she hadn’t played fair. She must have led him on. You don’t think that’s fair, do you?”
“Fair!” She pursed her lips. “He enjoyed himself while it lasted, and it’s his own fault if he’s spoilt it.” She threw back her head and trilled gayly. “Oh, I can see her stamping her little foot and saying, ’No. No. No, Horace.’ And then, I expect, she jumped straight into a cab and booked our berths on the very first ship that was sailing. You—you don’t approve of her?”
“I don’t know her. It wasn’t very thoughtful of her to give you such short notice.”
“But if I don’t mind—you see, it’s my business.”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Then I have no right to mind. But I’m wondering where you’d have been if I hadn’t turned up.”
“I! Oh, I’d have hired a car, I suppose, and Fluffy’d have had to pay for it, or Horace, or somebody.—I wish I could remember who it was shrugged his shoulders the way you do.”
“Perhaps it was——”
He glanced at her and broke off. This didn’t seem the propitious time to assist her memory. She was frowning. He had displeased her. The flippancy of Fluffy’s way of loving had cheapened all passion for the moment.
They were coming into Bath, with its narrow streets and wide spaces, its fluted columns and Georgian mansions.
“When we get into the country on the other side,” he thought, “I’ll tell her.”
But on the other side he found that her eyes were shut She lay curled up, with her child’s face turned towards him and her cheek pillowed against her hand.
“Desire,” he whispered. “Desire.”
She sighed, but her eyes did not open.
“It’s Teddy. Don’t you remember?”
She did not stir.
Very tenderly, lest he should wake her, he tucked her cloak closer, and buttoned it across her breast. By degrees he pulled the hood up over her ears and forehead. He stooped to kiss her, but drew back at the last moment To kiss her, sleeping, seemed too much like theft; “I love you, dearest,” he whispered. “I love you.”
She made no answer.
He drove on, dreaming, through the summer night.
Stars were weakening in their shining. He wished she would wake up. It was still night, but almost imperceptibly a paleness was spreading. The sky looked mottled. As he passed through an anonymous, shrouded village a clock was striking. One, two, three! If he kept up this pace, they would be in London, at the latest, by seven.
He began to calculate his respite. The boat-train left Euston at noon; if she allowed him to stay with her to the very last moment, he had—how much? About nine hours more of her company.
But probably she wouldn’t let him stay with her. She’d have packing to do. This Fluffy person would want to carry her off and gossip about Horace—what he had said to her and what she had said to him, and how thoroughly justified she was in her treatment of him. And so—he widened his mouth bitterly—and so she would blow out of his life like thistledown. This splendid meeting, which had been the dream of his boyhood, would be wasted—cold-shouldered into oblivion by. trivialities.
In his desperation he invented a dozen mad schemes for detaining her. It was on the cards that his car might break down. Unfortunately it showed every healthy sign of living beyond its reputation. Well, if it didn’t do it voluntarily, he might help it—might lose a spark-plug or loosen something.He might, but it wasn’t in him to do it. The moment he met her truthful gray eyes he’d be sure to shrive his conscience—then she’d detest him. No, if he was going to be a young Lochinvar, he had far better play the game boldly—swing off into side-roads and, when she wakened, explain to her laughingly: “You won’t catch your boat now, little Desire. I’ve made you lose it on purpose because—because I love you.”
Humph! And she’d be amiable, wouldn’t she? Some men might be able to carry that off. He couldn’t. He’d feel a cur; he’d look it. So he drove on through the darkness, cursing at every new mile-stone because it brought him nearer to the hour of parting.
He wished to heaven she would wake up. While he fumed and fretted, he built topply air-castles. Couldn’t he marry her—propose clean off the bat and get it over? Such things had happened. The idea allured him. He began to reckon his finances to see whether he could afford it. He had saved seven hundred pounds from his Beauty Incorporated dividends; every year there would be three hundred more. Then he had his future. His work was in demand. Several commissions had been offered him. No fiction-writer since Du Maurier, so the critics told him, had illustrated his own stories quite so happily. His next book was going to make him famous—he was sure of it. Oh, yes, so far as money went, he was eligible.
From somewhere at the back of his mind a wise voice kept warning: “You have to live all your life with a woman; marrying’s the least part of marriage. Go slowly. How d’you know that she isn’t another Fluffy?”
It was just as though Mrs. Sheerug were talking. He argued angrily against her disillusions. “But she’s not selfish like Vashti; and, anyway, you weren’t fair to Vashti. You wouldn’t believe that she was good—you wouldn’t even let Hal believe it. That was why he lost her.”
Then Madame Josephine took a hand: “When you find her, don’t try to change her. Women long to be trusted. Be content to love.”
He gasped. What a lot Madame Josephine knew about men and women. He was doing what all men did—and he had promised himself so faithfully to be the exception. Already he was wanting to change Desire: wanting to make her give up such friends as Fluffy; wishing she didn’t smoke cigarettes, though so long as she wasn’t married to him he found it rather fascinating; feeling shocked that she had trusted a strange man so carelessly, though, when he happened to be her chance-selected companion, he had been glad to profit by her carelessness.
And then—he didn’t like to own it—he felt piqued by her lack of curiosity. She had taken him so quietly for granted. She hadn’t asked who he was, or why he, of all men, had been sent to her rescue. Any man would have done, provided he had had a car. It was A Man with A Car that she had wanted. When the emergency was ended and he had served his purpose, she would dismiss him with a polite “Thank you,” and put him out of her memory. Thistledown—that was what she was.
He bent over her. Still sleeping! Her red lips were parted, the glint of her white teeth showing. One hand was beneath her cheek, the other against her breast like a crumpled petal. Below her eyes the long lashes made shadows. How sweet she was, how fragile, how trusting—how like the child-Desire who had snuggled into his arms in the woodland! With a sudden revulsion he despised his fault-finding. Chivalry and tenderness leapt up. He must make it a law with himself to believe the highest of her, whatever happened or had happened.
He longed to waken her. He imagined how her eyes would tremble on him if she awoke to find him bent above her hands. But would they? Because he wasn’t sure, he cursed his inherited reticence.
Out of the east, driving his misty sheep before him, the shepherd of the dawn came walking. Like a mischievous dog, with his red tongue lolling, the sun sprang up and scattered the flock through many pastures.
Still she slept.
Outside Reading the engine went wrong. For a moment he hoped—— But, no, it was nothing serious. In making adjustments he made much more noise than was necessary. She did not rouse.
Nearly five o’clock! Other people would claim her in two hours. For the next forty minutes that thought, that other people would claim her, provided him with exquisite torture. Some of those other people would be men—how could any man be near her without loving her?
He reached Maidenhead and came to the bridge—came to the river winding like a silver pathway between nose-gays of gayly painted houseboats.
“Ho-ho!”
Jamming on the brakes in the middle of the bridge, he brought the car to a halt. Her hand fluttered up to her mouth in a pretty pretense at checking the yawn. She rubbed her eyes. “Morning! Didn’t I choose a good place to wake up? Where are we?” She sat upright. “My, but I am cramped. And, oh, look at my dress! It’ll embarrass you most horribly when we get to London. The police’ll think you’re eloping with a faery.”
He crouched above the wheel, clutching it tightly, fearing what he might do with his hands. Her casual cheerfulness stifled his words. It was like a blow across his lips. What he had intended to say was so serious. His eyes felt hot. He had a vision of himself as a wild unkempt being, almost primeval, who struggled and panted. He was filled with a sickening sense of self-despising and dreaded lest at any moment he might hear her laughing.
“What a shame!” She stroked his sleeve gently. Her voice was concerned. “I am a little beast. You’ve been at it all night while I’ve been——” She rippled into laughter. “Do tell me whether I snored. Why don’t you say something? You’ll get me frightened; you look most awfully strange and funny.” And then, softly: “Poor you! You’re very tired.”
He was like a man turned to stone. She listened for any sound of footsteps; she might need help. Except for the sunshine, the lapping of the river and the careless singing of birds, the whole world was empty.
She swept the hair back from her forehead and gazed away from him. She mustn’t let him know that he’d upset her.
“The river! Isn’t it splendid? And all the little curly mists. Why, this must be Maidenhead. Yes, there’s the place where we hired the boat when I came here with Horace and Fluffy. I hate to leave it, but—— We’d better be getting on to London, hadn’t we?”
He didn’t answer. Slowly she turned and regarded him. Was he sulky, or ill, or——?
“I’m doing my best to be pleasant.” There was a hint of tears in the way she said it. “You won’t let me help you—won’t tell me what’s the matter. I suppose that’s because I look untidy and ugly.”
“Princess!”
Tremblingly he seized her hands. She drew back from him: “Oh, please! You’re hurting.”
His eyes had touched hers for a second, penetrating their cloudiness. He let her slip from his grasp. “I’m sorry. I thought—I thought you were some one else.”
He was on the point of starting when she rose and jumped out
“I’m stiff. Let’s say ’Good-by’ to the dear old Thames. It won’t take a minute.” And then, over her shoulder, as she leant across the parapet: “You thought I was some one else. Who knows? Perhaps I am.”
All that he could see of her was her slight figure and the back of her pretty head. He went and stood near her, within arm-stretch.
Without looking at him she asked a question. “Why do you beat about the bush? Last night you had something on your mind that you wouldn’t tell. This morning it’s worse. What makes you so timid? I’m only a girl.”
“Because——”
“Go on.”
“Because it’s something that would offend you if you weren’t——”
She shook her head. “I’m never offended. I’m too understanding. Perhaps—— Were you fond of this some one?”
“Fond, I?” The river grew blurred “It was years ago. I was a boy and she was only a little girl. It’s like a story—like some one I read about, and then went out to try and discover.”
A market-cart rumbled across the bridge, mountain-high with vegetables. When the sound of its going had died out, she moved closer.
“I knew a boy once who called me ’Princess.’ He used to tell me—it was a queer, dear thing to tell me—he used to tell me that the babies came into my eyes when I was happy. But that was only when I’d been awfully nice to him.” When he stared at her, she nodded. “Really. He did. I’m not joking.”
How long had she recognized him? Had she been cruel on purpose? Had she kept him on tenter-hooks for her own diversion? He laughed softly. It wasn’t quite the rushing together of two souls that imagination had painted. And yet, there were compensations: the sleeping houses with their blinds discreetly lowered; the sparkling river; the spray of plunging clouds; on the bridge, suspended between sky and river, this pale queenly sprite of a girl. The golden girdle about her waist jingled. He took no notice the first time and the second; but the third it seemed a challenge. He reached out his arm.
Tossing back her hair, she slipped from him. “Not allowed. You go too fast; you were too slow at first. Why on earth didn’t you tell me last night, instead of—— Think what a splendid time we might have had. And now we’ve only a few hours.”
He seized her hands and held them, palm to palm. This time she made no complaint that he hurt. “You’re not going.” He was breathing quickly. “You’re never going unless——”
Her half-closed eyes mocked him with their old impishness. “But you mustn’t hold me like that. It isn’t done in the best families—not in public, anyway—even by the oldest friends.”
She broke from him and stepped into the car. “Let’s be nice to each other. We haven’t been very nice yet.”
Very nice! He’d sat up all night and tossed his holiday plans to the winds for her. He grinned to himself as he cranked the engine. This was the same Desire with a vengeance—the old Desire who had tried to make people ask pardon when she was the offender.
They were traveling again. His hands were occupied; he could make love to her with nothing more alarming than words. She felt safe to lower her defenses.
“You were just a little judging last night.”
“Was I?”
“Just a little. About Fluffy. You don’t even know her We were stupid to quarrel.”
“It wasn’t as bad as that.”
“It was. You were, oh, so extremely righteous. But I’d have been just as angry in your defense, or any one else’s whom I liked. I make a loyal little friend.”
“Would you truly quarrel in my defense?”
She patted his hand where it rested on the wheel “Of course I would. But last night you hurt me so much that—— I wonder if I dare tell you. You see, it hurt all the more because we’d only just met. I pretended——”
He finished her sentence: “To be asleep.”
She bit her lip. “Yes.”
“Then you heard?”
“Heard what?”
“What I said when I buttoned your cloak about you?” She made her eyes innocently wide. “Did you do that? That was kind.”
She was dodging him. He knew it; yet he wondered. Had she heard him whisper that he loved her? If she had—— He glanced sideways; all he saw was the gleam of her throat through her blowy hair.
His mind went back across the years. How much he had lost of her—a child then, a woman now! If they were to bridge the gulf, it would be wiser to start with memories.
“I found what you’d written on the window—found it next morning, after you’d left.”
“Did I write anything? It’s so long ago. How wonderful that you should have remembered!”
“Not wonderful at all. If you’d meant it, you’d remember.”
She had gone too far with her evasions. Snuggling closer, their shoulders touching, she bent across him till their eyes met.
“I did mean it then. But you shouldn’t expect a girl to own it. I can prove to you that I meant it. I wrote, ’I love you,’ and then, lower down, ’I love you.’ I’ve—I’ve often thought about you, and about—— What times we had! D’you remember the bird-catcher and Bones? Poor Bones! How jealous you were of him, and I expect he’s dead.” She laughed: “So you needn’t be jealous any longer. And d’you remember how I would bathe? Shocking, wasn’t it? I thought it would change me from a girl to a boy. And how I called you King Arthur once, and made you angry? I think—— No, you won’t like me to say that.”
He urged her.
“I think you’re still a King Arthur or else—you wouldn’t have objected to Fluffy, and you wouldn’t have made such a mess about recognizing me.”
Stung by the old taunt he grew reckless. “I did tell you. You heard what I said, but you tricked me by pretending you were sleeping.”
“A Sir Launcelot wouldn’t have, been put off by pretense. He’d have shaken me by the shoulders. Oh, don’t look hurt. Let’s talk of something else. What d’you suppose I’ve been doing with myself?”
As they drove through the morning country, between hedges cool with dew and fragrant with opening flowers, she told him.
“After my father had kidnaped me” (so she knew that Hal was her father!) “my beautiful mother took me to America. Sometimes we traveled in Europe, but she was afraid to bring me to England so long as I was little. This summer’s the first time I’ve been back. She let me come with Fluffy. I’m going to be an actress—going to start next fall in New York, I expect, if my mother allows me. Fluffy’s promised to help. She’s a star. Janice Audrey’s her real name. You must have heard of her. No! Oh, well, she’s quite famous, even if you haven’t. So you see why it’s so important for me to sail with her.”
“You’re not going to sail with her.”
“I am.” She caught her breath and gazed at him wonderingly. “How foolish of you! That’s why we’ve driven all night, and——”
“You’re not going to now.”
She threw herself back in the seat a little contemptuously. “It’s nonsense to discuss it. I’d like to know what makes you say it.”
“Because——- It’s difficult to tell you. Because I couldn’t bear to lose you the moment we’ve met. I don’t think—well, of course, you can’t understand what you’ve been in my life. Don’t laugh, Desire; I’m not flirting—not exaggerating. I’ve always believed that I’d find you. I’ve lived for that. I’ve worked, and tried to be famous and worthy so that—so that you’d like me. I had an idea that somewhere, far out in the world, you were thinking of me and waiting for me.” He glanced at her shyly. “Were you?”
She was sitting motionless, staring ahead.
“Were you?”
Tears came into her eyes. “It’s very beautiful—what you’ve told me. It makes me feel—— Oh, I don’t know—that I wish I were better. You see, you’ve thought of me as a dream-person, as some one very wonderful. I’m only a reality—an ordinary girl with a little cleverness, who wants to be an actress. Yes, I’ve thought about you sometimes. Mother and I have often talked about you—but not in the way you mean, I expect.”
He thrilled. She had thought about him. She owned it “You couldn’t be better than you are,” he whispered.
She shook her head. “You haven’t known me long enough. I’m disappointing.”
He smiled incredulously.
“But I am,” she pouted, with a touch of petulance. “Then I’ll have to know you long enough. You’ll have to give me the chance to be disillusioned; that’s only fair. All the while you were sleeping I was planning a way to keep you from going. At first I hoped the car would break down. When it didn’t, I was tempted to loosen something so that we’d get stuck on the road. Not at all a King Arthur trick, that! But I couldn’t bring myself to do it after you’d trusted me. Then I thought I’d run off with you—let you wake up in Devon, miles from any railway, with no time to get back. Somehow, from what I remembered of you, I didn’t think that that would make you pleasant. Then I had a mad notion.”
“What was it?”
“You won’t laugh at me?”
“Honest Injun. I promise.”
“I thought I’d propose to you the moment you woke and we’d get married.”
“You thought of that all by your little self!” Her voice rose in a clear carol of music. “You quaint, funny person.” Catching her humor, he joined in her laughing. “It seemed tremendously possible while you slept. I even reckoned up my bank-account. But I’ve a real scheme now. When we ran away from Fanner Joseph, I was going to take you to my mother. D’you remember?”
“Well?”
“Let’s pick up our adventure where we dropped it. I’ll take you to her.”
“Dreamer! What about my sailing, and my mother waiting for me, and Fluffy?”
“Oh, hang Fluffy! She’s always intruding.”
“That’s not kind. Besides, I don’t want Fluffy hanged. If she were, she couldn’t help me to be an actress.”
“But you’re not going to be an actress. I’d hate to think of you being stared at by any one who could pay the money. An actress marries the public, but you—— Look here, I’m serious.”
“You think you are. I never met any one like you. You weave magic cloaks in your imagination and try to make live people wear them. If the magic cloaks don’t fit, you’ll be angry. So don’t weave one for me; I warn you. What’s the time? Then in less than seven hours I sail for America.”
He felt like a kite, straining toward the clouds, which the hand of a child was dragging down to earth. Her voice uttered prose, but her eyes smiled poetry. She seemed to be repeating disenchanted phrases which she had borrowed without comprehending. Every time he looked at her she inspired him to flights; but she refused to follow him herself. Because of that he fell silent.
Streets commenced. The smoke of freshly kindled fires boiled and bubbled against the sky. Frowsy maids knelt whitening doorsteps, as though saying their prayers. Blinds shot up at second-story windows. The world was getting dressed. It was the hour when dreams ended.
Desire drew her cloak closer, hiding the green and gold of her romance attire.
“I didn’t mean to be horrid. Don’t think that I don’t appreciate——”
Whatever it was she said was lost in the clatter of a passing tram.
“You weren’t horrid.” He spoke quietly. “Even if you had been, I deserved it. I’ve been,” he hesitated and shrugged his shoulders expressively, “just a little mad. What’s the address? Where am I to drive you?”
They had entered Regent’s Park. For a moment the spell of the country returned. In fields, beyond the canal, sheep were grazing.
“Can’t we go more slowly?” She touched his arm gently.
“We can. But, if we do, I’ll have more time to make a fool of myself, and I’ve done that pretty thoroughly.”
“I don’t think so.”
“But I have and I owe you an apology. You see, all my life you’ve been an inspiration. I’ve imagined you so intensely that I couldn’t treat you politely as a stranger—as what you call a ’real’ person.”
Her face trembled. All the mischief had gone out of it. Her hands moved distressfully as though they wanted to caress him, but didn’t dare. She crouched her chin against her shoulder and gazed away through the sun and shadows of the park.
“I don’t want you to be polite to me,” she faltered. “I don’t think you understand how difficult it is to be a girl. We neither of us know quite what we want.” She looked at him wistfully. “Disappointed in me already! Didn’t I warn you? And yet, if you’d take the trouble to know me, you’d find that I’m not—not so bad and heartless.”
“Little Desire, I never thought you were bad and heartless—never for one moment.”
The babies came into her eyes and her finger went childishly to her mouth. “No, you wouldn’t have the right to; but I’m ever so much nicer than you suspect.”
He slowed down the engine. His face had gone white beneath its tan. They were both stirred; they seemed to listen to the beating of each other’s heart “Give me another chance,” he urged unsteadily.
“But how? I must sail.” She gazed at him forlornly. “Here we are. You were going past it.”
They drew up before a tall, buff-colored house, standing in a terrace. As though glad to escape from their emotional suspense, she jumped out the moment they had stopped, ran up the steps and rang the bell. While she waited for her ring to be answered, she kept her back towards him. The door was opened by a maid in a white cap and apron.
“Hulloa, Ethel! So you see I’ve got back. How’s Miss Janice? Busy packing?”
“Still in bed, Miss Desire. I was just going up to help her dress.”
“Out last night with Mr. Horace?”
“Yes. He’s to be here to breakfast He’s going to the station to see you off.”
“All right. I’ll be in in a moment You needn’t stop.”
She came tripping down the steps to Teddy. He had got out of the car and had been standing watching her. He had feared that she would glance across her shoulder and dismiss him with a nod.