Chapter XIV
The sun of that same day going down, dusk was saluted as usual at thehotel by an instantaneous sparkle of electric lights. The hours betweendinner and bedtime were always difficult enough to kill, and the nightafter the dance they were further tarnished by the peevishness ofdissipation. Certainly, in the opinion of Hirst and Hewet, who lay backin long arm-chairs in the middle of the hall, with their coffee-cupsbeside them, and their cigarettes in their hands, the evening wasunusually dull, the women unusually badly dressed, the men unusuallyfatuous. Moreover, when the mail had been distributed half an hour agothere were no letters for either of the two young men. As every otherperson, practically, had received two or three plump letters fromEngland, which they were now engaged in reading, this seemed hard, andprompted Hirst to make the caustic remark that the animals had been fed.Their silence, he said, reminded him of the silence in the lion-housewhen each beast holds a lump of raw meat in its paws. He went on,stimulated by this comparison, to liken some to hippopotamuses, someto canary birds, some to swine, some to parrots, and some to loathsomereptiles curled round the half-decayed bodies of sheep. The intermittentsounds--now a cough, now a horrible wheezing or throat-clearing, now alittle patter of conversation--were just, he declared, what you hear ifyou stand in the lion-house when the bones are being mauled. But thesecomparisons did not rouse Hewet, who, after a careless glance roundthe room, fixed his eyes upon a thicket of native spears which were soingeniously arranged as to run their points at you whichever way youapproached them. He was clearly oblivious of his surroundings; whereuponHirst, perceiving that Hewet's mind was a complete blank, fixed hisattention more closely upon his fellow-creatures. He was too far fromthem, however, to hear what they were saying, but it pleased him toconstruct little theories about them from their gestures and appearance.
Mrs. Thornbury had received a great many letters. She was completelyengrossed in them. When she had finished a page she handed it to herhusband, or gave him the sense of what she was reading in a series ofshort quotations linked together by a sound at the back of her throat."Evie writes that George has gone to Glasgow. 'He finds Mr. Chadbourneso nice to work with, and we hope to spend Christmas together, but Ishould not like to move Betty and Alfred any great distance (no, quiteright), though it is difficult to imagine cold weather in this heat. . . .Eleanor and Roger drove over in the new trap. . . . Eleanor certainlylooked more like herself than I've seen her since the winter. She hasput Baby on three bottles now, which I'm sure is wise (I'm sure it istoo), and so gets better nights. . . . My hair still falls out. I findit on the pillow! But I am cheered by hearing from Tottie Hall Green.. . . Muriel is in Torquay enjoying herself greatly at dances. She _is_going to show her black put after all.' . . . A line from Herbert--sobusy, poor fellow! Ah! Margaret says, 'Poor old Mrs. Fairbank diedon the eighth, quite suddenly in the conservatory, only a maid in thehouse, who hadn't the presence of mind to lift her up, which they thinkmight have saved her, but the doctor says it might have come at anymoment, and one can only feel thankful that it was in the house and notin the street (I should think so!). The pigeons have increased terribly,just as the rabbits did five years ago . . .'" While she read herhusband kept nodding his head very slightly, but very steadily in signof approval.
Near by, Miss Allan was reading her letters too. They were notaltogether pleasant, as could be seen from the slight rigidity whichcame over her large fine face as she finished reading them and replacedthem neatly in their envelopes. The lines of care and responsibilityon her face made her resemble an elderly man rather than a woman. Theletters brought her news of the failure of last year's fruit crop in NewZealand, which was a serious matter, for Hubert, her only brother, madehis living on a fruit farm, and if it failed again, of course, he wouldthrow up his place, come back to England, and what were they to do withhim this time? The journey out here, which meant the loss of a term'swork, became an extravagance and not the just and wonderful holiday dueto her after fifteen years of punctual lecturing and correcting essaysupon English literature. Emily, her sister, who was a teacher also,wrote: "We ought to be prepared, though I have no doubt Hubert will bemore reasonable this time." And then went on in her sensible way to saythat she was enjoying a very jolly time in the Lakes. "They are lookingexceedingly pretty just now. I have seldom seen the trees so forward atthis time of year. We have taken our lunch out several days. Old Aliceis as young as ever, and asks after every one affectionately. The dayspass very quickly, and term will soon be here. Political prospects _not_good, I think privately, but do not like to damp Ellen's enthusiasm.Lloyd George has taken the Bill up, but so have many before now, and weare where we are; but trust to find myself mistaken. Anyhow, we have ourwork cut out for us. . . . Surely Meredith lacks the _human_ note onelikes in W. W.?" she concluded, and went on to discuss some questions ofEnglish literature which Miss Allan had raised in her last letter.
At a little distance from Miss Allan, on a seat shaded and madesemi-private by a thick clump of palm trees, Arthur and Susanwere reading each other's letters. The big slashing manuscripts ofhockey-playing young women in Wiltshire lay on Arthur's knee, whileSusan deciphered tight little legal hands which rarely filled more thana page, and always conveyed the same impression of jocular and breezygoodwill.
"I do hope Mr. Hutchinson will like me, Arthur," she said, looking up.
"Who's your loving Flo?" asked Arthur.
"Flo Graves--the girl I told you about, who was engaged to that dreadfulMr. Vincent," said Susan. "Is Mr. Hutchinson married?" she asked.
Already her mind was busy with benevolent plans for her friends, orrather with one magnificent plan--which was simple too--they were all toget married--at once--directly she got back. Marriage, marriage that wasthe right thing, the only thing, the solution required by every one sheknew, and a great part of her meditations was spent in tracing everyinstance of discomfort, loneliness, ill-health, unsatisfied ambition,restlessness, eccentricity, taking things up and dropping them again,public speaking, and philanthropic activity on the part of men andparticularly on the part of women to the fact that they wanted to marry,were trying to marry, and had not succeeded in getting married. If, asshe was bound to own, these symptoms sometimes persisted after marriage,she could only ascribe them to the unhappy law of nature which decreedthat there was only one Arthur Venning, and only one Susan who couldmarry him. Her theory, of course, had the merit of being fully supportedby her own case. She had been vaguely uncomfortable at home for two orthree years now, and a voyage like this with her selfish old aunt,who paid her fare but treated her as servant and companion in one, wastypical of the kind of thing people expected of her. Directly shebecame engaged, Mrs. Paley behaved with instinctive respect, positivelyprotested when Susan as usual knelt down to lace her shoes, and appearedreally grateful for an hour of Susan's company where she had been usedto exact two or three as her right. She therefore foresaw a life of fargreater comfort than she had been used to, and the change had alreadyproduced a great increase of warmth in her feelings towards otherpeople.
It was close on twenty years now since Mrs. Paley had been able to laceher own shoes or even to see them, the disappearance of her feet havingcoincided more or less accurately with the death of her husband, a manof business, soon after which event Mrs. Paley began to grow stout.She was a selfish, independent old woman, possessed of a considerableincome, which she spent upon the upkeep of a house that needed sevenservants and a charwoman in Lancaster Gate, and another with a gardenand carriage-horses in Surrey. Susan's engagement relieved her of theone great anxiety of her life--that her son Christopher should "entanglehimself" with his cousin. Now that this familiar source of interest wasremoved, she felt a little low and inclined to see more in Susanthan she used to. She had decided to give her a very handsome weddingpresent, a cheque for two hundred, two hundred and fifty, or possibly,conceivably--it depended upon the under-gardener and Huths' bill fordoing up the drawing-room--three hundred pounds sterling.
She was thinking of this very question, revolving the figures, as shesat in her wheeled chair with a table spread with cards by her side. ThePatience had somehow got into a muddle, and she did not like to call forSusan to help her, as Susan seemed to be busy with Arthur.
"She's every right to expect a handsome present from me, of course," shethought, looking vaguely at the leopard on its hind legs, "and I've nodoubt she does! Money goes a long way with every one. The young are veryselfish. If I were to die, nobody would miss me but Dakyns, and she'llbe consoled by the will! However, I've got no reason to complain. . . .I can still enjoy myself. I'm not a burden to any-one. . . . I like agreat many things a good deal, in spite of my legs."
Being slightly depressed, however, she went on to think of the onlypeople she had known who had not seemed to her at all selfish or fond ofmoney, who had seemed to her somehow rather finer than the general run;people she willingly acknowledged, who were finer than she was. Therewere only two of them. One was her brother, who had been drowned beforeher eyes, the other was a girl, her greatest friend, who had died ingiving birth to her first child. These things had happened some fiftyyears ago.
"They ought not to have died," she thought. "However, they did--and weselfish old creatures go on." The tears came to her eyes; she felt agenuine regret for them, a kind of respect for their youth and beauty,and a kind of shame for herself; but the tears did not fall; and sheopened one of those innumerable novels which she used to pronounce goodor bad, or pretty middling, or really wonderful. "I can't think howpeople come to imagine such things," she would say, taking off herspectacles and looking up with the old faded eyes, that were becomingringed with white.
Just behind the stuffed leopard Mr. Elliot was playing chess with Mr.Pepper. He was being defeated, naturally, for Mr. Pepper scarcely tookhis eyes off the board, and Mr. Elliot kept leaning back in his chairand throwing out remarks to a gentleman who had only arrived the nightbefore, a tall handsome man, with a head resembling the head of anintellectual ram. After a few remarks of a general nature had passed,they were discovering that they knew some of the same people, as indeedhad been obvious from their appearance directly they saw each other.
"Ah yes, old Truefit," said Mr. Elliot. "He has a son at Oxford. I'veoften stayed with them. It's a lovely old Jacobean house. Some exquisiteGreuzes--one or two Dutch pictures which the old boy kept in thecellars. Then there were stacks upon stacks of prints. Oh, the dirt inthat house! He was a miser, you know. The boy married a daughter ofLord Pinwells. I know them too. The collecting mania tends to run infamilies. This chap collects buckles--men's shoe-buckles they must be,in use between the years 1580 and 1660; the dates mayn't be right, butfact's as I say. Your true collector always has some unaccountablefad of that kind. On other points he's as level-headed as a breeder ofshorthorns, which is what he happens to be. Then the Pinwells, as youprobably know, have their share of eccentricity too. Lady Maud, forinstance--" he was interrupted here by the necessity of considering hismove,--"Lady Maud has a horror of cats and clergymen, and people withbig front teeth. I've heard her shout across a table, 'Keep your mouthshut, Miss Smith; they're as yellow as carrots!' across a table, mindyou. To me she's always been civility itself. She dabbles in literature,likes to collect a few of us in her drawing-room, but mention aclergyman, a bishop even, nay, the Archbishop himself, and she gobbleslike a turkey-cock. I've been told it's a family feud--something to dowith an ancestor in the reign of Charles the First. Yes," he continued,suffering check after check, "I always like to know something of thegrandmothers of our fashionable young men. In my opinion they preserveall that we admire in the eighteenth century, with the advantage, in themajority of cases, that they are personally clean. Not that one wouldinsult old Lady Barborough by calling her clean. How often d'you think,Hilda," he called out to his wife, "her ladyship takes a bath?"
"I should hardly like to say, Hugh," Mrs. Elliot tittered, "but wearingpuce velvet, as she does even on the hottest August day, it somehowdoesn't show."
"Pepper, you have me," said Mr. Elliot. "My chess is even worse than Iremembered." He accepted his defeat with great equanimity, because hereally wished to talk.
He drew his chair beside Mr. Wilfrid Flushing, the newcomer.
"Are these at all in your line?" he asked, pointing at a case in frontof them, where highly polished crosses, jewels, and bits of embroidery,the work of the natives, were displayed to tempt visitors.
"Shams, all of them," said Mr. Flushing briefly. "This rug, now, isn'tat all bad." He stopped and picked up a piece of the rug at their feet."Not old, of course, but the design is quite in the right tradition.Alice, lend me your brooch. See the difference between the old work andthe new."
A lady, who was reading with great concentration, unfastened her broochand gave it to her husband without looking at him or acknowledging thetentative bow which Mr. Elliot was desirous of giving her. If shehad listened, she might have been amused by the reference to old LadyBarborough, her great-aunt, but, oblivious of her surroundings, she wenton reading.
The clock, which had been wheezing for some minutes like an old manpreparing to cough, now struck nine. The sound slightly disturbedcertain somnolent merchants, government officials, and men ofindependent means who were lying back in their chairs, chatting,smoking, ruminating about their affairs, with their eyes half shut;they raised their lids for an instant at the sound and then closed themagain. They had the appearance of crocodiles so fully gorged by theirlast meal that the future of the world gives them no anxiety whatever.The only disturbance in the placid bright room was caused by a largemoth which shot from light to light, whizzing over elaborate heads ofhair, and causing several young women to raise their hands nervously andexclaim, "Some one ought to kill it!"
Absorbed in their own thoughts, Hewet and Hirst had not spoken for along time.
When the clock struck, Hirst said:
"Ah, the creatures begin to stir. . . ." He watched them raisethemselves, look about them, and settle down again. "What I abhor mostof all," he concluded, "is the female breast. Imagine being Venning andhaving to get into bed with Susan! But the really repulsive thing isthat they feel nothing at all--about what I do when I have a hot bath.They're gross, they're absurd, they're utterly intolerable!"
So saying, and drawing no reply from Hewet, he proceeded to think abouthimself, about science, about Cambridge, about the Bar, about Helen andwhat she thought of him, until, being very tired, he was nodding off tosleep.
Suddenly Hewet woke him up.
"How d'you know what you feel, Hirst?"
"Are you in love?" asked Hirst. He put in his eyeglass.
"Don't be a fool," said Hewet.
"Well, I'll sit down and think about it," said Hirst. "One really oughtto. If these people would only think about things, the world would be afar better place for us all to live in. Are you trying to think?"
That was exactly what Hewet had been doing for the last half-hour, buthe did not find Hirst sympathetic at the moment.
"I shall go for a walk," he said.
"Remember we weren't in bed last night," said Hirst with a prodigiousyawn.
Hewet rose and stretched himself.
"I want to go and get a breath of air," he said.
An unusual feeling had been bothering him all the evening and forbiddinghim to settle into any one train of thought. It was precisely as if hehad been in the middle of a talk which interested him profoundly whensome one came up and interrupted him. He could not finish the talk, andthe longer he sat there the more he wanted to finish it. As the talkthat had been interrupted was a talk with Rachel, he had to ask himselfwhy he felt this, and why he wanted to go on talking to her. Hirst wouldmerely say that he was in love with her. But he was not in love withher. Did love begin in that way, with the wish to go on talking? No. Italways began in his case with definite physical sensations, and thesewere now absent, he did not even find her physically attractive.There was something, of course, unusual about her--she was young,inexperienced
, and inquisitive, they had been more open with each otherthan was usually possible. He always found girls interesting to talk to,and surely these were good reasons why he should wish to go on talkingto her; and last night, what with the crowd and the confusion, he hadonly been able to begin to talk to her. What was she doing now? Lying ona sofa and looking at the ceiling, perhaps. He could imagine her doingthat, and Helen in an arm-chair, with her hands on the arm of it,so--looking ahead of her, with her great big eyes--oh no, they'd betalking, of course, about the dance. But suppose Rachel was going awayin a day or two, suppose this was the end of her visit, and herfather had arrived in one of the steamers anchored in the bay,--it wasintolerable to know so little. Therefore he exclaimed, "How d'you knowwhat you feel, Hirst?" to stop himself from thinking.
But Hirst did not help him, and the other people with their aimlessmovements and their unknown lives were disturbing, so that he longed forthe empty darkness. The first thing he looked for when he stepped outof the hall door was the light of the Ambroses' villa. When he haddefinitely decided that a certain light apart from the others higher upthe hill was their light, he was considerably reassured. There seemedto be at once a little stability in all this incoherence. Without anydefinite plan in his head, he took the turning to the right and walkedthrough the town and came to the wall by the meeting of the roads, wherehe stopped. The booming of the sea was audible. The dark-blue mass ofthe mountains rose against the paler blue of the sky. There was no moon,but myriads of stars, and lights were anchored up and down in the darkwaves of earth all round him. He had meant to go back, but the singlelight of the Ambroses' villa had now become three separate lights, andhe was tempted to go on. He might as well make sure that Rachel wasstill there. Walking fast, he soon stood by the iron gate of theirgarden, and pushed it open; the outline of the house suddenly appearedsharply before his eyes, and the thin column of the verandah cuttingacross the palely lit gravel of the terrace. He hesitated. At the backof the house some one was rattling cans. He approached the front; thelight on the terrace showed him that the sitting-rooms were on thatside. He stood as near the light as he could by the corner of the house,the leaves of a creeper brushing his face. After a moment he could heara voice. The voice went on steadily; it was not talking, but from thecontinuity of the sound it was a voice reading aloud. He crept a littlecloser; he crumpled the leaves together so as to stop their rustlingabout his ears. It might be Rachel's voice. He left the shadow andstepped into the radius of the light, and then heard a sentence spokenquite distinctly.
"And there we lived from the year 1860 to 1895, the happiest years ofmy parents' lives, and there in 1862 my brother Maurice was born, to thedelight of his parents, as he was destined to be the delight of all whoknew him."
The voice quickened, and the tone became conclusive rising slightly inpitch, as if these words were at the end of the chapter. Hewet drewback again into the shadow. There was a long silence. He could justhear chairs being moved inside. He had almost decided to go back, whensuddenly two figures appeared at the window, not six feet from him.
"It was Maurice Fielding, of course, that your mother was engaged to,"said Helen's voice. She spoke reflectively, looking out into the darkgarden, and thinking evidently as much of the look of the night as ofwhat she was saying.
"Mother?" said Rachel. Hewet's heart leapt, and he noticed the fact. Hervoice, though low, was full of surprise.
"You didn't know that?" said Helen.
"I never knew there'd been any one else," said Rachel. She was clearlysurprised, but all they said was said low and inexpressively, becausethey were speaking out into the cool dark night.
"More people were in love with her than with any one I've ever known,"Helen stated. "She had that power--she enjoyed things. She wasn'tbeautiful, but--I was thinking of her last night at the dance. Shegot on with every kind of person, and then she made it all soamazingly--funny."
It appeared that Helen was going back into the past, choosing her wordsdeliberately, comparing Theresa with the people she had known sinceTheresa died.
"I don't know how she did it," she continued, and ceased, and there wasa long pause, in which a little owl called first here, then there, as itmoved from tree to tree in the garden.
"That's so like Aunt Lucy and Aunt Katie," said Rachel at last. "Theyalways make out that she was very sad and very good."
"Then why, for goodness' sake, did they do nothing but criticize herwhen she was alive?" said Helen. Very gentle their voices sounded, as ifthey fell through the waves of the sea.
"If I were to die to-morrow . . ." she began.
The broken sentences had an extraordinary beauty and detachment inHewet's ears, and a kind of mystery too, as though they were spoken bypeople in their sleep.
"No, Rachel," Helen's voice continued, "I'm not going to walk in thegarden; it's damp--it's sure to be damp; besides, I see at least a dozentoads."
"Toads? Those are stones, Helen. Come out. It's nicer out. The flowerssmell," Rachel replied.
Hewet drew still farther back. His heart was beating very quickly.Apparently Rachel tried to pull Helen out on to the terrace, andhelen resisted. There was a certain amount of scuffling, entreating,resisting, and laughter from both of them. Then a man's form appeared.Hewet could not hear what they were all saying. In a minute they hadgone in; he could hear bolts grating then; there was dead silence, andall the lights went out.
He turned away, still crumpling and uncrumpling a handful of leaveswhich he had torn from the wall. An exquisite sense of pleasure andrelief possessed him; it was all so solid and peaceful after the ballat the hotel, whether he was in love with them or not, and he was not inlove with them; no, but it was good that they should be alive.
After standing still for a minute or two he turned and began to walktowards the gate. With the movement of his body, the excitement, theromance and the richness of life crowded into his brain. He shouted outa line of poetry, but the words escaped him, and he stumbled among linesand fragments of lines which had no meaning at all except for the beautyof the words. He shut the gate, and ran swinging from side to side downthe hill, shouting any nonsense that came into his head. "Here am I,"he cried rhythmically, as his feet pounded to the left and to the right,"plunging along, like an elephant in the jungle, stripping the branchesas I go (he snatched at the twigs of a bush at the roadside), roaringinnumerable words, lovely words about innumerable things, runningdownhill and talking nonsense aloud to myself about roads and leavesand lights and women coming out into the darkness--about women--aboutRachel, about Rachel." He stopped and drew a deep breath. The nightseemed immense and hospitable, and although so dark there seemed tobe things moving down there in the harbour and movement out at sea.He gazed until the darkness numbed him, and then he walked on quickly,still murmuring to himself. "And I ought to be in bed, snoringand dreaming, dreaming, dreaming. Dreams and realities, dreams andrealities, dreams and realities," he repeated all the way up the avenue,scarcely knowing what he said, until he reached the front door. Here hepaused for a second, and collected himself before he opened the door.
His eyes were dazed, his hands very cold, and his brain excited and yethalf asleep. Inside the door everything was as he had left it exceptthat the hall was now empty. There were the chairs turning in towardseach other where people had sat talking, and the empty glasses on littletables, and the newspapers scattered on the floor. As he shut the doorhe felt as if he were enclosed in a square box, and instantly shrivelledup. It was all very bright and very small. He stopped for a minute bythe long table to find a paper which he had meant to read, but he wasstill too much under the influence of the dark and the fresh air toconsider carefully which paper it was or where he had seen it.
As he fumbled vaguely among the papers he saw a figure cross the tail ofhis eye, coming downstairs. He heard the swishing sound of skirts, andto his great surprise, Evelyn M. came up to him, laid her hand on thetable as if to prevent him from taking up a paper, and said:
"You're jus
t the person I wanted to talk to." Her voice was a littleunpleasant and metallic, her eyes were very bright, and she kept themfixed upon him.
"To talk to me?" he repeated. "But I'm half asleep."
"But I think you understand better than most people," she answered, andsat down on a little chair placed beside a big leather chair so thatHewet had to sit down beside her.
"Well?" he said. He yawned openly, and lit a cigarette. He could notbelieve that this was really happening to him. "What is it?"
"Are you really sympathetic, or is it just a pose?" she demanded.
"It's for you to say," he replied. "I'm interested, I think." He stillfelt numb all over and as if she was much too close to him.
"Any one can be interested!" she cried impatiently. "Your friend Mr.Hirst's interested, I daresay however, I do believe in you. You lookas if you'd got a nice sister, somehow." She paused, picking at somesequins on her knees, and then, as if she had made up her mind, shestarted off, "Anyhow, I'm going to ask your advice. D'you ever get intoa state where you don't know your own mind? That's the state I'm in now.You see, last night at the dance Raymond Oliver,--he's the tall darkboy who looks as if he had Indian blood in him, but he says he's notreally,--well, we were sitting out together, and he told me all abouthimself, how unhappy he is at home, and how he hates being out here.They've put him into some beastly mining business. He says it'sbeastly--I should like it, I know, but that's neither here nor there.And I felt awfully sorry for him, one couldn't help being sorry for him,and when he asked me to let him kiss me, I did. I don't see any harmin that, do you? And then this morning he said he'd thought I meantsomething more, and I wasn't the sort to let any one kiss me. And wetalked and talked. I daresay I was very silly, but one can't help likingpeople when one's sorry for them. I do like him most awfully--" Shepaused. "So I gave him half a promise, and then, you see, there's AlfredPerrott."
"Oh, Perrott," said Hewet.
"We got to know each other on that picnic the other day," she continued."He seemed so lonely, especially as Arthur had gone off with Susan, andone couldn't help guessing what was in his mind. So we had quite a longtalk when you were looking at the ruins, and he told me all about hislife, and his struggles, and how fearfully hard it had been. D'you know,he was a boy in a grocer's shop and took parcels to people's houses ina basket? That interested me awfully, because I always say it doesn'tmatter how you're born if you've got the right stuff in you. And he toldme about his sister who's paralysed, poor girl, and one can see she's agreat trial, though he's evidently very devoted to her. I must say I doadmire people like that! I don't expect you do because you're so clever.Well, last night we sat out in the garden together, and I couldn't helpseeing what he wanted to say, and comforting him a little, and tellinghim I did care--I really do--only, then, there's Raymond Oliver. What Iwant you to tell me is, can one be in love with two people at once, orcan't one?"
She became silent, and sat with her chin on her hands, looking veryintent, as if she were facing a real problem which had to be discussedbetween them.
"I think it depends what sort of person you are," said Hewet. Helooked at her. She was small and pretty, aged perhaps twenty-eight ortwenty-nine, but though dashing and sharply cut, her features expressednothing very clearly, except a great deal of spirit and good health.
"Who are you, what are you; you see, I know nothing about you," hecontinued.
"Well, I was coming to that," said Evelyn M. She continued to rest herchin on her hands and to look intently ahead of her. "I'm the daughterof a mother and no father, if that interests you," she said. "It's not avery nice thing to be. It's what often happens in the country. She wasa farmer's daughter, and he was rather a swell--the young man up at thegreat house. He never made things straight--never married her--thoughhe allowed us quite a lot of money. His people wouldn't let him. Poorfather! I can't help liking him. Mother wasn't the sort of woman whocould keep him straight, anyhow. He was killed in the war. I believehis men worshipped him. They say great big troopers broke down and criedover his body on the battlefield. I wish I'd known him. Mother had allthe life crushed out of her. The world--" She clenched her fist. "Oh,people can be horrid to a woman like that!" She turned upon Hewet.
"Well," she said, "d'you want to know any more about me?"
"But you?" he asked, "Who looked after you?"
"I've looked after myself mostly," she laughed. "I've had splendidfriends. I do like people! That's the trouble. What would you do if youliked two people, both of them tremendously, and you couldn't tell whichmost?"
"I should go on liking them--I should wait and see. Why not?"
"But one has to make up one's mind," said Evelyn. "Or are you one of thepeople who doesn't believe in marriages and all that? Look here--thisisn't fair, I do all the telling, and you tell nothing. Perhaps you'rethe same as your friend"--she looked at him suspiciously; "perhaps youdon't like me?"
"I don't know you," said Hewet.
"I know when I like a person directly I see them! I knew I liked you thevery first night at dinner. Oh dear," she continued impatiently, "whata lot of bother would be saved if only people would say the things theythink straight out! I'm made like that. I can't help it."
"But don't you find it leads to difficulties?" Hewet asked.
"That's men's fault," she answered. "They always drag it in-love, Imean."
"And so you've gone on having one proposal after another," said Hewet.
"I don't suppose I've had more proposals than most women," said Evelyn,but she spoke without conviction.
"Five, six, ten?" Hewet ventured.
Evelyn seemed to intimate that perhaps ten was the right figure, butthat it really was not a high one.
"I believe you're thinking me a heartless flirt," she protested. "ButI don't care if you are. I don't care what any one thinks of me. Justbecause one's interested and likes to be friends with men, and talk tothem as one talks to women, one's called a flirt."
"But Miss Murgatroyd--"
"I wish you'd call me Evelyn," she interrupted.
"After ten proposals do you honestly think that men are the same aswomen?"
"Honestly, honestly,--how I hate that word! It's always used by prigs,"cried Evelyn. "Honestly I think they ought to be. That's what's sodisappointing. Every time one thinks it's not going to happen, and everytime it does."
"The pursuit of Friendship," said Hewet. "The title of a comedy."
"You're horrid," she cried. "You don't care a bit really. You might beMr. Hirst."
"Well," said Hewet, "let's consider. Let us consider--" He paused,because for the moment he could not remember what it was that they hadto consider. He was far more interested in her than in her story, for asshe went on speaking his numbness had disappeared, and he was consciousof a mixture of liking, pity, and distrust. "You've promised to marryboth Oliver and Perrott?" he concluded.
"Not exactly promised," said Evelyn. "I can't make up my mind which Ireally like best. Oh how I detest modern life!" she flung off. "It musthave been so much easier for the Elizabethans! I thought the other dayon that mountain how I'd have liked to be one of those colonists, to cutdown trees and make laws and all that, instead of fooling about with allthese people who think one's just a pretty young lady. Though I'm not.I really might _do_ something." She reflected in silence for a minute.Then she said:
"I'm afraid right down in my heart that Alfred Perrot _won't_ do. He'snot strong, is he?"
"Perhaps he couldn't cut down a tree," said Hewet. "Have you never caredfor anybody?" he asked.
"I've cared for heaps of people, but not to marry them," she said. "Isuppose I'm too fastidious. All my life I've wanted somebody I couldlook up to, somebody great and big and splendid. Most men are so small."
"What d'you mean by splendid?" Hewet asked. "People are--nothing more."
Evelyn was puzzled.
"We don't care for people because of their qualities," he tried toexplain. "It's just them that we care for,"--he struck a match--"jus
tthat," he said, pointing to the flames.
"I see what you mean," she said, "but I don't agree. I do know why Icare for people, and I think I'm hardly ever wrong. I see at once whatthey've got in them. Now I think you must be rather splendid; but notMr. Hirst."
Hewlet shook his head.
"He's not nearly so unselfish, or so sympathetic, or so big, or sounderstanding," Evelyn continued.
Hewet sat silent, smoking his cigarette.
"I should hate cutting down trees," he remarked.
"I'm not trying to flirt with you, though I suppose you think I am!"Evelyn shot out. "I'd never have come to you if I'd thought you'd merelythink odious things of me!" The tears came into her eyes.
"Do you never flirt?" he asked.
"Of course I don't," she protested. "Haven't I told you? I wantfriendship; I want to care for some one greater and nobler than I am,and if they fall in love with me it isn't my fault; I don't want it; Ipositively hate it."
Hewet could see that there was very little use in going on with theconversation, for it was obvious that Evelyn did not wish to sayanything in particular, but to impress upon him an image of herself,being, for some reason which she would not reveal, unhappy, or insecure.He was very tired, and a pale waiter kept walking ostentatiously intothe middle of the room and looking at them meaningly.
"They want to shut up," he said. "My advice is that you should tellOliver and Perrott to-morrow that you've made up your mind that youdon't mean to marry either of them. I'm certain you don't. If youchange your mind you can always tell them so. They're both sensible men;they'll understand. And then all this bother will be over." He got up.
But Evelyn did not move. She sat looking up at him with her bright eagereyes, in the depths of which he thought he detected some disappointment,or dissatisfaction.
"Good-night," he said.
"There are heaps of things I want to say to you still," she said. "AndI'm going to, some time. I suppose you must go to bed now?"
"Yes," said Hewet. "I'm half asleep." He left her still sitting byherself in the empty hall.
"Why is it that they _won't_ be honest?" he muttered to himself as hewent upstairs. Why was it that relations between different people wereso unsatisfactory, so fragmentary, so hazardous, and words so dangerousthat the instinct to sympathise with another human being was an instinctto be examined carefully and probably crushed? What had Evelyn reallywished to say to him? What was she feeling left alone in the emptyhall? The mystery of life and the unreality even of one's own sensationsovercame him as he walked down the corridor which led to his room. Itwas dimly lighted, but sufficiently for him to see a figure in a brightdressing-gown pass swiftly in front of him, the figure of a womancrossing from one room to another.