Julius crept from his room and crossed the corridor to the head of the main stairway. If they came in he would be able to watch and listen from the head of the stairs. There were no servants about. He understood now, they probably had their orders. They were used to this. Once more he swallowed and passed his tongue over his lips. He heard the key in the lock of the front door. He crouched back in the shadows, his eyes fixed upon the dark hall below, his mouth open so that he should hear better.The door slammed. Gabriel had come in alone.There was the sound of the fellow starting up his car, Julius backed away from his cramped position, and reached out for the switch. In a moment he had flooded the hall with light. Gabriel looked up, startled, she was fiddling with her bag. Her hair was untidy, and her cloak was slipping off one shoulder, a shoulder strap of her dress showed. He saw all this in a glance.
‘Hullo! - it’s you,’ said Gabriel. ‘Why such a scene with the lights? You gave me a shock.’
He did not answer, he stared down at her, white and trembling in his dressing-gown.
‘Darling, are you ill?’ she said. ‘You look terrible - what’s wrong? Why aren’t you in bed?’
He looked her all over as though fearful that something should escape him, and when she joined him at the head of the stairs he spoke:
‘You bitch!’ he said. ‘You bitch!’
For a moment she gazed at him, thinking he must be mad. ‘What on earth . . .’ she began. He did not give her time to continue.
‘I saw you,’ he said. ‘I saw you from the window. Out in the square with some fellow. You were in that car eight minutes. I timed you, eight whole minutes, and then you got out and I saw him kiss you. You bitch!’
She burst out laughing.
‘Good God, was that all? I thought you were in terrible pain. Your silly face is grey, darling. Go along to bed and don’t be so absurd.’
‘You can’t make a fool out of me,’ he said, and he reached out his hand to her arm, and shook her.
She wrenched herself away.
‘Don’t do that,’ she said. ‘Are you drunk, or what? I’ve never heard such bloody nonsense in my life.’
‘Come along to my room,’ he said. ‘I’m not joking with you.’ She followed, shrugging her shoulders, switching out the lights in the corridor.
‘I’m tired,’ she said. ‘I’ve been dancing since ten this evening. I’m not going to stay.’
He dragged her inside his room and shut the door.
‘How long has this been going on?’ he said.
‘What the devil d’you mean by “this”?’ she said. ‘Why so melodramatic?’
‘Don’t talk like that to me,’ he said.
‘I shall talk as I damn well please,’ she said.
He took hold of her wrists.
‘Why did you let that fellow kiss you?’
‘Because I like it,’ she said.
‘Has he done it before?’
‘No - as a matter of fact. No. I only met him to-night.’
‘You let him do that, and you’ve not met him before?’
‘Yes - darling.’
‘Do other men kiss you?’ he said.
‘Yes. If I’m attracted by them.’
‘On the mouth?’
‘Good heavens, where else do you suggest?’
‘Don’t play with me,’ he said. ‘How long have you let men kiss you?’
‘Oh, darling, I really can’t remember. I suppose it started during the war.’
‘Those fellows you danced with?’
‘Yes.’
‘Whenever you go out, do you always let them kiss you?’
‘It depends - please don’t be so damn idiotic. I want to go to bed.’
‘Do they only kiss you, or do you let them do other things?’ he said.
‘What d’you mean by “other things”?’
‘You know,’ he said.
‘Oh! I don’t sleep with them, if that’s what you’re getting at,’ she said.
‘D’you expect me to believe you?’
‘Yes.’
‘How can I?’
‘Because I wouldn’t lie to you,’ she said.‘If I ever want anyone, I’ll tell you. As it happens, I’ve never felt like wanting anyone up to date.’
‘You bitch!’ he said.
He sat down, passing his hand over his mouth, his hand trembling.
She looked at him thoughtfully.
‘Why should you mind?’ she said.
He brushed the remark away.
‘How do you think I’m going to live if I’m never to be certain of you, day or night?’ he said to her.
She shrugged her shoulders.
‘It’s not my affair if you choose to make a fool of yourself,’ she told him.
There was a pause and then she said: ‘You might have known this would happen. I’m nearly twenty-five, my life’s my own, after all.’
‘No,’ he said slowly. ‘No, that’s not true.You have no right to say that. You’re part of my life.’
‘Don’t shout, the servants will hear,’ she said. She picked up her bag from the table.
‘I’m going to bed, all this is very boring.You’ve probably had a tiring day and will feel better to-morrow.’
She went to the door.
‘Gabriel,’ he said. ‘Gabriel ...’
She glanced at him over her shoulder and shook her head.
‘No,’ she said.
He gazed at her sullenly, gnawing at his finger-nails, hating her.
‘I’ll stop you going to places,’ he said. ‘I’ll have you watched, I’ll see that you aren’t left alone with anyone - you needn’t imagine you can fool me, nobody has ever fooled me yet. Take care.’
She considered him a moment, her eyes narrow, making a study of him in her mind as he crouched in his dressing-gown, biting his nails, his shoulders hunched, his neck bulging over the collar, his white hair rumpled.
‘You know what’s the matter with you, you’re getting old,’ she said. Then she went out of the room.
Julius sat in his chair staring at the closed door; and as he waited there numbed and cold, too weary to drag himself to bed, it seemed to him that he could see faces watching him from the shadows, and could hear voices whispering in the corners and he was no longer Julius Lévy, but a traveller who had reached the summit of a mountain and must now go down into the dark valleys below. The white clouds had passed from his reach, the music of the heights was lost to him, and the gates of the secret city were closed.
And as he sat there alone, he knew that never again would he have any sensation of peace or contentment, that never would his days or his nights be free from anguish and bitter distress. Because of what he had seen and heard that evening he would be driven tormented to mental horror as yet unknown to him and feared, there would be no rest for him until he had crushed and hidden and made secure into eternity his own creation, possessed for ever or returned to the place from whence it came.
The weeks that followed were hideous in their monotony. The days came up and passed Julius by, giving him no respite from his mood of bitterness and despair. He must watch and wait, and listen, despise no trick as unworthy, steam open her letters, peer amongst her things, sit with doors ajar, steal from his room at night-time to hearken outside hers.
Her secrets would not escape him, she would not break away.
It was the height of the London season and Gabriel was for plunging into it, and doing everything as they had done before the war, only with greater freedom now, and luxury and abandon, because the war was over and she belonged to this new generation. Very well then, she should do as she liked, but he would follow her. Every function, every race meeting, every party - he would be by her side. He would dance with her night after night, however much he loathed it, he would know minute by minute every movement of her day when business in the City or attendance in the House kept him from her. She must introduce him to all her friends, he would know in a glance which one to fear. He would not let them get
to her. He would drive with her in the car back from her parties, he would see her to her room. Even then he would listen outside the door. Never left alone, never trusted for a moment, unless he knew for certainty her plans. If she announced a hairdresser appointment he would verify this, he would ring the hairdresser himself and find out if she were really there. Even then, the man might have lied, and to satisfy himself he would have to go in person, and walk into this shop and say: ‘Is Miss Lévy here? I am her father.’
And even with all these precautions, could he be certain? How was he to be sure?
She would say: ‘People are coming in to bridge this afternoon, ’ and he would answer: ‘What time?’ And when she told him he would remember this and if he could not be back he would telephone her from wherever he should be, asking to speak to her personally, counting the seconds she took to reach the telephone, listening if her voice should be breathless as though she had been surprised.
‘Who is with you? How many of them? How long will they stay? What are you all doing?’ and then, lying cunningly to her: ‘I shan’t be home before eight-thirty,’ so as to give her an opportunity to deceive him, and then returning stealthily at seven, going silently upstairs, flinging open the door, and finding her with her friends, playing bridge, calm and unconcerned.Was this a blind? How could he be sure?
When she smiled or talked to anyone, was there something behind that smile, a double meaning in her words? Why did she glance over her shoulder at that fellow, was there some reason in it?
He would watch her dancing, never taking his eyes from her for a single instant, and surely it would seem to him there must be some intimacy between her and her partner, her hand resting thus on his shoulder, her face upturned. What were they saying now, why did she laugh?
He would question her when she returned to the table. ‘What was he saying to you?’ And she, flushed and happy from her dancing, humming the tune: ‘Saying to me, when? I don’t remember.’
Surely she was lying.
‘Why do you like dancing with that boy? What does it do to you?’
And she, angry: ‘Oh! don’t harp like that. You’ll drive me mad.’
‘Dance with me, then,’ he said, and they would get up and dance together, he miserable, she bored, holding herself from him until he said to her: ‘Why do you keep away from me? Do you hate me?’ And she wearily: ‘Don’t be so ridiculous, why must you always be in this mood? Can’t I ever have any peace?’
A sullen silence, and then another scene, and then silence again.
The drive home in the car.
‘I suppose you want to be in a closed car with some boy, the lights turned off, under the trees in Regent’s Park,’ he said, and she, yawning, replying absently: ‘One’s not allowed to draw up in Regent’s Park,’ and he fiercely, seizing upon her words: ‘Ha! So you’ve tried, have you?’
Then she laughed. ‘God! What a fool you make of yourself.’ No understanding, no love, the old companionship gone. No intimacy, no trust.
‘Oh! Gabriel, this is such damned hell. Don’t let’s be like this.’
‘But it’s you,’ she said helplessly. ‘It’s nothing to do with me. What have I done?’
‘You think I’m old, is that if? I’m not young enough for you. You think I’m just an old fool, and you’re sick of me - is that it?’
‘When you behave in this way you might be senile,’ she said.
‘No - no - let’s finish that, let’s begin again. Tell me everything is just the same, Gabriel; tell me you’ll never be any different.’
‘Oh! of course,’ the sigh of exasperation, the silly half-hearted reconciliation, he groping for her hand, blubbering, murmuring nonsense in French, sentimental like an old drunkard, aware of his own fatuity and loathing it, and she so cool and impersonal, suffering him, her eyes somewhere else, and thinking what? Thinking of whom? No peace ever. Day after day, night after night.
He would give her presents after one of these scenes. Bracelets, ear-rings, a ring, a new hunter for next season, another boat, but whatever he gave her he knew it was but a temporary branch of truce, and meant little to her, she had so many of these things already.
‘Suggest something you want, I’ll give you anything,’ he would say, and she speaking straight from her heart: ‘Leave me alone, don’t harp at me - that’s all I ask.’ And this he could not do.
So the summer continued, the long drag through the little, petty events of the London season, dances, charity balls, dinners, garden parties, Epsom, Ascot, Wimbledon, Lords, Henley, Goodwood, Cowes - one after the other came and went, Gabriel professing herself to be amused by them, and Julius must therefore accompany her, otherwise she would deceive him, and escape, and go her way.
The City did not matter to him, nor the quarterly meeting with the managers of his cafés, nor the reports from his factories, nor the sales of his newspapers, nor the events in Parliament; there only remained to him this shadowing of Gabriel, this ceaseless vigilance that must not be relaxed.
She pretended she did not care, but he knew he was wearing her down. His was the stronger will, before long she would surrender and admit she could stand no more. He would have crushed the antagonism between them, and there would be no other course for her but to be subservient to him in all things. He had it in his mind that she took no pleasure in her days now that there was a barrier dividing them, her gaiety was a mask. He too, at her side, was like an actor playing a part, the happy father and the devoted daughter. It came to him sometimes that they were two dolls in a puppet show grimacing before company, but within they were lifeless, cold and stuffed like dummies. They would go to some big party together, she radiant and lovelier than ever, wearing those many jewels he had given her as though they were service stripes; and he at her elbow, tall and distinguished, bowing and smiling to their friends, calling a joke over his shoulder to someone who passed, and always a little buzz of excitement wherever they went: ‘There’s Julius Lévy and his daughter, isn’t she lovely! Oh! to be as rich as that. Mustn’t it be marvellous?’
No longer a fierce pride and a triumphant amusement because of their envy, but desolation, and emptiness, and a bitter feeling of contempt for their ignorance.
Those pitiful remarks: ‘You are a lucky fellow, Lévy, you’ve got everything in the world you want.’ And: ‘Hullo! Lévy - good man, you turn up at all these parties - gosh! You’ve got more capacity for enjoyment than any youngster,’ and then he must nod and smile and play his part, while Gabriel with her brilliant mask forced a smile in her turn, waved her hand to some friend who gazed at her in admiration, who called to her:‘Hullo, Gabriel - you look wonderful. Having a marvellous time as usual, I suppose?’
The clatter and screech of voices, the senseless patter of footsteps, little trills of empty laughter and loud guffaws, the thumping jazz band rattling above them all, and a fellow with a blackened face shouting to the moon.
While the end of all this would be the return to Grosvenor Square, the house for all its art treasures and exquisite furniture like a cold barracks, the servants in their livery, dumb and immobile as doorposts, Gabriel sitting down before the dressing-table in her bedroom, and pulling off one by one her bracelets and her rings, turning to glance over her shoulder at Julius who stood in the doorway. And she would yawn, tapping her foot on the floor impatiently, her face hard and her eyes cold, saying: ‘Well, what now?’ then not waiting for his answer, she lost control of herself, pushed the bracelets away from her, ran her hands through her hair in a frenzy of irritation and said: ‘Oh God! - if you knew how you bored me ...’
He asked her if there was anything in the world she would like to do, and she said she did not know, she had had everything, there was nothing left to do now; and when he suggested some fresh party or amusement, some new sport, motor-boating or flying, she shrugged her shoulders, she did not care.
He waited then, wondering if this was his chance, and he said gently:
‘Let’s go south in the yach
t, we haven’t cruised since the war, wouldn’t you be happy doing that?’
She thought a moment, she would not commit herself, and: ‘Perhaps,’ she said, and reaching for a file began to cut her nails.
‘Shall we just be ourselves?’ he began, but she broke in on this as though it delighted her to hurt him, and she said: ‘My dear - how deadly. What would we do? No, let’s have a crowd.’
He knew then that life on board the yacht would only be a repetition of the present summer, and so there would be no peace for him.
When Cowes week was over the big steam yacht Gabriel sailed from Southampton bound for Cannes, a party of fifteen, besides Julius Lévy and his daughter.This yacht was the luxury ship built at Stockport - she was like a miniature hotel.
When they were on board, Julius had some measure of security, Gabriel was too close here to elude him. She was therefore under his eye continually. Her state-room adjoined his on deck, separated only by a bathroom; if he slept with both doors ajar, he could hear every movement. The rest of the guests slept in state-rooms below, and the men of the party in separate quarters to themselves. To go there anyone would have to pass along the deck outside the window of Julius’s state-room, and he would see them. He was pleased with this arrangement of the cabins, he had thought it out with the greatest care.
When they arrived in Cannes surveillance became more difficult. It was so easy for people to slip away at the Casino, to disappear from the ballroom into the gambling-rooms, and then out perhaps, undiscovered, hidden somewhere. He trusted none of Gabriel’s friends, he disliked them all. He felt safest when she was playing bridge, or actually dancing - then he was able to watch.
When he was making a fourth himself and she was dancing on deck to the gramophone, he would keep his ear awake to the sound of the tune, and if it was stopped and a pause came before another one started he would move restlessly in his seat, wondering the reason. He could hardly conceal his impatience before the rubber was over to make some excuse, and jump up from his chair and climb the stair to the upper deck to see whom she was with.