Eustace and Hilda

  “I dare say you’re proof against it, Nelly.” Jasper’s tone convicted her of insensitiveness. “I must say I never have a comfortable moment there.”

  “But you’ll risk coming to see me?”

  “I’d much rather you came to me.”

  “As you like. Have you still the same cook, the divine Donnizzetta?”

  “Yes, but oh how tired I get of the things she does.”

  “You’re difficult to please, you know,” said Lady Nelly. “She’s far the best cook in Venice. And said to be the best-looking. You won’t be able to keep me away from your table.”

  “Come to-night, then.”

  “Delighted. But could you put up with a young man too?”

  “Oh dear, I knew there was a snag somewhere,” said Jasper. His monocle fell out and he eyed it with rancour. “You said you were alone.”

  “Well, I may be,” said Lady Nelly. “I’m not sure if he’s coming or not.”

  “Who is he? Do I know him?”

  “I shouldn’t think you would,” said Lady Nelly, “but you might.” She tried to place him for Jasper. “He’s a friend of Antony Lachish’s. I met him staying with John and Edie. He’s quite harmless—you wouldn’t notice he was there.”

  “Why do you ask someone to stay if you don’t notice that he’s there?”

  “I meant, you wouldn’t. I shall.”

  “That’s just what I’m afraid of,” said Jasper crossly. “Won’t he be tired after the journey? Couldn’t you let him dine at home?”

  “Oh, but think what a pleasure for him, meeting you his first evening in Venice.”

  “Well, tell me more about him.”

  “I will, but you must have a cocktail first.”

  “Is it as bad as that?”

  “No, but I don’t like to see you looking thirsty. Angelo!”

  In a moment the waiter was at her side. He turned a rather experimental smile on Jasper Bentwich.

  “What will you have?” asked Lady Nelly.

  “Their white vermouth is poison, I wonder you dare drink it.”

  “Try the red, with some soda. I think they call it an Americano.”

  “Americano very good,” said the waiter, giving Jasper a pleading look.

  “Very good for Americans, I dare say,” said Jasper, “but very bad for me. I think I’ll have some plain gin and water.”

  “Oh, Jasper, how could you, and in Venice, too.”

  “I like it for the same reason that you like your friends—because I hardly notice that it’s there. What’s his name, by the way?”

  “Eustace Cherrington.”

  “Ought I to know that name?”

  “No, but you asked me. He’s at Oxford, at St. Joseph’s, and he’s an orphan and lives with his aunt. He’s reading for Schools or whatever they do, and I thought it might be nice for him to come and read here. I’ve promised him that he shan’t see me.”

  “Then I don’t understand why he’s coming.”

  “To see Venice, of course. And we shall meet for meals. He may like to read at meals, too—I don’t know.”

  “You don’t seem to know him very well.”

  “No, that was partly why I asked him to come here, to get to know him better.”

  “You won’t, if you never see him.”

  “Well, we shall meet on the stairs, and also, I hope, at your hospitable board.”

  Jasper raised his glass of gin to the sky and gave it a search-ing look.

  “It doesn’t sound to me as if he’d get much work done.”

  “Dear Jasper, how you always look on the dark side. Between ourselves, I shouldn’t much mind if he didn’t. I think he’s in need of the sun, he seemed a little shut up and colourless.”

  “That’s the worst thing you’ve told me yet. You know how I dislike colourless people.”

  “You should meet his sister, then. There’s no lack of colour there.”

  “Is she as ruddy as their name? No, thank you, Nelly, I feel that one Cherrington is enough. She was for Dick, I suppose?”

  Lady Nelly’s eyes were mysterious behind her dark glasses.

  “He did pay her a certain amount of attention. We mustn’t jump to conclusions, but I thought Edie seemed a little anxious.”

  “No wonder, but on whose account?”

  “Well, you know, he’s the only son. But I’m afraid my misgivings were rather for her. Dick can look after himself.”

  “I suppose so. What’s the girl’s name?”

  “Hilda.”

  Jasper screwed his monocle into his eye, and his whole face seemed to rally to it in outraged repudiation.

  “Hilda!” he exclaimed. “You can’t mean it! You must be joking!”

  “There was a St. Hilda, you know,” said Lady Nelly placatingly, “a very good woman. I connect her with Whitby.”

  “Such an ungracious piece of coast! But surely not with Anchorstone?”

  “Well, that was where I met her.”

  “So this Eustace is to be your nephew-in-law?”

  “Privately, I don’t think so.”

  “Remember that he falls within the prohibited degrees! His cradle is défendu, vietato, verboten!”

  “Really, Jasper, I won’t talk to you any more! It would serve you right if I left you to pay the bill!”

  When Jasper had made a half-hearted attempt to claim this honour, they strolled together down the colonnade lined with shops towards the “mouth” of the Piazza.

  “Let me give you a lift,” said Lady Nelly; “my boat is at the Luna.”

  “Very obliging of you, I’m sure,” said her companion. “But you know I never ride in them—they’re full of fleas and all gondoliers are rogues.”

  “Mine isn’t,” said Lady Nelly, “and he spends hours every morning cleaning the gondola. He washes it from head to foot. No flea could possibly survive. I’ll give you a pound for every one you catch.”

  “I can’t catch them,” said Jasper. “That’s just it. But if you let me look at your gondola, I’ll tell you if I dare take the risk.”

  They walked towards the landing-stage. Sitting on the balustrade was a gondolier reading a newspaper. Over his white sailor suit he had a blue sash and a blue ribbon round his broad-brimmed straw hat. As soon as he saw them he jumped to his feet and called in a stentorian voice, “Erminio!”

  At the summons, the head and shoulders of a much smaller and younger gondolier suddenly appeared above the balustrade. He seemed to be standing on air, but they could now see that he was mounted on the poop of the gondola, the hold of which was in position at the bottom of the steps, ready to receive them.

  “Oh,” said Jasper, “I see you’ve got Silvestro.”

  “Wasn’t I lucky?” said Lady Nelly. “But first come, first served. Every day I am told of imploring letters, messages, telegrams, threats and attempted bribes pouring in from heartbroken padroni who say Venice will not be the same to them without him. But his loyalty to me remains unshaken.”

  “It remains to be seen,” said Jasper. “Still, I grant you he is better than most.”

  “And so good-looking,” said Lady Nelly.

  “Yes, I suppose so.... But I think that’s all rather a bore, don’t you, the myth of the gondolier with his flashing black eyes, always ready with a stiletto or a kiss? It’s all so stagey. Most of those I see are utterly moth-eaten and reek of garlic.”

  “Silvestro’s eyes are blue,” said Lady Nelly with spirit, “and he doesn’t flash them: they are simply the windows of his soul. The trouble with you, Jasper, if I may say so, is that you’ve lived in Venice too long. I’m not sure that I ought to let my caro Eustace meet you: you might disillusion him, and I’m sure he’s brimful of illusions. Now I’m going to make you admire something for a change.” She took his arm and drew him towards the riva; Silvestro, with his hat under his arm, preceded them down the steps.

  “Now don’t you call that beautiful?” said Lady Nelly. “Just say the word—I don’t believe you ca
n.”

  The gondola had a dark-blue carpet and two little black-and-gilt chairs riding tandem. Above the twin humps of the black seat was a wooden decoration, pierced and carved, also in gilt: it had an ogive outline, and beneath the point was a shield with a flamboyant ‘S’ repoussé on it.

  The polished black woodwork of the gondola flashed almost unbearably in the sun; Lady Nelly could see her face in it as in a mirror. The strips of brass with which it was lavishly adorned shone too. All the brittle brightness of the Venetian day, and the dazzling flicker of its reflections, seemed concentrated on those glittering surfaces of black and gold.

  “We were saying how beautiful your gondola is, Silvestro,” said Lady Nelly in Italian.

  The gondolier smiled, a slightly automatic smile, as if he expected to hear his craft complimented.

  “It certainly is like Cleopatra’s barge,” said Jasper. “It burns on the water. But ought you to have all that gold? Isn’t it rather vulgar? Wasn’t there a sumptuary law condemning gondolas to be black? Isn’t the gold just a concession to the forestieri who like to make a bella figura on the Grand Canal?”

  “Jasper, you’re hopeless,” said Lady Nelly. “You ought to live in Shoreditch.” Accepting the support of Silvestro’s bent arm, which he held out to her as stiff as a ramrod, and treading carefully on the wooden board which made a bridge between the gondola and the steps, she embarked.

  “Now take care, Jasper,” she warned him. “If you fall in I shall know it was on purpose.”

  Their exit from the narrow inlet was not easy. Insignificant boatmen who had dared to use it for their unimportant purposes had to be admonished and ordered out of the way; there were black looks, raised voices, repartees, grunts. But at last they were out on the dancing water, with the cloud-grey dome of the Salute in front of them, in the heart of pictorial Venice.

  Neither Lady Nelly nor her companion spoke for a moment; the impression was too strong to find an outlet in words. To her it seemed to contradict and annul his mood of criticism, and he, by his silence, seemed to admit that it did.

  The tide was flowing against them, and the gondola, to be out of the main current, hugged the fringe of palaces on their right.

  “Where do you want to go, Jasper?” said Lady Nelly at last.

  “Drop me at the Accademia Bridge, would you, Nelly? I’ll walk the rest of the way. I mustn’t be seen arriving in a gondola, even with you.”

  “You won’t object to me arriving in one this evening?” said Lady Nelly.

  “Not if you come alone.”

  “I can’t promise.”

  “I shouldn’t believe you if you did.”

  Outside the Accademia the water, churned into a fierce brown wash by the departure of a vaporino, forbade an immediate landing. Jasper Bentwich showed signs of impatience, and when the boat did draw up to the riva, to be feebly hooked by an infirm-looking rampino, he disregarded Silvestro’s warning and his proffered arm, and made an awkward landing. There was a look of irritation on his face as he turned to say good-bye. A moment later he had recovered his poise, and his tall, erect, well-tailored figure, striding purposefully through the drifting throng by the dust-pink wall of the Accademia, left them looking more than ever aimless and untidy. Somehow Lady Nelly liked them the better for it.

  “E un tipo originale, Signor Baintwich,” observed Silvestro. “Ha poca simpatia per i gondolieri, tutti quanti.”

  Lady Nelly did not disagree with him, though she was not sure that it was a sign of originality to be ill-disposed towards gondoliers. But Silvestro had not finished.

  “Mah!” he exclaimed. “Forse ha ragione. Sono lazzaroni, la più gran parte.”

  Lady Nelly was about to challenge this damaging statement when he added, “Scusi, Signora Contessa, ma mi sono dimenticato —c’è un telegramma e due lettere, una per lei e una per un signore di cui non posso dir il nome.”

  He produced the letters from one of the many pigeon-holes with which the gondola was structurally provided.

  The telegram said at great length and with many apologies that Eustace was arriving by the train-de-luxe that afternoon.

  One of the letters was for him; the other Lady Nelly opened.

  ANCHORSTONE HALL,

  NORFOLK.

  Darling Nelly [she read],

  I have been inexcusably long in writing to you, and I expect that by now you will be in Venice. I know how you love it and I almost wish I was with you—in spite of the heat and the smells and the mosquitoes and the rather queer people who are going there now, I’m told. When John and I spent our honeymoon in Venice (how long ago it seems), there were some really nice English people who had houses there, and one or two Americans, half English, of course, quite a little society. We had letters of introduction and dined out several times. I remember we were rather amused, because one old lady was rather particular about whom she ‘received’ and actually (so I heard afterwards) made inquiries about us! Of course, meetings of that kind don’t commit one to anything, so we went wherever we were asked. Even then I got the impression that they were all a little dépaysé and secretly longing to be in England, but I admit I’m prejudiced in favour of my own country and dear Anchorstone. Here, at any rate, one knows where one is, and at my time of life that is a comfort, but then I never did care much for experiments! —though sometimes they are forced on me.

  You wrote so appreciatively about our little party. All’s well that ends well!—but I don’t think I have ever felt more miserably nervous about Dick, even when he was in France or doing those rather dangerous missions in Irak. He is a dear boy, but I do wish he could settle down. The postcard did arrive; it came from Holland, just fancy! I expect girls who are orphans, like Miss Cherrington, take such things more lightly than we did, who had the background of parents and a comfortable home. Miss Cherrington is to come again for Dick’s birthday; her brother wrote to me that he couldn’t because he was going out to stay with you. Monica will be here too. I am so fond of her—she is a sweet girl, but she wasn’t at her best, or looking her best, when you were here.

  Of course, Miss Cherrington (somehow I can’t call her Hilda) is very striking to look at, and more so than ever when she is nervous or excited, and in spite of what John says, I think, and Anne thinks, that Dick is rather taken by her. You know how maddeningly difficult he is to talk to about such matters. We could have saved him so much trouble (and others too) if he would only have confided a little in us. I think some old childish fear of being thought ‘a mother’s boy’ makes him keep us at a distance. As I told you, I couldn’t make much of her. I suppose one couldn’t expect her to be very forthcoming when everything was so strange to her and (to speak frankly) different from what she was used to. She obviously has a very decided and determined character, and I don’t think she’s at all adaptable. Anne says that whenever she speaks it is like knocking down a nine-pin. She doesn’t seem to me like a fortune hunter or interested in material advantages—less so than her brother; sometimes she seemed almost hostile to the things we stand for. But in that case, why did she come?

  What she feels for Dick I don’t know—the little signs one might tell by are absent. She looks at him as she looks at us, rather startled and égarée.

  You’ll think I’m making a mountain out of a molehill and perhaps I am, but I do feel it would be a pity if Dick is really in earnest, their backgrounds are so different; and if he isn’t, then I feel for her sake we ought to take some steps, for she looks the kind of girl who might suffer, and Dick hasn’t always shown himself very considerate. But of course she may have the experience to know quite well what she is doing, in which case we needn’t waste much sympathy on her.

  Remember me to Mr. Cherrington—and with all my love to you, dear Nelly, and best wishes for a happy Venice.

  Yours affectionately,

  EDIE.

  “Scia! Scia!” barked a voice in front of her, tense with anxiety. There was a sudden swish and a foaming wave as the gondoliers pull
ed up. Recalled from a vision of Anchorstone Hall, Lady Nelly looked up, half dazed, at the pediment above the door. It was the door in the side canal; Silvestro objected to using the other, because the wash left by steamers and launches in the Grand Canal was ruination, he declared, to the delicate fabric of the gondola. Lady Nelly collected herself.

  “Silvestro,” she said, “a friend of mine is arriving this afternoon.” She spoke in English, and his look of troubled intelligent non-comprehension reminded her of a golden Labrador trying to understand what is wanted of it. She began again.

  “Un signore arriva nel pomeriggio col lusso”—she glanced at the telegram—“alle due e mezza.”

  “Si, signora. Che nome ha?”

  Lady Nelly showed him Eustace’s name on the envelope.

  “Cher-reeng-tong,” said the gondolier slowly. “Nome difficile.” Then his eye brightened.

  “Sherry è un vino spagnolo molto forte?”

  Lady Nelly smiled at the thought of Eustace being a strong Spanish wine, and, feeling that the gondolier could not dispute her etymology, explained that Cherrington meant Cherrytown.

  At this innocent, non-alcoholic rendering of Eustace’s name, Silvestro looked a little disappointed.

  “Come lo distinguo?” he asked. “E alto, magro, con baffi pendenti?”

  A typical Englishman, tall, thin and with a drooping moustache; the description did not fit Eustace. But he was not easy to describe. Confronted by a trainful of passengers pouring out of the station with harassed, luggage-lorn faces, Lady Nelly was not sure she would recognise him herself.

  “E di statura media,” she began, but Silvestro’s face, understandably enough, betrayed no confidence of being able to pick out a gentleman of middle height.

  “E giovane o vecchio?”

  Lady Nelly said that Eustace was about twenty-five.

  “Un bel giovanotto,” said Silvestro thoughtfully.

  In the interest of identification Lady Nelly felt she could not let this pass. Eustace was not a handsome young man.

  “Non tanto bello, neanche,” she said regretfully.

  “Non bello? Piuttosto brutto, allora?”

  How they see everything black or white, thought Lady Nelly. But you couldn’t call Eustace ugly.