A Crooked Mile Part 30

Mr. Wilkinson made a little sound of contempt.

"Bah! All talk. Day in and day out, talk, talk, talk. I want action. The leadership's all wrong. Want a man. I keep my seat because if I cleared out they'd be no better than a lot of tame Liberal cats, but I've no use for 'em----"

It was whispered that the members of the Party had no use for Mr.

Wilkinson, and very little for one another; but it doesn't do to give ear to everything that is whispered.

Then Mr. Brimby appeared suddenly to recollect something.

"Ah yes!... Action. Speaking of action, I suppose you've seen this Indian affair in to-night's papers?"

Mr. Wilkinson was still fuming.

"That Governor? Yes, I saw it.... But it's too far away. Thousands of miles too far away. We want something nearer home. A paper that calls a spade a spade for one thing.... Anybody heard from Pratt this week?"

They discussed Cosimo's latest letter, and then Mr. Brimby said, "By the way--how will this affect him?"

"How will what affect him?"

"This news, to-night. Collins."

"Oh!... Why should it affect him at all? Don't see why it should. The 'Pall Mall' has a filthy article on it to-night. That paper's getting as bad as the 'Times.'"

Here Walter Wyron intervened.--"By the way, who _is_ this man Collins?

Just pa.s.s me 'Who's Who,' Laura."

They looked Sir Benjamin up in "Who's Who," and then somebody suggested that their party wasn't complete without Edgar Strong. "I'll telephone him," said Walter; "perhaps he'll be back by this."--The telephone was in the hall, and Walter went out. d.i.c.kie told Laura how well Walter was looking. Laura replied, Yes, he was very well indeed; except for a slight cold, which anybody was lucky to escape in May, he had never been better; which was wonderful, considering the work he got through.--Then Walter returned. Strong had not yet come in, but his typist had said he'd be back soon.--"Didn't know it ran to a typist," Walter remarked, helping himself to more tea.

"It doesn't," Mr. Wilkinson grunted.

"Girl's voice, anyway.... I say, I wonder how old Prang's getting on!"

"I wonder!"

"He's gone back, hasn't he?" d.i.c.kie asked.

"Oh, a couple of months ago. Didn't Strong give him the push, Wilkie?"

"Don't suppose Strong ever did anything so vigorous," Mr. Wilkinson growled. "The only strong thing about Strong's his name. He's simply ruined that paper."

"I agree that it was at its best when Prang was doing the Indian notes."

"Oh, Prang knew what he wanted. Prang's all right in his way. But I tell you India's too far away. We want something at our own doors, and somebody made an example of that somebody knows. Now if Pratt had only been guided by me----"

"Hallo, here's Britomart Belchamber.--Why doesn't Amory come down, Brit?

She's in, isn't she?"

"What?" said Miss Belchamber.

"Isn't Amory coming down?"

"She's gone out," said Miss Belchamber, adjusting her hair. "A min-ute ago," she added.

Walter Wyron said something about "Cool--with guests----," but Amory's going out was no reason why they should not finish tea in comfort. No doubt Amory would be back presently. Laura confided to Britomart that she hoped so, for the truth was that her kitchen range had gone wrong, and a man had said he was coming to look at it, but he hadn't turned up--these people never turned up when they said they would--and so she had thought it would be nice if they came and kept Amory company at supper....

"We've got some new cheese-bis-cuits," said Miss Belchamber ruminatively. "I like them. They make bone. I like to have bone made.

The muscles can't act unless you have bone. That's why these bis-cuits are so good. Good-bye."

And Miss Belchamber, with a friendly general smile, went off to open her sweat-ducts by means of a hot bath and to close them again afterwards with a cold sponge.

Amory had not gone out this time to press amidst strange people and to look into strange and frightening eyes, various in colour as the pebbles of a beach, and tipped with arrow-heads of white as they turned. Almost for the first time in her life she wanted to be alone--quite alone, with her eyes on n.o.body and n.o.body's eyes on her. She did not reflect on this. She did not reflect on anything. She only knew that The Witan seemed to stifle her, and that when she had seen Mr. Wilkinson alight from his cab--and Mr. Brimby and d.i.c.kie come--and the Wyrons--with all the others no doubt following presently--it had come sharply upon her that these wearisomely familiar people used up all the air. The Witan without them was bad enough; The Witan with them had become insupportable.

It was not the a.s.sa.s.sination of Sir Benjamin that had disturbed her.

Since Cosimo's departure she had glanced at Indian news only a shade less perfunctorily than before, and she had turned from this particular announcement to the account of New Greek Society's production with hardly a change of boredom. No: it was everything in her life--everything. She felt used up. She thought that if anybody had spoken to her just then she could only have given the incoherent and petulant "Don't!" of a child who is interrupted at a game that none but he understands. She hated herself, yet hated more to be dragged out of herself; and as she made for the loneliest part of the Heath she wished that night would fall.

She had to all intents and purposes packed Cosimo off to India in order to have him out of the way. His presence had become as wearisome as that of the Wyrons and the rest of them. And that was as much as she had hitherto told herself. She had taken no resolution about Edgar Strong.

But drifting is accelerated when an obstacle is removed, and her heart had frequently beaten rapidly at the thought that, merely by removing Cosimo, she had started a process that would presently bring her up against Edgar Strong. She had pleased and teased and frightened herself with the thought of what was to happen then. So many courses would be open to her. She might actually take the mad plunge from which she had hitherto shrunk. She might do the very opposite--stare at him, should he propose it, and inform him that, some thousands of miles notwithstanding, she was still Cosimo's wife. She might pathetically urge on him that, now more than ever, she needed a friend and not a lover--or else that, now more than ever, she needed a lover and not a friend. She might say that nothing could be done until Cosimo came back--or that when Cosimo came back would be too late to do anything. Or she might....

Or she might....

Or she might....

Yet when all was said, Edgar and the "Novum's" offices were perilously near....

For it was not what she might do, but what he might do, that set her heart beating most rapidly of all. Her dangerous dreaming always ended in that. Here was no question of that trumpery subterfuge of the Wyrons.

It struck her with extraordinary force and newness that she was what was called "a married woman." It was a familiar phrase; it was as familiar as those other phrases, "No, just living together," "Well, as long as there are no children," "Love _is_ Law"--familiar as the air. Left to herself, the phrases might have remained both her dissipation and her safeguard.... But he? Would phrases content him? After she had tempted him as she knew she had tempted him? After that stern repression of himself in favour of his duty? Or would he ask her again what she thought he was made off?... It was always the man who was expected to take the decisive step. The woman simply--offered--and, if she was clever, did it in such a way that she could always deny it after the fact. If Edgar should _not_ stretch out his hand--well, in that case there would be no more to be said. But if he should?...

A little sound came from her closed lips.

Cosimo had been away for nearly three months, and had not yet said anything about returning; and Amory had smiled when, after many eager protestings that there was no reason (Love being Law) why he should go alone, he had after all funked taking his splendid turnip of a Britomart with him. Of course: when it had come to the point, he had lacked the courage. Amory could not help thinking that that lack was just a shade more contemptible than his philanderings. Courage!... Images of Cleopatra and the carpet rose in her mind again.... But the images were faint now. She had evoked them too often. Her available mental material had become stale. She needed a fresh impulse--a new experience----

But--she always got back to the same point--suppose Edgar should take her, not at her word, nor against her word, but with words, for once, left suddenly and entirely out of the question?...

Again the thumping heart----

It was almost worth the misery and loneliness for the sake of that painful and delicious thrill.

She was sitting on a bench under the palings of Ken Wood, watching a saffron sunset. A Prince Eadmond's girl in a little green Florentine cap pa.s.sed. She reminded Amory of Britomart Belchamber, and Amory rose and took the root-grown path to the Spaniards Road and the West Heath. She intended to take a walk as far as Golders Green Park; but, as it happened, she did not get so far. A newsboy, without any sense of proportion whatever, was crying cheerfully, "Murder of a Guv'nor--Special!" This struck Amory. She thought she had read it once before that afternoon, but she bought another paper and turned to the paragraph. Yes, it was the same--and yet it was somehow different. It seemed--she could not tell why--a shade more important than it had done.

Perhaps the newsboy's voice had made it sound more important: things did seem to come more personally home when they were spoken than when they were merely read. She hoped it was not very important; it might be well to make sure. She was not very far from home; her Timon-guests would still be there; somebody would be able to tell her all about it....

She walked back to The Witan again, and, still hatted and dressed, pushed at the studio door.

n.o.body had left. Indeed, two more had come--young Mr. Raffinger of the McGrath, and a friend of his, a young woman from the Lambeth School of Art, who had Russianized her painting-blouse by putting a leather belt round it, and who told Amory she had wanted to meet her for such a long time, because she had done some designs for Suffrage Christmas Cards, and hoped Amory wouldn't mind her fearful cheek, but hoped she would look at them, and say exactly what she thought about them, and perhaps give her a tip or two, and, if it wasn't asking too much, introduce her to the Manumission League, or to anybody else who might buy them....

Young Raffinger interrupted the flow of gush and apologetics.

"Oh, don't bother her just yet, Eileen. Let her read her cable first."

Amory turned quickly.--"What do you say? What cable?" she asked.