Olivia in India Part 15

I am not going to write any more, not because I haven't lots to say, but because writing much or talking much about a thing--being queer and Scots, it is hard for me to say love--seems somehow to cheapen it, profane it.

I have opened this just to say again, My dear, my dear!

_Calcutta, April 21_.

... only three more days in India, and I don't know whether I am horribly sorry to go or profoundly relieved to get away. There is no doubt it is a sudden and dangerous country. Three people we knew have died suddenly of cholera, and two others have had bombs thrown at them. I shall be thankful to find myself safely on board the steamer, but even if I escape I am leaving Boggley in the midst of these perils. Not that he lets the thought of them vex his soul. You learn, he says, to look upon death in a different way in India, but I am sure I never could learn to regard with equanimity the thought of being quite well one day and being hurried away to the Circular Road Cemetery early the next. It is sad to die in a foreign land, and it is somehow specially sad, at least I think so, for a home-loving Scot to lie away from home.

"Tell me not the good and wise Care not where their dust reposes.

That to him who sleeping lies Desert rocks shall seem as roses.

I've been happy above ground, I could ne'er be happy under, Out of Teviot's gentle sound.

Part us, then, not far asunder."

Yesterday I saw a pathetic sight. A couple in a _tikka-gharry_; the man a soldier, a Gordon Highlander, and on the front seat a tiny coffin. The man's arm was round the woman's shoulder, and she was crying bitterly. A bit of shabby c.r.a.pe was tied round her hat, and she carried a sad little wreath.

Since coming back from Agra we have stayed at the Grand Hotel. It is a comfortable, airy place, wonderfully pleasant in the morning when we sit at a little table in the verandah looking out on the Maidan, and flat-faced hill-waiters bring us an excellent breakfast. Our own servants are with us--Autolycus and Bella. When we arrived very early in the morning and the coolies were carrying up our luggage, a servant sleeping outside his master's door held up his hand for quietness, saying something quite gently about not waking his master, "Beat him,"

said Autolycus to the coolies quite without heat, as he hurried on.

The air gets hotter, and everything looks more and more tired every day. Even proud-pied April dressed in all its trim can't put a spirit of youth into anything.

But these last days in Calcutta, in spite of fears and heat, are very pleasant. I don't know how I could have said the Calcutta women were horrid! Now that I am going to leave them they seem so kind and attractive. Every minute of my time is filled up with river-picnics, garden-parties, tennis tournaments, dinners and theatre parties; and my mornings are spent with G. raking in queer shops for curiosities.

I am insatiable for things to take home, and Autolycus has packed and roped three large wooden boxes containing my treasures.

I wish life weren't such a mixed thing. Just when I am tiptoeing on the heights of joy because I am going home, I am brought to common earth with a thud by the miserable thought that I must leave Boggley.

(How pleasant it would be to have a sort of spiritual whipping-boy to bear the nasty things in life for one--the disappointments, the worries, the times of illness and sorrow, the partings.) Boggley says it will be all right once I am away. As a rule he only feels pleasantly home-sick. Now, with the preparations for departure constantly before him, helping to address boxes to the familiar old places, going with me in imagination from port to port till we reach cool Western lands, I'm afraid he has many a pang.

I am so sorry you are so worried. You will almost have got my letter by this time, but I wish I had cabled as you asked, only, somehow, I didn't like the idea. I thought you knew I cared; but, after all, how could you? I didn't know myself when I left England. Looking back I seem always to have cared immensely. How could I help it? What I can't understand is how every woman of your acquaintance doesn't care as I do; you seem to me so lovable. I am so glad (though it seems an odd thing to be glad about!) that you have no mother and no sister. I don't feel such a marauder as I would have done if, by taking you, I had robbed some other woman. And I am glad of your lonely life. I shall be able to show you what a nice thing a home is. A quiet, safe place we shall make it, where worldly cares may not enter. Boggley says I can make an hotel room look home-like, and, indeed, it is almost my only accomplishment, this talent for home-making. There is one thing I want to say to you. You know what Robert Louis says about married men?--that there is no wandering in pleasant bypaths for them, that the road lies long and straight and dusty to the grave. It dulls me to think of it. _Don't_ feel that. Don't let it be true. We mustn't let our lives get dusty and straight and narrow. We shall love whimsies and we shall laugh. So long as laughter isn't heartless and doesn't hurt anyone it is good to laugh. Life will see to it that there are tears--at least I'm told so. But suppose in years to come, after we have grown used to each other (though it does amaze me that people should talk about things losing their charm because one gets _used_ to them. Does a child tire of its mother because it is used to her? Is Spring any the less wonderful because we are used to her coming? G.o.d grant we have many years to get used to each other!)--suppose one fine morning you find that life has lost its savour, you are tired of the accustomed round, you are tired of the house, you are tired of the look of the furniture, you want to get away for a time--in a word, to be free. Well, remember, you are not to feel that the road isn't clear before you. I promise you not to feel aggrieved. I shan't wonder how my infinite variety could have palled.

I know that all men--men who are men--at times hear the Red G.o.ds call them (women hear them too, you know, only they have more self-control; they find their peace in fearful innocence and household laws), and I shall be waiting on the doorstep when you return from climbing Kangchenjunga, or exploring the Bramahputra Gorges, ready to say, "Come away in, for I'm sure you must be tired."

Arthur, dear, am I a disappointing person, do you find? Ought I to be able to write you different sorts of letters, tenderer, more loving letters? But, you see, it wouldn't be me if I could. My heart may be, indeed, I think it is, full of the warmest instincts, but they have been unwinged from birth so they can't fly to you. One of the most talkative people living, in some ways I am strangely speechless. Why!

I haven't even told Boggley, though if he had eyes to see instead of being the blindest of dear old bats, my shining face would betray me. I keep on smiling in a perfectly imbecile manner, so that people exclaim, "Well, you are indecently glad to get away," and when they ask Why? I point them to the scene in the Old Testament where Hadad said unto Pharaoh, "_Let me depart, that I may go to mine own country." Then Pharaoh said unto him, "But what hast thou lacked with me, that, behold, thou seekest to go to thine own country?" And he answered, "Nothing: howbeit let me go in any wise_." So it is with me. India has given me the best of good times. I have lacked for nothing--"howbeit let me go in any wise." You needn't think I am changed. I'm not. I'm afraid I'm not. One would think that a new environment would make a difference, but it really does not. A person with a suburban mind would be as suburban in the wilds of Nepal as in the wilds of Tooting. The illuminating thought has come to me that it isn't a man's environment that matters, it's his mind. Haven't you often noticed in an evening in London all the City men hurrying home like rabbits to their burrows (not the prosperous City men, but the lesser ones, whose frock-coats are rather shiny and their silk hats rather dull), and haven't you often thought how narrow their lives are, how cramping their environment? But suppose one of those clerks loves books and is something of a poet. What does it matter to him though his rooms in Clapham or Brixton are grimy, almost squalid, and filled with the worst kind of Victorian furniture? "Minds innocent and quiet take such for an hermitage." Once inside, the long day at the office over, and the door shut on the world, an arm-chair drawn up to the fire and his books around him he is as happy as a king, for his mind to him is a Kingdom. He may be a puny little man, in bodily presence contemptible, but he will feel no physical disabilities as he clambers on the wall of Jerusalem with Count Raymond, or thrills as he sets forth with Drake to fight Spaniards one against ten. Instead of the raucous cries of the milk or the coal man, he hears the horns of Elfland faintly blowing, and instead of a window which can show him nothing but a sodden plot planted with wearied-looking shrubs, he has the key of that magic cas.e.m.e.nt which opens on perilous seas in fairylands forlorn. He will never do anything great in the world, he will never lead a forlorn hope, or marry the Princess, or see far lands; he will never be anything but a poor, shabby clerk, but he is of such stuff as dreams are made of, and G.o.d has given to him His fairyland.

No, I don't think a new environment changes people, and it is foolish to think it makes them forget. Sometimes in the Eden Gardens at sunset, when we draw up to listen to the band, I watch the faces of the youths--Scots boys come out from Glasgow and Dundee--dreaming there in the Indian twilight while the pipers play the tunes familiar to them since childhood. They are sahibs out here, they have a horse to ride and a servant to look after them, things they never would have had had they stayed in Dundee or Glasgow, but though they are proud they are lonely. What does grandeur matter if "the Quothquan folk"

can't see it? The peepul trees rustle softly overhead, the languorous soft air laps them round, the scent of the East is in their nostrils, but their eyes are with their hearts, and is this what they see? A night of drizzling rain, a street of tall, dingy, grey houses, and a boy, his day's work done, bounding upstairs three steps at a time to a cosy kitchen where the tea is spread, where work-roughened hands at his coming lift the brown teapot from the hob, and a kind mother's voice welcomes him home at the end of the day....

Autolycus has knocked at the door to say "Master's come" (he likes to be very European with me so doesn't call him Sahib), and I must go to tea. To-morrow Boggley is taking the whole day off and we have got it all planned out, every minute of it. In the morning we shall drive in a _tikka-gharry_ to the Stores to buy some final necessaries (such as soap and tooth-powder), then to Peliti's to eat ices, then to the shop in Park Street so that Boggley may get me a delayed birthday present, then round and round the Maidan. _Then_ we shall go to luncheon at the Townleys and go on with them to Tollygunge for golf. _Then_ we are going to tea with some people who are taking us a motor run. _Then_ we go to a farewell dinner at the Ormondes'. Then we shall go to bed.

Bless you, my dear.

_S.S. Socotra, Homeward Bound, Somewhere in the Hoogly, April 24_.

... This day seems to have been going on for weeks and it is only tea-time now. Was it only this morning that we left? I can't think it was _this_ morning that Boggley and I took our last _chota-hazri_ together, and Boggley as he gloomily sugared his tea, said, "Now I know what a condemned man feels like on the morning of his execution."

Then we laughed and it wasn't so bad. Autolycus, very important because the Miss Sahib was going to cross the Black Water, bustled about with my few packages (all the heavy baggage went away two days ago) and, finally, bustled us into a _tikka-gharry_ in such good time that we had to drive twice round the Maidan before we went to the landing-stage. Dear, funny Autolycus! I shall miss his ugly, honest face. He has added greatly to the gaiety of nations as represented by Boggley and me. The last we saw of him was standing before the hotel door along with Bella and the two _chupra.s.sis_ bowing low and murmuring, "Salaam, Miss Sahib, salaam," while I, undignified to the last, knelt on the seat and wildly waved a handkerchief.

The landing was crowded with people. I wondered how we were all to get on board one ship, but found as we got on to the launch that most of the people remained behind; they were only see-ers off. Mr. Townley had by some means managed to get permission for himself, his wife, and Boggley to go down the river with us in the launch to where the _Socotra_ lay; which was a great comfort to us all. When we found our party, poor G.'s face was much less pink than usual. The Ormondes were there, having ridden down to see us off, and quite a lot of other people had come for the same reason. We (the pa.s.sengers) had to be medically examined before we were allowed to leave--in case of plague, I suppose. G. and I were rather scared at the thought--how were we to know that we hadn't plague lurking about us? However, after a very cursory glance we were pa.s.sed on, got our good-byes said, and embarked on the launch. At any other time I would have hated saying good-bye to the Ormondes and the other dear people, but with the parting from Boggley looming so near, I was absent-minded and callous, though I hope I didn't appear so. The _Socotra_ is quite a tiny ship compared to the _Scotia_. G. and I clambered on board, in great haste to find our cabin. We found it already occupied by our cabin companion (she is Scotch and has artificial teeth and a fine, rich Glasgow accent, and (I think) is of a gentle and yielding disposition) and an enormous hat-box.

Boggley was with us, but when he saw we were going to be firm he fled,

"This," said G., waving her hand towards the offending box, "must go into the baggage-room."

"Certainly," said the Glasgow woman. "I'm sure I don't know what it's doing here. Ma husband wrote the labels." And she actually began to drag it into the pa.s.sage.

Seeing her so amenable to reason, we smiled kindly and begged her to desist. But she said, "Not at all," and smiled back in such a delightfully Glasgow "weel-pleased" way that my heart warmed to her. I can see she will be a constant entertainment.

Mr. Townley introduced us to the captain, who looks kind, and who asked us to sit at his table, and then we all went in to breakfast. In spite of our low spirits we enjoyed the meal. G. created something of a fracas about a kidney which she ate and then said was bad, but she calmed down, and we enjoyed looking at the other pa.s.sengers, speculating as to who and what they were.

Almost directly after breakfast our people had to go, and G. and I, very stricken, watched the launch as it steamed up the river till lost to sight behind a big vessel. Since then, except for an interval in the cabin to get our eyes bathed into decency, we have sat on deck with aching heads, trying to read and write. At first the heat was terrible. We drooped like candles in the sun, we wilted like flowers, and G. gasped, "If all the voyage is going to be as hot as this, I'm done." Limp and wretched, I agreed with her. Then we found we had put our chairs against the kitchen, which is up on deck in this ship.

No wonder we were warm! We quickly found a cooler spot, and I have been writing a long letter to Boggley to send off with the pilot.

Isn't he pure gold, my Boggley? I know that you too "think n.o.bly of the soul." He will be home in a year, and I am trying to tell myself that a year isn't long. Well, the Indian trip is over, and I have a lot, learned a few things, and made some friends--best of them my faithful G. It is rather astonishing that I should have the joy of her company home again. Many people, I am sure, expected she would remain in India, but I think she took the precaution to leave her heart at home, wise G. One thing you should be thankful for, there will be no more letters. What a blessing people are nicer than their letters! How good you have been about mine, how willing to take an interest in the people I met, in the places I saw, in everything I told you about; and when I was jocose, you pretended to be amused. Ah, well! Be cheerful, sir, our revels now are ended!

And so I am going home, home to my own bleak kindly land, "place of all weathers that end in rain." I am going home to my own people (I think I see Peter jigging up and down in expectation before my trunks); and I am going to you. And the queer thing is, I can't feel glad, I am so home-sick for India. All my horror of bombs and sudden death has gone, and memory (as someone says) is making magic carpets under my feet, so that I am back again in the white, hot sunlight, under the dusty palm-trees, hearing the creak of the wagons, as the patient oxen toil on the long straight roads, and the songs of the coolies returning home at even, I see the country lying vague in the clammy morning mist, and the great broad Ganges glimmering wanly; and again it is a wonderful clear night of stars. I know that my own land is the best land, that the fat babu with his carefully oiled and parted hair and his too-apparent sock-suspenders can't be mentioned in the same breath as the Britisher; that our daffodils and primroses are sweeter far than the heavy-scented blossoms of the East; that the "brain-fever" bird of India is a wretched subst.i.tute for the lark and the thrush and others of "G.o.d's jocund little fowls"; that Abana and Pharpar and other rivers of Damascus are better than this Jordan--all this, I say, I know; but to-night I don't believe it.

India has thrown golden dust in my eyes, and I am seeing things all wrong. We have anch.o.r.ed for the night.... I am watching the misty green blur, which is all that is left to me of India, grow more and more indistinct as darkness falls. Soon it will be night.

G., who has been absolutely silent for more than an hour, sat up suddenly just now, and took my hand.

"Olivia," she said. "It's a nice place, England." Her tone was the tone of one seeking rea.s.surance.

"It is," I said dolefully. "_Very_."

"And it really doesn't rain such a great deal,"

"No."

"Anyway, it's home, and India isn't, though India _has_ been jolly."

She sighed.

Then, "I shall enjoy a slice of good roast beef," said G.