The Last September Part 12

"But I don't want to see her."

"But she is waiting for you in the hall."

"I've got nothing to say and I'm sick of always having to keep on saying it."

"I can't help that, she is your friend. And I thought her feelings seemed very much hurt."

"She will stay to lunch, you know," Lois retorted.

"How fickle girls are," said Lady Naylor, sitting down on the window-sill. Her manner of sitting and waiting most strongly encouraged an exit.

Lady Naylor was more than busy, but could not resist this last opportunity to discover, before the veil of an international marriage descended, what Marda really thought of the English. For nothing of Leslie was Irish except his aunts.

"Of course really," she said, "you are very adaptable. I daresay we all are, but with some of us it does not have to come into play. I daresay you'll be very happy indeed. Where did you think of living?"

Leslie had thought of London. Marda confessed an omission on her part.

"Of course that is hardly England," said Lady Naylor, encouraging. "And of course it will be lovely for you being able to go abroad so easily; you will be so much nearer everything. And you will have no neighbours; one never has, I believe."

"Demoralising... ."

"You could certainly never be happy living like Anna Partridge. She has an unnaturally sweet disposition: I often pity her ... I always found the great thing in England is to have plenty to say, and mercifully they are determined to find one amusing. But if one stops talking, they tell one the most ordinary things-about their husbands, their money affairs, their insides. They don't seem discouraged by not being asked. And they all seem so intimate with each other; I suppose it comes from living so close together. Of course they are very definite and practical, but it is a pity they talk so much about what they are doing. I can't think why they think it should matter: supposing I came up here and insisted on telling you what I had been doing the whole morning!"

Marda, feeling how true this must be, pulled open an empty drawer and looked into it, much depressed.

"Though I don't think it is fair," pursued Lady Naylor, "to say they have no sense of humour, and of course they are anxious not to appear conventional, and they are kindness itself once they have 'placed' one- Marda, surely you are not going to travel in that thin coat? Well, for heaven's sake do not develop a cold till it can be obvious that you haven't caught it here. How very unfortunate you have been in your weather! Just that one fine day at Castle Isabel and yesterday evening when you went for your walk. Before you came it was brilliant-such a pity you missed our last party-and as I was saying- Why, Hugo ... !"

He did not seem pleased to be with them. He was nonplussed at finding the door open, having prepared to tap on it inexpressively. Francie had insisted on sending him up with some eau-de-Cologne. She expected that Marda, being so modern, would not care for eau-de-Cologne, but wanted to give her some little token for the journey: this was all she could think of. To the idea of this present he offered surprising resistance. Or could she not take up her present herself? Her large eyes of protest reminded him-their plan of life must eliminate stairs for her; already, she had been "up to the top" once. So here he was, prepared to recede three steps when Marda should come to her door: he was of that school.

He stood back from the door, looking past with surprise at the room's non-committal features-the chairs, the window-as though he were specially struck by there being a room at all in this part of the house, and especially this room. Some tree-tops fidgeted under his scrutiny. Where had he been all the morning? his hostess wanted to know; no one could find him. Indeed? They could not have looked far: for he had been in the dining-room, down at the dark end, taking out those old Ill.u.s.trated London News, old bound volumes he remembered since he was a boy. There was that Tsar being bombed by Nihilists: very interesting.

"I can't think how any of those Tsars had any confidence," said Lady Naylor gloomily.

He looked doubtfully at the bottle of eau-de-Cologne; Lady Naylor asked at once what he had there, was told, and exclaimed at Francie's imagination.

"There is nothing like eau-de-Cologne at the end of a crossing, when one is trying to look like something again. Of course, it may not be so bad tonight: at present I don't like the look of those trees. Our inland weather does sometimes go by contraries; it may be surprisingly calm when one gets to Kingstown. I often wonder if living on an island does not make one more deeply religious-the French, for instance, could never have our sense of dependence-though of course they have railway accidents. But I shouldn't think about it, Marda; that's much the best way. I am sure one is often seasick from nervousness."

"I don't know what Miss Norton's friends will think of her hand," said Hugo. "Their worst suspicions will be confirmed; they will think we have been shooting at her. Her stumble was most unfortunate."

"I ought to have brought back that piece of slate from the mill."

"I hold you responsible, Hugo; you should not have let her go climbing about-never mind, it will give them something to talk about over there."

"You must draw on your imagination," said Hugo to Marda. "Don't let them suspect how tame we all are. They will expect you to be a bit of a heroine; you must tell them everything that might have happened."

Marda, finding a place for the bottle of eau-de-Cologne at the top of her dressing-case, declared: "That would be inexhaustible."

"They may think it odd that you should have cut the back of your hand... ."

The three closed suitcases had a look of finality. Marda wished to go down and find Francie and thank her, they all three crossed the landing at a high pitch of affability. Laurence gripped the hair over his temples in larger handfuls and crouched lower down over his book. His thoughts, tight with concentration, were darkened by a wave of malignance. Marda's door, which no one had shut, remained flapping and clicking.

In the yard, under the dripping chestnuts, Lois and Livvy walked about in their mackintoshes. This afternoon, Lois intended to wash the dogs; they might antic.i.p.ate the occasion by disappearance so she thought it better to go down now-they had had their dinners-and shut them up in the stables. They had gone up and looked for no reason into the loft, at the chaff and the dead swallows. They went back slowly, listening in vain for the gong.

"It seems odd," said Livvy, "she should be going away; she seems to have only just come. I generally get so accustomed to your visitors. I have said goodbye to her once-I had no idea I should be staying to luncheon. However, I don't suppose she will remember, she seemed rather flurried. Laurence was up there with her; it seems odd to me to have a man in one's bedroom even in the morning, but I daresay she is rather cosmopolitan ... It does seem a pity, Lois, you forgot to ask her about that jumper pattern."

"Do you remember those Black and Tans on the Clonmore road? They always remind me of her."

"Why?" said Livvy. Then with her holy look, which Lois had up to now managed to keep in abeyance, she added: "That was a memorable day for me, naturally."

"Why?" said Lois crossly.

"David and I decided to go to Cork."

"I thought you said that was just chance."

"It was predestination. Now I must tell you, Lois-"

"Things that have happened just before people seem like part of them."

"How you do talk... ."

"No, I don't."

"Lois," said Livvy sagaciously, "I hope things are not going wrong between you and Gerald?" Since her engagement, she spoke of all young men by their Christian names and made motherly little impulsive advances in all directions, like Mrs. Vermont.

Hugo wished to return to the Ill.u.s.trated London News but the parlourmaid was laying the table and looked at him in amiable surprise. In the hall the two young girls, hair damp from their excursion, were playing left-hand catch with a tennis ball. So he had to go into the library where his wife and Marda were still talking about eau-de-Cologne-Marda against the mantelpiece, bright and hard-looking in her coat and skirt. Eau-de-Cologne wasn't scent, Francie summed up; she hated scent for it seemed a kind of advertis.e.m.e.nt. Sir Richard joined them; they all four talked in an eager, unnatural way, as though they had just met for the first time.

Indeed, the unfamiliarity of the moment made them strange to themselves, though it now seemed to have been waiting ahead of them like a trap into which they had stepped with a degree of naturalness. Sir Richard, the least affected, thought the Montmorencys unduly animated and deplored departures. Visitors took form gradually in his household, coming out of a haze of rumour, and seemed but lightly, pleasantly superimposed on the vital pattern till a departure tore great shreds from the season's texture. Francie rubbed the palms of her hands lightly on the tapestry of the chair-arms. She knew that life was unkind, and that Marda must have begun at least to suspect this; she wondered how much Marda had understood from the eau-de-Cologne. Marda, turned half away from them, tapped a tune on the edge of the mantelpiece, laughed at every shade of a silence and felt how resolutely Hugo did not look at her now. There was to be no opportunity for what he must not say to be rather painfully not said. Hugo wished there had been a fire; the room was cold with rain and branches went restlessly up and down beyond the windows. Her face and figure, at at which he dared not look, compelled his imagination with ghostly sharpness.

"You will have a very wet drive, I'm afraid," said Sir Richard finally. To Francie, the remark had a faint echo. Had it been what she was going to say, or had she once said it?

Outside in the hall, Livvy skidded over the edge of a rug and came down heavily, knocking over a wicker chair. The tennis ball bounced away, Lois shrieked her condolences. They all made a movement of consternation and were delighted.

Livvy came in to luncheon fragrant with Pond's Extract, a shiny patch on her chin. She kept putting up a finger and feeling the b.u.mp: David must "kiss it better" for her tomorrow. David should have witnessed her courage: he seemed increasingly struck by her moral qualities; he had never observed these things in a girl before. Yesterday he had taken her over to tea at the Vermonts'; at her suggestion, they had "told" the Vermonts, in confidence. It had been a success: she had been made to feel at once she belonged to the regiment. She had had no idea Mrs. Vermont was so jolly; she had taken Livvy off for a real little chat in her bedroom; they agreed what a rag it would be if the regiment went to China. Livvy looked voluptuously from Sir Richard to Lady Naylor, thinking what a surprise she had here for them both. She ate two helpings of frica.s.seed chicken in absolute silence, designing her trousseau dressing-gown; and old Mr. Montmorency, who sat beside her, did not speak either.

"I like lunch at one," said Lady Naylor, surprised. "It shortens the morning, but gives one so much more time in the afternoon. I can't think why we don't have it always."

"I see no reason why we should not, my dear," said Sir Richard who, unlike an English husband, was not conservative in these matters.

The car came round twenty minutes too early, but Sir Richard said the chauffeur was quite right. He could hardly bear to let Marda drink her coffee and was but slightly mollified when she burnt herself. Mr. Montmorency sugared his coffee twice over, to Livvy's delight. They drank coffee out in the hall, standing up; it was like the Pa.s.sover. Marda went upstairs and came down in her travelling coat. Hugo stood at the foot of the stairs, in the back hall, tightening the screws of his racquet press.

"Goodbye," she said. "Thank you for being nice to me."

"Oh," said he, looking blindly at her with his pale eyes. "Have I been nice to you? Good!"

"Goodbye."

"Goodbye-Marda."

"Don't come on to the steps-"

"No, I'll finish this press."

They both half-turned, heard the pendulum of the clock swing once; she went on into the hall. Everybody was there but Lois.

Lois stood behind the door in the drawing-room, waiting. "Marda," she said through the crack. "Hullo?" said Marda. She came round the door, pushing it a little way to behind her. They kissed.

"Marda, I can't-"

"Never mind."

"Darling!"

"Be good!"

"Happy journey!"

"Oh yes." They parted.

Marda came back to the hall, not looking at anybody in particular, pulling her gloves on. Lady Naylor asked her if she had packed the cake. Sir Richard patted her arm and said she was a good girl and must be sure and be happy-then looked very much abashed and startled at what he had done. Laurence looked bored, so bored; she was sorry for Laurence. She said, "I am really going!" "I'm sorry you're going, I don't think it's-" They shook hands, he immediately turned--rather rudely, his uncle thought, and walked into the library.

After all, there were only Sir Richard and Lady Naylor and Francie to wave Marda off from the steps and watch the car up the avenue into a veil of rain. Rather few, they felt, considering what a dear she had been and how they had come to love her. Wondering why and where the others had gone, they tried to present the broadest possible expanse of smile and flutter. And of this effort the flick of Marda's gloved finger-tips round the hood conveyed the friendliest, the most satirical recognition.

"Well, that's that," said Livvy, at last discovering Lois in the drawing-room. "Partings make me ever so sad. Now listen, Lois-"

"I'm afraid I'm not well; I've eaten something," said Lois. "I'm sorry-" She clapped her handkerchief to her mouth and fled from the drawing-room by the other door, stumbling over the portiere. Livvy went a little way after her, talking, then came back: "It is a disadvantage to a girl," she reflected, "that kind of stomach."

Lois found in the empty spare-room a piece of paper that crept on the floor like a living handkerchief. Through the defenceless windows came in the vacancy of the sky; the grey ceiling had gone up in remoteness. More wind came through, flowers moved in the vases, the pages of a book left open beside the bed turned over hurriedly. The pillow was dinted, as though half way through packing Marda had laid down lazily. Or as though since last night the pillow had not forgotten the feel of her head.

Part Three.

The Departure of Gerald.

CHAPTER ONE.

CAPTAIN and Mrs. Rolfe of the Gunners were giving a dance in their hut. Denise Rolfe and her dearest friend Betty Vermont of the Rutlands had been more than busy the whole morning. Fl.u.s.tered and happy they darted about the hut, cutting sandwiches, scattering floor-powder, pinning draperies round the walls. They masked the electric lights with pink crinkly paper to produce the desired enchantment. Every now and then, one would collapse on to what remained of the furniture and, catching the other's eye, burst into delighted laughter. It was all such a rag. They smoked cigarettes and ground the ash into the floor to enrich the polish; they tried the new records over again and again till Mrs. Rolfe declared that the needles would give out and snapped down the lid of the gramophone resolutely.

Mrs. Rolfe's Colonel disapproved tacitly; Colonel Boatley did not think the dance was a good idea either. Entertainments in barracks had been given up long ago. But it was not easy to veto what ladies described as "a little fun in the huts." Married quarters in barracks were limited; as the army of occupation was reinforced, lines of hutments began to extend up the hill at the back of the Gunners barracks. There was nothing to beat these hut dances; for one thing, the floors were so springy. And the fewer the couples, the more intimate the occasion, Denise and Betty both thought with contempt of the Rutlands' official dance in the barracks-gymnasium, full of majors waltzing, where you were nearly blown off the floor by the regimental ba.s.soon.

"All the same," said Betty, rubbing a board with her toe, a shade despondent, "I wish this would polish more. You're certain it won't be sticky?"

"Nothing could be stickier than the C.O.," said Denise wittily. "If it wasn't for him, we should be keeping it up till breakfast."

"It's these wretched patrols and things," said Mrs. Vermont.

"It seems odd being short of girls. I do feel I should be getting my sister over."

"There will be heaps for tonight," said Mrs. Vermont, who thought people's young sisters rather a bother. The ladies of the neighbourhood had praised Mrs. Rolfe's kind intentions but said that they feared the roads were not fit for their girls these nights. But their girls, meeting Mrs. Vermont at the tennis club, had told her they would be certain to come. "In fact if they all come," said Mrs. Vermont, apprehensive, "I may have to telephone down to the mess for some more of our boys."

Captain Rolfe came off duty at lunch time, and during the afternoon friends kept dropping in, by twos and singly, with offers to help.

"But don't lookl" shrieked Denise every time, flinging herself against the wall to conceal the draperies. "It's all a surprise for tonight." The subalterns, after a hasty look round, prepared to be perfectly blind. They began to slide industriously, buffeted on the head by the Chinese lanterns which Betty had hung too low. Tubby, Mr. Simc.o.x, sat down on a mat and was whisked round the room by his friends to perform the functions of polisher.

"Really," volunteered someone, "we ought to be rolling the floor with champagne bottles... ."

Girls who succeeded in coming over for the dance had arranged to be "put up" in Clonmore or in married quarters. The two Miss Raltes, from Castle Ralte in the Tipperary direction, looked in about four o'clock, pink from a twelve-mile drive and parental opposition. Father, in fact, had been more than difficult. "He says," said Moira Ralte, looking beatifically round at the decorations, "that the whole proceeding is not only criminal but lunatic. He says he can't understand the C.O. allowing it, with the country the way it is. We really did think, till we got past the gates, he was going to stop us."

"But we came," said Cicely. Everyone laughed. The Miss Raltes had been cast as wild young Irish and rather liked themselves. But they exchanged glances, uneasy. It had not been quite the thing, perhaps, to have laughed at Father.

"It takes two to make a row," said Mrs. Rolfe wisely. "We're not fighting."

"More's the pity," said a Mr. Daventry of the Rutlands with violence. "G.o.d, if they'd-" The Miss Raltes, unaccustomed to swearing, looked down their noses. There was a moment of slight discomfort, of national consciousness.

"Wouldn't it be a rag," said Moira, relieving the tenseness tactfully, "if they tried to fire in at the windows while we were dancing?"

"I shall draw the curtains!" cried Mrs. Vermont.

Cicely glanced at the gramophone, hummed a foxtrot and tapped her heel on the floor, looking most unconscious. But the subalterns continued to slide violently, rebounding against each other, and dancing was not begun till the D.I.'s niece came in. The D.I.'s niece came in with a flourish and was greeted with uproars. She was priceless. She had light red hair fluffed over her forehead, a wide smile punctuated by gaps in her teeth and a tireless repartee in a Cork accent. Denise and Betty adored her. She was a Catholic; it seemed so queer to think that she worshipped the Pope. The Miss Raltes hardly knew her. As she came in, Daventry opened his arms, she ran into them with a gurgle and they began to dance. The gramophone spurted hoa.r.s.e music; other couples followed the gramophone.

Mr. Daventry, the senior subaltern, elegant, tall and a shade satanic, was "taken," obviously, with the queer little person. She could talk and dance at once with an equal skimmingness, and she did. Daventry shook her, murmuring: "Do shut up!" He whispered into her hair that she danced like thistledown and that he hated to have it spoilt.

"Like how much?" shrieked the D.I.'s niece above the music, bobbing her face up at him.

Mrs. Rolfe, as distracted hostess, allowed herself to drift into the arms of the adjutant, who had looked in for a moment or two. He spoke of himself as a busy man, but she knew this to be a pose. She danced remotely and kept repeating: "Gla.s.ses for claret cup ... Gla.s.ses for cider cup ... Cigarettes ... Cover the washstand... ."

"Washstand?" said the adjutant, solicitous.

"They will have to sit out in Percy's and my bedroom. Do you think it will matter?"

The adjutant took a firmer grip of Mrs. Rolfe, an ethereal girl with a habit of drifting just out of one's reach like a kite. He gulped, and said rather too genially: "It will be no end of a rag tonight. Well, we must make the most of it; it may be the last for a bit. As it is, we're doubling the guards. The C.O.-"

"Pig!" said Denise, looking into the adjutant's eyes.

"Mum," said the adjutant, blinking. "And another thing: I'm afraid you won't have Dobson of the Rutlands, I've just met him-he's to be out on patrol."

"Oh, but he said he'd get out of that! Oh, but he promised me-"

"He'd no business to; he's been due for patrol for ages. Their C.O.-"

"He spoils everything. Captain Dobson is one of my best dancers." She stopped short and turned off the gramophone. "Listen, Percy! They're sending Captain Dobson out on patrol at a moment's notice. Now I'd like to know what I'm supposed to do? I'd calculated the numbers exactly."