The Tall Stranger

by D. E. Stevenson

  Barbie said, ‘Yes, you should.’

  ‘This very minute,’ repeated Edward. ‘And Barbie, listen: I want you to come shopping with me on Monday. I’ll call for you at Garfield’s. Can you arrange to get off early – about four? We’ll go and choose a ring – an absolutely super ring – expense no object – see? Would you like an emerald – like that ring of Amie’s? I just thought when I put it back on her poor old finger that it would be perfect – for you.’

  ‘No, Edward.’

  ‘All right. If you’d rather have diamonds, we’ll –’

  ‘No, Edward!’ cried Barbie. ‘Don’t you understand? I meant what I said; we aren’t engaged.’

  ‘Oh, Barbie,’ said Edward’s voice reproachfully. ‘It isn’t a bit like you to go on like this. Listen, darling, I’ll come along tomorrow and see you and explain everything. I’ve got something to show you –’

  ‘I shall be out!’ cried Barbie frantically. ‘It’s no good coming. I shall be out all day.’

  The line suddenly went dead and she had no idea whether he had heard her or not, but having said she would be out all day it was necessary to be out. She explained this to Nell.

  ‘Yes, of course go out if you want to,’ said Nell. ‘I shall be out all day too, so if he comes there won’t be anyone here … but I wouldn’t worry if I were you.’

  ‘Not worry!’

  ‘There’s nothing to worry about. Edward can’t marry you against your will,’ said Nell, smiling at her friend’s anxious face. ‘What do you think he’s going to do? Abduct you or something?’

  ‘No, of course not. It’s just – so odd. I mean I’ve been quite rude to him. Why does he keep on badgering me?’

  Nell looked thoughtful. She said, ‘Because he wants you, of course, and I have a feeling that Master Edward usually gets what he wants.’

  ‘That’s just why I’m a little bit – frightened.’

  ‘What nonsense!’ exclaimed Nell.

  ‘It’s just a feeling I have,’ said Barbie doubtfully. ‘If I saw him he might persuade me. That’s why I don’t want to see him. And I don’t want to see Aunt Amalie either. I shall write to her tonight.’

  ‘Perhaps you had better,’ agreed Nell. ‘Why not go to Green Beech Cottage tomorrow? You haven’t seen the Kirks for ages.’

  This was an excellent plan for, next to Nell, David and Jan Kirk were Barbie’s greatest friends and were always delighted to see her.

  Barbie went to church in the morning (she liked going to church and was a regular attendant); then she lunched at a small restaurant and caught her bus.

  It was a hot steamy day; London had been uncomfortably warm and the bus overcrowded; but when she got out of the bus at Grimble’s Garage, and, leaving the main road behind her, began to climb the steep lane which led to her friends’ house, the air was quite different – fresh and sweet. It was one of the charms of the little place (this sudden transition from noise to peace, from the bustle and hurry of the arterial road to the leisure of the unspoilt country) but there were other charms as well, and when Barbie pushed open the green gate in the green beech hedge and saw the little house she was struck afresh by its perfection. It was quite small but its proportions were admirable and it was built of rose-pink brick – a gem of a house in a delightful green setting!

  When David Kirk had inherited the property from an old aunt it had been neglected for years and the garden was little better than a jungle, but he had set to work with a will and had got it cleared, and now it was tidy and well cared for. The same had happened inside the little house – as Barbie had reason to know, for she had helped Jan with the redecorations.

  Barbie had often thought that Green Beech Cottage was like a nest. Set on the side of the hill it looked out over the tops of the trees towards London. On a clear day you could see the winding Thames and masses of buildings but more often there was a haze over the great sprawling city which veiled its ugliness and turned it into a city of dreams.

  David was working in the garden. He looked up when he heard the gate. For a moment he hesitated and then he waved and shouted joyfully and came towards her holding out his hands.

  ‘Barbie, is it really you!’ he exclaimed. ‘This is a grand surprise. How are you? Let me look at you properly. You’re a lot thinner –’

  ‘You’re fatter,’ said Barbie smiling.

  ‘I know,’ agreed David. ‘It’s Jan’s cooking – and being so well looked after. Come in, Barbie. Jane will be delighted, she was just talking about you this morning and wondering how you were. And you must see Matthew James. He’s grown-up now. He’s a person. You won’t know your godson –’

  Matthew James was not quite grown-up yet (except in the eyes of his parents), for he was just two years old, but during the seven months since Barbie had seen him he had developed from a somewhat uninteresting baby into an amusing and delightful little boy. His godmother was pleased with him and astounded at his intelligence – for the intelligence of a two-year-old who spends his whole life with intelligent parents is often astounding to people who are not used to children.

  ‘He’s going to write books – like his father,’ Barbie declared.

  ‘Well, I don’t know,’ said David. ‘I thought it would be nice for him to be an admiral, but Jan is absolutely determined he’s to be Prime Minister – a second Churchill, no less.’

  ‘David, don’t be silly!’ exclaimed Jan, laughing.

  ‘He used to be very like Sir Winston,’ continued David, with a perfectly serious face. ‘He’s not quite so like him now – and I’m just wondering if Jan is right. She’s usually right, of course,’ added David … and he smiled suddenly and very sweetly at his wife.

  The time passed quickly for they had a great deal to talk about (not only the future career of Matthew James) and Barbie was shown various improvements in the house and the garden and called upon by her godson to admire his guinea pigs. The more she saw of the little family the more pleased she was, for she had had a good deal to do with the ‘making’ of it. If the marrige of David and Jan had turned out badly she would have felt responsible, so there was reason to be delighted that it was so thoroughly satisfactory.

  Once or twice Barbie found herself looking at David and comparing him with Edward. He had not Edward’s charm, but he was a better man in every way; solid and safe and extremely considerate; and he still had that air of boyish unself-consciousness which she had always found so endearing. In spite of his very real success in the world of letters David Kirk was completely natural and unspoilt.

  That’s the best thing I ever did, thought Barbie as she shut the gate of Green Beech Cottage behind her and walked down the hill to catch her bus.

  Nell, also, had been out all day. She and her companion had lunched at an old inn on the South Downs and then had decided to take a walk to stretch their legs and fill their lungs with fresh air. They parked the car in a convenient spot and set off up a steep path which led over the hills … and at three o’clock in the afternoon (when Barbie was opening the gate of Green Beech Cottage and being greeted rapturously by David Kirk), Nell and her companion were sitting resting in a little hollow in the shade of an old thorn.

  ‘You do understand, don’t you?’ Nell was saying. ‘I can’t leave her now – all in the middle of her troubles. She’s frightened.’

  ‘That’s nonsense.’

  ‘I know. I told her it was nonsense – but she is. It seems odd because Barbie is a very brave sort of person in most things, but she really is scared. So we can’t be engaged.’

  ‘We are engaged –’

  ‘No, Will,’ said Nell firmly. ‘If we were engaged I’d have to tell her. We tell each other everything. I simply couldn’t keep a secret from Barbie.’

  Will was silent for a moment. He was a little puzzled, for it seemed to him that Nell was keeping a secret from her friend, but he was aware that he was merely a man and that the curious workings of the female brain were mysteries which no mere man could hope to un
ravel.

  ‘You understand, don’t you?’ said Nell anxiously.

  ‘You said you would marry me –’

  ‘Because I thought she was engaged to Edward.’

  ‘Then you mean –’

  ‘I mean I’ll marry you when things come right for Barbie – if they do come right. In the meantime –’

  ‘In the meantime you’ll run about all over the place with Phil,’ said her companion clenching his teeth. ‘Oh yes, I know I’m jealous. I told you I could be jealous if I had anything to be jealous about, didn’t I?’

  ‘Dear Othello, it’s rather thrilling,’ said Nell in a dreamy voice.

  She was lying back upon the soft turf and Will turned and looked at her. He put his hands very gently round her neck.

  ‘Rather thrilling,’ repeated Nell softly.

  He leant over and kissed her.

  She had thought him ugly. Perhaps he was – but it didn’t matter.

  ‘Darling Will,’ said Nell. ‘You haven’t anything to be jealous about. They’re all just boys. It’s fun having them as friends.’

  ‘Give them up.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Would you like it if I had half a dozen women friends?’

  ‘I’d rather you had half a dozen than just one,’ replied Nell, giggling at the idea of her tall gaunt doctor surrounded by a bevy of adoring females.

  He had to smile, and when he smiled (as Nell had noticed before) he was not in the least ugly, but rather the reverse.

  ‘You must smile a lot,’ she told him.

  ‘I shall smile when we’re engaged – not before.’

  ‘What a pity!’ said Nell sadly. ‘You see I love you so much more when you smile.’

  ‘I love you all the time – better and better every moment. It all began that night in the fog. D’you remember what was written on the wall?’

  ‘Somebody Luvs Somebody,’ said Nell vaguely. ‘You were so cross because love wasn’t spelt properly – and then those men attacked us – and I was sick. You couldn’t possibly have fallen in love with me then.’

  ‘Yes, that was when it began. I remember everything about that night – every smallest detail. For instance I’ve often wondered why you told the policeman you had broken the man’s arm.’

  ‘Because I did.’

  ‘But Nell –’

  ‘Yes, honestly. The bone snapped. It was horrible.’

  ‘You couldn’t have done it.’

  ‘Ju-jitsu,’ said Nell nodding significantly. ‘Barbie and I had some lessons from a little Jap. We were getting on quite nicely and then he suddenly disappeared in the night. You don’t have to be stronger than the other person,’ explained Nell. ‘You just hold their arm and they do it themselves.’ She giggled and added, ‘It wouldn’t be as easy as you think to strangle me. That was one of the first things he taught us – how not to be strangled.’

  ‘You are a most extraordinary girl,’ declared Will Headfort.

  Nell was pleased. What girl doesn’t like to be told she is extraordinary?

  After a bit Will said, ‘I’ve been thinking about that child – the child you’re so worried about.’

  ‘Agnes?’

  ‘Yes. I think I could arrange for her to be put into a Home. Of course I’m not particularly keen on putting children into Institutions, but the Home I know about is in the country and there’s an exceedingly nice matron. It might be better for her than her present mode of life.’

  ‘Almost anything would be better!’

  ‘Or we could adopt her ourselves,’ added Will Headfort, throwing out this amazing suggestion in a casual manner.

  ‘Oh Will, you are good!’ exclaimed Nell in astonishment. She pondered the matter and then continued, ‘Of course we should have to think about it very seriously. She isn’t a very attractive child – poor little scrap – but I dare say she would improve. Do you really mean you wouldn’t mind?’

  ‘Why should I mind?’ he asked, smiling at her. ‘There’s plenty of room in the house and Mrs Ridge is a good soul. She would help. Anyhow you can think about it.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Nell. It was obvious that already she had begun to think about it very seriously indeed.

  It was peaceful and quiet on the hill; not sunny, but pleasantly warm. A soft haze was spread all over the sky and the light was silvery. They sat there for quite a long time and presently they began to play their ‘special game’ which consisted of bandying quotations of Shakespeare. It was rather a silly game, really, but it was fun to be silly together and Nell had found it a good way of keeping her Will in check when he became slightly unmanageable. He was more conversant than she with the works of his namesake, but Nell was making it her business to read, mark, learn and inwardly digest some of his favourite plays so as to be up-sides with him.

  So when Will – after a little silence – suddenly exclaimed:

  ‘Lord, who would live turmoiled in a court,

  And may enjoy such quiet walks as these?’

  Nell laughed and replied: ‘But “Here’s the lord of the soil come to seize me for a stray, for entering his fee-simple without leave!” ’

  The ‘lord of the soil’ was merely a South Down sheep, which had wandered round a rock in search of succulent pasture and, far from seizing the trespassers upon its fee-simple, stood for a moment regarding them with an expression of horrified amazement before it turned tail and fled with a loud ‘baa-aa.’

  When they had finished laughing Nell said it was time to go home so they walked back together to the place where they had left the car. They walked arm-in-arm, as they had done in the fog, and anyone seeing them might have jumped to the conclusion that they were engaged to be married – but of course they were not.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Underwoods seemed very quiet without Barbie, but there was plenty to do in the garden and Amalie was not lonely The garden was now at its best; wistaria rioted over the south wall, its branches bowed down with their weight of blossom, and the willow-gentian in its cool shady spot was beginning to come into flower. Soon the little bushes with their slender stems would bear narrow bells of deep blue flowers, and the corner of the garden where they grew would look like a pool of blue water. Amalie was very fond of these gentians, she had grown them herself from a few seeds gathered on a visit to Switzerland. She had been told that they would not grow here in the Cotswolds but they had liked their new home and had thriven and multiplied under her care.

  Amalie was in no hurry for them to flower. She would have held back the garden if she could … for, as each plant flowered and faded, she knew that it was gone for a whole year. The longest day was long past and not until next year would she see the may-tree smiling like a bride in the sunshine, nor the glowing lamps upon the rhodies nor find the scatter of golden primroses upon the bank beneath the ash. Next year was such a long time to wait … all through the dead winter. Summer days passed too quickly, thought Amalie; and then she thought, but there are still the chrysanthemums to come and the dahlias and the proud upstanding gladioli and the gold of ripe corn in the harvest fields and the flames of the autumn leaves!

  And there was planning to do. Now that the espalier had been erected she must make up her mind about climbing roses. Which to have! There were so many different kinds and all so lovely.

  Perhaps Amalie’s favourite spot, amongst all the enchantments of Underwoods garden, was the rectangular lily-pool surrounded with flowering shrubs which had been made long ago by her husband. Beside it was the wooden seat, and several large urns which were always full of roses. The trees had been cut back a little to give a vista of surpassing beauty, of a green valley and a silver river and small farms. She and Ned had often sat here together and enjoyed the peaceful scene; to Amalie it was ‘Ned’s seat’; the place where she could best evoke the memory of their companionship.

  Amalie had expected ‘bread and butter letters’ from Edward and Barbie but it was a week before they arrived. They came the same morning at breakf
ast time and Amalie opened Barbie’s letter first. She was a little surprised to see it was so short, for Barbie usually wrote long letters full of amusing details; she would have been more surprised if she could have seen the condition of the waste-paper basket when the final draft was completed. After the usual expressions of thanks Barbie continued:

  ‘I’m afraid this is going to hurt you a lot but I can’t help it. I have decided I can’t marry Edward. I made a mistake about my feelings. The only thing to do was to tell him. I expect Edward has told you about it. Later on I hope we shall be “just friends” as we were before, but in the meantime it will be better for us both if we do not meet. So I shall not be coming to Underwoods for the week-end. Dear Aunt Amalie, I am very sorry.

  Ever your loving

  Barbie.’

  Amalie felt a little dazed as she put down Barbie’s letter and opened Edward’s. His was very much longer and not nearly so clear for he had written in haste and without revision. It began by saying that he and Barbie had had ‘a little tiff’ but he was sure it would all come right so Amie was not to worry. There was quite a lot about ‘Barbie’s red-haired temper’ and how the disagreement was ‘all about nothing.’ He went on to say that he had done all he could to bring her round; he had rung her up and tried to explain but she had been ‘horrid’ to him and refused to listen: he had gone to see her at the flat but had not been able to get in. He did not know whether she was really out, or ‘was inside, sulking.’ It was absolutely the limit, declared Edward. He had done all he could. Barbie must be crazy. If she thought she could treat him like that, and get away with it, she could think again. He then said that he would not come to Underwoods for the week-end because Barbie would be there and it would be unpleasant for everyone and anyhow it was better to ‘let her stew for a bit in her own juice.’ He had been asked by some friends to go yachting on the Broads and he thought he would just go and leave Barbie to stew until he returned. Perhaps she would be more reasonable by that time. He finished by imploring his dearest Amie to write to Barbie immediately and persuade her to see him so that he could explain everything and put things right before he left for his holiday, otherwise he would not enjoy it at all.