“No, I don’t. Nothing.”
“You mean, you think she’s quite all right?”
“I think her heart is broken.”
“But that’s it,” cried Stephen. “I think so too. And I can’t bear it. I sometimes wish she’d start calling me a frightful child as she used to do. You know what I mean?”
“Yes. I can’t bear it either.”
A guide led a party of tourists into the Chapter House. His scowl reproved Melissa for perching on the Dean’s throne, so she rose, in some confusion, and fled with Stephen into the cloisters. They paced round two sides of them before Stephen spoke again:
“I’ve heard,” he said solemnly, “I mean I’ve read, that women are very constant.”
“We’re generally supposed to be fickle,” said Melissa.
“Well, look at all the books and poetry there is about girls who will go on loving the most awful cads! Look at that girl … er … Sollwig … she’s supposed to be very touching. Nobody writes poetry about a man who will go on loving a frightful woman. They think he’s cuckoo. What I mean is … do you think Lucy still loves him, in spite of everything?”
“It’s quite possible.”
“Because … he did ask if I thought she might like to see him.”
“Stephen! You mean …”
“I think he’d marry her, if she still …”
“But you can’t want him to!”
“It’s not what I want. It’s what she wants.”
“What did you say?”
“I said no. But he gave me his address. I could tell him to come. And since I’ve been here, these holidays, I’ve sometimes wondered if I oughtn’t to tell him to come. If she forgives him, does it matter that we can’t?”
Melissa reflected and then asked how Reilly was looking.
“That’s another thing that worries me. He looks a lot older and … and thicker. I think he’d been drinking. But it might be only lunch. Only … he does look rather a mess.”
“Oh, Stephen! She ought to marry somebody nicer.”
“What’s the use of saying that, if she doesn’t want anyone nicer? Think of all the times she must have prayed he’d come back! Melissa, do you remember the time when Mother said: There’s been a mistake. And Lucy jumped up….”
“Oh, don’t. I remember. But he’ll only break her heart again. He’s a heel.”
“She has the right to choose which way she’ll break her heart, hasn’t she? If I thought she was getting over it …”
“Oh, I don’t know. I don’t know. I’ll think it over and tell you later.”
They met Lucy at a café for lunch and both of them were struck by her unwonted elation. It was even more marked than it had been in the bus. Something of the old glow had really returned, and it was soon apparent that the explanation lay in her handbag into which she peeped importantly from time to time. Stephen caught Melissa’s eye and telegraphed an enquiry. But she shook her head. She could not think what had happened.
Towards the end of the meal Lucy ordered Stephen to go and get his hair cut, with something of her old imperiousness. She and Melissa would meet him in the lounge of the Crown Hotel for tea. He winked gleefully at Melissa and obeyed. Melissa almost began to believe that Lucy must have met Reilly while they were in the Cathedral and be concealing a new engagement ring in her bag. But this revived flicker did not quite warrant so dramatic an explanation as that.
The two girls wandered round Severnton examining the shop windows, and Melissa declared that the clothes exhibited were much more attractive than any to be seen in London. She bought herself a summer cotton and urged Lucy to do likewise, but Lucy said that she had no money. This was nonsense; she had, Melissa knew, just received a quarter’s salary and she had cashed a cheque in Ravonsbridge before they started that morning.
When they grew tired of walking they went and sat in the lounge of the Crown, though it was a little early for tea. There was a comfortable sofa in a corner upon which they subsided; Lucy peeped into her mysterious bag and Melissa observed provincial life.
“Coo!” said Melissa suddenly. “Look! County! Real moth-eaten County!”
“Where?”
“That toothy girl in tweeds who just came in; you should have seen all the bowing and scraping. She’s sitting by that potted palm over there.”
Lucy looked and said:
“That’s Penelope Millwood.”
“What? The daughter-at-home?”
Melissa studied Penelope eagerly and said:
“She does, doesn’t she?”
“Does what?”
“Let us know she wears woollen knickers.”
“These sofas are so low.”
“You and I can sit on them without making poppy-shows of ourselves, and we’re only poor middle-class girls. Think of all the advantages she’s had!”
“Control yourself,” said Lucy. “A greater thrill is on its way. Terrific Charles has just come through the swing door.”
“No! No!”
They sat breathless while Charles advanced and stared about him. His eye swept their sofa, became blank, as he hesitated and bowed slightly, and then continued the search for his sister. Having discovered her behind her palm, he went to join her.
“Well,” said Melissa, “are you burnt up like Semele? What did that gaping sort of salutation mean?”
“He doesn’t know who we are,” said Lucy. “He thinks we’re Severnton belles he’s met at a Hunt Ball.”
“Oh, nonsense! You worked for him like a black. You gave him a drink at the Swan.”
“I don’t remember that he’s ever looked at me.”
“Ho! I think he should have come and talked to us.”
“He’d never dream of it.”
“Where are we?” asked Melissa, getting up. “At Rosings? In the shades of Pemberly?”
She crossed the lounge and ordered tea from a porter by the door. She looked at nobody, but everybody in the lounge looked at her, as she floated back to her sofa and came gracefully to rest upon it. Charles asked his sister a question and Penelope craned round her palm to stare at them.
“She says,” opined Melissa, “that she’s never seen me before but that you are one of the Institute minions.”
A few seconds elapsed during which Charles fidgeted.
“He’s wondering,” continued Melissa, “whether he ever thanked you for all your hard work. Did he?”
“No.”
“He will, in a minute.”
She began to time it on her wrist-watch. Before the minute was out Charles rose and approached them. He wanted, he said, to take this opportunity of thanking Lucy for the noble work she had done for him during the election. Lucy smiled and introduced Melissa. The two girls sat side by side on their sofa looking up at him. The Lucy-Melissa battery, though it had been out of action for nearly a year, was as effective as ever. Charles shifted uneasily from one foot to another.
“I believe,” said Melissa sweetly, “that you might be able to tell me about the Pentecost window. I couldn’t find it.”
He began to explain that it was hidden behind scaffolding, and she interrupted him to suggest that he would be more comfortable if he sat. The chair which he would be permitted to use was pointed out to him. By the time that he had taken it his spirit was thoroughly subdued. He stayed talking to them as long as Melissa chose and was then pleasantly dismissed. He went back to Penelope wondering who Miss Hallam could be.
Melissa, impeccably well bred, talked to Lucy about stained glass until tea-trays, brought to both parties, ended the incident. Then, as she poured out Lucy’s tea, she murmured:
“Hoity-toity! What airs to be sure! I’m not a rich woman, as Annie the Scout used to say, but I’d give half a crown to see that lofty top-knot brought low.”
“You ruffled it a little,” said Lucy.
“You helped. It takes two to do that sort of thing.”
“You caused quite noticeable emotion, Melissa. I’d never have believ
ed it … he was almost human.”
“Oh, I daresay he’s human. I expect he conducts a stately love life in some lofty region beyond our ken. Where was he raised? Not Eton, I think?”
“No. Winchester.”
“I’m not surprised. Anything can come from Winchester. In College I suppose.”
Melissa pondered and then exclaimed that this must be the Millwood who was in College with Hump.
“Why didn’t I realise that before, Lucy! He must be the Eel!”
“Is that what Hump called him?”
“It’s what everybody called him. You see, this Millwood had a very peculiar method of getting into bed. Still has, for aught I know, if he’s that Millwood. He doesn’t tear the sheets apart to get in; he likes to stay all neat and tucked up. So he sits on the pillow and slowly inserts himself. Everybody thought it highly diverting. Crowds collected to watch him do it.”
Lucy, enraptured, wondered if this ritual was still observed in some august alcove at Cyre Abbey.
“Well, so a friend of Hump’s called Pattison caught a lot of eels one day. He’d meant to cook and eat them, but they looked too horrible. And up came Hump, who’d been out running, and dashed up, you know, all panting and dishevelled in shorts and a singlet, and Pattison called out: ‘Hi! Hallam! Where does a man put unwanted eels?’ And Hump never paused, he dashed past, shouting: ‘In Millwood’s bed.’”
“And did they?”
“Yes,” sighed Melissa disapprovingly. “Hump is very crude sometimes. Hump thought it was funny. He said Millwood got into bed as slowly as usual until his toes touched the eels….”
“Ha! Ha! Ha!”
“Dear me,” expostulated Melissa. “What a coarse laugh some people have! Some people are as crude as Hump.”
Lucy blushed, aware that everyone in the lounge was looking at her. But she continued to giggle for the rest of the afternoon over this simple joke.
Stephen, with a close-cropped pate, joined them and they had a merry tea. The evening passed delightfully until Lucy took Melissa back to her room at the Swan to help with her packing. For Melissa was leaving by a very early train in the morning.
“Melissa!”
Melissa looked up from her shoe bags. Almost … almost the old Lucy was sparkling at her. What is it? wondered Melissa. Is it … can he …?”
“I’m going to be selfish,” said Lucy, “and give myself a treat. You see, I mayn’t get off in July, so I want to give it to you now, for I must see your face when you see it. Your wedding present,” she explained, fishing in her bag, “I got it in Severnton today. I saw it there last week, in a tray in a junk shop, and I did love it so, but of course … and then I remembered it in the night and thought: Melissa’s wedding present. But oh, I was so much afraid it would be gone! But it wasn’t.”
She handed a grubby little box to Melissa. Inside, lying on cotton-wool, was a ring — an intaglio on a pale-green stone.
“Hold it up to the light,” commanded Lucy, “and you’ll see. It’s a cupid riding on a dolphin and waving his little hand. I don’t know what the stone is, and I didn’t like to ask in case the man in the shop might start looking at it and find out it was really good, for I think it must be, it’s so lovely. Do you see his little hand? And his wings?”
“Yes,” said Melissa, looking at the ring through smarting tears.
So this was the secret! Nothing for herself at all, only for me, thought Melissa. And that’s how she spent all her money! But I mustn’t cry … I must be delighted. She’s waiting for me to be delighted.
“Oh, Lucy, it’s perfectly lovely. I never saw anything quite like it. I know I shan’t have any other present quite so nice. I can’t wait to show it to John….”
But the sparkle was fading and disappointment was pushing Lucy back into her lonely path. She had seen Melissa’s distress and guessed the cause.
“I knew you’d like it,” she said flatly.
Then she gave Melissa a warm hug, as if trying to console her and to apologise for their ghastly predicament.
“We’ll be here with a taxi at eight o’clock,” she said, “and take you down to the station. Good night….”
For some time afterwards Melissa could do nothing but scold herself for her want of self-command. But then a more cheerful thought occurred to her. She argued that if so small a thing could, even for a short time, have so marked an effect, there must be great reason for hope. Time and Lucy’s own nature might heal the wound.
Next morning, at the station, she found an opportunity to take Stephen aside and beg him not to send for Patrick Reilly.
“If he comes of his own accord,” she said, “we can’t help it. But don’t let’s send for him. I believe she will get over it. I believe she will, in time, get over it completely, without any help from anybody.”
2
“I SHALL never get over it. Why should I?”
Thus Rickie, when the fact of Melissa’s engagement had at last been got into his head.
“People do,” said Lucy, “I can’t think why.”
“Not unless they want to. I don’t want to. I can’t face life without Melissa.”
“It’s no worse for you than for other people,” said Bess, in whose library they had assembled for a mid-morning cup of tea. “Everybody has their troubles and they get over them.”
Rickie helped himself to two lumps of sugar and said that people who get over things can’t have suffered very much.
“Oh, bosh! Look at Lucy. She’s had the most sickening luck. You know she has. But she’s been sensible and looked on the bright side, and now she’s quite all right again.”
Bess rose and took a cup of tea to Mr. Mildmay in his little room. There was a pause while Rickie stared at Lucy and Lucy digested this astonishing description of herself.
“I know you had a bad time,” said Rickie at last. “But I can’t believe you were ever as wretched as I am.”
“Oh, Rickie, I think I was.”
“You might have been at first, and then you must have thought you’d never get over it.”
“No. I thought so at once. It was the first thing I thought. At least … I didn’t think it. I said it. I said it to my mother. She was crying. I suppose I wanted to comfort her, but, when I said it, I knew it was true.”
“My mother is dead,” he reminded her gloomily. “I have nobody. I always thought Melissa would take her place.”
Lucy made a sympathetic noise but hardly heard him. She was lost in amazement, recalling that strange announcement which she had once made at her mother’s bedside. How had she come to say such a thing? She had never thought it strange before, but now she found it mysterious and inexplicable — a prophetic utterance, proceeding from no connected chain of thought, no effort of will. Reason and determination had come much later. This had merely been a statement of perception.
“I said it,” she repeated in a puzzled voice. “I suppose I’m like that lady in Gide’s novel; I can’t know what I think till I see what I say.”
“Then you’re crackers,” said Bess, returning. “Sensible people think before they speak.”
“I know they’re supposed to. But I sometimes wonder if the most sensible things we say have much to do with thinking.”
A reproachful groan from Rickie recalled them to his predicament. He still wanted to know why he should not drown himself in the Ravon.
“No reason on earth that I know of,” snapped Lucy. “If you do it’s because you do. If you don’t it’s because you don’t.”
She rose, and added that they ought all to be getting back to their work.
“Work!” cried Rickie. “How can I? When I’m feeling like this! I hate the thought of it.”
“You couldn’t hate the thought of it more than I do,” said Lucy. “This term has been hell, ever since Ianthe joined the Drama School. How I could ever have been so crazy to suggest the idea to her beats me. But hell or not, I work, and so must you, Rickie.”
“Is she no good at it
?” asked Bess.
“She’s frightfully good. But she’s properly knocking the Drama School to pieces. She has caused the Frog to quarrel with H. E.; Frog wants her in Twelfth Night, and he won’t have her in the cast because she’s a first-termer. So we’re all split into a pro-Ianthe party and an anti-Ianthe party, headed by Wendy.”
“Which are you, pro or anti?”
“I don’t know. She ought to be Viola, if talent counts. But she’s so spiteful. She’s put the others up to staring at poor Wendy’s legs, whenever she comes on. Well, they are terribly bandy, you know. She ought never to wear tights. But we never noticed it till darling Ianthe joined us. Come along, Rickie! Back to hell!”
But Rickie declared that he could not work.
“I’ll go for a walk,” he decided. “And tonight I’ll come to Sheep Lane and sit with you, Lucy, so that I shan’t be quite alone.”
Lucy had a lecture to prepare and did not relish this suggestion. But she was really sorry for him and felt that perhaps she had been a little unsympathetic. So she assented and thereafter discovered that she was to enjoy very few evenings to herself. He came every night to Sheep Lane and remained there until she threw him out. Sometimes he sat with his head in his hands, moaning feebly. At other times he entreated her to say that Melissa might yet change her mind.
He was not mentally deficient, but various circumstances had impeded his maturity. He had been an only child and his widowed mother had spoilt him.
Music is the least educative of the arts; it may lead its votaries to a better world but it teaches them little about this one. Living only for music, he had existed in a harmonious dream. Now, in his mid-twenties, he was not only confronted with a major disappointment but had become belatedly aware of many hard facts which should have been digested ten years earlier. It was nobody’s business to look after him. Nobody cared a pin for him and his troubles. His dinner must still be earned though his work, hitherto a delight, had grown wearisome. All these discoveries appalled him. He announced them one by one to Lucy, as they burst upon him, and finally, upon a Sunday evening, he came to the conclusion that a loving God would never have allowed him to be so unhappy.
Lucy Carmichael Page 16
