Nightmare

by Lynn Brock

  Chidgey slowed up behind a ’bus, approaching a dangerous corner. ‘Get on, get on,’ commanded Mr Knayle impatiently.

  Chidgey opened his throttle, passed out, and rushed round the corner at thirty miles an hour, narrowly escaping a cataclysmic collision. But he didn’t care if he did have a jolly good old smash-up. When he had left Mr Knayle at the Edwarde-Lewins’ he had returned to the garage with the car, resolved to do the gear-box and the back-axle. But in the end he hadn’t done them. He never would do them again. ‘Get on, get on’—as if he couldn’t be left to drive the car as he thought right. Suddenly he decided that he would give Mr Knayle notice. Yes—and give it to him straight away. What the blinking hell did it matter if he did give up a good job? What did anything matter so long as one dropped all the old stuff and got on to something new …?

  2

  ‘Very well, Chidgey,’ said Mr Knayle. ‘I shall be very sorry to lose you. But, of course, you know your own business best. I shan’t want you again this evening.’

  He went up the outside staircase, subduing his ascent to sedateness. Rather annoying about Chidgey. Very annoying in fact. Chidgey appeared to have no reason for wishing to leave. Really, it was rather extraordinary the way people did things now without having the slightest reason to do them. They had been talking about it at the Edwarde-Lewins’. Idiotic things—and perfectly sensible people did them.

  As he ascended, a confused medley of sounds became audible. The gramophone was blaring away, there was a violent hammering and smashing, a whistle was blowing, a tin can or something was being beaten.

  ‘Tsch,’ Mr Knayle exclaimed indignantly. ‘Well, really, what a damned shame.’

  Then he saw her. She was standing with Whalley on the landing of the staircase outside their hall-door, holding on with both hands to the arm which he was trying to free from her grasp. Her eyes were fixed imploringly on his face—a set white mask whose frozen desperateness was turned upwards towards the Prossips’ door. All her slight strength was strained in the effort to keep her hold. Neither of them saw Mr Knayle, who stopped, dismayed.

  ‘Darling, don’t—please. What’s the good? Simon—look at me. Don’t look like that. We’ll go away—right away from Rockwood. We’ll go back to Surrey. You were happy there. We can sublet the flat. Don’t look like that, dear …’

  Mr Knayle retreated down the steps with his posy stealthily. Arriving at the recess beneath the steps in which the rubbish-bins were kept, he paused and lifted the lid of his own bin. He felt very elderly and futile and out of everything. After some meditation, however, he replaced the lid, and went on into his flat, still carrying his roses. She would go away … he would see no trim little figure flitting through the front garden. Of course, now, he wouldn’t stay on when his lease terminated. He couldn’t now. Still, the wonder remained—he loved her. His heart had leaped at the sight of her. His secret would remain to him—for a few days the roses would share it with him.

  Chidgey was waiting in the hall, eager to withdraw his resignation. ‘Very sorry I made such a fool of myself, sir,’ he concluded.

  ‘That’s all right, Chidgey,’ said Mr Knayle kindly. ‘We all do foolish things occasionally. It makes a bit of a change. Have a bottle of beer with Hopgood and forget it.’

  3

  Mr Knayle could not get to sleep that night. Towards two o’clock he was lying in the darkness of his bedroom, still wide awake, revolving vaguely an idea which had occurred to him. Whalley could probably not afford to take any legal steps to obtain redress. But why should not he himself do so? Why shouldn’t he instruct his solicitors to write to Prossip, threatening application for an injunction if the nuisance of the gramophone was not abated. Prossip would probably get frightened—he was a mere blusterer. The noise in the top flat would stop. The whole thing would blow over—and the Whalleys would not go away.

  And, of course, he did hear the gramophone in his own flat. No matter if he only heard it partly—no matter what Edwarde-Lewin said.

  At this point he became aware that he heard at that moment a sound which had no business to be heard in his flat at that hour of the morning—the sound of water splashing. He listened for a little space, then rose, slipped into his dressing-gown and went out into his hall. A considerable portion of the hall was awash, and from one point in its ceiling—the boarding covering in the old staircase well—a small but steady trickle of water was falling into it. He routed Hopgood out of his bed, and they held counsel for a little space. Obviously the water came from the flat above. They listened—no sound was audible overhead. Ultimately Mr Knayle brushed his hair, put in his two false teeth, lighted a cigarette, ascended the outside staircase and rang the Whalleys’ bell. After some delay Whalley opened it.

  ‘Awfully sorry to disturb you, my dear chap,’ began Mr Knayle, ‘but have you had an—?’ His eyes took in the little lighted interior, and his unnecessary question died away. The hall and the passage were two glistening ponds connected by a miniature waterfall which was descending the little flight of stairs. From the ceiling three small cascades were falling as if from three open taps. In the background Elsa was hurriedly removing saturated coats from a hanging cupboard. Carpet, rugs, mats, furniture, walls, everything was sodden—splashing. Bogey-Bogey splashed as he gambolled excitedly. One cascade rebounded from the balusters of the stairs and splashed Mr Knayle’s face. Elsa’s slippers splashed as they moved hurriedly. (How adorable she was in her dressing-gown and pyjamas and the little net cap which, evidently she wore at night to keep her hair from tossing). ‘Hullo, Harvey,’ she said vaguely. ‘I suppose it has gone through into your flat.’

  ‘Dear, dear,’ Mr Knayle exclaimed in consternation. Then the light fell on Whalley’s face and his tone changed sharply. ‘Now, now, my dear fellow. Take it quietly. They can’t possibly have done this on purpose. I’ll go and knock them up.’

  He slipped past Whalley adroitly and went up and rang the Prossips’ bell several times, without success. Descending, he met Whalley hurrying up the steps and urged him downwards again.

  ‘No, no—it’s no good. I’ve tried. They’re either asleep or they don’t want to hear. There’s a tap running up there. Somewhere near their front door. In their bathroom, I rather fancy. Take it quietly, old chap. It must be an accident. Their hall must be in a flood, too. We must turn the water off at the main, that’s all. The tap of the main is in Ridgeway’s flat. I’ll go down …’

  He descended and returned a few minutes later with Mr Ridgeway and Hopgood. Elsa and Bogey-Bogey had disappeared. Whalley was standing looking up at the ceiling stonily. ‘We’ll mop this up in no time,’ said Mr Knayle cheerily, ‘when the water has stopped coming through. I wonder if they are upstairs. Funny they didn’t hear the bell. I rang about twenty times.’

  He prattled on cheerily. No one else said anything, however, and gradually he too subsided into silence. The four men stood clustered at the hall-door, looking at the swimming desolation within, listening to the tinkling, dreary splash of the water as it fell into the two buckets which Hopgood had carried up. For a long time it continued to fall steadily. When at last the three cascades had dwindled to three drips, they set to work, and by four o’clock had restored some semblance of dryness. Dawn had come. Elsa reappeared and gave them coffee gaily in the kitchen. Mr Knayle began to prattle again. Mr Ridgeway, in a dingy old dressing-gown and looking very blowsy in the early light, smiled at Elsa with his fine, tired eyes and suddenly told two very funny stories. Bogey-Bogey performed his three tricks. Hopgood, standing respectfully at the door while he drank his coffee, made a pretty speech. ‘Well, I must say, madam, you do keep your kitchen a treat.’ Whalley, however, remained outside this concluding cheerfulness and sat staring at his cup as if, Mr Knayle thought, he was alone. Mr Ridgeway’s attention was also attracted by his absorbed silence. He reached out a hand suddenly and laid it on Whalley’s wrist, feeling with the other hand for a watch which was not in a waistcoat which he was not wearing. His bristle
d, sagging face became confused and alarmed, and his hands retreated hurriedly to his cup. But no one, to his relief, had noticed their abrupt movements. Whalley continued to stare at his cup, unaware that a hand had caught his wrist.

  Hopgood went off with his buckets to mop up Mr Knayle’s hall and shortly afterwards, disclaiming gratitude, Mr Knayle and Mr Ridgeway went down the outside staircase, whose railing was festooned with sodden mats and strips of carpet. Though they had been neighbours now for over four years, their only contacts hitherto had been the occasional exchange of salutes in the front garden. But the adventure of the night had made them for the moment intimate.

  ‘They’re leaving, I understand?’ said Mr Ridgeway, looking back over a shoulder in the direction of the hall-door which had just shut behind them.

  ‘So I understand,’ said Mr Knayle. ‘I think they’re wise.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ agreed Mr Ridgeway. ‘I suppose so.’ They went on a few steps. ‘A sweet little creature, Mrs Whalley, I always think. One will miss her going in and out with that little cocker of hers.’

  ‘Yes, yes,’ agreed Mr Knayle.

  They reached the front garden, paused at the head of the short flight of steps leading down to Mr Ridgeway’s hall-door, looked at one another, and then decided, quite unnecessarily, to shake hands. Then, as if the handshake had had no significance whatever and as if important business awaited them within, they hurried into their respective flats.

  4

  The inundation, it may be said here, remained for Mr Knayle a mystery. He had a talk with Mr Prossip about it a couple of days later, but Mr Prossip (he was nervous and shaky, Mr Knayle noticed—the strain of the vendetta had evidently begun to tell on his bluster) could or would throw no light upon it. He and Mrs Prossip had been in London that night. His daughter Mawjery had given Agatha, the maid, permission to spend that night at her own home. Mawjery herself had spent it at her Aunt Maggie’s, having felt nervous about sleeping in the flat without male protection. There had been no one in his flat that night. Mawjery hadn’t left the bathroom tap running—the maid hadn’t left it running. Mawjery had found no water about the flat when she had returned to it on the following morning. Mr Prossip couldn’t understand the damned thing. When Mr Knayle suggested, urbanely, that a few words of polite regret might ease matters a little, Mr Prossip said he was damned if he would apologise to any b—y penny-a-liner. Mr Knayle decided to drop the matter.

  The Whalleys had apparently arrived at the same decision. They were out a great deal in their shabby little two-seater. The gramophone—which played only when they were in their flat—was sometimes silent until evening. Mr Knayle went off to fish in Wales for a fortnight with the confident hope that the whole ridiculous business was going to blow over.

  On the evening on which he and Hopgood returned, he went up to deliver a twenty-pounder which he had brought back for the Whalleys. The Prossips’ saucy maid met him on the outside stairs and flashed a bold smile at him.

  ‘If you’re going up to the Whalleys, they’re left.’

  ‘Left?’ repeated Mr Knayle vaguely.

  ‘Yes. They cleared out last week. Their flat’s to let—by what I hear Missus say.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Mr Knayle. ‘I see. Thank you.’

  He sent the salmon to a hospital. One can’t share a secret with a fish.

  CHAPTER IV

  1

  THERE were no further demonstrations in the coal cellar and the thumpings overhead, though always expected, became dilatory and less violent. The gramophone, however, continued to play. It played while they dressed, while they ate, while they sat talking, despite themselves, in daunted undertones. Its blare pervaded their lives; they heard it in their sleep and awoke, to lie awake thinking about it.

  The landlord’s solicitors wrote demanding that they should immediately get rid of ‘your savage and noisy dog.’

  And then the blow over which Mr Knayle had meditated fell like a thunderbolt. On the Sunday following the flooding of their flat they learned that Mr Loxton was to be married, very shortly, to a Mrs Gaythorne, of whose existence they had been until then unaware.

  They were introduced to Mrs Gaythorne in the garden before dinner—a good-looking, hard-eyed, smart woman of forty-five or so, whose presence remained unexplained for a moment or two of silence, while Mr Loxton smiled with mysterious archness. Then, dismayingly, he slid his arm into Mrs Gaythorne’s and she patted his wrinkled hand. All the dignity, the acute intelligence, the masterful self-sufficiency of this man who had transformed a small local firm into an immense business with ramifications all over the world disappeared; he grinned foolishly, a senile dotard.

  ‘I don’t know whether you have heard the glad tidings already, Elsa?’ he enquired jocularly.

  There was another little silence. ‘No, Uncle Richard,’ Elsa said at last.

  He wagged a finger. ‘Guess, then. Guess.’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t.’

  ‘You can’t? You can’t see that you are looking at the happiest and luckiest man in the world? You don’t hear joy-bells ringing? You don’t see favours fluttering in the wind? Well, well, well. Look at us again. Don’t we look like two people who are going to do the most wonderful thing that has ever been done? Now?’

  Over Mrs Gaythorne’s plump shoulder Elsa’s eyes met her sister’s.

  ‘Oh?’ She smiled valiantly. ‘Uncle—you sly old thing—’

  Mrs Gaythorne detached herself from Mr Loxton and took Elsa’s hands in hers. ‘My dear,’ she said with careful intensity. ‘Tell me that you and I are going to be very, very great friends.’

  The gong rang and the party moved towards the house. From Mrs Canynge Elsa received some hurried enlightenment as to Uncle Richard’s love-idyll. Mrs Gaythorne was the widow of a naval commander. She lived at Bath. Uncle Richard had met her at a garden-party there only three weeks before. She had no money. And she had three children—a daughter of twenty and two sons in their teens.

  ‘Silly old creature,’ said Mrs Canynge. ‘That little cat will lead him a dance. Harold and I are perfectly furious about it. I expect you and Simon are too. We have to run away as soon as this ghastly meal is over. But do come over and have a talk about it. It’s too devastating … Any time.’

  2

  The Whalleys were silent as they drove home. There was nothing to say. They had left Mrs Gaythorne behind them in the garden, already its mistress, planning a new herbaceous border. This clever, determined woman with no money and three children held Uncle Richard and his million, they had seen, in a grip of steel. Her hard, vigilant eyes had scarcely troubled to conceal their cool triumph; she had captured this foolish, amorous old creature of seventy-five and no niece or niece’s husband (she had snubbed Canynge during dinner so adroitly that he had become quite friendly with Whalley) was going to dispute her prize with her. Uncle Richard had already ceased to be. That ultimate dependence which, in spite of recurring doubts and distrusts, had remained a background of reassurance had been swept away. When Uncle Richard went there would be—for Elsa—Aunt Gladys, with her alien interests, her hard smile and her three children, to deal with. There was nothing to say.

  When they reached the flat Whalley looked about him vaguely, heedless of Bogey-Bogey’s rapturous welcome.

  ‘We must get out of this, Elsa,’ he said abstractedly. ‘This book simply must be finished. It’s no good—but it must be finished. We must get out of this at once. I hate asking you to leave the flat. But it’s our only chance. I can’t work here. We must sub-let the flat and go somewhere.’

  She bit her lip to stop its trembling. The flat had been her little kingdom—despite all troubles, her little paradise. She had made it. Every chair and mat and cup and saucepan (she had chosen them all so carefully) had shared all sorts of thoughts with her.

  ‘Where, dear? To Surrey?’

  ‘No. I’ve thought it over, coming back. We’ll buy a piece of land out there at Camphill—where we sat yesterday—on that sl
ope. We’ll buy a piece of land there. There was a board saying that it was for sale in lots. Quite a small bit will do—an acre or so. Or two acres. I expect the land out there is cheap. We’ll put up a hut and some sort of garage for the car. We can get water from that cottage down the hill. We shall be right away from everything out there. It’s not twenty minutes walk down the hill to that village—Clapenham. There’s a sort of general store there and a butcher’s shop. We can run into Rockwood for other things—it’s only half an hour—barely ten miles …’

  He developed his idea, pacing up and down the little passage, looking at his watch, seeming not to hear her when she suggested some obvious difficulty. For him his plan had no difficulties; he saw it already accomplished. With a simplicity which hardly hesitated, he arranged a complete uprooting of their lives. She was familiar with this curious, primitive naïveté which contemplated difficult and complicated undertakings as if they were already performed. Sometimes it took him a whole week to decide to write a letter of a few lines. But she had known him jump up in the middle of breakfast and begin the writing of a novel of 90,000 words, whose plot had occurred to him while he buttered his toast. So, she divined, he had decided to write plays. So he had decided to live by writing novels. So, perhaps, he had decided to marry her. But she would not have it otherwise—it was Simon; and he was right. His voice and his eyes always made her feel that he was right in spite of everything. They must leave the flat. The novel must be finished; it was three years since a book of his had been published—authors’ names were soon forgotten. There would be difficulties, but they must be faced. How was liver to be got every day? But it must be managed. It would be lovely out there in the early mornings … And perhaps if the novel was sold, they might be able to come back—

  ‘Very well, dear, let us just think it over for a day or two.’

  But he was looking at his watch again.

  ‘We shall have time to run out there before tea. The agents’ name was on that notice-board. I’ll show you the bit I think we ought to try for—from the edge of the wood up to the gap where we went in through the hedge. We’ll have our gate at the gap. We shall have only three sides to fence. The hedge will fence the other side …’