The Expensive Halo

by Josephine Tey

  “You?”

  “Musicians.”

  “Some of my best friends are musicians. It’s the crowd who hang round them I can’t bear. Perhaps camp followers are always a despicable bunch. Even a prostitute is better than a pimp, I suppose. Play me some more. When you play so well it must be hellish to play dance stuff.”

  “Oh, it might be worse,” Gareth said airily. “And after all, there are lots of people like me. Look at Hal. It isn’t any use grumbling. After all, very few people are able to make their living doing the thing they like best. And I can always do the thing I like best for nothing in my spare time. Not many people can say that.”

  “But you are far too philosophical! No one gets anywhere by being philosophical. You should be resentful and kick and make a row. Then people take notice of you.”

  Gareth grinned. “Yes, they have you ejected.”

  “You look as if you would make an ideal martyr.”

  “Do I? It’s the last thing I should like to be. I used to have ideas, of course, about playing nothing that wasn’t music, but I soon gave that up. I found the only place where I could play the things I wanted was the street, and—well, I’m not a martyr.”

  “But if you really—” Ursula began, and stopped. That had been a knock on the door. It was Lady Wilmington.

  Watching her mother cross to them Ursula thought that her mother was just the type of woman who is murdered and no one can think why.

  Oh, darling! So sorry to interrupt. I didn’t know you had visitors. But I had to see you for a moment. I know you’ll think I’m a plague, darling, but I can’t help it.”

  “Mother, this is Gareth Ellis, the violinist.”

  “How do you do, Mr. Ellis? I’ve heard such a lot about you. Delighted to meet you. I expect you are a very busy man, Mr. Ellis, with your concerts and things, but perhaps some day you’ll find time to play for one of my charities. Now don’t say no! I know it is asking a lot to expect you to play for us, but it is always for such a deserving object. We’re having a concert next Friday in aid of the Society for the Promotion of Better Understanding. Between nations, you know. And we are so hard up for really first-rate performers—although Madame Buffel has consented to sing for us. Now do you think you can come and play just for five minutes or so?”

  “Mother, you can hardly expect a musician whose normal fee is fifty guineas to go and play at a wretched little charity concert for love!”

  “But I don’t expect it! Don’t be ridiculous, Ursula! I’ve heard all about your wonderful talent, Mr. Ellis, and I shouldn’t dream of asking you to give us your services. But perhaps, since the object is so very splendid you could see your way to giving half your fee, perhaps, to the cause. I think the organising fund would run to twenty-five guineas if you would be really noble and come for that.”

  “I expect Mr. Ellis will make the sacrifice. Mr. Ellis is nothing if not noble,” Ursula said.

  “Then shall I say ten minutes’ performance?”

  “Oh,—er—fifteen, if you like,” Gareth began, “but, you know—”

  “Then that’s settled. Thank you a thousand times! I do so want this concert to be a success. Janet Goddridge ran it last year and they made only three hundred. Of course, she’s hopeless at organising anything, perfectly hopeless. So charming of you to help me. And now, Ursula. Darling, would you come and judge the dresses at the Children’s Ball? Cedric is so hoping you will!

  “Why me? I don’t know anything about dresses?”

  “No, but Cedric says you’re the only person in London who won’t care a tinker’s curse what people think of your decisions.”

  “How nice of him! But then, Cedric is always complimentary when he wants something.”

  “It would mean such a lot off my shoulders if you would, darling.”

  Ursula hesitated.

  “All right, I will,” she said.

  Her mother’s surprise was almost touching. “You will! Oh, darling, how sweet of you! You know, I didn’t dare hope you would, I promised Cedric I’d ask you but I didn’t think you’d say yes. It is sweet of you. It must be your music, Mr. Ellis. I see you’ve been playing.”

  “I’m the savage breast, you see,” Ursula said to Gareth.

  “Oh, darling! You know I didn’t mean that. Well, I must fly. A thousand thanks, Mr. Ellis. Au revoir till next Friday.”

  “I say,” Gareth said as the door closed behind her, “why did you—what made you—”

  “Are you backing out of your engagement?”

  “No, but, you know, those people who are running the concert, they’ll find out that I’m not famous, and then what will happen?”

  “Oh, no, they won’t. No one will dare to say they never heard of you in case they drop a brick. And by the time the affair is over you’ll be well on the way to being famous, if you play as you played to-night.”

  “Yes, but the committee who pay the twenty-five guineas. They’ll ask questions surely?”

  “Mother is the committee, and the rest would as soon think of resigning as questioning anything that mother may do. That is how she is allowed to run round being idiotic. And once they hear you there won’t be any need of questions.”

  “I say, it’s awfully good of you to—!” But she stopped him. “Play me something else. It’s early yet.”

  As he played the atmosphere, stirred up and troubled by Lady Wilmington’s hysterical animation and urgency, grew slowly still again. Ursula could almost feel it settling; like dew. The scent of the lilac came out as scents do on a still evening. He played something she did not know. At the beginning it promised to be simple, like the expression of a faith. But presently she found that phrases which one had expected to be acquiescent floated away instead in strange wild aspirations. It was not a statement; it was a crying voice in a wilderness. The music was full of unexpected intervals, and yet the melody was there for even the most obtuse to hear; only it was not the melody one expected. It sang and it cried in the still room; and it ended in two little short notes that had in them all the hopelessness of human endeavour, all the gladness of being able to aspire.

  There was an appreciable pause when he finished. “I’ve never heard that before,” Ursula said. “It’s very modern, isn’t it? What is it?”

  “It’s called ‘Moth to a Star,’” Gareth said, his head bent over to listen to the string he was tuning, so that his face was hidden.

  “Whose is it?”

  There was another pause, and she looked at his bent head with a new interest.

  “It’s your own, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Is it as bad as that!”

  “You know very well that it isn’t bad.”

  “Did you like it, then?”

  “Very much.”

  “You say that as if you meant it.”

  “Of course I mean it! I shouldn’t say so if I didn’t.”

  “If you didn’t,” Gareth said, suddenly impish, you would say that you simply loved it. I was terribly afraid you were going to say you adored it.

  “Are you accusing me of hypocrisy?”

  “That’s not hypocrisy; just conventionality.”

  “Good God!” Ursula said, “have I lived to hear someone call me conventional to my teeth!” They smiled at each other.

  “How long is it since you composed that thing?” she asked as she poured out two cocktails.

  “The day before yesterday.” There was moment’s silence, and he hurried on as if anxious to break it. “At least, the night before last. All my best ideas come through the night.”

  “And do you get up there and then to play? How awful for your family!”

  “Oh, no. It happens in my head. The family don’t suffer.”

  “Tell me about your family.”

  Gareth drank his cocktail, and described without much interest the members of his family. The household at Sark Street had not for him the evil fascination of hatred that it held for Sara.

  “Is your sister pretty?”
/>   “Yes, I think she is.”

  “What does she do? Anything?”

  “She dressmakes.”

  “Are you very good friends?”

  “Yes. She’s not very—what do you call it—demonstrative. But she’s always stuck up for me when things got hot. She’s an awfully good sort. She once took a spanking for me—without my knowing, of course.”

  “How funny!—Bobby—that’s Chitterne, you know—once did that for me. What had you done?”

  “Let the cat into the kitchen.”

  “I put tadpoles in the nursery bath.”

  “Was that a dreadful thing to do?”

  “Heinous. My nurse thought nature nasty. My thirst for knowledge was always being frustrated when I was small. Perhaps that is why I have such a passion for experiment now that I am grown-up. Do you and your sister still do things together?”

  “Well, now that we’re both working it’s different. But she and Molly are very good friends.”

  “Who is Molly?”

  “The girl I’m going to marry.”

  There was a little silence.

  “Oh? You’re engaged to be married?”

  “Why didn’t you tell me so thrilling a piece of information before?” Ursula’s tone was light, but her voice sounded like water dripping in a shallow dish.

  “What interest could it have held for you? And it isn’t thrilling. We’ve been engaged ever since we were in our teens.”

  “How—estimable!”

  There was a slight pause. Gareth set down his glass. “I must go,” he said, and got to his feet. “No, don’t go. I apologise. That was a horrid thing to say. It was—cheap.”

  “Time’s getting on. I must go.”

  “I’ve apologised for being petty. I can’t do more. Don’t be angry.”

  “I’m not. Why should I be?”

  “Then stop looking like John Knox and bring me another cocktail.”

  Gareth crossed over to her, moving stiffly as if it were only by a deliberate effort of the will that he made his limbs move. He took her glass and carried it to the table.

  “You know,” Ursula said, “you’re inclined to take things au grand sérieux.”

  “I don’t know any French, but I suppose you mean I haven’t a sense of humour.”

  “I don’t mean that at all. I mean that you take some things too seriously.”

  “Some things are serious.”

  “As what, for instance?”

  “Earning your living. And being in love.”

  “That is a very life-is-real-life-is-earnest point of view for an artist to take!”

  “If you don’t take something seriously you don’t get any kick out of life. If nothing matters to you what pep is there in existence?”

  “Ye-s. Wilde said something like that—a little more elegantly—last century. But it was just about as true as all the other would-be clever things he said. It’s a mistake to take anything seriously. You only get hurt. Give me my cocktail.”

  He poured out the cocktail, and having poured out too much, carried the glass over to her with an inelegant and infantile care, putting his heels down first and breathing deeply.

  “You know, I don’t believe you’re hard—hard—” He paused, anxious about the liquid. “Boiled—? Hearted—? Don’t leave me in suspense!”

  “I’ve filled it too full. I don’t believe you’re really cynical. It’s what you said just now. You’re afraid you’ll get hurt.”

  “And what would hurt me?”

  “Oh, life, I suppose.”

  “Then you admit it hurts?”

  “Oh, sometimes, of course. But that isn’t any reason for being cynical about it. The things that hurt most are often the things you wouldn’t have missed for the world. Don’t you believe in anything?”

  “Nothing I can think of at the moment.”

  “You don’t believe that there can be something—oh, something utterly lovely, if you know what I mean, in life?”

  “Nothing taken to bits is lovely. And I’ve always been a taker to bits. What do you find lovely in life?”

  “I don’t know. To-day—and to-morrow coming.”

  “My dear!” she said, her voice suddenly tender, “how I envy you!” Then, after a second, “Tell me about your fiancée. Is she fair or dark?”

  “Sort of medium.”

  “Like me.”

  “Yes.” He had given her the cocktail and was standing beside her, looking down at her. “No. No, she isn’t like you,” he said slowly, as if the words were pulled out of him. “She isn’t beautiful. She doesn’t talk the way you do. Or—or do anything like you. Her eyes don’t laugh the way yours do, and her mouth doesn’t—doesn’t—”

  “Doesn’t what?”

  Gareth leaned over and kissed her on the mouth. He did it without expression, as if a compulsion outside him had bent his body over to her. As he straightened himself realisation woke in him. “I’m sorry,” he said stupidly.

  “You should never apologise for kissing a woman. It’s adding insult to injury. You’ve spilt my cocktail.”

  “I’m terribly sorry!” Gareth said desperately. “Really, I’m terribly sorry!”

  “It doesn’t matter. I hate the frock anyhow.”

  “I didn’t mean the frock.”

  “Well, you should have meant the frock.” She looked up at him in the process of rubbing the stain, and laughed. “My dear Gareth, don’t look so abashed. One would think you had never kissed anyone but your mother and your fiancée!”

  “I haven’t.”

  “If it weren’t for the practical demonstration I shouldn’t believe it. You’ll have to take a course. I should speak to Molly, if I were you.”

  “Don’t laugh at me!” Gareth burst out. “Don’t laugh at me—please! I can’t bear it. I adore you. I can’t think of anything but you since that first night at Raoul’s. I worship you, and you just think of me as a poor little beast of a musician who amuses you because he’s different. I can’t bear it. I wrote that thing for you, and hoped that that would get it off my chest, but it just goes on getting worse. Every time I see you it gets worse. At the concert yesterday I couldn’t think of anything but you. I knew you were just being nice to me. I knew I was a fool, but I couldn’t help it. And I didn’t want to help it, somehow, because it was so wonderful being with you. It was something that might never happen again. I’ve never known anyone like you. I never meant to kiss you, or to say all the things I’m saying now. I know I’m crazy, and I’m going before you throw me out.”

  “Gareth, my dear—” she said, rising.

  “Oh, don’t be kind to me, for God’s sake. That would be the last—”

  “Gareth, be quiet.” She caught him by the shoulders as he was turning away, and swung him round to face her. “Listen to me. You are the loveliest thing that ever happened in my life. If anything could make me believe in the essential decency of things it would be you. Don’t you think I have felt all that too? Why, these last days the whole world has been different. I’ve even suffered fools gladly because you happen to be alive. When I walked into Regan’s that morning, and saw you, something happened to me that never happened before. And everything has been—new, ever since. I’ve done all the old boring things and found them beautiful, just because somewhere in London you were doing something too.”

  “Ursula! It’s not true.”

  “No? Do you think I’m being unmaidenly and immodest just for fun!”

  “Do you mean—? Do you actually mean—”

  His voice died away. It would be like blasphemy to say it aloud.

  “Yes, I mean just that. Are you going to make a better job of it this time?”

  Gareth’s arms went round her in a queer movement which had in it something that was almost resignation. It was as if a swimmer who had believed himself drowning saw rescue at hand and found it difficult to drag himself back to the realisation of life. But as his mouth met hers again the world not only swung back, but
into a new perspective altogether. A new-born dazzling world it seemed to him, with Ursula in his arms.

  They sat down side by side, Ursula smiling, Gareth serious. “Ursula,” he said, “you won’t mind if I stick Ursula into everything I say, will you? It’s so wonderful to be able to say it. Ursula, I adore you. When can I see you again?”

  “Breakfast-time to-morrow, if you like.”

  “No, but seriously.”

  “Well, if you don’t like the breakfast offer I can’t see you for ages and ages. Not till tea time.”

  “Where?”

  “Here if you like.”

  “No; you come out with me somewhere.” He hesitated. “The worst of it is there are so few places where—”

  “No, but there’s always the top of a bus.”

  “Bus tops are not what they were.”

  “Well, there are those outside pieces that trams have at the back. If it comes to that, I don’t mind kissing you in the middle of Piccadilly.”

  “Oh, you suggest a place.”

  “Let’s go to a Lyons Corner House and practice looking vacantly at each other.”

  “Be serious. It’s time I went.”

  “How can I be serious when you love me?”

  “That’s terribly serious.”

  “No, just incredibly lovely. Do let’s sit stolidly in a Lyons and look as if we’d quarrelled over the mid-day joint.”

  “We couldn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “It will be Saturday. There’s no joint on a Saturday.”

  “You know everything.”

  “I know that!”

  “Well, I’ll meet you at Borodin’s, in Buckingham Palace Road. We won’t see anyone we know there, so we can be as abandoned as we like. Half-past four.”

  “Not till then?”

  “No. I’m going to lunch with a lot of fools. It makes me feel quite Christian when I think how charitable I’m going to be to them. Play ‘Moth to a Star’ once more for me before you go.”

  “No, I don’t think so. I don’t feel a bit like that now, you see. I’ll write you another one. I shall go away and write it now. I feel it coming on.”

  “You talk as if it were a fit.”

  Gareth grinned. “It is, rather.”

  “Are you going to publish ‘Moth to a Star’?”