by A. A. Milne
‘Hallo!’ said Reginald, as she dropped into a deck-chair by his side.
‘I do just know you, don’t I?’ said Lena, ‘and you aren’t really lonely, are you?’
‘Yes. No,’ said Reginald.
They talked idly for a little, and then were silent, watching Sylvia.
‘Yes,’ said Lena with a sigh, ‘she is, isn’t she?’
‘What?’
‘The most beautiful woman in the world.’
Reginald looked round at her with a self-conscious smile.
‘Did you know I was thinking that?’
‘Of course.’
‘I wasn’t. Not beautiful. That isn’t the word. That means something terrific, don’t you think? Like Cleopatra.’
‘Sorry. I don’t know why I said beautiful. It was stupid of me. Utterly lovely.’
‘Yes.’
They were silent again. Then Lena said:
‘Isn’t love funny?’
‘Very,’ said Reginald, for that was just what he was thinking.
‘Could you have a marriage of intellects? A happy marriage?’
‘It’s generally supposed to be the only happy marriage, isn’t it? The only lasting one.’
‘Is it? It isn’t true.’
‘No. It couldn’t be.’
‘Why couldn’t it be?’
‘I’ve been wondering. I think, to be perfectly happy, you’ve got to be reaching out to something above you. Well, that’s a truism, of course.’
‘Why not to an intellect above you?’
‘Exactly. But then the other one in the partnership is not reaching out. He, or she, is condescending.’
‘You mean,’ said Lena, preferring to have this in a less abstract form, ‘a man could only be intellectually happy with a woman cleverer than himself, and she could only be happy with a man cleverer than herself, so they could never both be happy together.’
‘That’s the idea. Like all my ideas probably wrong. It’s a tremendous business, married life, and I don’t see how it can be done on a purely intellectual basis.’
‘Two minds that beat as one,’ murmured Lena.
‘Rubbish. How could they?’
‘What on, then? A purely physical basis?’
Reginald laughed.
‘Of course that sounds hopeless, put like that.’
‘Put it less hopelessly.’
‘All right.’ He thought for a moment. ‘A happy marriage is best founded on a spiritual appreciation of physical qualities.’
‘Yes, that certainly sounds better,’ smiled Lena.
‘The point is that physically men and women don’t compete. Each can look up to the other. Admire the other.’
‘We haven’t all got Sylvias to admire.’
‘You’ve got Tom,’ said Reginald.
‘In the same class—sex for sex?’
Reginald wasn’t going to admit that.
‘Ah, but that’s the beauty of it,’ he said quickly. ‘There are no classes in physical attraction. It’s subjective, not objective. The attraction may be no more than a lisp, which the rest of the world thinks affected, a dimple, a turn of the head, a pair of hands——’
Now, inevitably, they were both looking at hers, her left hand holding the fingers of her right as it drooped out of her lap.
‘That can go on attracting for ever?’ she said, colouring faintly.
‘Well, that’s love. Being attracted for ever.’
Lena was silent, twisting her wedding-ring round and round her finger.
‘Tom is awfully good-looking, don’t you think?’ she said aloud, following up her thoughts.
‘Oh, rather! But then I’m attracted by his mental qualities too.’
‘Oh?’ said Lena, raising her eyebrows. She thought for a moment and then said, ‘Oh, well, I’m generally too tired in the evening to notice them.’
Reginald laughed.
‘Try noticing them at breakfast.’
‘My dear man, do you know when we have breakfast?’
‘Sorry. Don’t tell me. I couldn’t bear it.’
‘Gosh!’ cried Lena suddenly and startlingly, ‘it is a relief to talk to you.’
‘How tired you’d get of it!’
‘I wonder.’ She gave him a sideways glance, and then looked back at Sylvia; hesitated, and said, ‘Speaking as a cad, do you ever feel——’ But stopped in time.
‘What?’ said Reginald stolidly.
‘Oh, my dear Mr.—— Do I call you Reginald? I forget.’
‘You might try.’
‘Then, my dear Reginald, don’t say “What?” when you know perfectly well what I shied at saying.’
‘That I like talking to you? Yes, I do.’
‘It wasn’t that.’
‘That I have enjoyed my afternoon more than I thought I was going to? Yes. Much more.’
‘It wasn’t that, either.’
‘I know it wasn’t.’
‘Of course you do. That’s why I like talking to you.’
But still he hadn’t answered her question. And now he seemed to be changing the subject.
‘Do you like Westaways?’ he asked, putting another match to his pipe.
‘Who doesn’t? You know how I feel. I’m utterly in love with it.’
‘So am I,’ said Reginald. He blew out his match, and pushed it into the ground by the side of his chair. ‘Utterly.’
Lena gave him another sideways glance. She could see that he was conscious of her, though his eyes were on Sylvia. ‘Do you ever feel that it is a relief to talk to somebody intelligent like me?’ had been her question. His answer seemed to be, ‘I adore Westaways, and Westaways doesn’t talk at all.’ Not quite an answer really.
‘Well, I adore Tom,’ said Lena firmly.
‘That’s good,’ said Reginald.
III
The party had now definitely been a success. As they drove home Sylvia said:
‘Did Lena tell you how much she liked your book?’
‘No,’ said Reginald, sitting up with a jerk, and then pulling the Morris back into safety. ‘I didn’t know she’d read it.’
‘Oh, yes, she simply loves it, she told me.’
Funny, that. Why had she said nothing about it to him?
He tried to imagine her reading it. How much had she understood, guessed, imagined? He began to go through the book in his mind, putting himself into Lena’s mind. . . .
‘Tired, darling?’
Sylvia always thought he was tired when he was silent.
‘Good Heavens, no. I’ve done nothing. You must be.’
‘Not a bit really. All right after a bath, anyway.’
‘I loved playing with you.’
‘Did you, darling? So did I.’
‘I wasn’t so bad, was I?’ he asked humbly.
‘Of course you weren’t, darling. You never are.’
His thoughts went back to his book. After dinner he would just glance through it again. He had never thought of it as being read by Lena. . . .
Chapter Seven
III
IT was now time to get one’s hair cut again.
‘Anything you want in London?’ asked Reginald at breakfast.
‘I ought to have my hair done too,’ said Sylvia, looking across at his. ‘Darling, you must not.’ This was to Grandmamma on her lap, stretching her claws a little forgetfully.
‘Come with me,’ said Reginald eagerly, and immediately repented of the eagerness . . . and immediately felt ashamed of the repentance. But to-day, surely, there would be news in London. All London, according to Mr. Pump, was talking of his book; talking in a language which Sylvia would not understand. Let him have London to himself, just for to-day.
‘I should have to
make an appointment,’ she said, ‘and I promised to lunch with Margaret next time I came. I’ll go by myself one day next week, and you can meet me.’
‘I should love to,’ said Reginald gladly. ‘What about the car to-day? Will you want it? Say Yes, and then you’ll have to take me to the train.’
She shook her head with a smile.
‘If you come by the 3.10, I’ll walk to the station.’
‘Sweetheart, it’s much too far, and much too hot for you.’
‘I don’t say I’ll come all the way. You’ll have to look out for me.’ She blushed a little and said, ‘I love meeting you.’
‘So do I,’ he agreed. ‘I think more than anything else in the world.’
So it was arranged; and so, later in the morning, he found himself for a moment at the Victoria bookstall again, a bookstall draped now in Bindweed.
‘Read this, sir?’ said the clerk, pushing a copy at him.
‘Yes.’
They ought to have had a long conversation about the book, but they didn’t. The clerk didn’t seem to want to.
‘Read this?’ he asked, pushing forward an inferior work by an inferior writer.
‘Well, as a matter of fact,’ said Reginald, drifting away, ‘I—er——’ He lingered out of sight of the clock, watching the next victim. This was a stout young woman, who hesitated for a long time between Bindweed and Weldon’s Home Dressmaker, and finally decided to make dresses at home.
He would have his hair cut first. Mr. Alderson was as glad as ever to see him, as surprised as ever to hear that he wanted his hair cut, as doubtful as ever if the thing could be managed in his shop. These usual preliminaries over, Reginald settled down comfortably to the lullaby of Mr. Alderson’s scissors.
‘And how is the country looking, sir?’ asked Mr. Alderson, in case Reginald felt talkative. It was his usual opening with country clients, and gave them illimitable opportunities of speech or silence, as they wished. Reginald’s grunt left him uncertain how the country was looking, but assured of Reginald’s feelings. He snipped on quietly. . . .
Reginald wondered suddenly if he had read Bindweed, smiled at the thought, and decided to ask him.
‘Ever heard of a book called Bindweed?’
‘No, sir,’ said Mr. Alderson. ‘I am not what you would call much of a reader. But Mrs. Alderson indulges in the habit frequently, and is always glad to hear of a book. What did you say was its name, sir?’
‘Bindweed.’
‘Ah! And suitable, you would say, for—— Mrs. Alderson does not care about anything racy.’
‘No, it isn’t racy,’ said Reginald, smiling down at his inverted surplice.
‘I will recommend it to her. Who is the author, if I might ask, sir? That sometimes helps in obtaining a book.’
Reginald hadn’t expected this, and began to feel uncomfortable. With a carefully careless laugh he confessed that as a matter of fact—er—he was.
‘Really, sir?’ The scissors snipped thoughtfully. ‘I shall give myself the pleasure of recommending it to Mrs. Alderson.’ (Snip, snip.) ‘Did you ever hear of a Mr. Walter Besant who was a writer? Afterwards he was knighted for his books, and became Sir Walter Besant.’
‘Oh, rather!’
‘He used to come here a good deal.’
‘Really?’
‘Oh yes, sir. Many a time we have trimmed Sir Walter’s hair for him. He used to write books with a Mr. Rice. Now that strikes me as a funny thing, sir. Two men writing a book together. You wouldn’t have thought it was possible. I did venture to inquire of him once how he did it. His reply, humorously given, of course, was that he used a thick nib and Mr. Rice used a fine one. A gentleman told me once that Sir Walter had worked this little piece of humour into one of his books afterwards, but I never came across it myself.’
‘That must have been a very long time ago. I mean, I shouldn’t have thought——’
‘Ah well, sir, it was of course my father who attended to Sir Walter mostly. I was a very young man at the time.’
‘Oh, I see.’
‘We have some curious gentlemen in here,’ he went on in his quiet voice. ‘There was a young gentleman came in once, an old customer, very smartly dressed he was, this time, with a pink carnation in his buttonhole, and he asked me for a shave, and when I had shaved him, he wanted his hair trimmed, and then a shampoo, and when I had dried his hair and left him for a moment, I saw him holding his hands up and looking at them, so I looked at them, and said, “Well, you don’t want a manicure, Mr. Tallow,” —that was his name, a curious name—and he said, “I was wondering”—beautiful kept hands they were—“I was wondering,” he said. “No, I think they’ll do.” Well, when I’d finished with him, he got up and went to the basin, I can see him now, standing there, his mind on something else, and he’d turned on the tap, and he was standing there letting the water run over his fingers, and he had this carnation in his left hand, and he was flicking the water on to it from his fingers to freshen it up. And then he put it back in his buttonhole, and fixed himself up in the glass, and said “Well, good-bye, Alderson, pray for me,” and I said “Good luck, sir,” not knowing of course what he was after, and he went out. That was in the morning, and in the evening paper that night I saw that they’d found his body. Shot through the head.’
‘Good God!’ burst out from Reginald.
‘Yes, sir. I never knew which way it was. Sometimes I’ve thought he was getting himself up that way to meet his lady, and she’d refused him, and then sometimes I’ve thought that he’d dressed himself up, if you’ll excuse me, sir, to meet his God. Poor young gentleman.’
‘Didn’t anything come out at the inquest?’
‘No, sir. If there was a lady, she didn’t come forward. Mrs. Alderson and I were very unhappy for a time, thinking of him; and then the war came, and now I say, “Well, even if he had lived, he would have been killed in the war,” and it doesn’t seem so bad. There, sir, how’s that?’
Reginald walked the short distance to his club, thinking to himself, I suppose there are a million people in London who could tell you a story like that; the one supremely tragic or beautiful or funny thing which has happened to them. How silly to write a made-up book!
II
How silly not to write a book!
‘Morning, Wellard. Congratulations.’
‘Oh, thanks.’ . . .
‘Morning, Wellard. I say, I suppose it is you, isn’t it? I didn’t know you went in for that sort of thing.’
‘Must do something.’
‘Well, you seem to have done it all right.’ . . .
‘Morning, Wellard. Congratulations.’
‘Oh, thanks.’
‘Matter of fact I’d read it long before old Raglan got hold of it. I meant to have written to you about it.’
‘That’s very kind of you,’ said Reginald. To himself he thought, It isn’t a bit kind. Anybody can mean to do a thing and not do it. It would have been kind if you had written. I should never have forgotten it.
‘Morning, Wellard. How’s it going?’
‘Oh, pretty well.’
‘That’s good. I thought you’d be fairly safe, once Raglan fell for it. I’ve been telling him about it for weeks.’
‘Oh, really? How nice of you.’ . . .
‘Hallo, how’s the millionaire?’
Reginald laughed. All there was to do.
‘I haven’t read it yet, but I’ve got it.’
A pat on the shoulder and a quiet voice, ‘Well done. Terribly good.’ Reginald turned round quickly, and saw the back of —— Now who was that? Nobody he knew.
‘Morning, Wellard. That’s an awfully good book of yours.’
‘Oh, have you read it?’
‘My dear fellow, I should think I was about your first reader. As a matter of fact it was something I
said in here which put Raglan on to it.’
‘Really. Well, I’m very much obliged to you.’
And so on. He loved it and he hated it. If Reginald Wellard were his son, how proud he would be, standing here invisible, listening to them. There is no praise too extravagant or too insincere for the father or the mother of an adored one. I suppose, he thought, it is because Bindweed is my child that I yearn to hear it praised, and because it is really I who am being praised that I feel so uncomfortable. A real father knows how little he is responsible for the child which has come to him.
As he came into the dining-room, there was an imperative snap of the fingers from a table in the window. Wellard looked across.
‘Here!’ A finger summoned him.
I loathe Ormsby, thought Reginald. I think he’s everything that’s pernicious. Damned fools talk about eugenics and sterilization and God knows what, and leave Ormsby alive. Anybody feeling as I do about Ormsby would stop for a moment at his table to empty the salad-dressing on his head, and then pass on without a word to the most distant corner of the room. Being what I am, I shall fawn on him and thank him humbly for noticing me.
‘Here, Wellard, come and sit here. You know Ambrose Raglan, don’t you?’
Reginald and Raglan murmured polite things to each other.
‘Well, my boy, feeling grateful to us? No need to. Duty of any one who can influence public opinion to put ’em on to a good thing. Go racing at all? Well, you can trust “The Flag Lieutenant”. If he likes a horse, he’ll tell you. And if Raglan likes a book, he’ll tell you. Eh, old man?’
‘Ever written anything before?’ asked Raglan.
‘No. My first and my last.’
Ormsby, who was making loud salad noises, intercepted them for a moment to say, ‘That be damned.’
‘Why do you say your last?’ asked Raglan.
He looks like a well-bred fox, thought Reginald. What a pair of swindlers they would make.
‘I only know a certain amount’, he explained, ‘and I seem to have used it all. And I don’t suppose I shall ever get another idea. That one came by accident.’
‘Ever read Dickens?’ said Ormsby, waving a fork-full of green-stuff at him.
‘Of course.’
Ormsby emptied the fork and munched, ‘Like him?’
