The Bachelor

by Stella Gibbons

  “Is the first time anny man has kiss me,” murmured Vartouhi, smiling still.

  Richard put his hand to his forehead and said a little wildly:

  “Vartouhi, will you marry me?”

  His mother, whose suspicions about his state of mind had been steadily deepening all the morning, opened the kitchen door in time to hear the end of Vartouhi’s answer, which was partly muffled by giggles:

  “No, no, Rich-ard, because you have no money and I do not like it when you kiss me!”

  “But——” he was beginning desperately, then turned and saw his mother standing there.

  “Darling, do you want any help?” she asked gaily. And because it was so plain that he did, and because she was unable, as all mothers are at the long last, to give the help he needed, she could not bear the look on his face and went on in the lightest possible tone, “we’re all starving and I’ve had rather a wearing morning of it with the Night Club King; if I could strain the sprouts for a change——”

  “Of course; we’ll be glad of any help, shan’t we, Vartouhi?” he said at once, turning to the stove and beginning to move saucepans about while he recovered himself.

  “Look what he give me!” said Vartouhi gaily, holding up the bracelet.

  “How charming, do let me look,” said Betty, who knew how little money Richard had and guessed that this—though it was not expensive—had taken most of his latest cheque from America. As she murmured graciously over the bracelet, she felt really angry with this shallow, cruel little girl, and full of pain for Richard. It was as if he were a little boy again, suffering the miseries that even happy children must endure, and she suffering for him and with him but powerless to help. She handed the bracelet back to Vartouhi with a smile, but for the moment she could not say anything pleasant.

  “Ah! May I come in? All hands to the pumps!” exclaimed a cheerful voice, and Mr. Fielding advanced upon the trio. Betty and Richard, who would have been equally pleased to see a rattlesnake at that moment, summoned every civilized quality they possessed to deal with the situation, and soon the kitchen resounded with jokes about puddings and the voices of Miss Fielding and Mrs. Miles, who could no longer be kept from their food. Amid general gaiety, the Christmas dinner was dished up and carried into the dining-room. The bracelet sparkled upon Vartouhi’s slim sallow wrist, and every eye in the room was immediately riveted upon it, and everybody wondered what had been happening. Such are the pleasures of conducting a courtship in a house full of people.

  So far, Christmas Day has been most happy, thought Vartouhi, rolling up her sleeves the better to display her jewel. All is gay and cheerful, and after all this dark holy pudding tastes good to eat.

  The old Fielding, whose place I sat next to his son, has moved himself to sit by Mrs. Marten. Miss Fielding and Mrs. Miles have noticed this. Ah! here is young Mr. Fielding. This evening when we have presents from that strange little tree with the toys on it I shall have my other present. And a English man has asked me to be his wife! I will write a letter to Yania in the United States of America to tell her this. But I like better to have presents than to be asked to be a man’s wife. You can be only one wife but you can have many presents.

  After dinner, Richard excused himself on the plea of needing exercise after all that food, and hurried out on a long walk over the freezing countryside; past cottages with lights already burning in their windows as the dim December light began to fail, and along lonely lanes where the only colour was an occasional dark green holly or russet mass of lingering beech leaves. The sky was lowering and almost motionless and the peculiar hush that belongs to Christmas Day was in the air. The pure scent of cold leaves and moss and the subdued colours and the silence, broken only by the occasional solitary whistle of a robin, calmed him after he had been walking for some time and he was able to think, rather than only to feel.

  He realized that he had put the happiness of both their lives in danger, simply by asking her to marry him, because he had been momentarily overcome by his longing to have her beauty and gaiety and charm always with him, and he soberly thanked Heaven that she had refused him. But below the congratulations which his reason uttered, there was an increasing pain, which became almost unendurable as he repeated over and over again to himself her devilishly cruel words. The fact that she had refused him began to dominate his thoughts. It was all over. He had asked, and he was not to have his heart’s desire. For weeks he had, without knowing it, clung to hope because he had never put his hope to the test: he had kept on telling himself that it would be idiotic to propose to her, in case she said “yes” ; that they would never hit it off together; that he might find himself bound for life in one of those horrible yet fascinating bondages of the spirit which only the death of the sufferers can destroy; and then again he thought it might be all right because he loved her so wildly and he could not, he knew from experience, love what was wholly bad. And all these questionings and doubts had been a waste of energy, that energy which meant so much to him because he was not strong, because she had refused him instantly, without a thought, as mercilessly as a child.

  He gave a kind of groan, and stopped in his frantic stride, gazing about him. He was in a lane enclosed by tall leafless hedges and occasional groups of large old elms. The quiet grey sky was beginning to get dark and the distant woods across the fields looked clear, as they do when rain is coming. I’d better get back, he thought, recognizing that he was some four miles from home, and he turned round and began to retrace his steps, more slowly now, for he was very tired.

  Vartouhi found time in the afternoon to work on her bedspread in Miss Burton’s sitting-room while the latter enjoyed a refreshing sleep. Half of the older members of the party did the same; and Mr. Fielding both had his cake and ate it, for he not only got Kenneth alone for ten minutes in the morning-room after dinner and borrowed five hundred pounds from him but also fell sweetly asleep in front of the drawing-room fire for an hour and a half, and awoke at half-past four demanding tea and the whereabouts of Betty just as the trolley was wheeled into the room by Vartouhi, with Betty (whose thoughts were away with Richard) following it. When they had been at tea for about ten minutes Richard came in, looking unusually pale but otherwise as usual, and Vartouhi, with a smile and a coquettish little movement of her head, offered him the hot toast.

  Is not so gay as everything was at dinner, thought Vartouhi, eating her own toast and letting her long brown eyes wander lazily from one face to another. The old Fielding is even more gay but Mr. Fielding is silent (how I hope he has not broken it, my present) and Miss Fielding and Mrs. Miles are cross at something. The old Fielding sits with Mrs. Marten and looks at her and laughs but her heart is full of fear because Rich-ard has been out walking on this cold day because he is sad because I say I am not to be his wife, and she is afraid he will have another illness. How I wish it was time to put all the lights on and play the music and have the presents from that little tree!

  She encourages him, thought Miss Fielding, carefully not looking at her father and Betty. Giggling at everything he says in that silly way, thought Mrs. Miles. It would be perfectly easy for her to choke him off, goodness knows she’s had enough experience, thought Miss Fielding. I wonder she isn’t ashamed, in front of Richard, thought Mrs. Miles. Surely he can’t mean to——? thought Miss Fielding. At his age——? thought Mrs. Miles. No dignity, thought both sisters together.

  After tea there was a diversion caused by Henry, Mrs. Miles’s husband, who telephoned to say that he feared there was now no hope of his getting away over the holiday at all. Everybody had forgotten about him, and such was the intensity of their personal preoccupations that most of them even experienced a momentary difficulty in remembering who he was, but they all expressed hearty regrets which Mrs. Miles boomed at him down the telephone. Miss Fielding was so relieved that he could not come that she insisted on telling him herself how sorry she was. Mrs. Miles was glad too, for he wasn’t very happy and that made him rather a nuisance to
people who thought that they were.

  Everybody was cheered by the putting up of the black-out and the lighting of all the lamps once more. The pink and silver and white chrysanthemums gleamed, the pearly moons of the lamps floated in the golden air. Mr. Fielding switched on the radio, as he would call it, and the house became full of loud gay music and there was much making of cold chicken sandwiches and preparing of coffee. Will this day never end? thought Richard, shutting his eyes for a moment as he lingered in the kitchen.

  “Headache?” inquired a voice heartily at his elbow; he opened them and looked down into the friendly face of old Mr. Fielding, peering up at him like one of the dwarfs in Snow White. “I’ve got some things upstairs that’ll get rid of that for you in ten seconds; wonderful things; man I know in New York sends them over for me.”

  “That’s extremely good of you; thank you very much,” said Richard with real gratitude, but hoping that he was not going to have to deal with the additional burden of Mr. Fielding’s sympathy. And he hadn’t a headache anyway.

  The wonderful things were pale green and as large as a thumbnail and he failed to swallow them adequately and the resultant taste was vile beyond belief; nevertheless, in ten seconds he certainly felt “better,” if a sparkling inner indifference to everybody, as if he were looking down on them from the star Arcturus, could be described as “better.”

  This passage between the old gentleman and the young one had been observed with dismay by Miss Fielding and Mrs. Miles as they stalked between the kitchen and the drawing-room with trays. Trying to get round Richard now, thought Mrs. Miles. Making up to her son, thought Miss Fielding. Everything has gone wrong ever since he came into the house, thought Mrs. Miles. Nothing seems to have gone right since he came, thought Miss Fielding. Richard is upset about something and what is the matter with Kenneth, and Betty is worried too, and why did Richard want to give Vartouhi a bracelet? Surely there can’t be any nonsense going on there? they thought together.

  I shall hear all about it after everyone has gone to bed, thought Miss Burton, who had spent an interesting ten minutes earlier in the day questioning Vartouhi, with apparent idleness, about her bracelet. She had not been rewarded by a complete confession, for Vartouhi could still assume the polite reserve of her nation whenever she wanted to, but she had put two and two together, and made them into a romance. She looked in smiling silence at the girl for a moment, then patted her hand and turned away. No, she doesn’t suspect anything yet, I’m sure, was Miss Burton’s curious reflection. Dear old boy, I do hope it comes off.

  After the coffee and chicken sandwiches had been partaken of, with many amusing anecdotes from old Mr. Fielding and with laughter from everybody except his two daughters, Kenneth announced that it was time to “have the tree.”

  Everybody stood up, and Kenneth and Richard carried the table on which the tree stood over to the fireplace. It was a well-shaped little tree, decorated with pink and green balls and little houses and fantastic birds made from fairy-glass, as the children call it. These toys had been carefully preserved by Miss Burton from the days when Mrs. Miles’s children had been young enough to enjoy a Christmas tree, and every year she brought them out and decorated the tree with them. Usually this custom was looked upon by her cousins with mild amusement, but this year, as the strangely heart-stirring little tree was set down in front of the fire, and its blue and silver and gold decorations tinkled themselves into glittering stillness once more, Kenneth looked across at her and said with a smile:

  “A good thing you’ve always saved the decorations, Frankie, there aren’t any to be had this year.”

  “I always knew a time like this would come,” answered Miss Burton, and then Kenneth began to give out the presents and cries of “Just what I wanted!” began to sound in all their falseness upon the festal air.

  Richard was watching Vartouhi. The icy sparkle, as from Arcturus, that had temporarily relieved his pain was beginning to subside, leaving him just reckless enough not to care if people noticed or not that he was watching her. Her hands were clasped like a waiting child’s, and her bright eyes were fixed upon the heap of presents round the tree. All the household had remembered her; Miss Fielding had presented her with a small picture of some green spirits with no legs in a passe-partout frame; Miss Burton had sewn her a scarf from three broad brilliant ribbons with fringe at the ends, and even Mrs. Miles had produced, evidently from some emergency store, a little bag full of rather stuffy lavender.

  She received all these gifts with her usual polite curtsy and smile, but it was painfully clear to Richard that all her interest was concentrated upon the large parcel addressed to her in Kenneth’s writing, which he had left until last.

  Oh, my darling, don’t look at her like that, thought his mother, glancing at him above the heap of presents that was slowly collecting in her own arms; she isn’t worth it. As if that ever made any difference!

  At last Kenneth took up the parcel and held it out. “Vartouhi,” he said, smiling at her across the circle.

  Everyone was watching, for this was the last present to be delivered.

  “Oh thank you, thank you, Mr. Fielding,” said Vartouhi, dropping a very low curtsy, and then, while Miss Fielding and Mrs. Miles were still apprehensively regarding the size and obvious opulence of the parcel, she began with flushed face and sparkling eyes to undo it.

  Everyone was quiet. What a pity he didn’t give it her while we were all busy with our presents, thought Miss Burton, but of course he’s so inexperienced.

  Vartouhi exclaimed with delight as the wrappings fell away from a long golden box. She opened it, loosened some gold ribbons, and slowly took out a bottle of cut glass decorated with gilt scrolls and flowers and containing a pint of White Rose scent. The extravagance of it dumbfounded everybody for a minute; even such spiritual beings as Miss Fielding knew what a pint of White Rose scent, in a bottle and a box like that, must cost in war time.

  “Is scent!” cried Vartouhi, holding it up for everybody to see, as though their eyes were not fixed upon it already. “Never before I have had scent! Oh thank you, thank you——”

  “What a lucky girl,” interrupted Mrs. Miles, “just as if there were no war.”

  “Glad you like it,” muttered Kenneth. He glanced at the clock. “Want to hear the news, Connie? It’s just on nine.”

  “Yes, Kenneth, I think we will to-night,” said his sister in a repressive tone, as if they all needed pulling back from an orgy of scent bottles and fun to the grim present; and he turned on the wireless.

  The rest of the evening passed quietly. Richard sat exhaustedly behind a book and dozed off and awoke at intervals, and Betty and Kenneth joined the two more frivolous members of the elderly quartet at Bridge. Vartouhi had retreated with her loot upstairs. Miss Fielding and Mrs. Miles sat in front of the fire, the one with some tapestry and the other with some horrible civilian knitting, and worked in silence. Occasionally, at some frivolous remark from Mr. Fielding and a giggle from Betty, they glanced at one another or compressed their lips, but their minds were now seething over the bottle of scent and they could think of nothing else. What could Kenneth have been thinking of? Wasting all that money on a little refugee! Whatever would everybody think? It was only too plain what everybody would think. And Vartouhi too, sly little thing. She must have been making up to him all this time while I thought he was being silly over Betty, thought Miss Fielding. Poor Constance has been taken in on all sides, thought Mrs. Miles. The house is full of women with designs on Father and Kenneth; it’s too dreadful. How could she have let things come to such a pass? It is a pity I can’t spare the time to stay here for a week or two; I’d soon have them out of it.

  Her sister was quite silent until bedtime. She was trying to think of a convincing pretext for dismissing Vartouhi.

  CHAPTER 21

  MISS FIELDING WAS so used to confiding her difficulties to Miss Burton that she did so on this occasion, sweeping into her bedroom with a torch at half-pa
st six in the blacked-out morning and frightening her very much and asking her if she thought there was any nonsense going on between Kenneth and Vartouhi?

  Miss Burton, half-asleep, yet had sufficient command of herself to say stoutly that she was sure there was not. It was Richard who was sweet on Vartouhi, not Kenneth. Constance knew how silly Kenneth had always been over a pretty face and how easily he was upset if anyone was in trouble. He had only meant to be kind to Vartouhi because her country was occupied, and she was a refugee and all that.

  “But seven guineas! Joan says that scent couldn’t have cost a penny under seven guineas, Frances!”

  The Usurper said airily that Ken probably knew a man in the scent business who let him have it cheap.

  “Just like Father, he always knows men who let him have things cheap,” put in Miss Fielding gloomily. “In every way, Ken is even more like Father than I feared. And then there’s Betty and Father! He hardly left her side all day yesterday! And Father has borrowed an enormous sum of money from Kenneth; five hundred pounds! Imagine! Joan and I suspected something was up and we got it out of Ken last night after you’d all gone up to bed.”

  Poor Ken, thought Miss Burton.

  “What does Uncle Eustace want it for?” she asked, lying back on her pillows and gazing up at Miss Fielding’s large troubled face by the light of the bedside lamp.

  “Need you ask? He has an idea for another night club. Apparently they aren’t so easy to run nowadays with all these restrictions (and a very good thing too) and he has lost a great deal of money lately.”

  “How long is he going to stay?” asked Miss Burton.

  Miss Fielding’s face became less troubled.

  “Well, he said something about leaving us after the holiday. That’s one good thing; apparently he won’t be here for long. But the harm is done! He has got five hundred pounds out of Kenneth, and goodness only knows what will happen with Betty—I dare not think!”