Works of E F Benson

by E. F. Benson

  Dodo smiled.

  “But until now no one has quite understood the young lady herself,” she said. “Least of all, has she understood herself. I think she will find that she is less mysterious now.”

  “Mr. Graves will have to take some nourishment soon,” said Nurse Bryerley.

  Dodo considered.

  “Then could you not give him his nourishment very cautiously, so that he will go to sleep again afterwards?” she asked. “I should like them to sleep all day like that. But then, you see, nurse, I am a very odd woman. But don’t disturb them till you must. I think their souls are getting to know each other. That may not be scientific nursing, but I think it is sound nursing. It’s too bad we can’t eternalize such moments of perfect equilibrium.”

  “Certainly the young lady was awake till nearly dawn,” said Nurse Bryerley. “It wouldn’t hurt her to have a good rest.”

  Dodo beamed.

  “Oh, leave them as long as possible,” she said. “You have no idea how it warms my heart. There will be trouble enough when they awake.”

  Seymour was among those who were going by the early train, and when Dodo came down he had finished breakfast. He got up just as she entered.

  “How is he?” he asked.

  Dodo’s warm approbation went out to him.

  “It was nice of you to ask that first, dear Seymour,” she said. “He is asleep: he has slept all night.”

  Seymour lit a cigarette.

  “I asked that first,” he said, “because it was a mixture of politeness and duty to do so. I suppose you understand.”

  Dodo took the young man by the arm.

  “Come out and talk to me in the hall,” she said. “Bring me a cup of tea.”

  The morning sunshine flooded the window-seat by the door, and Dodo sat down there for one moment’s thought before he joined her. But she found that no thought was necessary. She had absolutely made up her mind as to her own view of the situation, and with all the regrets in the world for him, she was prepared to support it. In a minute Seymour joined her.

  “Nadine came down to the beach just before Hugh went in yesterday morning,” he said, “and she called out — called? — shouted out, ‘Not you, Hughie: Seymour, Berts, anybody, but not you!’ There was no need for me to think what that meant.”

  Dodo looked at him straight.

  “No, my dear, there was no need,” she said.

  “Then I have been a — a farcical interlude,” said he, not very kindly. “You managed that farcical interlude, you know. You licensed it, so to speak, like the censor of plays.”

  “Yes, I licensed it, you are quite right. But, my dear, I didn’t license it as a farce; there you wrong me. I licensed it as what I hoped would be a very pleasant play. You must be just, Seymour: you didn’t love her then, nor she you. You were good friends, and there was no shadow of a reason to suppose that you would not pass very happy times together. The great love, the real thing, is not given to everybody. But when it comes, we must bow to it.... It is royal.”

  All his flippancy and quickness of wit had gone from him. Next conversation remained only because it was a habit.

  “And I am royal,” he said. “I love Nadine like that.”

  “Then you know that when that regality comes,” she said quickly, “it comes without control. It is the same with Nadine; it is by no wish of hers that it came.”

  “I must know that from Nadine,” he said. “I can’t take your word for it, or anybody’s except hers. She made a promise to me.”

  “She cannot keep it,” said Dodo. “It is an impossibility for her. She made it under different conditions, and you put your hand to it under the same. And Nadine said you understood, and behaved so delightfully yesterday. All honor to you, since behind your behavior there was that knowledge, that royalty.”

  “I had to. But don’t think I abdicated. But she was in terrible distress, and really, Aunt Dodo, the rest of your guests were quite idiotic. Berts looked like a frog; he had the meaningless pathos of a frog on his silly face—”

  “Nadine said he looked like a funeral with plumes,” Dodo permitted herself to interpolate.

  “More like a frog. Edith kept pouring out glasses of port to take to Nadine, but I think she usually forgot and drank them herself. It was a lunatic asylum. But Nadine felt.”

  “Ah, my dear,” said Dodo, with a movement of her hand on to his.

  Seymour quietly disengaged his own.

  “Very gratifying,” he said, “but as I said, I take nobody’s word for it, except Nadine’s. She has got to tell me herself. Where is she? I have to go in five minutes, but to see her will still leave me four to spare.”

  Dodo got up.

  “You shall see her,” she said. “But come quietly, because she is asleep.”

  “If she is only to talk to me in her sleep—” began he.

  “Come quietly,” said Dodo.

  But all her pity was stirred, and as they went along the passage to Hugh’s room, she slipped her arm into his. She knew that her coup was slightly theatrical, but there seemed no better way of showing him. It might fail: he might still desire explanations, but it was worth trying.

  “And remember I am sorry,” she said, “and be sure that Nadine will be sorry.”

  “Riddles,” said Seymour.

  “Yes, my dear, riddles if you will,” said she. “But you may guess the answer.”

  Dodo quietly turned the handle of the door into the nurse’s room, and entered with her arm still in his. She made a sign of silence, and took Seymour straight through into the sick-room. All was as she had left it a quarter-of-an-hour ago; Nadine still slept and Hugh, in that same attitude of security and love. Her head was drooped; she slept as only children and lovers sleep. But Dodo with all her intuition did not see as much as Seymour, who loved her, saw. The truth of it was branded into his brain, whereas it only shone in hers. She saw the situation: he felt it.

  Then with a signal of pressure on his arm, she led him out again.

  “She has been there all night,” she said. “She only fell asleep at dawn.”

  They were in the passage again before Seymour spoke.

  “There is no need for me to awake her or talk to her,” he said. “You were quite right. And I congratulate you on your ensemble. I should have guessed that it required most careful rehearsal. And I should have been wrong. And now, for God’s sake, don’t be kind and tender—”

  He took his arm away from hers, feeling for her then more resentment than he might feel against the footman who conveyed cold soup to him. He did not want the footman’s sympathy, nor did he want Dodo’s.

  “And spare me your optimism,” he said. “If you tell me it is all for the best, I shall scream. It isn’t for the best, as far as I am concerned. It is damned bad. I was a Thing, and Nadine made a man of me. Now she is tired of her handiwork, and says that I shall be a Thing again. And don’t tell me I shall get over it. The fact that I know I shall, makes your information, which was on the tip of your tongue, wanton and superfluous. But if you think I shall love Hugh, because he loves Nadine, you are utterly astray. I am not a child in a Sunday school, letting the teacher smack both sides of my face. I hate Hugh, and I am not the least touched by the disgusting spectacle you have taken me on tiptoe to see. They looked like two amorous monkeys in the monkey-house.”

  Seymour suddenly paused and gasped.

  “They didn’t,” he said. “At any rate Nadine looked as I have often pictured her looking. The difference is that it was myself, not Hugh, beside whom I imagined her falling asleep. That makes a lot of difference if you happen to be the person concerned. And now I hope the motor is ready to take me away, and many thanks for an absolutely damnable visit. Don’t look pained. It doesn’t hurt you as much as it hurts me. There is a real cliché to finish with.”

  Dodo’s coup had been sufficiently theatrical to satisfy her, but she had not reckoned with the possible savageness that it might arouse. Seymour’s temper, as we
ll as his love, was awake, and she had not thought of the two as being at home simultaneously, but had imagined they played Box-and-Cox with each other in the minds of men. Here Box and Cox met, and they were hand-in-hand. He was convinced and angry: she had imagined he would be convinced and pathetic. With that combination she had felt herself perfectly competent to deal. But his temper roused hers.

  “You are at least interesting,” she said briskly, “and I have enjoyed what you call your damnable visit as much as you. You seem to have behaved decently yesterday, but no doubt that was Nadine’s mistake.”

  “Not at all: it was mine,” he said.

  “Which you now recognize,” said she. “I am afraid you must be off, if you want to catch your train. Good-by.”

  “Good-by,” said he.

  He turned from her at the top of the stairs, and went down a half-dozen of them. Then suddenly he turned back again.

  “Don’t you see I’m in hell?” he said.

  Dodo entirely melted at that, and ran down the stairs to him.

  “Oh, Seymour, my dear,” she said. “A woman’s pity can’t hurt you. Do accept it.”

  She drew that handsome tragical face towards her, and kissed him.

  “Do you mind my kissing you?” she said. “There’s my heart behind it. There is, indeed.”

  “Thanks, Aunt Dodo,” he said. “And — and you might tell Nadine I saw her like that. I am not so very stupid. I understand: good-by.”

  “And Hugh?” she asked, quite unwisely, but in that optimistic spirit that he had deprecated.

  “Don’t strain magnanimity,” he said. “It’s quality is not strained. Say good-by to Nadine for me. Say I saw her asleep, and didn’t disturb her. I never thought much of her intelligence, but she may understand that. She will have to tell me what she means to do. That I require. At present our wedding-day is fixed.”

  Seymour broke off suddenly and ran downstairs without looking back.

  Dodo was quite sincerely very sorry for him, but almost the moment he had gone she ceased to think about him altogether, for there were so many soul-absorbing topics to occupy her, and forgetting she had had no breakfast, she went to Edith’s room (Edith alone had not the slightest intention of going away) to discuss them. Her optimism was luckily quite incurable: she could not look on the darker aspect of affairs for more than a minute or two. She found Edith breakfasting in bed, with a large fur cape flung over her shoulders. Her breakfast had been placed on a table beside her, but for greater convenience she had disposed the plates round her, on her counterpane. There were also disposed there sheets of music-paper, a pen and ink-bottle, and a box of cigarettes. The window was wide open, and as Dodo entered the draught caused the music paper to flutter, and Edith laid hasty restraining hands on it, and screamed with her mouth full.

  “Shut the door quickly!” she cried. “And then come and have some breakfast, Dodo. I don’t think I shall get up to-day. I have been composing since six this morning, and if I get up the thread may be entirely broken. Beethoven worked at the C minor Symphony for three days and nights without eating, sleeping, or washing.”

  “I see you are eating,” remarked Dodo. “I hope that won’t prevent your giving us another C minor.”

  “The C minor is much over-rated work,” said Edith; “it is commonplace melodically, and clumsily handled. If I had composed it, I should not be very proud of it.”

  “Which is a blessing you didn’t, because then you would have composed something of which you were not proud,” said Dodo, ringing the bell. “Yes, I shall have some breakfast with you. Oh, Edith, everything is so interesting, and Hughie has slept all night, and Nadine with him. They are sleeping now, Nadine on the floor half-sitting up with her head against the bed, looking too sweet for anything. And poor dear Seymour has just gone away. I took him in to see them by way of breaking it to him. Whoever guessed that he would fall in love with her? It is very awkward, for I thought it would be such a nice sensible marriage. And now of course there will be no marriage at all.”

  At this moment the bell was answered, and Edith in trying to prevent her music-paper from practising aviation, upset the ink-bottle. Several minutes were spent in quenching the thirst of sheets of blotting paper at it, as you water horses when their day’s work is over.

  “One of the faults of your mind, Dodo,” said Edith, as this process was going on, “is that you don’t concentrate enough. You have too many objects in focus simultaneously. Now my success is due to the fact that I have only one in focus at a time. For instance this Stygian pool of ink does not distress me in the slightest—”

  “No, darling, it’s not your counterpane,” said Dodo.

  “It wouldn’t distress me if it was. But if I opened your mind I should find Hugh’s recovery, Nadine’s future, and your baby in about equally vivid colors, and all in sharp outline. Also you make too many plans for other people. Do leave something to Providence sometimes.”

  “Oh, I leave lots,” said Dodo. “I only try to touch up the designs now and then. Providence is often rather sketchy and unfinished. But yesterday’s design was absolutely wonderful. I can hardly even be sorry for Hugh.”

  Edith shook her head.

  “You are quite incorrigible,” she said. “Providence sent what was clearly intended to be a terrible event, but you see all sorts of glories in it. I don’t thing it is very polite. It is like laughing at a ghost story instead of being terrified.”

  Dodo’s breakfast had been brought in, and she fell to it with an excellent appetite.

  “There is nothing like scenes before breakfast to make one hungry,” she said. “Think how hungry a murderer would be if he was taken out to be hanged before breakfast, and then given his breakfast afterwards. I had a scene with Seymour, you know. I am very sorry for him, but somehow he doesn’t seem to matter. He lost his temper, which I rather respected, and showed me he had an ideal. That I respect too. I remember the struggles I used to go through in order to get one.”

  “Were they successful?” asked Edith.

  “Only by a process of elimination. I did everything that I wanted, and found it was a mistake. So, last of all, I married Jack. What a delightful life I have led, and how good this bacon is. Don’t you think David is a very nice name? I am going to call my baby David.”

  “It may be a girl,” said Edith.

  “Then I shall call it Bathsheba,” said Dodo without pause. “Or do I mean Beersheba? Bath, I think. Edith, why is it that when I am most anxious and full of cares, I feel it imperative to talk tommy-rot? I’m sure there is enough to worry me into a grave if not a vault, between Seymour and Nadine and Hugh. But after all, one needn’t worry about Nadine. It is quite certain that she will do as she chooses, and if she wants to marry Hugh with both arms in slings, and two crutches, and a truss and one of those sort of scrapers under one foot she certainly will. I brought her up on those lines, to know her own mind, and then do what she wanted. It has been a failure hitherto, because she has never really wanted anything. But now I think my system of education is going to be justified. I am also suffering from reaction. Last night I thought our dear Hughie was dying, and I am perfectly convinced this morning that he isn’t. So, too, I am sure, is Nadine: otherwise she couldn’t have fallen asleep like that. And what Hughie did was so splendid. I am glad God made men like that, but it doesn’t prevent my eating a huge breakfast and talking rot. I hope you don’t mean to go away. It is so dull to be alone in the house with two young lovers, even when one adores them both.”

  “Aren’t you getting on rather quick, Dodo?” asked Edith.

  “Probably: but Seymour is congédié — how do you say it — spun, dismissed, and quite certainly Nadine has fallen in love with Hugh. There isn’t time to be slow, nowadays. If you are slow you are left gasping on the beach like a fish. I still swim in the great waters, thank God.”

  Dodo got up, and her mood changed utterly. She was never other than genuine, but it had pleased Nature to give her many facets,
all brilliant, but all reflecting different-colored lights.

  “Oh, my dear, life is so short,” she said, “and every moment should be so precious to everybody. I hate going to sleep, for fear I may miss something. Fancy waking in the morning and finding you had missed something, like an earthquake or suffragette riot! My days are reasonably full, but I want them to be unreasonably full. And just now Jack keeps saying, ‘Do rest: do lie down: do have some beef-tea.’ Just as if I didn’t know what was good for David! Edith, he is going to be such a gay dog! All the girls and all the women are going to fall desperately in love with him. He is going to marry when he is thirty, and not a day before, and he will be absolutely simple and unspoiled and a wicked little devil on his marriage morning. And then all his energies will be concentrated on one point, and that will be his wife. He will utterly adore her, and think of nobody else except me. I shall be seventy-four, you perceive, at that time, and so I shall be easy to please. The older one gets the easier one is to please. Already little things please me quite enormously, and big ones, as you also perceive, make me go off my head. Oh, I am sure heaven will be extremely nice, if I ever die, which God forbid; but however nice it is, it won’t be the same as this. You agree there I know; you want to make all the music you can first—”

  “As a protest against what seems to be the music of heaven,” said Edith firmly, “if we may judge by hymn tunes and chants, and the first act of Parsifal, and I suppose the last of Faust, and Handel’s oratorios. It is very degrading stuff; all the changes of key are childishly simple, and the proportion of full closes is nearly indecent. And I want another ink-bottle.”

  Edith whistled a short phrase on her teeth, as a gentle hint to her hostess.

  “It’s for the flutes,” she said, “and the ‘cellos take it up two octaves lower.”

  She grabbed at her music-paper.

  “Then the horns start it again in the subdominant,” she said, “and all the silly audience will think they are merely out of tune. That’s because they got what they didn’t expect. To be any good, you must surprise the ear. I’ll surprise them. But I want another ink-bottle. And may I have lunch in my room, Dodo, if necessary? I don’t know when I shall be able to get up.”