Which Way?, page 5
There was a good congregation. The choir and the priest entered as to a burst of applause on the exultant notes of “Hark the herald.” Claudia felt rather emotional. Of course that was not religion (any more than feeling choky at “Abide with me,” or saying “God bless you!” with a lump in the throat!) but it was rather pleasant. At first the whole thing seemed very triumphant and glorious and big. And then later on it suddenly seemed very simple and touching, something you wanted almost patronisingly to protect. Very holy—but so frail. Of course that wasn’t the right way to feel. “Once in royal David’s city …” And then there was a very good sermon. And she began to feel that perhaps it was she who was defenceless and little. One ought to be able to do more about it than one did. It was not sin that Christ condemned nearly so much as stupidity. People need not be so stupid, so unperceptive, so dead. Seeing, they would not see; hearing, they would not understand. So Christ tried, not to reform, but to wake them up. And He never regarded the body as divorced from the spirit, or of no account. He never despised flesh. He gave the people wine at Cana of Galilee, and when He spoke of the spirit He used the concrete image, saying to Simon Peter, “Feed My lambs.”
“Oh come, all ye faithful,
Joyful and triumphant,
Oh come ye, oh come ye
To Bethlehem!”
The organ blared, the congregation shouted; how they all let it rip! “Come ye, oh come ye—” If they only could! To the child in the stall at Bethlehem, like children at this children’s festival. Children were little demons, dirty, rough and unkind. But one looked back startled on a time when one was so single-hearted. And so very innocent. Claudia marvelled anew at the mystery of how grown people with their complexes, their repressions, their mixed motives and tangled desires, could ever have been as that stocky, sturdy child two pews ahead who had just dropped three hymn books to the floor and was fidgeting beside its nurse. And there in church, singing “Oh come ye, oh come ye …” it did seem suddenly inappropriate and unfitting that people should be hard to each other or that they should condemn. Thus vaguely moved she put more than she had intended in the collection plate.
The Heseltines got up a good deal of Christmas spirit and there was a certain amount of fun available in the county. There was notably an excellent dance at a house some fifteen miles from Chesnor, and the Heseltines’ children’s party, a time-honoured social event which took place with great success almost every Christmas; that is whenever Claudia spent Christmas at home. In the course of January there were the Farmers’ Ball, the Hunt Ball and the Kennedy-Rye’s Bottle Party, and what with these and various country house visits Claudia felt that she had been long absent from the dear old home by the time she settled down again to life at the flat every Monday to Friday or Saturday.
She was sitting one day in the pleasant drawing-room of the flat going through her post, with Hugo perched on the arm of her chair calmly looking over her letters. She opened one from Rosemary Crane, and presently began to laugh.
Beloved Claudia, the letter began,—Such an unexpected annoyance! I dined for a fancy dress ball and I was introduced to rather a good-looking man whom I thought was Dion Dring the artist. Well we got on awful well, and you know what it is with the carnival spirit and being all painted up as Cleopatra and looking so preternaturally devastating for once and the way I can’t help giggling at parties, I found we’d got to the end of the evening with never a word of sense and nothing said about Art at all. So I bubbled spontaneously out with an invitation for a week-end at Aston Cobalt. He immediately accepted. My dear, what shall I do with him? It was Lionel Byng!
“Who’s Lionel Byng?” asked Claudia.
“Really, my poppet,” protested Hugo, “you should read the papers. He’s much more in your line than mine. He’s the famous polo player.”
“Oh that fellow! Lucky Rosemary—I should like to meet him. But I needn’t worry and neither need she. An important man like that is certain to chuck a weekend accepted on impulse after a good evening!”
“Talking of week-ends,” said Hugo, “you must come and stay with us in Gloucestershire. I’ve suddenly thought it would be nice if you’d come for my birthday. Have you got a calendar? I know the date but I can’t remember the day of the week. I want to fix it now. You must come.”
“I can’t find a calendar. What’s the date to-day? We can count up.”
“I can’t remember,” said Hugo.
“Oh well, never mind,” decided Claudia, “I know I can come. I’m only booked for next week-end that’s important. There’s nothing else I couldn’t get out of for a thing like your birthday.”
“That’ll be wonderful,” he told her, and smiled a quick, radiant smile. “When we’re up there it’ll be a good place, I mean it’s lovely, and there’ll be time, well anyway, I’ll write you the date as soon as I get home and make sure it’s all right.”
He wrote to her the following morning. She found his letter and another from Rosemary waiting for her as she let herself into the flat between tea and time to dress for dinner. She opened her letters and read them in the hall, then went towards the drawing-room to answer them at once. As she opened the door, the telephone started ringing.
There was a fire in the room; very comforting and gay. It threw a lovely liquid sheet of orange on the big armchairs on each side of it. It sent a flickering glow on to the gallery table where lay weekly and daily papers, magazines, a few books lately thrown down. The cushions were fluffed out, inviting. An antique clock marked time in a hushed monotone. Only the fire was alive, consuming its life—for what?
Part III
Turning to the Left
1
If you start worrying what girls see in ginks, your mind’s going right off your business.
On the Spot, Edgar Wallace.
There was no one in the room. Blinds and curtains were closed; the light of the skies, if any, was shut out. Branches and trails of flowers stood in great jars, drained of their colour in the shadows but not of their faint sweetness. The door opened and as Claudia came with hurried steps into the fire’s glow, two open letters in her hand, the telephone began ringing. She shut the door and turned up the lights.
She crossed to the writing-table, threw down the letters and lifted the telephone receiver.
“Hullo … yes of course it is, Lalage dear … yes, longing to meet him again and the dazzling actress … how sweet of you … oh, dear, but I can’t! Not the week-end after next. … I can’t really, I’m going to Gloucestershire. … What fun the party sounds. … No I really can’t possibly … darling, I tell you I can’t … Oh Lalage, but I can’t really!” It flashed suddenly across her mind how very much she would enjoy this party, even apart from her desire to see again the intriguing Guy Verney. And on a sudden impulse, speaking quickly lest she change her mind again, she cried, “Listen, darling. I will come. … Yes, I’d love to. I’ll fix it somehow … I must come, it sounds such fun! You’re a lamb to ask me. … Bless you and a thousand thanks … yes … yes … all right … Lovely! Good-bye.”
She sat down at the desk and wrote:
Darling Rosemary,—How sweet of you and I’d have loved it! And I wanted to meet Lionel Byng! But I can’t possibly, I’m week-ending with the Carstairs at Farling. Isn’t it too damnable? Ever so many thanks and I am sorry. Let’s ring each other up on Monday.
Your loving
Claudia.
Then she turned to her second letter: Dearest Hugo,—she began, I am sorry, and I’d love to come absolutely any week-end after. But I got in a frightful muddle … It was a difficult letter to write, and she felt rather caddish as she finished it.
The party at Farling consisted of the Cazlitts, the Denzels, the Alcesters, Lord Rattislake who had been Mrs. Delmar Vermont’s second husband, Miss Slade who was in a dress shop, Alan Vane, the Verneys, and of course Claudia and the Carstairs themselves. Alan Vane, complete with car and chauffeur, took Claudia down on the Thursday evening. She cross-questioned him about Carol Verney. He said, as usual, ever charitable, that she was a little darling and a sweet little thing. Was she pretty? Yes, very. Was she clever? No. Was she amusing? Only late at night when she’d drunk a little. Was she nice? Oh, well, she was a nice little thing. Claudia wanted to ask whether Alan respected her but decided not to in case he didn’t. She liked all women to be respected even in defiance of reason. They returned instead to that perennial source of interest to social London, Alan’s love affairs. She was amused and sympathetic, and towards the end of the journey let him hold her hand, excusing to herself her unaccustomed conduct on the obscure ground that Alan didn’t count.
All such women of the house party as knew Claudia already, greeted her after the peculiar way of their set: that is, with an enthusiastic warmth which they did indeed feel at the moment, and with many pleasant plans for clasping her to their bosoms in all their future doings and taking her everywhere, whereas, in fact, only Lalage ever asked her to anything. Not such a bad peculiar way either. Claudia knew that she was not really one of them, that they would forget her again. Meanwhile they spoke sincerely, it made her one of them for the moment and caused her to feel good.
Only three of her fellow guests were unknown to her. Lord Rattislake, who was still generally admitted to be a good fellow, but whose good looks were now running to flesh and dissipated lines. Miss Slade, who was unbelievably slender without being thin, and who possessed brown velvet eyes and a husky voice. And Mrs. Guy Verney.
Carol Verney was beautifully made, a little plump, and the happy owner of the most wonderful golden curls. She never came down before twelve, and lounged about all day in rapturous Ascot creations, carefully enamelled, laden with jewels, and smelling like a hothouse full of flowers. One was relieved to find that she had the voice of a lady, but a lady who affected a drawl. She hardly roused herself to talk to the other women at all and seemed to think that looking at her should be sufficient even for the men; that is until after dinner, when having drunk a really surprising amount, a feverish vivacity would grip her, an edge would come into the drawl, and she would roll her great grey eyes and gesticulate with her heavily ringed hands, laughing shrilly and telling an endless variety of funny stories with an air of curiously innocent corruption.
“He never saw her in the daytime till after he married her,” explained Lalage, less kind than Alan. “They met every night after the theatre and she carried him completely off his feet. She never gave him time to pull himself together. You must remember photographs of the wedding. A terrific splash, and she had groomsmen as well as bridesmaids. Marrying a gentleman, and one with money, has gone completely to her head. The airs she gives herself, and the way she treats Guy!”
She was always trying to quarrel with Guy, always attacking him, and though he did not perhaps seek her company he was invariably considerate and courteous. Claudia was appalled at her constant aggression, till she suddenly thought: “God help her! She’s trying to assert herself. He doesn’t love her any more and she loves him still.”
But Lalage said that she was known to be unfaithful to him and probably took drugs. And she added more kindly: “Poor Carol! I suppose it’s bad luck partly. Very few married couples are as happy as Noel and I.”
All the women of the party were nice to Carol and Sir Reggie Cazlitt discovered in her, temporarily, his ideal of womanhood. It was a party which tended to fall into couples, and as it started on Thursday evening, for some of the men wanted to hunt on Friday, there was time for plenty of alliances to shape and reshape. It was perhaps in self defence that Guy singled out Claudia. The Farling party was his natural element, the other women his friends whose companionship he regularly sought. But they always wanted to start something; they had designs upon his mental independence which he invariably evaded. Claudia was a nice little thing with no designs. He was fourteen years older than she and felt quite avuncular, he told himself; while at the same time her immaturity was rather rejuvenating. It was a novelty to get to know something so innocent, so inexperienced. Yet she was not a débutante and knew quite well how to dress and how to behave.
And Guy himself? What did anyone see in him? He was an ordinary enough man of thirty-seven, very well-made, six feet one or two in height, with dark hair, grey-blue eyes, a thin, sallow face and protruding front teeth. Women liked his pleasant voice with its slightly cynical sound, his friendliness and his aloofness, his tolerant, selfish way. Men liked his ability to do the usual sort of thing well, to talk easily and to suit himself to his surroundings. He carried on successful financial operations with two partners in the neighbourhood of Liverpool Street Station. His one distinctive accomplishment was playing with great dexterity on the banjo and singing almost any amusing song you could think of with a rather pleasing, matter of fact air. He was a very civilised product with sophisticated tastes and a simple mind. He wished himself all possible good and no one any harm.
Perhaps it was really Claudia who took the initiative. She felt from the start that it was not for nothing that she had noticed him, remembered him, so particularly. Somehow it was very important that they should be friends. Not only for her vanity’s sake. It was natural and right. It was fated. She had a responsive nature, and friendship, with a capital F or perhaps even with two small ffs, was her ideal. And being such an eminently harmless little creature she was able to worm her way under his guard and stake out her claim.
Guy and Claudia were returning from a walk after tea on the Sunday. It was nearly dark. They had suddenly ceased talking.
“You’re looking very solemn,” said Guy.
They were nearly at the house. They paused and looked in silence on the February dusk. They saw the holly, an opaque hillock of darkness; the birch, a blurred plume; the cedar, horizontal layer upon layer of frayed black. In the sky behind the holly was a last smudge of colour forgotten from the day, a rusty smudge, a faded bloodstain filmed over with a wash of grey. Through the cloudy curtain across the sky’s space, nine stars, three bright, six dim and struggling, showed their remote faces.
“Why are you solemn?” asked Guy in a quiet voice.
Claudia’s answer was hardly an answer. “It’s been such a nice week-end.”
He agreed; “Yes it has. Very.”
“You’ve enjoyed it too, then?”
“Yes of course I have. You’ve been so terribly nice to me.”
“But now it’s over, Guy.”
“Not till to-morrow.”
She said reproachfully: “Aren’t you going up to-night after dinner with Alan?”
“But to nowhere less remote and accessible than London,” he consoled her.
Claudia drew a sharp breath. “Shall I see you in London then?”
“Yes of course.” He considered a moment. Perhaps he ought not to take her out dancing. But some suggestion was clearly called for. “You say you like racing. Will you join the little party we were talking of? We want another woman, and I’ll arrange it all and call for you.”
“Oh! I’d love you to,” she answered. “Thank you, Guy.”
“That’ll be lovely,” he assured her, “and now let’s come out of this very depressing twilight.” He took her arm in a firm grip and steered her briskly to the house.
2
“Do you know Hugo?”
“Hugo who?”
“Hugo to hell!”
Old Spanish Proverb.
Croyez-vous aussi, me dit-elle, qu’il soit si facile d’être jolie fille sans causer de malheurs?
Anatole France.
Two things happened before the racing party took place. The Verneys had a terrific row, ending in the departure of Carol for Hollywood. Hugo came to call on Claudia.
“Had a nice week-end?” asked Hugo.
“Yes, awfully. Oh Hugo, I am sorry about it! I’d simply love to come any other time—though I notice you haven’t asked me!”
“I can’t wait till then. You knew, didn’t you, what I was going to say last week-end? Or did you not know? Which was it?”
It came to her unpleasantly that actually she must have known, but just hadn’t thought about it. She couldn’t answer, “I forgot,” so she answered instead: “I didn’t realise.”
And she looked pleadingly at Hugo where he stood close before her chair, young and boyish and very slight, his smooth, almost girlish face creased with anxiety.
She thought absurdly: “I wish he were my son.” And she began to talk.
“Won’t you sit down? You’re not in a hurry, are you? You look so restless, my dear, hovering about like a bird on the wing, you quite unnerve me. How have you been writing these last few days?”
He didn’t sit. He remained standing before her, fidgeting like a schoolchild with his hands. He said:
“You could make me write, Claudia, I know it’s in me to write good books. But these last days I could write nothing for thinking of you. I think I’ve always loved you, but now it’s different; I’m in love with you and I can’t bear it. Darling, I do make you happy; you’ll never be able to talk to anyone easier than you can to me. Marry me, Claudia, marry me please, and I’ll write you the best books in the world. I’ll make you happy, I love you so.”
It was worse than she could have believed possible. She longed to give him all he wanted. He was so very dear, and yet he was somehow remote, ineffectual, a ghost out of something that had ceased to be. She began to falter the time-honoured stuff about his trying not to think of her like that, and being sorry, and so fond of him in a different way. And as his face became hurt and lost and desolate he looked younger than ever, less than sixteen, a little boy of eight. After they had gone through the dreadful rigmarole about hoping and not hoping, he went on standing helplessly there, looking round the room with a trapped, distasteful gaze, unable to go.
