From the dining-room came sounds of laughter, and Hugo stood outside the door, listening nervously. He wondered if a sudden silence would fall on them if he went into the room. He could not, as he had hoped, slip in behind Laura, for she had gone straight upstairs. And after a little while he reminded himself that he had had tea. He would put it off a little longer. He would go into the library and be very busy writing something.
But before he had time to escape the dining-room door opened and Alec came out, peering short-sightedly and almost bumping into Hugo as he hovered on the mat. The two of them set to partners, for Alec thought that Hugo was trying to go through the door. At last he realised that it was not so, and something of the uncertain misery in Hugo’s soul must have reached him, for he closed the door and suggested that they should go for a walk.
Hugo accepted eagerly, though he hated going for walks. It was another respite, nor did it occur to him, until they were well away from the house, that even Alec might regard him as an unsuccessful guest. Taunting memories came back to him. Alec had a reputation for kindness to people in misfortune. Laura had said that she always put the bores next to him at dinner.
“Who sat next to him last night?” wondered Hugo. “Philomena! Hell! At least I won’t start thinking about Philomena.”
For he was growing very angry with Philomena. He was angry with all of them. They had all conspired to make a fool of him. But Philomena had done worse. She had led him on to make a fool of himself. She had got him into a false position, taking advantage of a moment’s folly, and now he had a suspicion that he was going to be set free in a way that was even more humiliating. To get out of it adroitly was one thing: to be dropped was another.
Perhaps Alec had been expressly told off to entertain a failure. But a country walk was poor entertainment. Over a great many stiles they went and conversation languished. Courting couples, embracing in the lanes, made way for them respectfully. Courting couples lay prone upon the downs. In some cases they lay right across the path so that Alec and Hugo had to walk round them. Hugo, accustomed only to the more urban forms of licence, was embarrassed. He could not achieve the imperturbable serenity of his companion, who strode on and looked the other way. Occasionally they stopped to peer at small, uninteresting flowers and wonder what they were called, and at one time Alec grew very angry over a new red bungalow which had been built just on the edge of the Syranwood property. Geraldine, he said, had tried to prevent it, but a speculating builder from Basingstoke had been too many for her.
“It’s positively indecent,” he complained. “It ought never to have been allowed.”
“I should think so,” agreed Hugo, trying not to look at two people on the grass ten yards ahead of them.
“It’s the thin edge of the wedge,” said Alec. “We’ve kept the place from being vulgarised up till now, but in another ten years it’ll be quite spoilt.”
When they got to the top of Chawton Beacon he pointed out the walk which they were going to take, a pleasant circuit of seven miles or so, which they could easily do before dinner. Hugo, who had thought the walk already too long, broke into a cold sweat. He murmured something about having some writing to do, whereat Alec relented so far as to point out a shorter route whereby they could save three miles. To its modified horrors they committed themselves. As might have been expected, a blister had already begun to form on Hugo’s heel. And a deadly fatigue settled upon all his limbs, the frozen impotence of a nightmare, so that he had absolutely to force one foot in front of the other while he listened to Alec’s dry savourless voice.
They spoke of the drama, because Alec was always careful to talk to people upon their own subjects. He used, he said, to like going to the theatre, but now he could never hear what they were saying. It was not that he was deaf, but that modern enunciation was so bad. But he still made an effort, in spite of his work, to keep up with all that was going on. He could make a few dim little comments about each of the well-known dramatists. Concerning the elder generation he had already made up his mind. Palemon White was very clever, oh, very clever indeed, but not an Englishman of course. Alan Chrome was clever too, but there was something ill-natured about the fella, Alec thought; he left a nasty taste in your mouth. And as for Edgerton, well, Alec knew Edgerton. They had a place nearby, over at Brassing, and he liked the fella. They had been contemporaries at Cambridge and nobody would then have suspected such a thing. But he did not like Edgerton’s plays. He thought them subversive. They were too serious, that was the point. Clever Mr. Palemon White could be dismissed with indulgent laughter because he was not, after all, an Englishman. Not so Edgerton. The fella was always raising points which he did not himself seem able to answer. Those were not the sort of points which ought to be raised in a play. A serious play might possibly teach a lesson, but it ought not to make the public feel uncomfortable. There was no such thing as ideal justice in this world and Edgerton was an educated man who ought to know it. But he seemed to be always demanding it, and that was the sort of thing that might make ignorant people discontented. Not that Edgerton was biased exactly. That was another thing. You could never tell which side he was on, so that you could not even be sure if you disagreed with him. Still, he liked the man. Had always liked him.
But it was the younger generation that he wanted to discuss with Hugo. Which of them would live? Which had a message?
Hugo, as they forged up the next hill, panted out the names of his three most prominent rivals, adding that formula of praise which he could, by now, have repeated in his sleep. But Alec wanted to hear more than that. He wanted to get the young dramatist’s point of view, and he asked tactlessly whether any of them were really any good. Would they live? Hugo wanted to say that they were all quite healthy as far as he knew, but he restrained himself. His head was empty of ideas and his heel hurt him abominably. He said that one of the three would live, he thought. Well, which? asked Alec. Cecil Hopkins, said Hugo, believing that he spoke at random, but guided unconsciously by a determination not to be jealous. But why Cecil Hopkins? Because he was so very clever. But they were all clever. And vitality was apt to be overrated, nowadays. After all it was merely raw material. And had Hopkins anything in particular to say? That was what he wanted to know. They limped up hill and down dale, and Hugo felt that the conversation was becoming more and more imbecile.
Before the end of the walk they had both given it up. Hugo could think of nothing but his heel, and Alec had gone back to the problem of a cargo of china teapots, shipped from Bristol to Honolulu. They had arrived in pieces and it was his own opinion that this was due to a monsoon, but it was his business to convince a judge that there might be reasonable grounds for saying that it was not so. Since Hugo did not want to talk he might as well go on thinking about that. But it was a pity, because he really did desire to keep up his interest in the arts and nobody would help him. Hugo was not the first person who had fallen into a kind of blank stupor when out on a walk with Alec.
The afternoon was sultry and they had to go out of their way in order to avoid a field with a bull in it. When they got home it was after seven o’clock, and they found the hall full of people who all seemed to have come to the end of their resources. They were just sitting about, too much exhausted to go up and dress for dinner. Aggie’s departure had left them all at a loose end, and their several preoccupations were far from pleasant. Laura had lost her lover, Adrian had got to go to East Prussia, Philomena had decided that she would never be able to “manage,” and Gibbie was making up his mind that the Good Man takes a firm line. But Hugo thought that they were all displeased with him. He had grown so nervous that he could not consider them as individuals any longer. They were just a public which had turned against him.
Sitting down beside Corny he rallied sufficient spirit to make a very small joke. Corny laughed abruptly. In that quarter abruptness was a well-known danger signal, for Corny had never been known to desert a friend in trouble. His friendships generally dissolved urbanely before trouble of any sort set in. After the laugh there was a long silence as though everyone was waiting for a lead. Now, if ever, might Hugo have seized the opportunity to reinstate himself. He should have rushed in and held them all spellbound. He said nothing.
Failure, as he now saw, is like success in that it is cumulative. It generates its own fuel. Because a man is out of humour he has to go for a walk with a first-class devitaliser like Alec, is reduced to a mass of thirst and blisters, and automatically becomes incapable of recovery. Failure is a quicksand, an octopus, anything that drags you down if you struggle. All these people, so ready yesterday to applaud his good fortune, were quite indifferent to-day at the sight of his collapse. They would sit round and coolly watch him sink. Not one of them cared to give him a helping hand, not even Philomena, who ought, at least, to have laughed when he made jokes. He looked across at her, almost appealingly, but she stared back as solemn as an owl. And this final proof of his falling credit left him quite hopeless.
When, at last, he went upstairs to dress he could think of nothing save Philomena’s inconstancy. He promised himself a rich scene with her later on. She should be forced to explain herself. He would have it in plain English. If she had dropped him because he was not being a success, then it must have been the purest snobbery which had flung her into his arms twenty-four hours ago, and he would make her say so. The whole business had been ugly and insincere. He did not want her. He had only made love to her because he was bored and she seemed to expect it. She ought to be ashamed of herself, and he would tell her so.
Seething with indignation he tied his tie and saw in the glass that romantic young face which had been his fortune and his undoing. Ill temper could change but not spoil it. He snarled:
“At least you can still make Joey giggle.”
And flung out of the room.