IHAD splinted a broken leg in Blackwell’s bookshop; I had sported about in the Serpentine with an elderly lady. The stories with variations (some of them indelicate)–were soon buzzing round Cornford. I did not attempt–to deny them. What was the good? Mother, after her first suspicions, fully believed both tales and was embarrassingly sympathetic towards me. She also liked Miss Hargreaves far more than I had supposed she would.
‘Whatever you may say about her,’ she was arguing with Jim, ‘she does wear that hat well. I call that an accomplishment.’
‘But, mother, it’s a fantastic hat!’
‘Of course it is. But Miss Hargreaves is a fantastic person. You know, I can’t help liking her. Of course, I can easily understand how difficult it must be for you, Norman dear. I think one would get quite fond of her, and yet never want to set eyes on her again.’
‘That’s exactly how I feel,’ I said.
‘Well,’ said Jim, ‘I think she was an impossibly rude old woman. Look at the way she talked about poor Marjorie!’
‘As for that,’ said mother, ‘I absolutely agree with her. I can’t bear these painted finger-nails and I’ve always told Marjorie so.’
I went to the Cathedral with a low heart the following morning. I fully expected her to be there. But for some reason she didn’t turn up; neither did I see her all that day. I kept well clear of Canticle Alley, of course. Every minute I expected I should bump into her somewhere; but I didn’t. Had she chartered a balloon and floated away to her home beyond the stars? Who knew?
It was early-closing day and happened also to be a plain day at the Cathedral. Marjorie and I had arranged to spend the afternoon on the river perhaps the last trip we should get that season. I rather doubted whether she’d come with me after what had happened last night. (Marjorie hates being criticized.) So I went round to Beddow’s in the morning to see if I could borrow Henry’s two-seater, instead of having to take the bus to Cookham as we generally do. I knew Marjorie wouldn’t find it easy to resist a drive in the car; she’s mad about driving.
‘Well,’ I said, ‘Connie’s back!’
‘Good God! No?’
Apparently Henry had heard nothing about yesterday. I told him everything. To my annoyance he was very critical about the new stories Miss Hargreaves and I had made up. (I don’t mind telling you I was awfully pleased with those stories. Who wouldn’t be?)
‘You’ve only got yourself to blame,’ said Henry, ‘if you will go on making up these mad yarns.’
‘But, Henry what the devil was I to do?’
‘You should have sat quiet and said nothing at all.’
‘With mother pumping me all the time and Connie glowering at me from her chair. Yes, I should like to have seen you sit quiet.’
‘The truth is,’ said Henry, ‘you just can’t resist taking people in.’
I was furious with him for that; furious because it was true.
‘It’s all very well for you,’ I said, ‘but you’re not plagued by her as I am. I don’t see why you should be.’
This was a deliberate threat. Henry knew it. I saw him go quite white at the thought of it.
‘Well, old boy, I’m sorry, I really am. But to tell you the honest truth, I’m downright sick of the whole queer business. Don’t get mad with me, now! Whatever happens, I’m going to hold my tongue from now on.’
‘If you’d held your tongue from the beginning, we might not be in this fix.’
‘I’m not in a fix,’ he said truthfully. Which made me damned angry. It seemed so unfair. Why shouldn’t he be in a fix too?
‘I shall turn her on to you,’ I said. I left the garage so fed up with him that I forgot to ask him to lend me the car. However, I phoned him later and he was quite nice about it; said I could have it as long as I liked.
Friday, September the thirtieth. Another dreadfully memorable day. Turning back to my diary I find this cryptic entry: ‘Swans in tall hats.’ Means nothing whatever to you, does it? Wish it meant nothing to me. Or rather, I wish I knew what it did mean.
It was another beautiful day and ordinarily I should have been looking forward to our trip on the river. But I couldn’t. I felt something unpleasant was going to happen.
Parking the car at the Ferry-Boat Inn I chose a punt from Cooper’s boat-house and we set off down the river.
‘We’re very quiet, aren’t we?’ I said.
‘Yes, we are, aren’t we?’ she agreed, looking up from her novel. I extricated my pole from some weeds and for about ten minutes we sailed smoothly down towards the lock. I didn’t know what to say. So I waited to see if she’d say anything. It was a lovely day, the sun mellowed in the faintly misty sky, the great banks of trees round Cliveden House turning to a rich gold. A lovely day, but rather a sad one. A long way away somebody was ringing the six little tubular bells of little Hedsor church; I don’t know why they were ringing, but to me it sounded like a farewell to summer. Bells are like that; they cry a vale, never an ave. We passed hardly any other boats. Floating on the water were hundreds and hundreds of dead willow leaves; they, and the six little bells, made me think of all the hundreds of days and millions of minutes of my life that I couldn’t account for. I got so melancholy that I knew there was only one thing to do.
‘I think I shall swim,’ I said.
‘Do,’ said Marjorie. If I’d have said ‘drown’ I think she’d have still said ‘do’.
We entered the lock, the only boat to go in, and while we waited I lit a cigarette.
‘Good book?’ I asked.
‘Very.’
‘Who’s it by?’
‘Oh, I don’t know! What’s it matter?’
‘Of course it matters. I can’t understand you saying a thing like that, Marjorie.’
‘I can only remember the titles of books.’
‘Titles! As though they were anything!’
‘Oh, do be quiet!’
‘You’re very good company to-day,’ I said bitterly. It’s always the way. Whenever I get depressed I quarrel with somebody; then I feel better.
‘I just happen to be interested in my book,’ she said.
‘Well, I think you might be interested in me. A fellow expects a girl to say something when he sweats away with a pole all the afternoon.’
She laid down her book rather deliberately. ‘You know perfectly well what’s on my mind,’ she said. ‘If anyone talks about it–you only fly into a rage.’
‘Well, go on. Risk that. Better than sulking.’
‘Wait till we’re through the lock.’
If you’ve got anything to say, it might as well be said in a lock as out of it, I thought. However, I waited, prepared for the worst. As soon as we were through the gates I coaxed the punt into the bank, laid down the pole and turned firmly to Marjorie.
‘Now,’ I said. It’s a word I know how to use.
Again she put down her book and looked at me straightly. ‘I don’t believe that story about you meeting Miss Hargreaves in Blackwell’s shop,’ she said. ‘I should like you to tell me the truth, Norman.’
I was silent for a long time. ‘If I were to tell you the truth,’ I said, ‘you’d simply say I was mad.’
‘Then it was a lie?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, tell me the real truth then, Norman. It’s rotten, the way you’re going on; absolutely rotten.’
‘Look here, Marjorie,’ I said earnestly, ‘I know my behaviour must have seemed funny, but if you’d gone through what I had, you wouldn’t criticize. You’d be glad of a friend. I tell you I’m doomed–I’m cursed.’
‘That hat!’ she sniffed. ‘I wouldn’t mind so much if she didn’t make you look so ridiculous. Everybody in Cornford’s talking about you. And who is she to talk about me in the way she did?’
‘If I do tell you the truth and nothing but the truth, will you try to believe me?’
‘I shall do what I like with my own finger-nails,’ muttered Marjorie.
‘Oh, damn your finger-nails!’ I cried. ‘Sorry, darling–didn’t mean that. They’re lovely finger-nails–glorious!’
‘You do still love me, don’t you, Norman?’
‘Darling, I–’ I kissed her. They always believe you when you kiss them. ‘I wish all this had never happened,’ I said.
‘Darling, you talk as though it was something awful.’
‘It is awful.’ I told her everything then, from Lush church onwards.
‘Henry’ll tell you the same,’ I said. ‘He’s as mystified as I am.’
For a long time she was silent, and I couldn’t tell whether she believed me or not. It was very calm and cool there and I felt happier now I’d got it all off my chest. After all, she is a topping girl, really; it would be awful to lose her, I told myself. She’s got such grace, such poise. I looked at her in her white dress and compared her to a swan who sailed up near us. Of course, she hadn’t got such a long neck, or anything like that, but she had the same sort of dignity.
‘The awful thing is,’ I added presently, ‘everything I now make up about the wretched woman comes true.’
‘You mean–like Blackwell’s shop and the Serpentine–and–’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you really make those tales up, Norman?’
‘Of course I did.’
‘But she talked about it too. When you were out of the room she said how noble you’d been to her how she would never have lived if it hadn’t been for your quickness. Although I couldn’t bear the old thing, I couldn’t help being proud of you.’
‘But you said, just now, you didn’t believe those stories.’
‘It wasn’t true. Of course I believed them. I said I didn’t believe them because I felt certain something must have happened between you and Miss Hargreaves which you were hiding from us. I thought if I said I didn’t believe all that, you might get angry and blurt out the truth.’
‘I’ve told you the truth, Marjorie.’
‘But–Norman darling–if you really can invent things which come true, why don’t you simply get rid of her?’
‘Do you hate her as much as that?’
‘Don’t you?’
I evaded this. ‘I did try to get rid of her,’ I said. ‘I told you. I sat under the table and willed her away. She went.’
‘And came back.’
‘I wanted her back. It was my fault. I didn’t really believe she’d gone for good. I tell you what, Marjorie; I reckon that if I could really bring myself to believe she didn’t exist well, she wouldn’t exist. But that’s damned hard when you see her sitting in the Bishop’s Throne with a fifteen-inch hat. Isn’t it?’
‘What about the Duke of Grosvenor?’ she asked. ‘There is such a title, isn’t there? I thought they used to live at Cliveden.’
‘Yes, they used to–about a century ago. That’s probably what brought the name into my head. But I think the title’s extinct now. I believe there’s a branch of the family in Ireland somewhere.’
‘Couldn’t you find out from them whether Miss Hargreaves is–’
I grew impatient. ‘What’s the good?’ I snapped irritably. ‘The more I try to find out about her, the more tied up I’m bound to get. Henry wanted to go to Oakham. I said no. Can’t you see how dangerous it would be? Why, for all I know, I might actually have created a Duke of Grosvenor. And Agatha look at that! She’s dead. But there’s a corpse somewhere which I’m responsible for. And I don’t even know what sort of corpse.’
Marjorie shuddered. ‘It’s horrible,’ she said. She withdrew from me a little, I noticed. ‘If you can really do these extraordinary tricks,’ she said, ‘why don’t you try something big?’
‘Big?’
‘Yes.’ Marjorie smiled. ‘You might turn her into that swan, for example.’
‘I see,’ I said bitterly. ‘You don’t believe a word.’
‘I haven’t said so.’
‘Turn her into a swan! It’s an absolutely mad idea! Besides, think how damned uncomfortable it’d be for her.’ Marjorie shrugged her shoulders. ‘Well, you say you invented her. If you turned her into a swan, I might begin to believe you.’
She smiled at me mockingly. It was obvious that she didn’t believe a single word I’d told her. If I could do it, I thought; if I could really turn Miss Hargreaves into that swan, Marjorie would simply have to believe me then; nobody would ever doubt my word again. The immensity of the job frightened me. Suppose I tried? Or–would it be better to try to turn the swan into Miss Hargreaves–so that Marjorie would really have her evidence at once? No. Because if I succeeded in doing that, we should have her here floating about in the river, making an awful nuisance of herself. Besides, she might not be able to swim. Hargreaves into swan was the trick.
. . . It was done. In my mind, I mean. Almost before I could argue the wisdom of it, I heard myself muttering with terrific intensity, ‘Miss Hargreaves turn into that swan; Miss Hargreaves, turn into that swan. Don’t dare to disobey me. Turn into that swan and no more nonsense. Don’t come here, either. Change somewhere else.’
‘What’s that you’re saying?’ asked Marjorie.
‘Nothing,’ I said quietly. I held on to the side of the boat, feeling a bit queer.
‘Why, what’s the matter with you?’ she cried. ‘You’ve gone white, Norman darling. What’s wrong? Do you feel ill?’
‘I feel sick,’ I said, in that lumpy sort of way in which you speak when you feel you’re going to be sick.
She drew away hurriedly. ‘Lean over the side,’ she advised. ‘Shall I thump you on the back–?’
‘Leave me alone,’ I gasped. ‘Don’t talk. I shall be all right in a minute–’
It passed. I was staring at the swan. Nothing whatever had happened. The swan floated gracefully away from us, disappearing regally round a bend in the river. I had been mad to imagine I could ever do it. But the effort had given me a turn. Funny how the brain works on the body like that.
‘Better now,’ I said.
‘What on earth came over you? Something you ate?’
‘I tried to turn Miss Hargreaves into a swan. It tired me.’
‘You needn’t be funny, Norman.’
‘I’m not being funny. I tried to do what you suggested. And it tired me. Damn it all!’ I cried, getting suddenly angry–with her. ‘Damn it all! Turning old ladies into swans isn’t easy work. You try it yourself.’
She looked at me very queerly and didn’t say any more.
I swam presently. Slithering about under water I got back some of my composure. I don’t know about you, but I can always believe in myself more under the water. The fact that I haven’t got fins yet can still go on living with several gallons of that watery stuff above me, always gives me confidence in myself. Lately, I’d begun to doubt a good many things. Whether life wasn’t one long dream: whether dreams weren’t really life: whether I actually existed. Under water, I knew, at any rate, that I existed; I knew that because I knew that if I stayed there much longer I should cease to exist. Funny way of proving it, but it is proof.
I came up, spluttered, and looked about me. Immediately I doubted everything again. Miss Hargreaves–was she real? I’d seen her eat. But was the food real? Damn it all–this was a pure nightmare! I swam quickly down to the bed of the river again. Suppose she died? Then I should know she had existed. Well, suppose I killed her? I might be hanged. Didn’t want that to happen. The parents wouldn’t like it. Marjorie would get into the papers. No. Suppose, with all the power I was capable of, I willed her for ever away? It could never be done unless I could convince myself that she wasn’t real. Had I believed in her when I had first brought her to life? Yes, firmly; she had grown more and more with every fresh thing I made up about her. Could I compel myself to behave as though she wasn’t alive? Henry and I had tried that; and it had broken down.
A sentence of father’s came back to me. ‘Like me, you can’t be bothered to control what you create.’ Suppose–the dreadful possibility lurched into my mind–she were to control me?
My lungs were bursting for air. I shot to the surface just in time.
On our way back to Cookham I finally challenged Marjorie.
‘You might as well admit it, you don’t believe me.’
‘No, darling, I don’t. I’m sorry. How can I?’
‘Well, whether you believe me or not,’ I said, ‘I don’t see why you should allow her to come between us. She’s done you no harm.’
‘She’s made you the laughing-stock of Cornford.’
‘I don’t care. Let them laugh. Miss Hargreaves is original, anyway.’ I laughed ironically; but Marjorie didn’t see my point. ‘You’re simply jealous,’ I told her, ‘that’s all it is. Jealous of an old lady of eighty-three!’
‘I don’t know the meaning of the word “jealous”.’
‘Oh, yes, you do!’ I dug about with my pole. I was angry with her now. It did seem to me that people ought to try to see, at least, how remarkable Miss Hargreaves was. ‘Jealous,’ I went on, ‘because she’s got style, and you haven’t.’
‘Oh. I haven’t got style? I see.’
‘There are hundreds like you. But there’s only one Miss Hargreaves. You ought to be proud to know her. She’s out of the rut. You ought to be proud to know me. It isn’t everybody could do what I’ve done.’
‘Look out for that pole, you idiot!’
‘Oh–sorry!’ I said to a beetroot-faced old gentleman in a motor-boat, who’d somehow got in the way of my pole.
‘Another thing,’ I continued, ‘Miss Hargreaves has got a mind. Thinking that the authors of books don’t matter! Huh!’
‘You needn’t say any more. This is the end.’
‘Amen,’ I said.
‘You’re not a man.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m a magician.’
Marjorie suddenly burst into tears. ‘Oh, you beast!’ she sobbed. ‘You horrid beast! Saying I’ve got no style when everybody knows I’m the best-dressed girl in Cornford. Even Jim admits that. You beast–you horrid beast!’
‘Oh, God!’ I groaned. ‘Don’t cry! I’m awfully sorry. You’ve got tons of style. You’re marvellous. You’re grand. Miss Hargreaves doesn’t come in it.’
‘Give her up–never see her again. Then I’ll know you love me.’
‘I wish I could, darling.’
‘Well, why can’t you?’
‘She won’t let me,’ I said. We didn’t speak another word.
I dropped in to see Archie Tallents early that evening. He was in the dark-room when I arrived at his studio and he asked me to wait. When he came out a few minutes later he was holding a plate up to the light and looking at it. ‘Just a minute, dear,’ he said. Resting the plate on a dish, he went over to the telephone.
‘Is that the Cornford Mercury?’ he asked presently. He continued: ‘I’ve got a nice picture of old Jezebel. Yes, got it this afternoon. Any use to you? All right. Send your boy round for it in half an hour. Good-bye.’
He rang off. ‘Always carry a camera with you,’ he said to me. ‘Never know what you might see. Look at that.’
He showed me the negative. It was a group of people in Disraeli Square, some on the pavement, some in the middle of the road. A long line of traffic was held up and a policeman was poking at something with a stick.
‘Can’t quite make it out,’ I said. ‘Somebody run over or something? Oh, yes–I can recognize the Dean. He seems to be backing away from my God!’ I held the plate against my sleeve in order to see it more clearly. ‘This isn’t a swan, is it?’
Archie nodded. ‘That’s Jezebel,’ he said. ‘The oldest royal swan on the river, so they say. She always was a spiteful one.’ I began to feel a little faint.
‘Will you open a window, Archie?’ I asked. ‘Bit close in here.’
He opened the window for me. ‘What’s the matter, dear?’
‘Nothing, Archie. I’m all right. Tell me about this Jezebel. What time did she turn up in the Square?’
‘About four. Dear old canary came waddling out of Canticle Alley–’
‘Did you say Canticle Alley?’ I asked faintly.
‘Canticle Alley, I said. She stopped in the middle of the road, by the traffic lights, as you can see. The policeman got a little huffy. So did Jezebel. She seemed to want to lay an egg or something. The Dean went for her with his umbrella. Most undeanly.’
‘Did they catch her?’
‘Catch Jezebel? Not likely! They had to turn the fire-hose on her.’
‘Fire-hose? Good God! She’ll catch cold.’
‘Is this fowl a friend of yours, Norman?’
‘She–Never mind. Go on.’
‘Well, she toddled away after that. Back to the river.’
‘I suppose, Archie, you’re quite sure it was Jezebel? I mean–there wasn’t anything unusual about the bird, was there?’
‘Unusual? Jezebel’s a very unusual sort of bird. Very old bird.’
‘Yes. A very old bird.’ I agreed. I turned to the door. ‘Well, so long, Archie,’ I said. I felt I couldn’t talk to him now. Something had to be done at once.
I rushed straight round to Canticle Alley and knocked at Mrs Beedle’s door. Mrs Beedle came herself.
‘Is Miss Hargreaves in?’ I asked. I was shaking so much I could hardly talk.
‘No, sir. She went out this afternoon and she ain’t come back yet.’
‘Oh. Do you know where she went?’
‘Over the hills and far away’ croaked Dr Pepusch bitterly from a room upstairs.
‘Drat that there bird!’ exclaimed Mrs Beedle. ‘ ’Uman, I calls that bird, simply ’uman. Miss ’Argreaves, she goes to the river. “Mrs Beedle,” she says to me, “I feels like a blow on the river.” Those was her words, her very words, Mr ’Untley. “What!” I says. “You go on the river, Mum! Well, just you mind you don’t catch a chill, then.” Because she’s the sort that do catch a chill, Mr ’Untley, and go off sudden.’
‘I know,’ I said. ‘I know, Mrs Beedle.’
‘ “There are times,” she says to me, grave-like, “times there be, Mrs Beedle, when I am driv willy-nilly to do things as don’t proper become a lady of my years.” Willy-nilly–they was her very words. And she puts on her ’at, the one like a chimney-pot, and off she goes.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Yes, I see.’ I felt numbed.
‘She’s a very funny lady, ain’t she now?’ said Mrs Beedle. ‘Last night, look, you wouldn’t believe her, her ’eart were set on a balloon, nothing but a balloon it must be. Well, look, my little girl got a balloon or two, see, so I blows one up–took a lot of breath it did and I’m ashmatical too–and I gives it to her. “There,” I says, “there’s a balloon, Ma’am.” But she says, “That ain’t no good to me, Mrs Beedle. It’s a real balloon I want.” And she looks kind of wistful-like. She affect me, sir.’
‘Affects you? Oh. Does she?’
‘Affect me, she do. I don’t believe she’s got a friend in the world except you. She think the world of you. She tell me how you saved her life. Lonely-like, she is. Of course, she do wear odd ’ats, but look–’
I suddenly came to my senses. ‘What time did she go out?’ I snapped.
‘Well, it would have been about four, Mr ’Untley, yes, about four, because look, the wireless was playing that minuet what they call it and–’ ‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘Good evening.’
‘They go off sudden,’ shouted Mrs Beedle after me. ‘The nights is damp and she’ll catch ’er death. They go off sudden.’
I reeled out into Disraeli Square, Mrs Beedle’s gloomy words ringing in my ears. It was time for me to go home to supper, but I knew I shouldn’t be able to eat anything. A drink was what I wanted. I turned towards the Swan. The very sight of the great golden bird with his wings outspread above the doorway made me feel sick. A coincidence. I muttered to myself over and over again; a coincidence. It must be, it must be, it must be. A picture soared into my mind: the picture of a swan in a balloon sailing away into the clouds, over the hills and far away as Dr Pepusch had prophesied. ‘God!’ I said aloud. ‘No balloons–please. Whatever else has to happen, let there be no balloon. Change back, dear Miss Hargreaves; change back at once. Wherever you are now, change back to your proper self.’
I was staggering up St James’ Street, making for Henry’s house and hardly knowing what direction I was taking. I felt giddy and sick; I felt as useless as a pin without a head; I felt drunk with the knowledge of power that terrified me; I felt afraid.
I knocked at Henry’s door. ‘Damn fool,’ I muttered to myself. ‘There’s nothing in it. It can’t be true. Coincidence coincidence coincidence–’
He was having a late tea; deeply immersed in a book propped up on the teapot. I flopped down by the fire.
‘Half a mo,’ said Henry. ‘Just finish this chapter. Most extraordinary story about a stockbroker who fell in love with his wife’s boots.’
‘Thanks for offering me tea,’ I said.
‘Sorry, old boy.’ He poured some out and gave it to me. ‘Been wenching on the Thames?’ he asked presently. I nodded blankly. I felt unable to talk.
‘Bit late in the year,’ he observed, lighting his pipe and sitting in an armchair opposite me. ‘Had a good time?’
‘Interesting.’
‘Made it up with Marjorie, I hope?’
‘No. Made it worse.’
‘Oh? I hope you’re not throwing her over in favour of Connie.’
‘Shouldn’t be surprised at anything. Or rather, no–’ I added hastily. ‘I am not throwing her over in favour of Connie.’
‘How is the old fowl?’
I groaned. ‘Need you call her a fowl, Henry?’
‘Well–hen, then.’
‘I haven’t seen her since yesterday. I believe she’s changed a bit.’
‘Oh? Dyed her hair, or something?’
‘No. She’s gone–rather white.’
‘White?’
‘Yes. White. And her neck’s a bit stiff.’
‘Oh.’
Henry glanced at me rather strangely. Then he walked up and down the room in an uneasy sort of way, jabbing the stem of his pipe in the nape of his neck. You could tell he was thinking hard.
‘Look here, old boy,’ he said, ‘I’ve got an idea about you.’
‘Have you? That’s nice. Want me to see a doctor, I suppose.’
‘No. Not a doctor. This psycho-analyst fellow. I think you might see him.’
‘Who do you mean?’
Henry took up the book he had been reading. ‘Fellow who wrote this,’ he said. ‘Marvellous book! I’ve found out a whole lot about myself I never knew before.’
‘Why–do you think there’s something wrong with me?’
‘You never know. You’re looking rather peeky. And you’re growing extraordinarily absent-minded.’
‘I never had much of a mind to be absent, Henry.’
‘Well, it might as well be present, whatever it is.’
‘Wonder if I could work her into a flea?’ I mused, half to myself.
‘What?’ said Henry.
‘Flea. I should have her under control more. I don’t suppose a flea could hold up a line of traffic.’
‘What the hell are you talking about, Norman?’
‘Oh nothing. Let’s have a look at that book.’
It was a green book, with a long list of contents under several sub-headings. It was called The New and the Old Self, and it was by a Doctor Birinus Hals-Gruber. I opened it at random and read a bit. There was a lot about the Sesame Impulse and the Agamemnon-Reflex which made, as they say, fascinating reading. But I couldn’t relate Miss Hargreaves to any of it.
‘It mightn’t be a bad plan,’ suggested Henry, ‘if you took Connie and had her psychoed too. You’d probably find she ogled you in your pram centuries ago.’
‘You can take her, if you like.’
‘Not me. No, thank you, old boy. Anyway, I’ve got a feeling that Connie doesn’t much care for me.’
‘You’re damn lucky.’
‘Well, what about it? He might help you. There’s no getting away from the fact, Norman, you’re up against something that we can’t understand at all. And, after all, these fellows know more about minds and subconsciousnesses and what-not than I know about cars or you know about organs.’
‘I don’t know, Henry. I don’t much believe in them. I tell you–’ A sudden idea came to me. ‘I tell you who might help.’
‘Who?’
‘Father Toule.’
‘What? That comic little R.C. with a face like an egg?’
‘I reckon he’d understand this sort of thing somehow. It’s–well, it’s a miracle, and Roman Catholics know more about miracles than most people.’
‘Why don’t you go to the Dean? He’s a kind old bird. He’d listen.’
‘Yes. And think I was mad. Father Toule wouldn’t think that.’
‘I don’t see why.’
‘He came into the shop one day, Henry; and bought an old book about some queer saint-chappie. Joseph, he’s called; Joseph of Cupertino. He used to fly.’
‘First time I’ve heard of an aviator-saint.’
‘Idiot. This was in the seventeenth century. Nothing to do with aeroplanes. He used to fly all over the church. The monks had a job to keep him down. It’s a fact, you needn’t laugh. At least–it is to the R.C.s. He hadn’t much brain, either. Like me in that way.’
‘Well, I don’t see what flying’s got to do with Connie.’
I shuddered. ‘It might,’ I said cautiously, ‘have more to do with her than you imagine.’
‘You’ve got something fresh up your sleeve about Connie,’ said Henry suspiciously. I was silent. I felt I didn’t dare tell him about the swan. It might not be true, after all. And, if I blabbed about it, it might yet come true. Which was the last thing I wanted, attracted as I was by the miraculous.
‘Well,’ said Henry, ‘I think you’d far better go to this doctor fellow. There’s nothing supernatural about it. Something’s just gone askew in your mind–that’s what it is.’
‘Thank you, Henry,’ I said bitterly. ‘And in your mind, too, I suppose.’
Henry ignored this. I could see that bath sticking in his throat again. He swallowed rapidly. ‘Suppose,’ he said, ‘he could prove you had known Miss Hargreaves years ago? That’d get you somewhere, wouldn’t it?’
‘It’s too damn prosaic an explanation,’ I objected. ‘I don’t want it.’
‘You don’t want it?’
‘No. I–’ I hesitated. I was burning to take him into my confidence about the swan. I couldn’t resist throwing out a hint.
‘I might have done something pretty big to-day,’ I said. ‘I don’t know yet. I’ll tell you when I’m sure.’
‘You haven’t murdered her, have you?’
‘Not quite. Just a little metempsychosis.’
‘A little what-osis?’
‘Metempsyche.’
Henry stared at me.
‘I wonder if–’ I mused to myself, looking at a vase of montbretias on the table. I was suddenly tempted to try to turn them into a cotton-reel. Don’t know why. Just came into my head. Another peak.
‘Be a reel of cotton!’ I hissed, throwing a lot of invisible dust at them.
Nothing happened. The clock ticked on. I laughed weakly.
‘Only my little joke,’ I said feebly. ‘Only my little joke. So long, Henry.’
I left him. Through the window I could see him holding up the montbretias and looking at them. There was a rather scared expression on his face, I thought.
Things fly round a bit too quickly in Cornford. I believe if you sent a telegram to yourself you’d get it before you sent it.
‘Marjorie’s broken-hearted,’ said mother, the moment I got in.
‘Don’t you believe it,’ I said. ‘Hearts don’t break as easily as that.’
‘How can you be so unkind? Marjorie actually told Jim she was certain you were going to marry this wretched woman. Of course, I don’t believe anything so fantastic as that, but I do wish you would tell us the truth, Norman.’
‘Truth!’ I laughed cynically.
‘First you say one thing, then you say another. What are we to believe?’
‘I’ll tell you something about truth,’ I said bitterly.
‘What do you mean?’
‘They say Truth lies at the bottom of a well. I’ve got drowned in it. That’s what I mean.’
‘Norman, I really believe you are ill.’
The way my mother said that word ‘ill’. I wish you could have heard it. ‘You can’t go on like this,’ she continued. ‘You’ve dropped your work completely; you won’t settle down to a thing. And it’s all because of this Miss Hargreaves. I–’
I suddenly lost my temper.
‘Damn Miss Hargreaves!’ I cried. ‘Blast Miss Hargreaves! To hell with–’ I caught back my words, appalled at what I had said. Who knew what might not happen to her now?
‘I’m sorry I swore,’ I said. ‘Is father upstairs?’
‘Father is in his room, messing about as usual.’ Mother turned rather coldly away from me, obviously offended. I went upstairs. Father calmed me. He always does. He’s never yet told me I’m a liar. He doesn’t necessarily believe what you tell him, but at any rate he never voices his disbelief.
I had to tell him all about the swan; it was intolerable to keep it to myself any longer.
‘I know it’s impossible,’ I said. ‘But still–’
‘H’m.’ He was very slowly tapping out letters on an old Oliver typewriter. ‘Swans are funny creatures. I wouldn’t trust a swan with a five-pound note. No, I wouldn’t.’
‘Yes, but the point about this swan–’ I began. Then I stopped. What was the use of talking about it? Somehow I had simply got to convince myself that the whole thing was pure coincidence. A good many things that seem surprising are coincidental. I dare say my being alive and writing this book is a coincidence, really, if one could only get to the bottom of it all. What a damn mystery life is!
‘Give me a drop of whisky, will you, father?’ I asked.
‘Go ahead, my boy. You’ll find the siphon on the top of the butterfly cabinet. You might put back those oak-eggars, will you?’
I drank and fell back into a chair; I felt like drinking myself silly. Father lit a cigarette and poured himself a drink.
‘Do you think I’m batty, father?’ I said.
‘Battiness,’ he remarked, ‘is far more common than one supposes.’
‘Nothing seems real to me to-day.’
‘Reality isn’t what it’s thought to be,’ he said, blowing out great clouds of smoke, then blowing them away from himself to me. ‘No. Reality is–well–there’s that fellow who talks on the wireless–who is it? Lord Elton, or is it Eddystone? No! Edison, that’s the fellow. We’re here today gone to-morrow and some say to-morrow never comes, so perhaps we don’t go. Who knows?’
‘Do you believe in psychology, father?’
‘How do you know you’re real? You might not be here at all. There’s only one thing I’m certain of, my boy; and that is–I’m not certain of anything. You can’t prove a damn thing. Two and two make four; so they say. But who the hell knows what two is?’
I helped myself to some more whisky. For several minutes we were silent. It was queer how I felt that my father had the key to the whole mystery of Miss Hargreaves, if only he could find the right lock to put it into. But you never could pin father down to anything definite; if you could, he wouldn’t be father.
‘Music now,’ he said presently. He rose, stubbed out his cigarette in an old bowler hat he uses as an ash-tray, and found his violin.
‘I can’t play,’ I said. ‘I’ve got an addled mind.’
‘Well, you can listen to me, then. Music’s the only thing in this world that isn’t addled.’
He stood by the open window and started to play one of his own tunes. I wish I could write it down for you, but it would lose something if I tried to tape it out to minims and quavers and so on. It was, as usual, the long cantabile type of melody that always seemed to grow as naturally as speech from him. More naturally. I knew that when he started he hadn’t the slightest idea what he was going to play. He gave the violin a life of its own; never interfered with it. The violin had a song to sing; father was merely there to help it.
‘There,’ he said, laying down his fiddle. I was moved and I said nothing. ‘I,’ continued father, ‘and this gut and carved wood–animal and vegetable–together we combine to produce something that’s never been in the world before. Listen.’
I listened. ‘Can’t hear anything,’ I said.
‘That’s the point,’ he said. ‘Neither can I. But if you had sharp enough ears, you’d be able to hear that tune going on somewhere. You don’t suppose it’s dead, do you?’
‘What’re you getting at, father?’ I sat up, keenly interested.
‘An idea of mine,’ he said. ‘Just an idea of mine. About sound. Go and strike a great fat arpeggio chord of D flat on the piano, boy.’
I went to the piano.
‘Hold the loud pedal down,’ he said. ‘Strike bass D flat–then A flat a fifth higher–then tenor F–and so on right up the piano to the highest F. Then sit still with your foot down on the loud pedal. Listen. You’ll understand something.’
I did as he commanded, very slowly and powerfully striking the notes, then sitting silently, the loud pedal down, and listening. Slowly, slowly, the great chord trembled away into space. For nearly a minute we could hear it. It was hard to break the silence afterwards a silence that was no longer a silence and never, never could be again.
‘My God!’ I said.
‘Hush!’ whispered father. He stood at the window, looking out. ‘Still there,’ he murmured. ‘Never dies, you know. Never dies. Going on, all round the world, my boy. You can’t cancel it. That’s my idea. You and your Miss Holgrave–that chord, my tune. Mysteries, boy; all mysteries. Don’t be surprised at anything. When you understand what that chord does, you’ll be near to understanding everything.’
Mother came in. It’s always the same. Whenever father and I get talking, mother comes in. And, of course, she doesn’t know; she doesn’t understand the sort of things father and I talk about. Not that we understand them ourselves, as a matter of fact.
‘Have you heard the news?’ mother asked. You could tell she was bursting with something important; I knew it was Hargreaves news.
‘Jim’s just met Mr Carver, the house-agent who was handling Lessways. Miss Hargreaves has bought the property.’
Somehow, it didn’t surprise me. Vaguely I knew that I must be responsible, though I didn’t know exactly why.
About half-past ten, feeling terribly uneasy, I went round to Canticle Alley again.
Mrs Beedle shook her head mournfully.
‘No. She ain’t come back. I were thinking about these ’ere S O S’s, sir. They’ll be dragging the river, mark my words. Willy-nilly, she say to me, and those was her very words . . .’
I tried to sleep. The moon straggled through on to my pillow. The infinite chord of D flat reverberated in my brain. I tossed about. I dreamt of swans wearing tall hats sailing over the hills in balloons to the perpetual accompaniment of father’s violin. Awful. About three I rose, put on my dressing-gown and went to the window. Below me, on the other side of the road, Lessways rose emptily to the moony sky. The board had gone. I thought of Miss Hargreaves in residence there. It was incredible. Baffled, bewildered, I gazed out at the night. Everything looked very cool and silvery. Far away, beyond the Cathedral, I could see the winding arc of the Thames.
I went back to bed, but sleep wouldn’t come. Again I rose. This time I dressed quickly, putting on an old sweater and a pair of flannel trousers. Creeping downstairs, I got my bicycle out of the shed, wheeled it down the garden and leapt on the saddle. In twenty minutes I had reached Cookham Bridge.
I was glad I had come out. If you’ve got any serious thinking to do, you must do it at night. The longer I stayed on that bridge, listening to the lapping of the water against the boats, the greater was the sense of mystery which filled me. Father was right; we didn’t understand a damn thing. Old professors might tell me that the moon was carbon monoxide, or whatever they like to call it, but that didn’t make the moon any simpler. They might tell me that I, Norman Huntley, was only a mass of electrons formed in certain shapes to produce heart and lungs, brain and limbs. I was still a mystery.
Take Miss Hargreaves, I said to myself. Another mystery–the only difference being that she was an unfamiliar mystery. There was simply, so far as I knew, no precedent for the way Miss Hargreaves had appeared in my life. And yet, actually, she wasn’t any more of a mystery than my little finger.
Anything was possible. That’s what I felt that moonlit night as I leaned over the bridge. On the far bank of the river, beyond Hedsor wharf, was an apple orchard; sheltering behind it, graced by beautifully mown lawns, an old house that I had often admired. Why shouldn’t it be mine? Far away at the top of the hill, Lord Astor might be asleep in his bed. Why shouldn’t I be there? (Not as well. Instead of.) Move him out, I said, and put yourself there, the master of Cliveden. Or instead of there being the apples of autumn in that orchard, let there be the blossom of spring. Let there be light now; no darkness.
My gosh! I thought how grand God must have felt when He’d said ‘let there be light’ and it worked. After all that darkness, how He must have revelled in His new creation, making things because He’d made light and now had got nothing to look at in the new light.
Everything, it seemed to me, was just within my grasp. (Yes, I know it was all a horrible blasphemy, but there it is.) For that moment I accepted Miss Hargreaves without question or complaint. I felt proud of her; I realized these things didn’t happen to everybody. Naturally there were going to be complications. One couldn’t learn in a minute how to manage her. If she was still a little out of control–well, don’t all created things get out of control before long? Well, I mean, look at us ... God thought we were a very good job. And look at us . . . Well, I mean . . .
‘Oh, Miss Hargreaves!’ I breathed her name upon the cool night air. I longed to see her again. Couldn’t bear the thought of her going just when I was beginning fully to understand my responsibilities towards her. Whatever embarrassments she plunged me into–she was my own handiwork. Never again must I be tempted to play about with her. A strict sense of form must inspire all my dealings with her. No good getting drunk on swans and such like. Slowly I must adapt her to the conditions of Cornford society and guard her from all dangers of my impetuous will.
Thus I thought, that autumn night over the Thames. And, even as I thought, my eyes were fixed on the bit of river running past the orchard.
What was that strange melancholy singing? What was that boat doing out in mid-stream? Whose form huddled in the bows? Whose hat?
Whose hat?
‘My God!’ I muttered. I rushed across the field to the bank.
‘Miss Hargreaves!’ I cried from the bank. ‘Miss Hargreaves!’
Whether she heard me or not, I don’t know. At any rate, she paid not the slightest attention. I called again, louder, a little exasperated. What in God’s name did she imagine she was doing?
‘Can’t you hear me?’ I shouted.
She looked up. I could just see that she was writing something in her note-book.
‘Who is that?’ she called irritably.
‘Me. Norman. What on earth are you doing?’
‘Oh. You! Do you want anything?’
‘I want to get you home. You’ll die of cold.’
‘I’m busy now,’ she said. ‘Come and join me if you wish. But do please be quiet.’
‘How on earth did you get there?’ I asked.
But she was writing in her note-book and did not answer me.
‘Where are your oars?’ I bawled.
‘I can’t hear you!’ she snapped. ‘If you must talk, come closer. I am not accustomed to shouting across a river.’
There was only one way to reach her, short of swimming. I walked along the bank till I came to Cooper’s boat-house, nearer the bridge. Luckily there was nobody about, not even a prowling policeman. Taking one of the rowing-boats, I unmoored it, and rowed up to the little tributary. In a few minutes I was alongside her.
‘You’d better get into this boat,’ I said, ‘and I’ll row you back. What have you done with your oars?’
‘A minute! Wait–wait–’ She wrote rapidly. ‘I was hoping to set it to music,’ she murmured, pausing with her silver pencil tapping on the side of the boat, ‘but I cannot quite get the tune. No matter. I will read you my verses.’
‘They can wait,’ I said. ‘We’ve got to get you home somehow. Don’t you realize Mrs Beedle is worried to death about you?’
‘I do wish,’ she said petulantly, ‘you would not keep interrupting. What is this Beedle woman to me? Listen.’
Before I could say any more, in a low vibrant voice she started to recite.
‘River at Night. A Lament. I hope you follow me. A Lament.’
‘Yes, yes,’ I muttered. ‘I get you. Go on. Hurry up.’
She cleared her throat. ‘Strike a match, dear,’ she said, ‘and hold it over the manuscript. I cannot see too well. Keep striking matches as quietly as you can.’
I struck a match and held it near her note-book. Very tempted I was to set the thing on fire.
She read:
‘Oh, water and breezelight and magical moon,
And me all alone on the river!
They tell me that dawn will be here very soon–
They talk of a chill on the liver.’
She paused. ‘You like it?’ she asked anxiously.
‘What was the first line again?’ I asked.
‘ “Oh, water and breezelight and magical moon”.’
I frowned. ‘Breezelight?’
‘Precisely. Breezelight.’
‘Don’t you mean moonlight?’
‘What does it matter?’ she cried. ‘If I write “magical breeze” the rhyme is annihilated. In any case, the breeze is not magical; the moon is. How stupid you are! This is verse two:
Oh, for the wings, for the neck of a swan!
To swim all the night and not shiver.
Oh, say not the hour is eternally gone
When I floated like floss on the river!’
‘Yes. I–I like that,’ I said uneasily. ‘But really now–I think we’d better–’
‘Verse three,’ she said, ‘goes like this. Why don’t you strike another match? I cannot be expected to read in the dark, can I?’
I struck another match and she read verse three.
‘God made reservations to human desires,
And though He’s a bountiful giver,
He turned a deaf ear to the mind that aspires
To sport all the night on the river.’
‘Is it blasphemous, do you think?’ she asked anxiously. ‘I trust not. I have always had a very high regard for my Maker.’
‘Who is your Maker, that’s what I want to know!’ I said.
‘What did you say, dear? Speak up! Speak up!’
‘No. This isn’t time for talking. You must come home at once.’
‘How extraordinarily prosaic you are! Alone on the river “night with her train of stars”–Henley, dear; the poet; not the place–alone, you and me–and you must talk of going home. Fie! Come and sit in my boat. If you must pursue me, at least you need not be unsociable.’
‘Good God!’ I exclaimed. ‘You’re moored to the bank!’
‘Am I? Possibly. I attempted to engage the oars, but they are such clumsy things. I let them go.’
‘Oh, Miss Hargreaves!’ I cried, ‘you’re really too bad! There’ll be an awful row about this if anyone finds us. Do come into this boat at once and let’s get home somehow.’
Her boat was moored, I had now seen for the first time, to a tree stump at the bottom of the orchard.
‘I can’t understand how on earth you got here,’ I said.
‘Got here? Really–it is so many hours ago. How can I be expected to remember everything? In any case, I see no reason why I should account to you for all my movements.’
‘All right,’ I said hastily. ‘You needn’t get huffy. Read your poem again.’
I knew that would pacify her. Miss Hargreaves never could resist reading her poems. When she had finished her second reading she tore the pages out of the book, wrote her name at the bottom and gave them to me.
‘Keep it, dear,’ she said. ‘Perhaps it is not my best effort. Not, I fear, on the high level of the verses in Wayside Bundle. But no matter. A poet cannot always roam on Parnassus.’
‘Jolly true,’ I agreed. ‘Personally, I like this poem. It seems so–well, so much from your heart.’
‘All my poems,’ she said, ‘emerge to the world directly from my heart. They always have and they always will.’
‘Quite. But this–well, you know, it’s packed with experience. Why, one would almost think from reading it that you had actually been a swan.’
‘That is precisely what it is meant to convey. Pavlova was a close personal friend of mine.’
I was silent for some moments. Then I made another attempt to get her into my boat. ‘Come on,’ I said. ‘Take my hand. Be careful. We must get home.’
But she would not stir. ‘Do you remember the Serpentine, dear?’ she said. ‘How luscious those strawberries were! How I wish we could partake of some such refreshment now. But, alas–’ Then she suddenly pointed to the apple trees. ‘But look! The forbidden fruit! It is Providence, dear. Providence!’
‘When you get home,’ I said uneasily, ‘Mrs Beedle’ll make you a nice cup of tea and boil you an egg.’
‘We could light a fire,’ she mused. ‘There are plenty of sticks. Possibly we could roast the fruit. Raw apples lie none too easily within me. Get into my boat, dear. Pull on the rope. You will soon draw us into the bank.’
‘If you talk like this,’ I cried, ‘I shall go away and leave you here.’
‘Do!’ she said coldly. ‘What do I care? I have the stars. I can look at the fruit. No doubt I shall die of cold. But no matter–no matter. Connie Hargreaves has ceased to interest you, that is quite clear. Leave me. Go!’
She shivered petulantly and drew her fur more closely round her neck. Of course, I couldn’t leave her. I decided it was best to humour her; to land on the bank, perhaps eat an apple or two, then find our way through the garden somehow to the road. I only hoped we shouldn’t wake anybody in the house.
I clambered into her boat with some difficulty and pulled it into the bank, mooring the other boat to the same tree stump.
‘Ah!’ she said warmly. She took my hand and stepped nimbly on to the bank. ‘Ah! Apples now!’ She rubbed her hands together almost avariciously. ‘Get my sticks, dear. And now you must light a fire. It is quite simple. I abominate fuss. Let an adventure have more spice in it than dough. An old Norwegian proverb, dear. Light me a fire and I will do anything you wish. Yes, anything!’
‘You mean that?’ I said sharply.
‘Most certainly. Anything within my power.’
‘Then,’ I said, ‘oblige me by getting rid of that hat.’
There was an awkward pause. Suddenly she wrenched it from her head and flung it into the river.
‘You are right,’ she said. ‘It was a mistake. It was a little too low in the crown.’
‘Oh, my bag!’ she exclaimed. ‘Please get it out of the boat, dear. There is nothing of any value in it–except to me. My diary–a little miniature of Mr Archer–Agatha’s licence–trivial things, but precious to me. Thank you, dear, thank you.’
She was shivering a little; her hair was blowing about in the wind.
‘Perhaps you would lend me the coloured handkerchief from your breast pocket,’ she said. I gave it to her and she wound it round her head, tying it at the back. It was queer how completely it changed her appearance.
‘You look like a gipsy,’ I said.
‘Ah!’ She wagged a diverting finger at me. ‘What blood, I wonder, flows in my veins? One never knows, dear; one never quite knows. But these are indelicate topics. Come come–what about this fire. Look sharp. This wretched dawn will be here before very long. How feelingly one echoes Swinburne’s complaint–“Ah, God! Ah, God! that dawn should come so soon!” I have never approved of the particular circumstances which drove the poet to resent the dawn, but I entirely endorse the sentiment. Give me a cigarette.’
I gave her one and, seeing there was no way out of it, began gathering sticks to light a fire.
‘These are moments to be remembered, Norman,’ she said. ‘Let us not waste them in soft thoughts of bed and blankets. Be sturdy. Be different. Pick me an apple.’
‘Damn you!’ I muttered, crouching over my sticks and striking a match. ‘Damn you!’
But I picked her the apple. In spite of my annoyance, I realized I was half enjoying this adventure.
‘Did you–have any trouble with the traffic to-day?’ I asked. (Supposing, I was arguing, I had managed to turn her into a swan? It was quite possible that she herself had never realized the change.)
‘Trouble?’ she echoed. ‘Oh, I might have done.’ She shrugged her shoulders. It was easy to see how easily she would have shrugged wings. ‘I might have done. It is really so long ago, I cannot remember. Oh, yes! I stopped to do up my shoe-lace and I seem to recollect a lot of motor-horns sounding. A rude sound. Most offensive!’
‘H’m,’ I said thoughtfully. I snapped some sticks with my foot. They were damp and wouldn’t catch. ‘I supposed you don’t remember seeing the Dean, do you?’ I asked.
‘The Dean? Possibly. But why are you asking me all these questions? I cannot understand you.’
I said nothing. The clock up at Cliveden struck four; far away I heard the chimes of the Cathedral. Something else I could hear too; footsteps crackling the twigs in the orchard.
‘Listen!’ I whispered. ‘Somebody’s coming!’
‘Well? What of it? As I was saying, many a time Marie Corelli said to me how–’
A light was suddenly flashed in our eyes. A deep voice said, ‘May I ask what you imagine you’re doing here?’
It wasn’t at all an easy question to answer. If I had it in an examination, I don’t suppose I should be able to fill up both sides of the paper. Miss Hargreaves, however, seemed to find it simple.
‘By all means,’ she said crisply. ‘You are certainly at liberty to ask.’
A man came through the trees, flashing his torch down on my twigs. ‘Damned impertinence!’ he muttered. ‘Well,’ he said aloud, ‘I am asking what you imagine you’re doing here. And I should like an answer.’
‘We’re trying to–that is, we’re lighting a fire,’ I said feebly. ‘But the twigs are rather damp.’
‘And eating,’ added Miss Hargreaves, ‘your excellent apples. A superb flavour, if I may say so. Do you use any special manure in the soil?’
‘I can see perfectly well what you’re both doing.’
‘Then,’ remarked Miss Hargreaves rationally, ‘why ask? I imagine, my good sir, that what you really desire to know is why we are doing what we are doing? Is not that so?’
The fellow grunted. I could see now that he was a very tall, square-shouldered chap, with a rather sallow face, a flattened boxer’s nose. He was wearing a dark, close-fitting overcoat; it seemed to me to fit a little too closely.
‘I don’t know who the hell you both are–’ he began.
But Miss Hargreaves cut in on him. If there was one thing she could never tolerate, it was loose language. Dropping the apple as though it had been a live coal, she rose from the felled tree she had been sitting on, and addressed me. ‘Norman, we will go now. Get the boat ready.’ She opened her bag and fumbled about for some money. ‘Perhaps,’ she said to the chap, ‘you will be good enough to tell me the price of your fruit. I have consumed half an apple. Incidentally, I have also used your boat and lost your absurd oars. Kindly name a price.’
‘Well, that’s cool!’ said the fellow. I thought he seemed quite disposed to be friendly, so I spoke quickly before Miss Hargreaves should say any more.
‘We’re awfully sorry,’ I said. ‘The truth is, Lady Hargreaves and I were–’
Immediately he looked at Miss Hargreaves with considerably more interest. Wonderful what tricks you can work with a title.
‘Lady Hargreaves?’ he said.
I nudged her.
‘Precisely,’ she said, playing up magnificently. ‘I have, unfortunately, no card upon me. Why are you nudging me, Mr Huntley? Is anything amiss?’
(Oh, bravo, bravo! I said to myself.)
‘Well, come inside,’ said the chap. ‘Perhaps you’d like some refreshment. I don’t know what on earth you’re both doing here, but anyhow, it’s warmer in the house.’
I didn’t, of course, want to go. But it was kind of him to ask us and hard to know how to refuse. So we followed him up through the orchard and across the lawn.
‘I’m Major Wynne,’ he said carelessly, over his shoulder. ‘What do you think of my house? Rather good, eh?’
Miss Hargreaves swept a glance at it through her lorgnettes. ‘H’m,’ she said. ‘I think you should cut back that Virginia creeper. And these yews want clipping. This tulip tree is sprawling, positively sprawling, Major. But perhaps you prefer them to sprawl. How many gardeners do you keep?’
‘Oh, I do most of it myself.’
‘Indeed! I suppose that is rather the modern habit, is it not?’
We followed the Major through some french windows that opened into a drawing-room. Switching on the light, he quickly whipped some dust-sheets from the chairs and invited us to sit.
‘Sorry the place is covered up,’ he said. ‘Fact is, servants all away house is really closed up. I came down unexpectedly–from London on business and thought I might as well picnic here for the night. I only use the place in the summer, of course. Wife in Italy.’
‘Bordighera, I presume?’
‘Yes. That’s right. Now, what’ll you drink, Lady Hargreaves?’
‘I suppose you have gin?’
I stared at her. Drinking gin? It was the last thing I would have expected.
‘Oh, yes,’ said the Major. Miss Hargreaves sat down on a sofa. ‘Dear me!’ she exclaimed. ‘How pleasant it is to rest. I see you have one of these electric heaters. Detestable things, but they have their uses. Can you switch it on? These autumn nights are a little chilly.’
‘Oh, certainly.’ The Major turned the switch with his foot. ‘Excuse me a moment,’ he said. ‘I’ll get the drinks.’
He went out. Miss Hargreaves, after having surveyed the room rather disdainfully, held her hands out to the heater. ‘You did that jolly well!’ I said to her.
She stared at me displeasedly. ‘Did what jolly well?’
‘That Lady Hargreaves business. Rather a good idea of mine, wasn’t it? I thought it would impress him.’
To this remark she vouchsafed no reply except a cold stare which rather puzzled me. While we waited I examined the room. It was very comfortably furnished. Chairs of a deep strawberry shade; carpet a pale rose; walls, white. The furniture was ‘modern antique’, heavy stuff with synthetic worm-holes. There were a lot of unread-looking books in fine bindings and one or two dim oil paintings–the sort that are ‘reputed to be by Canaletto’. It wasn’t an original room. But it was warm and inviting.
I yawned. I was dead tired now. ‘What are we going to say to the Major?’ I asked her.
‘I don’t see that there is any need to say anything.’
Major Wynne came in, carrying a tray with bottles and glasses on it. Miss Hargreaves accepted gin and soda; the Major and I drank whisky. Presently, when we were all settled, the Major turned rather apologetically to Miss Hargreaves.
‘I’m afraid I was a little short with you just now,’ he said.
‘No matter. No doubt it was a little surprising for you.’
‘Lost your way, or something?’
‘More or less,’ she said airily. She pointed over to the books in the bookcase. ‘You admire Meredith?’
‘Eh? Who’s Meredith?’
The Major followed the direction of her finger. ‘Oh–books! No. Afraid I don’t read much.’
Miss Hargreaves smiled, sipped her gin, and waved her silver pencil at the Major. ‘A man of action, eh, Major?’
‘That’s right,’ he agreed. ‘Do you live in this neighbourhood, by the way?’
She crumbled a water biscuit thoughtfully. ‘My uncle,’ she said to him, ‘once had property here. Cliveden, you know. A pleasant little place. But that was years ago. The river became too popular, Major Bin, far too popular. I am at present residing at Cornford.’
‘Oh? Well, hope we may see more of each other.’
‘My circle’–she snapped a piece of biscuit sharply in two ‘is small. Most of my old friends have crossed the bar. I detest people of low family, Major Bin; I positively detest people of low family.’
Uttering this remark with the most marked venom, she popped the piece of biscuit into her mouth and carefully wiped her fingers on her handkerchief.
‘Oh, quite!’ said the Major quickly. For a man who’d had a blow below the belt he behaved rather well, I thought. ‘So do I. So many bally rotters about nowadays, what? Never know where you are with people.’
There was a long and rather awkward silence. I felt my eyes nodding. I could see that Miss Hargreaves, too, was very tired. Presently the Major rose, collected the glasses, and went towards the door.
‘Would you care to stay the night?’ he suggested. ‘It’s rather late to get anywhere else now. You’re welcome, if you wish.’
Miss Hargreaves nodded sleepily.
‘A capital suggestion,’ she murmured. ‘Five blankets. And put a glass between the sheets to see they are properly aired. I like water–Vichy, if you have it–and a Bible by the bed. Authorized Version. Mr Huntley, please see to everything.’ Her eyes were drooping; already she was nearly–asleep. ‘Three pillows,’ we heard her say, ‘and buttered eggs at ten. I hope the water is soft.’
‘Don’t you bother,’ I said to the Major. ‘Anything will do.’
‘Anything will certainly not do,’ snapped Miss Hargreaves, suddenly wide awake.
‘Well, I’ll go and see to the beds,’ said the Major. ‘I suppose,’ he said to me, ‘you’re her chauffeur, or something, aren’t you?’
Before I could deny it he had left the room.
I woke with a start. Over the misty river the autumn sun was streaming into the room. Blackbirds and thrushes were singing. A cherubic gilt clock on the mantelpiece struck a quarter to seven.
At first I couldn’t place my surroundings. Then I saw Miss Hargreaves curled up peacefully asleep in her chair and all the wild events of yesterday rushed back to me with what they call sickening reality.
I rose, stretched, and wandered to the window. I remembered suddenly that it was one of the mornings when I was supposed to be at the Cathedral to play the organ. I remembered also that there was an early bus from Cookham to Cornford at seven-ten. If we hurried there would be just time to catch it.
It was queer that the Major had never come back. Or perhaps he had, and finding us both asleep, had decided to leave us. My whole instinct was to leave the house without seeing him again; but it didn’t seem right. After all, he’d been very decent to us. It was up to me to thank him, at any rate, and try to offer some sort of explanation.
Without waking Miss Hargreaves (let sleeping dogs lie, I thought), I went upstairs, thinking I’d try to find the Major’s room. There were three doors on the landing. I opened each one gently, but the rooms were empty, all the furniture covered up as it had been downstairs last night. I tried another wing; the attics; then downstairs smoking room, dining-room, boudoir. But it was no good. There wasn’t a soul but us two in the house.
‘Extraordinary thing!’ I said. But I couldn’t pretend. I was sorry. It simplified matters, the Major not being there. It meant I should be spared trying to explain our trespassing in his orchard.
I returned to the drawing-room and found Miss Hargreaves standing by the open bookcase, turning over a volume of Jorrocks.
‘Major Wynne isn’t here,’ I said. ‘We’d better scoot pretty quick. We can catch a bus if we hurry.’
‘Why this ridiculous hurry? Is there no morning tea?’
‘Oh, don’t be absurd!’
Without making any reply she walked over to a chair, sat down, and started to read.
‘Come along,’ I cried impatiently. ‘We’ve only just time to catch the ’bus.’
‘Bus? I am not accustomed to travelling in buses. Ring a garage and order a car–a large one. I cannot bear being cramped. Do it at once. I abominate–’
Before she could say ‘fuss’ I rounded on her.
‘Are you crazy?’ I shouted. I was mad to get out of the house in case the Major should return. He might have gone for an early dip in the river, for all I knew.
She ignored me completely. ‘Where is the toilet?’ she asked. ‘And why is there no tea? What a place!’
‘Look here,’ I said, ‘you’ve got us into this fix–’
‘Fix?’ she said. ‘I do not understand. Who is in a fix?’
‘You’ve got us into it,’ I went on, ‘and you’re going to let me get us out of it in my way, not yours.’
Very slowly she walked to the shelves, returned the book to its place, took off her spectacles, put them away in her bag, and finally addressed me.
‘Mr Huntley,’ she said gravely, ‘it seems that I had the misfortune to spend an entire night in this room with you. Do not assume–do not assume that such close proximity to my person for so long a period entitles you to any sort of familiarity. Kindly ring the garage and instruct me as to the geography of the house–if such a poor place has any geography. There need be no argument.’
‘Upstairs. First floor,’ I said savagely. I was so angry I could hardly trust myself to speak.
Slowly she walked up. I went to the phone in the hall, took up the receiver, hesitated, hooked it back again. No, I was damned if I’d be browbeaten like this! Fuming impatiently I strode up and down the hall. After an intolerable time she came down.
‘Is the car ready?’ she asked.
I lied quickly. ‘It’ll be waiting for us on the road,’ I said. I led her out through the drawing-room.
‘Appalling taste!’ she muttered. ‘All this strawberry colour. So morbid! Atrocious!’
I hurriedly led the way down the garden. Farther along the orchard was a bridge which led to the meadows, and thus to the main Cornford road, a hundred yards away.
‘I cannot understand all this hurry,’ she said breathlessly.
‘No. Neither can I,’ I said. I could see the Cornford bus just crossing the bridge. Obviously we could never catch it. Suddenly, also, I had remembered my bicycle. I couldn’t leave it on Cookham Bridge.
‘Mr Huntley,’ said Miss Hargreaves, ‘wait one moment, if you please. I wish to have a word with you.’
‘Go on,’ I said bitterly. ‘I can bear it.’
‘I should take it as a courtesy if you were to tell nobody about our–what can I call it?–mad frolic of last night. I blame you entirely, of course. But I dare say a little of the blame rests upon me. That is all. Where is this car you keep talking about?’
I couldn’t stand any more of this. Could you have?
‘You’re insufferable!’ I cried. ‘I spend the whole night doing my damnedest to get you safely home–I trespass on other people’s property–I behave generally like a madman–and then you treat me like this! It’s absolutely shameful, Miss Hargreaves.’
Coldly, critically, she surveyed me through her lorgnettes. In a few hours she seemed to have lost all the affection she had once had for me. It was heart-breaking.
‘Mr Huntley,’ she said, ‘you once came to my assistance at a critical moment in a bookshop. Do not suppose–do not suppose this gives you leave to address me as though you were my equal. A cat may look at a king. Oh, yes! There is little offence in that. But I have yet to learn that a cat may–to employ one of your own vulgar expressions–hob-nob with a king.’
‘My God !’ I said. For a moment I stared at her. I think there were almost tears in my eyes. Then I hurried on towards the bridge, far more hurt than angry.
My bicycle was still where I had left it.
‘I hope,’ she said, ‘I am not expected to travel on the step.’
‘No,’ I said bitterly, ‘you can find your own way home.’
‘I would prefer it. Where is this car?’
‘You can get it yourself. I didn’t order it.’
‘This is intolerable. I have never been so insulted. Leave me!’
‘I’m going to. You can do what you like from now on. I’ve finished with you–finished with you.’
I swung my leg over the saddle.
‘My bag!’ she exclaimed. ‘I have left it in that ridiculous house. Kindly run back and get it.’
‘I’m damned if I will. I’m sick and tired of you. I never want to see you again.’
I rode off in such a state that I only just escaped being run down by a lorry. If I’d stayed on that bridge another second with her, I honestly believe I’d have picked her up and thrown her into the river.
I went straight to the Cathedral, played the organ desultorily, then returned home for breakfast. Nobody knew I had spent most of the night out. After Matins I saw the Cornford Mercury with Archie’s picture of the swan in it. ‘Coincidence,’ I muttered, ‘pure coincidence.’ To this day I force myself to believe that.
So ends the first part of the history of Miss Hargreaves. I wish to God that were all; I wish to God there were no second part to write. But there is, and it’s got to be done.