Did she know that she was cruel?
“Good-bye, Imogen. Of course, all this is entirely private. I know I can trust you and Monica.”
“Of course. We’ve thought so much about it all.”
“Sweet of you, my dear. Well, now you know the whole story. Monica, you must go and stay with them when the weather gets rather nicer, if you wouldn’t be too bored. They’d love to have you, I know, and I’m sure you could put a little sense into them if you tried.”
She laughed again.
“Really, one’s daughters! Not that you’re anything but extremely lucky in yours, Imogen — I’ve a very soft corner for dear little Monica, as you know. I’ve always said she should have a diamond bracelet as a wedding-present, and so you shall, Monica. Don’t leave it too long, my dear.”
Lady Marlowe kissed Mrs. Ingram, adjusted her veil in front of the glass, and was seen downstairs to the waiting motor-car by Monica.
When Monica returned to her mother Mrs. Ingram said thoughtfully: “What a cat she is!”
Both of them knew that the reference was to Lady Marlowe’s final injunction to Monica, not to leave it too long.
“What utter nonsense, her telling us that it was private about Cecily. As if I didn’t know perfectly that Theodora will make a thoroughly good story of it wherever she goes for months to come!”
“I don’t see how she can,” Monica observed.
“Well, really, I don’t know that it isn’t the wisest thing she can do. Everyone knows perfectly well how disgusted she is that both the girls have been failures, and so she may just as well make a joke of it. People are anyhow going to say spiteful things, whatever line she takes.”
“Yes,” said Monica, “I suppose so.”
Mrs. Ingram began to replace the cushions on the sofa.
“Ring, darling. This room needs tidying; the newspaper seems to be up here instead of in the library. There’s one thing, anyway. Those wretched girls needn’t feel that neither of them has ever had a look-in of any kind. Even though it didn’t come to anything, Cecily can always tell people that there has been a man who definitely did ask her to marry him.”
Chapter II
One day Mrs. Ingram unexpectedly said to Monica:
“Is Carol Anderson at all in earnest, darling?”
Monica, startled, did not know how to reply, although she understood perfectly what her mother meant.
“Because if he’s not, there’s no real use in his continually coming here, and in your going about with him. It may put off other men who might really mean something.”
“What other men?” Monica demanded with sudden bitterness. It was Mrs. Ingram’s turn to look startled.
“Don’t talk like that, darling,” she began automatically, and then checked herself as though realizing the futility of her own admonition.
They looked at one another in silence for a moment.
Then Mrs. Ingram turned her eyes away from Monica, and said, in a tone so unwonted that Monica scarcely recognized it as an expression of timidity:
“Naturally I’m only too glad you should have him here. And he’s very nice in many ways, though I’m not sure dear father would have thought him good enough for you, quite —— I was only just wondering if, perhaps, if he was taking up your time rather unfairly, and not going to be of any real use at the end of it all.”
“We’re friends, mother. That’s all.”
“Darling, there’s no such thing as friendship between an unmarried man and woman.”’
Monica knew very well that from that Victorian stronghold her mother could never be moved.
She reflected gloomily how true it was that she saw a great deal of Carol, and that it had not led, and probably never would lead, to his asking her to marry him. He was continually inviting her to accompany him to picture-galleries, concerts, plays, and even on expeditions to the country.
He was an agreeable companion, especially when he forgot to try and impress her, and as he became more assured of her liking and sympathy he became more natural with her, and therefore more likeable. Sometimes Monica could succeed in forgetting that she was a woman and Carol a man, and that if she could not make him fall in love with her, it was something between a disgrace and a misfortune.
Nothing could be more evident than that, if he was at all in love with her — which Monica doubted — he did not know it himself, nor ever intend to know it. He was introspective, vain, and imaginative, and not passionate, and his idealization of his affair with Viola Lester appeared to satisfy him emotionally. He still spoke of it, although less frequently, and from time to time worked up a recrudescence of despair, convincing to himself if not to Monica.
It sometimes vaguely crossed her mind that it would be satisfactory to tell Carol the truth about himself, and even to laugh — frankly, and with friendliness — at his childlike self-deceptions, but she was afraid of losing his friendship, and would not risk it. He was her chief outside interest in life, even though she had almost given up hope that he would ever want to marry her.
Monica did not, nowadays, know many unmarried men. She no longer went to dances, and her mother had ceased to entertain.
Mr. Pelham and one or two other middle-aged men still called faithfully upon the widow and her daughter on Sunday afternoons, and once Monica met Claude Ashe, whom she had not seen for years, in the Park.
He talked to her for a little while, looking curiously unaltered, but they had nothing to say to one another, and although she knew that he was not married she felt no wish to meet him again.
It was when she got home, after that encounter, that Monica deliberately stood and examined her own reflection in the mirror for some time. Something had told her that Claude Ashe, who had once admired her so much, had seen a far greater alteration in her than she had in him.
She sought to discover wherein it lay.
Except that her fresh colour had faded and her hair become a dull, instead of a bright, brown, she could not see any very startling changes in herself. She was thinner, certainly — and the little line between her eyebrows and the faint downward drag at the corners of her mouth had not been there in her early youth.
It wasn’t that.
It was something vital, magnetic, that had gone out of her. Something that had attracted men.
Monica caught her breath, and turned away from the mirror.
Day by day, life seemed to her more utterly dreary and devoid of interest. She even thought of trying to find an occupation for herself — visiting a Settlement, or going to help at an East End Club — but she knew that the mere suggestion would distress her mother, who would see in it a public admission of the fact that Monica was a failure.
Vernon Ingram had died in the winter. In the summer following his death, Mrs. Ingram was trying to make up her mind where she and Monica would spend August and September. Various old friends had sent kindly invitations, but Mrs. Ingram could not bear the idea of accepting any of them.
“People mean to be very kind, I know, but there’s always something going on in a country house — people coming and going, and young things playing tennis, and perhaps music in the evenings — I couldn’t stand it. But you’d better go without me, my darling.”
She did not really expect Monica to go without her, as they both knew, and the suggestion was not even seriously discussed between them.
Scotland, where they had always gone before, was declared by Mrs. Ingram to be equally intolerable.
“Everything would remind me so terribly. … It would all be just the same, and my life so different, so absolutely changed.”
She began to cry.
Evening after evening they went over the same ground. It sometimes seemed to Monica as if her mother did not really want to make up her mind at all. At last she said:
“Why shouldn’t we stay in London, and not go away after all?”
“We couldn’t stay in London through August, darling. There isn’t a soul left. You know that as well as I
do. Besides, the servants must have their holidays.”
“Shall we try going abroad, somewhere?”
“You and I by ourselves? Darling, you don’t understand how difficult it would all be without a man. We’ve always had dear father to see to everything and take care of us before.”
Decision seemed as far off as ever.
Late in July Carol Anderson went to Scotland. He told Monica that he should miss her dreadfully and that they must write very often to one another. He was to be away until September.
“I hope you’ll have a good time, Carol, and enjoy yourself,” said Monica.
“I don’t think I ever enjoy things exactly,” said Carol thoughtfully. “To be perfectly honest with you, I never can see that there is anything to enjoy in life.”
He gave her his melancholy smile.
“I used not to be like that, of course. I have quite exceptional powers of enjoyment by nature, I believe.”
“They’ll come back,” suggested Monica maliciously.
He shook his head.
“You may be right, my dear, but I don’t think so. I’m very peculiar in that way. Other people may change and get over things. I never do.”
There seemed no more to be said.
Although Mrs. Ingram had affirmed that Carol Anderson was of no real use, his departure from London seemed to help her to come to a decision of her own.
She suggested to Monica that it would be nice to take a small house near the New Forest for August and part of September.
Monica agreed, as she would have agreed to any definite plan in her relief at seeing an end to the nightly discussions that never seemed to lead anywhere. She felt grateful to Mr. Pelham who had suggested that plan and had told them of a house that was to let provided the owners — cousins of his own — could find tenants whom they knew, or of whom they knew.
“They would be only too delighted at your taking the little place. It’s quite a cottage, most charming, and in the very edge of the Forest. If you don’t know that part of the world, Mrs. Ingram, you really ought to go there. But, of course, don’t let me persuade you to anything, unless you really feel you’d like it.”
Mrs. Ingram did not, like Carol Anderson, protest that she was incapable now of liking anything. She thanked Mr. Pelham, declared definitely that she would write at once to his cousins, and suggested that he should himself come down and spend a few days with them if they did become tenants of the cottage.
Mr. Pelham gravely and gratefully accepted.
Three weeks later, he redeemed his promise.
Monica was a little doubtful as to his entertainment. The cottage was certainly, as he had told them, charming, but life there was very quiet and the chief occupation of the day was to walk in the Forest.
“What on earth shall we do with him if it rains?” she enquired.
“Darling,” said her mother impatiently, “it isn’t as if he was a very young man. He’ll be quite happy with the newspaper indoors, and after dinner we can always play cards, or have a little music. It’s delightful to have the use of that good gramophone.”
In her gratification at finding a gramophone and a quantity of records, Mrs. Ingram had overcome her inability to listen to music. She said, perhaps truly, that a gramophone was not music.
Her prophecy concerning Mr. Pelham was proved correct.
He was a very easy guest, and in addition the weather was lovely and the Forest more beautiful than Monica could have imagined. It was a beauty that calmed and rested her, even while it made her heart ache in the perpetual loneliness of which she was always conscious, and which the presence of Mr. Pelham at first did little to dispel.
He knew the Forest well, and constituted himself Monica’s guide on daily strolls that he invariably referred to as “rambles.”
Mrs. Ingram sometimes came with them in the mornings, starting out after eleven and returning very soon after twelve. Lunch was at one, and followed by a dawdling period in the garden or little shady drawing-room, and then Mrs. Ingram went to the room, and Monica and the visitor set out — this time more briskly — sometimes taking with them a picnic tea.
Their conversations were usually impersonal, except when Mr. Pelham embarked on a story — of which he had many — concerning mutual acquaintances. His detailed descriptions and reiterations on these occasions were apt to send Monica into a brown study, from which she roused herself periodically to grasp at the thread of the story, and ejaculate a comment or two.
He never seemed to resent any lack of attention on her part, and gradually Monica perceived that Mr. Pelham was coming to attach a certain sentimental value to their companionship.
She had known him so long, and had thought of him as being so much older than herself, that at first the realization startled her, and she felt disinclined to believe in her own intuitive conviction.
Then her mother suddenly put it into words.
She was alone with Monica in the drawing-room. Through the open French window they could catch a distant glimpse of the top of Mr. Pelham’s panama hat showing over the back of a deck-chair, and of the sheets of the morning paper scattered all round him on the lawn. The angle of the deck-chair, no less than the discarded leaves of The Morning Post, seemed to indicate that Mr. Pelham was sleeping, after Sunday lunch and a cigarette.
“There’s something very simple and nice about him,” said Mrs. Ingram abruptly. “After all, it might have been rather awkward, having him here without another man, or anything much to entertain him — but I think he’s really quite happy.”
“So do I.”
“If you come to think of it, he’s really one of the oldest friends we’ve got. At any rate since you grew up.”
“I know. I was thinking of that only the other day.”
“Were you, darling?” said Mrs. Ingram wistfully.
She looked at her daughter.
“Monica — do you suppose —— ?”
“No — oh no,” said Monica uncertainly. “I’m sure he wouldn’t think of anything of that kind. He’s not that sort of man, really, is he?”
“It’s quite time he settled down.”
The phrase, with its implication of a butterfly-like past, was so inappropriate that they both smiled.
“The Marlowes always used to say that he’d been refused by at least six different girls.”
“The Marlowes!” ejaculated Mrs. Ingram, with great contempt. “As if the Marlowes knew anything about it! If he’d proposed to one of them he wouldn’t have been refused, that’s very certain.”
“I don’t think he likes them.”
“I’ve yet to meet the man that does — except, I suppose, Cecily’s ridiculous doctor, and she managed to choke him off.”
“I wish I knew what was happening to poor Cecily.”
Mrs. Ingram made no effort to follow Monica’s lead, and change the conversation. She remained silent for a few moments and then said:
“After all, he’s thoroughly nice and sensible and quite-quite, and father liked him, I remember. You do think him nice, don’t you, Monica?”
“Very,” said Monica laconically.
She was not in the least preoccupied with any consideration as to whether or not she thought Mr. Pelham nice.
All that she could think of was the exciting, bewildering, fantastic idea that at last, after all these years, she might find herself freed from the stigma of being a woman who had not been sought after by men.
It was incredible.
It was too good to be true.
Monica decided that it was of no use to think about it, and then thought of little else.
She knew that her mother, inwardly, was also profoundly excited.
Mr. Pelham, however, was calm, and gave no sign of any inner perturbation.
On the last evening of his visit it was very hot.
After dinner Mrs. Ingram sat by the open window of the drawing-room, slowly fanning herself. She urged Monica and Mr. Pelham to go out into the garden and seek a
breath of air.
“Come too,” suggested Monica.
“No, darling, I’d rather sit still. I never knew such heat! I’m sure there’s a storm coming.”
“I hope not,” said Mr. Pelham, “I was going to suggest that we might wander to the edge of the Forest. It would be cool there.”
“The dew will be rather heavy, under the trees — but still — only you must take a wrap with you, Monica, my child — one never knows.”
“Mother! I couldn’t catch cold!”
“Girls always say that — but their mothers know better!”
Mrs. Ingram, in an access of archness that caused Monica to flush hotly, looked at Mr. Pelham, as though inviting him to exchange a glance with her over the incredible rashness and ignorance of young girls.
Feeling as though she were being made a fool of, Monica went into the hall and fetched a white serge tennis-coat.
“Allow me,” said Mr. Pelham, taking it from her.
Her mother watched them with approving eyes.
“Why not come too?” Mr. Pelham said persuasively.
Instantly Monica felt aggrieved. Did he want the company of a third person?
“No, really, thank you. I’m more comfortable resting here.”
“We shan’t be very long,” Monica observed curtly.
She stepped out into the perfect stillness of a summer night.
“Look at the stars!”
Mr. Pelham gazed upwards.
“‘Star of the evening, beautiful, beautiful star,’” he said. They passed down the garden, and outside into the road beyond. Already they were on the edge of the Forest. The hush was profound.
“Do you think it would be unwise to sit down here for a moment or two? Let me put your coat down for you, to protect your dress.”
He carefully laid her coat across a fallen tree-trunk, and Monica sat down upon it. As Mr. Pelham took his place beside her, she was suddenly reminded of the afternoon that she had spent sitting on a fallen tree-trunk with Carol Anderson on a Surrey common.
Monica supposed that she could very easily have fallen in love with Carol. She had been near to it, that day on Hindhead. Afterwards, unacknowledged disappointment had gradually been merged into affection born of understanding, and of his curious dependence on her.
Collected Works of E M Delafield Page 362