The Disturbing Charm

by Berta Ruck

  CHAPTER XII

  SHRAPNEL AND THE CHARM

  "Never the time and the place and the loved one all together!"

  Browning.

  And what of the other people who had been at Mrs. Cartwright's partywhen that raid alarm came through?

  Olwen Howel-Jones and young Ellerton had imagined that by taking "theMetropolitan" from Baker Street Station they might arrive at WembleyPark before the raid started in earnest.

  This hope proved to be vain before their train reached WillesdenJunction. Out went the lights as the train came to a dead stand betweentwo stations. Up went the windows; above the iron bars that guarded themthere craned the heads of passengers asking in every key what the matterwas.

  They were answered by the distant growling of those first guns.

  "Bai Jove! Held up for the blessed raid," exclaimed the cheerful voiceof young Ellerton, who was alone with Olwen in a first-class carriage inthe front of the train. "How priceless! Here we are and here we stayuntil the blighters choose to finish their little call, I s'pose. That'sall right.... Hope you don't feel nervous, Miss Howel-Jones?"

  The soft voice of little Olwen came to him out of the dark. (She wassitting in the corner seat, opposite to him.) "Oh, no! I'm not nervousat all, thanks. I think it's quite exciting! I only hope Lizzie (that'smy Aunt) won't be worrying about me; but then she knew where I was;she'll probably think Mrs. Cartwright kept me."

  "Ah, yes. She'll probably think Mrs. Cartwright kept you," agreedOlwen's companion. "I thought it looked a likely night for our friends."

  He had made this remark, by the way, twice on their way to Baker Street.

  "Yes," said Olwen.

  Silence, punctuated by a nearer muttering of the guardian guns fellbetween the two young people in the carriage to themselves. The voicesof other passengers could be heard further along the train; and theguard appeared to be exchanging repartee with the engine-driver, whosename (as that of all drivers of 'bus or engine seems to be), was Bill.Olwen gave a little laugh as "Bill's" comments were shouted forth on thenight air, and her companion chuckled also. But he started noconversation about it. Or about any other subject.

  The whole truth of the matter was that this quite good-looking andpleasant young man Harold Ellerton hadn't got very much conversation.Others besides Captain Ross (who was never inclined to be fair to him)had noticed this. Olwen herself had noticed it before now. It had beennoticed by various girls whom he had taken out; for he was fond oftaking out girls. But, unlike the majority of his sex, he preferred_them_ to talk to _him_. He was perfectly happy to punctuate theirtreble twitter with his appreciative bass, "Ha!" "Bai Jove!" and"Priceless!" But (except for one other detail to be presentlyspecified), he hardly knew what else to say to a young woman who was outwith him. That was why he felt most at ease sitting beside her at atheatre (where, during two enjoyable hours, all the talking necessarywas done for him by Mr. Owen Nares, or Mr. Leslie Henson, or somebodylike that). Or at a restaurant, preferably at a table near the band;listening to that could always fill up any awkward pause. At dances,again, one could dance. At a little dinner party like tonight's, forinstance, there was a crowd where everybody talked; made everything somuch more cheery at once. But it was when these things came to an end,when one had the girl all to oneself to bring home----_That_, he found,was the crab!

  Why was it, he wondered, that he found it so difficult to talk to her,except upon one subject?

  He remembered delightful evenings, ending in these painful and tediousjourneys _a deux_. Tonight, for instance, it was going to be the verydickens with this little Miss Howel-Jones. A jolly nice little kid,thought the sailor, a pretty kid! But here they might be held uptogether in this confounded train for another hour, perhaps, and hecouldn't even see her face, and he was blessed if he knew what more tosay to her----Why, he'd said everything as he sat next to her at dinner,he and that funny little Brown chap. He did envy the flow of chaps likethat! Chaps who could yarn away upon this, that, and the other subjectfor three years or the duration of the War. Talk to girls for ever, theycould, without repeating themselves!

  "I thought it looked a likely sort of evening for a raid," he heardhimself say at this point.

  "Yes," said the girl opposite to him in the dark.

  Of course he'd said everything there was to be said on the subject ofair-raids in general and this air-raid in particular on the way to BakerStreet. Yet he couldn't sit here in the dark opposite to her for thewhole length of the raid, saying nothing?

  Still the guns made distant thunder....

  "I do hope you aren't frightened," he said. "It's quite all right, youknow."

  "Oh, I know. I'm not a bit frightened," came from Olwen; truthfullyenough.

  She was not frightened as she settled herself back against the paddingof the carriage. She was only a little sleepy, a little anxious for thekind-hearted Lizzie, who would be waiting up for her in that prettyvilla at Wembley Park; she was also excited and elated still after herlovely party.

  She was thinking far more of that party than she was of her companion ofthe raid!

  She was also wondering about Captain Ross.

  What a _disgusting_ temper the man had been in all that evening!

  Positively scowling at her! Was he jealous, really? _Was_ he?

  Then she wondered what Captain Ross was doing at that moment.

  If there had been no raid----! If it had been he who was seeing her homeshe might have asked him what she had done that he should scowl at herlike that.

  Or if only it were Captain Ross who was sitting with her here in thisdarkened carriage all smelling of engine-dust and cigarette smoke,waiting for the raid to finish....

  Hurriedly Olwen put the thought away. It was no use allowing oneself todwell on thoughts of things that were too good to be true. No, no, nottoo good. She told herself firmly that she did not wish Captain Rosswere in this railway-carriage instead of Mr. Ellerton. Captain Rosswould only be disagreeable.

  Only----Well! She could imagine some girls feeling glad of a raid inthese circumstances. Some girls to whom it would be as one long, longlovely dance "sat out" in a dark corner with their favourite partner ofall. Perhaps there were girls "hung up" in this very train, feeling thatit was the evening of their lives.

  Whereas all she could feel was apologetic to Mr. Ellerton. He liked her,but she was sure he had never bargained for sitting out with her a danceof this length. Still, what was to be done? Here the train stuck. Theycouldn't get out and walk to Wembley!

  "Shall we smoke?" suggested Mr. Ellerton. "You'll have a cigarette,won't you?"

  He fumbled in his pockets and brought out his torch. Its tiny beams maderounds of light in the carriage and upon his face and upon the goldbraid and gold rings of his uniform. He found case and matches. Helighted a cigarette for Olwen, who puffed at it with secret distaste(for the moderate smoker is not found among her sex; a woman beingeither a cigarette fiend or a passive objector).

  The two red glow-worms winked and wavered in the dark carriage, theirreflections shining in the glass of photographs over the rack. Outsidethe searchlights pointed, and now and again the sky showed the alienstar of a shrapnel-burst.

  Then, without warning, crash after crash seemed to rock the train on therails. Some guns, very near, that had not yet spoken, were barkingsavagely, and between the barks a shrill "whee-you! whee-you!" hissedpast the telegraph wires....

  The start that Olwen gave made her drop her cigarette on to the floor ofthe carriage. She dug her little French heel into the spark. YoungEllerton threw his cigarette down beside it and rose quickly. Snappingup the arm of the seat by Olwen, he sat down close to her.

  "You needn't be frightened," he said, encouragingly.

  "I'm not frightened," she assured him. "Only it makes me jump."

  "Brutes, frightening you!" exclaimed young Ellerton. "I say, I do wishI'd thought of bringing some chocolates or something for you."

  "I'm not hungry either, thank you," laug
hed Olwen into the barking ofthose guns, but young Ellerton's voice repeated, "I wish I'd got anysweets for you. I've only this----"

  She felt him move against her arm as he leant nearer to her to getsomething else out of his pocket: it was a phial of saccharine tablets,carried about since the sugar restrictions.

  "Have some of these," he said. "Put out your hand ... here, where areyou?" He shook half a dozen tablets out into her palm.

  As it happened, Olwen disliked saccharine worse than she dislikedVirginian cigarettes, yet she munched the substitute-sweets to pleasethis young man who, according to his lights, was being nice and kind andprotective towards her.

  For the severalth time he informed her that she was not to befrightened.... Then, in a new tone, he added, "Dear little girl." Then,more softly still, "For you _are_ a dear little girl, you know. Do youknow, you're just about the sweetest I've ever met."

  "Oh, pooh!" laughed Olwen, taken by surprise, nevertheless. She ratherwished she could see the face of the young man sitting so close besideher. Had she done so, she would have seen it was what is known as "astudy." For during the last half-hour or so the young man had become theprey to conflicting emotions indeed. Chief of these, perhaps, was ahelpless fascination; the fascination of some one with a weak head whowatches himself draw nearer and nearer to the brink of some giddyheight.

  Harold Ellerton knew he was drifting, as he'd done times and again,towards a fatal habit of his. Times and again, since before he had leftDartmouth, this thing had happened to him. It was as characteristic ofhim as was his lack of general conversation where women were concerned.In fact, it's not impossible that one of these characteristics may haveled to the other.

  He didn't know what to say to girls unless he were making love to them,and his sole conception of love-making was to ask them to marry him!

  He saw it coming now in the dark accomplice solitude of this railwaycarriage. He knew that he was going to say a few more tender things tothis little Howel-Jones girl, about her eyelashes and how sweet she'dlooked at that party and how she ought to have a bridal party of herown, directly--dear little sweetheart she'd make to any fellow!

  He said these things.

  He knew the other was coming.

  It came.

  "Look here, d'you think you could care enough to be _mine_?" he heardhimself say. "Bai Jove, if you would----! If you'd marry _me_! Wouldyou? Would you?"

  There! He'd done it again.

  Now came the agonizing moment.

  Now again he'd have to wait for the girl's answer. That always seemed tohim to be at least two hours in coming: except once, an anguished oncewhen the girl had said, "Yes" directly. What would this one say; what?He waited in the dark; and sweat broke out on the young brow under thepeaked cap.

  In a long, uncertain breath the girl said, "Oh----"

  Then, "D'you mean it, Mr. Ellerton?"

  "Of _course_!" returned Mr. Ellerton, ardently, but digging his nailsinto the palms of his hands.

  The soft voice beside him said, rather waveringly, "Wait a minute----"

  The young man who had just proposed again set his teeth and waited. Thiswas Hades. Serve him right for being such a double-blanked fool again!But this was the worst yet. Never before had he not been able to see thegirl's face when he asked her to marry him. Never again, he vowedincoherently to himself, never again would he be such an ass as topropose to a girl during a raid with all the lights out! But then, neveragain would he let himself in for this with any girl alive! Not if hegot safely out of this! Oh, Lord, the fool he'd been!... Could hepossibly light a cigarette?... No, only wait.... "A minute" this littlething had said....

  Before she spoke again, aeons seemed to elapse.

  Actually they were a few moments only, during which the mind of OlwenHowel-Jones dashed swiftly through four distinct phases of thought. Thefirst was pure surprise.

  The second was a "No" that came from the bed-rock of woman's nature,that fundamental thing which Convention must blast and quarry intoacceptable shapes.

  The third was a "Yes" compounded of a thousand artificialitiesinherited, acquired, fostered, observed, and taught. Fear was amongthem; fear handed down from generations of dowerless girls who acceptedthe first proposal lest they might die as old maids. Why not! thoughtlittle Olwen. Engaged! Fancy if she were! What would her Aunts think,and Uncle, and her sisters! She would be the first of her sisters tobecome engaged! And she had got her leave, too, and would be going downto Wales; fancy going home to tell them! Fancy telling them at theHoneycomb; Mrs. Newton and everybody! What fun! Engaged to Mr. Ellerton.She did like him so much; she did, she did! He was awfully nice, andjolly with people, and so good-looking and so----it appeared, so fond ofher!... More than could be said for Captain Ross. Wouldn't it beabsolutely ridiculous to miss a real thing like this, for just a fancylike that? Girls had to get engaged while they could. It was thehappiest thing; getting engaged and having a ripping time for a bit,then getting married and having everybody congratulating you. Gettingengaged in the middle of a raid, too! Nobody could say that wasn'tromantic. Love?... Well, Captain Ross had said that men couldn't bear"that Love-with-a-capital-L" business. It wasn't for everybody. And whydo without all the fun of getting engaged, simply for the sake of someman who evidently didn't care two-pence.... It would be awfully silly tosay "No."

  Swiftly as the flash of the guns this phase passed; swiftly as thefollowing report there followed the fourth phase in the girl's mind. Itflung her back to phase the second. But that had been composed of dumbInstinct. This was articulate.

  No, no! She must not say "Yes" to this young man. However nice, howevergood-looking, however fond, he was not the man. She knew it. She did notlove him. Golden said Love must be Lovely. What more unlovely than aloveless pact? The "fun" of this engagement? What would that be? Awretched substitute; no more real, sweet fun than the saccharine tabletswhich she had been munching were real sugar. Sugar in tea; Love inLife.... Some people put up with makeshifts cheerfully; but not she.Some other people (she pursued the childish analogy) never did takesugar in their tea. The luckier they! They missed nothing; Olwen wouldcrave it forever. But better a thousand times to go without everythingthan to accept the wrong thing!

  She came out of her swift inner reverie, back to the dark railwaycarriage and the young man.

  "Oh, Mr. Ellerton," she said hurriedly and remorsefully. "I amdreadfully sorry but I can't possibly. I don't care for you. Not thatway. I do like you ever so much. But if--if you don't mind, I _couldn't_marry you."

  She heard the young man near her give, in the darkness, the profoundestsigh that she had ever heard torn from any human breast....

  Remorsefully she repeated, "I am so sorry----" Then stopped abruptly.She seemed, in the darkness and the vibrating atmosphere, to have caughta floating idea that startled her somewhat.

  She began again gravely. "Will you lend me your torch for a minute?"

  She felt it put into her hand.

  Quickly Olwen said, "It's very rude of me, but I _must_ look at you,please: I must see your face!"

  Then she turned the little beam right upon him.

  Then she exclaimed, "Mr. Ellerton!"

  "Yes----" he said, unmistakably sheepish.

  Olwen burst out laughing. "You are a fraud," she exclaimed gaily. "Youaren't one bit sorry that I refused you. You're trying not to, butyou're looking----yes, _relieved_. You're glad! Don't pretend!"

  "Oh, I say----"

  "No! Don't pretend! You were laughing. You're feeling gladder thanyou've ever felt over anything in your life because I don't want tomarry you! I _know_!"

  Young Ellerton dragged his handkerchief from his cuff, pushed back hiscap and wiped his forehead. "Bai Jove," he said with the sincerestadmiration in his tone, "you _are_ a clever little thing. I--I don'tthink any of the others have ever tumbled to that."

  A moment later he found himself talking to her with more real ease andenjoyment than he had ever talked to a girl in his life; with realfluency.
To her (during the second hour for which they were hung up) heconfessed that no, he didn't want to get married. There werepeople----anyhow, men, who _didn't_. Not to the sweetest and prettiestgirl in the world. Not to _anybody_. To tie himself up like that forlife, declared the young sailor, was what he wouldn't want to do foranything under the sun; certainly not for anything under a hat. Never!

  Olwen, finding she had ceased to be bored by him for the first timesince she had left Mrs. Cartwright's turned her face towards him in thedark and plied him with question after laughing question.

  "But you ask people to marry you!"

  "Can't stop myself! It's the devil!"

  "And none of them have accepted you?"

  "Yes; one! A girl who was at college with my sister. A nice girl. I didget to loathe her!" with feeling. "We were engaged for one whole awfulweek!"

  "How did you break it off, then?"

  "She did. I loved her for that. She said I was too much like the youngman in Stevenson who said being engaged was all right as long as hersisters were there. So she chucked me. And after that I've beenlucky----I mean, you know what I mean!"

  Olwen shook with laughter. "But, then, why d'you _do_ it?" shepersisted.

  "I tell you I can't help it. It happens!"

  "Why? For instance, why did you let it happen tonight? Quite frankly,_why_ did you ask me?"

  "Oh, you----!" he began, and he paused for a minute. "Oh, come," hesaid, "you are an awful nice little girl, you know. Anybody might beexcused for losing his head. You were looking extra pretty at the partytonight, too. Some _peach_, you looked, if I may say so; and it wasn'tjust looks either. There was _something_ about you. Sort ofdisturbing.... I swear there was. You attracted me till I----"

  "Don't propose to me again," Olwen warned him. "I might think better ofit."

  "Oh, no," laughed Harold Ellerton. "You're an absolute littlesportswoman, I know."

  The little sportswoman, while she continued to laugh and chat with himin the friendliest way until the signal sounded for the train to startagain, the little sportswoman had been really arrested by one of hisremarks.

  "_Something about her_" tonight, he thought. She'd heard something likethat before. She thought she might know what it meant.

  She went back to early on the afternoon of that eventful day.

  * * * * *

  Very late she had found herself as she was dressing for her tea with Mr.Brown at the Regent Palace; even as she was putting on her nicest silkstockings she had known that it would mean a scamper down the drive ifshe meant to catch that train....

  Then in her hurry a suspender had snapped.

  "Dash!" she had cried.

  No time to stitch it.

  She had cast round for the nearest bit of ribbon wherewith to garterherself securely, and had snatched it up from where it dangled on herdressing-table, hardly seeing which bit of pink ribbon it was with whatsatin sachet attached. She'd wound it hastily about her slim andsilk-sheathed leg and forgotten all about it. That's how she had come tobe wearing it that evening, not in the orthodox way round her neck, butwearing it nevertheless; the Disturbing Charm!

  Hidden thus, it almost seemed as if it had done its work again?

  * * * * *

  As they said good-bye at the wicket gate of her Aunt's house, she foundherself quite affectionately promising to write, while on leave, to thisyoung sailor who never would be anything but a friend to her. She foundherself submitting quite naturally to one of those flavourless anddefinite kisses on the cheek, of which the entirely brotherly qualitycan never be mistaken by the recipient.

  A looker-on may be more easily mistaken.

  Olwen's Aunt Lizzie was coming up the Drive behind her, having beendelayed in another carriage of that very same train, since she had alsobeen dining in town. From some distance she had observed the farewell atthe gate. But she exchanged greetings, quite unprejudiced, with theyoung sailor who passed her. She was a modern Aunt....

  At the house she found her niece already in the bedroom, so busy withher little straw work-basket and two lengths of pink ribbon, that beforeany talk even of the raid, she asked, "What have you got there, Olwen?"

  "I'm just mending something," returned the intent Olwen, "that I've gotto wear."