by Hugh Walpole
“That’s right,” said Martin, “Now we’ll have this put into a case.”
“How wonderful he is,” thought Maggie. Not as other women might have thought, “I wonder how many times he’s done this before.” Maggie thought then that it would be more proper to retire a little so that she should not know the price — and she stood in the doorway of the shop, looking upon the wind and weather in Bond Street and the magnificent motor car that belonged to the lady with the pearls and a magnificent chauffeur, who was so superior that it was probable that the lady with the pearls belonged to him — and she saw none of these things, but was conscious of herself and Martin wrapt together in a mist of happiness that no outside force could penetrate.
As they walked away from the shop she said: “Of course I won’t be able to wear it.”
He put the little square box, wrapped in tissue paper, into her hand, and answered: “You can wear it on a ribbon under your dress.”
“Oh yes,” she whispered, pressing his hand for a moment.
They did not climb on to a ‘bus that morning, but walked ahead blindly, blissfully, they did not know whither. They were now in wild days at the end of November and the weather was tempestuous, the wind blowing with a screaming fury and black clouds scudding across the sky like portents. Little heavy drops of rain fell with a sudden urgency as though they were emphasising some secret; figures were swept through the streets and the roar of the wind was so vehement that the traffic seemed to make no sound. And yet nothing happened — no great storm of rain, no devastating flood. It was a day of warning.
They noticed nothing of the weather. It might have been a world of burning sunshine for all they saw of it.
“You know,” said Martin, “I’ve never liked giving any one anything so much as I liked giving you that ring.”
“I wish I could give you something too,” she said.
“Well, you can,” he said. “Some little thing that I’ll carry about with me always ... Oh, Maggie!” he went on. “Isn’t it strange how easy it is to be good when no one worries you. These last ten days with you I couldn’t have done anything wrong if I tried. It isn’t fair to say we can help ourselves. We can’t. Something just comes along and seizes you and makes you do wrong.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Maggie. “Don’t let’s talk about those things. It’s like Mr. Magnus, who says we’re treasure hunters or pools of water, or old men in asylums. I don’t understand all that. I’m just Maggie Cardinal. — All the same I believe one can do what one wants to. I don’t believe people can make one do things.”
“Do you think any one could make me not love you if they tried? I shall love you always, whatever happens. I know I shall never change. I’m not one to change. I’m obstinate. Father used to say ‘obstinate as a pig.’”
That made her think of the old days at St. Dreot’s, just then, as they seemed, so remote. She began to tell him of those old days, of the Vicarage, of the holes in the floor and the ceiling, of her loneliness and the way the villagers used to talk, of her solitary walks and looking down on to Polchester from the hill-top, of her father’s sudden death, of Uncle Mathew ...
“He’s a funny old codger,” said Martin. “What does he do?”
“I don’t know,” said Maggie. “I really don’t know how he lives I’m afraid it’s something rather bad.”
“I’ve known men like that,” said Martin, “plenty, but it’s funny that one of them should be connected with you. It doesn’t seem as though you could have anything to do with a man like that.”
“Oh, but I like him!” said Maggie. “He’s been very kind to me often. When I was all alone after father died he was very good—” She stopped abruptly remembering how he’d come into her bedroom. “Drink’s been his trouble, and never having any money. He told me once if he had money he’d never do a thing he shouldn’t.” “Yes,” said Martin. “That’s what they always say when they haven’t any money, and then when they have any it’s worse than ever.”
He was thinking, perhaps, of himself. At any rate to stop remorseful thoughts he began to tell her about his own childhood.
“Mine was very different from yours, Maggie,” he said. “I wasn’t lonely. You don’t know what a fuss people made of me. I was conceited, too. I thought I was chosen, by God, out of all the world, that I was different from every one else, and better too. When I was only about nine, at home one Sunday they asked me if I’d say a prayer, and I did, before them all, made it up and went on for quarter of an hour. Lord! I must have been an awful child. And outside the religious time I was as wicked as I could be. I used to go down into the kitchen and steal the food and I’d dress up as a ghost to frighten Amy and I’d break mother’s china. I remember once, after we’d had a service in the drawing-room and two girls had gone into hysterics, I stole down into the kitchen in my nightdress to get some jam and I found one of the Elders making love to the cook. They were both so fat and he had his coat and waistcoat off and he was kissing her neck. My word, they were frightened when they saw me standing there! After that I could do what I liked with the cook ... We used to have prayer meetings in the drawing-room, and sometimes father would pray so hard that the glass chandelier would shake and rattle till I used to think it would come down.”
“And the funny thing was that one minute I’d be pinching Amy who was kneeling next to me and the next I’d be shaking with religion and seeing God standing right in front of me by the coal-scuttle. Such a mix-up! ... it was then and so it is now. Amy always hated me. She was really religious and she thought I was a hypocrite. But I wasn’t altogether. There was something real in it and there still is.”
“Didn’t you go to school?” asked Maggie.
“No, that was the mistake. They never sent me. Father loved me too much and he wanted to keep me always with him. He tried to teach me himself but I never learnt anything. I always knew I could turn them round my little finger. I always knew he’d rather do anything than make me unhappy. Sometimes we had lovely times together, sitting in the dusk in the front of the fire. Do you know, Maggie, I’ve never changed in my love for father? I’ve changed in everything else, but in that never. Yet I’ve hurt him over and over and over again. I’ve done things ...” Here he broke off. To-day was to be happy; they must build up their walls faster, faster, faster to keep the world out. He would think of nothing, nothing but the present. The wind blew and the heavy drops of rain fell, one and one and one, slowly between the gusts. Ho drew her close to him.
“Are you cold?”
“No, Martin dear.”
“I suppose we should turn back.”
“Yes, it’s getting late.”
“It will seem hours until to-morrow.”
“And to me too.”
They were at the end of the Green Park. There was no one there. They kissed and clung together and Maggie’s hand was warm inside his coat. Then they turned back and entered the real world once more ...
“Now we must have our matinee,” Martin said. Maggie could not refuse and besides she herself wanted it so badly. Also the three weeks were drawing to a close, and although she did not know what was in store for them, she felt, in some mysterious way, that trouble was coming.
“Yes, we’ll have our matinee,” she said.
It was a terrific excitement for her, apart altogether from her love for Martin. She had, of course, never been to a theatre. She could not imagine in the least what it was like. It so happened, by a wonderful chance, that a note came from Katherine Mark asking her to tea. She showed this to the aunts and said that she would accept it. She wrote to Katherine Mark and refused and told Martin that for that Wednesday afternoon she was quite free until at least seven o’clock. She wove these deceits with strong disgust. She hated the lies, and there were many, many times when she was on the edge of confessing everything to the aunts. But the thought of what would follow that confession held her back. She could not make things harder for Martin.
Nevertheless she won
dered why when she felt, in herself, no shame al all at the things that she was doing, she should have to lie to cover those things up. But everything in connection with the Chapel seemed to lie. — The place was wrapped in intrigue and double-dealing. How long would it be before she and Martin were out of it all?
She was to meet him by one of the lions in Trafalgar Square. She bought a golden chrysanthemum which she stuck into the belt of her black dress and she wore her coral necklace. She was tired of black. She sometimes thought she would spend all her Three Hundred Pounds on clothes ... To-day, as soon as she was out of the house and had turned the corner into King William Street, she slipped on her ring. She kissed it before she put her glove on. He was waiting there looking like a happy schoolboy, that way that she loved him to look. That slow crooked smile of his, something that broke up his whole face into geniality and friendliness, how she adored him when he looked like that! He was wearing clothes of some rough red-brown stuff and a black knitted tie —
She was carrying something, a little parcel in tissue paper. She pressed it into his hand when they met. He opened it, just like a boy, chuckling, his eyes shining, his fingers tearing the paper in his eagerness. Her present was a round locket of thin plain gold and inside was the funniest little black faded photograph of Maggie, her head only, a wild untidy head of hair, a fat round schoolgirl face — a village snapshot of Maggie taken in St. Dreot’s when she was about fifteen.
“It’s all I had,” she said. “I remembered it the other day and I found it. A travelling photographer took it one day. He came to the village and every one was taken, father and all. It’s very bad but it was the only one.”
“It’s wonderful,” said Martin, and truly it was wonderful. It had caught by a marvellous chance, in spite of its shabby faded darkness, the very soul of Maggie. Was it her hair, her untidy hair, or the honesty of her eyes, or the strength and trustiness of her mouth? But then it was to any one who did not know her the bad dim photograph of an untidy child, to any one who did know her the very stamp and witness of Maggie and all that she was. Maggie had spent twenty-five shillings on the locket (she had had three pounds put away from her allowance in her drawer).
It was a very simple locket, thin plain gold round and smooth, but good, and it would last.
“You darling,” whispered Martin. “There couldn’t have been anything more like you if you’d been taken by the grandest photographer in London.”
They started off towards Shaftesbury Avenue where the theatre was, and as they went a funny little incident occurred. They were both too happy to talk and Maggie was too happy even to think. Suddenly she was aware that some one was coming towards her whom she knew. She looked and tugged herself from that world of Martin and only Martin in which she was immersed. It was the large, smiling, rosy-cheeked, white-haired clergyman, Mr. Trenchard. Yes, certainly it was he. He had recognised her and was stopping to speak to her. Martin moved on a little and stood waiting for her. She was confused and embarrassed but pleased too because he seemed glad to see her. He looked the very picture of a well-dressed, kindly, genial friend who had known her all his life. He was wearing a beautifully shining top-hat and his stiff white collar gleamed. Yes, he was glad to see her and he said so. He remembered her name. “Miss Cardinal,” he called her. How had she been? What had she been doing? Had she seen Mrs. Mark? He was staying with his sister at Brown’s Hotel in Somewhere — she didn’t catch the name of the street. His sister would be so glad if she would come and see them one day. Would she come? He wouldn’t tie her down, but she had only to write and say she was coming ...
He took her hand and held it for a moment and looked in her eyes with the kindliest friendliest regard. He was glad to have seen her. He should tell his sister ...
He was gone and Maggie really could not be sure what she had said. Something very silly she could be certain. Stupid the pleasure that his few words had given her, but she felt once again, as she had felt in Katherine Mark’s drawing-room, the contact with that other world, that safe, happy, comfortable, assured world in which everything was exactly what it seemed. She was glad that he liked her and that his sister liked her. Then she could not be so wild and odd and uncivilised as she often was afraid that she was. She rejoined Martin with a little added glow in her cheeks.
“Who was that?” Martin asked her rather sharply.
She told him.
“One of those humbugging parsons,” he said. “He stood over you as though he’d like to eat you.”
“Oh, I’m sure he’s not a humbug,” she answered.
“You’d be taken in by anybody,” he told her.
“Oh, no, I shouldn’t,” she said. “Now forget him.”
And they did. By the time they had reached Piccadilly Circus they were once more deep, deep in one another. They were back in their dark and gleaming wood.
The Lyric Theatre was their destination. Maggie drew a breath as they stepped into the hall where there stood two large stout commissionaires in blue uniforms, gold buttons, and white gloves. People pushed past them and hurried down the stairs on either side as though a theatre were a Nothing. Maggie stood there fingering her gloves and feeling lonely. The oil painting of a beautiful lady with a row of shining teeth faced her. There were also some palms and a hole in the wall with a man behind it.
Soon they too passed down the stairs, curtains were drawn back, and Maggie was sitting, quite suddenly, in a large desert of gold and red plush, with emptiness on every side of it and a hungry-looking crowd of people behind a wooden partition staring at her in such a way that she felt as though she had no clothes on. She gave a hurried glance at these people and turned round blushing.
“Why don’t they sit with us?” she whispered to Martin.
“They’re the Pit and we’re the Stalls,” he whispered to her, but that comforted her very little.
“Won’t people come and sit where we are?” she asked.
“Oh yes; we’re early,” he told her.
Soon she was more composed and happier. She sat very close to Martin, her knee against his and his hand near to hers, just touching the outside of her palm. Her ring sparkled and the three little pearls smiled at her. As he breathed she breathed too, and it seemed to her that their bodies rose and fell as one body. Without looking directly at him, which would, she knew, embarrass him before all those hungry people behind her, she could out of the corner of her eye see the ruddy brown of his cheek and the hard thick curve of his shoulder. She was his, she belonged to no one else in the world, she was his utterly. Utterly. Ever so swiftly and gently her hand brushed for an instant over his; he responded, crooking his little finger for a moment inside hers. She smiled; she turned round and looked at the people triumphantly, she felt a deep contented rest in her heart, rich and full, proud and arrogant, the mother, the lover, the sister, the child, everything to him she was ...
People came in, the theatre filled, and a hum of talk arose, then the orchestra began to tune, and soon music was playing, and Maggie would have loved to listen but the people must chatter.
When suddenly the lights went down the only thing of which she was conscious was that Martin’s hand had suddenly seized hers roughly, sharply, and was crushing it, pressing the ring into the flesh so that it hurt. Her first excited wondering thought then was:
“He doesn’t care for me any more only as a friend. — There’s the other now ...” and a strange shyness, timidity, and triumph overwhelmed her so that her eyes were full of tears and her body trembling.
But as the play continued she must listen. It was her very first play and soon it was thrilling to her so that she forgot, for a time, even Martin. Or rather Martin was mingled with it, absorbed in it, part of it, and she was there too sharing with him the very action of the story. It was a very old-fashioned play about a little Charity girl who was brought up by a kindly middle-aged gentleman who cared for nothing but books. He brought her up on his own plan with a view to marrying her afterwards. But meanwhil
e, of course, she saw a handsome young soldier who was young like herself, and she was naturally bored with the studious gentleman. Maggie shared all the feelings of the Charity girl. Had she been brought up, say by a man like Mr. Trenchard and then had met Martin, why, of course, she could have gone only one way.
The soldier was not like Martin, being slim and curled and beautiful, nor was the studious gentleman like Mr. Trenchard, being thin and tall with a face like a monk and a beautiful voice. But the girl was like Maggie, prettier of course, and with artful ways, but untidy a little and not very well educated. At the first interval, when the lights were up and the band was playing and the people walking, Martin whispered:
“Do you like it, Maggie?”
“I love it,” she answered.
And then they just sat there, without another word between them, pressed close together.
A little song ran through the play — one of Burns’s most famous songs, although Maggie, who had never read anything, did not know that. The verses were:
O my luve’s like a red, red rose That’s newly sprung in June: O my luve’s like the melodie That’s sweetly played in tune!
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass, So deep in luve am I: And I will luve thee still, my dear, Till a’ the seas gang dry:
Till a’ the seas gang dry, my dear, And the rocks melt wi’ the sun; I will luve thee still, my dear, While the sands o’ life shall run.
And fare thee weel, my only Luve, And fare thee weel a while! And I will come again, my Luve, Tho’ it were ten thousand mile.
First the handsome soldier sang this to the Charity girl, and then, because it was a sentimental tune, it was always turning up through the play, and if one of the characters were not singing it the orchestra was quietly playing it. Maggie loved it; she was not sentimental but she was simple, and the tune seemed at once to belong to herself and to Martin by natural right.
As the story developed it became more unreal and Maggie’s unerring knowledge of the difference between sense and nonsense refused to credit the tall handsome villainness who confronted the Charity girl at the ball. The Charity girl had no right to be at the ball and people stood about in unnatural groups and pretended not to listen to the loud development of the plot and no one seemed to use any of their faculties. Then at the end, when the middle-aged gentleman nobly surrendered his Charity girl to the handsome soldier, the little tune came back again and all was well.