Boys and Girls Come Out to Play

by Nigel Dennis

  He heard the cathedral clock strike eight.

  He thought of Divver’s raging, red face; and his pleasure turned into fear. I’m in for it he said to himself a few times, sighing. Out of the mixture of pride in his achievement and fear of the consequences came a third, surprising idea: Perhaps I should go back home now: and he pictured himself walking the floor of his mother’s house with an assurance that would puzzle the whole county.

  A folded slip of white paper appeared under Divver’s door and edged its way into the room. He watched it without moving until he heard Divver leave his room and go off down the passage.

  The note said: “Please have your things packed by evening. I shall be away all day.”

  Thank God for that, he thought, and his fears changed into happy whistling.

  Soon after, he heard a light knock, and another letter crept under the other door. It was from his mother. The American envelope had a hunted look on its face; it was stamped airmail and special delivery; it quivered with airplanes, bicycles, underscorings, frankings and capital letters.

  “My dearest boy …”

  That’s what you think, said Morgan.

  “… What I must say will surely not please you, but it has got to be said, because it is my duty to say it. Your boat had scarcely left the dock when I realized that in letting you go I had committed an act of sheer madness. During the last few days this conviction has grown so firm that I simply must inform you of it.

  “To put it briefly, Hitler may strike at any moment—at the very place where you are. Do I need to remind you of this, when you yourself must every moment of the day see evidence that you are a visitor to an armed fortress?

  “I cannot understand how I let myself be persuaded to let you go. It was your pleading and persuasion that drew my consent, but the responsibility is wholly mine. I see now that I permitted you to go to Poland simply because it seemed the only way of keeping you close to me. Perhaps you don’t understand what I mean by that. I half hope you don’t understand, because I am ashamed. I took the easy way, and although I did it out of my love for you, I do not forgive myself.

  “I want you to come home at the earliest possible moment. By earliest possible I do not mean at once. That would be too cruel to you, much as I would like it. But by the beginning of August should give you time enough to absorb something of a culture that I fear will soon cease to exist.

  “I am not informing Max of my request to you. First, it would be unfair to you, were I to employ him as a means. Second, he has his own work to do, and it would be unfair to distract him by imposing your and my problems upon him. He is a good and kind man, as well as serious, and you should learn much from his steadiness and broad experience.

  “I cannot tell you how surprised people are to hear that you are in Poland. They look at me with such amazement, and I can guess their thoughts under the surface of their politeness. I am not referring to those who come to our Sunday luncheons, but to the steady, responsible people who live in this neighbourhood.

  “You may be unsure how to go about obtaining passage home at the earliest date. If so, do not hesitate to cable me immediately, and I shall see that all is arranged from this end. I deeply hope I shall hear from you. I shall not worry you with questions as to the state of your health?

  “My dear boy, you must try and believe that this letter is not just hysterical ravings. You know I would do nothing to hamper your happiness, save when it is essential. We will have much to talk about when you return, when it can be done calmly and easily. I beg you to come soon.

  “I also hope from the bottom of my heart that so far you have had a good time, and that it will continue to be good in every way until I see you again.

  “Little Peggy has left me suddenly, to live in New York, with no explanation given. Poor Mr. Petty seems very woebegone: I think there must have been something between those two that we never suspected.

  “Your grandfather, Rosa, and all the household send their love, and one and all look eagerly to your return. Do come soon, dear boy. You are in danger, and your absence makes me feel like a murderer.”

  He held the letter in his hand for some moments, his face grave, his eyes puzzled but rather vacant. Then he scrunched it into a ball and threw it away. A stubborn look came into his face. He began to dress, feeling angry with himself for having so much as toyed with the idea of returning home.

  Suddenly a new idea struck him; he crossed over to the window and finished his dressing looking out into the square with the utmost watchfulness. The square was empty, except for a black sedan, drawn up at the foot of the Poland’s marble steps. As the clock struck nine, he saw what he had hoped to see: the foreshortened figure of Harriet’s husband, dressed in the same worksuit, appeared and paused on the top steps. Another figure stepped out of the sedan, came half-way up the steps and greeted the engineer with a little bow. Then they descended together, entered the car and drove off toward the mines.

  His heart beating fast, Morgan ran from his room, down the passage, through the baize door. He tapped on the drawing-room door of the Archduke Suite, and when no answer came, he went on to the bedroom entrance, and tapped there.

  He heard her call: “Who’s there?”, in a high, surprised voice.

  “Me.”

  “What?”

  “Jimmy Morgan.”

  “Who?”

  He put his lips to the keyhole and whispered hoarsely: “Harriet, don’t you remember me?”

  He heard her hurry to the door. When she opened it, he said, “Hullo!”

  “Come in, for heaven’s sake,” she said, peering over his shoulder. “Don’t stand there hulloing.”

  She looked rumpled, and gummy around the eyes; her head appeared unbalanced, because her hair was up one side and down in wisps the other; she looks the way anyone’s bound to look on waking, he thought, nightdress creased, etc., and he liked her all the better for it; it made him feel they’d been old friends for years. Nonetheless, she avoided his beaming smile, made a couple of uneasy half-turns, and seemed to be on the point of asking him what it was he wanted. But at last she said, very firmly, “Wait a moment, in the next room, will you?” and sidled off into the bathroom.

  He went into the drawing-room.

  Almost at once, there was a knock at the door, and the face of a very old waiter peered in and stared at Morgan with astonishment.

  He went to the bathroom and said: “Harriet, there’s someone here.”

  She flew out, looking very angry, her face and hands drippy with soapy water. She called sharply at the aged face: “No, Simon, go away please. In an hour.”

  “Yes, Madame-Director,” said the old man.

  “The whole of Mell’s chasing you this morning,” Morgan said, laughing; but Harriet didn’t manage even to smile, and flew back to her toilet.

  Already, the drawing-room had a homey, familiar message for him. He looked fondly at the two chairs they had sat in the night before, and marked the spot where they had first kissed. He walked to the window, and smiled to see the little balcony they had never used. The sun was shining, the coloured tables were being put out again, and an old man with a sack on his back was stabbing up the last of yesterday’s paper hats with a pronged stick. It all gave him a warm and tender feeling toward Mell, Poland, and Europe, as well as a bland sense of self-esteem. I am the man who was locked in the closet last night, he reflected; and again, as he looked into the bright sunshine, he was struck by the timelessness of history.

  He watched her walking over to him, clean, tidy, calm and innocent. He kissed her, and was preparing to take her in his arms when she edged away and found herself a cigarette. “Didn’t your parents teach you manners, Jimmy?” she said. She smiled as she said it, but not enough to take away the crossness.

  “Shouldn’t one look out of other people’s windows?”

  “Never mind. Now you’re here, sit down, Jimmy dear.”

  After a moment’s silence, she said: “Jimmy, I don’t exa
ctly know where to start.”

  “Is there something you have to tell me?”

  “Tell me, do you confide most of what happens to you to that friend of yours?”

  “Good God, no! Why?”

  “Well, a man always has to have someone to confide in.”

  “I can do without that,” he said primly.

  She, too, looked prim. Suddenly he saw in her face as clear as day the expression of tranquil, adamant, self-sacrifice that his mother wore when she was going to refuse him something. He saw too that she was searching her mind for the most convenient path into what she had to say; and the closer she came to it, the more her eyes seemed to sparkle with sad, pious delight.

  “As you know,” she said at last, in a low tone, gazing at a lamp-shade, “my husband came home last night. He did not sleep in Tutin after all.”

  “No.”

  “After you left—by the way, you did get back all right?”

  “Oh yes; no trouble.”

  “I was sure not, or I would have asked before. Well, after you had left the room, I had a talk with Larry, a long talk. Larry’s my husband.”

  “Of course; you told me.”

  She paused, and fixed Morgan with a glowing eye. “When we had finished talking,” she said, “I felt closer to him than I ever had before.”

  “Oh, isn’t that a good thing?” he said, his stomach sinking.

  “It’s going to make things much easier if you can see it that way. Frankly, it’s much more than I expected from you.”

  He, too, began to feel proud. “Well, any man should be able to recognize … not to make trouble … Anyway, I only met you yesterday.”

  “I have been married ten years, Jimmy. Larry isn’t the easiest sort of husband. If you ever meet him—and I very much hope you will, because I know you’ll like one another—you’ll find that he’s not like most people.

  “He’s always been very ambitious; his job means everything to him. He worked terribly hard when he was young, and he still does.

  “Now, he isn’t so young. When he’s disappointed, he’s not able to ignore it as he used to. That’s something I forget, because I’m still so young myself.”

  “Not to me,” he said warmly.

  “Many men retire when they get to Larry’s age. Larry just can’t do that. He’s very proud. He’s done very well in Europe, but it’s not the same as doing well at home.”

  “How funny; that’s just what Max says!”

  “You have to do twice as well in another country. Larry says it’s because everything’s twice as easy, and so you can always be twice as brave; but you never really feel brave. Sometimes, he says, you feel like an escaped criminal.”

  He wondered at the pride in her voice; she spoke every word as if she treasured it.

  “I suppose because I’m so much younger than Larry, he’s never said much to me about such things. He’s never given me a chance to share his mind and doubts. That’s made me feel small, and sometimes it makes me feel mean and I want to punish Larry. I felt that way when I met you. Do you get what I mean?”

  He nodded, trying to damp down a sense of insult.

  “Now, I’m sorry, Jimmy, that I sort of got my revenge on Larry through you. When he came back last night he really talked to me for the first time; and you can imagine how I felt. This job in Mell isn’t much by Larry’s standards. He’s used to much bigger ones. Once he had two thousand Hungarians working under him, and he was much younger then, and didn’t know half of what he knows now. But people seem to think that because a man’s older he’s not as good.

  “Yesterday, in Tutin, the Minister of Mines, whom Larry knew when the Minister was just a little clerk, didn’t even keep his appointment with Larry. He asked him to telephone next day: just think!” Her eyes sparkled with indignation, making his heart sink still more. “Larry had expected to have to stay overnight in Tutin, and he was actually undressing in his hotel, when he suddenly decided he wasn’t going to let himself be pushed around, and so he came back. He thinks he did the right thing, but naturally he’s nervous; and with things looking so bad, he doesn’t know where he might go next.”

  “He might have to go back to America.”

  “He’d go almost anywhere rather than that. I think, he’d almost go to Germany.”

  “What!”

  “I shouldn’t have said that,” she answered quickly, frowning. “All I meant was: Larry’s very bitter about the way they’re treating him here, but the thought of going back home is unbearable. He’s too old; I mean, he thinks he’s too old.

  “I’d never seen him the way he was last night. He’d been irritable and difficult for weeks, but last night he was so hopeless, in a way that was new to me. I hope you won’t mind if I say that it made me ashamed of what I’d just done.”

  “No, no, I do understand, really.” He was moved to get up and squeeze her arm affectionately.

  “I’m going to try and pretend that nothing really did happen between you and me.”

  “Of course it didn’t: nothing but an accident.”

  “Yes, and you know, what’s more, that’s true; it was really just an accident, nothing that either of us needs remember. Often, it’s wrong to remember too persistently: you start remembering some trifle and next thing you know it’s built up into something too big to forget. And all the time it’s nothing but the mind at work—a kind of dangerous self-indulgence that hurts not only you but the people you love.”

  “You must put it right out of your mind, Harriet.”

  “That’s what I’ll try to do. How sensible you are, Jimmy: I see how kind and sensible you are.” She jumped up and kissed him tenderly, and he towered above her with a kindly smile, as old and wise as Moses.

  “What I do intend to remember,” she said firmly, “is what alcohol does to me. You remember, I mentioned it last night: I scarcely knew who I was, or anything. It’s just plain, silly childishness to drink too much, and can lead to terrible trouble.”

  “It was kind of you to tell me all this,” he said. “After all, there was no reason for you to go into all these details. You could have just refused to see me again.”

  “Oh, no!” She stood back, looking at him happily, and said: “Jimmy, I shall have such friendly memories of you. Already I feel that we never did meet until this morning.”

  This was rather more than he cared to accept, but he nodded profoundly.

  “And in any real sense, you know, we didn’t. You never saw the real me before this morning, and I never saw the real you. It makes me very happy, to know that.”

  “Me too.”

  They stood awhile in silence, smiling at each other, until he said: “Well, I guess I’d better be off.”

  At the door, she threw her arms around his neck, and kissed him with much more enthusiasm than she had shown when they were lovers. She murmured: “You’ve been such a great help, dear Jimmy; so sweet.”

  “I wish I could see you again, in just an ordinary way.”

  “Well, we’ll see. You won’t mind if I decide that?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Will you be here much longer?”

  “Through August.”

  “Good luck and thank you, Jimmy dear. Kiss me again, you real friend.”

  *

  He reached his room shaky in the legs and dazed. He lay down, to sum things up: he knew he had reached a far point, but was it a peak or a dead end? He felt much too calm; calm as the smooth skin around hysteria. Too many things have happened to me in the last day, he thought, holding out his fingers to see if they trembled. It’s too much to find that each new thing makes the thing that happened only a few hours before seem childish. I can’t grow that fast.

  He began to feel sorry for himself, not because he had had to give up Harriet but because the renunciation seemed so mature, and he would have preferred at this moment to be an abandoned child.

  But soon, he recovered his pride in the renunciation; and the romance that had
preceded it looked shoddy and contemptible by comparison, full of cowardice, panic, lying, disorder. The renunciation had been so impressive in its decency; for a long time he recalled their two figures, quietly seated, dressing up unselfishness like a naked doll. He made the sun shine through the window, so that they sat in an aura of holy yellow. I must really have looked a fine sight, he thought: why not admit the fact if I believe I was so?

  He went to the window and looked down on the scene in the square: the strolling Lithuanian and Esthonian barons, the bankers and businessmen from Danzig, a natty French governess leading three American children, waiters sliding between the coloured tables in their white suits, rich White Russians, German Jews in transit to safer areas, a uniformed bell-hop carrying a package toward the entrance of the Poland. What good people, he thought, encircling them in his sadness and hoping that no harm would come to them: if I were in orders, leaning down from here, I would certainly give them a mass blessing; they are good, I know, even though they cannot be aware of who is watching them. If I were fatter, as well as ordained, and had a huge black beard, my benevolence would be irresistible.

  He believed his course was all set again; he would be able to go about his business quietly: from now on he would develop into a civilized man; one whose past is filled with irreproachable miscarriages.

  But at the very moment when he had risen into a tremulous enthusiasm for this new conception of life, his mind seemed to topple over to the other side, and drop into ugliness. He had a burst of deep suspicion.

  Why, he thought, did she bother to tell me such a long story? If a woman spends one night with a stranger, next morning she does not owe him her autobiography. When I knocked on her door this morning, why didn’t she just say: “Yesterday was the fourth of July, but today’s the fifth?” It seems to me that women are very good at forgetting something, simply by giving it a name that makes it dissolve like a salted snail. Perhaps she only wanted me as an audience this morning. She only admitted me because renunciation is more elevating if one actually stands on the renounced one. When she heard me knock, she said: “How wonderful! I can hardly wait to renounce him! If only he’d given me time to put on my best dress!” I am no longer her sweet, enthusiastic, intelligent Jimmy; I am one of the lariats she’s lassoing her husband with, one of the laces of her elevator shoes. I am kind and good—how disgusting, how contemptible!