Dark Angel

by Sally Beauman

  “My dear Gwen”—Eddie turns away—“do you intend to waste one and a half hours?”

  “Galoshes!”

  Boy stops in his tracks, just outside the house, and looks down at Jane’s feet with a mournful expression.

  “I really think … the grass is so damp, and if we are to go down through the garden … yes, galoshes would be the thing.”

  “I don’t need galoshes, Boy,” Jane replies with some asperity, for Boy’s irrepressible gallantry irritates her.

  Beside them, Acland surveys them lazily, his face expressionless. He swings his tennis racquet, looks up at the sky, looks away.

  “It rained last night. The grass still hasn’t dried out. You could take a chill. It’s a long way to the court. Really—galoshes! I insist on it!”

  Boy’s voice has taken on that stubborn note it always does when his protectiveness is challenged. Jane can hear that faint hesitation before certain consonants, a residue of the bad stammer Boy had as a child. It returns whenever he is nervous—in conversation with his father, for instance, or on those occasions (frequent) when Acland teases him. It returns when he is with Jane because he is ill at ease with her. There is that general understanding, thick in the air as a conspiracy, that sooner or later Boy will propose; it is what his father wishes. Jane knows this, and also knows that Boy does not wish to propose, for he does not love her. For that reason Boy is solicitous to a fault. Poor Boy: he does not find it easy to be a hypocrite. Jane, pitying yet still irritated, gives a sigh.

  “I didn’t bring my galoshes, Boy. Please, don’t fuss.”

  She stops, aware that Acland, turning back, is inspecting her. His gaze travels from head to foot: the crisp tennis blouse with its sailor collar; the wide black belt with its silver clasp; the long, pleated white skirt, which reaches to her ankles; the trim shoes, which the maid Jenna has whitened and powdered.

  This outfit is new; Jane ordered it, with a light heart, for this visit, just as she ordered the green silk dress she will wear this evening. Hours looking at pattern books, hours posing in front of a mirror while her aunt’s dressmaker knelt, pins in mouth, and tucked and adjusted.

  Of the green dress Jane is still a little uncertain: not the color she would have chosen. But her aunt, who brought her up and whom she dearly loves, had bought the material, bringing it back in triumph from an expedition to London. So proud, so pleased, so anxious, that Jane had not had the heart to demur.

  “Bourne and Hollingsworth,” her aunt said fondly, stroking the silk. “A most obliging girl there, and she assured me it was the latest thing. A very special dress for a very special evening.”

  A little pause then; a meaningful glance exchanged with the elderly dressmaker, and there the word lay among the three of them, unspoken but understood: a proposal. At last.

  “My agate necklace, dearest Jane,” her aunt had said, bringing forth a polished leather box just as Jane was leaving. “My agate necklace—an engagement present from William when I was eighteen. Dearest Jane, it will look lovely with your dress.”

  Her aunt had been widowed fifteen years; her uncle was, for Jane, no more than a whiskery memory, but Jane was touched. She kissed her aunt; she will wear the necklace, as promised, this evening. Not for Boy, as her aunt expects, but for the benefit of someone else, someone who is looking at her and at her crisp new tennis clothes, and smiling.

  Under that gaze, quizzical, possibly amused by Boy’s fussing, Jane grows self-conscious. She smooths her skirt, blushes, averts her gaze. Minutes before, looking at herself in her glass, telling herself that yes, she looked well, that simple clothes suited her best, Jane had felt confident—confident of the clothes, confident of herself, confident (in some odd and irrational way) of the immediate future. There was the afternoon; it hovered brightly before her. There were the stairs down to the afternoon, and there, at the foot of those stairs, waiting, was Acland.

  How long has she loved Acland? Jane hardly bothers any longer to ask herself this question, which, in any case, she has never succeeded in answering. All she knows is that she loves Acland now and has loved him for as long as she can remember.

  When they were both children and their two families constantly met, she loved him as a brother, perhaps. Her own brother, Roland, whom she idolized and who was much older, could be censorious on the subject of Acland. Acland needed discipline, Roland claimed; Acland was wild, but the right school eventually would tame him.

  The right school did no such thing, but Roland did not live to see that, because he went away to Africa to fight in the Boer War and never returned. After Roland died … Was it then? But no, Jane was only eleven then and still too young, so it must have been later, perhaps when she was fifteen or sixteen, that she finally realized the feelings she had for Acland were not sisterly.

  One occasion she remembers vividly. She and Fanny Arlington, who was her best friend, whose father’s land bordered her father’s land—Fanny, with whom she shared a governess; Fanny, who was sweet-tempered and featherbrained, who had curly blond hair and eyes blue as hyacinths—they were both at Winterscombe, with Hector (Fanny’s brother) and Boy and Freddie and Acland. It was spring. The boys climbed one of the oak trees; she and Fanny stood and watched them.

  Higher and higher, and which of them—of course—had to go highest of all? Why, Acland. Twenty feet up, thirty. Hector and Acland’s brothers gave up; Acland continued climbing. Jane stood in silence and watched. Beside her, Fanny fluttered her hands and clasped them; she sighed and gasped and called out admonitions in a voice Jane had never heard her use before, until quite suddenly a bitter thought sprang into Jane’s mind and lodged there. Fanny was encouraging Acland: “Oh, no further!” she would cry, and “Please don’t, Acland—you’ll fall. I cannot bear it.” And Acland would mount a foot or two more, and the oddest, most complacent smile came upon her friend’s face as he did so.

  Was this performance of Acland’s, then, for Fanny’s benefit? Jane became convinced that it was. For the first time in her life she experienced jealousy. It sliced into her mind; for a moment she hated her friend, hated her for her curly hair and her hyacinth eyes, and hated Acland, who must be doing this for Fanny’s benefit. Acland, who presumably did not care—why should he?—that Fanny was stupid.

  Jane, then, would have liked to shout aloud: Look at me, she wanted to cry; look at me, Acland. I can speak French and construe Latin. I have a quick mind for mathematics. I am interested in politics. I read poetry and philosophy, which makes Fanny yawn and turn up her eyes. All those things, and more, she would have liked to cry. And yet what was the point, for what were such accomplishments, and what man or boy would care for them? You could talk to me, Acland, she wanted to cry … and she turned away from the tree, knowing it was hopeless, for why should Acland want to talk when he could gaze at delicate pink cheeks and hyacinth eyes?

  I am plain, Jane thought, realizing her plight fully for the first time, and just at that moment, when she felt the most bitter regret, Acland climbed down. He jumped the last twelve feet, rolled over on the grass, and sprang up unhurt.

  Fanny rushed to him. She must brush his jacket and cling to his arm and assure herself he was safe. Acland unexpectedly—and, to Jane, triumphantly—pushed her aside.

  “Don’t hang on me, Fanny. It bores me,” he said.

  No attempt to disguise the rebuke. Fanny’s eyes rounded in dismay. Acland walked away.

  Well, that was a long time ago. Fanny married at eighteen and lives in Northumberland now and has two children, and Jane, still her best friend, is godmother to the first. Jane visits her twice a year, and sometimes, when they talk about the old days, Jane suspects that Fanny knows of her feelings toward Acland. Nothing precise is ever said, but somehow the hints are there, and this throws Jane into a panic. No one must know her feelings for Acland. She never speaks of them, never admits them, not even to her closest confidante, her Aunt Clara. They are her secret, lodged in her heart, and she hugs that secret to her. It is
a quick, bright, painful thing, her love for Acland; Jane protects it fiercely.

  If Acland guessed at her feelings, Jane knows he would bring their friendship to an end. Meanwhile—because Acland does not know, does not suspect—they can be friends. They can meet constantly, play tennis, dance one regulation dance together at their friends’ balls, ride occasionally, walk…. Walk, and talk—above all, talk—and those conversations, which Acland probably forgets the instant they are over, are precious to Jane. For years she has recorded them in her journals, noting Acland’s most casual remarks in painstaking detail. Sometimes, although she knows them by heart, she will read them over, trying to see in them a pattern, and in that pattern the lineaments, the sense, of the man she loves.

  Such a nihilist! Jane will think sometimes as she reads. Acland seems to believe in nothing: He decries the religion he is made to practice; he denies the existence of a god. He takes a perverse delight in denying all the other beliefs sacred to his family and his class. Patriotism; the benign and civilizing influence of an aristocracy? Acland will have none of it. The sanctity of womanhood? Marriage? On these subjects, too, he can be scathing—although Jane has noticed that his sarcasm is directed at these targets less of late.

  Acland, Jane tells herself, is a radical, a freethinker—and that is part of his attraction for her, of course. He is, to an extent, her surrogate, exploring heresies Jane knows to exist but from which she herself shrinks.

  And then, for all his nihilism, there is much to admire in Acland. He is fierce in his loyalties, obdurate in his rejection of hypocrisy, considerate to those he loves or respects. Acland is noble, Jane tells herself; his faults are large, not petty. He is impatient, impetuous, arrogant, certainly—but then he is very clever, so Jane would expect a certain arrogance of mind. There is nothing wrong with Acland that could not be cured; sometimes Jane catches herself thinking this, and she knows the corollary: Acland could be cured … by the love of a good woman.

  This thought checks Jane. She sees Acland as he could be in the future: quieter, more stable, kindlier; Acland, a contented man. I could save Acland from himself; that idea, too, will steal into her mind. She is always careful to dismiss it. As far as Acland is concerned, she is a friend. Beyond that, he is blind to her. It is not a situation likely to change.

  Yes, Acland likes her; he seems to respect her mind. Just occasionally, Jane finds this unbearable.

  Now, standing in the damp grass, while Boy still fulminates on the question of damp grass, chilled feet, and the fragility of womankind, Jane turns away. She sets her face in its usual mask of casual indifference.

  Acland is showing signs of impatience. Boy is being adamant. There is a cloakroom, he points out (an untidy cloakroom, nicknamed the hellhole); in that cloakroom are innumerable pairs of galoshes. One pair must surely fit Jane.

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Boy,” Acland says with sudden irritation, and looks at his watch. “Are we going to play tennis or not? We’ve wasted half the afternoon already.”

  “I merely thought,” Boy begins in a ponderous way, and Acland throws his racquet down on the grass.

  “I’ll get them then, if you insist. But you’re being ridiculous. Jane doesn’t want the damn things anyway.”

  With which Acland disappears into the house. Boy starts to apologize, thinks better of it, sinks down onto a garden bench, then rises again until Jane is seated.

  They wait five minutes. Jane tells herself (as she has done before) that Boy is kind, that when he is being most annoying—as he is now—it is because he so lacks confidence and therefore must be assertive in trivial matters. She begins to add up his good qualities: He is honest; he is honorable. She reminds herself of her age—twenty-two and humiliatingly old, given her fortune, to be still unmarried.

  Ten minutes have gone by. Boy has remarked on the weather twice. Now he looks at his watch and rises to his feet.

  “What on earth can Acland be doing?” he remarks to the sky. “All he had to do was find a pair of galoshes—Oh.” He breaks off. From the darkness of the doorway Acland emerges. The light catches his hair, his face is lifted to the sun, and he is laughing, as if at a remark just made and broken off. Behind him, clutching a pair of black galoshes, is the maid Jenna.

  “At last,” Boy says with reproach in his voice, but Acland ignores that.

  “Do you know how many pairs of galoshes there are in there? Thirty at least. And all mismatched, and half of them with holes, and then I had to guess the size—for Jane’s feet are very small—and then, luckily, Jenna was passing, and so …”

  “Thank you, Jenna,” Jane says, and takes the galoshes from the maid. Cursing Boy and mustering what dignity she can, she puts on the galoshes. She stands, takes a step or two. The galoshes make a squelching, rubbery noise. Jane stops, blushes with humiliation, sees the amusement in Acland’s face.

  “Can we go now, Boy?” she asks sharply, and Boy takes her arm. They have progressed a short way along the grassy path before they notice that Acland is not following. He has thrown down his racquet, stretched out on the garden bench.

  “Acland,” Boy calls. “Aren’t you coming? That fellow Jarvis will be waiting. I said we’d make a four.”

  “Changed my mind. Don’t feel like it. It’s too hot for tennis,” Acland calls in a careless way. Boy pauses, as if he might argue, and then changes his mind. He walks on at a faster pace.

  “Just as well, really. Acland has such a devil of a serve,” he says more cheerfully. Jane nods agreement, scarcely listening. All color has gone from the afternoon; it is now without Acland and without expectation. Already she has begun to erase the next few hours from her mind and to think ahead. Tea—she will see Acland at tea. And then this evening, and she will wear the green dress and the agate necklace.

  “Hates losing though. And shows it,” Boy adds. “Not that he does very often.” Arm in arm, they round a large and gloomy yew hedge, turn a corner, walk between the herbaceous borders in the direction of the tennis court.

  “Very fine, these,” Boy says, when they are halfway down, gesturing to right and left. “In the right season, of course.”

  Jane glances up at him in surprise. Boy always makes this remark but usually waits until they have reached the end of the border. “When the roses are out,” Jane answers, as she always does. One last time, she glances back.

  Trees and shrubs, the great bulge of black yew. Only the roof of Winterscombe can now be seen, and Acland is invisible.

  “Now,” Acland says, the second Jane and his brother have rounded the yew hedge. “Now, Jenna.”

  He takes her hand. He draws her back from the doorway and out into the sun.

  He lifts her hands, both of them, presses his own palms flat against them, and stands still, looking down into her face. They remain in this way, neither moving, neither speaking, for some while. Jenna is the first to step away.

  “It can’t be now. There’s things I’m to do. Ironing. Miss Conyngham’s dress—I’ve to iron that, for this evening.”

  “How long to iron a dress?”

  “Ten minutes. Fifteen maybe. Unless it’s too crushed from the packing.”

  “And then?”

  “Very little. Lay out her things. That’s all. I unpacked her cases this morning.”

  “We have an hour then. Nearly an hour.”

  “No, we don’t. I’ll have to be back for four. She’ll change for tea. She may ring for me.”

  “My love.”

  Acland, who has been still all this while, suddenly moves. With a new agitation he presses Jenna’s palm against his lips. Jenna can sense both his urgency and his anger—in Acland the two are always closely allied. She stands quietly, looking up into his eyes; a grave look, a still look. It is the tranquility of Jenna that he loves, Acland thinks, a gift she possesses and he does not.

  “Snatches,” he bursts out at last, knowing it would be better not to speak but unable to stop himself. “That is all we ever have. Snatches of time. An ho
ur here, a few minutes there. I don’t want that. I hate that. Everything and nothing. Lies and subterfuge. I despise it. I loathe it. I want …”

  “Say it. Say what it is you want.”

  “Time. Our time. All the time in the world. An eternity of time. It still wouldn’t be enough. I’d die wanting more time.”

  “Everyone dies that way,” Jenna says drily. “I reckon.”

  She tightens her arms around his neck. She knows these storms that spring up in Acland; she also knows that she can cure them—with her body. Glancing over her shoulder first, she draws Acland closer. She presses his hand against her breast. They kiss. Jenna intends that they should kiss, then part—but this does not happen. It never happens. Once they touch, the need is intense. Acland pulls her back into the doorway, out of sight, then into the cloakroom beyond. It is shadowy there, pressed up against coats; they are both breathing fast. Acland kicks the door shut, opens her mouth under his.

  “Quickly. Here. We can do it here. No one will come in.” Acland has undone her dress. Still he has to fight his way through under-bodice and petticoats to touch her skin.

  “This stuff—damn this stuff. Why must you wear so much of it?”

  “Keeps me decent.” Jenna has begun to laugh. “I’m a decent girl. Don’t fight it so. Look, it’s easy.”

  And she parts her bodice, so her breasts spill out.

  “Decent? Decent?” Acland, too, has begun to laugh. He whispers the words against her hair. Her breasts feel heavy in his hands, full and slightly damp. In the cleft between her breasts there is a runnel of sweat. He licks it. Her skin tastes of salt and smells of soap. “Decent is a horrible word. An obscene word. I should hate you to be decent—”

  “It’s Jack’s word. That’s what he says—”

  “Damn Jack. Jack is an alibi, that’s all. Forget about him. Come here—”

  “Come and get me—”

  Jenna darts away, laughing again. Acland makes a grab for her. His arm comes around her waist. He swings her up and off her feet. The next moment they are tumbling back against the coats, onto the floor. They roll across the floor, panting, struggling, laughing. They kiss again. Acland is the first to draw back.