She looked at him quickly.
“Because,” he went on in his quiet voice, “I had already fallen in love with you.”
She tried to rise.
He put out his hand and grasped hers. “Don’t,” he said, “don’t keep running away from me.”
For a moment, there was silence. She didn’t rise, after all. There was no strength in her body. She sat still, feeling the warmth of his hand encircling hers, the uneven beating of her heart. She tried to reach back to reality, back to Payton Pleydell and his wife and their ordered life. Reality? She looked down at her hand, caught in Jan’s, at the arm that had held her as they danced.
“How many weeks since we first met?” he asked.
“Seven.”
“How many times have we been invited to the same party?”
She looked at him.
“Five dinners, three luncheons, and nine cocktail parties.” He laughed, and she found she was laughing too. “And how often have I seen you passing by, on the street? Or lunching with someone else? Or visited your house for an evening of talk and discussion? Do you think I came there to listen to a lot of men? I came to watch you.” He was serious now. He lifted his hand and touched her cheek. “And how often have I walked past your house, late at night, and looked at a lighted upstairs window and wondered if it were yours?”
“Jan—this is madness—this is—”
“Madness? It’s more real than that solid mass of bricks.” He looked at the distant house and its bright lights. Then he turned to face her. “And you’ve felt that, too,” he said.
Yes, she had felt it. She met his eyes. She was no longer running away. She was coming to meet him.
He put both arms around her, drawing her close to him. He waited for a moment, his eyes still searching her face, and then he kissed her.
It was the test, and they were trapped. She had thought she would say when the kiss ended, “See, Jan—I’m just another woman. And your kiss is just another kiss.” But she could say nothing, nothing at all except “Jan, oh Jan!” And even then her voice was lost in the wonder of the moment, and his kisses silenced her surprise.
The music from the terrace faded, the laughter from the garden’s shadows drifted away. The distant house vanished. There was only the perfume of roses, the soft cool earth beneath her shoulders, the dark blanket of trees shielding them from the bright-eyed inquisitive stars.
This is the way all love should be, she had thought, this is the way all love should be.
They didn’t return to the house. Jan had said, “I’ve a car somewhere around here. Let’s leave.”
“Now?”
“Why not?”
She laughed. “Why not?”
“We shan’t be missed,” he told her, leading her along a narrow path. They began to run, hand in hand. A couple of truants from school, she thought, and laughed again. She looked over her shoulder at the house, at the crowded terrace with its riot of happy voices and shimmering lights. Then she looked up at Jan. She stumbled and he caught her at once. He was smiling.
“We’ve escaped,” he said, and his smile widened.
* * *
The telephone rang and ended the dream.
She sat still, her arms clasped around her knees. Her fingers were tightly gripped. She unclenched them. She covered her ears. She closed her eyes and her head drooped. She blotted out everything—the roses, the telephone, even the memories that had quickened so treacherously.
At last, she rose. The telephone was silent now. Silenced as the dream. She began to get ready for the day ahead.
When she came out of the shower, she found Minna waiting for her with a message. There had been a call from Mr. Pleydell’s office.
“From Mr. Pleydell?”
“From that woman.”
“His secretary?”
“You go to see the doctor at half-past three.”
“Oh, really, now!” But there was little use exclaiming. There would only have to be more explanations if she didn’t go and see Dr. Formby after Payton had arranged it. “All right,” she said. “When Miss Black calls again tell her I’m now going to my Civil Defence class; then I’ll be at the Shoreham for that Red Cross luncheon; then I’ll drop in to see Dr. Formby on my way home.” Payton, she thought, would understand that little recital: Miss Black might think she was an idiot, but Payton would understand. The Dutiful Wife, or How Can I Say I’m Sorry? A bitter little comedy in one act. “Has Miss Jerold returned?”
“No,” Minna said placidly. “Are you ill, going to that doctor?” Her face slowly became anxious.
Sylvia shook her head.
“I’ll make you an egg soup,” Minna said. “For dinner I’ll make that.” And she nodded her head. She had eaten her own way out of her troubles so often that it seemed the only sensible advice to offer, much more sensible than medicine and pills.
“I wonder where Miss Jerold is?”
“It is a nice morning to take a walk. She had a book with her. The book with a picture of the streets.”
If a girl could travel across a continent by herself, she certainly ought to be able to find her way around Georgetown. “I hope she hasn’t forgotten that Mr. Hallis is going to call for her, this morning.”
Minna was impressed. “Mr. Hallis comes here?” she asked to make sure of the message. “This morning?”
“Seemingly.” Stewart Hallis could arrange his working time to suit himself. His offer to escort Kate today had been a grand gesture of such independence. If I know Stewart, Sylvia thought, he was up at six o’clock this morning clearing off urgent matters from his desk. But that, of course, he would never admit. He was the young man at college who graduated Summa Cum Laude without ever appearing to do a stroke of work: just natural brilliance, the naive would say admiringly. “And, Minna, if Lieutenant Turner ’phones again, get him to leave his number so that Miss Jerold can call him back.” After all, she thought, Mr. Hallis mustn’t have his own way too much.
“Yes, Mrs. Pleydell.” Minna picked up the tray. “You eat like a sparrow. A sparrow would eat more than you.”
But Sylvia, remembering the outsize helpings that Minna thought barely normal unless repeated, wasn’t going to be drawn into any discussion about the size of the human stomach. She smiled, glanced at the clock and began to dress rapidly. She was still wondering where Kate had got to.
* * *
Kate, the book now held quite openly at an intricate map, had reached a point of no return. I look like the complete tourist, she told herself angrily. The streets had enticed her. She had twisted and turned, following a pediment here, an oriel there, a medallioned wall, doorways with fanlights and sidelights, Georgians and Federal and some odd afterthoughts. Now she had come to a busy modern street with drugstores and food markets and neon lights. She remembered vaguely that Sylvia had driven along part of this street yesterday when they were coming from Washington. And then they had branched up to their right. But where?
Oh, she thought despairingly, this book’s no good at all. It’s even lost Twenty-ninth Street. Completely.
She began again. Now, here’s M Street where I’m standing. (Even that baffled her. How could you remember a street so anonymous as M?) And there’s Twenty-eighth Street. But where’s Twenty-ninth Street?
She decided to ask. It would be quicker than walking in the wrong direction. She stopped a woman who had just come out of a drugstore. “Would you please tell me—”
“I’m a stranger here, myself. Difficult at first, isn’t it?” The woman shook her head. “Better ask a policeman,” she suggested brightly.
I suppose there are lots of strangers in Washington, Kate thought, but there don’t seem to be any policemen. She looked at the map again. Someone else came out of the drugstore. “Would you please—” She stopped short. The man raised his hat politely. His grey eyes looked from the map back to her again. He was tall, dark, serious-faced. And then, as he saw a startled look of recognition come into Kate’s eyes, he
looked more closely, and he smiled. Watching that smile, Kate began to understand what Miriam Hugenberg had been talking about last night.
“The girl in the green suit,” he said. “You were at the station, yesterday.”
She nodded. She was trying to imagine him in uniform with a row of medals. “You’re Jan Brovic.”
“Sylvia told you?” He was surprised, and yet relieved.
“No. People were talking about you last night.”
“Were they?” His smile disappeared. “And what’s the problem, now? That book’s not much help. I used to get lost with it regularly when I first came here.”
“I’m trying to find Joppa Lane. That’s where I’m staying. I’m Kate Jerold.”
He thought for a moment. “One of the California cousins?”
She nodded. Had he known Sylvia so well as that?
“Well, you aren’t very far lost,” he told her. “I’ll show you the way. That’s easier than giving you directions.” He glanced over his shoulder as he spoke.
She hesitated.
“It’s all right.” He was a little amused, now. “I shan’t walk up to the door with you. Besides, I’ve got to talk to you.” And now he was serious. “I want you to tell Sylvia all I say. She won’t listen to me. I’ve just been telephoning her.”
“Then should I listen to you?” she asked, equally serious.
“I’d rather not stand here,” he said. He glanced along the street as if he were watching for something.
“Are you being followed?” she asked incredulously. And somehow she fell into step beside him.
“A nervous habit.” His voice was suddenly bitter. “Actually, I think I’m alone this morning. I slipped out to call Sylvia from a drugstore.” What had made him think that by coming over to the outskirts of Georgetown he might even persuade Sylvia to meet him for a few minutes? As he used to persuade her? He remembered the way he would walk through this district hoping for the odd chance of seeing her; even, on nights when there was no hope of that, waiting in Joppa Lane and watching her lighted windows. Or sometimes, he would call her. From that very drugstore. And if she could, she would slip out of the house to mail a letter, to buy cigarettes...
“Won’t they allow you to ’phone her?” “They”—she was already taking sides. I’m crazy, she told herself, and she nearly left him. “They” belonged to him: she had better not forget that.
“Yes. But then I’d have to say what they want me to say.”
She looked at him quickly.
He was studying her face. “I can trust you,” he said.
“Look, Mr. Brovic,” she began angrily and then hesitated. More quietly she finished, “I don’t like your new friends. I’m not on your side. So you can’t trust me one bit.”
“Did I say they were my friends?”
She watched his face.
“You see how far I trust you?” he said.
“I don’t understand,” she said slowly. “I don’t understand anything.” She hardened her voice again.
“Some day I’ll be able to explain. But first, I need help. Sylvia’s help. That’s what I want you to tell her. Only that. Will you? I’ve got to see her.”
She studied his face. “Couldn’t anyone else help you? Must it be Sylvia?”
“Yes.”
“But why Sylvia?”
He didn’t speak.
“Is it fair to come back like this?” she asked suddenly.
“Life is never very fair,” he said grimly.
She was remembering Sylvia’s face last night at the dinner table, Sylvia’s silence. “But she may not want to see you again.”
“I know she does.”
“Then why shouldn’t she—” Kate broke off. “I just don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“How old are you, Miss Jerold?”
“I’m twenty-two.”
“No, you couldn’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Well,” she said, her annoyance rising, “well, I must say—” Then she halted, calming down. “You know, I almost begin to believe you.”
“Why?”
“Because you aren’t very clever.”
He half smiled and considered that. “Sometimes I am,” he said. “I was clever enough to get out of Czechoslovakia. But, I admit, I’m not really a clever man as a rule.” His smile broadened. “And why don’t I seem clever at this moment?”
“You made me angry with you. If you wanted my help you should be flattering me.”
“Only, if you’re like Sylvia, you’d be all the angrier. And then I’d have been still more stupid.”
“I didn’t say you were stupid.”
“But not clever,” he reminded her. “Was that praise?”
“Perhaps. After all, have you ever known a very clever man whom you could really trust? I mean clever, not intelligent. There’s a big difference.”
“Where do you get your ideas?” he asked. “No, don’t get angry again—I like them. Only at twenty-two, unless you’re a miracle, you don’t get ideas like that. Honestly, do you?”
She began to smile. “My father has so many ideas that some spill over,” she admitted. She began to laugh. “He’d be amused, too, if he heard me.”
“You’re a devoted family?”
“I suppose you could call us that.” The word was too emotional for her taste. She added, “We have our little revolts but we stick together when there’s trouble.”
“I have a family in Czechoslovakia.”
She looked at him curiously.
He didn’t follow that up. His lips tightened; he walked on, suddenly moody and silent.
What is he trying to tell me? she wondered. She glanced at his face anxiously, feeling somehow that she ought to understand more. And if ever she saw a man who was desperately worried, who needed help, then it was Jan Brovic.
He stopped at the next corner. “Just up there, to your right,” he said. He raised his hat. “Goodbye, Kate.” He had given up trying to persuade her.
“Goodbye.” She hesitated, watching his eyes. They were troubled, hopeless. And yet they didn’t look at her bitterly. “I’ll tell Sylvia,” she said suddenly.
The look of relief on Brovic’s face was almost painful to watch. “Tell her,” he said at last, “tell her I need her help. I’ll call her this evening. At six?”
Kate nodded. Then she turned quickly away and began walking along the uneven sidewalk towards the white shutters of Payton Pleydell’s house.
6
Walter let Kate into the grey-green hall. He opened a door very well indeed. The hum of a vacuum cleaner turned to a whine that ended in silence, and the solid Minna came out of the drawing-room with a nervous side glance at Walter.
“Miss Jerold,” she said in a hushed voice, and Kate followed her into the small room that was called the library. Minna pointed to the telephone on the slender Sheraton desk. “He called twice. The lieutenant.” She searched in her capacious pocket and found a scrap of paper. “This is the number.”
“And I’m to call Lieutenant Turner?”
“Yes. He said it was urgent. And Mr. Hallis will be here at half-past eleven. And Mrs. Pleydell will be home this late afternoon.” Minna sighed with relief: all the messages had been remembered. The worry left her face and now she could smile.
“Thank you, Minna.”
Minna’s smile widened, then left her face completely as she scurried silently back towards the drawing-room. In a few minutes the hum of the vacuum cleaner began again. In the hall, Walter shifted around a small silver salver and the amethyst vase of pink tulips on top of the satinwood table. Kate closed the library door firmly before she went over to the telephone. Walter could arrange a table very well indeed, too.
She had to wait for a little, before she could be connected with Robert Turner. He had a good telephone voice, she decided, clear and pleasant, with no affectations to be accentuated. He sounded delighted to hear from her, and yet he was a little formal.
&
nbsp; “Could I call you back at lunch-time?” he asked, which was an original way to start talking to a girl who had just ’phoned him at his own request.
“I’m going out to lunch,” she said.
“Then I’ll have to be fairly brief. I’m sorry.”
She said she understood.
“It’s about this evening—the Marx brothers are off.” He spoke hurriedly, and his voice faded as if he had looked round at someone else in the room beside him.
“Too bad. What else is showing?”
“I mean, everything’s off. I’ve just had orders. I’m leaving Washington this afternoon.”
“Oh!” She felt more disappointed than she could explain.
“Only for a week. Could you give me a rain-check?”
“Of course.”
“I’m sorry,” he said again.
“It’s perfectly all right.”
“When do you start work at the Berg Foundation?”
“Next Monday.” He certainly was a man who knew how to stretch a brief ’phone call, she thought with amusement.
“What are you doing there, anyway?” His voice was more natural now, as if the other person had gone from the room.
“I straighten the pictures on the wall.”
“And apart from that?”
“I’m an assistant to an assistant’s assistant.”
“And apart from that, too?”
“If you don’t hold it against me—” she hesitated, and then admitted, “I’m cataloguing prints. And I give little lectures each week. Strictly for beginners only.”
“That’s just my level. I’ll join one of your tours on my first day off,” he promised.
“Oh, no! By the way, I’m sorry about last night.”
“So am I. We didn’t get much chance to talk.”
“I mean—I’m sorry about that yawn. I really was tired.”
“What I was saying didn’t amount to much anyway, I guess.” He laughed suddenly. “To tell the truth, I got it all out of a book.”
I and My True Love Page 7