by Henry Green
'I must say I can't see that makes the slightest difference. Anyway I did know about the Prince what d'you call him. You see, Angela, we were arguing about who could have sent the notice if Embassy Richard didn't sent it for himself. I can't see that it matters two hoots if the Prince Royal was cross.'
'I can,' said Julia, entering into it again. 'I think it's a score for Richard if the Ambassador's employer is cross with him for trying to score off Richard.'
'No,' and Alex was now speaking in his high voice he used when he was upset, 'that's not the point. The real point is that the Ambassador ticked off Embassy Richard in public by writing to the papers to say he had never invited him to his party. If the Prince Royal told his Ambassador off for doing it, it doesn't make any difference to the fact that Richard was shown up in public.'
'But Alex, dear, it does,' Julia said. 'If the Prince Royal did not approve, and the party was being given for him, then it means that Embassy Richard should have been invited all the time.'
'I don't see that it does, Julia. He may not have approved of the way his Ambassador did it. My whole point is that the Prince Royal never made his Ambassador write another letter to the papers saying that Richard should have been invited after all. D'you see?'
Angela said 'No, Alex, I don't.'
'Well, what I mean is that you and I may know the Prince Royal was tremendously angry and threw fits, if you like, when he read his Ambassador's letter but the thousands of people in the street who read their newspapers every morning would not hear about it. All that they know is that Embassy Richard regretted not being able to attend a party he was not invited to.'
'Oh, if that's it,' said Angela, 'then who cares about the people in the street and what they think about it.'
They were all silent trying to keep their tempers when Evelyn Henderson came in. They all told her at one time what they had said and what they had meant and when she had gathered what all this was about she said:
'But I don't understand your saying that the Ambassador knew Richard quite well. You know in that letter of his the newspapers printed he said he had never seen him in his life. And then for the matter of that, isn't the story of Embassy Richard's being a friend of the Prince Royal just the sort of thing Richard would put round to clear himself? Does anyone know, really know, that it's true?'
Angela said well, as a matter of fact, she did know for certain they were friends because her mother knew the Prince Royal well and he had told her so. Alex asked if that was before or after this business about the party and she replied that it was before. He was just about to say the Prince Royal might think very differently about Richard now and Angela was waiting for him – she was in that state she would have accused him of being rude whatever he said – when Alex saw signs of agitation in Evelyn Henderson and guessed she must have news of Miss Fellowes. So, in order to occupy her attention, he began to make peace with Angela while Evelyn drew Julia aside. In a minute these two went out together and Angela, when she saw it, realized how treacherous Alex really was.
When they were outside that room Miss Henderson said to Julia:
'My dear, you look very pale, are you all right?'
'Yes, I think so. I get so excited, up one moment, down the next, you know how it is,' and Miss Henderson when she heard this thought poor child, it is in love. She was three years older than Julia. 'Well,' she said, 'what I wanted to tell you and of course I didn't want the others in there to hear, is that poor Claire's aunt is very ill, I'm sure of it.'
'Oh dear!'
'Yes. Robert has gone to try and find a doctor. I expect there'll be one stuck in this beastly hotel same as we are. But there's more than that. I'm rather unhappy in my own mind about it. She had a parcel of sorts and as we were getting her on the bed it fell down and came open and there was a pigeon of all things inside.'
'A dead pigeon? Perhaps she was taking it back for her supper.'
'No, it was all wet.'
'Oh, Evelyna, how disgusting! But how could it be wet?'
'That's what I asked myself. But Claire's old nannie, who has been keeping an eye on her tells me she saw Claire's Auntie May washing it in the "Ladies".'
'Well, I think that's rather sweet.'
'I'm not so sure about that, my darling Julie, and I'd rather you did not say anything to Claire about that part of it. I don't think she knows and she is so upset already, I don't want her worried any more.'
'Yes, if you say so, but I don't see anything so very awful in it.'
'Good heavens, do you see what I see, those poor old dears are crying. Why,' Evelyn said, hurrying up to where those two nannies sat in tears on a settee, 'it is being a tiresome difficult day for us all, isn't it?' she said to them. 'Now, wouldn't you like a nice cup of tea?'
They made noises which could be taken to mean yes and Julia explained to Miss Henderson how Max had already ordered tea so that it would be easy to carry two cups along to them without Angela knowing. As they moved off down the corridor Evelyn said she did not like the way they were crying, did Julia think Miss Fellowes had done anything? Julia said something or other in reply. She was now struck by how extraordinary it was their being here in this corridor with the South of France, where they were going, waiting for them at the end of their journey. They had all, except for Angela Crevy, been in the same party twelve months ago to the same place, so fantastically different from this. One day would be so fine you wondered if it could be true, the next it rained like anywhere else. But when it was fine you sat on the terrace for dinner looking over a sea of milk with a sky fainting into dusk with the most delicate blushes – Oh! she cried in her heart, if only we could be there now. Indeed, this promise of where they were going lay back of all their minds or feelings, common to all of them. If they did not mention it, it was why they were in this hotel and there was not one of them, except of course for Miss Fellowes and the nannies, who did not every now and again most secretly revert to it.
As for Miss Fellowes, she was fighting. Lying inanimate where they had laid her she waged war with storms of darkness which rolled up over her in a series, like tides summoned by a moon. What made her fight was the one thought that she must not be ill in front of these young people. She did not know how ill she was.
Those nannies, like the chorus in Greek plays, knew Miss Fellowes was very ill. Their profession had been for forty years to ward illness off in others and their small talk had been of sudden strokes, slow cancers, general paralysis, consumption, diabetes and of chills, rheumatism, lumbago, chicken pox, scarlet fever, vaccination and the common cold. They had therefore an unfailing instinct for disaster. By exaggeration, and Fate they found rightly was most often exaggerated, they could foretell from one chilblain on a little toe the gangrene that would mean first that toe coming off, then that leg below the knee, next the upper leg and finally an end so dreadful that it had to be whispered behind hands.
Robert Hignam appeared, asked how his aunt by marriage was and said he thought they would be able to find a doctor for her. Julia said how sorry she felt for Claire, and Robert said yes, it was rather a bore for her. He went on:
'You know, a most extraordinary thing happened about Claire's aunt. You know, Evelyn, you wanted me to go and find Angela and Max. Well, when I found myself outside the bar down there I went in and came up against Max. D'you know the first thing I asked him was whether he had seen Claire's aunt although no one had ever asked me to find her? As a matter of fact Max did not know her by sight but as soon as I'd finished telling him, there she was in a chair, large as life and ill at that.'
'I knew all along I'd forgotten something,' Julia said, but almost to herself and in so low a voice they did not catch it, 'there's Thomson outside now still looking for the others and he's probably looking for us now as well.'
Evelyn told Robert it could never be thought-transference as if anyone had been thinking of Miss Fellowes they could not have known she was ill. He said it had made him feel rather uncomfortable and she said she
did not see how it made him feel that. 'That's all very well,' he said, 'but wouldn't you if for no reason at all you began asking after someone you had no reason to think of?'
Evelyn was very practical. 'But that's just it, Robert,' she said, 'you had cause to think of her because you had probably seen her unconsciously as you came in, though you did not realize it at the time, and that is what made you ask after her.'
And now Julia, who had been worrying about Thomson, got to that pitch like when a vessel is being filled it gets so full the water spills over. Julia broke in, saying but what about Thomson, he was sent out with you Robert, what's happened to him?
'Half a tick, Julia. No, look here, Evelyn, if I had seen her subconsciously as you say I would not have been so surprised when I did realize she was there.'
'But how do you know?'
'Oh, bother you two and your questions,' said Julia. 'What am I to do about Thomson? Now that they have put that steel door down over the hotel he won't be able to find us or anyone.'
Miss Henderson suggested he might have gone back to their luggage.
'Robert, I wonder if you will do something for me,' Julia said. 'Could you go to the station master, no, of course you can't get outside. But you could telephone to him, couldn't you, and say it's for me, and ask him to send someone out to look for Thomson and tell him that he must go back at once to where the luggage is and tell him to see my porter does not put it in the cloakroom if we are a long time. I told my porter that he must not put it in the cloakroom whatever happened, I don't trust these places, but you know what these porters are. Robert, will you do that for me?'
'Yes, only too glad to. But I say, Julia, you know that station master must be a pretty busy man, what with the fog and everything. What do you think?'
'He'll be glad to do it because of my uncle. It would be ever so sweet of you, my dear.'
Miss Fellowes, in her room, felt she was on a shore wedged between two rocks, soft and hard. Out beyond a grey sea with, above, a darker sky, she would notice small clouds where sea joined sky and these clouds coming far away together into a darker mass would rush across from that horizon towards where she was held down. As this cumulus advanced the sea below would rise, most menacing and capped with foam, and as it came nearer she could hear the shrieking wind in throbbing through her ears. She would try not to turn her eyes down to where rising waves broke over rocks as the nearer that black mass advanced so fast the sea rose and ate up what little was left between her and those wild waters. Each time this scene was repeated she felt so frightened, and then it was menacing and she throbbed unbearably, it was all forced into her head; it was so menacing she thought each time the pressure was such her eyes would be forced out of her head to let her blood out. And then when she thought she must be overwhelmed, or break, this storm would go back and those waters and her blood recede, that moon would go out above her head, and a sweet tide washed down from scalp to toes and she could rest.
'My dear Mr Hinham,' the station master said to Robert, for he had not caught his name, 'My dear sir, there are now, we estimate, thirty thousand people in the station. The last time we had a count, on the August Bank Holiday of last year, we found that when they really began coming in, nine hundred and sixty-five persons could enter this station by the various subways each minute. So supposing I sent a man out to look for the individual Thomson, and he did not find him in ten minutes, there would be forty thousand people to choose from. A needle in a – a needle in a—' and he was searching for some better word, 'a haystack,' he said at last, at a loss.
'I know,' said Robert.
'So you see, sir, I'm afraid we can't,' the station master said, and quickly rang off before his temper got the better of him.
Miss Crevy asked Alex where everyone had got to. and he said he could not think where they could be. She asked him outright if anything had happened to anybody, and then, because this question seemed awkward, especially as whatever it was that had happened was obviously being kept from her, she lost her grip and fell further into it by asking him did he know what had become of her Robin. She knew she had been thinking of him without realizing it, all this time.
'But he's gone, Angela.'
'Oh, yes, of course, he had to go away.'
To tide over her embarrassment Alex suggested they might mix the cocktails now.
'But Max isn't here,' she said.
'That doesn't matter. He won't mind.'
Because of all that had gone before, she said:
'But it's rude to drink other people's cocktails before they come in. You wouldn't go into someone else's house...' and she stopped there, realizing, of course, he probably would if he knew them well enough. She felt miserable. Alex had been so tiresome about Embassy Richard – she must remember to call him by Ms proper name – and they were all conspiring together to keep something or other from her and then she had shown about Rob, everyone now would think they were engaged. And it was really so rude to start on his drinks without Max being there.
As for Alex he was frantic that she had been asked on their party. People one hardly knew were always putting one in false positions. It would have been too offensive, though so tempting, to reply that naturally one could go into someone's house and drink their drink, not champagne, of course, but why not gin and lime juice, everyone else did. And besides, it was a question of how well you knew the person, it was intolerable that he should be put wrong because she did not know Max well. It was true that people used not to do it, but when one was in the schoolroom one did not suck one's fingers after jam; on account of one's sisters' governess one wiped them, but one sucked them now, one was grown up.
'I'm sorry, I'm afraid I'm being tiresome,' she said. 'But this journey is being so long, isn't it? I think I'm going out for a minute.'
'Oh, don't go,' was all he could think of saying, and she all but said try and stop me if you can, I could knock you down, but she did no more than look away as she went by him.
When she went out into that corridor she had made up her mind she must go home. She felt she had only been invited so they could humiliate her; not that Max would ever do such things, it was the others. Then she saw the nannies, who were still crying. Poor ducks, she thought, have they been vile to them too, how really beastly, poor old things and one of them Claire's nanny. She went up and said,
'There, there, it will be quite all right.'
But they would not cry in front of a stranger, and she was surprised and rather hurt to find their tears were drying up, and in two moments she saw they would be putting their handkerchiefs away. Even their nannies, she thought, even their nannies are in league to make one feel out of it. At that instant the man who had been with Miss Fellowes in the bar, and had spoken to her and watched her, and who had followed when she had been carried up, reappeared walking slowly up the corridor. His head was bent forward. He stared at those nannies when he was close to them. He stopped and then, for the first time, he looked at her.
'Ah, they carried 'er up here. Terrible bad she was then, I reckon.'
There was a long silence. He went on:
'On one of them stools with backs to 'em there was in the bar.'
Alex had come out after Angela. It upset him to see this man. He spoke in his high voice he had when he was upset.
'What are you doing here?' he said.
'What's that to you, my lad?'
'Why don't you go away? These are private rooms here.'
'Aye, but the corridor's public,' this man returned, and without any warning he had used Yorkshire accent where previously he had been speaking in Brummagem. This sudden change did his trick as it had so often done before and Alex, losing his nerve, asked him in to have a drink. He thought he might be the hotel detective.
'What'll you have?'
'I don't mind,' this man said, speaking this time in an educated voice.
'I'm afraid everything must seem very odd to you,' said Alex, 'I mean there seems to be so much going on, but you se
e we are all going on a party together abroad, and now here we are stuck in this hotel on account of fog.'
It was difficult for Alex. He had come out after Angela because he could never stand things being left in what he called false positions. He was friendly by nature and if he could not help feeling annoyed with Miss Crevy and having digs at her, particularly when she tried to put him in the wrong as he now felt she was continually trying to do, he did not want her to bear him a grudge. It was as much this particularity of his which led him to entertain the mystery man as it was his feeling that he might make trouble for Miss Fellowes if he was not kept amused. While he busily talked with this little man he kept on despairing of ever getting things straight with Angela.
Miss Crevy stood outside with those two nannies, who were also standing up now. She was not so anxious to get home. She was wondering what could be going on that they would not tell her. Then Claire came out with a man who was too obviously the hotel doctor. He looked at Angela with suspicion, and walking down that corridor he said to Claire, quietly:
'What relation is the lady I have just examined to you?'
'She is my aunt.'
'I see, I see.'
'What are we to do?' Claire asked him. 'It really is such a bore poor Auntie May getting like this, and it seems quite impossible to get her out of here. It was extraordinarily lucky that we were able to get hold of you. But, of course, it is too tiresome for her, I can't think of anything worse, can you, than being ill in a hotel bedroom? It was so lucky I did go where they told me I'd find her, because I could see at once she was very ill. What do you think of her?'
'Has she been drinking any stimulants, within the last hour shall we say?'
'Why, yes, I think someone said she had.'
'Well, I don't think you need worry about her. It would be a good thing if she could get some sleep. Keep her warm, of course. Oh, yes, it will pass off. Perhaps I might see your husband, wasn't it, for a moment?'
When Robert Hignam came out this doctor drew him aside and said that would be ten and sixpence, please. Claire sent those nannies in to watch Miss Fellowes telling them there was nothing to worry over in her condition, which they did not believe, and she told Julia who was there, too, that it was nothing, and they could go back to that other room and have a drink. Max had come back after trying unsuccessfully to get an ambulance to take Miss Fellowes home (it appeared the streets were so choked with traffic that no communication was possible) and Robert having paid the doctor they all, with Angela, came into the room where Alex was pouring drinks.