The Short Stories of Warwick Deeping

by Warwick Deeping

  To offer to set him free, because she felt herself a failure!

  “Good God!” he said to himself; “I thought that I had made her realize—— I’ll make her realize—to-night.”

  The afterglow spread to the zenith as York passed through the beechwoods. Primroses! Yes, the last of them, and the first bluebells. He picked a few primroses, and inhaled their faint perfume, and the flowers became a part of his emotion. Through the green film of the young leaves he saw the farm; the pear trees were in flower with a whiteness that seemed to him miraculous.

  He wondered where he would meet her, and how. Would she be sitting in that familiar room, bending over some piece of work? Those serious and dark eyes would look up at him suddenly.

  Surely it was good to suffer, when suffering went so deep?

  As he entered the lane he realized that he wanted her to be alone, with no witnesses, however friendly, of that moment when they should meet. No, he was beyond the casual easiness of the ordinary human interplay. This casual age, slangy, and trying to appear deep by being shallow!

  He came to the gate in the oak fence. He looked at the porch door and the windows. How quiet the place looked! He decided to go straight in.

  But it was not York who opened the door. It was opened for him when he was within a few steps of the porch, and he saw his wife standing there. The afterglow lay on the porch, but Bess herself was in the shadow, a figure of stillness, looking at him with deep eyes. Yet, it was not the stillness of consent or of surrender. She stood in the doorway of their common life, ready to hold it against herself and him.

  York’s hand had gone to his breast pocket, but he looked at her, and in looking felt that there was a part of her he did not know. This beloved stranger!

  “I have brought you—your letter, Bess.”

  She did not move.

  “I want you to take it back.”

  She did not attempt to touch the letter, but continued to look at him with those deep and asking eyes.

  “Only——” she began, and hesitated.

  It may be that he understood the question that the whole of her was asking him, and he gave her the one and only answer.

  “Bess—don’t you know——?”

  He saw her lips quiver.

  “Oh—Ronny——”

  She saw and she knew, and her hands made a little movement towards him.

  “If you——”

  She let him catch her—and his face seemed to her white and fierce. This strength of him was new to her—this almost savage tenderness. She could feel the beat of his heart—and all the surge of his dear necessity.

  “Ronny——”

  She clung to him now, pressing her head against his neck, and her strong young body answered his. She understood now that the elemental woman had asked to be convinced, and that behind her seeming self-renunciation a subconscious cunning had watched and waited.

  “I wanted to be sure, Ronny——”

  “That I wanted you——?”

  “Is a woman ever sure?”

  “Well—you have given me three days of panic. What a man can imagine——! Besides—— Look at me.”

  He put a hand under her chin and raised her face.

  “I’m not a boy. I’m old enough to know what matters, and how few things matter. A friend or two, a house, a dog—and perhaps one woman. I suppose it’s a matter of temperament. As for children——”

  She faced him bravely.

  “You won’t grow away from me, dear man, if no children come?”

  “Grow away from you! As far as my observation goes—children put people apart—yes, very often. Let’s be honest about it. I think my wanting a boy was restlessness and egotism.”

  “But if—I——”

  “You do?”

  “I suppose women want children—for different reasons. Some want just children; others have children forced on them. I—wanted—your child.”

  York kissed his wife.

  “Who knows!” he said.

  XI

  Next day York wired to a French friend of his who lived on a neighbouring estate in Algeria.

  “Staying in England two months. Can you look over the farm for me?”

  The reply was the response of a friend:

  “Enjoy yourself. I am here.”

  So York despatched a telegram to Odgers and wrote two letters, and then went out like a boy with his girl to pick primroses in the April woods.

  So the days passed, and York was content to follow the simple ways of that simple country life, while the woods grew greener and the apple blossom followed the pear. It was a wet but sunny spring, a spring of wonderful atmosphere, blue distances set in silver or gold, and no man who loved trees and green grass could quarrel with it. And York and his wife were just man and woman, going out together into the fields and woods, and asking nothing of life but they should be together.

  Old John Shenton, who was a shy man, and inarticulate behind his beard, had begun by going about his own house and garden as though at any moment he would have to face about and lose himself in wilful blindness.

  These lovers——! And married more than twelve months! How long were they going to take to get over it? But, gradually it dawned upon old John Shenton that York and his daughter were not ordinary lovers.

  “Just like Adam and Eve,” as he put it.

  He found that he might play God in the garden, and that they were not troubled. They were just as glad to see him as they were to see the sheep-dog or the stable cat, or one of the gentle cows, another wholesome and live creature not bothered over the latest novel or the most recent scrap of genius.

  Smoking his pipe of an evening, he discussed deep things with Mrs. Jenny Rourke.

  “They seem pretty well content with things, those two. What are they up to now?”

  Mrs. Jenny laughed.

  “Going round with the egg basket when last I saw them.”

  “Like a couple of children.”

  “And why not—Mr. Shenton?”

  “Oh, why not—sure!” said he, “so long as they’re happy.”

  And then he would fall to teasing Kitty, his youngest daughter, and the others would come in with a casual clamour for supper.

  “We have to get up early.”

  “What do you call early, my dear?”

  “We are going to make butter. Aren’t we, Ronny?”

  “My place is at the churn, Mr. Shenton.”

  Old Shenton smiled at him.

  “And you are a rich man,” said that smile. “You’ll stay rich—in the right way—if you get up to turn a churn handle at six o’clock in the morning.”

  For a week they were with Miss Philippa at Hookfield House, and less happy there than at the farm, though the old lady put her car at their disposal. She was infinitely kind, and so were her old servants, but it was the kindness of people who were determined to put York’s wife at her ease. Which kindness was quite unnecessary, and too obtrusive in certain quarters.

  Bess laughed over it.

  “The great Pynton has been telling me what I ought to wear to-night, Ronny.”

  “Wear—yourself.”

  “I’m going to.”

  For Miss Philippa had thought it her duty to collect some of her neighbours and to give a dinner-party for the official benefit of those who were convinced that Byron York had married beneath him. Which was obvious, and yet not at all obvious when Bess put on a Paquin frock, and sat and talked to old Sir Julian Burgetrode as though he had neither bushy eyebrows nor a fierce red nose.

  Early in June they were back at Beech Hangar, and spending a last week there before returning to Algeria. York’s plan was to go back to Mida for two or three weeks, see that things were in order, engage another manager, and then to take his wife to the Pyrenees. He wished her to escape the heat of July and August.

  York was away for a night or two in town, busy with his tailor, and arranging for seats on the train south, and for a cabin from Marseille
s to Algiers. Bess remained at Beech Hangar. Her sister Grace was coming over with her child, and Bess wished to see them both. The Shentons were clannish people, but Elizabeth York had other reasons.

  When York came back from town Elizabeth had news for him. He found her sitting in the orchard under one of the apple trees, and there was a something in her eyes that made him wonder, an inward knowledge, an air of annunciation. Her smile was different. She did not rise to meet him, but suffered him to come to her.

  Bending to kiss her he felt her two hands clasping his.

  “It has happened—Ronny.”

  “My dear——!”

  “Are you glad?”

  Men are strange creatures, and York was both glad and sorry, but he showed her only his gladness.

  “You had better stay in England—Bess.”

  But she would not hear of it.

  “Our home is out there. I want it to happen there. Besides—it won’t happen for a long time—yet.”

  XII

  Christopher Odgers could be usefully reticent; he was not the sort of servant who blurted out a list of all the disasters that had happened during his master’s absence.

  “Nothing happened, Kit?”

  “Nothing, sir. Hope you are well, sir?”

  Odgers was quite sure that if York had to be told of any unpleasant incidents, well—to-morrow would do for the telling of them. Why take the smile off the pretty lady’s face, though Arabs were Arabs, and men got drunk, and guns went off and killed people?

  But York had to be told next day, though Odgers managed to give him the news as though it were supremely unimportant.

  “I have had trouble, sir, with Proyart. Came around one evening—shouting drunk; we had to throw him out. I went down afterwards, and saw Marie and had a talk with her. Said if it happened again we should have to take out a procès verbal or whatever they call it. She used to be a sensible woman when she was Marie Delage.”

  “Isn’t she now?”

  “Well—yes and no. Rather like a cat, sir; not sure whether she is going to scratch or not.”

  “Anything else, Odgers?”

  “Mahomet shot a thief a few nights ago. This side of the garden wall. Mahomet had shouted three times before firing.”

  “Killed the man?”

  “Sure.”

  “An Arab?”

  “Yes. We buried him. Maybe a bit of a nuisance for Mahomet, sir, but that’s all.”

  “There is always the revenge.”

  “Just so, sir; but that’s Mahomet’s business—and I reckon he knows it.”

  York looked serious, for though life was not over-valued in Algeria, and a thief could be shot when certain formalities had been complied with, and nothing would be said, he knew that it would mean bad blood, and the beginning of an Arab vendetta.

  “A pity Mahomet didn’t shoot to scare him.”

  “The fellow had a gun,” said the laconic Odgers.

  “Confound him! Look here, man, I don’t want Mrs. York to know anything about this.”

  “No need for her to know anything, sir.”

  For all York’s thoughts centred about his wife and the young, unborn life that was theirs. Englishmen may be sentimentalists, and if a husband is not something of a sentimentalist he is but a sorry mate in times of human crisis. There was nothing that could be done that York did not do.

  His ingenious tenderness was a source of great amusement to old Madame Le Noir, who came often to the villa to observe what she called “This exceptional marriage.” But then—as she put it:

  “York was always an enthusiast, and did things thoroughly. Had he been born a bon viveur, no household would have been safe! But being devoted, tien, he builds a glass-house round marriage.”

  Her wickedly humorous old face masked a sympathetic curiosity.

  “Glass-house, did I say? Let us call it an ice-house in which the absurd man shelters the lady so that she shall not melt. Electric fans—everywhere. And have you seen the grotto in the garden—with a little fountain playing, and green things growing? What extravagance in water! But—then—if a man is not extravagant sometimes—he is but a poor creature. Dr. Edouard comes out every week from Algiers. It should be a wonderful infant!”

  Yet nothing seemed like suggestion, and the whole York household became permeated by the suggestiveness of monsieur’s devotion. Jenny Rourke revelled in it. The quiet feet of the Arab servants seemed to grow even quieter. Mahomet and Osman, the two watchmen, were for ever on the prowl about the place as though they were guarding one of the holy places of the Prophet. Kaled, the gardener, made himself an invisible spirit, toiling to keep a few flowers alive by morning and evening splashings with his water-pot. Two of the dogs took to emulating the humans, Jean the mastiff, and Pom-pom the fox-terrier. Pom-pom spent the day curled up close to Elizabeth, and never so sound asleep as to miss a movement. Jean’s solicitude exercised itself in the garden. The big dog hardly ever left York’s wife. He would lie with his muzzle resting upon his paws, or sit alert like a stone dog on a pedestal.

  If love is blind, hate has quick ears, and down at Mustapha Farm the news reached Marie Proyart:

  “Monsieur York is to be a father.”

  Marie’s child had been born. When the nurse had first shown it to the father, Proyart had stared at the infant with a look of astonishment and of horror.

  “Ma foi!”

  For the child’s face was disfigured by a purple nævus that covered the whole of one cheek and a part of the forehead.

  “Pauvre petite!”

  “What is it, a girl?”

  “Yes; a girl.”

  Proyart had been drinking, and he had turned away with an oath.

  “Just my luck! A girl! And with a face like that. Good Lord!”

  Obviously, Marie’s marriage was not all oil and honey. With a child that was hideous, and a husband who had taken to drinking, she had nothing to boast about, though Louis could be kept in order when Marie was up and doing. She was very much the dominant partner, a woman who was both hard and sensual, and Proyart was afraid of her. She intended him to make money, for he was a capable fellow; therefore she had informed him that it was his business to keep sober.

  “One day a month you may drink as hard as you please, mon garçon; but in between—no.”

  The news from the Villa York filled Marie with an evil and secret rage. No longer could she feel herself somehow superior to that other woman, and sneer at L’Anglaise, that bit of butter and milk. Her venom was ineffectual, and therefore emulative. It became like a sac of poison—distended, painful.

  Ill-wishing did not relieve her, for Marie was of a practical turn of mind. She liked tangible results.

  “If the brat could be born—deformed.”

  Which unpleasant thought was but a reflection upon her own unfortunate child, and her malice was the more embittered by it.

  XIII

  During the heat of the day Elizabeth would retire to her “grotto.” It made her smile, this cave cut into the slope of the hillside, piled about and roofed with blocks of stone, and planted with green things, and filled with the coolness of its little fountain.

  “What a boy’s idea,” she thought.

  It seemed to her that the eternal boy in Byron York had conceived and carried out this most quaint of garden-houses where she could lie in her long chair, protected by this mass of stone. Most men would not have come by such an inspiration, or would have been too self-conscious to carry it out had the inspiration come to them.

  “That uxorious fool, York.”

  Later in the day, when the sun was nearing the hills, Elizabeth would wander to her shelter under the pine trees where the cypresses raised a green wall. She was in the open here, and able to look over the great plain, and at the greyness of the mountains whose tops would grow all rosy at sunset.

  York would bring his coffee out here, and they would sit and watch the stars or the rising moon. Sometimes the plaintive music of Arab pipes wou
ld come to them out of the still night. The smoke from York’s cigar would make faint grey spirals.

  They would talk quietly of intimate things, or not trouble to talk at all, for the understanding between them was as tranquil as the African night.

  Below them, in the plain, the little town of Mida would show up as a blur of faint light in the surrounding darkness.

  In one of the wine-shops of Mida, a blind Frenchman played a violin, and girls and men danced, with solemn Arabs and negroes and Kabyles sitting watching on the wooden benches. Here, Louis Proyart came to swagger as the propriétaire, and as the man with money. The girls made a fool of him, especially when he had begun to grow merry and sentimental—and the Arabs would study his bombastic antics like sages studying the habits of some absurd insect. Proyart would call any man his brother when the red wine was in him, and cheap cognac had begun to work. He would go about treating anybody and everybody, loving the whole world, and never growing quarrelsome.

  An intoxicated man may blunder into all sorts of friendships and situations, and one September night Marie heard her man upon the road after one of his permitted excursions to Mida. He was singing, and he was talking, and it appeared that he was not alone.

  Marie stood in the doorway. Two figures arrived at the gate, and one of them was the figure of an Arab. She saw the white burnous and haik. Her husband had an arm over the Arab’s shoulders, and while embracing him was being supported by the tall white figure. They paused at the gate, Proyart declaiming with drunken emotion:

  “My house—dear friend. At your service. Madame—my wife—a warm welcome. Oh, la-la, we understand each other—I think.”

  Marie concluded that the reveller had been helped home by some Arab neighbour, but when the two arrived at the doorway she was made to realize that there was method in her husband’s madness. The little flame of cunning had not been quenched.

  “Ma chérie, permit me to introduce Omar Ben Ali. A friend—yes—— Make him welcome. He is here at Mida on a little private business. He speaks but little French.”