The Woman at The Door

by Warwick Deeping

  “Please excuse me, but I am having two chairs put outside our cabin for my wife and myself.”

  The man was disposed to argue the case. He nibbled. He was ironic and myopic. Had Luce reserved that portion of the deck as well as the cabin? But here the steward intervened; Luce had tipped him early and generously; the other fellow had not, and the steward assured Mr. Coney that the gentleman must be allowed his chairs and piece of deck outside his cabin. He would provide Mr. Coney with two chairs outside an unoccupied cabin. And Luce, who was feeling mischievous, wanted to say “And throw in a lettuce, steward.”

  Lunch had been cleared away.

  “I feel so sleepy, John. It must be the champagne.”

  “Good medicine, cherie.”

  He made her lie down, and tucked her up, and drawing the curtain and closing the cabin door, he left her to sleep. One of the deck chairs served him, and he sat and smoked his pipe, and looked at the sea, and thought strange thoughts. Did he regret anything? Nothing. He could swear that life promised to be good, even in exile, for the only exile that is lethal is the loneliness of growing old alone. Let his love forget and sleep, for they were not yet out of the cage. There were the Belgian officials to be faced at Ostend, though a British passport was a British passport, and its facial credit as solid as John Bull’s countenance.

  People walked up and down. Mr. and Mrs. Coney nibbled at each other. A Belgian girl, hatless and with her hair blowing, leaned over the rail in front of him and watched for the first glimpse of the Belgian coast. Her father joined her, a grizzled, lean old man in a beret, with binoculars slung about his neck. The little steward appeared with Luce’s bill. Would monsieur and madame like tea? Tea seemed superfluous after so good a lunch, and madame was asleep. Luce passed the steward two pound notes, and asked him to procure some Belgian small change. The sea was grey and dimpled flatness, and Luce, hearing an exclamation from the girl at the rail, stood up and gazed. He could detect a faint yellowish, hazy streak on the horizon. Yes, probably that yellow streak was the Dunes.

  War memories came back to him. During 1917 he had spent several weeks in that Dune country about Nieuport, either in the trenches, or in a rabbit-warren under the houses on the sea-front of Nieuport Bains. Crowded in semi-basements or cellars you had been able to explore the abandoned houses above you had you cared to risk a chance shell. Some gunners had sandbagged a balcony and sat out on it in scrounged chairs. One house had contained a billiard table, a piece of furniture that had been too bulky to move. But the main street and the sea-front of Nieuport Bains had been damnably unhealthy and in going up to the trenches by the Yser you had followed a tunnel passage that had been knocked through the basements of the houses. Luce remembered how he had often felt a strange desire to promenade upon that deserted parade where nothing but whizzbangs played, but the desire had been too unwholesome to be satisfied. Now, peace was there, children, and people who bathed.

  He could distinguish the dim grey outlines of the Dune pleasure towns rising out of the swelling sea. The dunes themselves were pale and ghostly. Yes, it had been devil’s country, with shell-bursts blowing sand into men’s bodies. And was that not Nieuport Bains over there, very far and faint? He thought that he could recognize the queer, cliff-like cube of a high building crowned by a sort of cupola at the Yser end of the parade. He felt like borrowing the Belgian’s glasses, and he did go and stand by the rail and enter into conversation with him. Why not begin repolishing his rather rusty French?

  Was that Nieuport Bains over yonder? It was, and Luce went on to explain that he had known the Dune country during the war. The Belgian offered him his glasses, and Luce was able to make out the pier at the mouth of the Yser and that grim sea-front. It still looked somewhat derelict and deserted.

  He returned the glasses, and the Belgian pointed out Westende, and Middelkerke, German territory during the War. The Belgian had spent four years under the terror. He had no illusions about Prussia, and a very lively dread of another war.

  When Luce went back to the cabin and gently opened the door, he found Rachel still sleeping. Her face was like the face of a child, strangely soft and innocent, and he decided not to wake her until they were close to Ostend harbour. She would open her eyes upon that last crisis with hardly time to realize that there was yet another barrier to be passed.

  “After all,” thought Luce, “I might have been blown to blazes over there. This is almost like going on leave, with the chance of being stopped. And so much more than that.”

  With the pretentious front of Ostend welcoming them he went in and woke her.

  “Landing in a quarter of an hour.”

  She sat up, looking startled and poignant.

  “O, my dear!”

  “Yes, you’ve been very much asleep. I didn’t order tea. We can have tea in Bruges.”

  When the boat was berthed the steward got them one of the first porters to come aboard, and Luce and Rachel were absorbed in the crowd. Most of the travellers were taking the Brussels express. The passport examination proved to be no sort of ordeal, being far more perfunctory than the customs examination, and in ten minutes they were following their porter along a sunny and quiet platform to the Bruges train. They appeared to be the only people travelling on that particular train, and Luce had his jest.

  “You see, they ordered a special for us!”

  The porter had gone, and as though to celebrate the blessed event, he took her in his arms and kissed her.

  5

  She sat and looked upon very peaceful country, poplars all arow, rich crops in the fulness of their beauty, wheat, barley, rye, the glistening green of beet. Deep dykes rimmed some of these fields with silver. And, under the immense sky the little white homesteads with their black plinths and tiled roofs floated like water-fowl amid green pastures.

  And suddenly she was weeping. But how absurd! She was aware of him looking at her with a troubled and compassionate perplexity that changed to understanding. Why should she not weep? Why should not her eyes brim over with an emotion that was both profound and simple? Why did birds sing? Why was the heart of man glad? Was not the trembling of beauty near to tears? He too sat and looked at these peaceful fields, and sensing the mystery of seed-sowing and harvest, said never a word.

  But, half-way to Bruges he came and sat beside her, and in silence they held hands, feeling that it was their marriage hour, and that in this empty railway carriage they were becoming one spirit and one flesh.

  At last she spoke. “I wonder if one is forgiven, John.”

  “God and the soil forgive man every year, my dear. I think there is more to be forgiven you than you have to forgive.”

  She gave him a little wet and upward smile.

  “Outcasts, both of us, and I’m the guilty one. But if ever you want your freedom, dear.”

  “This—is freedom. Give me your handkerchief. We’re near the end of the day.”

  And like some big father-creature he dried her wet eyes.

  Bruges. Two porters in blue blouses quarrelled over their luggage, for they appeared to be the only prize on the train, and Luce, suddenly laughing, tipped both men, and Mammon was appeased. They were put with politeness into a taxi. Narrow streets, high gabled houses, crowded footpaths, a bell tolling, a dog harnessed by some weird contraption to a cripple’s wheeled chair and helping to propel it. The taxi bumped its way over the grey pavé. A very small policeman in a white helmet on point duty waved them into the Rue St. Jacques. A left turn through a gateway and they found themselves in the tiled courtyard of the Grand Hotel. The church of St. Jacques rose up steeply with the sunlight shining through gold-green windows. Luce bade her stay in the taxi while he went to make sure that the hotel could take them in.

  The Grand Hotel was not too grand, and had retained its individual and old-world soul. Madame herself met Luce in the bureau. It was like being received by a gentlewoman instead of being confronted by some casual and anonymous clerk.

  Yes, the hotel was en
chanted to welcome them, and would monsieur like rooms overlooking the garden. Monsieur would. A porter was rung for, and Luce went out to bring in his wife, for that was how he both spoke and thought of her. Madame led them up a queer, circular staircase with white swans supporting the iron balustrade. A broad passage turned to the left and the sunlight. Here were two communicating rooms, their windows opening upon the little garden with its Continental iron arbour and weeping ash.

  Madame, having assured herself that they were satisfied, left them there, and Luce, after inspecting both rooms, assigned the more decorative chamber to his wife. It possessed a wonderful flowery wallpaper, gala curtains and a rose-coloured quilt on the bed.

  “Yours—I think.”

  The porter brought in their luggage, and Luce was unlocking the suitcases when he became aware of Rachel removing various small articles from her handbag and placing them upon the dressing-table, and among them he noticed the cheap red case containing the tinted glasses purchased at Cirencester.

  “You won’t need those again.”

  “Never, John?”

  “As a disguise to beauty—never.”

  XXII

  At the end of a week Luce left her, to return to England, but during that week the Grand Hotel had become a friend’s home, for Edgar Van den Berghe and his wife were kindly people. The hotel had been in the family for more than a century, and Monsieur Van den Berghe was very much a person, a hotelier who had manners, a merry blue eye and some knowledge of the great world. Madame was a gentle, shy willow of a woman who regretted that she was childless, and adored her dog. So far as the English were concerned the season was a quiet one, and though monsieur deplored it, he cherished his hotel’s panache. In his grandfather’s day it had housed Longfellow, that obvious and flowery fellow twanging a Yankee lyre, and Monsieur Van den Berghe had himself entertained royalty. Luce did not regret the absence of the English, and he had no serious qualms about leaving Rachel in that old white house. He opened an account for her at the Bank of Bruges, and incited her to enlarge her wardrobe and to take French lessons.

  She drove with him to the station and standing on the platform, watched the Ostend train come in. If she was sad, it was not with the sadness of misgiving. Luce had bought for her in Bruges a new gold ring, and she had dropped the old ring at dusk from a bridge into one of the canals. Intimate things had happened between them during that week, but not as they happen to people, enjoying a surreptitious and sensational week-end.

  He had kissed her and entered a second-class carriage.

  “I shouldn’t wait, dear.”

  She had discovered how sensitive he could be on her account. She had experienced it during those intimate moments. He was afraid of hurting her either in the spirit or the flesh.

  “But I’d like to wait.”

  She looked up at him as he stood at the window.

  “How long do you think you will be?”

  “Not longer than I can help. But the business must be made to look natural. It won’t be safe for me to write from Brandon.”

  She seemed to confront his absence and those weeks of silence.

  “Yes, you mustn’t write, unless you could post a letter in London.”

  “I might do that.”

  When the train began to move she gave him a little smile, and turning quickly walked away. That she would have need of her courage was certain. For the first time she would be alone like some obscure little person sitting in a picture gallery and looking at strange pictures. His big, deliberate sanity had sustained her. She passed out of the station, but she did not return at once to the hotel, but made her way to the old ramparts and so to the Minnewater. She sat on a seat and listened to the wind in the trees, and watched the play of light and shadow upon the water.

  She had complete faith in her man. She did not think of him, as many more sophisticated women would have thought of him, as an opportunist who had satisfied desire and was making a cad’s exit. If she mistrusted anything it was the inconsiderate coincidences and cruelties of life. Her faith in the beneficence of human institutions had been so shaken. Society did not forgive you for being found out. Her secret fear was that some untoward thing might happen to Luce, some devastating and violent intervention of circumstances. She was to tremble inwardly at the thought of accidents by road or rail. She was so utterly alone while waiting for him to return to her.

  Before going back to the hotel she passed over the bridge and through the gate of the Beguinage. There was a soothing and gentle austerity in the little white houses with their sage green doors, and in the grass and the trees. She entered the church, and kneeling, put up a very simple prayer.

  “O God, if I have sinned, do not visit my sin on him. Let him come back to me. I will try to make life good for him.”

  She went daily to this church and offered up the same simple prayer.

  2

  Mr. Temperley had kept records of the doings and sayings of the Brandon rooks, and when the community of the elms became unduly agitated and conversational, he found himself infected by the tumult in the tree tops. He did not envisage a mere change in the weather, but somehow expected unusual human happenings, and was prepared for them. Only yesterday he had received a letter from Bruges, and had been careful to burn it, while realizing that even at the age of seventy-three man was not proof against boyish emotion. As for the elucidation of the Beech Farm mystery, the problem had progressed towards a solution that was partial and hypothetical, and Mr. Temperley had made it his business to remain in touch with the official mind.

  “No luck at all, sir. The dogs took us down to the river, and there we lost things.”

  “Isn’t that rather significant, Inspector?”

  “Yes, sir, but we haven’t been able to find the body.”

  “Held down by water weeds or tree roots, perhaps?”

  “That’s my view, sir. We are having the river patrolled to watch for anything coming to the surface.”

  “What about the dog, Ford?”

  “She may have taken him with her, sir. A woman in that state may do strange things.”

  This particular day brought no surprises until the evening. Mr. Temperley was in his bath when the bell rang, for Mr. Temperley liked a deliberate and meditative bath before dinner. Martha, going up to announce the visitor, knew that her master did not welcome intrusion at this hour.

  “A lady wishing to see you, sir.”

  “A what?”

  “A lady, sir. She says she is staying at the Chequers.”

  “Well, I can’t see her here, Martha.”

  “She’s in the drawing-room, sir.”

  “What name?”

  “A Miss Reubens, sir.”

  Mr. Temperley sat up in the bath. He had heard from Luce of Miss Reubens, and how Luce had used her on a critical occasion to act as an unconscious super on the stage, but discretion suggested that Miss Reubens was one of those pushful people who need confronting with cushions. Mr. Temperley, looking very pink and clean, and wearing his black velvet coat and a bow tie, found Miss Reubens spread on the sofa and smoking a cigarette. Mr. Temperley apologized in courtly fashion for keeping her waiting, and sitting down with his back to the light, inquired how he could oblige the lady.

  “I believe you can tell me when Jack Luce is expected back.”

  Mr. Temperley smiled upon her. Miss Reubens was wearing no stockings, and her attack was completely frontal.

  “Miss Reubens, the novelist, I believe?”

  “That’s me.”

  “I’m afraid I have no definite information. Dreamy people like my friend Luce——.”

  Miss Reubens was sitting with her legs well spread.

  “They told me at the pub that you were his stable companion in his caravan.”

  Mr. Temperley put his fingers together, and looked almost coyly at the lady’s legs.

  “I plead guilty. But I left Mr. Luce in Wales. I found caravaning a little too primitive for my years.”


  “Yes, all flies and washing up,” said Carlotta. “But perhaps you can give me a hint as to whether he is fed up yet with that Georgian ruin.”

  “You mean the Signal Tower?”

  “Yep.”

  “I really can’t speak for Mr. Luce in the matter.”

  “Well, what I want to say is that if he is tired of the place, I would take on the tenancy.”

  “Indeed!”

  “I write books.”

  “Yes, I’m afraid I haven’t the pleasure——.”

  “They’d give your reverend soul some shocks.”

  “Is that possible?”

  She waggled her lips at him.

  “Fact is I have a particular book to write, and I want a particular place to write it in. I like particular places for particular books. Besides, it’s ruddy good publicity. I spent two months on a canal barge before I wrote ‘Shirts in the Wind’.”

  “Is that so?” said Mr. Temperley.

  Mr. Temperley, much more so than Luce, was in a position to be amused by Miss Reubens, but he was seventy-three and not likely to be the victim of Miss Reubens’ sudden passion for the male.

  “Am I to understand that if Mr. Luce should contemplate a change of domicile——?”

  “Say, I ought to put you and your language in a book. Yes, it’s a firm offer.”

  “I am afraid it is a question that cannot be settled immediately. I don’t know what my friend Luce’s plans are.”

  “From what I hear he has the wander lust. Quite useful in a man. Not too much bricks and mortar and domestic sentiment.”

  “Restless as an old Viking?”

  “Another nice illusion. When I was in Norway I didn’t spot a single tow-headed giant. An undersized, weedy lot.”

  “Generalizations, Miss Reubens, are——.”

  “A bit infantile, but so stimulating. Well, I shall be at the local pub for a week. You will keep the offer in mind?”