Ann Veronica: A Modern Love Story

by H. G. Wells

  Part 6

  These were Ann Veronica's leading cases in the question of marriage.They were the only real marriages she had seen clearly. For the rest,she derived her ideas of the married state from the observed behavior ofmarried women, which impressed her in Morningside Park as being tied anddull and inelastic in comparison with the life of the young, and from aremarkably various reading among books. As a net result she had come tothink of all married people much as one thinks of insects that havelost their wings, and of her sisters as new hatched creatures who hadscarcely for a moment had wings. She evolved a dim image of herselfcooped up in a house under the benevolent shadow of Mr. Manning.Who knows?--on the analogy of "Squiggles" she might come to call him"Mangles!"

  "I don't think I can ever marry any one," she said, and fell suddenlyinto another set of considerations that perplexed her for a time. Hadromance to be banished from life?...

  It was hard to part with romance, but she had never thirsted so keenlyto go on with her University work in her life as she did that day. Shehad never felt so acutely the desire for free initiative, for a lifeunhampered by others. At any cost! Her brothers had it practically--atleast they had it far more than it seemed likely she would unless sheexerted herself with quite exceptional vigor. Between her and the fair,far prospect of freedom and self-development manoeuvred Mr. Manning, heraunt and father, neighbors, customs, traditions, forces. They seemed toher that morning to be all armed with nets and prepared to throw themover her directly her movements became in any manner truly free.

  She had a feeling as though something had dropped from her eyes, asthough she had just discovered herself for the first time--discoveredherself as a sleep-walker might do, abruptly among dangers, hindrances,and perplexities, on the verge of a cardinal crisis.

  The life of a girl presented itself to her as something happy andheedless and unthinking, yet really guided and controlled by others, andgoing on amidst unsuspected screens and concealments.

  And in its way it was very well. Then suddenly with a rush came reality,came "growing up"; a hasty imperative appeal for seriousness, forsupreme seriousness. The Ralphs and Mannings and Fortescues came downupon the raw inexperience, upon the blinking ignorance of the newcomer;and before her eyes were fairly open, before she knew what hadhappened, a new set of guides and controls, a new set of obligations andresponsibilities and limitations, had replaced the old. "I want to bea Person," said Ann Veronica to the downs and the open sky; "I will nothave this happen to me, whatever else may happen in its place."

  Ann Veronica had three things very definitely settled by the time when,a little after mid-day, she found herself perched up on a gate between abridle-path and a field that commanded the whole wide stretch of countrybetween Chalking and Waldersham. Firstly, she did not intend to marry atall, and particularly she did not mean to marry Mr. Manning; secondly,by some measure or other, she meant to go on with her studies, not atthe Tredgold Schools but at the Imperial College; and, thirdly, she was,as an immediate and decisive act, a symbol of just exactly where shestood, a declaration of free and adult initiative, going that night tothe Fadden Ball.

  But the possible attitude of her father she had still to face. So farshe had the utmost difficulty in getting on to that vitally importantmatter. The whole of that relationship persisted in remaining obscure.What would happen when next morning she returned to Morningside Park?

  He couldn't turn her out of doors. But what he could do or might do shecould not imagine. She was not afraid of violence, but she was afraid ofsomething mean, some secondary kind of force. Suppose he stopped all herallowance, made it imperative that she should either stay ineffectuallyresentful at home or earn a living for herself at once.... Itappeared highly probable to her that he would stop her allowance.

  What can a girl do?

  Somewhere at this point Ann Veronica's speculations were interruptedand turned aside by the approach of a horse and rider. Mr. Ramage, thatiron-gray man of the world, appeared dressed in a bowler hat and a suitof hard gray, astride of a black horse. He pulled rein at the sight ofher, saluted, and regarded her with his rather too protuberant eyes. Thegirl's gaze met his in interested inquiry.

  "You've got my view," he said, after a pensive second. "I always get offhere and lean over that rail for a bit. May I do so to-day?"

  "It's your gate," she said, amiably; "you got it first. It's for you tosay if I may sit on it."

  He slipped off the horse. "Let me introduce you to Caesar," he said;and she patted Caesar's neck, and remarked how soft his nose was, andsecretly deplored the ugliness of equine teeth. Ramage tethered thehorse to the farther gate-post, and Caesar blew heavily and began toinvestigate the hedge.

  Ramage leaned over the gate at Ann Veronica's side, and for a momentthere was silence.

  He made some obvious comments on the wide view warming toward itsautumnal blaze that spread itself in hill and valley, wood and village,below.

  "It's as broad as life," said Mr. Ramage, regarding it and putting awell-booted foot up on the bottom rail.

  Part 7

  "And what are you doing here, young lady," he said, looking up at herface, "wandering alone so far from home?"

  "I like long walks," said Ann Veronica, looking down on him.

  "Solitary walks?"

  "That's the point of them. I think over all sorts of things."

  "Problems?"

  "Sometimes quite difficult problems."

  "You're lucky to live in an age when you can do so. Your mother,for instance, couldn't. She had to do her thinking at home--underinspection."

  She looked down on him thoughtfully, and he let his admiration of herfree young poise show in his face.

  "I suppose things have changed?" she said.

  "Never was such an age of transition."

  She wondered what to. Mr. Ramage did not know. "Sufficient unto me isthe change thereof," he said, with all the effect of an epigram.

  "I must confess," he said, "the New Woman and the New Girl intrigue meprofoundly. I am one of those people who are interested in women, moreinterested than I am in anything else. I don't conceal it. And thechange, the change of attitude! The way all the old clingingnesshas been thrown aside is amazing. And all the old--the old trick ofshrinking up like a snail at a touch. If you had lived twenty years agoyou would have been called a Young Person, and it would have been yourchief duty in life not to know, never to have heard of, and never tounderstand."

  "There's quite enough still," said Ann Veronica, smiling, "that onedoesn't understand."

  "Quite. But your role would have been to go about saying, 'I beg yourpardon' in a reproving tone to things you understood quite well in yourheart and saw no harm in. That terrible Young Person! she's vanished.Lost, stolen, or strayed, the Young Person!... I hope we may neverfind her again."

  He rejoiced over this emancipation. "While that lamb was about every manof any spirit was regarded as a dangerous wolf. We wore invisible chainsand invisible blinkers. Now, you and I can gossip at a gate, and Honisoit qui mal y pense. The change has given man one good thing he neverhad before," he said. "Girl friends. And I am coming to believe the bestas well as the most beautiful friends a man can have are girl friends."

  He paused, and went on, after a keen look at her:

  "I had rather gossip to a really intelligent girl than to any manalive."

  "I suppose we ARE more free than we were?" said Ann Veronica, keepingthe question general.

  "Oh, there's no doubt of it! Since the girls of the eighties brokebounds and sailed away on bicycles--my young days go back to the verybeginnings of that--it's been one triumphant relaxation."

  "Relaxation, perhaps. But are we any more free?"

  "Well?"

  "I mean we've long strings to tether us, but we are bound all the same.A woman isn't much freer--in reality."

  Mr. Ramage demurred.

  "One runs about," said Ann Veronica.

  "Yes."

  "But it's on condition one doesn't
do anything."

  "Do what?"

  "Oh!--anything."

  He looked interrogation with a faint smile.

  "It seems to me it comes to earning one's living in the long run," saidAnn Veronica, coloring faintly. "Until a girl can go away as a son doesand earn her independent income, she's still on a string. It may be along string, long enough if you like to tangle up all sorts of people;but there it is! If the paymaster pulls, home she must go. That's what Imean."

  Mr. Ramage admitted the force of that. He was a little impressed byAnn Veronica's metaphor of the string, which, indeed, she owed to HettyWidgett. "YOU wouldn't like to be independent?" he asked, abruptly. "Imean REALLY independent. On your own. It isn't such fun as it seems."

  "Every one wants to be independent," said Ann Veronica. "Every one. Manor woman."

  "And you?"

  "Rather!"

  "I wonder why?"

  "There's no why. It's just to feel--one owns one's self."

  "Nobody does that," said Ramage, and kept silence for a moment.

  "But a boy--a boy goes out into the world and presently stands on hisown feet. He buys his own clothes, chooses his own company, makes hisown way of living."

  "You'd like to do that?"

  "Exactly."

  "Would you like to be a boy?"

  "I wonder! It's out of the question, any way."

  Ramage reflected. "Why don't you?"

  "Well, it might mean rather a row."

  "I know--" said Ramage, with sympathy.

  "And besides," said Ann Veronica, sweeping that aspect aside, "whatcould I do? A boy sails out into a trade or profession. But--it's oneof the things I've just been thinking over. Suppose--suppose a girldid want to start in life, start in life for herself--" She looked himfrankly in the eyes. "What ought she to do?"

  "Suppose you--"

  "Yes, suppose I--"

  He felt that his advice was being asked. He became a little morepersonal and intimate. "I wonder what you could do?" he said. "I shouldthink YOU could do all sorts of things....

  "What ought you to do?" He began to produce his knowledge of the worldfor her benefit, jerkily and allusively, and with a strong, rank flavorof "savoir faire." He took an optimist view of her chances. Ann Veronicalistened thoughtfully, with her eyes on the turf, and now and then sheasked a question or looked up to discuss a point. In the meanwhile,as he talked, he scrutinized her face, ran his eyes over her careless,gracious poise, wondered hard about her. He described her privately tohimself as a splendid girl. It was clear she wanted to get away fromhome, that she was impatient to get away from home. Why? While the frontof his mind was busy warning her not to fall into the hopeless miseriesof underpaid teaching, and explaining his idea that for women ofinitiative, quite as much as for men, the world of business had by farthe best chances, the back chambers of his brain were busy with theproblem of that "Why?"

  His first idea as a man of the world was to explain her unrest by alover, some secret or forbidden or impossible lover. But he dismissedthat because then she would ask her lover and not him all these things.Restlessness, then, was the trouble, simple restlessness: home boredher. He could quite understand the daughter of Mr. Stanley being boredand feeling limited. But was that enough? Dim, formless suspicionsof something more vital wandered about his mind. Was the young ladyimpatient for experience? Was she adventurous? As a man of the world hedid not think it becoming to accept maidenly calm as anything more thana mask. Warm life was behind that always, even if it slept. If itwas not an actual personal lover, it still might be the lover not yetincarnate, not yet perhaps suspected....

  He had diverged only a little from the truth when he said that hischief interest in life was women. It wasn't so much women as Woman thatengaged his mind. His was the Latin turn of thinking; he had fallenin love at thirteen, and he was still capable--he prided himself--offalling in love. His invalid wife and her money had been only the thinthread that held his life together; beaded on that permanent relationhad been an inter-weaving series of other feminine experiences,disturbing, absorbing, interesting, memorable affairs. Each one hadbeen different from the others, each had had a quality all its own, adistinctive freshness, a distinctive beauty. He could not understand howmen could live ignoring this one predominant interest, this wonderfulresearch into personality and the possibilities of pleasing, thesecomplex, fascinating expeditions that began in interest and mounted tothe supremest, most passionate intimacy. All the rest of his existencewas subordinate to this pursuit; he lived for it, worked for it, kepthimself in training for it.

  So while he talked to this girl of work and freedom, his slightlyprotuberant eyes were noting the gracious balance of her limbs and bodyacross the gate, the fine lines of her chin and neck. Her grave fineface, her warm clear complexion, had already aroused his curiosity as hehad gone to and fro in Morningside Park, and here suddenly he wasnear to her and talking freely and intimately. He had found her ina communicative mood, and he used the accumulated skill of years inturning that to account.

  She was pleased and a little flattered by his interest and sympathy. Shebecame eager to explain herself, to show herself in the right light. Hewas manifestly exerting his mind for her, and she found herself fullydisposed to justify his interest.

  She, perhaps, displayed herself rather consciously as a fineperson unduly limited. She even touched lightly on her father'sunreasonableness.

  "I wonder," said Ramage, "that more girls don't think as you do and wantto strike out in the world."

  And then he speculated. "I wonder if you will?"

  "Let me say one thing," he said. "If ever you do and I can help youin any way, by advice or inquiry or recommendation--You see, I'm nobeliever in feminine incapacity, but I do perceive there is such a thingas feminine inexperience. As a sex you're a little under-trained--inaffairs. I'd take it--forgive me if I seem a little urgent--as a sort ofproof of friendliness. I can imagine nothing more pleasant in life thanto help you, because I know it would pay to help you. There's somethingabout you, a little flavor of Will, I suppose, that makes one feel--goodluck about you and success...."

  And while he talked and watched her as he talked, she answered, andbehind her listening watched and thought about him. She liked theanimated eagerness of his manner.

  His mind seemed to be a remarkably full one; his knowledge of detailedreality came in just where her own mind was most weakly equipped.Through all he said ran one quality that pleased her--the quality of aman who feels that things can be done, that one need not wait for theworld to push one before one moved. Compared with her father and Mr.Manning and the men in "fixed" positions generally that she knew,Ramage, presented by himself, had a fine suggestion of freedom, ofpower, of deliberate and sustained adventure....

  She was particularly charmed by his theory of friendship. It was reallyvery jolly to talk to a man in this way--who saw the woman in her anddid not treat her as a child. She was inclined to think that perhapsfor a girl the converse of his method was the case; an older man, aman beyond the range of anything "nonsensical," was, perhaps, the mostinteresting sort of friend one could meet. But in that reservation itmay be she went a little beyond the converse of his view....

  They got on wonderfully well together. They talked for the better partof an hour, and at last walked together to the junction of highroadand the bridle-path. There, after protestations of friendliness andhelpfulness that were almost ardent, he mounted a little clumsily androde off at an amiable pace, looking his best, making a leg withhis riding gaiters, smiling and saluting, while Ann Veronica turnednorthward and so came to Micklechesil. There, in a little tea andsweet-stuff shop, she bought and consumed slowly and absent-mindedly theinsufficient nourishment that is natural to her sex on such occasions.

  CHAPTER THE FOURTH

  THE CRISIS

  Part 1

  We left Miss Stanley with Ann Veronica's fancy dress in her hands andher eyes directed to Ann Veronica's pseudo-Turkish slippers.

  W
hen Mr. Stanley came home at a quarter to six--an earlier train byfifteen minutes than he affected--his sister met him in the hall witha hushed expression. "I'm so glad you're here, Peter," she said. "Shemeans to go."

  "Go!" he said. "Where?"

  "To that ball."

  "What ball?" The question was rhetorical. He knew.

  "I believe she's dressing up-stairs--now."

  "Then tell her to undress, confound her!" The City had been thoroughlyannoying that day, and he was angry from the outset.

  Miss Stanley reflected on this proposal for a moment.

  "I don't think she will," she said.

  "She must," said Mr. Stanley, and went into his study. His sisterfollowed. "She can't go now. She'll have to wait for dinner," he said,uncomfortably.

  "She's going to have some sort of meal with the Widgetts down theAvenue, and go up with them.

  "She told you that?"

  "Yes."

  "When?"

  "At tea."

  "But why didn't you prohibit once for all the whole thing? How dared shetell you that?"

  "Out of defiance. She just sat and told me that was her arrangement.I've never seen her quite so sure of herself."

  "What did you say?"

  "I said, 'My dear Veronica! how can you think of such things?'"

  "And then?"

  "She had two more cups of tea and some cake, and told me of her walk."

  "She'll meet somebody one of these days--walking about like that."

  "She didn't say she'd met any one."

  "But didn't you say some more about that ball?"