“You’re all right, Jane, are you? “said Miss Ironwood.
“Oh yes,” said Jane, “as far as that goes. Only one somehow doesn’t want to tell it. Well, quite suddenly, like when an engine is started, there came a puff of air out of its mouth, with a hard dry rasping sound. And then there came another, and it settled down into a sort of rhythm-huff, huff, huff-like an imitation of breathing. Then came a most horrible thing: the mouth began to dribble. I know it sounds silly but in a way I felt sorry for it, because it had no hands and couldn’t wipe its mouth. It seems a small thing compared with all the rest but that is how I felt. Then it began working its mouth about and even licking its lips. It was like someone getting a machine into working order. To see it doing that just as if it was alive, and at the same time dribbling over the beard which was all stiff and dead looking . . . Then three people came into the room, all dressed up in white, with masks on, walking as carefully as cats on the top of a wall. One was a great fat man, and another was lanky and boney. The third . . .’ here Jane paused involuntarily. “The third . . . I think it was Mark . . . I mean my husband.” .
“You are uncertain? “said the Director.
“No,” said Jane. “It was Mark. I knew his walk. And I knew the shoes he was wearing. And his voice. It was Mark.”
“I am sorry,” said the Director.
“And then,” said Jane, “all three of them came round and stood in front of the Head. They bowed to it. You couldn’t tell if it was looking at them because of its dark glasses. It kept on with that rhythmical huffing noise. Then it spoke.”
“In English? “said Grace Ironwood.
“No, in French.”
“What did it say?”
“Well, my French wasn’t quite good enough to follow it. It spoke in a queer way. In starts-like a man who’s out of breath. With no proper expression. And of course it couldn’t turn itself this way or that, the way a-a real person-does.”
“Did you understand any of what was said?”
“Not very much. The fat man seemed to be introducing Mark to it. It said something to him. Then Mark tried to answer. I could follow him all right, his French isn’t much better than mine.”
“What did he say?”
“He said something about ‘doing it in a few days if it was possible.’”
“Was that all? “
“Very nearly. You see Mark couldn’t stand it. I knew he wouldn’t be able to: I remember, idiotically, in the dream, I wanted to tell him. I saw he was going to fall. I think I tried to shout out to the other two, ‘He’s going to fall . . . ’ But, of course, I couldn’t. He was sick too. Then they got him out of the room.”
All three were silent for a few seconds.
“Was that all? “said Miss Ironwood.
“Yes,” said Jane. “That’s all I remember. I think I woke up then.”
’The Director took a deep breath. “Well!” he said, glancing at Miss Ironwood, “it becomes plainer and plainer. We must hold a council at once. Is everyone here?”
“No. Dr. Dimble has had to go into Edgestow, into College, to take pupils. He won’t be back till evening.”
“Then we must hold the council this evening. Make all arrangements.” He paused for a moment and then turned to Jane.
“I am afraid this is very bad for you, my dear,” he said; “and worse for him.”
“You mean for Mark, sir?”
“Yes. Don’t think. hardly of him. He is suffering. If we are defeated we shall all go down with him. If we win we will rescue him; he cannot be far gone yet.” He paused, smiled, and added, “We are quite used to trouble about husbands here, you know. Poor Ivy’s is in jail.”
“In jail?”
“Oh yes-for ordinary theft. But quite a good fellow. He’ll be all right again.”
Though Jane had felt horror, even to the point of nausea, at the sight (in her dream) of Mark’s real surroundings and associates, it had been horror that carried a certain grandeur and mystery with it. The sudden equation between his predicament and that of a common convict whipped the blood to her cheeks. She said nothing.
“One other thing,” continued the Director. “You will not misunderstand it if I exclude you from our council to-night.
“Of course not, sir,” said Jane, in fact, misunderstanding it very much.
“You see,” he said, “MacPhee takes the line that if you hear things talked of you will carry ideas of them into your sleep and that will destroy the evidential value of your dreams. And it’s not very easy to refute him. He is our sceptic; a very important office.”
“I quite understand,” said Jane.
“That applies, of course,” said the Director, “only to things we don’t know yet. You mustn’t hear our guesses, you mustn’t be there when we’re puzzling over the evidence. But we have no secrets from you about the earlier history of our family. In fact, MacPhee himself will insist on being the one who tells you all that. He’d be afraid Grace’s account, or mine, wouldn’t be objective enough.”
“I see.”
“I want you to like him if you can. He’s one of my oldest friends. And he’ll be about our best man if we’re going to be defeated. You couldn’t have a better man at your side in a losing battle. What he’ll do if we win I can’t imagine.”
II
Mark woke next morning to the consciousness that his head ached all over, but specially at the back. He remembered that he had fallen-that was how he had hurt his head-fallen in that other room, with Filostrato and Straik . . . and then, as one of the poets says, he “discovered in his mind an inflammation swollen and deformed, his memory.” Oh, but impossible, not to be accepted for a moment: it had been a nightmare, it must be shoved away, it would vanish away now that he was fully awake. It was an absurdity. Once in delirium he had seen the front part of a horse, by itself, with no body or hind legs, running across a lawn, had felt it ridiculous at the very moment of seeing it, but not the less horrible for that. This was an absurdity of the same sort. A head without any body underneath. A head that could speak when they turned on the air and the artificial saliva with taps in the next room. His own head began to throb so hard that he had to stop thinking.
But he knew it was true. And he could not, as they say, “take it.” He was very ashamed of this, for he wished to be considered one of the tough ones. But the truth is that his toughness was only of the will, not of the nerves, and the virtues he had almost succeeded in banishing from his mind still lived, if only negatively and as weaknesses, in his body. He approved of vivisection, but had never worked in a dissecting room. He recommended that certain classes of people should be gradually eliminated: but he had never been there when a small shopkeeper went to the workhouse or a starved old woman of the governess type came to the very last day and hour and minute in the cold attic. He knew nothing about the last half cup of cocoa drunk slowly ten days before.
Meantime he must get up. He must do something about Jane. Apparently he would have to bring her to Belbury. His mind had made this decision for him at some moment he did not remember. He must get her, to save his life. All his anxieties about being in the inner ring or getting a job had shrunk into insignificance. It was a question of life or death. They would kill him if he annoyed them; perhaps behead him . . . oh God, if only they would really kill that monstrous little lump of torture, that lump with a face, which they kept there talking on its steel bracket. All the minor fears at Belbury-for he knew now that all except the leaders were always afraid-were only emanations from that central fear. He must get Jane; he wasn’t fighting against that now.
It must be remembered that in Mark’s mind hardly one rag of noble thought, either Christian or Pagan, had a secure lodging. His education had been neither scientific nor classical-merely “Modern.” The severities both of abstraction and of high human tradition had passed him by: and he had neither peasant shrewdness nor aristocratic honour to help him. He was a man of straw, a glib examinee in subjects that require no exac
t knowledge (he had always done well on Essays and General Papers) and the first hint of a real threat to his bodily life knocked him sprawling. And his head ached so terribly and he felt so sick. Luckily he now kept a bottle of whisky in his room. A stiff one enabled him to shave and dress.
He was late for breakfast but that made little difference for he could not eat. He drank several cups of black coffee and then went into the writing-room. Here he sat for a long time drawing things on the blotting-paper. This letter to Jane proved almost impossible now that it came to the point. And why did they want Jane? Formless fears stirred in his mind. And Jane of all people! Would they take her to the Head? For almost the first time in his life a gleam of something like disinterested love came into his mind; he wished he had never married her, never dragged her into this whole outfit of horrors which was, apparently, to be his life.
“Hullo, Studdock! “said a voice. “Writing to little wifie, eh?”
“Damn!” said Mark. “You’ve made me drop my pen.”
“Then pick it up, sonny,” said Miss Hardcastle, seating herself on the table. Mark did so, and then sat still, without looking up at her. Not since he had been bullied at school had he known what it was to hate and dread anyone with every nerve of his body as he now hated and dreaded this woman.
“I’ve got bad news for you, sonny,” she said presently. His heart gave a jump.
“Take it like a man, Studdock,” said the Fairy.
“What is it?”
She did not answer quite at once and he knew she was studying him, watching how the instrument responded to her playing.
“I’m worried about little wifie, and that’s a fact,” she said at last.
“What do you mean?” said Mark sharply, this time looking up. The cheroot between her teeth was still unlit, but she had got as far as taking out her matches.
“I looked her up,” said Miss Hardcastle, “all on your account, too. I thought Edgestow wasn’t too healthy a place for her to be at present.”
“What’s wrong with her?” shouted Mark.
“Ssh!” said Miss Hardcastle. “You don’t want everyone to hear.”
“Can’t you tell me what’s wrong?”
She waited for a few seconds before replying. “How much do you know about her family, Studdock?”
“Lots. What’s that got to do with it?”
“Nothing . . . queer . . . on either side?”
“What the devil do you mean?”
“Don’t be rude, honey. I’m doing all I can for you. It’s only-well, I thought she was behaving pretty oddly when I saw her.”
Mark well remembered his conversation with his wife on the morning he left for Belbury. A new stab of fear pierced him. Might not this detestable woman be speaking the truth?
“What did she say?” he asked.
“If there is anything wrong with her in that way,” said the Fairy, “take my advice, Studdock, and have her over here at once. She’ll be properly looked after here.”
“You haven’t yet told me what she said or did.”
“I wouldn’t like to have anyone belonging to me popped into Edgestow Asylum. Specially now that we’re getting our emergency powers. They’ll be using the ordinary patients experimentally, you know. Whereas if you’ll just sign this form I’ll run over after lunch and have her here this evening.”
“I shall do nothing of the sort. Specially as you haven’t given me the slightest notion what’s wrong with her.”
“I’ve been trying to tell you but you don’t let me. She kept on talking about someone who’d broken into your flat-or else met her at the station (one couldn’t make out which) and burned her with cigars. Then, most unfortunately, she noticed my cheroot, and, if you please, she identified me with this imaginary persecutor. Of course after that I could do no good.”
“I must go home at once,” said Mark, getting up.
“Here-whoa! You can’t do that,” said the Fairy, also rising.
“Can’t go home? I’ve bloody well got to, if all this is true.”
“Don’t be a fool, lovey,” said Miss Hardcastle.
“Honest! I know what I’m talking about. You’re in a dam dangerous position already. You’ll about do yourself in if you’re absent without leave now. Send me. Sign the form. That’s the sensible way to do it.”
“But a moment ago you said she couldn’t stand you at any price.”
“Oh, that wouldn’t make any odds. Of course it would be easier if she hadn’t taken a dislike to me. I say, Studdock, you don’t think little Wifie could be jealous, do you?”
“Jealous? Of you?” said Mark with uncontrollable disgust.
“Where are you off to?” said the Fairy sharply.
“To see the D.D. and then home.”
“Stop. You won’t do that unless you mean to make me your enemy for life-and let me tell you, you can’t afford many more enemies.”
“Oh, go to the Devil,” said Mark.
“Come back, Studdock,” shouted the Fairy. “Wait! Don’t be a bloody fool.” But Mark was already in the hall. For the moment everything seemed to have become clear. He would look in on Wither, not to ask for leave but simply to announce that he had to go home at once because his wife was dangerously ill: he would be out of the room before Wither could reply-and then off. The further future was vague, but that did not seem to matter. He put on his hat and coat, ran upstairs and knocked at the door of the Deputy Director’s office.
There was no answer. Then Mark noticed that the door was not quite shut. He ventured to push it open a little farther, and saw the Deputy Director sitting inside with his back to the door. “Excuse me, sir,” said Mark.
“Might I speak to you for a few minutes.” There was no answer. “Excuse me, sir,” said Mark in a louder voice, but the figure neither spoke nor moved. With some hesitation, Mark went into the room and walked round to the other side of the desk; but when he turned to look at Wither he caught his breath, for he thought he was looking into the face of a corpse. A moment later he recognised his mistake. In the stillness of the room he could hear the man breathing. He was not even asleep, for his eyes were open. He was not unconscious, for his eyes rested momentarily on Mark and then looked away. “I beg your pardon sir,” began Mark, and then stopped. The Deputy Director was not listening. He was so far from listening that Mark felt an insane doubt whether he was there at all, whether the soul of the Deputy Director were not floating far away, spreading and dissipating itself like a gas through formless and lightless worlds, waste lands and lumber rooms of the universe. What looked out of those pale watery eyes was, in a sense, infinity-the shapeless and the interminable. The room was still and cold: there was no clock and the fire had gone out. It was impossible to speak to a face like that. Yet it seemed impossible also to get out of the room, for the man had seen him. Mark was afraid; it was so unlike any experience he had ever had before.
When at last Mr. Wither spoke, his eyes were not fixed on Mark but on some remote point beyond him, beyond the window, perhaps in the sky.
“I know who it is,” said Wither. “Your name is Studdock. What do you mean by coming here? You had better have stayed outside. Go away.”
It was then that Mark’s nerve suddenly broke. All the slowly mounting fears of the last few days ran together into one fixed determination and a few seconds later he was going downstairs three steps at a time. Then he was crossing the hall. Then he was out, and walking down the drive. Once again, his immediate course seemed quite plain to him. Opposite the entrance was a thick belt of trees pierced by a field path. That path would bring him in half an hour to Courthampton and there he could get a country ’bus to Edgestow. About the future he did not think at all. Only two things mattered: firstly, to. get out of that house, and secondly to get back to Jane. He was devoured with a longing for Jane, which was physical without being at all sensual: as if comfort and fortitude would flow from her body, as if her very skin would clean away all the filth that seemed to hang abou
t him. The idea that she might be really mad had somehow dropped out of his mind. And he was still young enough to be incredulous of misery. He could not quite rid himself of the belief that if only he made a dash for it the net must somehow break, the sky must somehow clear, and it would all end up with Jane and Mark having tea together as if none of all this had happened.
He was out of the grounds now: he was crossing the road: he had entered the belt of trees. He stopped suddenly. Something impossible was happening. There was a figure before him on the path; a tall, very tall, slightly stooping figure, sauntering and humming a little dreary tune; the Deputy Director himself. And in one moment all that brittle hardihood was gone from Mark’s mood. He turned back. He stood in the road; this seemed to him the worst pain that he had ever felt. Then, tired, so tired that he felt his legs would hardly carry him, he walked very slowly back into Belbury.
III
Mr. MacPhee had a little room on the ground floor at the Manor which he called his office, and to which no woman was ever admitted except under his own conduct; and in this tidy but dusty apartment he sat with Jane Studdock shortly before dinner that evening, having invited her there to give her what he called “a brief, objective outline of the situation.”
“I should premise at the outset, Mrs. Studdock,” he said, “that I have known the Director for a great many years and that for most of his life he was a philologist. I’m not just satisfied myself that philology can be regarded as an exact science, but I mention the fact as a testimony to his general intellectual capacity. And, not to forejudge any issue, I will not say, as I would in ordinary conversation, that he has always been a man of what you might call an imaginative turn. His original name was Ransom.”
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