A Test to Destruction

by Henry Williamson

  That evening it was settled; for the moment. He would leave all his shares in the Firm to Hetty; and his house and diamond ring to Charley, with the use of the income under the Trust Fund until he died, then the capital to be divided between Petal and her brother, Young Charley.

  On the table beside them was the small mahogany box, inlaid with yellow wood, holding two packs of cards, with scoring disks of ivory set with dialled figures and silver markers.

  “What shall it be, Hetty? Bezique, or piquet tonight?”

  “Oh, before I forget, there’s a little matter I’d like to ask your advice about——” She went on hurriedly, “But I don’t want to tire you, Papa. Shall we play bezique?”

  “What’s on your mind, my girl?”

  She could not bring herself to face her hidden anxieties. Then with mixed relief and alarm she heard him saying, “I see Phillip’s little dog sometimes outside in the road, looking at the gate as though expecting to see his master arrive home any moment.”

  “Yes, I have often had to send Sprat away, now that he belongs to Mrs. Neville. He is such a dear, sensitive little creature, and curls round when I have to speak to him. Still, he is very happy with Mrs. Neville. I often think that dogs have a sixth sense, for he followed the postman up the road this evening—and there was a letter from Phillip, saying that he will be leaving Cannock Chase any day now, to be demobilised at the Crystal Palace!”

  “He will be going back to the office, then? He won’t like that at first, after his widening experiences, Hetty.”

  This gave an opening to say what had been worrying her. “I must tell you, Papa, that Phillip in all probability won’t be going back to the Moon.”

  “How’s that, Hetty?”

  She told her father what Richard had told her; how the General Manager had written to Phillip in March, and asked when he was going to be demobilised. No reply had been received. The General Manager had written again in July, saying that as no reply had been received to his earlier letter, he had to inform Phillip that no further payments of salary would be made; in the meantime he required a reply at his earliest convenience. That had also been ignored; whereupon a third letter had been sent, telling Phillip that as apparently he had no intention of returning to the Office, no doubt he would want to refund the money paid to him during the war.

  “Phillip did not answer that either, Papa.”

  “So he won’t be going back?”

  “No, Papa, I’m afraid not.”

  “D’you suppose he squandered the money on that woman in Folkestone, Hetty?”

  “Oh, I have never asked Phillip, Papa! I have never broached the subject, after that terrible time last summer.”

  *

  The ‘terrible time’ had begun with Elizabeth spending her holiday at Folkestone. It had been Hetty’s idea that if she and Phillip saw each other away from their home, it might be the beginning of a new and happier relationship. Like most of Hetty’s good intentions, it had had the opposite effect. She knew the letter Elizabeth had written, by heart.

  Everybody down here in Folkestone is talking about Phillip gadding about with the young wife of a General, who is abroad with the Occupation Army in Germany. They are always together. Phillip takes her openly on the back of his motorcycle, sitting on the carrier. She is notorious for picking up young officers, one of whom is that red-haired man we saw on the Hill with Gramps one day, the son of old Mr. Warbeck. He is a horrid young man, and usually the worse for drink, they say.

  I can’t bear the idea of anyone finding out that Phillip is my brother, so Nina and I are going down to Sandgate this evening to try and find the apartment where we all stayed when we were children—Aunt Dorrie and our cousins Gerrie and Maudie. Please can you send me £2, by return, to Poste Restante, Sandgate, Kent, as I have had to buy a new tennis frock, my old one is far too long in the skirt and right out of fashion …

  After posting the money, which meant that she would have to owe some housekeeping bills for the following week, Hetty had called in to see Mrs. Neville.

  “The last time Phillip came to see me, now I come to think of it, dear, I found him very reserved, in fact, not at all like the old Phillip. He hardly noticed Sprat at all—and you know how fond he used to be of him. There, you see? Sprat knows who I’m talking about!”

  She patted the sharp-nosed little dog. “Of course, dear, I could tell that there was something on Phillip’s mind, but knew he would tell me about it only if he wanted to——”

  Ominous words: it must be something awful, for Phillip not to have confided in Mrs. Neville, thought Hetty.

  Then Desmond had come on leave, and Phillip had arrived the same evening. When she learned that Phillip was proposing to take Desmond back to Folkestone with him for the week-end, Hetty had gone again to see Mrs. Neville. There she had a heart-to-heart talk. “But please, Mrs. Neville, never never let Phillip know that I have spoken to you, will you.”

  “I’ll have a private word with Desmond, don’t you worry, dear.”

  That Friday evening the two had gone off on the motorcycle to return soon after midday on the Saturday.

  Hetty had been in the kitchen, cooking an omelette for Elizabeth’s lunch, when she heard the rapid reports of the motorcycle coming up the road. Seeing the set look on Phillip’s face she feared the worst, as he and Desmond came unspeaking into the kitchen.

  “Mother! Did you ask Desmond to humiliate me in the eyes of my friend, Mrs. Fairfax.”

  “I—Phillip——? I don’t understand——”

  “We were guests in her house. We dined there, we slept in two camp beds in the attic room, we were given breakfast. When we were about to leave this morning, Desmond refused the hand of his hostess when she offered it. When Mrs. Fairfax asked if he had hurt his hand, Desmond said, keeping his hand in his pocket, ‘Oh, you and I do not need to shake hands, Mrs. Fairfax, we know each other too well.’ Is that correct, Desmond?”

  “Quite correct.”

  “Did I ask you for a reason?”

  “You did.”

  “Did you give a reason?”

  “I told you that I was not free to do so.”

  “Did you act like that deliberately?”

  “I did.”

  “To cause a breach in a friendship between Mrs. Fairfax and myself?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why did you act like that?”

  “To help bring to an end an impossible situation.”

  “You made it impossible!”

  “That may be so. But, in any case, it was quite plain to me that that fellow Colyer, who came up after dinner, was having an affaire with her.”

  “Mother, did you ask Desmond deliberately to humiliate me in the eyes of my friend?”

  “Yes, I did ask Desmond to help me, Phillip. I did not want you to ruin your whole life.” Her lips trembled. “After all, I am your Mother.” She could not keep the tears from falling. “I beg you, my son, to give me your promise not to see this lady again. Will you, for my sake?”

  She stood with her back to the gas stove, feeling that all the hopes of her life were in vain; while, as though from a sacrificial offering (Phillip thought later) pale blue smoke from the burning omelette began to arise and add one more layer to the congealed essences of thousands of frying pan and oven experiments which had darkened the varnish of the paper’d kitchen walls.

  “No, of course I will not give such a promise!”

  She made another effort. “Please tell me, Desmond! Has Phillip been co-habiting with Mrs. Fairfax?”

  Before Desmond could reply, Phillip said curtly, “Why must you depend on gossip to know about my affairs? Haven’t you had enough from Elizabeth whom you sent to spy on me?”

  Tears ran down her face puckered like a child’s, Phillip thought, holding himself apart from her feelings, blank within his own suffering. Hardness filled the blank when she said, “Desmond, do you think it would do any good if your mother and I went down to Folkestone?”

&
nbsp; Pointing at her, he shouted in sudden frenzy, “Mother! If you do that I will never see you again!”

  The front door had been left open; Elizabeth had come in softly, to stand listening. She moved forward.

  “Now you know the truth, Mother! You didn’t believe me before, did you? Now you can see for yourself what Phillip is really like!”

  “Mavis—Elizabeth—please—please—— There, you see what you have done? He has gone away.”

  “Yes, and good riddance to bad rubbish! Oh, is that my omelette burning? I shall be late for tennis, and Nina and I are in the semi-finals!”

  Hetty looked at her daughter, and something in her went blank. She said quietly, “Go now and change and I will do you another.” When Elizabeth had gone upstairs she said to Desmond, “I am most grateful for your help.”

  “I shouldn’t worry, Mrs. Maddison. She had obviously done with Phillip, in fact she was trying to get off with me, that’s why I refused to shake hands.”

  It was the brittle hardness, the sudden revelation of a selfishness that sometimes had possessed Phillip in boyhood, that remained to affect Hetty. He was not well. His outburst alarmed her, in that it had reminded her of Mavis when she was in demanding mood, stamping her foot, her voice harsh and near-guttural, until she dared not not give way lest the girl fall into one of her ‘attacks.’ Mavis had been like that ever since she had been sent away with Phillip, at the turn of the century, to their Aunt Victoria at Epsom, during the scarlet fever epidemic, crying to her outside the door of the sick room, ‘Don’t lose me, Mummy! Don’t lose me! Please don’t lose me, Mummy!’ Later, she had had fits—the fear-filled face crying ‘Mother,’ ‘Mother,’ ‘Mother’—the child who had never really been able to stand on her own feet had grown into the young woman—‘Money,’ ‘Money,’ ‘Money’!

  *

  After leaving Landguard Phillip had spent a month at the Dispersal Unit at Shorncliffe. Troops from France had been marched there after disembarkation at the docks of Dover and Folkestone, to hand over arms and equipment and be demobilised. There had been little work to do. He had spent most of the month of cold weather snug in his cubicle reading, and smoking French cigars which could be bought cheaply from the returning soldiers. The books had come from a Sandgate lending library. He had progressed from Galsworthy to Hardy, and back to Conrad—the possibilities of a new world opened upon him as, feet extended to the glowing stove, blanket hung across window, he lay back in a battered Morris arm-chair and began to feel that he had the power to write scenes in the style of those arising from the printed pages.

  One night an unexpected visitor called to see him. It was his cousin Willie, filled with the grandeur of a book he had found in a secondhand shop in Folkestone. Willie declared that he was never going back to an office life; on the contrary, after demobilisation he intended to walk to the West Country and live a life next to nature. He read rapturously from the book, which was The Story of My Heart by Richard Jefferies. The next morning he left, leaving another blank in Phillip’s life.

  In April Phillip was appointed to the adjutancy of a Rest Camp just behind the Leas of Folkestone. Just before this, at a dance given by the Dispersal Unit in the town, he had met a beautiful girl who had been brought by a red-headed R.A.F. officer. The three had become acquainted. The R.A.F. officer, who had the scars of a crash on his face, had shown jealousy, revealed in a manner of aloof scorn.

  The girl, who said she was Mrs. d’Arcy Fairfax, took a fancy to Phillip, tall and aloof in his ‘blues’ adorned by two ribands. He thought she was the most natural person he had ever met, and wrote in his diary, early the next morning, that it was wonderful to be friends with such a rare, happy spirit, so understanding and generous, and ‘entirely devoid of any ulterior thoughts, since she is obviously very happily married, and has a little girl of her own.’

  The Rest Camp was a couple of acres of commandeered buildings, pre-war boarding houses and hotels, used as a hostel for troops coming on leave from, and returning to, the Rhineland Army. Phillip found the work in the orderly-room to be negligible, a mere signing of returns, which took him less than an hour every day.

  The first weeks of spring were a time of pleasure, shadowed only by occasional dark thoughts that he was barred forever from physical love: not that he had the least idea of any affaire with Eveline Fairfax, quite apart from the fact that she had a soldier husband in the Army of the Rhine—a question of honour. Anyhow, their friendship, he told himself, was not based on ‘anything like that.’

  The earlier symptoms of infection had disappeared; he had seen no doctor since leaving Felixstowe. He thought that the disease had ‘gone into his blood.’

  One day Eve, as he called her, had asked him if he had ever had experience with a woman. The question appalled him, for it had been made when she had impulsively taken his hand while they were sitting by the sea and kissed it; and he had felt that poignancy which meant he might be going to fall in love with her. That would be too awful, for he was virtually a pariah.

  “Oh, I’ve just remembered something I wanted to tell you, Eve! You know that the London agents promised me the first Brooklands Road Special Norton they received from Birmingham? Well, I had a letter this morning, saying it had come, and was at their showrooms in Great Portland Street!”

  “Wonderful news, my dear! Simply wonderful! No wonder your mind is preoccupied. I can compete for your interest with old Hardy and old Conrad, but not with a new motorcycle! You might be out of a book yourself—the strong, silent Englishman of fiction, at the same time boyish—oh damn you, why do you mock me!?”

  That night she taught him to kiss, gently plucking with the lips before the full conjoined softness which worried him in case his breath smelt of rank cigars and possibly decayed teeth—for he had not been to a dentist during the entire war. The next day he went up to London, to collect the longed-for bike.

  *

  The salesman in Great Portland Street said they had taken the Norton out of the window, since so many enquiries had been made about it. He could have sold it fifty times over; so he had put it in a back room.

  It was beautiful, long in the wheel-base, with a greyhound simplicity enhanced by the nickel-plated exhaust pipe curving down from the exhaust port to lie parallel with, and eight inches off the ground, and extending to behind the back wheel. The pipe was two inches in diameter, with a note like an organ pipe when the salesman, a pilot recently demobbed from the R.A.F., had raised the back wheel on the stand—the machine weighed only 200 lb.—and pulled over the wheel.

  “Lovely sound, isn’t it? Two hundred and forty revs on the pilot jet. You can paddle off at walking pace. She’ll fire at the drop of the valve lifter. Top speed? Oh, she’ll easily run up to three thousand six hundred revs on full throttle. Flexible job, this engine, considering the long stroke and high compression.”

  “The engine runs with little bubbles of sound!”

  He stood back to admire the lines of the machine. The handlebars were set wide for control at speed; the grey tank, flat like a wild-fowling punt, extended back to the saddle pillion, where it tapered off. The pearl-grey of its paint, under a coat of clear varnish, was lined out in red; proudly on the bows the word Norton proclaimed the inventor, the capital N of which flowed back to cover all the other letters, like a guardian wing.

  “One feels like a jockey, lying across the back of a horse. Or a greyhound!” he said, bestriding it, holding the grips.

  The salesman pointed out the wide cooling flanges and fins of the cylinder, black with graphite; the new model of the B. & B. carburettor, with tapered needle lifting in the barrel as the throttle opened, thus allowing more petrol to be sucked up through the jet, he explained—giving infinite variation, from tick-over to full throttle. “She lapped Brooklands at 74 m.p.h.”

  The foot-rests were set back so that the rider’s heels tailed off from his body lying forward over the tank like a pulled-out Z, he saw in a wide looking glass on the wall.


  “I’ve got a pair of rubber knee grips, in case you want them,” went on the salesman.

  Phillip could not find a mark, much less a scratch, anywhere on his splendid Norton, and no signs of wear on the blue rubber-and-canvas belt to the back wheel. How did the Phillipson variable pulley work, he asked.

  “It automatically expands to give a lower ratio with the v-pulley on the back wheel when the engine labours.”

  “What is the top ratio?”

  “It’s set at 4¾ to 1 at the moment. I think you’ll find that all right, for traffic down the Old Kent Road. There’s not much about on Tuesdays. A touch of the shoe-sole on that outer flange—it’s phosphor-bronze, which is malleable as you know—and the pulley automatically opens against the broad coil-spring within the flange. Normally it’s kept wound up by the engine thrust. Neat little job, don’t you think?”

  “I’m a bit scared of its speed. The first time I rode a motorbike, I went straight into a lamp-post.”

  “You’ll find her very docile. Go easy for the first hundred miles, won’t you? The bearings like to bed themselves in gradually, of course. Keep to a steady forty, don’t let her labour, and you’ll be all right.”

  “How about petrol and oil?”

  “I’ve put some in for you. The tank holds just over three gallons, I tipped in a can, that should get you to Folkestone with about a gallon left.”

  “Is this the way out?”

  “Yes. Er—just a little matter—— I’ve got the bill here for you. You paid a tenner, that leaves eighty-two odd quid.”

  New knee-grips laced criss-cross over the tank, new horn clipped above the throttle controls, receipt in pocket: he wheeled her into the street. He had a 5s. driving licence, the other didn’t matter, he had never bought one for his two previous mounts and certainly wasn’t going to bother about such civvy nonsense now.

  Wheeling her round the corner of the street out of sight of all salesmen, he quickened the pace, dropped the valve-lifter, and vaulted into the saddle. At first, owing to the extended position, he swayed across the road, but recovered, and stopped to get used to the feel of stretching forward on cork grips.