Love and the Loveless

by Henry Williamson

  She: “Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs! whence came ye,

  So many, and so many, and such glee?

  Why have ye left your Bushey haunts, why left

  Your nuts in oak-tree cleft?”

  He: “For wine, we follow Bacchus through the earth;

  Great god of breathless cups and chirping mirth!

  Come hither, lady fair, and joinèd be

  To our mad minstrelsy”

  Phillip knew the poem; they were jumping over the lines, picking pieces to suit themselves. There were tears in the eyes of the girl as she said,

  “Like an own babe I nurse thee on my breast:

  I thought to leave thee,

  And deceive thee,

  But now of all the world I love thee best.

  There There is no one,

  No, no, not one

  But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid;

  Thou art her mother,

  And her brother,

  Her playmate, and her wooer in the shade.”

  “That’s very pretty, dear,” said the voice of Flossie Flowers.

  Hardly had she spoken, when another voice with an exaggeratedly genteel accent said, “All the same, y-ew can’t beat Robert W. Service!” The voice, the manner, the attitude, the appearance of the man seemed out of keeping with the rest of the crowd. He was noticeable because he was the only one in fancy dress. He wore a white wig tied behind by a black bow, and there was so much lace at the sleeve-ends of his dark velvet cutaway jacket that he had to hold up his right arm and wiggle it before he could grasp the glass which he had left, after a sip, beside a potted palm. His kilt was a pattern of large yellow and red chequers, like the stockings he wore with buckled shoes.

  “I said, y-ew can’t beat Robert W. Service!”

  “Who are you?” asked Flossie Flowers, turning to stare at the speaker. “How did you get in here?”

  “I came here to meet my uncle, Miss Flowers. You know him, I think I’m right in saying, Miss Flowers!”

  “Your uncle? Who’s yer uncle?”

  “Don’t you know, Miss Flowers?”

  “No, I don’t! I don’t know your uncle, and I don’t want to know ’im, whoever he is. The sight of his nephew is enough. Now, dear,” to the beautiful young woman and her escort, “you two turtle doves get on with your piece. And if you, in that ridiculous outfit,” turning to the aggrieved young man, “interrupt again, I’ll have you put out!” Her face became mottled; her first nature had overtaken the façade of refinement. “I can do without your sort in my ’otel!” She walked after the retreating Prince Charlie.

  “Let’s flee to Eighty-eight!” Phillip heard the girl say, and with a pang watched the two moving away.

  Looking around for ‘Spectre’ West, he saw that he was with Sasha. She was holding his arm, as though caressing it. He heard her say, “No, darling, of course not——” and thought that they had been talking about him. It was a shock. He had been feeding on the idea of her coming into his room later that night. Well, he was glad that it was Westy she preferred. This time it would not be like Desmond and Lily. Should he leave at once? He knew no-one. Standing irresolute, he overheard talk between the playwright and another man.

  “Rough diamond, Freddy.”

  “More like the top, or should I say bottom, of a lemonade bottle, Hugo.”

  “The rot’s started, Freddy. This pub never had fairies in before. Not that I’m agin ’em. But not here, what?”

  “Flossie’s gettin’ a bit rough, Hugo. Who is his uncle? Looks like a Grouse and Claret. Or would you say a Jock Scot?”

  “Looks more like a Parmachene Belle to me, Freddy.”

  “Parmachene Belle! Sounds like a Mason-Dixie railway engine. Good title for a musical, ‘The Parmachene Belle.’ Where did you get it?”

  “It’s the name of a Canadian fly, Freddy.”

  The playwright called Freddy shot his cuffs, and squared his shoulders. He was wearing a dinner jacket, like many others, obviously soldiers, on leave.

  Miss Flowers came up. “Wonder if the flycops put in a nark, Freddy. Let’s have a little drink. Lord Streaky ’as made too much money, so why shouldn’t the soldier boys drink his health on New Year’s Eve?”

  “Who is the Parmachene Belle, Flossie?”

  “Him? I dunno, Freddy. Oh Gawd, here he comes again. Let’s take cover in the cellar, boys, and have a little drink.”

  Prince Charlie, with wretched eyes, came up.

  “On my word of honour, Miss Flowers, you do know my uncle!”

  “Well, tell us his name, dear,” she simpered.

  “I’ve been trying to tell you, Miss Flowers. Willie Clarkson!”

  Flossie Flowers guffawed, and said, “There’s no such bloody man!” She took his hand, continuing in her society voice, “All right, I wasn’t serious. Willie’s my dearest friend! So you’re his nephew, well well! Of course, I remember now. You’re part of a trapeze act at the Coliseum aren’t you?”

  “That’s right, Miss Flowers! The Three Macs! I also recite!”

  In her cockney voice, “Yes, Uncle Willie told me you did, only keep it dark. There’s only two people allowed to recite ’ere, and you’re not one of them. I can take this nonsense”—shaking the hairy sporran with her hand—“but not the Green Eye of the Little Yellow God stuff. Oh hell, what’s the odds? What’s your name? Bobby? You’re all right, Bobby. Well, about Uncle Willie. We all love him, so don’t be hurt by this little story. When he’d come back from Buck House after fixin’ up Royalty for charades—you know the story he tells—George Graves kidded him up that he was to be knighted. Uncle Willie was in a state! It was a shame, really, Bobby! Uncle Willie expected a call any moment, and after awhile when it didn’t come he got George Graves to try and find out what was holding it up. George comes back and says that H.M. was waiting there, sword drawn all ready, and taking practice jabs at the curtains, just like Hamlet. ‘Send for the man, whatsisname, that actor feller,’ says H.M. ‘But first tell me his name, so I don’t fix upon him some other pore innocent, inoffensive bastard’s name for the rest of his natural.’ Jab, right through the arras! ‘Come on, what’s the feller’s name?’ ‘Willie Clarkson, Your Majesty,’ replies Gold Stick in Waiting. ‘What name did you say?’ asks His Majesty. ‘Willie Clarkson, sir.’ ‘Willie Clarkson?’ shouts the King. ‘Are you trying to be funny? There’s no such bloody man!’ And with that he swishes the sword back in the scabbard and goes off in a rage. ‘There’s no such bloody man!’”

  “It’s just a gag, of course!” laughed the exaggeratedly genteel voice of Bobby. “I don’t believe a word of it, so there!”

  “Well, enjoy yourself, Bobby. But no gettin’ off in my ’otel! Or out you go! See?”

  Poor little creature, thought Phillip. So that was a fairy. Then they did actually exist. The fairy was biting his lip, his hands clenched.

  Depression became black. He did not know anyone, either. He looked for Westy and Sasha. People at tables were in parties, laughing and talking happily. He went out into the street. It was nearly midnight. A black police van was waiting round the corner.

  Wild cries echoed down the ravine of the street, alcoholic yells of abandon to happiness—for the moment. From afar came a shriek. His stomach turned acid by inferior wine, he thought wildly of the loneliness of life, of Eugene perhaps in his flat all alone. He had written to tell Gene that he was back; but nothing further. And his own home? Father, Mother, the girls, waiting up in the sitting-room, for the stroke of midnight—the sherry decanter already taken from the mahogany cupboard below the book-case with the Gothic glass front. Father solemnly filling the little glasses three-quarters full—then looking at his watch—“Well, I think we are almost in the New Year, Hetty”—and rising out of the armchair—“Here’s to your very good health, all of you——” Mother saying, too quickly, “And absent friends—including Phillip! We mustn’t forget Phillip——” “I was not forgetting Phillip. I was about to propose his health——”
then everyone raising the little, rather heavy, old-fashioned, ornate cut-glasses, and sipping.

  He looked at his watch—ten minutes to twelve; and overcoming a desire to walk away, returned to the hotel, remembering that he was Westy’s guest.

  The dance room across the courtyard was crowded. To his surprise he saw that the band was changed—five negroes now sat on the dais, playing a foxtrot. One of them, the drummer, struck a suspended cymbal with his stick. And then, with arm upraised, his ebon electric energy demanding attention, he laughed gutterally and cried, “‘The Black-eyed Susans’!”

  Cheers greeted the announcement; and squeaky, brazen din began. Moving past the dancers, he saw Sasha at her table, with ‘Spectre’ and others. He pretended not to see; but to be still searching. Then she got up, and was coming toward him, holding her jewelled vanity bag. Still he pretended not to see her, until the last moment, to prolong the feeling of being wanted by her.

  “Darling, you look so utterly lost! Where have you been?”

  “Oh, I went outside for a bit.”

  “We’ve been looking for you. Come and join us, it’s nearly the New Year. Isn’t it thrilling! A new New Year! All our very own, to do just what we want to with! I’m rather tipsy, darling, I’ve had too much champagne!”

  She took his arm, he went gladly. Her legless husband, sitting there, greeting him with a smile of splendid teeth. He looked keen and bronzed of face, as though he had been in the sun.

  “Rollo’s just back from the Riviera! Isn’t he splendid?” Rollo moved his wheeled chair, pulled another up beside him. “Come and sit down, Maddison. It’s just about midnight.”

  The band stopped. Scattered cries and clapping were lost in cheers. Boom-boom-boom on the big drum.

  “I guess thar’s one min’t t’go, la’s gen’mn!” cried the band leader.

  A circular line began to form around the floor. People got up from tables to join in. He wondered about Rollo in the wheeled chair—should he remain with him—but of course, Sasha was taking him. He hung back pretending to watch with interest. “Come on, darling!” He hastened forward; but seeing Westy standing by the wall, moved to stand beside him.

  “Hullo, Westy.”

  “Where did you get to?”

  “I went for a walk outside.”

  “Have you had any supper?”

  “Not yet.”

  “You’ll be lucky to find anything left at the buffet.”

  “I’m not hungry, thanks.”

  A prolonged roll on the side-drum, followed by bump-bump-bump-BUMP! of the big drum, the nasal voice of the band leader throwing into the room, lariat-like, the curving phrase, “I guess this is it, la’s gen’mn,” with smiling flash of teeth; then taking up his trumpet, he blew a long high blast which shaped itself into Should Auld Acquaintance Be Forgot, while hands were held out to make a chain around the floor.

  “Come on, everybody!” cried Flossie in her society voice, as she led “Spectre” West into the throng, followed by Phillip. The wheeled chair made for them—he crossed hands with Rollo, pretending not to see the outheld hand of Sasha, hurting himself a little while wanting to hurt her by keeping away from her. She linked up with Westy. He imagined her in Westy’s bed, but was unable to see in his mind what Westy would do; was he, too, “an icicle, whose thawing is its dying”? Was he still faithful to Frances, because she had not been able to return his love? Yet if he could yield to Sasha, she ought to be lovely for him.

  He swung his arms, holding to ‘Spectre’ West’s wrist beyond the black hand, and to Flossie’s fat hand, hard with rings, on the other, making up words for the song.

  Should auld acquaintance be forgot

  Then blast my bloody eyne,

  O take a cup too many, boys,

  But don’t fall in the Rhine!

  Cheers, yells, rattle of hunting horns; pop of corks everywhere. Drink to the New Year. Victory! To hell with D.O.R.A.! The man with hairy hands, wrists, ears, and nose called Hugo, drinking a toast with Prince Charlie, who looked coy and yielding. The Negro band bombilating away, the leader grating out You Great Big Beautiful Doll. Freddy saying to another man, “Hugo’ll get a whopping big bill from Flossie, although all the wine he’s had, six bottles, came from ‘Streaky’ Southbend’s bin. Just like the old bitch. She sent me in a bill last October for a hundred and twenty pounds. I didn’t pay it, and a month later for a hundred and forty, although I didn’t come here once after I’d got the first bill. So I paid the first one she sent in, and she let it go at that.”

  Phillip remembered this conversation when, a month or so later, he got a bill for £37 for “Cocktails and Wine”.

  Sometime later on a snake was formed, of men holding on to the shoulders of the one in front if a man, and to the waist, if a young woman. The snake went up the stairs, and into the bedrooms, hauling out any would-be sleepers or courting couples. Two doors were burst off their locks by Hugo’s shoulders, angry complaints smothered by cries and laughter. From room to room the snake went, from floor to floor, except the garrets which were the servants’ quarters. Then out into the frozen street, just to show the fly-cops, as Flossie called them, where they got off.

  “The fly-cops are always trying to pinch me,” she said, her Cockney voice released by drink. “Go on, everyone, let ’em try and pinch you for loiterin’ and accostin’, the flat-feet!”

  Many went back, to avoid the cold; about a score went on, to find a lamp-post with a ladder-bar at the top. There was a bet on: Hugo had laid a level pony with Valentine that Prince Charlie could swing a complete circle. Valentine, apparently, did not know about the trapeze act at the Coliseum. At last a suitable lamp-post was found in a cul-de-sac, near a tree. There Prince Charlie removed his wig, jacket, shirt and vest, and swarmed up in little more than his kilt and stockings. He reached the cross bar, launched himself upon it, and began to swing. The swings were about level when Phillip noticed the black van drawing up at the entrance of the court. Two policemen got out, and watched.

  Everyone under the lamp-post looked at the swinging figure.

  “Three hundred degrees,” announced Hugo.

  “The question is, will he whirl?” said Freddy.

  “Three hundred and twenty degrees—keep it up, Bobby!” cried Hugo.

  Grunts seemed to tear the swinger. Up one side almost to the vertical—a pause——

  “Three hundred and forty degrees. You’ll do it, Bobby!”

  “Oh dear, he’s almost en déshabillé!” exclaimed Freddy, with an assumed lisp, “How shocking! Indecent exposure, my dear!”.

  The kilt was almost an inverted parachute.

  “Goodness gracious, I hope he won’t catch cold, Hugo!”

  The rise; first showing his front almost vertical, then his back. The kilt was on the point of collapse when the police officers came down.

  “Move along,” said one. “Don’t you know there’s a war on?”

  “Keep going, Bobby. Three hundred and fifty degrees, old boy!”

  “Come along, get a move on!”

  “Wait, constable, wait, dear boy!” said Freddy. “The great question is—will Colonel Parmachene-Belle be able to make it, as the Yanks say? Don’t forget it’s adding to the gaiety of nations, and therefore to the war effort, officer!”

  “Are you trying to be funny?”

  “All my life, alas, I am trying to be funny, officer,” said Freddy. “I must send you some tickets for my play. Good God, can you beat that? Three months on the Western Front, just home on leave, and as fit as a fiddle! The war’s as good as over, officer!”

  Cheering broke out around the lamp post. As though frozen, the swinger remained inverted, exactly upright, on balance at 90 degrees to the ground, while his eyes stared down at the police. At that moment searchlights opened up, in the reflected light of which the white figure, clothed from the waist downwards by the kilt, was clearly revealed.

  “We’ve seen enough,” said the policemen. Names were taken; and Colonel P
armachene-Belle, carrying an armful of clothes, was pushed into the Black Maria. Hugo and others went to bail him out; Phillip slipped back to the hotel.

  *

  Sometime later he went up to his bedroom, leaving the noisy throng below. He was in bed, with the bed-light still on, wondering if he dare go in to see ‘Spectre’ in the adjoining bedroom, when Sasha, wearing a dressing-gown, came in. “Oh, darling, I’ve found you at last!”

  She sat on the edge of the bed. “Where have you been?” He told her. “You looked so surprised when I came in. As though you’d seen a ghost.”

  “I thought that perhaps you’d——”

  “Given you up? Oh, Phillip, how little you know women.”

  “How is Rollo?”

  “Sleeping blissfully, the babe. You look tired, my lamb. You’re shivering. You’re cold! I must warm you.” She got in beside him, turned over, and looked at his face. “You have such a gentle mouth, darling. Are you still thinking about Lily, that saintly person?”

  “I think of her sometimes, Sasha.”

  “She would want you to be happy, darling. The dead are not jealous, I am sure. A little curious perhaps—faintly curious. They know, I believe, in some remote way, that love is the same in life as in death.”

  “Yes, Sasha.”

  “Darling Phillip.”

  “Sasha, have you seen Westy?”

  “Not since I said goodnight to him downstairs, darling.”

  “I was wondering about you and him.”

  “Of course, how natural! I love Harold, but I am not much good for him, darling. He’s quite locked away. And so desperately sad, deep inside. Don’t be too sad for your friend, darling. You’re not too deeply sad inside, are you? You mustn’t be. Lily loves you, and wants you to be happy.”

  He felt a hypocrite. Lily was poetry, which was beauty, and truth; but it was not of Lily that he had been thinking all the evening. And yet now that Sasha was beside him, he was thinking of Lily.

  “You sighed, darling. I’ll leave you to sleep.”

  “Don’t go, Sasha.”

  “Very well, darling. Now sleep—and do not worry that dear head of yours.” She turned off the light.