“Look at Mrs. Wynne, mother,” Marion said at last, in the old languid tone. “She seems distressed. It’s not a pretty scene. We ought to let her go.”
Mrs. Wynne sprang up. “I’m going. I can’t stand it. You two should be entirely apart—it’s monstrous. Is there no one who could take you, Marion, for a while? I will, if you like. I can’t stand by and let this be—it’s not safe; I feel responsible . . . Let her come to me!” She turned to the mother, speaking gently now: she had regained her self-control.
Mrs. Cameron, a biscuit at her lips, laughed slightingly. Her voice took a vile note as she replied: “I’ll keep my unfortunate daughter, thank you.”
“Then some day you’ll have to keep her in a mad-house,” Mrs. Wynne exclaimed, once more forgetting prudence.
“That’s no worse than the kind of house you’d keep her in.”
Mrs. Wynne did not hear; she was looking at Marion, who had got up again.
“Stop!” she cried.
But Marion laughed, and threw the biscuit-plate—now empty—in her mother’s face.
It grazed the skin, that was all. Mrs. Cameron wept, Marion stood and laughed. Mrs. Wynne took out her handkerchief to stop the blood. The plate lay whole upon the floor some distance off; it had fallen into a thick woolly rug. The blood soon ceased—it was the merest graze. Marion stopped laughing; and Mrs. Wynne escaped. There was nothing she could do, except go to Dr. Ferguson. He must insist upon the separate room, at any rate.
She went, straight from the hotel—she found him in and told her tale, and Dr. Ferguson confessed that he was anxious. He would see the Camerons tomorrow. As a measure of precaution—“you understand me?”—he had at first refused the separate bedroom; now he, too, considered it essential.
“There can be no doubt that the mother’s constant presence is injurious to Miss Cameron.”
“But what should make her so inhuman to the girl? It has been a strain for both, of course; but what happened to-day was more than nerves. I assure you, Dr. Ferguson, it looked like intentional persecution. Yet surely such things cannot be?”
The doctor thought awhile; then said, “Persecution, yes; intentional persecution (in your sense), no. Do you happen to have read what is now being published here about Freud, a German scientist, and his theory of the ‘suppressed wish’?”
Mrs. Wynne had not. He set it forth, rudimentarily—a subconscious motive, usually sexual in origin and sinister in aim, underlying the conscious will, and secretly inspiring the action. In certain conditions, it became the dominant impulse, potent above all others.
“That amiable old lady,” he continued, and as Mrs. Wynne exclaimed, he sagely smiled. “As she appears, or appeared, to us to be, and in her own view still is. She knows nothing of the ‘wish,’ you must consider, either as a psychological theory or in herself—the wish in her case being to dominate, nay, humiliate, her daughter. You have perceived this in her, and may even, being a woman” (he bowed), “have diagnosed it correctly as jealousy: no rare thing, as doubtless you are aware, in a mother towards her daughter, though here it takes a somewhat unusual form. It was awakened, as I early saw, in Mrs. Cameron by her daughter’s prominence during the Bergsma period.”
“It sounds more devilish than ever,” Mrs. Wynne exclaimed.
“You must remember that the state is pathological. To inhibit the ‘wish’ is not within the victim’s competence, did she even know that it exists. A pitiable condition—and the more because it engenders dislike in all who witness its effects.”
But Mrs. Wynne could feel no sense of mitigation; rather, the “Freudian wish,” in its gaunt determinism, seemed to add despair to all the other ills.
“And the unhappy girl!” she cried. “Is she to be condemned to this, because a German scientist has an interesting psychological theory?”
He had an indulgent smile for her feminine unreason. “Most natural—in a woman, most natural . . . But reflect that if the daughter’s martyrdom can be explained, it is not thereby increased.”
She groaned. “Explanations have a way of paralysing us, I think! What are you going to do?”
Dr. Ferguson stiffened a little. “What can be done, you may rest assured. The separate room, for example.”
His tone annoyed her. “Is that the certain panacea?”
“We are struggling against an occult force in human nature, Mrs. Wynne,” he said, more stiffly still.
“But we’re not sure it’s there; we have only this man’s word for it!” And as he shrugged, she exclaimed, “I want to take Marion away from her.”
“Do so, by all means, if you can compass it,” Dr. Ferguson more cordially rejoined.
“Meanwhile, I will ordain the lesser separation.” His gesture was dismissive, and she rose.
At the door she turned. “To-morrow?”
“Without delay,” the doctor promised, again somewhat stiffly.
But with the morning of the next day, very early, came the secretary of the Camerons’ hotel to Mrs. Wynne, who, going out, met her upon the doorstep, and when she learnt who it was, drew her at once into the dining-room. The woman, with a horrible detached annoyance in her manner, told her news. Mrs. Cameron had found her daughter dead in bed at six o’clock that morning—in the same room with herself.
“In the same room, Mrs. Wynne, lying in streams of blood.” The faded, worried eyes traversed Mrs. Wynne’s room curiously, as she talked on. “Miss Cameron had cut open a vein in her arm, and bled to death. Such a state as everything was in—I needn’t tell you!”
“It must have been,” Mrs. Wynne heard herself inanely answer. She looked at the secretary; there was a kind of pity in her horror at the woman’s callousness. She was so much the creature of her job that her blank face, if it could be said to wear any expression, wore only that of anger at the “state” of Marion’s bedclothes and the carpet by the bed.
“And the talk and annoyance in the hotel—it’s been bad enough without that; people leaving because of the old lady and her tempers. We all thought Miss Cameron would go out of her mind, three months ago, but she seemed better.”
“We were getting a separate bedroom ready for her yesterday, but Mrs. Cameron countermanded it. Well, she might have spared herself something, if she hadn’t—not that it would have made much difference, I suppose. And of course there’s any amount of trouble and annoyance before us—the inquest, and all the unpleasantness.”
The inquest . . . of course there would have to be one . . . How much could be kept back? Mrs. Wynne controlled her face and voice.
“I’ll come over at once and see Mrs. Cameron,” she said, though her soul fainted at thought of that interview.
“You won’t find her. You wouldn’t suppose that she’d be in and out of the house every minute, but that’s what she is, and looking so queer with that cut on her face”—the secretary glanced at Mrs. Wynne as she said this—“that she got at tea-time yesterday.”
The biscuit-plate—had either of the Camerons remembered to pick it up, or had a servant found it on the floor, so far from the tea-table? . . . Mrs. Wynne again controlled herself.
“That cut was nothing, I fancy; I remember noticing it yesterday afternoon. You say Mrs. Cameron won’t be in?”
“She was out when I left, at Dr. Ferguson’s; at least that’s where she told the taxi to go—she had a taxi, that time. He was at the house this morning, of course; but she said she must see him again. Goodness knows why.”
Even the gleam of curiosity was listless. Mrs. Wynne felt, with shuddering reassurance, that you could never fathom London’s indifference.
“I’ll wait, then; I won’t go back with you to the hotel,” she said.
“Mrs. Cameron spoke of you, this morning,” the woman apathetically remarked.
“And said what?”
“It’s not very pleasant to repeat, but perhaps I’d better. She said on no account to let you in.”
“I was more Miss Cameron’s friend than hers. It’s o
dd, though,” Mrs. Wynne returned, and hoped that she seemed only ordinarily troubled. “At such a time, however, one can’t wonder at anything . . . Is there nothing I can do to help in any way?”
“I don’t think so.” But the woman still sat, looking round the room, and Mrs. Wynne grew fidgety. She wanted her to go at once, that she herself might get to Dr. Ferguson’s before Mrs. Cameron should leave him. No place could be so good to meet, and they would have to speak together, let her knowledge be resented as it might.
The secretary seemed to feel at last that they had finished. She rose, but then she paused, and spoke with eyes averted.
“I found the plate myself,” she said, as impassively as before. “I happened to go into the drawing-room. I haven’t mentioned it.” She waited.
“The plate?” said Mrs. Wynne, in a strained voice of questioning.
The faded eyes met hers. “The biscuit-plate. It wasn’t broken, fortunately. We may as well leave it out, if we have anything to say at the inquest. It would be a nuisance, if . . .” She drifted to the door. “You see, I have to think of my employers. People hate a scandal about a private hotel; it ruins business. You won’t speak of it?”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Mrs. Wynne lied bravely.
The secretary looked at her again. “Something happened in the drawing-room,” she went on, unmoved. “Any fool could see that—and you were there at the time. But it’s just as well for me to know nothing about it, so don’t tell me if I’m right.”
With that, she opened the door at last; Mrs. Wynne went with her to the steps in a stunned silence.
As she drove to Dr. Ferguson’s, Mrs. Wynne reflected on his theory. It, like the biscuit-plate, would have to be kept dark! Even in her grief, she smiled at a quick thought. The Freudian Wish—and the Bergsma visiting-card . . . but such ironic fellowships would be the very core, no doubt, of speculations in this kind. Was it another Wish that put the silly strip of pasteboard in its halfpenny envelope? And had Marion had one too—did she “wish” Bergsma to know what had been done? For, without the card, she would have had her separate room; those words would not have sounded: “I’ve never left you alone for a single instant, and I never intend to . . .” Never alone from Mrs. Cameron, ridden by the Freudian Wish! A new burden had been bound upon humanity, if that frightful theory were true.
She was at once admitted at the doctor’s, for she sent in her card. As she drew it from the case, she wondered if she ever should do that again without a shudder—and knew that she would, that this would pass as all things pass . . . She entered the consulting-room—yes, Mrs. Cameron was there. Instantly the old woman sprang up, and stood defiant of her. But the doctor put his hand upon her arm.
“Keep quiet, Mrs. Cameron,” he said, with stern decision. “Sit down, Mrs. Wynne.”
Mrs. Wynne sat down. She felt horribly unpitying. Mrs. Cameron looked as usual—the pink face was a little pinker for the sticking-plaster on the cheek, which gave her a weird air of coquetry. Her mouth was quivering, but it looked more peevish than distressed . . . And she had seen that sight, not many hours ago!
“Go on with what you were telling me,” Dr. Ferguson said.
Still standing, with one hand on the table and her angry eyes on Mrs. Wynne, Mrs. Cameron obeyed eagerly, as if she trusted the man to be her friend against the woman.
She had evidently been telling him about the visiting-card.
“I thought it seemed unnecessary, but my opinion was that Marion and I should call. I considered it my duty to uphold Marion’s dignity.”
She stopped, still fixing Mrs. Wynne with her malignant eyes.
Mrs. Wynne dropped hers before them. A coroner’s jury would not have heard of Freud.
“Yes—your daughter’s dignity?” Dr. Ferguson said, smoothly. His eyes met Mrs. Wynne’s when she lifted her head again.
THE KING WAITS
Clemence Dane
(1888–1965)
“Clemence Dane” was the pseudonym of Winifred Ashton, who started adult life as an artist and actress before deteriorating health during World War One led her to begin writing. “The King Waits” was one of her first published stories, following Dane’s first novel, Regiment of Women (1917), notorious in its time for its portrayal of a lesbian schoolteacher at an all-girl’s school. “The King Waits” did not attract the attention that Regiment of Women did, or that Dane’s second novel, Legend (1919), did. (Legend also has a lesbian theme, leading to persistent speculation that Dane, who never married and had a “secretary-companion” of many years, was gay.) Dane began writing plays and found success in that medium, with her A Bill of Divorcement (1921) becoming a hit and eventually a 1932 film starring Katherine Hepburn and John Barrymore. Dane continued to write plays but added screenplays and mystery and fantasy novels to her résumé. In 1946 she won an Academy Award for Vacation From Marriage; among the literary set, she gained fame as one of Noel Coward’s “muses.” Later in life she edited a series of science fiction novels for a British publisher, publishing John Christopher and C.M. Kornbluth among others.
Dane was largely a mainstream writer—and, obviously, a successful one—but the supernatural can be found in some of her stories and novels, whether overtly, as in Legend and The Babylons (1927) and “Frau Holde” (1935), or more subtly, as in “The King Waits,” which is also notable for its portrayal of Anne Boleyn, who in Dane’s hands is neither evangelizing, religious, or remorseful, but proud and not a little frightening.
THE MORNING WAS a Friday, the month was May; it was the twenty-eighth year of the Eighth Henry’s reign over England, and it needed five minutes to be noon. On Richmond Hill, under the great spring-leaved oak, stood Henry the King. His outstretched hand commanded silence, and his huntsmen stilled the restless coupled hounds in dumb show, with furtive, sidelong glances, fearing that outstretched jewel-laden hand, that arrogant glance. Who will disobey Henry the King, calling in that furious voice for silence? Even the midday sun, as a little cloud slipped from its face, poured down such an answering concentration of heat upon the green hill-side that the noon hush seemed an act of grace from one royalty to another. There was instantly no sound at all save the panting of the half-throttled hounds and the dry whisper of innumerable caterpillars hissing in innumerable leaves; for there was a blight that spring in the oak-woods.
For one minute—two—three—the silence endured; then a burst of wind broke it: and all the trees in Richmond Park began once more to strain, creak, rustle, and the scent of the May drifted by again in gusts, and high overhead the clouds too renewed their voyage eastward through the heavenly blue. Over the Tower of London, as the wind lulled once more, they banked together again, a white tower of the sky.
Far below the scent of the white May drifted over the town and in through the windows, doorways, and courtyards of the Tower, and over the Tower green. Through slits in the wall the river sparkled in the noon sunshine; but still it lacked four minutes to be noon.
Across the green to the new scaffold came Anne the Queen, dressed in black damask with a white cape, and her hat was in the fashion. The Lieutenant of the Tower helped her to mount the steps. She had her glance and her nod for the waiting swordsman; then she looked down upon her friends and upon her enemies gathered close about her harsh death-bed; said to them that which was in her mind to say; adjusted her dress and freed the small neck; then knelt. But she would not let friend or enemy cover her eyes, and though she knelt she did not bow her head, but looked again keenly upon the silenced crowd: and for the last time called upon the ready blood to flush her cheeks.
She had always been able to redden thus into beauty when she chose; and now the hot blood did not fail her. It was at its old trick, brightening her black eyes: and this was ever the sign of crisis with her. With that sudden flush she had won her game—how often?—with this king and husband who had now beaten her. She felt a strange pang of longing to remember, to finger once again her glorious victories over time, absence, malice
, envy, a queen, a cardinal, a king—and her own resentful heart.
She was not used to deny herself any wish; so, lifting her head, she let the spell work for the last time: and her executioner, meeting that full glance, hesitated and turned aside, as if his part were not yet ready to be played. Again he advanced: again she looked at him, and had the last triumph of her beauty as she won her respite. He would wait her pleasure for a minute, no more than a minute; but she knew now that the tales they had told of drowning men were true. The dying see their lives in a minute: she, dying, would see again her life.
She turned her eyes away from the frightened faces of her women, from faithful Mary Wyatt’s weeping agony: she looked in turn upon her gaoler Kingston, on courteous Gwynn clutching in his hand her last gift, on thankless Cromwell, on Suffolk’s exultant face. But here her glance checked, her very heart checked on its beat, for beside Suffolk, her enemy, stood a nearer enemy; it seemed to her that her husband’s eyes glittered at her, set in a younger, comelier countenance. So Henry had sent his bastard to watch her die! She smiled to herself as she thought that it was like him, like her fool and tyrant, her Henry, husband, king! She thought that he himself would have been glad to watch her die: he could not for his dignity, so he sent his left-hand son, young Richmond. Yes, to act thus was like Henry, and young Richmond, watching her, was very like Henry: she had seen on many a May morning that eager parting of the full, pinched mouth, that glistening of small, hard eyes.
Suddenly her thirty-odd years of life began to speed across her eyeballs, quickly and softy, like the scudding clouds above her speeding over the Tower in the spring wind. Childhood and youth at Hever Castle—in a flash she saw those spring years pass, and herself journeying to France in the train of Henry’s sister. Little thought fifteen-year-old Anne Boleyn that she would ever call the Queen of France sister! But she saw herself, nevertheless, all unconscious, dancing, dressing, laughing, learning, learning always to be a queen. And so home again to England, to the Court at Windsor Castle, like that last lone small cloud above her scudding across the sky to join the massed castles of the air. And there she saw herself for a little while serving the good dull Katharine; but she had no memory of Katharine’s lord, Henry King of England. Another face and form flitted across her eyeballs, of another Henry—Henry Percy, heir to the dukedom of Northumberland.
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