The Dangerous Years

by Richard Church

  Joan, clumsy and still somewhat afraid in spite of her longing and her love, hesitated. But while she stood there, unable to say a word or to help him, John suddenly put his head in his hands and broke down. That woke her, released her. With a murmur of endearment, she took him in her arms, and they wept together.

  That night, he came through from his room, and for the succeeding nights they slept together, man and wife.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The Summit

  Returning to her room one morning, rather late and therefore anxious lest she should be observed, Mary Winterbourne had hardly settled herself into the cold bed before the maid knocked at the door.

  Mary suspected that the woman was not quite as respectful as she had formerly been. She could not point to an actual rudeness, or familiarity. She told herself that maybe it was only her uneasiness that made her see a change in the woman’s attitude. She watched her now, and observed the rapid glance round the room, and at the hastily-rumpled bed. Was there a gleam of amusement in that Latin eye, or was it censure? Mary forced herself to dismiss such conjecture, and to attend to the practical matter of receiving the tray with coffee and brioches—and a letter.

  “Oh!” she exclaimed, involuntarily. “A letter!”

  “Yes, madam. It will cheer your solitude,” said the maid, demurely smoothing the quilt to put down the tray on Mary’s knees.

  “My solitude? Oh yes,” replied Mary, after a second’s pause, that might have been anger, or shame. But she quickly filled the gap with self-assurance, endorsed by the years of maturity behind her. This was so authoritative that the maid looked up, her eyes bright not with criticism, but admiration. The two women were friends henceforth; a turn which gave Mary added confidence in her own conduct.

  This confidence had been growing as day succeeded day without anything disturbing the love affair. The sense of payment deferred, with which she had first entered upon the adventure, grew fainter and fainter. She had begun to look upon this fullness of life and love as something to which she had a right. She was prepared to pay for it, but in her own way, and that a completely unselfish and unindulgent way. Tom, her Tom, was to be renewed, given just that self-determination which he had hitherto lacked. And she could do it. Already he was more authoritative, more prepared to grasp facts and deal with them.

  She pondered on this as she reached for the letter. It was addressed by Joan’s hand. Mary stared at it, frightened, hopeful. This was the first communication since the girl had gone away; frightened away by disgust. That fact had to be faced now, for this letter might confirm it, and confirm it dreadfully. All the new pleasure in life, the rejuvenation, might be dashed by one word from Joan. Mary knew that, and her heart quailed. She held the letter unopened, summoning courage.

  After the maid had left the room, making some remark that Mary had responded to automatically, without hearing, the letter still lay impassively where Mary had replaced it on the tray. But now she took it up again and at last opened it.

  As though to reassure herself, she paused to hear Tom moving about overhead. The distant stropping of his razor, that marital sound, brought an everyday quality to the relationship, so healthy, so sane and workable.

  “Dear Mother,” said Joan, in a non-committal opening. The stropping ceased, and Tom must now be leaning forward, his ruddy cheeks emerging like those of a youth from the lather. Mary pictured this, with a wilful artfulness, seeking aid against what might be coming from Joan.

  “For give me for not writing before. Life has been very full here, with two males to look after. The small one is not the least of the two, I can assure you. But I have reason to be grateful to him, though I may be fanciful in saying so. I’ll tell you about that sometime, if I can. Mother dear, something has happened between John and me. The old misunderstanding has vanished. That is all I can say, and I really believe little Adrian, all unwittingly, has had much to do with it. I shall never forget that, though he’s a dangerous little Turk, and I am sorry for the women with whom he comes in contact later in life. They will find themselves powerless. Oh, Mother, I too am powerless. I wish I could say more, but I have yet to learn how to. You did not teach me that. Perhaps to-day you would be willing to, for I have thought, since we came to Paris, that something momentous has happened to you. I was frightened; but now I understand, and I can only love you all the more for being yourself, and true to yourself, if it is that way. I don’t know. I am still rather a novice. Do you see what I mean, and what has also happened here, between John and me? We are man and wife at last, darling, and I am so happy that I am afraid. I don’t know of what, but sometimes life is too good to be true. They are collecting the post now, so I can say no more. But things are happening, that is all. John and I both long for a family. We have discussed it—more than discussed. You know what I mean. Bless you, and please write to us and say something. Ever, Joan.”

  Mary read the letter without response. It could not be true. Mary was still half-engaged in the sweet aftermath of love, listening to the movements of the man from whose arms she had so recently crept. Then the full purport of Joan’s news came home to her. She re-read the letter, and a flush of tearful delight suffused her whole person. Her lips trembled, she groped for her handkerchief, but she had left it under Tom’s pillow. No matter, she must go and tell him. This made all the difference. Here was a full and final justification for everything. She carefully put the tray on the side-table, and got out of bed. Groping for her slippers, she blindly made her way to the door, fastening the cord of her dressing-gown.

  Careless of being observed, she fled upstairs and knocked at Tom’s door, immediately opening it. He was towelling his head, and now stood, hair ruffled, his face ruddy with friction, and surprise.

  “My dear,” he said, “what on earth? But do be careful, Mary. There are people about by this time.”

  She ignored this caution. Shutting the door, she approached him, with the letter in her hand.

  “Tom, from Joan. A letter, and it accepts everything. Oh, I can’t tell you what I feel. It confirms all that has been happening. I knew it. I knew that we were justified. You will see. Joan only further convinces me that we are right, Tom. Why should we frustrate our lives, so late too, when we have only ourselves to consider? Nobody is suffering on our account. And now that even Joan has realised, and learned to approve, the way is clear. Tom, I love you more than ever now. I need not disguise it. Whatever happens, I will be with you. I will come to the …”

  But Tom interrupted her by his embarrassment. He was still concerned about her being seen by the hotel staff, or other guests.

  “Take care, my dear,” he said, “don’t overdo things. It’s better to go slow for the moment. God knows we’ve been reckless enough. I never thought that at this time of life I should …”

  “Oh, stop harping on our age, Tom. You make me feel cold. Listen, Joan says that something has happened to them. They are happy at last, and she even dares to hope for a family. She says it is due to the boy. I don’t quite understand that. But that doesn’t matter. What does matter is that she now understands us and is willing to accept our relationship. It is all-important. You know what she means to me. For all those years she was all I had. It’s different now, but she is no less precious, though I was risking losing her. Don’t you understand?”

  She did not realise that her appeals to him to understand this or that aspect of things, in their love, in the situation, in its potentialities, were becoming increasingly frequent. He stared at her now, his face still ruddy, his eyes hungry.

  “Jolly good show, my dear. But look here, cut back to your room now, before we’re caught. I don’t like the idea of people talking about you. It’s the woman to whom the mud sticks in these affairs. I’m a bit old-fashioned, Mary. I’ll be down after we’ve had our coffee. The maid will be along here with mine now, so cut off before she comes, for heaven’s sake. Here, kiss me and run!”

  He put his arm round her shoulders, the towel
enveloping her, and they kissed, still with a touch of desperation, even after the night’s fullness. He stood behind the door and shut it after her.

  An hour later they met again in the lounge and went out together. The storm had dropped, and frost covered the city. Sunlight was already etching patterns of light on it, reversing the process of ‘gold falling sick, being touched by mercury’.

  “There’s more correspondence from London, about this wretched business,” said Tom, in reply to Mary’s query as to what they should do that day. “I ought to call in and see those damn lawyers. Luke said I must consult them at every turn: but he’s footing the bill, and it must be piling up.”

  Mary studied him while he was telling her this. She was nervous whenever he mentioned the matter, for his manner became equivocal; not quite dishonest, but vaguely disconcerting. She had determined to construe it as another aspect of the embarrassment which gripped him whenever money was mentioned. Money, she decided, was for him a symbol of failure, and he had a sense of inferiority about it.

  “Dearest,” she said, hesitantly, tucking her hand under his arm and trying to be as feminine as possible, “why can’t I help over this affair? I know nothing about it really. You have never fully explained. Only a hint here and there. I’m certain that something definite can be done, without all this waiting about. Are you satisfied, yourself, with the lawyers?”

  “There are two lots of them, my dear girl,” he said. “Our own family firm in London, and these people here who are working for them. I don’t know. I give it up. It was Luke’s suggestion that I should come over to Paris for a while, and keep out of the way.”

  “It sounds rather odd, Tom. It’s not in keeping, surely?”

  “No. But the whole business is out of keeping. I ought never to have dabbled in it. I know nothing about the City. But my general put me up to it. We left the Service together, and he went on to the Board of the Guaranty Trust, and took me with him. I suppose our names looked respectable on the notepaper. But I never knew what they were talking about at the Board meetings. It was like higher mathematics to me. I’d had no experience in that sort of stuff. All that side of the regimental work I left to our adjutant, a sound enough fellow. Nothing ever went wrong there.” He looked as rueful as a schoolboy who has overwound his watch. They walked on in silence for a while, Mary casting about in her mind how to suggest helping him without wounding his pride. In spite of his upstanding figure and handsome bearing, he looked defenceless, almost beaten. At least, so he appeared to her, and she wanted to fight the world on his behalf. Pressing his arm closer to her side, she appealed to him.

  “Of course not, darling. How could it? But what has gone wrong here? That is the problem I’m not clear about. You haven’t explained.”

  “I don’t quite grasp it, Mary, to tell you the truth. There is something about the balance sheets not being satisfactory. I had been away, to contact the agent in South Africa. D’you know, I’m inclined to suspect it was a bit of a ruse to get me out of the way? But that sounds like cheap melodrama. It can’t be true. At any rate, the night I got back the secretary of the company rang me up and said the balance sheets had to go to press next morning in order to be ready for the general meeting a couple of days later. They were waiting for my signature, the last one. He asked me to sign them that night if he brought them round. That’s all it amounts to. He came in late, had a drink and a chat, and we talked about my trip, and off he went. He, too, was a decent sort of chap: been in the Territorials during the war.”

  This explanation did not mean much to Mary, but she accepted it as a satisfactory light on Tom’s part in the business. She clung to him with an almost primitive possessiveness as they walked down to the Seine and along the Quai Voltaire, which they had joined at the bottom of the Rue du Bac. They had made no plan after all, for the matter in hand was too compelling. Both were wary of taking a false step as they discussed it. Tom was obviously ashamed of his stupidity over the whole business, and he was trying to hide this chagrin from Mary.

  They walked past the first island and crossed the bridges to the He St. Louis, round which they promenaded, breaking off from their preoccupation from time to time to admire the ancient town houses. The sunlight grew no stronger, for the cold lingered in the narrow streets. Patches of frost began to encroach again, and outside a slummy courtyard in the Rue St. Louis that threaded from end to end of the island, the elderly couple, bemused both by love and money, saw a puddle of dirty water flickering over with a tiny corrugation of new ice.

  “Oh, Tom!” exclaimed Mary, suddenly, as they moved on, “let’s forget everything unpleasant for to-day. I’m so happy, after all, that I don’t care what happens. We’ve got each other now, haven’t we; after what we have shared? It’s not been done lightly, Tom? Tell me that?”

  His reply was hardly coherent, so overcome was he by strong feeling. Walking down the middle of the dirty little street, they attracted attention because of the way they clung together, gazing into each other’s eyes like Aucassin and Nicolette in the morning of romance. Parisians glanced at them, it might have been with envy; it might have been with derision.

  “I feel so strong. We will face this together, Tom. And I don’t believe that they can touch you. I wish I could find somebody to confirm my faith. And now our next objective is to persuade your brother to let that child accept these contracts. It is absurd to waste such an opportunity. I should think even musicians would agree about that. Now Joan is happy, I can feel free to come with you to America, if you go as his manager. Together, we surely could look after him properly, and even convince his parents that we would. It would mean a fortune for him, and it would solve all your problems too.”

  This cheered Tom instantly. He was willing to be convinced, and while they walked back to the Carrefour de l’Odéon, to the restaurant where Mary and Joan had enjoyed a meal the day after they first came to Paris, and where she and Tom had since habituated, frequently bringing Aloysius Sturm with them, the infatuated lovers talked freely of the golden opportunities awaiting them in America, through the conjuration of little Adrian.

  They continued in this daydream during the first part of the meal, their confidence growing as they warmed under the caress of the carafe of Beaujolais. They had hardly finished their escalops, however, before Mr. Sturm entered, his venerable head appearing up the spiral staircase like that of a performing seal.

  “Ha! I expected to find you here. I went to your hotel, Colonel, and heard that you had gone out together. Now tell me, if I may intrude, tell me what does this signify? If ever I saw a couple of people really happy, and really happy, I see them now; and indeed I have been watching that happiness growing ever since I first had the pleasure of meeting this lovely little lady, Colonel; and I am presuming that you will not object to my calling her that, in your presence of course. I am an American, and used to being outspoken. A spade is a spade, and a most beautiful woman is a most beautiful woman, and that goes for me, I may say. Do I have to begin to congratulate anybody?”

  The English couple, who had undergone almost a change of character in the waters of love, were far from objecting to Mr. Sturm’s observations. They purred together. They were on top of the world, and could afford to accept tributes. The donor was welcomed, and he sat down with them and rearranged the meal, calling for a special bottle of Chambertin to celebrate his return from St. Moritz, and the joy of the couple at whom he gazed with the utmost benevolence. Mary began to see him through a haze of approval.

  “We have been talking about plans for the future,” she said later, over the coffee and cognac. “I propose to go to America with Tom when he takes his nephew.”

  Mr. Sturm was in process of cutting his cigar when she said this. He paused, looked up shrewdly, studying her features with something other than the sentimental benevolence which he had shown throughout the luncheon.

  “You mean precisely that?” he said, continuing with his small task. “And I take it, then, that there wi
ll be an interesting event before you go; is that so, Mrs. Winterbourne?”

  Mary, her mind subconsciously occupied with the hints in Joan’s letter, misconstrued his words.

  “But Joan is not sure. She cannot be.” She was inclined to be hurt that Joan could, so indiscriminately, have confided her hopes to this stranger during his twenty-four-hour visit to St. Moritz. But Mr. Sturm quickly corrected her.

  “I was referring, dear lady, to you and the colonel. I take it that if you are thinking of going to my country together, you will also be thinking of going as man and wife. There might otherwise be some slight difficulty, formalities maybe, but vexing ones.”

  Tom, at this, began to lose some of his easiness of manner. He looked almost in panic at Mary, but she appeared to be unshaken.

  “Of course, that will be arranged, Mr. Sturm. Colonel Batten’s wife, whom he has not seen for ten years, will have to be persuaded to relinquish her grip. She has nothing to gain, so far as I can see, by persisting in her present attitude.”

  “I gather that she is a Catholic,” said the American, studying the glass of brandy in his podgy hand. “That implies more than an attitude, perhaps. It might present difficulties, a matter of principle. I am a Catholic myself, Mrs. Winterbourne. I can appreciate the problem involved, you see.”