A Man of Forty

by Gerald Bullet

  “Why Paul, darling?” said Mary again. “ What has Paul to do with it?”

  “It’s not Paul in himself,” said David, “ though that’s a problem too. It’s Paul in relation to his mother, and… and what she may do to him. To his mind if… if nothing else. When the horizon clears a bit, we can go ahead with everything,” he continued, nervously glib. Once everything’s arranged, she’ll be generous and helpful, I’m sure of that. Just now she’s not herself.” Feeling half-responsible for Lydia’s behaviour, in his mind he was pleading with Mary not to judge it too harshly. “ She’s been shaken up by all this. I hardly know her, she’s so different.”

  Mary gave him a considering look. “ Are you so fond of her?”

  He shrugged his shoulders, deprecating the question. “ Let’s talk of something else.”

  Mary turned her head away. “ But can we?’

  “Of course we can. What do you mean, darling?”

  “We’ve let her come between us,” Mary said.

  Terror leapt in him. “ For God’s sake don’t say that!”

  “Well, haven’t we?”

  “No,” said David. He spoke curtly, refusing to face the half truth she had uttered.

  After a silence Mary remarked, apropos of nothing : “ Aunt Allie’s coming tomorrow, to stay a night or two.”

  David welcomed the change of subject. “ Who in the world is Aunt Allie?”

  “My great-aunt Hinksey. All the morals in the family went to her. The rest of us had to go short.”

  David laughed. “ Good job too.” But an uncomfortable possibility occurred to him. “ It won’t affect our meeting will it?”

  “I’m afraid it will, David. She’s rather a handful, Aunt Allie is. She’ll expect her brother’s dear little granddaughter to be around to entertain her.”

  “But surely,” said David, “ you can slip away for an hour or two?”

  She shook her head. “ It’ll only be three days.”

  “Do you mean I’m not to see you for three days?” Deep in love though he was, the idea crossed his mind that she was perhaps using Aunt Allie as a pretext; making herself less easy of access; increasing demand by reducing supply. “ It’s an eternity,” he complained.

  “You don’t suppose I like it, do you?” said Mary. The quality of her smile set his unworthy doubts at rest. “ But it won’t hurt us for once. And it’ll give you time to get things straight in your mind.”

  “That’s true,” admitted David, making the best of it. “ Today’s Friday. Can we meet here on Monday? At three o’clock, say?”

  “Yes. I think she’ll be gone by then.”

  “But supposing she’s not?” he said discontentedly.

  “Then I’ll come all the same.”

  The promise restored him. He put an arm round her shoulders and drew her towards him. She lay passive and loving in his arms, but her eyes, he thought, had an absent look.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing,” she answered, looking away from him.

  “Tell me your thoughts.”

  “I’m not good at thoughts, David. You think too much.” She put her hand on the ground and pushed herself into a sitting posture. “ Is there anybody coming?”

  He looked : this way, that way. “ No. Nobody at all.”

  “I heard footsteps,” she said.

  “Someone on the road.” This anxiety was unlike her, and he suspected that she was trying to divert him from the subject. “ Why do you say I think too much?”

  Those words, though lightly spoken, had cut deep : for they expressed, as he had never dared express it himself, a secret fear in him. I don’t live : I dream of living. There’s something radically wrong with me; a sleepy sickness, a poison in the blood; something that drives me to encompass my own failure rather than let me be involved, by success, in action. Always I adapt myself to circumstances instead of changing them. And so it will always be, world without end. The memory of Bledlow made his self-reproach the more bitter. If once, why not again?

  The storm in him rose and subsided, and he hid his anxiety behind the customary amused, half-quizzing smile. He could feel it stuck on his face : the typical pretender’s smile, he thought.

  Mary took him gently by the ears and pulled his face towards hers.

  “Why do we waste so much time talking?” she said.

  Her mouth twisted into the sweetest, subtlest smile : a smile with a hint of pain as well as pleasure in it, or of something far beyond either. Kissing lightly, tenderly, avidly, first in a half-incredulous adoration, and then in a kind of anger, he entered with her an innermost paradise of the senses, filled with the touch and intoxicating scent of her flesh, mystery of mysteries, all beauty incarnate, until presently, his eyes becoming hungry again for the sight of her, which this nearness shut out, he drew a little away and looked down on her face, stroking it with a feather-touch of his fingers. At the same instant the world broke in. A motorist hooted on the nearby road, and the mills of thought resumed their fell industry, grinding his jewel into dust.

  § 9

  He went on Monday to the appointed place, burning with the ardour of a new resolve. It was three o’clock and Mary had not come. During Saturday and Sunday he had thought and thought and come to the end of thinking. Mary, Lydia, Paul : he saw at last that so long as one looked at that problem it must for ever stay unsolved; so long as one continued to ask which course of action, this or that, would do the less harm, have the happier results, yield the greater good to the greater number, so long would the mind remain miserably suspended between two incalculables. The only thing to do was to stop thinking, narcotize the brain, and act. I want Mary, and I will have her. This, he said, is my decision. All that remained to be done, before telling Lydia, was to see Mary and plan details with her, fixing time and place. But the hands of his watch moved on to half-past three, and still Mary had not come. He was in a fever of impatience to announce his decision to Mary, obscurely knowing that by doing so he would make sure not only of her but of himself. Until Mary were told, he was not committed; and until he were committed and the plan thereby objectified, what guarantee had he that this decision was not, like so many of his ideas, a private dream, a promise made only to himself and therefore breakable?

  Four o’clock came, but not Mary. The waiting was now an almost unbearable anxiety and vexation. He recalled, one by one, every shadow he had seen pass over her face, every sign of what might by a nervous lover be thought indifference, every gesture hinting at weariness. Only last Friday she had told him that he thought too much. Was that why she didn’t come? If so, if her patience had at last run out, what more natural in so young a woman paired with a man who paraded his wife and child before her imagination and was so busy making excuses to her that he had no time to make love? By thus grossly overstating the case against himself he made it ridiculous, made it negligible, and so was able to lišten to his heart’s fond reassurances. Whatever he was or was not, that Mary loved him could not be doubted. She had proved her love in more than words; and the body, said David, cannot lie. In the welter of doubt and fear which his world during recent months had become, his faith in Mary and their love was the one fixed point, the rock upon which he would build a new life. But she did not come. Another hour dragged by, and still she did not come. It was now five o’clock. He made up his, mind to ride on to Radnage Hollow and see for himself what kept her. Aunt Allie? But Mary had promised to come, whether Aunt Allie went or stayed.

  Joyce Hinksey opened the door to him, and the sight of her unsurprise at his visit made him wonder why he had not had the wit to come earlier.

  “Hullo, Joyce. Is Mary at home?”

  “How nice to see you!” said Mrs. Hinksey. As he stepped over the threshold she added : “ Mary’s in bed. She’s had an accident.”

  “What——?”

  “Didn’t you know? Yesterday evening. She took a toss from Duke, if you please. Such a good horsewoman, too.”

  “Do you
mean she was thrown?” David asked.

  Seeing him wince, she smiled reassurance. “ She’s all right, David. She’s not so breakable as all that, bless you. Only bruised and cut about a bit. And a badly sprained ankle that keeps her in bed.”

  Her casualness shocked him. Bruised and cut about! And it was Mary she spoke of!

  “But——” he began, and broke off. He could not believe it, could not believe that the hurt was less than mortal. “ But how did it happen?”

  Mrs. Hinksey shrugged her shoulders. “ How do these things happen? I don’t know. I wasn’t there. She was out riding with Adam Swinford, showing off a bit perhaps, and Duke took it into his head to be naughty.”

  David stared at her, knitting his brows. What in the world was she talking about? “ Did you say she was riding with Adam Swinford?”

  “ Yes. Your young cousin.”

  “Adam? Yesterday evening?”

  “He spent the week-end with us,” explained Mrs. Hinksey. “ But surely he told you?”

  “No,” said David. “ I don’t somehow think he did.”

  “How odd of him! We don’t want to steal the young man, David.”

  “You’re welcome to him,” said David with a false laugh. “ He probably told Lydia, in a letter.”

  “By the way, how is Lydia? Such a long time since we’ve seen her.”

  He forgot to answer the question. The numbed spot in his mind began throbbing with pain.

  “I didn’t know Adam was a rider,” he said, with a sick grin.

  “He’s been taking lessons, I gather, at a place in London,” Mrs. Hinksey answered chattily. “ Very industrious of him, I must say.”

  “Very,” David agreed.

  “Come along and meet Aunt Allie,” said Mrs. Hinksey. “ Tom’s about somewhere too.” She led him into the drawing-room and introduced him to a lean, long, string-coloured woman who shook his hand kindly, nodded as though she had seen him before, and said with a genial harsh laugh : “ You didn’t expect to find an old woman here, did you?”

  “Aunt Allie’s staying on a bit,” said Joyce Hinksey, “ to help look after Mary. Isn’t it nice of her?”

  David greeted Aunt Allie with a dazed mechanical smile. To Dr. Hinksey, half asleep in a deep chair, he said : “ No, don’t wake up. I’m not staying.”

  “I’m awake already,” said Hinksey, stretching himself. “ If it had been anyone but you, my boy, I’d have snored them off the premises.”

  “I’m honoured,” said David, doing his best.

  They all laughed at these pleasantries; and David, hiding himself behind a smirk, felt as though he had strayed into a madhouse. Are they blind, he thought savagely, or merely stupid? Can’t they see how it is with me? Why don’t they take me to Mary, so that I can look at her, speak to her, tell her all’s well, and be at rest? Mary. Mary and Adam. What can it mean, that nonsense Joyce told me?

  “Suddenly he heard himself saying : “ Is Mary well enough to be visited?”

  “Go and see if she’s awake, Joyce, while we drink,” said Hinksey. “ What’ll you have. David?”

  In a few minutes Joyce Hinksey returned from upstairs to say, with an air of some constraint : “ She doesn’t feel quite equal to it, David. She’s tired.”

  Tired? Tired?

  “Of course she is,” said David. “ It’s only natural.”

  A silly question stabbed through his mind : would she have been too tired to see Adam? But she’s mine, he said, answering himself. We belong to each other. I must’t start fancying things.

  He got to his feet and exchanged farewells with everybody.

  “Come again soon,” Joyce commanded.

  “Thank you,” said David. “ I’ll come tomorrow. “

  § 10

  After a night of confused terrors and a day of ebbing pain, the big sunny hospital ward turned out to be as nice a home from home, thought Lily Elver, as a person could wish. Much better than what you would have thought, if you believed all you heard. Spick and span wasn’t the word; and indeed there didn’t exist words in Lily’s vocabulary to describe the general effect of that place so far as its visible aspect was concerned. The brightness and the sense of space made it seem to her, at moments, like out-of-doors. The beautiful great windows letting in the summer; the tall pale-green walls as clean and bare as the sky itself; the freedom to sleep when you liked, and no questions asked : all this made a pleasant change from the large crowded semi-basement workroom, and the small crowded ill-furnished bed-sitter, and not least from the pushing sweating elbowing miscellaneous propinquity of the daily journeys to and fro (sardines are lucky, they’re dead, Lily thought). True, there was another side to it, a side that it wouldn’t be sensible to let yourself think about; and it was no use pretending that you could call your soul your own any longer, because you just couldn’t. It didn’t do to start having fancies about the people in the other beds; and when someone was screened off, that was only because the sun was too much for them. As for the precious rules, being woken up to be washed two minutes after you’d fallen asleep, and that kind of thing, that was the price you had to pay for being here at all. You mustn’t even die till you’ve been washed, let alone have your sleep out; and the one they called Sister would soon let you know about it if you imagined you could do as you liked. Okay by me, said Lily philosophically : I’m a good girl from this time on. Docility had never been a strong, point with Lily, but now she was glad with all her heart to hand herself over and struggle no more. Into Thy hands, O Lord… what did that mean? She was rid of herself and of all her troubles, anxieties, responsibilities. At moments she was even, in some sense, rid of her body, which, since these doctors and nurses had so unassumingly taken possession of it, no longer belonged to her quite as it had done before. The pain doesn’t hurt me : a queer thought, and she couldn’t have explained it. But something, had happened just before they gave her the stuff to smell. She had been afraid, tormented, rebellious, burning with hatred of Adam. Yet Adam was very far away, and the terror that she shrank from was very near, just behind her, following her, touching her, claiming her. But she wouldn’t stop, she wouldn’t look, she ran and ran, trying to shake free. And then—” We shan’t hurt you, dear,” said the nurse, and smiled; smiled in a way that made the words seem to come from beyond herself, from the bird in the plane-tree, from the people passing on the pavement, from Mrs. Parzloe, from Bert Vines, and yes, even from Adam. It came too from the thing, the thought, she had been running from. We shan’t hurt you. Maybe I’m going to die, and it doesn’t matter, she thought. Set free from fear and from desire, she entered into her own quietness.

  And here she was, quite alive after all, and with nothing to do but eat a little, sleep a lot, now and again to have a bit of a read, enjoy the flowers that Bert Vines had sent (how the world did he know, and how much did he know?), and put a hand under the pillow to see if Mrs. Parzloe’s letter was still there. To let Mrs. Parzloe know was almost her first thought, on coming-to after the black-out. She’d been anxious, poor old dear; and now she’d be ever so pleased. Sister would see to that : there was a postcard ready addressed in Lily’s handbag.

  Then afterwards, to make a nice change, there were the visitors. If you had asked her she would never have supposed that people would come to see her. Well, work it out for yourself : why should they? If people knew about her bit of trouble they’d feel like Adam, wouldn’t they? Say what you like, nobody cares to be seen with a girl once she’s been found out. They talk very free and easy; and talk it is, believe me. Only Adam and Adam’s reason for being touchy about it, true enough; but they were all alike, especially men, and when you came to think of it you couldn’t really blame them. Anyhow, said Lily, in her new-found charity, what’s the use of blaming people for being like what they are instead of like some-body else? I expect everyone would be nice if they could. It’s their bad luck if they’re not, like varicose veins. And the goodness of some, she felt, made up for the not-so-goodness of some
others. These hospital people, for instance, had never once, never for a moment, made her feel ashamed of herself for what she had done and for what had happened to her. They had put everything right, asking no questions and expecting no thanks. The trouble was over and would never be heard of again.

  No, she hadn’t expected visitors, except Mrs. Parzloe perhaps. She had some hope that the girls at the firm knew notning of the nature of her illness; but whether they knew or not, whether they condemned or sympathized, they could not have come to see her, worked to death as they were. And who else was there who would bother? Expect nothing and you won’t be disappointed : that’s my motto.

  Visitors came, nevertheless. And the first to arrive, believe it or not, was that hall-porter from Orkney House. He brought grapes for her, and was very cheerful in a quiet way, though rather shy of his surroundings, she thought. She was touched by his coming, and astonished beyond words. Whoever would have thought it, him coming to see her like this!

  “It was nice of you,” she said. She smiled weakly, wondering what to say next. “ This the first time you been in a hospital?”

  “No, not the first,” said Stevenage.

  “Don’t tell me you’ve ever been ill,” she said. “ I should think you’re ever so strong.”

  “Pretty middling,” admitted Stevenage modestly. “ No, it wasn’t me, it was my missus.”

  “Oh, you’re married? Any family?”

  “Well, not now, I’m not,” said Stevenage. “ She died, you see,” he explained apologetically.