"Magazines? I haven't tried. I know what the stuff's worth. You see, a year or two ago I had a great idea of getting into touch with Nature, just as the Greeks were in touch; and seeing England so beautiful, I used to pretend that her trees and coppices and summer fields of parsley were alive. It's funny enough now, but it wasn't funny then, for I got in such a state that I believed, actually believed, that Fauns lived in a certain double hedgerow near the Cog Magogs, and one evening I walked a mile sooner than go through it alone."
"Good gracious!" She laid her hand on his shoulder.
He moved to the other side of the road. "It's all right now. I've changed those follies for others. But while I had them I began to write, and even now I keep on writing, though I know better. I've got quite a pile of little stories, all harping on this ridiculous idea of getting into touch with Nature."
"I wish you weren't so modest. It's simply splendid as an idea. Though—but tell me about the Dryad who was engaged to be married. What was she like?"
"I can show you the dell in which the young person disappeared. We pass it on the right in a moment."
"It does seem a pity that you don't make something of your talents. It seems such a waste to write little stories and never publish them. You must have enough for a book. Life is so full in our days that short stories are the very thing; they get read by people who'd never tackle a novel. For example, at our Dorcas we tried to read out a long affair by Henry James—Herbert saw it recommended in 'The Times.' There was no doubt it was very good, but one simply couldn't remember from one week to another what had happened. So now our aim is to get something that just lasts the hour. I take you seriously, Rickie, and that is why I am so offensive. You are too modest. People who think they can do nothing so often do nothing. I want you to plunge."
It thrilled him like a trumpet-blast. She took him seriously. Could he but thank her for her divine affability! But the words would stick in his throat, or worse still would bring other words along with them. His breath came quickly, for he seldom spoke of his writing, and no one, not even Ansell, had advised him to plunge.
"But do you really think that I could take up literature?"
"Why not? You can try. Even if you fail, you can try. Of course we think you tremendously clever; and I met one of your dons at tea, and he said that your degree was not in the least a proof of your abilities: he said that you knocked up and got flurried in examinations. Oh!"—her cheek flushed,—"I wish I was a man. The whole world lies before them. They can do anything. They aren't cooped up with servants and tea parties and twaddle. But where's this dell where the Dryad disappeared?"
"We've passed it." He had meant to pass it. It was too beautiful. All he had read, all he had hoped for, all he had loved, seemed to quiver in its enchanted air. It was perilous. He dared not enter it with such a woman.
"How long ago?" She turned back. "I don't want to miss the dell. Here it must be," she added after a few moments, and sprang up the green bank that hid the entrance from the road. "Oh, what a jolly place!"
"Go right in if you want to see it," said Rickie, and did not offer to go with her. She stood for a moment looking at the view, for a few steps will increase a view in Cambridgeshire. The wind blew her dress against her. Then, like a cataract again, she vanished pure and cool into the dell.
The young man thought of her feelings no longer. His heart throbbed louder and louder, and seemed to shake him to pieces. "Rickie!"
She was calling from the dell. For an answer he sat down where he was, on the dust-bespattered margin. She could call as loud as she liked. The devil had done much, but he should not take him to her.
"Rickie!"—and it came with the tones of an angel. He drove his fingers into his ears, and invoked the name of Gerald. But there was no sign, neither angry motion in the air nor hint of January mist. June—fields of June, sky of June, songs of June. Grass of June beneath him, grass of June over the tragedy he had deemed immortal. A bird called out of the dell: "Rickie!"
A bird flew into the dell.
"Did you take me for the Dryad?" she asked. She was sitting down with his head on her lap. He had laid it there for a moment before he went out to die, and she had not let him take it away.
"I prayed you might not be a woman," he whispered.
"Darling, I am very much a woman. I do not vanish into groves and trees. I thought you would never come."
"Did you expect—?"
"I hoped. I called hoping."
Inside the dell it was neither June nor January. The chalk walls barred out the seasons, and the fir-trees did not seem to feel their passage. Only from time to time the odours of summer slipped in from the wood above, to comment on the waxing year. She bent down to touch him with her lips.
He started, and cried passionately, "Never forget that your greatest thing is over. I have forgotten: I am too weak. You shall never forget. What I said to you then is greater than what I say to you now. What he gave you then is greater than anything you will get from me."
She was frightened. Again she had the sense of something abnormal. Then she said, "What is all this nonsense?" and folded him in her arms.
VIII
Ansell stood looking at his breakfast-table, which was laid for four instead of two. His bedmaker, equally peevish, explained how it had happened. Last night, at one in the morning, the porter had been awoke with a note for the kitchens, and in that note Mr. Elliot said that all these things were to be sent to Mr. Ansell's.
"The fools have sent the original order as well. Here's the lemon-sole for two. I can't move for food."
"The note being ambiguous, the Kitchens judged best to send it all." She spoke of the kitchens in a half-respectful, half-pitying way, much as one speaks of Parliament.
"Who's to pay for it?" He peeped into the new dishes. Kidneys entombed in an omelette, hot roast chicken in watery gravy, a glazed but pallid pie.
"And who's to wash it up?" said the bedmaker to her help outside.
Ansell had disputed late last night concerning Schopenhauer, and was a little cross and tired. He bounced over to Tilliard, who kept opposite. Tilliard was eating gooseberry jam.
"Did Elliot ask you to breakfast with me?"
"No," said Tilliard mildly.
"Well, you'd better come, and bring every one you know."
So Tilliard came, bearing himself a little formally, for he was not very intimate with his neighbour. Out of the window they called to Widdrington. But he laid his hand on his stomach, thus indicating it was too late.
"Who's to pay for it?" repeated Ansell, as a man appeared from the Buttery carrying coffee on a bright tin tray.
"College coffee! How nice!" remarked Tilliard, who was cutting the pie. "But before term ends you must come and try my new machine. My sister gave it me. There is a bulb at the top, and as the water boils—"
"He might have counter-ordered the lemon-sole. That's Rickie all over. Violently economical, and then loses his head, and all the things go bad."
"Give them to the bedder while they're hot." This was done. She accepted them dispassionately, with the air of one who lives without nourishment. Tilliard continued to describe his sister's coffee machine.
"What's that?" They could hear panting and rustling on the stairs.
"It sounds like a lady," said Tilliard fearfully. He slipped the piece of pie back. It fell into position like a brick.
"Is it here? Am I right? Is it here?" The door opened and in came Mrs. Lewin. "Oh horrors! I've made a mistake."
"That's all right," said Ansell awkwardly.
"I wanted Mr. Elliot. Where are they?"
"We expect Mr. Elliot every-moment," said Tilliard.
"Don't tell me I'm right," cried Mrs. Lewin, "and that you're the terrifying Mr. Ansell." And, with obvious relief, she wrung Tilliard warmly by the hand.
"I'm Ansell," said Ansell, looking very uncouth and grim.
"How stupid of me not to know it," she gasped, and would have gone on to I know not what
, but the door opened again. It was Rickie.
"Here's Miss Pembroke," he said. "I am going to marry her."
There was a profound silence.
"We oughtn't to have done things like this," said Agnes, turning to Mrs. Lewin. "We have no right to take Mr. Ansell by surprise. It is Rickie's fault. He was that obstinate. He would bring us. He ought to be horsewhipped."
"He ought, indeed," said Tilliard pleasantly, and bolted. Not till he gained his room did he realize that he had been less apt than usual. As for Ansell, the first thing he said was, "Why didn't you counter-order the lemon-sole?"
In such a situation Mrs. Lewin was of priceless value. She led the way to the table, observing, "I quite agree with Miss Pembroke. I loathe surprises. Never shall I forget my horror when the knife-boy painted the dove's cage with the dove inside. He did it as a surprise. Poor Parsival nearly died. His feathers were bright green!"
"Well, give me the lemon-soles," said Rickie. "I like them."
"The bedder's got them."
"Well, there you are! What's there to be annoyed about?"
"And while the cage was drying we put him among the bantams. They had been the greatest allies. But I suppose they took him for a parrot or a hawk, or something that bantams hate for while his cage was drying they picked out his feathers, and PICKED and PICKED out his feathers, till he was perfectly bald. 'Hugo, look,' said I. 'This is the end of Parsival. Let me have no more surprises.' He burst into tears."
Thus did Mrs. Lewin create an atmosphere. At first it seemed unreal, but gradually they got used to it, and breathed scarcely anything else throughout the meal. In such an atmosphere everything seemed of small and equal value, and the engagement of Rickie and Agnes like the feathers of Parsival, fluttered lightly to the ground. Ansell was generally silent. He was no match for these two quite clever women. Only once was there a hitch.
They had been talking gaily enough about the betrothal when Ansell suddenly interrupted with, "When is the marriage?"
"Mr. Ansell," said Agnes, blushing, "I wish you hadn't asked that. That part's dreadful. Not for years, as far as we can see."
But Rickie had not seen as far. He had not talked to her of this at all. Last night they had spoken only of love. He exclaimed, "Oh, Agnes-don't!" Mrs. Lewin laughed roguishly.
"Why this delay?" asked Ansell.
Agnes looked at Rickie, who replied, "I must get money, worse luck."
"I thought you'd got money."
He hesitated, and then said, "I must get my foot on the ladder, then."
Ansell began with, "On which ladder?" but Mrs. Lewin, using the privilege of her sex, exclaimed, "Not another word. If there's a thing I abominate, it is plans. My head goes whirling at once." What she really abominated was questions, and she saw that Ansell was turning serious. To appease him, she put on her clever manner and asked him about Germany. How had it impressed him? Were we so totally unfitted to repel invasion? Was not German scholarship overestimated? He replied discourteously, but he did reply; and if she could have stopped him thinking, her triumph would have been complete.
When they rose to go, Agnes held Ansell's hand for a moment in her own.
"Good-bye," she said. "It was very unconventional of us to come as we did, but I don't think any of us are conventional people."
He only replied, "Good-bye." The ladies started off. Rickie lingered behind to whisper, "I would have it so. I would have you begin square together. I can't talk yet—I've loved her for years—can't think what she's done it for. I'm going to write short stories. I shall start this afternoon. She declares there may be something in me."
As soon as he had left, Tilliard burst in, white with agitation, and crying, "Did you see my awful faux pas—about the horsewhip? What shall I do? I must call on Elliot. Or had I better write?"
"Miss Pembroke will not mind," said Ansell gravely. "She is unconventional." He knelt in an arm-chair and hid his face in the back.
"It was like a bomb," said Tilliard.
"It was meant to be."
"I do feel a fool. What must she think?"
"Never mind, Tilliard. You've not been as big a fool as myself. At all events, you told her he must be horsewhipped."
Tilliard hummed a little tune. He hated anything nasty, and there was nastiness in Ansell. "What did you tell her?" he asked.
"Nothing."
"What do you think of it?"
"I think: Damn those women."
"Ah, yes. One hates one's friends to get engaged. It makes one feel so old: I think that is one of the reasons. The brother just above me has lately married, and my sister was quite sick about it, though the thing was suitable in every way."
"Damn THESE women, then," said Ansell, bouncing round in the chair. "Damn these particular women."
"They looked and spoke like ladies."
"Exactly. Their diplomacy was ladylike. Their lies were ladylike. They've caught Elliot in a most ladylike way. I saw it all during the one moment we were natural. Generally we were clattering after the married one, whom—like a fool—I took for a fool. But for one moment we were natural, and during that moment Miss Pembroke told a lie, and made Rickie believe it was the truth."
"What did she say?"
"She said `we see' instead of 'I see.'"
Tilliard burst into laughter. This jaundiced young philosopher, with his kinky view of life, was too much for him.
"She said 'we see,'" repeated Ansell, "instead of 'I see,' and she made him believe that it was the truth. She caught him and makes him believe that he caught her. She came to see me and makes him think that it is his idea. That is what I mean when I say that she is a lady."
"You are too subtle for me. My dull eyes could only see two happy people."
"I never said they weren't happy."
"Then, my dear Ansell, why are you so cut up? It's beastly when a friend marries,—and I grant he's rather young,—but I should say it's the best thing for him. A decent woman—and you have proved not one thing against her—a decent woman will keep him up to the mark and stop him getting slack. She'll make him responsible and manly, for much as I like Rickie, I always find him a little effeminate. And, really,"—his voice grew sharper, for he was irritated by Ansell's conceit, "and, really, you talk as if you were mixed up in the affair. They pay a civil visit to your rooms, and you see nothing but dark plots and challenges to war."
"War!" cried Ansell, crashing his fists together. "It's war, then!"
"Oh, what a lot of tommy-rot," said Tilliard. "Can't a man and woman get engaged? My dear boy—excuse me talking like this—what on earth is it to do with us?"
"We're his friends, and I hope we always shall be, but we shan't keep his friendship by fighting. We're bound to fall into the background. Wife first, friends some way after. You may resent the order, but it is ordained by nature."
"The point is, not what's ordained by nature or any other fool, but what's right."
"You are hopelessly unpractical," said Tilliard, turning away. "And let me remind you that you've already given away your case by acknowledging that they're happy."
"She is happy because she has conquered; he is happy because he has at last hung all the world's beauty on to a single peg. He was always trying to do it. He used to call the peg humanity. Will either of these happinesses last? His can't. Hers only for a time. I fight this woman not only because she fights me, but because I foresee the most appalling catastrophe. She wants Rickie, partly to replace another man whom she lost two years ago, partly to make something out of him. He is to write. In time she will get sick of this. He won't get famous. She will only see how thin he is and how lame. She will long for a jollier husband, and I don't blame her. And, having made him thoroughly miserable and degraded, she will bolt—if she can do it like a lady."
Such were the opinions of Stewart Ansell.
IX
Seven letters written in June:—
Cambridge
Dear Rickie,
I would rather write
, and you can guess what kind of letter this is when I say it is a fair copy: I have been making rough drafts all the morning. When I talk I get angry, and also at times try to be clever—two reasons why I fail to get attention paid to me. This is a letter of the prudent sort. If it makes you break off the engagement, its work is done. You are not a person who ought to marry at all. You are unfitted in body: that we once discussed. You are also unfitted in soul: you want and you need to like many people, and a man of that sort ought not to marry. "You never were attached to that great sect" who can like one person only, and if you try to enter it you will find destruction. I have read in books and I cannot afford to despise books, they are all that I have to go by—that men and women desire different things. Man wants to love mankind; woman wants to love one man. When she has him her work is over. She is the emissary of Nature, and Nature's bidding has been fulfilled. But man does not care a damn for Nature—or at least only a very little damn. He cares for a hundred things besides, and the more civilized he is the more he will care for these other hundred things, and demand not only—a wife and children, but also friends, and work, and spiritual freedom.
I believe you to be extraordinarily civilized.—Yours ever,
S.A.
Shelthorpe, 9 Sawston Park Road, Sawston
Dear Ansell,
But I'm in love—a detail you've forgotten. I can't listen to English Essays. The wretched Agnes may be an "emissary of Nature," but I only grinned when I read it. I may be extraordinarily civilized, but I don't feel so; I'm in love, and I've found a woman to love me, and I mean to have the hundred other things as well. She wants me to have them—friends and work, and spiritual freedom, and everything. You and your books miss this, because your books are too sedate. Read poetry—not only Shelley. Understand Beatrice, and Clara Middleton, and Brunhilde in the first scene of Gotterdammerung. Understand Goethe when he says "the eternal feminine leads us on," and don't write another English Essay.—Yours ever affectionately,
R.E.
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