The Man Who Didn't Fly

by Margot Bennett

  “Good evening,” he said. “I want to see Maurice Reid.”

  She recognised his voice at once. He was the man who had spoken to her in the garden.

  “Maurice. He’s not here. He’s gone home,” she said hopelessly.

  “He’s left his car,” the man observed. “I want to see him. My name’s Marryatt. I’ve spoken to you before.”

  “Yes.”

  “So you know I want to see him.”

  “You can’t. He’s gone home.”

  “Would you tell him I want to see him?”

  Her father came along the hall towards them.

  “What is it, Hester?” he asked in a flat voice.

  “It’s a man to see Maurice. I’ve told him Maurice has gone home,” she warned him.

  “Nothing could be clearer than that,” the stranger said. “Do you mind if I come in?” He came in, quickly.

  “I do mind. It’s late. We were going to bed.”

  He looked past her at her father. “Excuse me, but I want to see Maurice Reid.”

  “You can’t see him now,” Wade said, uttering every word like a separate sigh. “The truth is—”

  “No, it isn’t. Go to bed, Father. Go to bed. Oh, go!” Hester cried.

  “If I can’t see him, I can’t. But I want to warn you directly, you—Wade. I was talking to a friend of yours, to Harry. I told you on the telephone, Miss Wade. I don’t think I made it strong enough. I don’t want to stand back, now. I saw him in London by accident and I came down here to get my hands on him. He robbed and ruined my mother. I saw him in London and I followed him down here, for my own purposes. Now I thought I’d put it as straight as I can, in case—in case he gets anything out of you.”

  “Now you’ve told me. Thank you. Good night,” Hester said.

  “But I still want to speak to him. If you don’t believe what I say, that’s the end of that. But I’m going to see him now.”

  “Get out, please,” Hester said.

  “I know he’s in the house. I’ll wait.”

  “Make him go, Father.”

  “I won’t do him any harm. I want to give him twelve hours to get out of the country. I want to tell him in front of you, so he can’t go with your money. Not because I care about you and your money. I want to see there’s no more easy money for him.”

  “Tell him the truth, Hester,” Wade said. He groped for a chair, there was no chair, so he swayed against the wall. “Tell him the truth. Tell everyone the truth. There’s nothing else.”

  “Maurice isn’t here. I’ve told you,” she cried.

  “I’ve killed him,” Wade muttered into his chest.

  Hester put her hands against Marryatt’s chest and tried to push him out of the door.

  “I’ve killed him,” Wade repeated loudly, like a deaf man struggling to hear his own words.

  The silence gathered for a moment, then Marryatt sighed, and Hester spoke wildly, crying that her father was ill and Maurice had gone home.

  Marryatt ignored her. “You’re sure?” he asked Wade.

  “I don’t know. I think I’ve killed him. All I want to do now is ring the police and tell them.” He still leant against the wall, not moving towards the telephone.

  “Would you like me to see him? Before you ring the police?” Marryatt asked, looking at Hester.

  “Do what you want,” Hester said.

  “Don’t let yourself get worried,” Marryatt advised. “Hell, there might be nothing at all to get worried about.”

  “He hit his head on the curb,” Hester said. “He attacked Father. There was a struggle, an accident.”

  “No, Hester, I attacked him,” her father said.

  “It was an accident,” Hester said.

  “No, I was trying to hurt him.”

  “In there.” Hester stopped at the door. She didn’t want to go in the room again, but he held her by the arm and she went with him, keeping her eyes from the spot where Maurice lay.

  The Australian looked down, bent over him, picked up one of the slack arms with his fingers on the wrist. He dropped the arm again.

  “He’s not dead,” he said. The relief on his face struggled weakly and then succumbed to hatred. “You’d better tell your father.”

  He stood over Maurice, staring curiously at the square, solid face, with its wooden look of reliability now intensified by its absolute stillness. “In about ten minutes he’ll be fit to rob the first orphan he meets. Do you know what I’d like to do with this imitation corpse? I’d like to stamp on his face until I’d changed its shape so much that women would run away from him, screaming. I don’t want to see him dead. I want him alive, and suffering; working for a living until his back’s bent; turned out of mean lodgings because he can’t pay the bill; jailed for begging in the streets.”

  “No. No,” Hester said. She turned and ran from the room, along the hall to where her father sat.

  “He’s not dead. He’s all right, Father,” she said, bending over him and kissing him. “Father, you’ve nothing to worry about now. It’s all over.”

  She caught hold of him, trying to make him stand up. His hands were cold and trembling.

  “Father, you’ve had a shock. You must go to bed now.”

  He shook his head.

  “We can forget about it,” she insisted.

  “No, we can’t. I’m glad, I’m thankful you and Prudence have been spared,” he muttered.

  “But it’s finished. We’ve escaped. Maurice has escaped.”

  “I tried to kill him. It wasn’t right,” he mumbled, his voice trailing away and losing itself in a fog of bewilderment.

  “You must go to bed. When he wakes up I’ll send him away.”

  “I can’t leave you with him alone. I tried to kill him.”

  “I shan’t be alone. I’ll get that Australian to stay.”

  “Hester, it wasn’t right. I—I shouldn’t escape. I should be punished for this.”

  She helped him to his feet and guided him up the stairs. The power to control the physical processes of movement was deserting him, he walked slowly, like a wounded soldier lost in enemy territory. He didn’t speak while she took off his shoes and coat and laid him down on his bed. She put some blankets over him and then hurried downstairs again.

  The Australian sat in a chair, smoking, his eyes on Maurice.

  “What are you going to do with it?” he asked roughly. “You want me to stay?”

  “Yes, but…”

  “Well?”

  “I can’t, I just can’t have anything to do with what you feel about him. I don’t think it’s right to hate anyone like that.”

  “Bravely spoken,” he said contemptuously. “Have a cigarette.”

  “I don’t want to stay in the room with you when you hate him like this.”

  “Should I go? Or would you like to leave me alone in the room with him? For God’s sake don’t begin to cry. I’m not trying to be rude,” he added brusquely.

  “You’re horrible,” she said. She sat down. Tears of exhaustion were running from her eyes: she couldn’t stop them. “You’re just eaten up with hatred and I thought Father had killed him.”

  “He’s moving. Look at him. He’s moving.”

  “And I had to go through his pockets when I thought he was dead.”

  “That’s enough,” he said angrily. “Have a drink. Do you keep drink in this house? Crusted port or Napoleon brandy or something elegant and English?”

  “I don’t want a drink.”

  “I do,” he said. “All right, cry away. Cry as much as you like.” He kept his eyes on Maurice.

  “Life can’t be the same, after this.”

  “Who wants life to be the same?” he asked. “I hate that man there.” He jerked his head at Maurice. “But if he hadn’t taken my mother’
s money I’d have lived a softer life: I wouldn’t have been forced to turn out at sixteen and fight for a living.”

  She went on crying hopelessly.

  “Why are women always so soft?” he demanded angrily.

  “I’m not soft. It’s just you have no imagination and no human feelings and I hate you.”

  “I thought English girls were quiet and reserved. I thought you wouldn’t stay in the same room with anyone who hated anyone else. If you’re going to hate me, you’re building up a problem for yourself.”

  She put her head in her hands, trying to hide her tears.

  “I apologise. I certainly don’t know what I’ve done wrong, but I apologise. If you’d stop crying, we could talk like human beings,” he said.

  She didn’t answer him.

  “You look absolutely terrible when you cry. All women do,” Marryatt said deliberately.

  Maurice moved and groaned, and Hester stopped crying instantly.

  “What are we to do? How can we explain to him?” she asked.

  “Look, what’s your name, Hester, get out of this apologetic attitude. It’s that rat who’s got to do the apologising.” He walked across to Maurice, who was turning his head uneasily.

  “Get up!” he said.

  Maurice opened his eyes, stared at the face above him, and closed his eyes again.

  “Get up!”

  “Let me help you, Maurice,” Hester said. She ran forward and put an arm under his head. “Are you all right, Maurice?” she asked anxiously.

  “I—what—I don’t know,” he sighed.

  “Help me to lift him. Quick!” she said in a peremptory voice to Marryatt. He jerked her out of the way, and dragged Maurice on to a chair.

  “You can open your eyes,” he said. “Time to wake up. You’ve been having a little instalment of what you’re going to get. Life’s turning against you, Maurice. You’re moving into hard times. Don’t look so frightened. I’m going to take you home now.”

  Maurice moaned. “My head.”

  “Shall I get a doctor?” Hester asked.

  “He doesn’t need a doctor. I’ll take him home. You don’t want him here, do you?”

  “I can’t move,” Maurice groaned. “What happened?”

  “Well, what do you think happened?” Marryatt asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Maybe you never will. When a man’s been hit on the head, he sometimes forgets what happened before. Perhaps I hit you. Do you know? I might hit harder next time.”

  “Hester, I want to stay here,” Maurice whispered.

  Marryatt looked at her, and then back at Maurice. The gun she had taken from Maurice’s pocket lay in the fireplace, she saw him bend and pick it up.

  “Please, Hester,” Maurice repeated.

  “I’m taking you home.”

  “Hester, he’s a murderer. He wants to kill me.”

  The Australian flicked Maurice on the cheek with the back of his hand. “Get moving!” he said.

  “How dare you, how dare you hit him when he’s like this. Of course you can stay, Maurice,” Hester cried.

  “I’m taking him home,” the Australian said. “You needn’t worry. All I want is a chance to moralise. I’m picking the habit up from you,” he said insolently.

  “Please go away.”

  “Not without him.”

  “You’re not a civilised being.”

  “I give up,” Marryatt said violently. “I give up the whole damned business. Keep your rotten little swindler. Bathe his head and stroke his hair and give him breakfast in bed. Let him fill his pockets with your father’s money until the whole family’s bankrupt. So long as you do it politely in the English manner, you’ll be able to admire yourself at the end of it. I don’t understand how your father forgot his social position long enough to let him knock the little rat down.”

  “It was because—because of something he said.” Hester stopped, looking at Maurice, remembering, while both the men watched her. “If he’s strong enough to move, I wish you’d take him home,” she said to Marryatt. “You can’t stay here,” she said to Maurice. “You can’t come here again.”

  “I’m not well, I want a doctor,” Maurice said. His eyes were closed. He seemed to be making a brave effort to speak. “Sorry to be a nuisance,” he said, whispering.

  “You’d be wasting your time, seeing a doctor,” Marryatt said. “He’d tell you to spend a couple of days in bed. But I’m telling you to get out of this country by tomorrow. The two things don’t match.”

  “It’s my head,” Maurice explained. “If I could go to sleep now, if only I could go to sleep. I’m going to Ireland tomorrow, sleep…”

  Hester looked at him uncertainly.

  “You can sleep at home,” Marryatt said quickly. “I’ll take you there. I’ve a few things I’d like to say to you on the way. Now get going.”

  “Be quiet,” Hester said furiously. “I won’t have you in this house giving orders.”

  The Australian turned away from Maurice and looked at her. “Good night!” he shouted. “If you can look after yourself so well, get on with it!”

  He went out of the room in a rush, and she waited until he had slammed the door. Then she turned to Maurice.

  “You must leave early in the morning. I needn’t see you. I don’t want to see you again, ever.”

  She left him quickly, and went upstairs.

  She stopped outside her father’s room. She could hear no sound: she didn’t want to disturb him, so she went on to her own room, and undressed, and lay down. The grinding anxieties that filled her mind destroyed all sense of time; she didn’t know how much later it was when she heard the car. Perhaps Maurice was leaving? It was safe now, the Australian had gone away. Someone was moving in the house; it was easy to imagine these things. She listened in terror, but there was no one moving. It must be nearly dawn. If Maurice had escaped, there was still the question of the cheque. She should go down and ask him, but she had heard the car. A grey light was coming now, and the birds were singing hoarsely as though their voices were breaking. The stairs creaked again, it was cowardly not to get up, not to shout ‘Who’s there?’ It might only be Morgan. She was sure that someone passed her door. It was nearly daylight, and then everything was black as she fell into sleep at last.

  Friday (1)

  Prudence woke at eight in the morning. She lay still for a few minutes, thinking of the tennis dance, and luxuriating in the memory of her partners, how some of them had been enthralled by her conversation, and how Peter, who was already up at Cambridge and very experienced, had asked her for a second dance. She remembered Neville, and his oafish looks of adoration, and began to giggle. Rosemary knew all about Neville; she must telephone Rosemary, or was it too early? She began to dress, but when she had washed and brushed her hair, life seemed too dreary to be endured. The truth was, she simply couldn’t tango properly: Marion had noticed, even if Neville hadn’t: Marion had looked at her in a very bitchy way, and said, “You are learning quickly, considering.” Marion was coming to the dance next week. If she couldn’t tango perfectly by next week she would die. She threw the brush on the floor, and looked in the mirror. Her frock was too short, good enough for the house, Hester would say, but it wasn’t good enough for anything. If she bought some material she could make herself a new frock over the week-end and the family could starve. She remembered that Jackie was there to do the cooking; she was suddenly very hungry. She ran downstairs.

  Jackie wasn’t in the kitchen. There was no burnt toast, no strong tea. She went to the sitting-room, and looked in.

  Jackie was standing in the middle of the room, holding a duster. His flowered shirt looked shockingly bright beneath his drawn, exhausted face. Two limp rosebuds sagged from his button-hole.

  “Good morning, Jackie. Going gay—the roses, I mean.”<
br />
  Jackie’s hand went up to the roses. “He—he put them there, last night.”

  “He?”

  “Harry,” Jackie muttered.

  “You mean Mr Walters,” Prudence said severely.

  “I’ve always been fond of flowers. I’ll get the breakfast, Miss.”

  Prudence suddenly remembered. “Morgan’s flying to Ireland today. I’d better get him up.”

  She went back upstairs and knocked on Morgan’s door.

  “Are you going to have some breakfast before you go, Morgan?” she called.

  She opened the door cautiously. The room was heavy with cigarette smoke. Morgan sat in the middle of it, dressed in his usual dark clothes, holding his briefcase.

  She looked at his face, and was frightened by the despair she saw on it. She took refuge in a breezy refusal to see that anything was wrong.

  “Is that all you’re taking?” she asked, indicating the briefcase.

  He shook his head. “Nothing more. Everything’s gone. Two years and two months. The end’s worse than the beginning. The end’s the worst. Do you think I can go, Prudence? Will they stop me? Brickford’s a long way. Ten-forty-five the plane goes. It’s only half past eight. Prudence, when they say it, don’t believe them.” He jumped up, and stood staring into her face.

  “Don’t believe them. I’m telling you.”

  “Morgan, have some breakfast,” she said in a frightened voice.

  “I’m going. The plane’s my only chance.”

  He pushed past her. She heard him running down the stairs. She was so glad that he had gone that she forgot she couldn’t tango, although the memory soon returned, so that she was curt and abstracted all through breakfast, while she waited for an opportunity to ask Hester for a secret lesson. Hester seemed scarcely aware of her presence, and spoke only once throughout the meal.

  “You’re still wearing the roses in your button-hole, Jackie. Didn’t you go to bed last night?”

  “Slept better’n I’ve ever done on Brighton beach,” Jackie assured her.

  When he had left the room Hester stood up.

  “How do you feel about dancing?” Prudence asked quickly.