Two in a Train

Home > Historical > Two in a Train > Page 48
Two in a Train Page 48

by Warwick Deeping

“Do you want to pick them?”

  “O, no!”

  “Or write a nice little poem about them?”

  “No.”

  “How refreshing! Isn’t it rather revolting putting beauty into a sausage machine and turning out words, popular pulp? Yes, the word-game can become rather loathsome.”

  She looked up at the mountains.

  “One asks—only to sit and stare. But then—one has to sell things—to live.”

  “Need one?”

  “I have to.”

  “Not necessarily. Hallo, there’s the steamer. Always makes me think of ‘The White Horse Inn.’ Yes, I saw it when I was in London last year. It amused me. What about lunch?”

  “I’m ready, disgracefully ready.”

  “That’s splendid. You’re capable of a comfortable greed?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Same here. Nothing like being a couple of gross kids.”

  She reproved him.

  “Not quite gross.”

  “Well, like a couple of birds.”

  After their lunch—and it was a very good lunch—they went and sat by the lake, and he smoked a pipe.

  He said, “In the winter—it’s almost as marvellous up here. Down there—I feed the birds, hundreds of birds. You should see their footmarks in the snow. I have one chaffinch who comes and sits on the foot of my bed and cheeks me till I get up. Last year I had a blackbird with a white cap on his head. I can’t say that I pine for Piccadilly.”

  She said, “Don’t be cruel. I have to go back to a shabby little corner in Camden Town.”

  “Am I cruel? You know, Mallison is supposed to be a merciless beast.”

  “Who feeds the birds.”

  She was silent for a while, and he watched her face.

  “Ten thousand pounds, my dear!”

  She turned quickly.

  “Or a penny?”

  “Tell.”

  “I was thinking that I have just two more days.”

  “Nonsense. You can’t be more than thirty-three. Supposing you were to live to seventy. Thirty-seven more years. I’m fifty-three. That gives me, say, seventeen. Stay and feed the birds.”

  She understood. His hand rested upon her shoulder.

  “Nothing else?”

  “Well—Mallison the egoist ought to say something. The selfish devil needs a good wife. Stay. Chuck your return ticket into the Inn. My dear—I’m not a bad sort of brute.”

  “I’ll stay.”

  FINIS

    Books by

  WARWICK DEEPING

  The Man on the While Horse

  Seven Men Came Back

  Two Black Sheep

  Smith

  Old Wine and New

  The Road

  Short Stories

  Exiles

  Roper’s Row

  Old Pybus

  Kitty

  Doomsday

  Sorrell and Son

  Suvla John

  Three Rooms

  The Secret Sanctuary

  Orchards

  Lantern Lane

  Second Youth

  Countess Glika

  Unrest

  The Pride of Eve

  The King Behind the King

  The House of Spies

  Sincerity

  Fox Farm

  Bess of the Woods

  The Red Saint

  The Slanderers

  The Return of the Petticoat

  A Woman’s War

  Valour

  Bertrand of Brittany

  Uther and Igraine

  The House of Adventure

  The Prophetic Marriage

  Apples of Gold

  The Lame Englishman

  Marriage by Conquest

  Joan of the Tower

  Martin Valliant

  The Rust of Rome

  The White Gate

  The Seven Streams

  Mad Barbara

  Love Among the Ruins

  THE END

  TRANSCRIBER NOTES

  Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been employed.

  Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors occur.

  A cover has been created for this book. The resulting cover is placed in the public domain.

  [The end of Two in a Train and Other Stories by Warwick Deeping]

 

 

 


‹ Prev