He said soberly, “There’s no proof. What are you going to do about it?”
He was sitting on the arm of a book-laden chair. She frowned up at him.
“I don’t know-tackle her, I suppose.”
His mouth drew awry.
“And what will you do if she bursts into tears on your shoulder and owns up?”
Julia turned a shade paler.
“I suppose I should have to tell Jimmy, and get him to pension her.”
He murmured, “Pensions for old age poisoners-Darling, I must say you’ve got a nerve! But suppose she denies it- where do we go from there?”
Julia’s eyes widened. The slanting light from the window behind Antony slid down into them, making them look like peaty water with the sun on it. She said slowly,
“I-don’t-know. I don’t know what there is to be done. It keeps me awake at night. You see, Lois makes everyone hate her, and when you get a lot of people all hating, things happen-horrid sorts of things. It’s like having a lot of electricity about-you don’t know where the lightning is going to strike.”
He said coolly, “Keep the drama for the great works, darling.”
The angry colour ran up into her face.
“You can laugh, but you don’t know what it feels like! I’m not dramatizing, I’m telling you about facts. Lois-well, she’s either got the wind up, or-I don’t know what. You know what it is when a person doesn’t show anything, but you can feel them being all worked up underneath-she’s like that. And Jimmy won’t let her take anything that’s made separately. He wanted her to knock off her beastly Turkish coffee, but she wouldn’t, so now he takes it too, poor darling, and you can see him hating every minute of it. Of course he knows perfectly well that no one will play tricks if he’s taking it.”
“So there have been no more attacks?”
“Not since you left. I say, that sounds rather incriminating, doesn’t it?” Her lips widened in the beginning of a smile, but it never got anywhere. She reached out for a small pile of books, dumped them on the stack, and said in a careful voice, “But it wouldn’t be you, naturally.”
He sat there swinging his foot and watching her.
“Is that intended for a compliment-a kindly tribute to my law-abiding character?”
“No, it isn’t. You’re out of it because-” She bit her lip and stopped suddenly. What an absolute damned fool jealousy made of you. Only when it was goading at you all the time something suddenly gave way and you came out with the very last thing you meant to say.
He looked at her quizzically.
“Gratifying, but inconclusive. I should like to know why you are not considering me as a possible poisoner.”
She spoke then, quite gravely and simply.
“Because you are fond of Lois. You used to be very fond of her.”
He shook his head.
“The answer is in the negative, darling.”
She blazed up suddenly.
“You were in love with her!”
“Quite a different thing, my child.
‘Yesterday’s fires are clean gone out, yesterday’s hearth is cold;
No one can either borrow or buy with last year’s gold.’ ”
Julia felt her heart leap up. He was telling her what she would have given almost anything in the world to be sure about. It leapt up, and it sank down again. Because what else could he say? He wouldn’t tell her or anyone else if he was still in love with Jimmy’s wife. She said in her deepest, gloomiest voice,
“I’ve got to go back there tomorrow, and it’s going to be absolute hell. Lois hasn’t got her new staff coming in for another fortnight, so we’ve all got to hang on till then. Ellie and Minnie are doing the work, so they can’t clear out. As a matter of fact neither of them has anywhere to go. Minnie won’t go to that awful old Miss Grey, I’m thankful to say, and Ellie hasn’t managed to find a room yet-they’re sending Ronnie to Brighton, and it’s packed. I shall have to stand by as long as they are there. I only hope I get through without having a final row with Lois.”
He gave a short dry laugh.
“Feeling optimistic about it?”
She said vehemently, “I mustn’t have one-because of Ellie. I keep telling myself that. You know, Antony, I’m not letting myself really hate her, but I could.”
“You’re putting over a pretty good imitation, darling.”
She looked at him, her eyes sombre, all the light gone out of them, her brows a black straight line.
“I’ve thought about it a lot. You can hate in such a lot of different ways. I think it’s all right to hate with your mind. Because what your mind hates isn’t people-it’s the things which are really hateful-the things everybody ought to hate. That’s all right, but when you begin to hate with your emotions it’s dangerous, because they swing you off your balance and the hating carries you away. You don’t know where it’s going to take you, or what it’s going to make you do. I’m trying very hard only to hate the things that Lois does, but sometimes-I’m afraid.”
Antony got up. She had moved him more deeply than he cared to show. He brought her half a dozen books, and when she had taken them he put both hands on her shoulders and shook her a little.
“You’re a stupid child, but you mean well. Stick to it! It won’t do Ellie any particular good if you pour oil on the troubled embers.”
She laughed, releasing the happiness she always felt when he touched her. Far below the words they used, the current ran between them smooth and strong. She said in a young voice,
“I don’t want to have a row.”
CHAPTER 13
Antony went down to Latter End next day. He didn’t want to go, his every instinct warned him against going. But he went. It wasn’t Julia’s asking that took him there. He had found it hard to say no to her, but he had said it. He hoped he would have stuck to his no, but he was to have no means of telling, for that evening Jimmy rang him up. No to Julia was possible, if difficult. No to Jimmy became quite impossible during the three minutes of that country call.
“I’ve a very particular reason for wanting you to come. The fact is I want to talk to you-about the girls. They’ll have to have some money. Old Eliza Raven left me a little-you know I went down to settle her affairs. Well, I want the girls to have it. Thought perhaps you’d be trustee. And then there’s Minnie-I’m very unhappy about Minnie-I don’t mind saying so. I’ve got to talk to you.”
Not possible to go on saying no. Afterwards he was to wonder what difference it would have made if he had. It might have made a very dreadful difference, or it might have made no difference at all. The part which depended upon a guilty premeditation may have been already fixed. The part which depended upon the turn of a chance might still have turned the way it did. Or there might have been no chance at all, in which case the tragedy would have been so much the deeper. Just how much Antony ’s presence at Latter End contributed to the event, he never found it possible to decide. The only thing certain was that had he known what lay ahead he would, even at the last moment, even in the village of Rayle itself, have turned his car about and gone back to town.
He took Julia down with him. As far as she was concerned, the barometer had risen, the sky was clear, and the sun shone. The fact that it was one of those unseasonable weeping September days made no difference. She carried her weather with her, and when Antony and she were together there were no dull days. There might be a storm, there had been one or two earthquakes and an occasional conflagration, but there were also floods of sunshine and quite enchanting rainbows. Today it didn’t matter to her in the least that the rain fell, and that when they emerged into the country their view was bounded by dripping hedgerows and curtains of white mist. You could always talk. Julia talked.
“Lois had had one in the eye anyhow.”
“Darling-your English style!”
She laughed.
“I know! But you’ve got to take a holiday sometimes. If you don’t you get all clamped up and stiff. I’m frigh
tfully particular on paper.”
“Dulce est desipere in loco! All right-who’s been giving Lois one in the eye?”
“Jimmy. He met old Hodson down the lane, and Hodson let him have it-really good stuff on the lines of ‘It wouldn’t have happened in your father’s day, nor yet in your grandfather’s-taking the roof from over a poor man’s head to let foreigners in!’ All that sort of thing. And all Jimmy could do was to stand there and gape. And when he said, ‘But I thought you wanted to go to your daughter-in-law,’ Hodson came back at him with ‘And who told you a dirty lie like that, Mr. Jimmy?’ ”
Antony whistled.
“What happened after that? By the way, how do you know all this?”
“I was there. I don’t know when I’ve enjoyed myself so much. Jimmy told Hodson there had been a misunderstanding, and that the cottage was his for as long as he wanted it. Then he went home and blew right up. I got out of the way, but not before I heard him tell Lois that she must leave the management of the place to him. I hope it will do her good.”
“A pious hope can do no harm,” said Antony drily. “When did all this happen?”
“Just before I came up. Antony, it’s Minnie I’m miserable about. I think Ellie will be all right if we can get her through the next six months. Jimmy is going to give her an allowance, and if she can get a room at Brighton she’ll be able to see Ronnie every day, and she won’t have all this housework which is wearing her out. I think she’ll be all right-I’ve got to think she will, or I shall blow right up. But Minnie-she’s proud, you know, though she’s so gentle. She won’t take money from Jimmy-I believe she’d rather die. That’s what frightens me-she hasn’t got anything to live for. And she looks desperate-Jimmy’s awfully unhappy about it. The only person who can do anything is Lois. I suppose you couldn’t say something?”
Antony frowned at the long, wet road running on into the mist.
“I did.”
“Any good?”
“I thought so at the time. At least I thought there was a possibility. Now I don’t. The fact is, Minnie has got on Lois’ nerves, and when that happens it’s the end-no good arguing about it. There’ll be a clean sweep, and we’ll all start fresh. I don’t suppose Latter End will see very much of any of us after this.”
Julia was silent for a long time. Then she said,
“It’s rather an-amputation, isn’t it? I oughtn’t to feel it, because I haven’t been down there so much, but it hurts all right. It’s stupid of me, but one of the things I mind most about is Mummie’s picture hanging there on the wall behind that woman’s chair. It hurts like hell.”
“Jimmy would give you the portrait if you asked him for it.”
The dark colour rushed into her face.
“I couldn’t do that! It would be like turning Mummie out- for her!”
They drove in silence for a while, the mist closing them in. It was like being together in a room with white walls, a room so small that they could not move away from one another. He was aware of her thoughts-the colour and rhythm of them coming up out of warm depths. What Julia was aware of she kept to herself. Presently she said,
“I wish we were going anywhere else.”
He gave her a light answer.
“Wishes are cheap. Where would you like to go?”
“To Latter End ten years ago.”
Antony laughed.
“I’ve just left school, and you and Ellie are fourteen.”
“And there isn’t any Lois. It would be heaven, wouldn’t it?” Then, with sudden energy, “Do you know what she has done now? She’s got that odious Gladys Marsh in the house.”
“What’s happened to Joe?”
“Gone down to a sister in Devonshire. There’s supposed to be some idea of his going into his brother-in-law’s business. The fact is, he’s up against it in the village-everyone’s crying shame on him about his mother. And Gladys hates Rayle-they’d like to get out. The sooner the better, I should say. But meanwhile there’s Gladys at Latter End, putting onthe most awful side you ever saw.”
“What is she supposed to be doing there?”
“Odds and ends of sewing, maiding Lois-and whether she’s supposed to or not, she listens at doors. Ellie did dig her toes in and say she must do her own room, but there was some head-tossing over it-‘I don’t know, I’m sure. Housework is so bad for the hands, and not at all what I’m accustomed to.’ ” Julia gave an angry laugh. “I told Ellie I’d scream the house down if she gave in, so she stuck it out. Gladys now gives a perfect imitation of gentility with a mop and a duster-little finicky dabs and flicks, as if she’s never done a room in her life.”
Antony put out his left hand and let it rest for a moment on Julia’s knee.
“Darling, do turn off the gas and simmer down! If you go on boiling up like this you’ll boil over, and then the fat is going to be in the fire, which none of us particularly wants. Suppose you tell me about the new book instead.”
She gave him a look, half angry, half melting.
“There isn’t any new book.”
“There seemed to be a lot of well-inked paper lying about on your table.”
“It’s not a book-it’s a mess. I can’t write when things are happening.”
But she began to tell him about it all the same.
CHAPTER 14
Antony had hardly set foot in Latter End before he was convinced that, Jimmy or no Jimmy, business or no business, he would have done better to have stayed in town. It had not been a happy household when he had said goodbye to it ten days ago, but it was a paradise compared with how he found it now. Minnie Mercer’s looks fairly horrified him. She had the air of a sleepwalker set apart from those around her in some miserable dream. It reminded him of a picture which he had once seen and been unable to forget. The artist had painted a girl who was just about to be shot as a spy. Before his colours were dry she was dead. In the picture she scarcely looked alive. Every time he looked at Minnie the picture came into his mind. No wonder poor old Jimmy was worried about her.
By the time he was halfway through his talk with Jimmy in the study he was worried about Jimmy too. There was something wrong, and he had only to see him and Lois together at the evening meal to realize that this something lay between husband and wife. Lois, in extreme good looks, lost no opportunity of making this clear. Her glance flicked over Jimmy with light contempt. She called him “darling” in a voice like splintered ice-a voice which melted charmingly to Antony a moment later. After which it sank to a murmur, which Jimmy at the other end of the table was vainly trying to follow.
Antony was sitting next to her. You cannot turn your back upon your hostess. You cannot change your place at table. He kept his own voice audible, and presently endeavoured to make the conversation general. Only Julia responded. Ellie looked worn out. Minnie was in her dream, and Jimmy quite unmistakably in one of his rare queer fits of temper. Usually the most abstemious of men, he poured himself out so liberal an allowance of whisky that Lois raised her eyebrows, upon which he drank it off with the merest modicum of soda. And did it again.
When he looked back afterwards Antony was to wonder by what variation in his own conduct the issue might have been avoided. He was left with the hopeless feeling that too many other people were concerned. There was too strong an undertow. It would have taken more than any effort of his to stem the flow which was sweeping them to disaster.
If Jimmy hadn’t asked Julia to sing, insisting until it would have been folly to refuse; if he himself had not gone out into the garden with Lois; if Jimmy hadn’t tuned up his obstinacy, his hurt feelings, his vague suspicions, with all that whisky; if Gladys Marsh hadn’t taken it into her head to have a bath… What was the good of all those “if ”s? There are states of the mind, and states of feeling, in which some mounting passion turns everything to its own ends, as a fire once it has taken hold will feed on what is meant to smother it, and turn all efforts to get it under into an added heat.
One of the changes
which Lois had made in the drawing-room was the removal of the piano. It was supposed to be somewhere vaguely in store, but Julia said roundly that Lois had sold it. There was, however, an old piano in the schoolroom, and to the schoolroom they repaired, with Jimmy demanding Julia should sing.
Lois lifted her eyebrows and gave a faint icy laugh.
“My dear Jimmy-how antediluvian! I thought ‘a little music after dinner’ was dead and buried!”
He gave her a resentful look.
“I happen to like music after dinner. I happen to want to hear Julia sing. Haven’t heard her sing for years. Sit down and begin. P’raps it’ll sweeten this revolting coffee.”
The eyebrows rose again.
“You needn’t take it.”
“You know damn well why I take it.”
Lois laughed.
“That’s Jimmy’s latest!” she said to Antony. “If I’m to be poisoned, he’ll be poisoned too. Touching devotion-isn’t it?” She picked up her cup off the tray and crossed over to the window where he stood half turned from the room. “He’s in a filthy temper, isn’t he?” She hardly troubled to drop her voice. “We had a row about Hodson’s cottage. I wanted it for the Greenacres, you know. And it was all fixed up-the old man was going to a daughter-in-law in London, where he’d be properly looked after. But now Jimmy’s come crashing in on my nice plan and says he won’t have it. What do you think of that? I’m furious.”
He smiled at her.
“I think you’d better let the cottages alone.”
She leaned nearer.
“Come into the garden and soothe me down. You haven’t any unnatural craving for the drawing-room ballad, have you?”
“I want to hear Julia sing.”
She threw him a bright, sarcastic glance, settled herself on the window seat, and lighted a cigarette.
After a moment’s hesitation Antony sat down too. He had drunk his coffee and left his cup on the tray. Jimmy was making faces over his and drinking it doggedly down. Lois’ cup, with only the dregs left in it now, stood between them on the broad oak sill.
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