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diff --git a/49090.txt b/49090.txt deleted file mode 100644 index a6a9f26..0000000 --- a/49090.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,4258 +0,0 @@ - LOVE IN A MUDDLE - - - - -This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online at -http://www.gutenberg.org/license. If you are not located in the United -States, you'll have to check the laws of the country where you are -located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: Love in a Muddle -Author: Christine Jope Slade -Release Date: May 30, 2015 [EBook #49090] -Language: English -Character set encoding: US-ASCII - - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE IN A MUDDLE *** - - - - -Produced by Al Haines. - - - - - - LOVE IN A - MUDDLE - - - BY - - *CHRISTINE JOPE SLADE* - - AUTHOR OF - "BREAD AND BUTTER MARRIAGE" - - - - HODDER AND STOUGHTON LIMITED - LONDON - 1920 - - - - - _BY THE SAME AUTHOR_ - - THE KEYS OF HEAVEN - LOVE IN A MUDDLE - BREAD AND BUTTER MARRIAGE - WEDDING RINGS FOR THREE - - HODDER & STOUGHTON, LTD. - PUBLISHERS LONDON - - - - - *I* - - -I can't sleep. - -I should go simply potty lying down and trying to get quiet and -peaceful. - -I'm going to write down all the absolutely mad, freakish things that -have happened to-night, and hope that in doing so I shall perceive some -sane and feasible method of escape. - -Diaries are useful sometimes; they keep your nerves from going -absolutely to pieces with the sheer unexpectedness of life. - -Dad and mater were in a particularly horrid mood this evening. The C.O. -had complained about the Y.M.C.A. hut in the camp, or something, and -dinner was filthy, so the usual mutual recriminations took place. Rows -always make me feel so frightfully sick. I've never enjoyed a really -proper one, because I've always had to run away in the middle and be -ill, and then of course I never feel equal to coming back and finishing -it. - -I don't think any of the shabby Tommies' wives who come over on the -paddle steamer on Sundays to visit their husbands at the camp live such -a petty, sordid life as we do in our diggings. - -I hate dad when he gets red and shouts--I simply have to beat a retreat. -I can quite understand why the men are in such a fearful funk of him. I -have been terrified and appalled by him all my life, such is his effect -on my temperament that I could do or say anything when he loses control -and goes for me, tell any childish lies or make any excuses. My moral -sense positively ceases to exist. - -I crept from them to-night and went for a walk by the sea. - -I am not afraid of the dark. I enjoy it. You can think so awfully well -when there is nothing to distract your eyes, and the world feels so -spacious after our digs. - -All my life I have felt there was never quite enough room for the three -of us, dad, and the mater, and myself. I believe if we lived in St. -Paul's together I should still feel overcrowded. - -I walked for a long time. It was a topping night, the air was as soft -and warm as cotton-wool and the moon was on the sea. It was the sort of -night that makes you want to do a frightful lot of good in the world, -mother a lot of orphans or marry a man from St. Dunstan's. I could have -cried because there was such a lot of sorrow and unhappiness in the -world. You do feel like that sometimes out of doors. - -I went along keeping close to the cliff and not thinking, and then I -suddenly realised that I was right under the lee of the big guns, and -facing the big guns of the fort just across the water; and the -searchlights over there suddenly started playing and picked me out. - -I got frightened, absolutely scared. - -I could have screamed. - -Every minute I expected to see those big guns fire; only the month -before a German spy in woman's clothes had been found wandering just -where I stood. - -I knew the marines behind the searchlights could see me quite clearly, -probably even my white mackintosh. I had asked father to let me go to -the fort. He wasn't keen. I'm twenty-three, but he pretends to himself -that I'm not "out"--it saves dresses, so I never go anywhere. - -I was in an absolute panic, and I felt as if all the muscles of my knees -had suddenly turned to water, which wibble-wobbled every time I moved -them. - -I turned back; and those searchlights never left me alone, one steady -bar of brilliant, dazzling light kept me focussed the whole time, and I -could not see to walk in it. I felt as though every step might be a -drop into space. - -It was a perfectly beastly experience, and every minute I expected the -guns to belch out at me. - -I suppose I must have been crying. I seemed to have noticed myself -making a funny little bleaty noise; I know I screamed when a very curt -voice said: "What the devil are you doing here? You know perfectly well -you aren't allowed!" - -"The searchlights!" I stammered. "The searchlights!" - -"Well, they probably think you're up to no good here." - -"I am Major Burbridge's daughter," I stammered; "and they'll fire!" - -"Probably," he said casually, "if they think you're spying." - -"But they mustn't!" - -"It would be a bore," the voice admitted lazily, "especially as I should -be included in the result of their energies." It sounded as if he -didn't care a hang whether he was or not. - -He came and stood in the dazzling white path of light the searchlight -made, and I saw he was an officer. I had never seen him before, but -there were dozens of officers I did not know. I only met those who came -to the house to play auction with father and mother. - -"Please, please--make them go away," I pleaded, just like a kid -surrounded by sheep or something. - -"To signal," he said thoughtfully, "would be to invoke the wrath of the -gods at once. We are nearly out of the boundary. They can see I am an -officer, they can probably see also who I am." The light remained -unwaveringly upon us the whole time he was speaking. "If the gentleman -behind them could be persuaded to believe we are but a couple of -harmless lovers! I dare not wave or anything, because, although I am -attached to the joy-spot, they might not recognise me; the sparkling -intelligence behind the guns would immediately take it for the arranged -signal to a sporty submarine. Would it annoy you fearfully if I made an -effort, by exhibition, to show that we are harmless lovers who shun the -light of publicity now being shed upon us? It is the only thing I can -think of to persuade them to transfer their attentions." His voice -sounded bored and mocking, and I thought he must be an elderly man. - -"Please," I said, "please make them go away." - -He moved to my other side and put his arm round me, then he turned for a -minute so that his embracing arm must have been visible against my white -mack to the men behind the searchlights. - -"Forgive me," he said perfunctorily. "I think the pantomime will have -the desired effect on our friends yonder, and whether they know me or -not they know they'll have a hot time to-morrow for playing the dickens -with an amorous officer--the main thing is to get them to switch the -light off us, isn't it?" - -I thrilled. I had always wondered, as every girl born wonders, what it -was like to feel a man's arm round you. - -I _liked_ it. - -I liked the cool, rather insolent, devil-may-care voice. - -I am always honest with myself, so I write these things quite honestly -and frankly. - -I love reading, but I have never thought of love or romance as being -even remotely connected with me. I have always been very interested in -engaged couples and newly married people, but I think it is rather -squashing to be the plain daughter of a pretty mother and a father who -can't afford to give you nice clothes. I mean, it doesn't give you much -chance. Suddenly, when I felt those arms round me--very limp and casual, -it is true--I would have given the world to have been attractive and had -an attractive personality and attractive frocks. I have tried very, very -hard to be nice and useful and kind in my life, because I know I could -never have the more alluring virtues; but it has been very, very dull. -I do think clothes matter, and hair-waving, especially when your hair is -straight like mine; and I do understand the girl who, when she was -asked, "Which would you rather be, beautiful or good?" answered, "I -would like to be born beautiful and grow good." I feel she must have -been a relation of mine. - -The lights swished round. - -"That," said the officer, "has done the trick, Miss Burbridge, and here -we are at the boundary." - -He removed his arms from me, and out of the darkness suddenly came my -father's voice. - -"I had no idea you were in the habit of taking my daughter for walks, -Captain Cromer. Your mother sent me to search for you, Pam. I am -awaiting an explanation." - -"Oh--Captain Cromer--just--just----" - -"Yes," said my father, "I perceived it. I presume you have an -explanation to make, sir? I have had the pleasure of watching you for -the last ten minutes." - -"Yes," said my companion, "Miss Burbridge unfortunately got picked out -by the searchlights, and we thought the guns----" - -"Pamela," said my father, "have you anything to say? If not----" - -"Yes," I said desperately. "Oh yes----" then the old sickening fear of -my father, the terror that made me deceive and even lie in a sort of -blind panic, rushed over me. - -"I presume there is some understanding, an engagement between you and -Captain----" - -"Hullo! Major. Hullo! Captain Cromer. We've had a most entertaining -time. We've been watching you through our glasses. If you will stand -in the limelight----" came an unexpected voice behind father. - -It was the C.O. and his wife. - -"It brings back my own young days," said the C.O. with his jolly laugh. - -"I suppose we are the first to congratulate you young people," the -C.O.'s wife said charmingly. "I couldn't help overhearing the word -'engagement.'" - -I looked at father. - -"Yes," I answered desperately. "You are--thank you very much." - - -_Later_. - -I threw this on the top of the chest of drawers because mother came in -to say "good night!" - -She has never done such a thing before. - -"What a dreadfully old-fashioned nighty you are wearing, Pam," she said. - -"It was one of yours," I answered. "I always have yours when you have -done with them." - -"You must have some pretty new things now, dear," she said. She stayed -and chatted for a few minutes, and then strayed out again, leaving an -atmosphere of elegance and jasmine scent. - -I really am numbed mentally. My brain keeps taking records to-night, -like a camera. It's a sort of human sensitised plate, but I don't feel -anything, not even that it is really happening to me. - -When the C.O. and his wife made their appearance, we all turned and -walked up the hill together; father and the Colonel and his wife walked -on in front, and the man and I walked behind. - -The man bent his head quite close to my head and laughed. It was rather -a beastly laugh, not villainy, just as if he didn't care whether an -earthquake or the millennium started next minute. - -"Well," he said, "you seem to have had your innings, Miss Burbridge. -Now I want mine." - -"I'll tell dad when I get home," I babbled foolishly. "I'll explain -fully all about the searchlights and everything." - -I felt absolutely the same as I did when I sat down at my "maths." paper -when I tried to matric., after having been awake all night with raging -toothache. I felt I couldn't be decisive or adequate or even sensible, -I couldn't deal efficiently with a fly that settled on my own nose. - -"The inopportune arrival of the Colonel and his wife have made it rather -difficult to explain," he hazarded. "Don't you remember gracefully -acknowledging our tender regard for each other, and equally gracefully -accepting congratulations on existence of same?" He sounded all the -time frightfully amused in a bored sort of manner. He had the most -delightful kind of voice, frightfully deep and soft, and he drawled in a -fascinating way. - -We walked, unconsciously, slower and slower, far behind the others, in -the scent of the heather that clothed the hill. - -It was a wonderful night. It sort of caught you by the throat and made -you ache for all the things you could never, never have; crave the deep -friendships and wonderful love that would never come your way. - -"I am afraid I have been very stupid," I said. "I often am. You see, I -am afraid of father." - -"He's a bully, a rotten bully," he said; and then: "I beg your pardon, -Miss Burbridge--I shouldn't have said that." - -"It's just that he shouts, and I can't think when he shouts. I just say -something that will make him stop shouting--anything." - -"It's funny my not meeting you before," he said. "I've met your mother -scores of times. Of course, I've heard of you." He paused thoughtfully, -as if he were trying to remember what he had heard. - -"I don't go about much," I put in. - -It seemed unnecessary to tell him I had no "glad rags." - -"Have you ever had a good time?" he demanded abruptly. - -"I don't think so," I answered, then sudden loyalty to my parents made -me add: "I--I don't care for the sort of good time some girls have." - -"Rubbish!" he interrupted rudely. "Every girl likes a good time, and -every girl will use a fellow to get one--his money, his influence, his -friends, his admiration, his love--anything that adds to her rotten -vanity and flatters her. There is no honour among women, they are all -the same; there isn't a sport among them--not one; and the prettier a -girl is the less of a sport she is." - -"I am plain enough to be a sport," I put in. - -"Yes," he acquiesced indifferently; then he suddenly swung round on me. -"The real explanation of to-night is going to be damned awkward," he -said curtly. "Do you realise that?" - -"Yes." - -"Then why explain? It suits me jolly well if you don't." - -"I must." - -"Why?" - -"Oh--because I must." - -"A fool reason." - -"We can't pretend to be engaged." - -"Why not? I think it would be rather a piquant relationship. It -appeals to my debased sense of humour. It would at least have this -Stirling advantage over the average engagement. We needn't be a couple -of confounded hypocrites the whole time with each other. We have no -mutual regard--we could at least reserve our self-respect by being -honest; or perhaps the prospect of explaining to the inflammable Major, -his Colonel, and the Colonel's lady, the circumstances that necessitated -the loving embrace in which they found us to-night appeals to your sense -of humour?" - -"Don't be a beast," I flashed out. - -"You perceive how charmingly natural we are already. I find it -refreshing--and I intend to continue to refresh myself. Own honestly -that you simply daren't explain. The Colonel is going back to the mess -for bridge. When I arrive the entire mess will be in a position to -congratulate me. Those officers who have charming wives in billets will -carry back the glad tidings of our betrothal." - -"You must stop him!" I said. "Oh--please--please--do something! Where -are they?" I searched the hill for the three figures. - -"They have considerately left us to our lovers' lingering. Your father -is swollen with pride to-night." - -"Why?" - -"Because I am an excessively eligible young man--the sort of young man -no one expected you to noose." - -"You are a horrible young man--perfectly beastly!" - -Yet I did not hate him, he was so frightfully exciting. I can't quite -explain to myself what I felt about him. I could breakfast every -morning in his company for a year and not know what I was eating once. -I am quite sure of that. - -"I am not going to let you go," he said suddenly. "I have made up my -mind about that. You are a present from the devil to the worst side of -my nature. There, aren't you _thrilled_? Doesn't your foolish female -heart flip-flap?" - -"No," I said stormily; "and I think you are talking like an idiot." - -"Delightful creature! Now, listen here, young spitfire, I'm going to -give you a good time----" - -"I won't take it!" - -"You'll lap it up as a kitten laps up milk--that's all girls are for." - -"I am going back to explain to father and mother." - -"The thought of 'father' explaining to the C.O. and the mess fills me -with pleasurable anticipation. Your own conduct alone will require all -his ingenuity to explain; the natural and charming and quite unblushing -way in which you accepted the very nice congratulations of Mrs. Walters -and the Colonel requires quite a----" - -"I didn't know what I was doing." - -"That merely denotes you an idiot." - -"Where are we going?" I said, suddenly realising the pleasant wiry -spring of the heather was gone from beneath my feet. - -He gripped my arm and laughed. "I am taking you to pay a little call," -he said. - - - - - *II* - - -"It's Brennon House!" I protested. "You aren't going in here!" - -For answer he swung open the gate of the largest house in the -neighbourhood, still keeping tight hold of my arm. - -"Why not?" he demanded coolly. "I have a book to return." - -"But it must be nearly ten." - -"Better late than never." - -"Besides--I don't know them--and I have my old mack on." - -I knew who lived there well enough. - -Mother had called. - -"It is an honour to know the Gilpins," he assured me. - -I knew that. I knew they were frightfully rich and aristocratic, and -that half the officers were crazy about Grace Gilpin. All the most -attractive ones used to live up at Brennon House playing tennis and -boating on the artificial lake in the grounds; and they used to give -weekly dances and have a coon orchestra from London, and they had -amateur theatricals and no end of fun. - -Grace Gilpin had always seemed sort of unreal to me, like the princess -in a fairy story. I had never seen her. - -"Please! Please!" I protested. "This is madness!" - -"It is delicious madness," he said softly. - -In the moonlight I could see the heavy, colourless heads of flowers; the -scent of them, sweet and strange and all different, seemed to wave over -us for a minute as we passed. - -"They'll be on the veranda," he said. "We'll go round." - -"You're not going in!" I said desperately. - -He stopped and looked down at me. - -"In six weeks I go to the front with my draft," he said. "And I hope to -be killed. To-night has placed us both in the most extraordinary -position. It's practically impossible for us, at the moment, to -extricate ourselves. It just happens that fate has played into my hands -in the rummiest way. I don't want to extricate myself. Six weeks is a -very short time. I'm awfully rich. I'll give you a topping time, a -time you'll remember all your life--if you won't try to extricate -yourself for six weeks." - -"Pretend to be engaged to you?" - -"Why not? You've no one else in view at the moment. Everyone will envy -you, and say sweet things to your face and nasty things behind your -back. If you won't--I leave you to explain things to your people and -the regiment and the wives of the regiment." - -"I can't!" - -"Precisely! Then why worry? What does our engagement demand of us? -Civility and excessive courtesy in our bearing towards each other before -people. And please"--he caught his breath sharply--"when we are alone -we will have no horrible hypocrisy, no feminine flim-flam, no playing up -and pretty lies and coquetries and deceits; nothing but the plain -unvarnished truth and bare honesty; as we have no interest in each -other, we can at least pay each other the compliment of behaving as if -we were two men." - -"But," I began, dazed. He absolutely carries you off your feet. - -"Come on," he said curtly. - -We went through a sort of old-fashioned honeysuckle and jasmine pergola -and came opposite a broad stoep, all hung with baskets of pink geraniums -and ferns and pink Japanese lanterns with electric lights inside, and -white wicker armchairs and big pink silk cushions and white tables. - -It was just like a theatrical scene. - -There was an awfully handsome middle-aged woman sitting at a table -playing bridge with three elderly men, and someone inside the inner room -was playing "Iolanthe." - -Everybody yelled, "Hello, Cromer!" and "Cheerio, Cromer!" - -A girl suddenly appeared from behind a huge flowering Dorothy Perkins in -a white tub, and two or three officers and another girl in a bunchy -mauve and silver gown fluttered up from a low pink divan. - -They stared at me, in my old mack, with well-bred curiosity, and I -thought I looked like someone from the pit wandered on to a musical -comedy scene. - -The music stopped, and a girl suddenly appeared at the french-windows. - -She was perfectly wonderful. - -She was awfully fair and tall and slender, and she had blue eyes the -exact colour of her georgette gown. - -You could have cried over her, she was so lovely; and she had the sort -of mouth that made you feel you simply couldn't go away until you had -seen it smile. - -"Hullo! Cap.," she said; her voice was light and high and sweet, almost -as if she were laughing at something. - -"I've brought your book back, Grace," he said; and then he took my hand. -"Oh, Pam dear," he said--then to the handsome lady at the bridge table, -"May I introduce my little fiancee--Miss Burbridge." - -I knew then; I just knew by the look in those very blue eyes. I quite -understood why Captain Cromer was bitter, why he wanted a fiancee. - -He wanted to hit back. - -A sort of buzz of talk and teasing broke out all round me, and through -it all I detected a vein of surprise. - -Grace Gilpin came down the veranda to shake hands. She walked -wonderfully--just like an actress on the stage. - -"Why, you poor souls!" she said, lightly and gaily, "so it's -raining"--and she looked at my old mack; then _everybody_ looked at it. - -I felt suddenly as if I wanted to cry. - -"I made her put it on," I heard Captain Cromer say. "She is such a -foolish little person. She doesn't take half enough care of -herself"--and I knew that I could learn to love that man, that I was -doing a crazy thing, and I was going to go on with it. - - - - - *III* - - -When I am with people I feel as if I am a fairy princess taking part in -a fairy play, a wonderful and desirable and adorable person. It is a -perfectly marvellous feeling; and when I am alone with Cheneston I feel -as if he switched the limelight off with an impatient hand, and I was -just a plain, shabby, silly kid. - -He has bought me an engagement ring--for the six weeks before he goes to -the front. - -"Let us be as beastly orthodox as possible," he said as he popped it on. -"Why don't you look after your nails--you've got decent hands." - -"What shall I do with it when----" - -"When you write and break off the engagement! Oh! keep it if you like." - -It is a platinum set with one glorious ruby, an enormous stone. You -could almost warm yourself by the red there is in it. - -I love warm things, and glows and twinkles and brightness. - -I am waking up. I feel as if I were as covered with shutters as an old -anchor with barnacles, and every morning when I wake up I find more -shutters opened. - -I think Cheneston must be perfectly appallingly rich. He has a villa in -Italy, and a little hut in Norway where he stays for the ski-ing season, -and the white yacht _Mellow Hours_ in the harbour is his. - -It's more fairy tale-y than ever. - -Mother and father are delighted at my engagement; but their surprise is -rather humiliating, it does make me realise how awfully plain and dull I -am. - -I haven't any parlour tricks or conversation, my tennis is rotten, I'm -sick on the yacht, I swim like a mechanical toy, I haven't the foggiest -idea how to play golf, and I'm never sure of my twinkle in jazzing--and -Grace Gilpin does all these things absolutely toppingly. She's been -trained to do them from quite a little kid. - -We seem to do everything in fours--I and Cheneston, and Grace Gilpin and -a man called Markham, Walter Markham, who adores her. - -Cheneston is sweet to me when we're all together, but when he and I -leave the others and are alone sometimes he hardly speaks. - -I imagine he is bored. - -I do love him so much, every day I seem to love him more and more and -more. - -I suppose I ought to be ashamed and humiliated to write that down, -because I simply bore him to tears; but I'm not, mine isn't a silly -love--he's my very, very dear, the most wonderful man I have ever seen -or known. - -Sometimes people say things that simply wring my heart. - -"I suppose you'll get married directly after the war?" the C.O.'s wife -said. "Will you live in England?" - -"I--I don't know," I answered. - -"We shall winter in the South," said Cheneston; he glanced at Grace -Gilpin and I knew she was listening. "We shall probably go to Norway -for the sports, and spend the rest of the time in England." - -"It sounds like a fairy tale," said the C.O.'s wife. - -"I think it is," I broke in unexpectedly. - -Grace Gilpin turned in her chair and glanced at me. She was lovely; she -wore cornflower blue crepe and white collar and cuffs. - -"I think Cheneston would be quite wonderful in the role of a fairy -prince," she said. - -He laughed, rose, and walked away. - -Going home he looked at me gravely. - -"I hope you're not getting romantic about our engagement. I don't mean -anything rotten, child--but all that silly rubbish about fairy tales and -fairy princes. I have only five weeks more--then I go to the front." - -"Did you care for Grace most frightfully?" I asked boldly. - -He looked down at me with slightly puzzled eyes. I can't describe his -eyes exactly, they are hazel, and when he is going to laugh they laugh -first; and they are hard and honest and straight. - -"I thought," he said. "I gave my very soul into her hands, to play with -and laugh at--but I don't know. It doesn't hurt so much--as it did. -Pam--I gave her everything that was best in me; and she encouraged me, -she let me give, and when I had beggared myself--when I cared like -hell--she flung my gifts back in my face and laughed. I wanted to -humiliate her as she had humiliated me. I'm not a great man, Pam; she -ground my pride and my love and my manhood under her heel--and I wanted -to hit back." - -"And I afforded you the opportunity," I said very quietly. - -He looked out over the downs, his eyes were worried and troubled and his -face was white. - -"I wouldn't hurt you for the world, Pam; I have been thinking over this -make-believe engagement of ours, wondering if it could possibly hurt you -in any single way. The only thing I can see is that it might keep off -another man who might want to marry you--and there isn't one about. It -simply amounts to this: I give you a good time, and you wear a ring I -gave you. I wouldn't hurt you, Pam. Sometimes I could almost fancy -you're not like other women--you're not a beastly little actress. I -suppose I seem an awful cad sometimes. We can't cry off just now, kid; -the Service makes prisoners of us all. I can't leave here, whatever -happens, until I go to France with my battery in five weeks' time; and -if we pretended things were broken off now our position would be -intolerable. We've got to carry on. I'll make the next five weeks as -pleasant as ever I can for you." - -Mother came out as we reached our gate, and Cheneston said good-bye. - -She looked at me curiously as we went inside. - -"You funny cold little thing," she said, "never a kiss." - -One of the things that makes me feel frightfully sick is the amount -mother and father are spending on clothes for me. - -It's rather like an Arabian Nights dream to have a wardrobe full of -perfectly adorable frocks, but I feel it's so unfair to let them spend -all this money to get me settled when being settled is as remote as it -ever has been. - -I try to accept the light and airy "take what the good gods give" -philosophy, but I am too aware that it isn't the good gods, it's mother -and father who give, on a Major's pay, fully believing their reward will -be made concrete in "The Voice that breathed o'er Eden," and the -disposing of a singularly plain and unexciting daughter to a handsome -young man with pots of money. - -I would so like to be angry with someone for being plain, but I did it -absolutely on my own, because mother is quite a beautiful person and -father is frightfully aristocratic and romanish--they are both rather -splendidly beaky, but mine is a pure and unadulterated snub. - -I suppose I have a petty, shallow nature, but I pine to be romantic and -wonderful like Grace Gilpin, and simply draw people to me; no one but -deaf old ladies who think I look kind and good ever ask to be introduced -to me; and only chivalrous men who think I look tired and anaemic and -work for my living ever offer me seats in buses or tubes. - -Grace Gilpin takes her surroundings and uses them as a background--she -is always to the fore. I sink into the background and become part of -them. - -Yesterday we took out lunch on the links, caviare sandwiches and stuff, -and Grace sat down by a flaming gorse-bush in a grey frock and a grey -jersey. She just used that glorious bit of flame as an "effect." I sat -on the other side, and they all nearly forgot me and went off without -me. - -"I didn't see you," Walter Markham said. - -It's true; there are heaps of people in this life you don't see because -of the more ornamental people. - -I would have given almost anything to have been born showy, so that -people would look at me. I want Cheneston to look at me as he, and -other men, look at Grace, as if she were a splendid vision vouchsafed to -them for five minutes. - -I do love that man, and love isn't one bit what I thought it was. I -always imagined it was a mixture of bubble and scorch, but it -isn't--it's so sweet to love. I could be good! It makes me feel good -right to my finger-nails, and full of that -after-church-on-a-summer-Sunday evening-in-peace-time feeling; that's -why I think that my love for the man isn't anything to be ashamed of or -humiliated about. He doesn't love me, I know; but I have a conviction -you can't grow unless you love, and I feel so much more use in the world -since I've started growing. - -Loving Cheneston has made life perfectly wonderful for me. He doesn't -know it and he never will, but he's shown me all the dear beauty of the -world--and it is beautiful. - -Walter Markham is awfully nice to me; sometimes he leaves Grace Gilpin -to Cheneston and walks with me, and he is teaching me tennis in the -mornings before breakfast. He is much older than Cheneston, Grace, or -I--he must be forty--and he is very rich. - -I wonder if Grace will marry him--or if she will marry Cheneston. -Sometimes I think he will forget he is angry with her, and he will tell -her how the mistaken idea of our "engagement" arose, and why he let it -prosper--there is a frightful lot of the open-hearted, impetuous -schoolboy about Cheneston. - -I don't think he is happy. - -If he made a clean breast of it to Grace we should have to break off our -supposed "engagement," and mother would have to take me away--father -couldn't leave. - -I can imagine what my life would be! - -I think they would pack me off as governess or companion to someone. - -I know if I don't marry by a certain age that will be my fate. Mother -was perfectly honest about it--before Cheneston came along; now I am her -dear little daughter, she looks at me in pleased bewilderment sometimes, -as if wondering how so homely a hunter could have achieved such a -sensational capture. - -They have never tried to equip me in any way. I was never given the -opportunity to acquire any accomplishments. Old Giovanni taught me to -sing--for love of his art. - -Mother laughed when she heard he was teaching me--she laughed because he -was a funny, broken-down old Italian singer, and the boys used to pay -him five shillings a night out of mess funds to come up and play to them -in the evening when the regiment was stationed at Gilesworth and there -was nothing on earth to do. - -Giovanni was a great teacher, and to him I owe to-night. - -I don't think I'll ever forget to-night. - -It was lovely! - -I wish I could tell Giovanni all about it, he would so understand. Once -he was furious; he told mother I had an extraordinary voice, and mother -laughed and said she did not doubt it. - -Cheneston used the words at the Gilpins' to-night. - -"You have an extraordinary voice, Pam!" he said, "amazing." - -Grace sings. Cheterton and Pouiluex of the Paris Conservatoire trained -her voice. - -To-night we all went over to the Gilpins' for coffee--mother, father, -Cheneston, and I--and when we arrived Grace was singing "Jeunesse," that -funny little song about "taking your picture out of its frame, and out -of my heart I have taken your name"--it wasn't very effective. It needs -a lot of sorrow in the voice, and Grace's voice is full of light -laughter; it was rather like a tom-tit trying to dance a minuet. - -I was feeling stirred up and rebellious. It seemed so hard that I had -only a funny little face and homely little ways in which to express all -the beautiful big, swishy feelings that were eating me up inside, and -Grace was so lovely that she could express things she didn't really feel -at all. - -It seemed so awfully unfair and rotten, just as if we were both trying -to touch Cheneston's heart with the same melody, and she had a glorious -grand to work on, and I just a little boarding-house upright. - -They had blue chinese lanterns with apple-blossom pattern on the stoep, -and great copper bowls of larkspurs and pale pink carnations everywhere, -and black cushions on all the white wicker chairs; and Grace wore black -with an enormous blue sash. - -She was singing in the drawing-room, with Walter Markham turning over -her music, and when she came out on to the stoep she said: - -"Surely, Pam, you play or something?" - -"I sing a little," I said. - -"Then do try," said she--you know the sort of woman who always asks -another woman to "try" to sing. - -I went straight to the piano and I sang "Melisande in the Wood," -accompanying myself. - -I think my voice has a funny register, it seems to surprise people. -It's terrifically deep and strong and soft--almost "furry." - -It's rather disconcerting, because it doesn't sound as if it belonged to -me at all; I am like a doll's house fitted with a church organ. - -I don't think I have _ever_ sung as I did that night. I was pealing and -ringing and chanting inside before ever I started, and all that was -there in my heart seemed to rush into my voice. - -It was like some great big longing, hoping, sad she-spirit singing. - -When the last "sleep" had sort of slid away, I turned round; they were -all in the room staring--just staring. - -Walter Markham came over to see me. - -"You are wonderful!" he said. "Pam--you are wonderful!" - -I looked at Cheneston, suddenly I felt as if I had taken control of my -background. - -Cheneston's face was white. - -His face was the face of a discoverer. - -He bent over me. - -"You have an extraordinary voice, Pam," he said, "amazing---- But of -course it lies--women use their singing voices to tell lies--wonderful, -beautiful, sweet-sounding lies." - -"Sing again," Grace said. - -But I would not sing again; I had made my effect--I own it quite, quite -honestly--I could have shrieked with triumph. - -So Grace sang. - -She sang "Rose in the Bud"--and it was like the trickling after the pour -had ceased. - -I think they all felt it. - -They began to talk. - -Cheneston did not talk; he leant back against the black cushions and -stared into the garden with a white face. - - - - - *IV* - - -I do love life. - -It's a perfectly priceless possession, sometimes I'm quite sorry to go -to sleep and forget what has happened and what is going to happen. I -suppose I am childish. - -Cheneston makes everything so smooth and easy and charming. I never -realised the enchanted atmosphere that money and good breeding creates. -You feel as if you were continually being feted. All the women in the -set in which I live now are treated the same way. I cannot understand -why they ever grow old or have to have their wrinkles massaged and their -hair hennaed; none of the sort of things that make a woman grow old are -allowed to come near them. - -All the things, and the sights, and the feelings that are stale to Grace -Gilpin and her chic friends are new to me--I sort of rush at them and -mop them up. I can't help being thrilled and happy. - -"You'll wear yourself out," Grace Gilpin says. - -Yet the men seem to like my enthusiasm. I couldn't be blase if I tried. - -I love, love, love every bit of every single day--that's the honest -truth. - -I don't think it's rained once since the night Cheneston and I met in -the glare of the searchlights. I suppose that seems a frightfully little -thing, but it isn't--it's an awfully big thing. - -And the battery is nearly due to leave for France. - -Cheneston is so sweet and gentle with me, just like an elder brother to -his little sister. - -I never knew a man could understand in the way he does. I always -thought a man had a totally different type of brain. - -We went up to Town to the opera last week, and we dined at the Carlton -and I wore a rather clever dress mother selected for me--brown and amber -tulle the colour of my hair, with just a huge bunch of tea-roses at my -breast. - -A man Cheneston used to be at Oxford with, and his sister, and -Cheneston's aunt and uncle, made up the party; and I seemed to make them -laugh an awful lot, and I heard the aunt tell Cheneston I was the most -original child she had ever met. - -Oh! but the music! - -I didn't know I could feel as I did. It seemed to pluck at my heart -with little red-hot fingers. One minute it picked me up and swung me -into a state of dizzy gladness, and the next I seemed to see nothing but -Grace Gilpin and Cheneston, and the battery leaving for France! One -minute I felt good--so good that I could have got up and walked straight -into a convent for the rest of my life. And the next I wanted to fight -Grace Gilpin for Cheneston and start that very minute; me, the funny -little thing with the snub nose who made people laugh! - -Why did Heaven make me a funny little thing with a snub nose? It wasn't -sporting; and I do think it handicaps one. One doesn't somehow expect a -snub nose to be a Joan of Arc, or Florence Nightingale, or Mrs. -Pankhurst, or anything thrilling and earnest and vital and glowing. - -I think it's rotten to be born a quaint little thing that nobody takes -seriously. - -It was awfully weird the way Cheneston looked at me, and the boy who was -at Oxford, and the uncle, and the father--just as though I was something -they had never really seen properly before. - -Cheneston sat behind me, and I could feel him trying to read things in -my brain through the back of my neck--it made me all tingly. - -He is a strange man--you could wonder what he was really like for hours. - -"Did you like it?" he said when it was all over and he helped me on with -my coat. - -I nodded. I couldn't speak. - -We were staying the night at the Savoy, and Cheneston and I drove there -together, mother and father preceding us in another taxi. - -"Pam," he said, "what were you thinking of to-night?" - -"Just dreaming," I answered. - -"I was thinking that in another week I shall be--out there." - -"Yes," I said; and all the happiness that the music had brought me ebbed -from my heart, and left it cold and dark, like a little cellar when the -lamps had been extinguished. - - -To-morrow at six the battery entrains. - -I heard father giving orders for the band to play them off. - -He is to go too, of course, but mother seems quite philosophic about it. -I wonder if when people grow older they lose that sort of sick, gnawing -fear that attacks you when you think of someone you care for very much -going into danger. - -If you do I hope I grow old very quickly, because at the present moment -I feel dreadful. - -To-morrow Cheneston goes--and I mustn't show him I care the least little -bit. I've got to keep the flag wagging. - -I suppose everyone will turn out to see the battery off. I know a lot -of the men's wives came over in the old paddle boat last night to say -good-bye. Poor souls!--their eyes were red, and some of them had little -kiddies in their arms; but they had the right to grieve. I haven't any. - -I think having the right to break your heart makes the breaking an -easier affair. - -I'm sorry about father, but I'm not as sorry as I ought to be. I have -always felt uneasy when he was around, like Pomp and Circumstance, his -wire-haired fox-terriers, on the alert to move out of the way quickly -and hide if necessary. - -I don't think he realises the dreadful effect his red-faced shouting has -on people--it's like being scolded by a lion. - -The atmosphere of the house is almost as if a raid were just over when -he is gone. - -The Gilpins had announced their intention of seeing the battery off, and -they were calling for us in their motor. - -I dread that little station at six o'clock in the morning, and all the -men, and the crowd of women beyond the barrier, and the mess band -shouting "The Long, Long Trail," and the chilly greyness; it sort of -nibbles your heart before ever the good-byes are started. - -Cheneston has been up to say good-bye to the Gilpins. - -He is whistling outside for me to go down. Oh! I wish I were wonderful -like Grace, and I could make him care, ever such a little bit, before he -went away! - - -_Later_. - -The moors, and the stars, and the leaves of the aspens shivering in the -moonlight like spangles on a dancer's dress, and the scent of the -heather, and of gorse, and the tingling, exhilarating pungency of the -unseen sea--could anything hurt more? - -And me, longing to belong to the night--to capture just a scrap of its -mystic, thrilling beauty--walking beside the one man in the world an -unromantic, bunchy little thing with a snub nose. - -He was very pale and constrained. I suppose it was his good-byes with -Grace. I kept on wondering what they had said to each other, wishing I -knew! - -"Let's sit down, kid," he said abruptly. "I've a lot to say." - -We sat down. - -We seemed to have the whole, beautiful, wonderful world to -ourselves--only it was an empty old eggshell of a thing, because he -didn't care. - -"Pam," he said, "I want to thank you for being a fine little pal to me. -I--I must have seemed a pretty rotten sort of swine often." - -Now, as I write him down and the things he says, he doesn't cut a very -gallant figure, and yet he is. He's a _big_ man--his eyes, his laugh, -his voice, the funny way he says things. He makes all other men seem -little and very young. - -"Oh no!" I said. I shut my eyes because I could concentrate on getting -carelessness into my voice, and it all hurt so horribly. - -He seems little and ordinary--I can pop the atmosphere on paper--but he -wasn't; he was _big_, and splendid, and very, very far away from me. I -seemed to look at him through glass and hear him through space. He -isn't the type that could share himself with two women--I expect I got -that feeling because he'd given everything to Grace. - -"Pam," he said, "I'm so afraid--it's tortured me! You had a rotten dull -life before I came. Will--will it seem very dreadful going back?" - -"I always knew I should have to," I said steadily. - -"Yes," he said, "I know!" I had never heard his voice like that. -"Pam--be honest! I didn't know how absolutely splendid you were! I -thought you were just like other women!" - -I rose and stuck my hands in my pockets. - -"I'm all right," I answered brusquely. "I've had a top-hole time, and -I'm frightfully bucked about it. Let's have a tramp." - -He rose too, he looked ill and worried. - -"Pam," he said, "things may happen--out there. They do. I don't think -it's necessary to break off our supposed engagement at once. It--it -would be so much easier for you if you didn't. Pam--I wish to God I -could undo things." - -"Why?" I queried starkly. - -"If you should ever pay for these six weeks--in any way--I'd never -forgive myself." - -I tried to reach him. I wish I were big that I could tuck an arm in his -and tell him not to be an idiot, but I dare not touch him. I knew that -I should cry and cling to him. - -I do not believe there ever was a more wonderful night, so full to the -brim of scents and moonlight and velvet shadowed mystery. - -"I--I want to go home," I said suddenly. "I'm tired." - -We hardly spoke again until we reached our garden gate. I had the -feeling that he, too, was surging with the things he wanted to say. - -At the gate he put his hands on my shoulders, he was breathing like a -man who had run far. - -"Pam," he said, "Walter Markham and I were talking about you -to-night--and I told him the truth, child--that we weren't engaged, and -hadn't any feeling for each other." - -"Why?" - -"A man knows when another man--cares. I'm glad I'm off to-morrow. Pam, -I was just an incident, kid--an incident." - -"Did--did Mr. Markham say--he cared?" - -"He's too loyal a pal for that. Besides, until I told him, he -thought----" - -"What did he say when you told him?" - -"I--I don't know. I just walked out of his hut and came to you. He's -not going with us to-morrow, you know--he's going to take on the new -draft. I--I'm glad. Pam, say that I'm just an incident. I shall feel -better about things, kid! I feel awful!" - -"You're just an incident!" I said quietly. - -I couldn't send him away with that look on his face. - -He bent and kissed my hand. - -His lips seemed hot. - -Then he turned, and I heard him running swiftly down the little lane. - -I wanted to have a sort of bright and shining appearance the next day, -but nothing helped me, neither the sleepless night nor the hot coffee. - -I climbed into the Gilpins' car with a white face. - -It was the beginning of a gorgeous blue and gold September morning, but -everything was misty and silvery and shiny with dew and mist. - -"Cheer up, little thing!" Mrs. Gilpin said as I got in. - -"Everyone is turning out to give them a send-off," Grace said. "I -suppose the Major has been gone hours?" - -"Yes," I answered, "his orderly called for him at four. Mother never -goes to see him off. She hates it." - -Mrs. Gilpin made sympathetic noises. - -"Walter Markham is the most fed-up thing on earth. He hates new -recruits. He wishes he was going," said Grace. - -"Perhaps the war will soon be over; the papers say the _morale_ of the -German troops is deteriorating," said Mrs. Gilpin hopefully; -conversation languished until we arrived. - -All the coldness and greyness of the morning seemed concentrated in that -little station. It was heart-breaking; and the mess band blaring out -"Soldiers of the King" seemed to accentuate the dreariness. - -The battery had answered the roll-call; when we arrived they stood in -little groups, some of them sitting on their kit-bags, the tin -bullet-proof helmets that had been served out the previous day hanging -from their haversacks. - -"There's Captain Markham," said Grace. "There's Mr. Wood and Connel; -there's Colonel and Mrs. Walters, and there's your father. I don't see -Captain Cromer, Pam." - -"I--I expect he'll be here," I answered foolishly. - -We passed through the gate on to the platform; the little group of women -outside the barrier watched us enviously. - -I was shivering and my teeth were chattering--the silence was so -uncanny. It was as if all those women outside and the men on the -platform were waiting for a miracle to happen and deliver them from the -necessity to face the immediate future. - -Father was much in evidence. He came up and spoke to us, and then -bustled off again. - -I turned to see Cheneston and his orderly beside me. - -"Morning," he said; he, too, was pale, but smiling. He turned aside to -speak to Grace. - -I saw an A.S.C. man push through the crowd to Colonel Walters; he looked -very hot; in his hand he had a telegram. - -The men were beginning to get into the train; a cheer, a very feeble -cheer that somehow seemed wet, came from beyond the barrier. - -Walter Markham joined us, and another man, a cheery boy called Withers. - -"I wish I was going too," Walter Markham said. "I applied for a -transfer months ago. I want to get into a Scotch regiment." - -I thought he avoided looking at me, and I felt uncomfortable. - -"I shouldn't have to train," he said, "and my majority is due. Yes, -sir?" this to Colonel Walters, who had hurried up looking amazingly -agitated. - -"The War Office is mad!" he said. "Stark, staring mad! Markham, you -have been transferred with a majority to the Cameron 10th Battalion of -the Leal Argyllshires. You will report to the C.O. at the headquarters -on Wednesday." - -"Yes, sir." - -"You, Captain Cromer, will remain on home service to train the new -battery which occupies the barracks under Colonel Prosser, taking -Markham's place. Johnstone is promoted to Captain at my discretion, and -I am to go with one subaltern lacking and an inadequate battery. Stark, -staring mad!" - -"I--I am to stay?" Cheneston said. "I--I can't." - -"Headquarters' orders," said the Colonel curtly. "Now, boys, all -serene?" - -The band blazed out "Tipperary." - - - - - *V* - - -Fortunately a climax is like a raid or a storm--it has a definite -duration. - -In the days before the curtain went up on life, I used to think how -ripping it would be to live through great situations and climax and -tragic happenings, like the heroines in the novels I used to devour. -Now I know you do not know they are happening to you at the time; -sometimes it's months before you say to yourself with sudden -understanding, "That was a terrible day!" or, "It was a great moment!" -or, "It was the happiest day of my life!" - -Undoubtedly the biggest moment in my whole life was when Colonel Walters -told Cheneston he was not to go to the front with his battery--and yet I -didn't know it at the time. - -Mrs. Gilpin said, "Oh! isn't that splendid! Aren't you glad, Pam?" and I -said, "I'm awfully glad!" - -Grace Gilpin was white as death. - -I think Cheneston was even whiter. - -"I'm to stay behind and take Markham's place, and train a lot of fool -boys to form fours and dig trenches! It's infamous!" - -"Surely you are glad for Pam's sake, Mr. Cromer," the Colonel's wife -interrupted reproachfully. - -I think Cheneston had utterly and completely forgotten me until that -moment. He turned and looked at me in bewilderment; I suppose he -suddenly realised that his enforced stay in the town would necessitate -the continuation of our supposed engagement. - -He drew a long breath. - -"Of course," he said, quite quietly, "of course, Mrs. Walters." - -You would imagine that when Fate calmly picked up two people, shook -them, and then placed them in a position alien to anything they had ever -planned or dreamed of, they would remain in a state of scared chaos; but -it isn't so. - -When we had seen the train off, Cheneston and I walked back to the camp, -quite quietly. - -"Poor little kid!" he said. "One never anticipated this, did one?" - -"No," I answered. I was thinking that God had made the morning for -lovers to walk in--the mist had not lifted, the sun shimmered golden -through it. It seemed to encase us in soft amber radiance. I had that -only-two-people-in-the-whole-wide-world-to-day feeling, which must be so -absolutely wonderful when you want to be quite, quite alone with a man -and he wants to be quite, quite alone with you. I was watching a cobweb -sewn with dewdrops; there was a sweet and foolish peace in my heart. I -could only remember that Cheneston was going to stay. - -"What are you going to do about it, Pam?" - -"Oh--carry on," I said. I tried to speak lightly. - -"You feel like that about it?" - -"Well--we can't break the engagement at once. It would be perfectly -awful for both of us--especially me. People would say I was only -waiting for you to go to France to--to rot." - -"You funny little soul! Pam--I--I blame myself for all this. You seem -only a kid to me--until you sing." - -"And then?" The golden mist seemed to dance towards me. - -"And then I know you are a woman--with all a woman's rotten wiles, the -little feline habit of plucking at a chap's heart-strings in order to -amuse yourself. There's only one good woman in the world--my mother." - -"I--I had no idea you had a mother!" - -"Why should you have?" he demanded curtly. "She is a great invalid, she -lives at Cromer Court near Totnes, in Devon." - -"Does she know about--us?" - -"She knows nothing," he said briefly. "There is nothing for her to know. -My God! look!" - -I looked. We had walked down to the sea, near Brennon House -bathing-tents. The Gilpins had built a little diving platform, and on -it, her hands above her head, stood Grace Gilpin. - -Half mermaid, half angel, she looked. She wore a black bathing-dress, -and a beach gown of brilliant violet lay behind her, a little pool of -exquisite colour. - -No pen can do justice to her, only the brush of a Sargeant or one of -those people who have things on the Academy walls that make everybody -else's work look dud. I think if I had been an artist I would have -burst into a passion of tears--something rose in my throat because she -was so lovely; perched there, gold and black, between the misty blue sea -and the misty blue sky, all the colour in the morning seemed to be -enmeshed in her hair and her beach gown, and the next minute she had -dived into the water. - -I looked at Cheneston--and I looked away. - -If only I might gleam and shine, if only I might palpitate with youth -and beauty and stand twixt sky and earth a thing of loveliness! But I -knew that no one would stand and stare if I stood where Grace Gilpin had -stood a moment before; they would only say: "There's a girl bathing--but -she'll find it pretty fresh." - -Cheneston was speaking. - -"Life isn't fair. One does a thing in pique or temper, or because one's -pride is hurt; one thinks the effects will only last a minute, and they -last for months and years--they are far-reaching, they involve other -people, till sometimes it seems one cannot light a match or perform the -most trivial office without involving other destinies and lives. Kid--I -never guessed, that night, that all this would happen." - -"In a way we're sort of pawns," I said. "It isn't any good fussing, is -it? You'll be sent out with this battery for sure, and then things will -settle themselves--won't they? I ought to go home to mother and tell -her that father went off quite cheerily. She knows, because Mrs. Gilpin -went back to her." - -I went home. It seems all singularly lacking in tenseness and emotion, -it seems common-place--it seems as if I had skipped the great moment and -hurried on with the "afterwards"; but there was no great moment, it was -all afterwards-ish. - -Things went on the same as usual, Cheneston, Grace Gilpin, and I went -about together; she had a new man in place of Mr. Markham, a man called -Dickie Wontner. The only change I find is in myself. - -Oh! I get so angry when people talk of the "peace of love"--there is no -peace in it. Maybe there is when you are married, I don't know and -probably I never shall; but love is revolutionary, it robs you of your -power of concentration--it may only be that you dust the same thing -twice, or you put things down and can't remember where you put them, or -you forget to take an interest in your friends and lose them without -knowing it; but the fact remains that you are only living with half of -yourself, the other and more vital half is continually padding round -after the beloved like a little invisible dog. - -I love Cheneston. I write it honestly. It is almost the only thing in -my life I am proud of. Sometimes I feel that my love is compounded of -blue sky and sunshine, and everything that is big and honest and -glittering in nature. - -He does not care one little scrap for me. - -He loves Grace Gilpin. - -I want them to be happy together, but I do not wish to sit in the front -pew at their wedding, or watch them fashion life together afterwards--I -want to run right away then, to the utter-most corner of the earth. - -I don't believe the world is round; I believe that somewhere there are -little corners for lovers who are not loved, and there neither -moonshine, nor sunshine, nor star shine shall worry them, neither the -scent of flowers nor the dear, shrill, heart-plucking songs of birds; -there shall be no memory of the quivering, glowing _beauty_ and _wonder_ -of life, which is not for them, but there shall be work--useful, honest -work--in which to find forgetfulness and fresh courage. - -I am hunting for a corner to run away to when my time comes. - - - - - *VI* - - -No one has heard from Walter Markham. - -He has no relations here, it is true--but it's funny he hasn't written. - -He is in Mesopotamia; perhaps the mails have been sunk or he has -dysentery or something. - -Grace is always asking Cheneston if he has heard, and whenever Cheneston -answers he avoids looking at me. - -Sometimes I honestly think Cheneston thinks I might have cared for Mr. -Markham, perhaps did care for him, and my supposed engagement to himself -spoilt and prevented things ever coming to a head. - -I know Cheneston is horribly unhappy. - -I know Grace is equally wretched. - -Neither of them knows how miserable I am, or that I suspect they are. - -Sometimes life seems so strange to me, peopled by a lot of actors and -actresses all living little lies. - -I know Cheneston will never tell Grace that his engagement to me is only -a farce. He has a fierce sense of honour, it makes him regard all sorts -of things that other men do every day as utterly and absolutely -impossible. - -Sometimes I have thought of going to Grace and telling her the whole -story of the mistake from beginning to end; but it might make things -even more impossible for Grace, because it isn't the sort of story a -woman should tell a woman. - -I wish I could learn to care for one of the boys and they for me, it -would simplify matters; but not one of them is a bit keen. Their eyes -shine when I sing--but they shine because of the memories I bring of -other girls. - -I am just "a nice little thing" and "a perfect sport"--and it is as safe -as being the mother of sons too old for the Army. - -Mother is getting a trifle impatient. She twitters about weddings -sometimes, and comes and sits on my bed and shows me pictures of bridal -gowns from sixpenny illustrated weeklies. Poor mother! it's going to be -a bitter blow. Sometimes I feel a little criminal about it. I read a -book the other day in which the heroine finds herself in "a ridiculous -position, unbelievable and unsurpassed in fiction"--I laughed until I -cried. She had only got to use a pennyworth of honesty and a pinch of -common sense to get out of her position; I am wedged tight in mine. - -Fantastic problems often demand fantastic solutions. - -Meanwhile, winter is coming on, frost is crisping the leaves, this -morning the dahlias in our little garden were black and sodden. - - -_Later the same day_. - -I have found the solution--and it is even more fantastic than I had -dreamed of. - -I know that Mrs. Gilpin, Grace, young Wontner, Cheneston, and one or two -other men who were at Gilpin's to-night, think I am in love with Walter -Markham in Mesopotamia and he with me--in spite of the fact that I was -engaged to Cheneston when he went out. - -I saw the Way Out for Cheneston quite suddenly, and grabbed it before it -was too late. - -I am sure that to-morrow Cheneston will come to me and ask me outright -if I love Markham, and then he will release me---- Oh, I don't know -what will happen! There will be a horrible row with mother, and I am -sure Grace will marry Cheneston before he goes out. - -They were all talking about Markham, and saying how weird it was that no -one had heard a single word since he left England. - -"He's not the sort of man to drop his friends, either," Mrs. Gilpin -said; then she turned to me, laughing. "Come now, Pam, you were in his -confidence--haven't you heard?" - -"Yes," I lied suddenly, "I've heard." - -Everyone exclaimed. - -Grace Gilpin was wearing pearl grey crepe de Chine and old Mechlin lace; -she leant forward in her low chair and stared at me; her face was very -pale, her wonderful eyes wide. - -"You didn't tell us, Pam!" she said, her voice thrilled, that queer -silver voice that always seemed to laugh. "Why ever didn't you tell -us?" - -Cheneston was staring at Grace. He was white too. I had a queer idea -that a minute before Grace had seemed very far away from him and I had -brought her near. - -One or two of the men were looking at Cheneston furtively, to see how he -took it. - -"Yes, why didn't you tell us, Pam?" Cheneston said. - -Suddenly I realised that they were all thinking what I meant them to -think--that Walter and I were unconfessed lovers. - -I had achieved my effect. - -"I--I didn't wish to," I said, and burst into tears. - -And now I am wondering what is going to happen, what everyone will say -and do, particularly Cheneston and mother. - -I wish I could find a corner of the earth now to crouch in, and I want -it to be dark and utterly silent, so that I may think and find out where -I stand. - - - - - *VII* - - -Sometimes I wonder what humans are fitted with imaginations for; they -are a great nuisance and utterly unreliable. I was fitted with a -high-power imagination--it overbalances me sometimes, swings me down to -misery and nearer to the face of ecstasy than I was ever meant to go. I -spent a sleepless night wondering what would happen after my confession -that I had heard from the renegade Captain Markham, and my inexplicable -tears; by the time I rose I had all the results planned out, beginning -with the interview with Cheneston, in which I implied my love for Walter -Markham, and ending in a sort of grand finale scene with mother, in -which elegance and reproaches and jasmine scent mingled, and my clothes, -all I had cost, and my obvious lack of chic and charm were hurled at my -head. - -None of these things happened. - -Grace Gilpin and her mother drove by in the high dog-cart as I was -taking Pomp and Circumstance for their morning run; they stopped and -chatted, but neither of them referred to Walter Markham, or Cheneston, -or the little scene I had enacted in their drawing-room the previous -night. - -I am one of the people who never "click" in their effects. - -I had meant to be so frightfully subtle over Walter Markham when the -idea first flashed into my mind. I meant to leave my little audience -with the vague impression that there might be something in it, that I -might have found in Walter Markham's society I had made a mistake in -getting engaged so quickly to Cheneston Cromer--I just wanted to make it -easy for Cheneston to break off the engagement. - -I was so sure he would come to me and ask me if his first suspicions -were correct and Walter and I cared for each other; then I would be -delicate and subtle again, and hint at devotion, nothing settled, -nothing sure. - -I had wanted the delicacy of a butterfly, and I had trodden as earnestly -and thoroughly as an elephant--a whole herd of them. - -I had tried to be subtle and I had achieved blatancy. - -I'm more schoolgirl than woman of the world; sometimes I get so mad with -myself I wish I could be another person, and meet myself out, and be -fearfully subtle and humiliating. - -All the morning I was strung up to concert pitch waiting for things to -happen, and nothing happened. I had a feeling that the end of my little -interlude with Cheneston was nearly over. I tried so hard to be -philosophic about it. - -We were going for the last picnic of the season with the Gilpins and -Morrisons. We were going to motor out to the White Woman's Cave and -have lunch there. Cheneston was coming too; the new battery was not in -camp yet, and he was at a loose end. Several of the officers had been -invited, and I had looked forward to it. - -"You'll wear your lemon linen coat and skirt and your big black sailor, -won't you, Pam?" mother said, wandering into my room as I was changing. -"Dear, dear! how ragged the garden looks! Winter will soon be here, and -then we shall have to see about coats and skirts and things for you. -Pam, there isn't any hitch, is there?" - -I slipped on my exquisitely cut linen jacket. - -"Hitch?" I repeated. - -"You've not been doing anything stupid--because, remember, your father -and I have had considerable expense in----" - -"What have you heard?" I said hardily. - -"That you had a certain friendliness for Walter Markham, and that, -although no one else has had the honour of being reminded of his -existence, you have been hearing from him." - -"Well!" I said, my voice sounded like reinforced ice. "Who has been -gossiping?" - -"I heard it," said mother uncomfortably. "I--I should wear that quaint -little collar with the quaint spotted border, Pam." - -So already the idea was gaining ground, the little rumour was gleaning -strength as it floated along. Pam Burbridge was in love with Walter -Markham, they wrote; perhaps they were waiting till he came back to -break it off. The Burbridge-Cromer engagement had been too sudden to be -lasting. Rather hard on Cromer; still, it was pretty obvious where he -would console himself, and a far more suitable match in every way. I -could hear them. - -I looked at the successor chosen by popular opinion when she and her -mother came to call for me. She wore a curious sea-green hand-woven -linen; instantly I knew why--it was the colour of the water in the White -Woman's Cave. She wanted to make another exquisite picture for -Cheneston and the subalterns to gaze at. - -"Carver is following with the lunch in the dog-cart," she said. "Melon -and salmon mayonnaise and pineapple, and cold pheasant and quail, and -all sorts of lusciousness. Climb in, Pam. Captain Cromer and the boys -are motoring over. Isn't it a ripping morning? I heard from Walter -Markham this morning. He says it's the first letter he's been able to -write since he got out there. They seem to have had a ghastly time." - -"Yes," I said, "they have." - -"Oh--of course," Grace said, "you heard. You said so last night, didn't -you? I forgot. Do you like Walter Markham?" - -"I like him awfully," I said earnestly. I tried to bring all sorts of -things into my voice, but I only sounded, as usual, like a guileless but -honest schoolgirl. - -"So do I," said Grace Gilpin. Her face was half turned away, exquisite -tendrils of gold fluffed about her face and hat--there were cherries on -her hat, they seemed no redder than the curve of her wonderful mouth. - -"If I were a man I should want to eat you," I said suddenly. -"Grace--what does it feel like to be able to make any man you meet feel -like that?" - -"Are you being catty?" Grace said. She looked at me with surprise in -her beautiful eyes. - -"I--I don't know," I said miserably. "I think I'm trying to be." - -Grace turned. - -"Pam, have you really been hearing from Walter Markham?" she said -quietly. - -I looked beyond her, up at the great bunch of blackberries gleaming like -black diamonds in the sun. They seemed like a bunch of eyes watching -me. - -Suddenly I felt good; I felt as if my silly little soul were enlarging -and bubbling to the surface. I knew why Grace asked--she asked for -herself and Cheneston, she wanted to think I cared for Walter Markham. - -"Yes," I said, "I have." - -"Does--Captain Cromer know?" she said. - -"You heard me say I had heard from him last night in your drawing-room." - -"I know, and then you burst into tears. I was so glad you did." - -"Why?" I asked, startled. - -"You saved me from doing the same thing, you did it first." - -We went into the White Woman's Cave while the maids laid the lunch on -the smooth, springy grass. More guests had been invited than I -expected, but Cheneston had not yet turned up. - -The walls of the White Woman's Cave are smooth and dark, and the sea -purrs through it and licks the smoothness with a little kiss, and the -light comes through the roof and lights the water so that it gleams like -pale green fire. - -It was wonderful and a little uncanny, like a theatrical scene, and it -was cold in there, and the daylight and the sunshine seemed far away. - -"And to think a woman lived here for years," one of the girls said. - -"Her lover died and she wanted to get away from the world." - -"How romantic!" said another girl. "Look, here's Major Morrison and -Captain Cromer." - -I think she thought that much more romantic. As she spoke Grace Gilpin -moved. I don't know whether she did it purposely; perhaps the instinct -to frame her beauty is implanted in her. She stood so that the green -light from the water, fairylike and phosphorescent, held her in a -shimmering glow of opalescent fire. She had taken off her hat; her -coronet of fluffy, tendrilly gold hair shone like a halo, and her dress -gleamed like a mermaid's sheath; she seemed neither of heaven nor earth, -a betwixt and between creature made for man's undoing. - -"I wish I were an artist, Grace!" Cheneston said. - -Her pretty silver laughter floated out. - -"Oh! Why?" - -"He would paint you as a spirit of the cave," Major Morrison said. - -As we came out into the sunshine I saw that Cheneston was very white. -He gripped my arm. - -"Pam," he said, "I must talk to you, child. I'm nearly off my head!" - -"Lunch," I said feebly. I was suddenly inexplicably scared. I seemed -to have brought the atmosphere of the cave into the sunshine with me. - -"Confound the lunch!" he said violently. He turned to Grace. "I must -talk to Pam," he said. "May we have a quarter of an hour's grace?" - -"Oh--certainly." - -"Begin without us if we don't come." - -"Very well," she acquiesced. - -"Come," said Cheneston curtly. - -So he had been thinking things over, and he was going to ask me about -Walter Markham, and tell me that he and Grace had discovered they cared -for each other. - -I wondered if I could manage to look merry as a marriage-bell with a -funeral going on in my own heart. I discovered that to be a quaint -little thing with a snubby nose has its advantages: you're not expected -to furnish a big display of facial emotion. - -"I can't walk any more," I said. My knees were trembling; I felt -horribly, unromantically sick. It was my great hour, the hour of my -renunciation, and I had no great feelings, only little squeamish, -physical ones. - -"Sit down, then," he said. - -I sat down with a flop, under a crab-apple tree that was like a flame, -and there was blue sky above us and golden bracken all around us, and -when it swayed we could see the sea, like slits of turquoise through -golden fretwork, and it seemed to me the stillest place in all the -world. - -"Pam," he said, "my mother is very ill--dying," and he turned from me -and buried his head in his hands. - -I sat very still. It was so absolutely unexpected, and by-and-by I -clutched the bracken on either side of me and I prayed inside myself: -"Don't let me go on feeling so dreadfully like his mother--or I shall -put my arms round him and cuddle him!" - -And I knew then that I loved Cheneston with the only sort of love that -is real and lasting--I loved him as if he were my little, little boy. I -loved him when he was my strong, decisive young knight. I loved the -mystery in him, and the strength of him that I didn't understand; but I -loved him best of all, most sweetly and dearly of all, when he was just -my hurt boy. - -I don't think I see things romantically. I suppose it's in keeping with -my appearance. I never see love as something that is remote and cold and -miles away. I would go to the ends of the earth with Cheneston, and I -would love to nurse him when he's got a cold. I would love to go to his -house in Norway, but I would also adore to make toast in front of the -kitchen fire with him if the maid was out. I suppose my love is homely -like myself, but it seems to me that once you've got love you can't tuck -it up with the stars when you order dinner and help make the beds--you -don't even want to, it makes you absolutely enjoy ordering dinner and -making the beds, that's the splendid part about it. - -Love makes ordinary every-days, full of ordinary every-day tasks, into -high-days and festivals full of little sacred services and missions. - -"Pam," he said. He lifted his head and looked at me. "I'm sorrier than -ever, my poor little soul--since last night. You see, I always thought -that Walter Markham cared, but I didn't know that you did. Kiddie, -you're such a splendid little sport, and I'll help you all I can; but if -you can't stick it, dear, I'll understand." - -"Stick what?" I said. - -He put his hand over mine, and I felt it tremble, and somehow the -trembling made me very strong. - -"I'm an only son," he said. "I think I've been rather a bad egg, debts -and cards, wandering over the face of the earth, a sort of rolling -stone, running away from my niche. It's worried the poor old mater. -You see, Cromer Court is rather a topping old place, family for -generations and all that. She wanted me to settle and marry and all -that. Grief of her life that I didn't." - -"Yes," I said. - -"She's splendid, absolutely fine. Pam, somebody has told her--about us. -She wrote me a wonderful letter this morning--it broke me up--about us." - -"About us?" I said idiotically. - -"Someone wrote to her and told her I was engaged to you. She wants to -see my future wife. She's dying. I had a telegram from my cousin down -there. Her letter was so wonderful. She said she would die happy -knowing. Pam--is it too much?" His eyes were full of tears. - -"It's nothing," I said. "I understand." - -"Pam!" he said. "Best woman in all the world! Pam, there's something -about you--it upsets all my theories; I seem just a pretty helpless sort -of rotter." - -I tried to find the right words to say. - -The bracken swayed, a delicate, golden trellis broken here and there -into turquoise like a mosaic; the birches shook their golden spangles; -and the little harebells, their stems invisible in the welter of gold, -swayed like jewels on invisible chains: all the world was wonderful, -wonderful, wonderful, and its wonder was throbbing in me, and all I -could say was: - -"When is the next train?" - - - - - *VIII* - - -I am writing this in my bedroom at Cromer Court, at a Queen Anne desk, -and by-and-by I am going to climb in a Queen Anne bed to watch the -firelight flicker on the white panelled walls, on the quaintest chintz I -have ever seen covering the chairs and the great divan, and fluttering -like restless wings over open windows--pale green linen, the colour of -young leaves, with bunches of white-heart cherries scattered over it. - -I feel simple as a milkmaid and good as a nun in this dear old house, -and I have never felt so happy. It is a precarious happiness. I should -think the wives of the husbands home on leave feel it the last two days. -It is a sort of happiness that freezes you while you are hugging it to -you because of its warmth, and turns and rends you while you are -caressing it--painful and beautiful at the same time. - -I saw Cheneston's mother to-night for a few moments. - -She is like one of those exquisite miniatures in the Academy that no one -but miniaturists ever stay long enough to examine; her skin is like a -child's, her eyes are Cheneston's eyes grown infinitely gentle--those -queer hazel eyes that look, in a miniature, as if the paint had never -dried. - -"So this is Pam," she said, looking up at me, and her voice is like -Cheneston's, grown faint and gentle; it has the same curious quality -that makes you feel thrilled, and causes all the little nerves in your -spine to "ping" as they do at an exciting play. "My son," she said, "I -am so proud--such a vain old woman!--proud that you should have won such -a woman--the only sort of woman that could ever have held you, son." - -They have no gas or electric light here, only candles in silver sconces. -I looked up suddenly and saw the perspiration glistening in beads on -Cheneston's forehead. She took my hands. - -"Pam," she said, "you're a wonderful little person--half gallant boy, -half elf, and the other part sheer mother. The gallant boy in you will -be his pal, the elf will keep him your eternal lover, and the -mother--will keep him on his knees to you." She looked up at me -whimsically, tenderly. "The Cromers are a woman's life-work--they run -away for years and leave you to break your heart, and they come back and -fill the hall with tusks and elephant-leg umbrella-stands, and expect -you to go mad with them over the trophies. The elf in you will still -the call of the wild in Cheneston, he will not dare to leave you, and -the mother that broods in your quiet eyes." She turned to Cheneston. -"You mustn't lose her--she's the one woman in the world for you--the -only woman." - -Then the nurse came back and signed to us to go. - -Old Mrs. Cromer gave me a wonderful smile, and in that smile I suddenly -realised how beautiful, how magnetic she had been. It was a smile of -the most extraordinary and amazing happiness. - -"Your father," I said, when we got outside, "your father went away from -her?" I wanted to see if I had understood the significance of the -smile. - -"He took her," he said hoarsely. "She was his star, his goddess." - -To-night we dined alone downstairs. - -I wore my grey taffeta with the tiny bunches of pink apple-blossom and -the little pink georgette fichu. - -I felt that nothing else in my wardrobe was in keeping with the -atmosphere of the Court. - -Cheneston changed into ordinary evening dress. It was the first time I -had seen him out of khaki. It sounds foolish and snobbish to say he -looked a very gallant gentleman, as if I were trying to write an -old-fashioned novel; but it is the only phrase that exactly describes -him. - -I felt an extraordinary atmosphere of noble sweetness, it seemed to -throb through me. I was shiningly happy in the very inmost corner of my -soul. - -Cheneston is a perfect host; so many men leave off being the wives' -hosts after they have married them. I had a feeling that Cheneston -never would. - -We talked of books--funny, dear old-fashioned authors like Dickens and -Mrs. Gaskell and Jane Austen. When we rose he looked at me. - -"You, woman, are wonderful," he said tersely: "you have only blown in -here, and yet you belong to it, you are of it." - -"And to-morrow I shall blow away again," I said. - -"And to-morrow you will blow away again, he acquiesced. - -"Can you imagine Grace Gilpin here?" I said suddenly. "Can you imagine -her beauty in this setting?" - -"It is unimaginable," he said curtly. - -"She is beautiful," I persisted. I had an idea that my words must come -sobbingly, because my heart was sobbing. - -"She is the most beautiful thing I ever saw," he agreed. "They are -bringing us coffee in the drawing-room." - -I think the drawing-room is the biggest room I have ever been in; it is -so long and narrow; the walls are white panels, and the carpet pale -grey, and the chintz is the same grey with a little fierce blue lobelia -bobbing about on it, and there is priceless blue Chinese porcelain -everywhere, and a wonderful and enormous grand piano, and there were -great bowls of white jasmine everywhere. - -I sat down at the piano and ran my hands over the keys, and Cheneston -spoke. - -"Pam--please don't sing. I--I beg you not to sing." - -"I won't if you don't wish it." - -"Thank you." - -But after they had brought in the coffee old Mrs. Cromer's nurse came -and begged me to leave the door open and sing. I looked at Cheneston. - -"Yes," he said. "Tell mother Miss Burbridge will sing." Then he looked -at me; his face was very white. "Can I fetch you music, Pam?" he said. - -"No, I don't need it, thank you." - -He opened the french-windows, and the air that blew from the sea and the -red fields of Devon swept into the room in a cloud of jasmine scent, and -through the diamond panes I saw the stars twinkling--and suddenly I lost -Pam Burbridge and the pretty room. I became something that had kinship -with the stars and the hot scent of jasmine, something that was -houseless and homeless and free; I walked beside Cheneston through -Elysian fields, I talked to him and had no need of words. We were -mates, we who had never been lovers. - -I stopped. I was quite alone, and someone was rapping on the floor, and -I heard the nurse's voice over the stairs. "Miss Burbridge, will you -come?" - -I went slowly. I was trembling and a little afraid. - -I found the old lady sitting up in bed, and Cheneston with his arms -round her supporting her at the back. - -"Pam," she said, "I was frightened, dear--so frightened. I had to send -for you. You and Cheneston had lost each other--I heard it in your -wonderful voice, child, I saw it in the boy's face when he came to me. -What is it? What is it?" she looked at us piteously. "I feel something -is there. I know it! Something that shouldn't be there! I feel it!" - -"Nonsense, dearest," Cheneston said. - -"There is," she persisted. "I am frightened for you both. Why do I -fear you losing each other?--you who were made for her, and she who was -made for you." - -"You are nervous," he said. "You are worrying yourself unnecessarily." - -She caught his hands. - -"I am afraid for you, my dears," she said. "Cheneston--let me see you -married before I go. Let me be quite sure you have not missed the -supreme happiness." - -"We cannot do that, mother--there are many things to be thought of." - -"White satin and bridesmaids, wedding bells and marriage settlements do -not make a marriage, children. Pam, what is the obstacle?" - -"Nothing," I said desperately. "Nothing." - -She looked at Cheneston; Cheneston laid her down very gently. - -"You are worn out, dearest," he said. "You must rest now." - -She did not refer to it when I saw her the next morning. She looked -frailer than ever by day, a wraith woman with jewelled eyes. - -I breakfasted alone; a thin, fine rain drove against the windows like -sea-spray. In the garden I could see the michaelmas daisies bowed, -great clumps of amethyst, the chrysanthemums gleamed tawny red. Autumn -was later here, but in the rain gold leaves kept falling, and the pearly -white of the jasmine from the front of the house strewed the path, and -here and there the petal of a passion-flower, like an exotic beetle's -wing. - -I put on my little rainproof coat and sou'-wester and went out. - -I walked through the orchards, where wet apples gleamed like jewelled -fruit wrought in ruby and emerald, where yellow plums hung like waxen -fruit, and the late pears like amber ornaments. I walked through little -spinneys where the wet gold made your eyes ache. I saw the red fields -waiting for ploughing and fields heavy with the late crops through the -rain like a soft coloured map: and I saw the sea, queer and grey as an -aged woman, through the trees--and as far as I could see it all belonged -to the Cromers, and the words of an old poem came to me, something about -"a goodly heritage, bound by the sea and netted by the skies." - -I stopped to speak to a little child, and it answered me in the soft -up-and-down of the Devonshire dialect; and I knew I could have been -happy with Cheneston here--not with the satisfied happiness of those who -possess a chippendale drawing-room suite, a parlourmaid, and a car, but -happy as those who inherit the earth. I could have been happy with a -glorious, keen, swelling happiness. - -I turned home. It smelt as fresh as if all the earth had been newly -turned that morning, and as I turned a sunbeam struggled through and -flickered uncertainly. - -I found a letter waiting for me--two letters, one from mother and one -from Grace Gil pin. - -Mother's was characteristic. She hoped Mrs. Cromer was a nice woman and -approved of me. Were the estates extensive? Had Cheneston a big rent -roll? The end was typical. "I cannot see what you gain by postponing -your marriage. It cannot enhance your value in Cheneston's eyes. It is -always as well to remember that the world is full of girls, and an -engaged man is not regarded in the same light as an engaged girl. I -shall be very glad to hear that you have come to some sensible decision. -Your father writes that he has struck an expensive mess, and that he has -not been lucky at bridge lately. He is playing "pirate"--it has -superseded auction; try to learn it if you can, social assets are never -to be despised." - -Pirate at Cromer Court! I smiled. - -I sat down on an old oak chest in the tiled hall and opened Grace -Gilpin's letter. The sun was shining brilliantly now; the twinkling -raindrops that fringed the windows and hung glistening on the strands of -jasmine were reflected on the red tiles in wriggling little shadows, -like tadpole ghosts. I took off my wet mackintosh and my little -sou'wester, and fluffed up my hair with my fingers. - -Grace's letter was very much to the point. - - -"Walter Markham is home wounded. He is at Lynn Lytton Hospital, Long -Woodstock, Near Manchester. What are you going to do about it, Pam?" - - -Well, what was I going to do about it? - -What _could_ I do about it--except pray that Cheneston didn't get to -know until he didn't want me any more. - -I sat down stupidly and stared at the letter. - -I had a sudden vision of Grace writing, her golden head bent, seeing in -the missive and Walter Markham's presence in England the chance of -freedom for herself and Cheneston; believing Cheneston loved her and I -loved Walter Markham; believing that our engagement was just an -emotional mistake, never guessing it wasn't an engagement at all! - -A great many engagements are emotional mistakes. Why not ours? - -Cheneston came out of the door on the right, I suppose it was his study. -He held a letter in his hand. He was in khaki again, and he looked ill -and worried. - -"Good-morning," I said. I noticed he had his Burberry over his arm, and -his service cap and a small dispatch case under his arm. - -"You've heard?" he said. - -"What?" I said stupidly, and my heart began to beat very rapidly. - -"That Markham is in England--wounded. Oh! Pam--you shan't suffer, -because you've been so splendid and wonderful. You ought to be with -him; but he'll spare you, and understand when he knows." - -"Where are you going?" I said desperately. - -"Up to Lynn Lytton to tell him I understand that you care for each -other, that you've told me all about it, and that we're not engaged to -each other. To tell him how absolutely superb you've been, and why -you're here. My God! Pam, do you think I'd ever forgive myself if I -mucked up your life, dear!" - - - - - *IX* - - -"You--you mustn't go to Walter," I pleaded desperately. "I--I want to -go myself." - -I had one thought; it was so vivid that it seemed like something dressed -in scarlet floating on a grey sea of little thoughts and fears all -inextricably mixed--it was that I must get to Walter Markham first and -_explain_. - -"Pam," Cheneston said gravely, "are you afraid of my being clumsy and -not making things clear to him?" - -I nodded. I couldn't speak. The idea of Cheneston being clumsy, -Cheneston with his fine, fierce, almost uncanny insight into things, had -me by the throat. - -"I see," Cheneston said slowly. "Little Pam, I hate to think I have -made you afraid for your happiness even for one minute. You are so -worthy of happiness--so absolutely great! He'll understand, dear, how -simply priceless you've been to--come here. He's bound to understand." -He looked down at me with fierce anxiety in his hazel eyes, he seemed -desperately questioning his own belief in Walter Markham's -broad-mindedness. - -"I'll make him understand," I said. "Don't worry, I'll make him -understand." - -A sudden flood of fierce protective love swept over me. I wished for -the hundredth time that I might be big and Cheneston little--ever so -little--that I might take him in my arms roughly and tell him not to -look like that. I felt I could go to Walter Markham and explain -everything, I could sit by his bedside and skin my very soul--but I -couldn't help feeling, even then, it would be easier to do something -bigger and less painful, something more actually physical than -soul-skinning. - -I never found it very easy to show my feelings to people; the bigger -they are the more tightly corked they seem. I often wished for, and -sometimes I've cried because I haven't, little frothy feelings that -bubble over into little easy caresses and kind words and pretty -compliments and easy things like that. It rather hurts me to get to the -surface, I seem to have to tug from such a long way down. - -"I'll drive you to the station," Cheneston said. "I shall tell mater -you've got to go up to Town on business." - -"I'll tell her," I answered hastily. - -I knew she would sense Cheneston's disquiet; women lie to women better -than men to women. She took my departure more quietly than I had -anticipated. There was a lovely expression on her dear face--it was as -if her soul was smiling to itself while she was grave. She patted me -with her lovely soft hands. - -"And you will be back early to-morrow, dear, funny little girl? It's -odd," she said, "I see a cloud between you and Cheneston. When I first -saw it I was frightened, but now I know it is not made by your -hearts--it is only a cloud your silly brains have made, child, and it -will go. You are going to dissipate some of it to-day." - -"Yes," I said, "I am." - -It was true. In that at least I didn't lie. I was going to explain the -truth to Walter Markham, and I was going to make it easy for Cheneston -to marry Grace Gilpin. - -She held my hand against her face. The charm of her was like a -beautiful, strong current--I can't explain; all the things I long to -express and cannot, the things I suffer so for my inability to voice and -demonstrate, seemed gloriously easy. I put my arms round her and -pressed her face to mine. I loved her with a dear and full love. - -"My little Pam!" she said. "My dear, funny little soul!" Then she said -sharply and fiercely: "Oh, Pam, it's cruel if we women who are sent into -the world with out-size hearts and feelings meet the wrong men! I met -the right one!" A note of triumph crept into her voice. "And Cheneston -will understand that in your dear tiny body is a soul and a heart too -big and strong. People call it the artistic temperament--it isn't -really that, it means that something that is shut up and sealed with -other people until they get to heaven where nothing can hurt is left -open--maybe it's left open accidentally, maybe it's meant--and those -people suffer more than the rest of the world, and are more gloriously -glad, and out of the glory and the travail of their souls they give to -the world wonderful music, or wonderful pictures, or wonderful books. -_And they are not like other people_, Pam! They are very great and very -little at the same time, and not one in a thousand can understand how -life hurts, and how glorious it is when it is glorious. Cheneston will -understand; that is why you and he must never, never run away from each -other--you dear, funny little soul!" - -Then I heard Cheneston calling. - -We drove to the station almost in silence. He took the high dog-cart, -and we could see over the hedges; they sparkled with thousands of -raindrops, and the late dog-roses seemed like phantasies wrought in -vivid coral, and blackberries like black diamonds and rubies jewelled -the world, and every bird seemed singing and every cricket chirping for -sheer gladness of the newly washed day. - -He told me he had had an extension of leave. - -I was so happy. I have never had a feeling that I did not want to -share--I can't explain. I just want to pass on every bit of loveliness -that comes into my life. We passed lots of children picking -blackberries, and I could have cried because I wanted to kiss them so, -or give them something, or just tell them I thought they'd get the -loveliest lot of blackberries I had ever seen--because I was up in the -world, sitting above the hedges with Cheneston. - -We passed a little girl who had spilt all her blackberries and was -crying, and I took off a little gold bracelet I had on and flung it to -her. - -I shall never forget the ecstatic look in her small, grimy face. - -"You see," I said quickly, "I'm sorry if you think I'm mad, but--but she -was crying, and now she is happy. She will be awfully happy all day." - -I'm never sorry for the impulsive things I do, but I am nearly always -sorry because people don't understand. It seems to me like rubbing all -the lovely bloom off a butterfly's wing just to demonstrate that it is a -butterfly. - -"I don't think you're mad," he said, smiling. - -If I had had anklets as well as bracelets I could have given them away -this morning. He helped me down at the station; he was just a little -constrained, so I knew he was feeling tremendously full of feeling, just -as I was. - -"Modern life doesn't give a fellow much of a chance. I have rather -absurd notions about you at this minute--I should like to be Sir Walter -Raleigh, and put my cloak down for you to walk on. You don't know how -humble you make me feel, Pamela Burbridge." - -I felt myself sort of melting towards him. - -"What can I do to show you how splendid I think you are?" he said. "You -wonderful small person!" - -And something inside me wanted to say, "Exchange all this chivalrous -gratitude for just a tiny bit of love"; but I sat on the something's -head _hard_, like a good girl, and I said: - -"Why, you can get me my ticket; the booking-office is open now." - -There is nothing more cheerless and depressing than going to a place you -don't know and arriving all alone. If only there is a pillar-box in the -vicinity where you have once posted a letter, or a tea-shop where you -bought chocolates, it establishes a feeling of intimacy. At Long -Woodstock I felt an alien of aliens, an Englishwoman in a foreign -country. - -I swallowed a cup of tea and had a wash on the cheerless northern -station; then I took a mouldy old fly that smelt of innumerable weddings -and funerals, and set out for Lynn Lytton Hospital, and as I travelled -past the rows of grey stone houses I felt myself shedding my high-flown -courage of the morning feather by feather, until I became the reserved, -nervous little coward I had always been. Furthermore, I began to feel -very sick. - -I feel with intense earnestness that Charlotte Corday and Nurse Cavell -and Christobel Pankhurst, and those wonderful women who fought in the -Russian Army, could never have felt sick as I can feel sick, or they -would have stopped in the middle of their heroic deeds and gone home to -bed. - -I can think of nothing more unheroic than to feel sick on all the great -and emotional occasions of your life. - -We seemed to climb Lynn Lytton, it was high up on a hill, and by the -time we reached it the birds were twittering their benedictions and the -first stars were netted in the tree-tops. - -I told the cabman to wait, and climbed some steps--they seemed like the -steps of the Monument. - -I am glad the door opened at once, or I would have turned and bolted -down them like a rabbit. - -I must have been feeling pretty bad, because there was some late -clematis clinging to one of the pillars of the portico, and they seemed -to me in the twilight like large and particularly meaty spiders. - -I want so badly to write of the heroic sentiments and thoughts I had, -but I was sick, and the clematis looked like fat spiders, and I wanted -to run away. That is the honest truth. - -"I want to see Captain Markham," I told the sister who came to the door. - -"It is after visiting hours," said the sister gently. "Are you his -wife?" - -"No--he hasn't a wife." - -"His sister?" - -"No--just--just----" - -"I see," said the sister very gently. "Please come in," and I saw that -she did not see--she thought that Walter Markham and I had sentimental -relations. - -She took me into a little grey distempered room hung with orange -curtains, and sent the matron to me. She reminded me of snow, so deep -that it could never, never melt--kind snow, deep enough to be soft. - -"Are you Pam?" she said. - -I looked up, startled and taken unawares. - -"Yes," I said briefly, and stared. - -She sat down; she was a large woman, and there was a soothing placidity -about all her movements. - -"I thought so," she said. "Captain Markham has been calling for you -night and day--if we could have ascertained your other name we should -have sent for you, but when he was conscious he said there was no Pam." -She looked at me thoughtfully. "So you are Pam," she said. - -I nodded. "But it couldn't have been me he was calling for. -I--I--why?" - -"He is very ill," she said, "that is why I am going to let you see him -to-night. I do not think he will live till morning." - -I saw that she told me purposely without preamble. - -I sat numbed. I could only repeat stupidly: "But it couldn't be me he -wanted." - -I felt as if she were passing to me some imitations of her aloof -snowiness. I, too, felt a little unreal. - -"I think you have turned up at the right moment," she said. "Please -come, and don't be surprised if he doesn't know you." She put her hand -on my shoulder. "Don't give up hope," she said; "nothing is -certain--not even in science and surgery." - -I think it is in one of Tennyson's things there comes the phrase "into -the jaws of Hell"; it crept into my mind when I saw Walter Markham. - -I have never seen anything so terrible or so pathetic. He was -conscious. - -"Why, it's Pam!" he said weakly. "Dear little, funny little Pam." Then -earnestly, with a terrible effort to concentrate. "Are you real?" He -took my hand and felt it tremblingly. "You're real," he said. - -The matron left us alone. - -He was in a tiny room by himself, the blind was up and the big window -looked on to a great hill, like the hunched shoulder of a giant. - -"Why did you come?" he said. "Why did you come?" - -I knelt beside the bed. I was trembling and I felt sicker than ever. - -Above the titanic shoulder of the hill the tiny bare white shoulder of -the moon shrugged itself into view. - -"I can't!" I pleaded. "Not now." - -"My dear, you must. If I go out to-night I go out--wondering." - -I began to tell him. I told him all about meeting Cheneston in the -searchlight, and how the mistake about our being engaged had started. I -told him that Grace Gilpin and Cheneston loved each other. I told him -all about somebody writing to Cheneston's mother and telling her that -Cheneston was engaged to me. I told him how fearfully ill she was, and -that I had gone to Cromer Court because she so passionately wanted to -see her son's future wife. - -"But why did you come to me?" he said. - -The moonlight was sweeping down the hill to us now, an incoming tide of -limpid silver. I looked out of the window desperately. - -"I told Cheneston you and I cared--I wanted him to feel free to marry -Grace. This morning he--he was coming to you--Cheneston was--he was so -afraid you would misunderstand my being at Cromer Court, and think I had -ceased to care for you. Also this morning I had a note from Grace -Gilpin telling me you were here, asking me what I was going to do about -it." - -"And they--Grace and Cromer--believe there is some understanding between -us, that we grew to care for each other when the four of us went about -together?" - -"Yes," I said desperately; the hill suddenly seemed to tip towards me, -it seemed to carry with it the smell of iodoform and disinfectant. - -And then the amazing and paralysing thing happened: Captain Markham -suddenly put his arm round me. - -"Well," he said, "isn't it true, Pam! My God! child, isn't it _true_? -Don't I love you?--you ridiculous child, you wonderful, wonderful thing -with your strange crooked little mouth and your great eyes! Oh! Pam, -my little, little girl--didn't you know I cared!" - -The hill tipped back into place like a giant sitting back on its -haunches, and the silver tide seemed to ripple down it to ultimately -engulf us. - - - - - *X* - - -Love is a cloak and is made in different styles; some people wrap -themselves tightly in it, and there is only just enough to go round -them: it is their cloak, and if Cupid himself, dimpled and in his -birthday suit, came and sat beside them on the top of a motor-bus in the -rain, they wouldn't go shares. For other people Love is a large cloak, -voluminous and overlapping, and capable of sheltering, warming, and -comforting quite a lot of people round the hem. - -My heart ached for him as I sat beside him. He held my hand very tightly -with his thin fingers, almost like a frightened child, and I had a -feeling that he feared to drift out and I was his anchor, and I wished -that I could drift out with him. - -"Pam," he said once or twice, and I had a feeling as if he were saying -"Mother," and I answered, "Yes, dear," and by-and-by he smiled and -whispered again, "Pam." - -The matron kept coming in and out. Once or twice she fed Walter Markham -with a teaspoonful of brandy, once she brought me a cup of bovril; she -seemed just the same as when I first met her hours ago, like warm snow -immeasurably deep. - -"Human vitality is at its lowest in the small hours," she whispered. -She looked down at Walter Markham. I looked at her. "I don't know," -she said. "I don't know." - -I sat on. It was so quiet in there--the world seemed like a very young -baby asleep, the moonlight flooding over the hill to diffuse a sort of -white holiness, an effortless tranquillity. - -They had said that Walter Markham could not live through the night, and -yet I was not sorry for him. I only wanted to be immensely good to him -while he lived, to send him out happy. - -"Pam," he said, "I sort of hear you singing--are you singing?" - -"Perhaps my heart is." - -"What songs, Pam?" - -"Lullabies, dear, lovely, gentle lullabies." - -"Not love-songs, Pam?" - -"No." - -"Love-songs suit you best," he said. - -I tried to see the future, sitting there. I thought the peace and the -moonlight might help me, it seemed to make things so beautifully -abstract and impersonal that the planning hardly hurt at all. In all my -plans I never contemplated Walter Markham living and loving me, and -believing I had come to him because I loved him. I saw myself leaving -the hospital and going back to Cromer Court. I knew that Cheneston's -sympathy and gratitude would be my particular Garden of Gethsemane. - -I wondered a little why Life and Love should always peck and beat and -burn me, and I wondered for the first time without resentment. - -The house surgeon came in; he wore a long white linen coat over pink and -white pyjamas, and apologised for his costume, and I went and walked in -the moonlit corridor with the matron. - -"It will be a triumph if we save him," she said--"but it will be your -triumph." - -I looked at her, startled and perplexed. - -"Then you think?" I said. - -"Six hours ago the chances were a hundred to one against; they aren't -now." - -"Doesn't anything ever hurt you?" I said suddenly. "Don't you ever feel -all twisted up with the beauty or the honour of things? Don't you find -things cruelly lovely or hideously bad? Don't people and their ways -make you writhe?" - -"I haven't time," she answered tranquilly. "I'm always doing things or -else I'm sleeping hard." - -The house surgeon came out. - -"Everything is extraordinarily satisfactory," he said. "I've tried a -very small dose of scopolamin-morphine." - -I went back and resumed my vigil. I did not feel at all tired. I felt -a little aloof, as if I were sitting apart and critically watching -myself. - -I heard a bird twitter, and then the stillness settled down tighter than -ever, and then the bird twittered again and a tinge of light, pallid and -uncertain, crept up behind the hill. - -The dawn was coming, the little bird voice had heralded it. - -The little tinge became pink; the stars seemed to blink baldly, like -eyes without eyelashes. - -The bird world stirred, a blackbird trilled a few delicious notes. I -saw that a few trees fringed the hill; the dawn peeped behind them, rosy -and fresh, like a child peering from behind its fingers. - -The hospital was waking up, too; I saw a woman cross the dewy orchard to -a cowhouse in the corner carrying milk-pails and stool. - -The scene, which had been changing and intensifying every second, -suddenly remained stationary; it was as if Nature suddenly stepped back -to view her work--she had fashioned a golden world with the help of the -sun, gloriously, dazzlingly gold, golden apples and golden trees, golden -thatched roofs; it blazed beyond my window. - -Walter Markham opened his eyes. - -"Topping day," he said weakly. "Hullo, doc!--I didn't go out, you see." - -"Go out! Havers! man, I'll be dancing at your wedding before the week -is out!" The gruff Scotch doctor, shaved, and clad in khaki and alert, -laughed. "You're doing fine!" - -"Wedding," Walter Markham said weakly. "I shall be all right? My arm? -There--there isn't any reason why I shouldn't marry?" - -"None on earth." - -He looked at me. There was a radiancy in his eyes, a sort of throbbing -happiness. - -"O God!" he said, "I'm so happy!" - -The house surgeon took me away; he was babbling foolishly, and he looked -like an excited rocking-horse; he had a long narrow face and wide -nostrils. - -"Splendid!" he kept saying. "Absolutely top-hole! Splendid! Good -chap, yours! Splendid!" - -"He's going to live?" I said. Suddenly I felt very tired, as if my -eyelids had been pressed back. - -"Of course! The hospital must have some of your wedding-cake. Oh, -splendid!" - -The matron came down the long corridor. - -"Will you take her down to the visitors' room, doctor?" she said. "I'm -just going off duty. I didn't tell you before, Miss Burbridge, but your -mother is here--she's been here nearly an hour." - -Mother was sitting with her back to the orange curtains. As I entered -the room I became conscious of the faint scent of jasmine with which I -always associated her. - -"How did you know I was here?" I said involuntarily. - -"I wired to Cromer Court that I must see you, and Cheneston wired back -that you were away in the North for a few days. I was puzzled. I -showed the letter to Grace Gilpin, and she suggested that you had come -to see Captain Markham. Why did Cheneston let you come, and why did you -come?" - -"I wanted to and he wanted me to," I said. - -I thought it very clever of Grace Gilpin to guess and send mother here, -it made it so much easier for Cheneston and her if I could be caught -with the man I was supposed to be in love with. - -"I knew that you knew no one in the North; but for Grace I should never -have thought. I didn't believe I should find you here." - -"But you have," I said wearily. "What do you want?" - -"Pam," mother said baldly, "are you in love with Walter Markham?" - -I wish I didn't feel so horribly tired and done. I knew I could never -be subtle and evasive with mother, somehow she always knocked over my -defences and surprised the truth in me. She had a way of taking my -deepest and most secret feelings by the scruff of the neck and dragging -them ruthlessly into the light--almost as if she wanted to see if their -ears were clean. - -"No," I said, "I'm not in love with him." - -"Then what are you doing here?" - -"He wanted me." - -"Did he send for you?" - -"No." - -"Pam," said mother, "you are hiding things. Are you?" - -"Yes," I said. - -"I am going to find them out, there's something here I don't understand -at all. Why did Cheneston let you come to see another man?" - -"He thought I wanted to." - -"You did not want to," mother said. "You are crazily, madly in love with -Cheneston, that is obvious to anyone who knows you." - -"Is it?" I said. "I hoped it wasn't. I did it for that purpose, you -see, because I am crazily, madly in love with Cheneston, and he is -crazily, madly in love with Grace Gilpin." - -"He used to be before he met you," mother put in. "I did not know----" -she paused and looked at me. "I think you'd better explain right from -the beginning," she said decisively. - -"Do you?" I countered quickly. "I am afraid it will be rather a -shock--you see, I'd never met Cheneston until that night father came -home and told you I was engaged to him. He has never for one minute -intended to marry me." - -"But you are staying with his mother as his future wife." - -"We could neither of us help that. It was Fate." - -"Look Here, Pam, cease to talk like a penny novelette! Explain things." - -"Very well," I acquiesced. I sat down and explained things from the -very beginning, fully. - -"And so you're engaged to neither of them?" mother said when I had -finished. - -I felt as if my very soul had been dragged out for public inspection. I -was busy packing it back again. - -"No," I said. "Now please tell me why you came?" - -"I came because I have to get five hundred pounds from somewhere at -once." - -"I haven't fifteen shillings, mother; why come to me? and what is it -for?" - -"Your father," answered mother; her lips were compressed. "He must have -it immediately. He owes to his C.O.--and there are complications. -He--" she paused and frowned--"he was always a vile bridge-player. His -declarations were crimes." - -"Yes," I said. "But why come to me?" - -"You must borrow it from Captain Markham or Cheneston." - -I stared at her! This morning she seemed no longer handsome, her -elegance was the only thing left to her--and that seemed just a physical -and social mark. - -"It is impossible," I said, "absolutely! Captain Markham is desperately -ill!" - -"Then there is Cheneston." - -"Absolutely impossible!" - -"He would give it to you in gratitude for the way you've played the -game. If you don't you force me to take it with my own hands--you see, -we should have had the money but for the amount we have spent on you -lately." - -"What would you do?" I said hoarsely. - -"I should just tell Cheneston that you adored and worshipped him, and if -he didn't marry you he would utterly spoil your life. I should say you -were too proud and noble to come yourself." - -"You wouldn't do that," I said. "Mother--at least play the game!" - -"Two can't do that," she said. "Your father does that. I pay the -price." - - - - - *XI* - - -I used to wonder, in the days when love and marriage seemed very -beautiful and interesting and tremendous food for speculation, but -utterly removed from reality and _me_, what the woman felt like when the -question of money first cropped up, whether it spoilt the idealism and -romance a little, upset the atmosphere like a Ransome lawn-mower -introduced into the Garden of Eden. - -I used to wonder how I would like asking Cheneston for a new hat, and I -always came to the conclusion that I would sooner wear the brim like a -halo when the crown fell to pieces from old age than ask him. - -I suppose if men love you frightfully they make the question of finance -easy; but I think my experience with mother and father has rather -terrified me, they made the mutual finance discussion so utterly -degrading--and I think listening to them has given me a nervous -distaste, a sort of hyper-sensitive shrinking from the discussion of -ways and means. - -It has always seemed so infinitely easier to go without things. - -When I sat in the train and thought of asking Cheneston for five hundred -pounds to pay father's card debts I felt sick, and I felt the real me -starting to close up tight, like a sea-anemone when you poke it with -your toe. - -Mother travelled to Town with me. - -She questioned me about my farewells to Walter Markham--she has a serene -way of questioning. I think she would have made a mark in the Spanish -Inquisition. - -"Did he show much distress at your leaving him, Pam?" - -"I don't know whether he quite realised. He had a sort of relapse, and -he was only partially conscious. The doctors thought me callous. The -one like a rocking-horse told me I had no right to leave him. I said it -was essential I should return. If he could have kept me there by force -he would." - -"I understand from the sister that this sudden relapse makes it more -unlikely than ever that he will pull through, apparently the next -twenty-four hours are the test." - -"Yes." - -"Your nails are not very carefully manicured," said mother. - -I laughed; it was so like mother to obtrude utterly unimportant -trivialities, to bring you crashing to earth with some ridiculous -trifle. - -"You will send the money as soon as possible, Pam." - -"I absolutely can't do it, mother!" I said desperately. I had a sudden -vision of myself asking Cheneston for money. - -"You must," mother returned hardily; she spoke casually, as if she were -reminding me to send a postcard to notify her of my safe arrival. "I -shall not hesitate to go to Cheneston and tell him you are frantically -and desperately in love with him, and what may have been jest to him is -grim reality to you, and unless he marries you he'll ruin your -happiness. I shall be able to say it sincerely because I know it to be -true. You are going to tell Cheneston that Walter Markham quite -understands why you are staying at Cromer Court, that you have unlocked -your lovers' hearts to each other." - -I spoke rudely to mother for the first time in my life, my fear of her -was swept away by a sudden passion of rebellion. - -"Oh, shut up!" I said furiously. "Shut up! Shut up! Shut up!" - -She looked at me curiously, her lips a little compressed. - -"We should have trained you for the stage," she said. "There is an -abandon about you at times that would do better for the theatre than -real life--where it is merely crude and bad form." - -"It seems to me that everything real and vital and honest, all forms of -emotion and feeling, are bad form!" - -"Nearly all." - -"Except borrowing from your friends and threatening your daughter." - -Mother shrugged and looked out of the window. - -"Unless your father can produce five hundred pounds within the week he -will be forced to resign his commission, in which case he would get no -pension, and as he has no influence and no brains the prospect of our -future does not intrigue me." - -I, too, looked out of the window; a light frost had crisped the leaves, -and though there was no sun the landscape was so full of gold that it -glowed and vibrated with apparent sunshine. The fields were full of -workers, women in coloured linen overalls guiding ploughs, and -allotment-workers on their patches, and the little cottage gardens were -gay with autumn flowers; and I wondered if there were undercurrents in -all these apparently simple lives, if the men and women out there in the -brilliant golden world had furtive motives and social masks like mother -and I. - -It is never safe to wonder for more than three seconds whether -everything is what it seems unless you are over fifty--when you are -under fifty it hurts, but when you are over fifty you know that you can -never alter other people, only yourself, and you know that your -disillusionment is half your own fault. - -I felt a sort of strangling bitterness. I was very grateful for it, -because I knew that out of it you can grow a sort of hothouse -don't-care-ness that makes it possible for you to do horrid things and -not feel horrid until long after they are done. - -I caught a train to Cromer Court almost at once. - -Mother saw me off. - -She stood at the window and chatted charmingly. I am sure that all the -people in the carriage were enchanted with her personality. Mother is so -fastidiously, almost contemptuously refined and cultured. Had she lived -in the time of the French Revolution she would have been gloatingly -guillotined by the revolutionists for the very way she breathes. - -"And you won't forget?" she said lightly. - -"I won't forget," I answered. - -One of the most disappointing things in life is that you never go back -to a place--even if you have only been away twenty-four hours--feeling -exactly the same as when you left it. You can recover your old poise, -but the going away has altered you, you make a dozen little mental -readjustments on your return--you see things with the aid of the new -experience you have gained during your absence. Life is one continual -process of readjustment with people, places, and things, and ourselves. - -We marvel at the chameleon--his feats are nothing to the feats of a -perfectly normal human. - -I went back to Cromer Court a different person. - -I met Cheneston as a different person. - -I know that he was different. - -Nothing stands still. - -"How is he?" he said at once; and I answered: - -"They think he will pull through." - -"Oh, Pam!" he said; and then "Thank God!" - -"Mother came to the hospital," I told him as I climbed into the -dog-cart. "Grace Gilpin seemed to think I would be there. It was -rather funny her thinking that." - -"I told her--I wrote," he said. - -I smiled; the don't-care mood was flourishing. I could feel it steadily -swallowing up my little qualms and pitiful sense of honour and dignity, -they were vanishing in it like debris thrown on thoroughly efficient -quicksands. - -"How is your mother?" - -"Longing for your return. Oh! Pam--the tremendously strong feeling she -has for you makes it doubly hard for both of us. You explained to -Markham--everything?" - -I nodded. - -"And they will telegraph news of him here?" - -"Yes." - -He lifted me out of the dog-cart at the door of Cromer Court; his face -looked grey. - -"God bless you," he said, "for coming back to us!" - - - - - *XII* - - -We dined in Mrs. Cromer's room. - -She insisted and would take no denial. - -I thought she seemed stronger and more lovely than ever; she was full of -whims and loveliness. She seemed to sparkle with happiness. She sent -us away, she wanted a consultation with the cook. - -"It is to be a very special dinner," she told us. "And Pam is to go and -lie down. Sweetheart, have you a white frock?" - -"No," I said, "only pink, dear, pink and grey." - -"You must wear white," she said. "I am bubbling with schemes for my -dinner of dinners. I have a frock for you, Pam. Nurse shall bring -it--you'll look like a funny little Dutch princess in it, stepped out of -an old Dutch fairy-tale book. Now run away, Honey." - -Nurse was perturbed when she brought the frock; it was of softest ivory -white satin, made in Empire style with a wealth of real point de rose -lace. - -"She will insist," she said, "and the doctor said she was to have her -own way as much as possible--but I don't know. I don't know, I'm sure. -She says you are to wear this pearl comb in your hair, and these little -white satin shoes studded with pearls. Aren't they ducks? Are you -going to pile your hair on the top of your head like those funny old -pictures downstairs? I wish the doctor would call again. I think he'd -veto this dinner idea, but I'm not sure it wouldn't upset her more to be -thwarted than to give it. She's wonderful." - -There are moments in everyone's life when you feel as if you're taking -part in an unreal play; there comes a sudden feeling of panic, as if you -did not know your part. I got it that night when I was dressing--and -yet there was a dreadful thrilling, electric sweetness about it all. - -I was excited, my fingers and my toes tingled and my spine felt creepy; -and when I brushed my hair it cracked with electricity, and a funny -little nerve near my ear that always betrays itself when I am excited -began to wriggle. - -I suppose there is something of the joy of forbidden fruit in it--but it -is _wonderful_ and gorgeous to have Cheneston look at me like a lover, -even though I know it is only to satisfy his mother. - -I think it is awful the way we women can kid ourselves about love, -drench ourselves in a sweetness that isn't really there, get intoxicated -with a joy that exists only in our own imaginations. - -If I had been going to the altar with Cheneston I couldn't have been -more thrilled than I was when I entered Mrs. Cromer's room. - -Cheneston rose. He was looking very white and bewildered; and suddenly -the fact that he was nonplussed made me feel almost cruelly gay and -confident. - -"Pam!" Mrs. Cromer said. "Oh, boy! boy! isn't she the very sweetest -thing that ever happened?" - -"Surely," he said. - -There was a round table laid for two, with a white linen tablecloth with -a border of real lace eight inches wide, and in the centre stood a huge -white and gold Venetian glass basket filled with lilies of the valley -and maidenhair fern. - -"I am going to have a little white love-feast all to myself for my two -children," she said. - -I caught my breath--somehow I had not quite expected just that. - -For a dizzy moment I wondered what she would say and do if she knew the -truth--that Cheneston and I had never been engaged and would never -marry. - -Everything we had was white, from the artichoke soup to the iced -pudding. It was a wonderful meal, exquisitely served; it tasted like -straw to me--and it would have fascinated an epicure. There was -champagne, the only note of colour on the table; and Cheneston and I -talked at high tension. - -To me it had a peculiar and appealing joy; I could say to Cheneston some -of the things I felt, and he accepted them as part of my role in the -astonishing little farce; and from her bed the old lady watched us, an -indescribably happy expression on her face. - -And Cheneston said things to me--things to remember and hoard in myself, -and not the knowledge that they were just "part of the game" could rob -them of their wonder for me. - -The atmosphere was extraordinary--to me it felt rather as if we were all -being charming and polite, and listening for an explosion at the same -time; and there were moments when the explosion seemed inevitable. It -seemed as though it _must_ come. - -At last she let us go--and yet I was loath to. - -As I was crossing the hall a maid came to me. - -"The boy brought it nearly ten minutes ago--so I kept him. I didn't -like to disturb you, miss." - -I took it. It was from the matron of the hospital. "Patient doing -well. Out of danger." - -"No answer," I said. - -So Walter Markham was going to live, and I had promised---- - -"Good news?" Cheneston said. - -I handed him the telegram, and he followed me into the drawing-room. - -"Oh, Pam!" he said. "Then you can marry him and be happy! I wish I -could do something just to show my enormous gratitude to you." - -"Do you really mean that?" I said. I swung round on the music-stool, on -which I had seated myself, and smiled up at him. - -"Of course I do." - -"Then give me five hundred pounds," I said. - -Cheneston lit a cigarette. - -I do think the girl who has been brought up among a pack of brothers and -a crowd of male cousins misses something. When you start knowing men -for the first time in your twenties--when your critical faculties are at -their very keenest--you do get a fearful amount of astonishment and -thrills out of the appalling difference there is between their ways and -the ways of your own sex. It's a never-ceasing source of wonder to you. - -I had startled Cheneston by a totally unexpected demand for five hundred -pounds--and he lit a cigarette. - -A woman would have played with something, probably the -blind-tassel--Cheneston was standing near the window--repeated my -question, and tried to read my face; the man did none of these things. -I think cigarettes are to men what dangly things about dresses, and -bracelets, and hairpins are to women--something they can play with and -readjust when something has robbed them of their poise and sang-froid. -I notice that nervy women and shy women often have scarves and bead -necklaces and things they can finger in stressful moments. - -"Would you like it in notes, or will a cheque do?" Cheneston asked -quietly. "If you will take a cheque I will give it to you now; if you -want notes I am afraid you must wait until I can drive in to the bank." - -"I want it in notes," I said. - -I wanted him to ask questions, to show enormous astonishment and -interest. I was furious with him for being so calm. - -"I think you owe me something for coming here," I said crudely. - -I wanted to rouse him at any price. I don't know quite what there is in -feminine make-up that makes you suddenly want to hurt the man you -love--and somehow the more aloof and patient and wonderful they are, the -more you want to scratch. It's only when they get a bit peevish and -earthly that you suddenly leave off and feel repentant. If a man, -especially a husband, ever patted me on the head, I should _bite_ him; -and I don't know why, but terribly gentlemanly men always make me feel -horribly unladylike. - -I don't think I'm a nice character--but I don't think people who feel -things terribly, and get themselves all sort of churned up with -intensity, are very nice--not what ordinary people call "nice," anyway. -I think ordinary people like to feel "sure" of you because it's a great -compliment when it is said of you, "She's always just the same." They -advance on you with the same trustful confidence that a kitten does on -its saucerful of milk. I own it's bad luck to find a saucerful of dead -sea, or a minute proportion of fire and brimstone. - -"I owe you more than five hundred pounds," Cheneston said quietly; then -he looked at me for the first time. "Pam," he said, "you've altered so -lately. Are you happy?" - -"I'm a twittering bunch of sunshine," I said. - -I felt black inside with bitterness and rebellion. - -"I'm glad," he answered quietly, "you didn't just strike me that way." - -I wanted to cry like a silly kid, and yet I wanted to be a woman of the -world and sting and say clever, lashing things full of prettily covered -up spite. - -I wanted to feel old and hard and bad, and I could only feel young and -inadequate and tearful and sniffy, and I hadn't even got a handkerchief. - -I opened the piano. I was thinking how horrid it is to have our parents -thrust upon us, and have to do humiliating things for them that put you -in a false position with the people you love best. My brain was a -tangled bunch of rebellious "whys?" all squirming like blind kittens. - -"Do you mind if I strum?" I asked. - -"Please do," Cheneston answered courteously. "Will my smoking worry -you?" - -"Oh no," I said carelessly, and what I wanted to say was, "Don't you -even care enough to ask me why I want that five hundred pounds from you? -It's positively insulting of you just to give it to me without a single -query as to its destination. How dare you--dare you--dare you think I -am the sort of young woman who calmly asks for five hundred pounds for -pin-money! Your silence implies that you _think_ I am." - -The long narrow drawing-room looked so beautiful, so dainty, so fresh. -The candle-light was reflected softly on the white panelled walls; the -fierce little blue lobelia on the quaint grey chintz seemed to stand -out, and the moonlight coming through the french diamond-paned windows -lay in pools on the grey carpet like stagnant water--the room was so big -that the mellow candlelight never spread to there. - -It was all so big and grave and stately that I felt like an angry -mosquito--and yet fate had behaved rottenly to me, assigned to me an -ignoble part. - -I chose the wonderful love-song from "Samson and Delilah," and I forgot -Cheneston, I forgot the room, and the blue dragon-pots of late madonna -lilies. I forgot myself--only the scent of the lilies stayed and -drenched me with indescribable sweetness, and I seemed to struggle down -into the soul of Delilah and understand why she hated and yet loved -Samson for his strength, as I hated and loved Cheneston for his. - -Cheneston was sitting in the arm-chair, gripping the sides, and when I -stopped he lit another cigarette. - -I could have smacked him. - -"Thanks," he said, "it's a wonderful thing." - -I played the opening bars of "Thank God for a Garden." - -I felt like a worn-out mosquito. - -"I'm afraid you're tired, Pam," he said when I had finished. "You look -awfully tired." - -"I think I'll go to bed," I said. "My head is rather rotten." - -"I'll ask nurse to bring you an aspirin." - -"No thanks--it's just sleep I want. I shall be all right to-morrow." - -"I'm sorry your head is bad." - -"I often get headaches." - -He held open the door for me. - -I wondered if he were going to refer to the five hundred pounds. - -"Good-night," I said slowly. - -"Good-night," he answered gravely. "I hope your head will be better in -the morning." - -Outside the door of old Mrs. Cromer's room I paused. I had a passionate -and overwhelming desire to go and tell her the truth. I was in need of -counsel. I craved advice. I felt that nothing in the whole world could -ever be right again. The future terrified me, and all the people in -it--Walter Markham, mother, father. - -I felt I would give anything to go and lay my burden on someone else's -shoulder. - -If I felt like a mosquito at all, it was when it feels and fears the -approach of winter. - - - - - *XIII* - - -I woke at midnight with an extraordinary feeling that I was the last -person left alive on earth, a consciousness of desolation and isolation -terrifying and indescribable. I used to get it when I was a child, and -I would have gone into a lion's cage for company. I believe it is some -form of nerve pressure medical men can't explain. - -I got up shivering and put on my little silk kimona. - -I felt I had to go to Mrs. Cromer--I had to tell her all about Walter -Markham, who was getting better and who thought I loved him and wanted -to marry me, and Cheneston who did not love me. I felt I had to tell -her about Grace Gilpin--the very lovely person Cheneston cared for. - -The impossibility of struggling through the immediate future alone and -unadvised appalled me; chiefly I was terrified about Walter Markham, the -man to whom I had been so horribly unkind in my kindness, the man who -believed I had gone to the hospital to see him because I cared. I had -fostered the belief because he was dying--and he had lived, and all the -hopes I had raised and the delusions I had tenderly fostered lived with -him. - -My life had been the life of a little child until my meeting on the -shore with Cheneston that day, all things ordered and planned for me, -and now I was suddenly called upon to play a role almost verging on -drama, requiring subtlety of which I was quite incapable, finesse of -which I could have no knowledge. - -I crept, shivering, along the panelled landing, past Cheneston's door. -I knew the nurse was sleeping in the little dressing-room attached to -Mrs. Cromer's. - -I prayed Heaven she was asleep as I cautiously opened the door. - -The night-light on the washhand-stand burned steadily; it was reflected -in little spots of primrose light on the mahogany furniture. - -I crept to the bed. - -The old lady was lying very still. She looked extraordinarily lovely -and fragile, and a tiny smile curved the corners of her sweet old mouth, -as if she had fallen asleep in a network of happy thoughts. - -She seemed so small in the big room full of furniture. - -I realised as I knelt beside her how much I loved her, what an ideal she -would always be in my life. - -I softly kissed her hand, kneeling there, and then I realised it held a -letter, and I caught sight of the words. - -"I fall asleep happily because I leave you to another mother--little -mother Pam of the big eyes and the big heart. The child loves you, -Cheneston----" - - -I touched her face; it was cold as ice. touched her hand. - -Cheneston's mother had fallen asleep happily. - -"Oh, my dear!" I whispered. "And I came to tell you--and now you'll -never know that I wanted to be his mother, and he wanted another sort." - -I don't know how long I stayed there. I seemed very close to her. She -was so beautiful, the loveliest old thing with that little tender smile -curving her lips; the peace of her, like the loveliness, was -indescribable. - -I wondered if in heaven there were things to mother and love. I hoped -so; her life had been so full of warmth, so radiant with humanity. I -thought of her extraordinary quaintness, the delicious way she put -things--I heard again her laughter. - -I looked at the letter. - -"The child loves you, Cheneston." - -He mustn't see that; last words have a tremendous significance, and we -credit those who are near heaven with super-insight; just those few -words might set him questioning and wondering, might get between him and -Grace Gilpin. - -Had I right to rob him of her last message? - -To leave it there would be to give myself a chance; to take it would be -to destroy my last. - -I took it very gently from her fingers. - -I would not destroy it, it was not mine to destroy; I would cherish it -very carefully, and after a while I would send it to him anonymously. - -I realised that the need for my presence at Cromer Court was over; I was -free to go, my part was played and the curtain was down. - -Exit Pamela Burbridge from Cheneston Cromer's life. - -I staggered to my feet. - -It is easy to do dramatic things, to make your exit; but to slip away -when you want to stay, when your whole heart is aching to stay, to make -exits so silently and unostentatiously that the ones you long to miss -you hardly know that you are gone--that is the hardest of all. - -I knew before I left Mrs. Cromer's side that I was going to run -away--away from Cheneston and Walter Markham and mother and father. - -I had to. I couldn't stay and face things out. - -To begin somewhere else all over again. - -It was the explanation I was afraid of, explanations to mother, to -father, to Cheneston, to Walter Markham. - -I was running away from Explanations. - -I wrote a little note and pushed it under Cheneston's door, where he -would find it in the morning. - - -"Please send the five hundred pounds to mother.--P.B." - - -I packed a few of my serviceable clothes in a handbag. - -I had five pounds in notes and fifteen shillings in silver. - -The dawn was just breaking when I left the Court. - -The world was wet and cold. - -I looked back at the house from the other side of the wrought-iron gate; -its shuttered windows seemed like hostile eyes. - -I felt a little like Eve expelled from the Garden of Eden--I wondered if -her expulsion had taken place on a wet morning before the sun was up. - - - - - *XIV* - - -I had read "Alone in London" stories, rather wonderful, poignant things. -I remembered two, one by Horace Newte and one by Peggy Webling. They -had gripped me at the time. I had been so lonely in my real life that I -always found it easy to get inside the skin of the heroines I was -reading about, and for days my lonely walks with Pomp and Circumstance -across the wet moors and through leafless lanes were no longer lonely or -desolate--they had become the streets of the greatest capital in the -world. - -If you have sufficient imagination and a cheap lending library near you -your world is never unpeopled. I often think that the library is the -one thing that prevents prisoners going mad--you couldn't go mad if you -were allowed O. Henry once a week and Jane Austen to read yourself to -sleep with. - -Two things I hadn't expected about London happened: it was radiant with -sunshine when I arrived, and no one took the faintest notice of me. - -I was a little nonplussed; then I found a boarding-house, not in -Bloomsbury, where the wallpaper was not flowered and the atmosphere was -not cabbagey; the landlady neither stared at me nor asked questions, and -the maid was fat and brisk and efficient; and there was a parrot in the -basement who said "change for 'Ighgate" all day long; nothing could have -been less sinister or more normal and cheery. - -I cried myself to sleep the first night--it seemed the right thing to -do; but I left off in the middle because I couldn't think of anything -more to cry about. - -I had a dear old lady in the room next to mine. She knocked at my door -just as I was falling to sleep. - -"My dear," she piped, "if you should hear a raid warning, if you would -just tap the wall. We all go down into the cellar--and one likes to -prepare a little." - -"Prepare?" I said. - -"Hindes," she whispered apologetically, "curlers--you know--one doesn't -like----" - -I fell asleep smiling on my first night in darkest, dreadfulest, -naughtiest London. - -The next day I started to hunt for work. I was paying forty shillings a -week, and had only four pounds ten left of my money. - -I found it at once. I took the money in a cinema booking-office. It -was dull, and I got thirty shillings a week; I took it because it gave -me the entire morning to hunt for more remunerative work. - -I met with no adventures in my hutch. I was sworn at several times for -giving the wrong change, and the gorgeous gentleman in Prussian blue and -silver uniform, who waved the people to their seats inside, gave me a -packet of butterscotch. But the more remunerative work did not present -itself. I was untrained. I could not type or do shorthand, and I had -no previous experience. The men who interviewed me were most civil, -they suggested Clark's College or Pitman's. I was no good to them. - -I had to change my boarding-house. I went to one near Kentish Town, it -was very clean, and the landlady had been a professional cook. I boarded -with the family, and a Polish Jewess also lived there, a skirt hand in a -big West End tailor's. She used to press my skirts. - -I wondered if anybody was advertising for me, or if there was any -fussation going on. I did not think I was worth a whole detective for -one minute. I did not attempt to hide. I had read somewhere that to -live an ordinary life was the surest way to escape detection. - -I wondered, as the months slipped by, if Cheneston had married Grace -Gilpin. - -I did not lose Cheneston. I could always step right back in memory into -the days I had spent with him, days of infinite and dear delight. - -I knew I loved Cheneston, that I wanted passionately to be his wife; -that if he were to ask me to marry him I would marry him rapturously and -thankfully, even though I knew he didn't care two straws about me and -would need a photograph to remember the way I did my hair. - -I believe the "if she be not fair for me, what care I how fair she be" -sort of people are very, very jelly-fishy. - -If you care for a man you care for him, and that's all there is to it; -the fact that he cares for someone else or doesn't care for you doesn't -alter your feelings, it only makes the pain and hurt of it an artistic -success. - -I wish I was jelly-fishy in my feelings for people. If I were I could -say of Cheneston, "I can't stick here! I'll float on." But I'm a -barnacle creature where I love. I shall be Cheneston's girl even if I -never see him again. My heart went from me when I first met him, and the -doors closed after it and left a little hole. It will always ache, and -I shall always know there is a hole where a heart should be--especially -when I listen to wonderful music or see sunsets or little children at -play. - -I shall never, never have another heart to give away; some women have -theirs on bits of elastic so that they can always pull them back and -give them away again; a man sort of holds it until somebody else wins -it, like a challenge shield or a football cup. - -I gave mine entirely and unconditionally; I believe that time will -cocaine the hole. - -I look to time to do a lot for me in the healing and dulling line--all -that the poets and the proverbs say it will. Time never fails you--when -all else fails, you can always kid yourself you haven't given it long -enough to perform the miracle. - -I don't ever want to see anyone I knew in the old life. I feel that the -Pamela Burbridge of those days is dead, poor thing! but she has a more -exciting time than most defunct people, because every night I shake her -up and make her live over again her enchanted halcyon days by the sea -and at Cromer Court. - -She lives in sunshine and happiness for an hour or two of memory every -night, even if she has to die off while I go and do my day's work. - -Life is really awfully funny and un-understandable. Why are we given -feelings we've got to squash? - -Are we big if we squash them and little if we let them grow? - -I wouldn't squash my feelings about Cheneston. - -I simply love them. - -I couldn't squash them even if I knew I would grow such a huge and -splendid national character, and such a power for good, that they would -give me a gold-leaf Pamela Memorial in Kensington Gardens with a -lightning conductor, and ten lines in the _London Guide Book_ all to -myself. - - - - - *XV* - - -I have lost my job, and the little Russian tailoress presses my skirt -every day and has lent me a pound. - -Russia doesn't seem a lucky country for me; the cinema proprietor was a -young Russian Jew, and when the August orders about Russians serving -came up he got five months' exemption, and now he's joined up and the -cinema has been turned into a Y.M.C.A. canteen. I help them two nights a -week. - -It was funny; the other day there were a lot of men expected in. It's -just outside the station, and often we get officers, and an officer in -Walter Markham's regiment came in. I knew it was his battalion. The -officer was just home on leave. I asked him if he knew Captain Markham. - -"Used to be under him," he said. "Went West, poor chap! Died in a -hospital somewhere up North." - -"Are you sure he died?" I said. - -"Positive. He had a sudden relapse. Ballyntine, one of our senior -officers, was pipped at the same time and got sent to the same hospital. -He was there when Markham died. He's rejoined since; he's out there -now. Why? Did you know Markham?" - -"He was a great friend of a friend of mine." - -"Jolly decent chap," the young officer said. - -I thought it such an accurate epitaph. He was a jolly decent chap. I -turned away because my eyes were so full of tears. - -If he had recovered and I had married him I could never, never have made -him happy. I should have been one of those wives who suddenly look at -their husbands with vacant eyes, and have thoughts they cannot tell when -they are asked--you see, Cheneston Cromer is with me for keeps, the -memory of him will never go, and I know that often I should wander away -from Walter with Cheneston, and be sorry to come back, and Walter was -too great a dear to treat like that, a very gallant and honest English -gentleman. - -Regina Merolovitch has found me a "job" at twenty-five shillings a week. -She says it is only temporary, and soon I shall find something better; -but I don't know. I am only "honest and willing," and the world seems -overcrowded with honesty and willingness unadorned. - -I "do anything" for Madame Cherry, who has a little cherry-coloured shop -with grey fittings and purple hangings in the West End. Sometimes I am -in the showroom, sometimes I make tea for the girls, sometimes I pick -pins off the showroom floor, sometimes I "match" things at the big -London stores, sometimes I take things home to customers. - -I marvel at the prices people pay for clothes. The people who fluff in -and say, "I must have some little cheap thing, madame," seem to pay most -and buy most. - -Madame made a wonderful "little cheap thing" the other day--black tulle -over blue tulle, and all of it edged with blue beetles' wings, and blue -tissue round the waist to match. - -It was done in a violent hurry because "he" was coming home on leave; -"he" was staying at the Savoy with her for a few days, and then they -were going down to their country seat when he had seen about his kit. - -She paid for the girl's "hurry." - -Madame never breaks her promises. - -She had promised it by seven, and I was to deliver it at the Savoy. - -"And wear your best coat and skirt; and if it is fine you can wear that -blue velour hat that has just come in, but don't put any pins in it," -said Madame. "I can't have people carrying my boxes and going to the -Savoy looking anyhow." - -Madame's boxes are French grey with bunches of cherries on them, tied -with gay cherry ribbons, and "Cherry" written across. They are a part -of her general scheme. - -I had one of them on my arm when I went to the Savoy. - -I like the Savoy; it never smells foody, and the orchestra chats to -itself instead of shouting at you. I like an orchestra that chats to -itself, and then you can talk without feeling you oughtn't to. - -I was very, very tired, and I did feel an awful alien in that place. -It's not personality or breeding that makes you feel at home in big -restaurants and hotels--it's just clothes. It doesn't matter if you've -given your twelve country seats to the country for hospitals, and you've -got the newest thing in Rolls Royce's nestling on the kerb outside; if -you've got the wrong clothes on you feel as out-of-place and -insignificant as a flapper at a silver wedding. - -I found the right suite and delivered the box; an ecstatic young woman -rushed out in a violet kimona with black storks on it. I think my -appearance rather nonplussed her, it's horribly embarrassing to wear -decently cut clothes sometimes. - -"Are you Madame Cherry's daughter?" she said. "Well--it's frightfully -decent of you to bring it--er--will you have a cocktail or anything?" - -I went down the lift with a huge box of Fuller's chocolates tucked under -my arm. - -I adore Fuller's chocolates. - -As I stepped out of the lift at the bottom someone grasped my arm and -said: - -"Pam! Pamela Burbridge!" - -It was Grace Gilpin. - -She looked simply gorgeous. - -She wore a cloak of dull velvet the exact colour of her hair, with a -great skunk collar. There was a sort of laughing radiancy about her, as -if she were bubbling and dancing with happiness. - -I wondered if she knew that my people didn't know where I was. I -thought I could trust mother for that. I was right. - -"I met Mrs. Burbridge not so very long ago," she said. "She was most -mysterious and injured about you, Pam. What have you been doing? She -seemed quite martyred. I couldn't get anything out of her. Have you got -married, or gone on the stage, or what? Won't Cheneston be surprised! -You must stay and have dinner with us and tell us all your misdeeds." - -"Cheneston?" I said. - -People were drinking their coffee and staring at Grace, just as they -always did. - -"Yes, he's home on leave and staying here. Pam--didn't you know I was -married?" - -"Yes," I lied swiftly. - -I knew that Cheneston was behind me. I knew it without turning. I felt -it; once more the old thrilling excitement, the tension of expectancy, -stirred in me--for another woman's husband. - -"Where is that husband of mine?" Grace said in her familiar, high, -sweet, laughing voice. "I do want you to meet." - -I wanted to say, "He's behind me. You don't know it, but _I_ do. I can -feel it all down my neck and spine. He belongs to you, but you can't -feel it. I'm glad you can't feel it. Glad! Glad! Glad!" - -Instead I said: - -"Good heavens! I was forgetting! I'm going on to dinner, and my -husband's outside in the car. I went up to see some friends, and said I -wouldn't be a second." - -"You married, Pam! I never knew that!" - -"I must absolutely fly!" I said. - -"But, Pam--I'm so interested. Who did you marry, Pam? Hang it all! -I'm thrilled to the core--you can't run away like this! Besides, -Cheneston's here, and---- Pam, _why did you break off your engagement -to Cheneston?_" - -"Must fly!" I said. - -I caught sight of Cheneston. He had not recognised my back, he was -waiting to come forward and join his wife. - -That queer, quizzical, bored look was on his face. He's the only man -whose thoughts I ever pined to know. - -I would have given the world to have been able to stop and say: - -"What _are_ you thinking about?" - -I heard Grace say in that queer, lilting voice of hers: - -"Oh, bother! Cheneston, you're just too late! That was Pam -Burbridge--only she isn't any more, she's married, and her husband is -outside in a car." - -And as I hurried out into the courtyard a woman getting out of a car -said: - -"Look at that woman; isn't she wonderful!" - -Of course it was Grace; if it had been me she would have said: - -"Look at that funny little moth-eaten rabbit of a girl hurrying away as -if there was a stoat after her. You really do see the queerest people -everywhere nowadays." - - - - - *XVI* - - -There is a street that leads round the back of the Savoy Theatre. I ran -down that. I don't know what it was like. There were great inky -splotches of shadow, they seemed almost glistening wet in their -impenetrable blackness. As a rule I mind these pools of darkness. I -cross roads to avoid them, and if I must needs pass through them I hurry -very quickly and my heart seems to beat in my throat. - -This night I did not care; mad kaffirs, Landrus, the denizens of Soho, -might nestle in their dozens in the shadows of London--I didn't care. - -You can get so absolutely don't-carish that the things that normally -terrify and appal you fail even to rouse a flicker. - -I reached the Embankment. - -I love the Thames Embankment. To me it seems a thousand times more -romantic and wonderful than the canals of Venice or the crocodile-y -charms of the Nile. The water is so sad and so wicked--the wisest, -wickedest thing in England, flowing greyly between the great palaces of -commerce; floating little ships and dirty hulks; holding up to the -sunset, in places, a tangled mass of sails, a veritable fretwork; the -humbler and less ostentatious commerce of the world flows through its -veins, dear furtive, dirty, splendid, muddy old river! - -I looked over the parapet. Once in my dim, funny little far-away youth, -when impressions sort of bedded themselves down on your mind, I had -driven in a hansom with mother and father from Blackfriars to Waterloo; -and all the electric signs over the warehouses on the bank had streaked -the water with colour, and all the Embankment had been fringed with -electric lights, and I had cried with the beauty of it, and mother and -father had been curious as to the cause of my emotion, and then angry -because I wouldn't tell them--but how could I tell them I was crying -because somebody's whisky advertisement looked so lovely on the water. - -I remembered as I looked in the water and thought how jolly it is to be -able to feel sad and romantically melancholy about abstract things, and -let yourself go, when the real sorrows come there is always something to -prevent you from letting yourself go. - -I wondered why I wasn't feeling more awful about Cheneston's marriage to -Grace. - -I wasn't feeling at all. I was numbed. The pain hadn't begun to work. - -An old gentleman passed me and then came back. Instantly the -remembrance of London novels I had read flashed into my mind. Was he -going to offer to adopt me, or help me save my soul, or thrust five -pounds into my hand. - -"You're not thinking of--popping in?" he said. - -"It hadn't occurred to me," I answered. - -"Good," he said, relieved. "It's cold, and damn silly. It just -occurred to me. You seem interested. I can't swim." - -"Neither can I," I said. - -"Then it _would_ be damn silly," he said. "Good-night." - -And then I heard Cheneston's voice. - -"Where is your husband?" - -"Ah," murmured the old gentleman, "now I see." - -"Oh," I said stupidly, "he--he didn't wait." - -"I followed you," Cheneston said. "I had to know things." - -"What things?" I said feebly. I was beginning to feel the pain now, the -numbness was passing off; and I knew that I was going to suffer. - -"I want to know when you married, and if you are happy--and why you ran -away like that, and if you loved Walter Markham. Pam--I'll be content if -you'll only answer me one thing, is he good to you? Have you married -the right man? Pam, I've got to know." - -I knew then how much it hurt; my throat felt like a funny little -unoiled, unused machine when I spoke. - -"Tell me if you are happily married?" - -"I?" - -"Yes." - -"I'm not married at all." - -"Grace," I said, "Grace said----" - -"She's married. She married Clay Rendle. She was always in love with -him." - -"She was in love with you." - -"Never! I was in her confidence, that was all. Clay Rendle's wife was -a homicidal maniac. She died a week after mother. But, Pam--I'll go -away, I'll go straight back to the Savoy now, if you'll just answer -'Yes' or 'No.' Pam, are you happily married?" - -"No," I said. - -He looked down at me, he was very white there was a queer look on his -face, as if his feelings were bunched up inside him and he was sitting -hard on the lid. - -I wanted the lid up. - -"I'm not married," I said. - -The lid flew up. - -I did not know a kiss _could_ feel like that. The Embankment sort of -slid away from under it and us. I think it lasted for hours. - -We looked at each other blankly. - -"Pam," he said shakily, queerly, "you kissed me--did you know you kissed -me?" - -I nodded. I felt as if half of me stood there and the other half was -slowly unwrapping itself from the kiss. - -"You kissed me as if--as if----" - -"I know," I said. - -"I didn't think that any woman in the world could kiss like that," he -said. "My God! I didn't think it! Pam, are we both crazy?" - -"Yes," I said. - -His eyes began to flicker and twinkle, those curious hazel eyes, not -brown, not yellow, and not readable. - -"I want things explained," he said, "and yet I don't want them -explained. You are sure you aren't married?" - -"Quite," I said. - -"Then, Pam, will you marry me? Oh, Pam!--listen to it--you funny, -exquisite little person! Listen to it!--doesn't it sound -gorgeous!--Heaven!--_you_ married to _me_! Did you ever like anything in -the world as much as the sound of that, my sweet?" - -"No," I whispered. - -He put his face down to mine. I was trembling and crying; his face was -wet. - -"I love you so!" he whispered. "I love you so's I could eat you, and -yet I'm scared to touch you--that's _how_ I love you, you exquisite baby -thing!" He laughed and kissed my hands. "I'm plum crazy with -happiness," he confessed. "You'll have to be sane for the two of us. -What shall we do, sweetheart, what shall we do?" - -"Walk on--and I'll explain things." - -"And every time we come to a shadow I'll kiss you." - -"Only big ones, then. Which way shall we go?" - -"Towards the Houses of Parliament." - -"Why?" - -"I see a shadow," he said. - -I have always been scared of shadows, but if all the murderers and -thieves in the world nestled in the shadows that night, I did not know. -I did not care. - -_I did not see_. - - - - - BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS GUILDFORD ENGLAND - - - - - - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOVE IN A MUDDLE *** - - - - -A Word from Project Gutenberg - - -We will update this book if we find any errors. - -This book can be found under: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/49090 - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, so -the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright royalties. -Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this -license, apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg(tm) -electronic works to protect the Project Gutenberg(tm) concept and -trademark. 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