Читать книгу The Black Dog, and Other Stories - A. E. Coppard - Страница 9

Table of Contents

“I walked out of the hotel, just as I was, and left her there. I never went back again. I don’t think I intended anything quite so final, so dastardly; I had not intended it, I had not thought of doing so, but that is how it happened. I lost her, lost my wife purposely. It was heartless, it was shabby, for she was a nice woman, a charming woman, a good deal younger than I was, a splendid woman, in fact she was very beautiful, and yet I ran away from her. How can you explain that, Turner?”

Poor Bollington looked at Turner, who looked at his glass of whiskey, and that looked irresistible—he drank some. Bollington sipped a little from his glass of milk.

I often found myself regarding Bollington as a little old man. Most of the club members did so too, but he was not that at all, he was still on the sunny side of fifty, but so unassertive, no presence to speak of, no height, not enough hair to mention—if he had had it would surely have been yellow. So mild and modest he cut no figure at all, just a man in glasses that seemed rather big for him. Turner was different, though he was just as bald; he had stature and bulk, his very pince-nez seemed twice the size of Bollington’s spectacles. They had not met each other for ten years.

“Well, yes,” Turner said, “but that was a serious thing to do.”

“Wasn’t it!” said the other, “and I had no idea of the enormity of the offence—not at the time. She might have been dead, poor girl, and her executors advertising for me. She had money you know, her people had been licensed victuallers, quite wealthy. Scandalous!”

Bollington brooded upon his sin until Turner sighed: “Ah well, my dear chap.”

“But you have no idea,” protested Bollington, “how entirely she engrossed me. She was twenty-five and I was forty when we married. She was entrancing. She had always lived in a stinking hole in Balham, and it is amazing how strictly some of those people keep their children; licensed victuallers, did I tell you? Well I was forty, and she was twenty-five; we lived for a year dodging about from one hotel to another all over the British Isles, she was a perfect little nomad. Are you married, Turner?”

No, Turner was not married, he never had been.

“O, but you should be,” cried little Bollington, “it’s an extraordinary experience, the real business of the world is marriage, marriage. I was deliriously happy and she was learning French and Swedish—that’s where we were going later. She was an enchanting little thing, fair, with blue eyes; Phoebe her name was.”

Turner thoughtfully brushed his hand across his generous baldness, then folded his arms.

“You really should,” repeated Bollington, “you ought to, really. But I remember we went from Killarney to Belfast, and there something dreadful happened. I don’t know, it had been growing on her I suppose, but she took a dislike to me there, had strange fancies, thought I was unfaithful to her. You see she was popular wherever we went, a lively little woman, in fact she wasn’t merely a woman, she was a little magnet, men congregated and clung to her like so many tacks and nails and pins. I didn’t object at all—on the contrary, ‘Enjoy yourself, Phoebe,’ I said, ‘I don’t expect you always to hang around an old fogey like me.’ Fogey was the very word I used; I didn’t mean it, of course, but that was the line I took, for she was so charming until she began to get so bad tempered. And believe me, that made her angry, furious. No, not the fogey, but the idea that I did not object to her philandering. It was fatal, it gave colour to her suspicions of me—Turner, I was as innocent as any lamb—tremendous colour. And she had such a sharp tongue! If you ventured to differ from her—and you couldn’t help differing sometimes—she’d positively bludgeon you, and you couldn’t help being bludgeoned. And she had a passion for putting me right, and I always seemed to be so very wrong, always. She would not be satisfied until she had proved it, and it was so monstrous to be made feel that because you were rather different from other people you were an impertinent fool. Yes, I seemed at last to gain only the pangs and none of the prizes of marriage. Now there was a lady we met in Belfast to whom I paid some attention....”

“O, good lord!” groaned Turner.

“No, but listen,” pleaded Bollington, “it was a very innocent friendship—nothing was further from my mind—and she was very much like my wife, very much, it was noticeable, everybody spoke of it— I mean the resemblance. A Mrs. Macarthy, a delightful woman, and Phoebe simply loathed her. I confess that my wife’s innuendoes were so mean and persistent that at last I hadn’t the strength to deny them, in fact at times I wished they were true. Love is idolatry if you like, but it cannot be complete immolation—there’s no such bird as the phœnix, is there, Turner?”

“What, what?”

“No such bird as the phœnix.”

“No, there is no such bird, I believe.”

“And sometimes I had to ask myself quite seriously if I really hadn’t been up to some infidelity! Nonsense, of course, but I assure you that was the effect it was having upon me. I had doubts of myself, frenzied doubts! And it came to a head between Phoebe and me in our room one day. We quarrelled, O dear, how we quarrelled! She said I was sly, two-faced, unfaithful, I was a scoundrel, and so on. Awfully untrue, all of it. She accused me of dreadful things with Mrs. Macarthy and she screamed out: ‘I hope you will treat her better than you have treated me.’ Now what did she mean by that, Turner?”

Bollington eyed his friend as if he expected an oracular answer, but just as Turner was about to respond, Bollington continued: “Well, I never found out, I never knew, for what followed was too terrible. ‘I shall go out,’ I said, ‘it will be better, I think.’ Just that, nothing more. I put on my hat and I put my hand on the knob of the door when she said most violently: ‘Go with your Macarthys, I never want to see your filthy face again!’ Extraordinary you know, Turner. Well, I went out, and I will not deny I was in a rage, terrific. It was raining but I didn’t care, and I walked about in it. Then I took shelter in a bookseller’s doorway opposite a shop that sold tennis rackets and tobacco, and another one that displayed carnations and peaches on wads of coloured wool. The rain came so fast that the streets seemed to empty, and the passers-by were horridly silent under their umbrellas, and their footsteps splashed so dully, and I tell you I was very sad, Turner, there. I debated whether to rush across the road and buy a lot of carnations and peaches and take them to Phoebe. But I did not do so, Turner, I never went back, never.”

“Why, Bollington, you, you were a positive ruffian, Bollington.”

“O, scandalous,” rejoined the ruffian.

“Well, out with it, what about this Mrs. Macarthy?”

“Mrs. Macarthy? But, Turner, I never saw her again, never, I ... I forgot her. Yes, I went prowling on until I found myself at the docks and there it suddenly became dark; I don’t know, there was no evening, no twilight, the day stopped for a moment—and it did not recover. There were hundreds of bullocks slithering and panting and steaming in the road, thousands; lamps were hung up in the harbour, cabs and trollies rattled round the bullocks, the rain fell dismally and everybody hurried. I went into the dock and saw them loading the steamer, it was called s.s. Frolic, and really, Turner, the things they put into the belly of that steamer were rather funny: tons and tons of monstrous big chain, the links as big as soup plates, and two or three pantechnicon vans. Yes, but I was anything but frolicsome, I assure you, I was full of misery and trepidation and the deuce knows what. I did not know what I wanted to do, or what I was going to do, but I found myself buying a ticket to go to Liverpool on that steamer, and, in short, I embarked. How wretched I was, but how determined. Everything on board was depressing and dirty, and when at last we moved off the foam slewed away in filthy bubbles as if that dirty steamer had been sick and was running away from it. I got to Liverpool in the early morn, but I did not stay there, it is such a clamouring place, all trams and trollies and teashops. I sat in the station for an hour, the most miserable man alive, the most miserable ever born. I wanted some rest, some peace, some repose, but they never ceased shunting an endless train of goods trucks, banging and screeching until I almost screamed at the very porters. Criff was the name on some of the trucks, I remember, Criff, and everything seemed to be going criff, criff, criff. I haven’t discovered to this day what Criff signifies, whether it’s a station or a company, or a manufacture, but it was Criff, I remember. Well, I rushed to London and put my affairs in order. A day or two later I went to Southampton and boarded another steamer and put to sea, or rather we were ignominiously lugged out of the dock by a little rat of a tug that seemed all funnel and hooter. I was off to America, and there I stopped for over three years.”

Turner sighed. A waiter brought him another glass of spirit.

“I can’t help thinking, Bollington, that it was all very fiery and touchy. Of course, I don’t know, but really it was a bit steep, very squeamish of you. What did your wife say?”

“I never communicated with her, I never heard from her, I just dropped out. My filthy face, you know, she did not want to see it again.”

“Oh come, Bollington! And what did Mrs. Macarthy say?”

“Mrs. Macarthy! I never saw or heard of her again. I told you that.”

“Ah, yes, you told me. So you slung off to America.”

“I was intensely miserable there for a long while. Of course I loved Phoebe enormously, I felt the separation, I.... O, it is impossible to describe. But what was worst of all was the meanness of my behaviour, there was nothing heroic about it, I soon saw clearly that it was a shabby trick, disgusting, I had bolted and left her to the mercy of ... well, of whatever there was. It made such an awful barrier—you’ve no idea of my compunction—I couldn’t make overtures—‘Let us forgive and forget.’ I was a mean rascal, I was filthy. That was the barrier—myself; I was too bad. I thought I should recover and enjoy life again, I began to think of Phoebe as a cat, a little cat. I went everywhere and did everything. But America is a big country, I couldn’t get into contact, I was lonely, very lonely, and although two years went by I longed for Phoebe. Everything I did I wanted to do with Phoebe by my side. And then my cousin, my only relative in the world—he lived in England—he died. I scarcely ever saw him, but still he was my kin. And he died. You’ve no comprehension, Turner, of the truly awful sensation such a bereavement brings. Not a soul in the world now would have the remotest interest in my welfare. O, I tell you, Turner, it was tragic, tragic, when my cousin died. It made my isolation complete. I was alone, a man who had made a dreadful mess of life. What with sorrow and remorse I felt that I should soon die, not of disease, but disgust.”

“You were a great ninny,” ejaculated his friend. “Why the devil didn’t you hurry back, claim your wife, bygones be bygones; why bless my conscience, what a ninny, what a great ninny!”

“Yes, Turner, it is as you say. But though conscience is a good servant it is a very bad master, it overruled me, it shamed me, and I hung on to America for still another year. I tell you my situation was unbearable, I was tied to my misery, I was a tethered dog, a duck without water—even dirty water. And I hadn’t any faith in myself or in my case; I knew I was wrong, had always been wrong, Phoebe had taught me that. I hadn’t any faith, I wish I had had. Faith can move mountains, so they say, though I’ve never heard of it actually being done.”

“No, not in historical times,” declared Turner.

“What do you mean by that?”

“O well, time is nothing, it’s nothing, it comes and off it goes. Has it ever occurred to you, Bollington, that in 5,000 years or so there will be nobody in the world speaking the English language, our very existence even will be speculated upon, as if we were the Anthropophagi? O good lord, yes.”

And another whiskey.

“You know, Bollington, you were a perfect fool. You behaved like one of those half-baked civil service hounds who lunch in a dairy on a cup of tea and a cream horn. You wanted some beef, some ginger. You came back, you must have come back because there you are now.”

“Yes, Turner, I came back after nearly four years. Everything was different, ah, how strange! I could not find Phoebe, it is weird how people can disappear. I made enquiries, but it was like looking for a lost umbrella, fruitless after so long.”

“Well, but what about Mrs. Macarthy?”

Mr. Bollington said, slowly and with the utmost precision: “I did not see Mrs. Macarthy again.”

“O, of course, you did not see her again, not ever.”

“Not ever. I feared Phoebe had gone abroad too, but at last I found her in London....”

“No,” roared Turner, “why the devil couldn’t you say so and done with it? I’ve been sweating with sympathy for you. O, I say, Bollington!”

“My dear Turner, listen. Do you know, she was delighted to see me, she even kissed me, straight off, and we went out to dine and had the very deuce of a spread and we were having the very deuce of a good time. She was lovelier than ever, and I could see all her old affection for me was returning, she was so ... well, I can’t tell you, Turner, but she had no animosity whatever, no grievance, she would certainly have taken me back that very night. O dear, dear ... and then! I was anxious to throw myself at her feet, but you couldn’t do that in a public café, I could only touch her hands, beautiful, as they lay on the white linen cloth. I kept asking: ‘Do you forgive me?’ and she would reply: ‘I have nothing to forgive, dear, nothing.’ How wonderful that sounded to my truly penitent soul—I wanted to die.

“‘But you don’t ask me where I’ve been!’ she cried gaily, ‘or what I’ve been doing, you careless old Peter. I’ve been to France, and Sweden too!’

“I was delighted to hear that, it was so very plucky.

“‘When did you go?’ I asked.

“‘When I left you,’ she said.

“‘You mean when I went away?’

“‘Did you go away? O, of course, you must have. Poor Peter, What a sad time he has had.’

“I was a little bewildered, but I was delighted; in fact, Turner, I was hopelessly infatuated again, I wanted to wring out all the dregs of my detestable villainy and be absolved. All I could begin with was: ‘Were you not very glad to be rid of me?’

“‘Well,’ she said, ‘my great fear at first was that you would find me again and make it up. I didn’t want that then, at least, I thought I didn’t.’

“‘That’s exactly what I felt,’ I exclaimed, ‘but how could I find you?’

“‘Well,’ Phoebe said, ‘you might have found out and followed me. But I promise never to run away again, Peter dear, never.’

“Turner, my reeling intelligence swerved like a shot bird.

“‘Do you mean, Phoebe, that you ran away from me?’

“‘Yes, didn’t I?’ she answered.

“‘But I ran away from you,’ I said. ‘I walked out of the hotel on that dreadful afternoon we quarrelled so, and I never went back. I went to America. I was in America nearly four years.’

“‘Do you mean you ran away from me?’ she cried.

“‘Yes,’ I said, ‘didn’t I?’

“‘But that is exactly what I did—I mean, I ran away from you. I walked out of the hotel directly you had gone—I never went back, and I’ve been abroad thinking how tremendously I had served you out, and wondering what you thought of it all and where you were.’

“I could only say ‘Good God, Phoebe, I’ve had the most awful four years of remorse and sorrow, all vain, mistaken, useless, thrown away.’ And she said: ’And I’ve had four years—living in a fool’s paradise after all. How dared you run away, it’s disgusting!’

“And, Turner, in a moment she was at me again in her old dreadful way, and the last words I had from her were: ‘Now I never want to see your face again, never, this is the end!’

“And that’s how things are now, Turner. It’s rather sad, isn’t it?”

“Sad! Why you chump, when was it you saw her?”

“O, a long time ago, it must be nearly three years now.”

“Three years! But you’ll see her again!”

“Tfoo! No, no, no, Turner. God bless me, no, no, no!” said the little old man.