Читать книгу Imperial Palace - Arnold Bennett - Страница 18

II

In her own bedroom Gracie knelt down and unpacked the suit-case; then arranged the toilet-table; then undressed completely, turned on the water in the bathroom and bathed. She opened the door of Tessa’s room to make sure that the noise of the water had not wakened the girl. Not a sound there. She put on blue silk pyjamas, and surveyed herself, moving to and fro, in the wardrobe mirror. She laid her small, elaborately embroidered travelling pillow on the hotel pillow, lit the bed-lamp, drew the blinds, closed the curtains, got into bed, switched off the lamp. She shut her eyes.

She was intensely conscious of her body, of the silkiness of her pyjamas, of the soft ridges of embroidery in the pillow. Luxurious repose. Extreme exhaustion; not merely physical; emotional. Exhaustion induced by the violence of her sensations and her aspirations in Smithfield Central Market and in the crypt below it. Thoughts of Tessa had receded. Once again she was absorbed in self-contemplation. Despite fatigue, an impulse to initiate immediately her secret project grew in her. It became imperious. She fought it, was beaten. She lit the lamp, hesitated, arose, put on the rich dressing-gown from the foot of the bed, passed into the drawing-room, carrying with her the jewel-case. It was locked—of course. The key was probably in Tessa’s bag. She was bound to go back to Tessa’s room. Still no sound nor movement there. She found the bag; she found the key-chain. Now, she was no more interested in Tessa.

In the drawing-room she opened the jewel-case, and took from it a morocco manuscript-book, virginal, which she had bought in New York. It had a lock, and the tiny key hung from the lock by a silk thread coloured to match the binding of the gilt-edged book. She sat herself at the desk, with the book opened in front of her, and seized a pen. The moment, she judged, was critical in her life. It might, it should and would, mark the beginning of a new life.

Slowly had been forming in her the resolution to write—to write literature. She had written one or two poems, and torn them up. No doubt they were worthless. But she knew them by heart. And perhaps they were not worthless. She had determined to write a journal of her impressions. She wrote the word ‘London,’ with the date, and underlined it, her hand trembling slightly from excitement, her mind thrilled by the memory of acute sensations felt in Smithfield. Her sensations seemed marvellous, unique. If only she could put them on paper. Formidable enterprise!

Her eye fell on a three-signal bell-tablet on the desk, ‘waiter, valet, maid.’ She must have some tea. She pressed the little knob for the waiter. True, she needed tea, but what influenced her as much as the need was a wish to delay the effort of writing the first momentous sentence in the book, the inception of the new life.

When the waiter had received her order he said:

“If you please, miss, there is a telephone-message for Sir Henry; he does not answer the telephone and his bedroom-door is locked.”

“What next?” thought Gracie, startled; and asked the waiter in a casual tone:

“What is the message?”

The waiter gave her a telephone-slip. She read: “Mr. Orcham is very sorry to say that he has outside appointments which will keep him away from the hotel all day.” She said to the waiter: “All right. I’ll see that Sir Henry gets the message.”

She was alarmed. She knew her father. If he had been suggesting an interview with Mr. Orcham, and this was the reply to the suggestion, there would certainly be an explosion, and trouble between the two men. The Napoleonic Henry Savott was just about the last man to tolerate such a curt message—especially from a hotel-manager! And somehow she could not bear the prospect of trouble between these two powerful individualities. (“Why can’t I?” she asked herself.) After she had drunk the celestial tea, she rang up her father in the next suite. Fortunately Napoleon had wakened.

“I say, dad—yes, it’s me—do you know you’ve been fast asleep and they’ve been trying to get a message to you, from Mr. Orcham. He says he’ll let you know as soon as possible later in the day. He’s frightfully sorry, but he’s just had to go out on very urgent business.” She rang off.

Well, there it was! She’d done it. She had ravelled the skein, and she would have to unravel it. How? She would face the problem later. Such was Gracie’s method. Anyhow she would have to communicate with Mr. Orcham. But later. A rush of the most vivid impressions of Smithfield, sensations at Smithfield, swept from her brain down her right arm. She could actually feel their passage. She began to write. She wrote slowly, with difficulty, with erasures. Everything but Smithfield vanished from her mind. The concentration of her mind was positively awful; that is to say, it awed her. The new life had opened for her.