Читать книгу Simple Peter Cradd - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 6

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A HAYFIELD, grass nearly ripe, its mingled perfumes floating on the sunlit air, and the sea glimmering barely twenty yards away. The thing didn't seem possible, and yet there it was. Flowers too, amongst the grasses—too many poppies for anything but beauty, a few blue cornflowers, some purple orchises growing close to the ground. Peter Cradd raised himself lazily from his hidden place amongst the quaking grasses, and for a long time sat in a crouching position, his chin supported upon his hands. Before him was a long estuary where day by day the silver sea came dancing in or sobbing its way out to the muddy banks. Just now the tide was on the turn, and every moment it flowed more deeply and spread wider. Every moment it seemed to bring more pungently the real salt savour of the distant ocean. Above his head a lark was singing. He watched it drift farther away over the swampy inland until its notes became like the faintest tinkling of some fairy music. There were other birds twittering around, the humming of many insects in the grasses, and all the time the gurgle of the rapidly filling silver waterway. There was a book in his pocket, but who could read on such a morning? Every sense in his body seemed to be receptively open to warmth and perfume, sweet visions and sweet sounds. Peter Cradd forgot to think—he lived.

Down the winding estuary came a tiny skiff, tacking from side to side—a little before its time, perhaps, because as it reached the point where Peter Cradd was seated, it grounded on the mud. The seaman took a pole. The mud was sticky, and one of his sleeves hung emptily down. He looked at Peter Cradd, seated there, his trousers turned up to his knees, showing his bare legs.

"Will 'e give us a shove. Mister?" he asked invitingly. Peter Cradd, who had already been paddling in the cool velvety water, sprang to his feet at once. The mud oozed up between his toes as he stepped into the stream. He had almost reached the skiff, before he became conscious of its passenger. He paused suddenly. A girl, with closely cropped, fair hair, a white sweater, very open at the neck, and a negligible white skirt, was lying flat on a rug in the bows. She was, like him, bare-legged; she, like him, had apparently been dreaming. She turned over on one side, and her eyes smiled into his.

"Coming to give us a shove?" she asked. "My fault. I would start out. Large here said we might get stuck. It will be all right lower down."

"I will help with pleasure," Peter Cradd replied.

A puff of wind brought the boat over to a perilous angle. The boatman stood up and hauled down the sail. Cradd advanced and gripped the side of the skiff. He looked curiously at its occupant—a pleasant, even a pretty face, a little tired perhaps, but with a line of sunburn already creeping over her fair skin. There was something in her expression which awoke an instantly responsive spark in his.

"You look very contented and happy," he remarked.

She smiled at, him.

"It's so wonderful," she murmured, "to be alone."

Cradd put his shoulder to the task, in went the pole, and the skiff floated off. The girl waved her hand lazily and Cradd, wading to the shore, threw himself once more on to the cool grass, with his glistening legs in the sunshine. To be alone! He found himself repeating her words, and there came to him a sudden comprehension of his own ecstasies. He was alone! The long nightmare had passed. The chorus of greedy, peevish voices had ceased. In its place were all these wonderful things. His eyes wandered languorously. The skiff was making fine progress now, the girl invisible, the boatman with the tiller in his hand, and his pipe lit, also recumbent. Broader and broader the streak of silver widened that distant blue line of the sea. A puff of wind brought him a taste of its saltiness. He moved a little and looked away inland, to golden fields where the corn leaned lazily before the south wind,? green meadows, grey stone and red-tiled farmhouses, a distant church, square-towered, crumbling with age, but still one of the sentinel towers of the lonely coast. His lark had come back to sing to him. The gurgle of the water had become a ripple. Other white-winged boats were stealing down the waterway. At the distant quay there was a pleasant little stir of humanity. Full on him shone the sun. In his ears, with the strengthening of the wind, came also the rustling of the grasses. Again as he had done for many hours in the last few mornings, Peter Cradd slept—and he slept to music.

The next morning he made his way on to the quay at the turn of the tide and accosted Large, the one-armed boatman.

"Some day," he said, "when you're not engaged, I should like to hire your boat."

The man nodded assent.

"I do generally hang about until this time," he confided, "to see if the young lady she wants to go out. . . . She's likely here about now if she does. If she don't come, say in five minutes, I'll take you with pleasure. You be fond of sailing. Mister?"

"I don't know much about it," Peter Cradd confessed. "I love the sea and the sunshine and the quiet down here."

"You be from the city, perhaps?"

Cradd nodded.

"A Londoner, maybe?"

"A Londoner."

"Must seem quiet to you a-nights down here."

"It's like heaven," was the almost passionate response.

The man looked up at him curiously. They had all noticed him about—a strange, pleasant-faced little gentleman who had come down looking like a ghost, but whose rapidly acquired sunburn and increasing clearness of the eyes seemed every day to be giving him a fresh vitality. He had made his first appearance in a worn, ready-made business suit. The last few days no one had seen any trace of it. He was now wearing a fisherman's jersey, a pair of shorts bought in the village, and sand shoes. Even at that moment he looked down at himself and chuckled at the thought of his costume.

"You're not taking my boat?" a startled voice demanded in his ear.

He turned round. The young lady of the day before had made her appearance, swinging a towel and bathing suit, and carrying a small brown paper packet. She was looking at him in genuine alarm.

"Not for the world," he assured her hastily. "I was just telling the boatman here that one day when you weren't wanting him, I might like to go out."

"That was very nice of you," she acknowledged. "I'm rather later this morning. I went to buy a bathing dress."

"Well, Large was very faithful to you," he told her good-humouredly. "He said he always waited first to see whether you turned up."

She studied him for a moment appraisingly. There was something irresistibly pleasant in the kindliness of his face, his clear eyes, and sensitive mouth. The pinched look which he had worn for many years was passing. Peter Cradd in his natural state was not at all an ill-looking fellow.

"Can you swim?" she asked him.

"Well, I used to be able to," was the doubtful reply. "I have done a little at swimming baths the last few years. I haven't really seen the sea since I can remember."

"You look as though you were enjoying it," she observed.

"I am enjoying every moment of it. If I were to try to tell you how much," he went on, with a smile, "it would take so long that you would miss the tide."

"Would you like to come with me?" she invited. "There's plenty of room for two, and you can get a bathing suit at Large's sister's there—the first shop on the left."

"Sure you wouldn't mind?" he asked wistfully. "Remember what you said yesterday. I thought of it so much."

"About being alone?"

He nodded.

"I have a feeling," she continued, "that I would be just as much alone with you there. We won't get in the way of one another's thoughts. I don't think you'll say the things to me I'm tired of hearing, and I'm quite sure I sha'n't be a bother to you."

"I won't keep you," he promised her.

In less than five minutes he arrived with a small parcel under his arm. She spread out her rug. Large managed to produce another one which did for a pillow, and side by side they glided down the waterway. To-day they were a little later, and there was no mud to be feared. They zigzagged down the broadening streak, and each time their tacks were longer, until at last they sailed in a fair breeze, and Peter Cradd opened his eyes with the sheer joy of the motion. Up till then neither of them had spoken. The girl lay as though she slept. Peter Cradd glanced towards her with a little tremor. Her long throat with its V-shaped coating of brown, was soft and agreeable to look at. Her jersey frankly displayed her girlish figure. Her bare legs were drawn slightly up, and her pretence at a skirt left them visible well above the knees. He looked at her almost stealthily. For the first time for many years he felt a strange, pleasant stirring of the senses of which he was half ashamed and yet which he hugged all the time to his bosom. She was part of the new and splendid things of life. These vague and indescribable emotions with which she had suddenly inspired him were part of the new world, the singing of uncaged larks, the rustling of the wind in the corn, the gurgle of the sea, the sweet caress of the sunshine. They seemed all woven into this new existence of beauty and rest, so grateful to his tired soul. An angel could only have smiled at his thoughts, yet Peter Cradd blushed under his tan when he suddenly found her looking at him with wide-open eyes.

"So you're awake," she remarked.

The friendliness of her tone filled him with a great relief.

"To tell you the truth," he confided, "when I am out of doors like this, I never know whether I am awake or asleep."

She nodded.

"I know what it is to feel like that. I know just what you mean. You're odd, aren't you? Come from London?"

"Yes."

"So do I—and that's all we're going to say about it. Look down and see how deep the water is."

"About five feet, I should think," he speculated. "What do you say, Large?"

"It's plenty deep enough for a bathe," the boatman replied. "I can hold over a rope if you like. Sweet water it be, with a sandy bottom."

"Come on," the girl proposed, getting up. "Let's."

Peter Cradd was filled with a great embarrassment. The girl probably noticed it, for she laughed at him.

"You go over by Large," she pointed out, "and we shall have the sail between us. It won't take me a second to get into my things. In fact I've got my knickers on now."

Peter Cradd did as he was bidden. To say the least of it, the shelter of the sail was slightly inadequate, and there was one moment, when it suddenly flapped over that he experienced a sudden thrill half of pleasure, half of confusion. She had just begun to drag the top part of her costume over her head. He looked away with the uneasy sense that she was laughing at him. A moment later he heard the ripple of her laughter—a very pleasant sound it was too.

"All clear," she announced. "I'm quite decent. We sha'n't want shoes, shall we? You're sure you can help me?"

"Let me get over first and experiment," he begged. "Remember, it's a long time since I tried."

Then again came one of the great, sweet joys of this new phase of living. He dived carefully into the blue, limpid water, felt it all round him, felt the gentle buoyancy of it as it lifted him up, and he lay for a moment upon his back. He stretched out his arms, and moved a few strokes—the sun on his face, the water like a velvety couch about him. He turned over and swam around the boat. Every stroke was a delight. He was conscious of a strength which he had never dreamed of in his limbs, a great desire to embrace with his body this new and wonderful sensation.

"Oh, you're all right, I can see," the girl exclaimed cheerfully. "Look out—I'm coming!"

She came in rather clumsily, spluttered a good deal, but with a touch of his hand rose to the surface. Side by side they swam out, Large following them in the boat a few lengths behind. Neither of them spoke. Peter Cradd was too happy even to think. Only one faint reflection came to him—that he had perhaps found one other person in the world who shared his passionate need of rest.

She swam slowly, but with an ecstatic expression upon her face. With his help, asked for by a dumb gesture, she turned on her back, and it seemed to him that she thrilled too with that same desire which had sung its way through his blood—to give himself to the ocean, to realise in faint, emotional fashion, the deep craving of the sea lovers of the world.

Large called out to them at last.

"I say, folks, you've been in half an hour. Ain't that long enough?"

They swam to the,side of the boat. Large's great right hand dragged them in, and they lay white and glistening once more side by side.

"Don't let's change," she begged. "Let's dry like this."

Peter Cradd, who had always been a little careful of his health, because of what an illness must entail, and wore goloshes on a wet day as far as the bus, laughed happily as he stretched himself out. The taste of the salt was in his mouth, the burn of it upon his body. She threw a little of the rug over his legs.

"My, you're white!" she exclaimed. "You want to do this by degrees. Here!"

She produced a bottle and, kneeling by his side, rubbed his legs with some sort of oil. He lay in a divine trance. Every touch of her fingers was marvellous. When she had finished, she did the same thing to her own legs, although they were already a pleasant shade of brown. Then once more they glided off towards that distant line of blue. Large was looking around him with the all-comprehensive survey of the seaman.

"I think I'll just land you at Seagull's Island for your luncheon," he suggested. "Miss has been there before. It's a rare place for resting awhile."

"A paradise," the girl murmured lazily.

"Heavens, I haven't brought any luncheon!" Peter Cradd exclaimed. "Not that it matters at all," he went on hastily. "I never care about eating in the middle of the day. Can one get anything at Seagull's Island?"

Large grinned.

"There's plenty of seagulls, if you can catch some," he said, "but they ain't so powerful good to eat."

The girl smiled reassuringly.

"I've heaps," she declared. "I always leave half mine, and Large brings his own. We've got some water too, somewhere."

Her companion remembered the size of the parcel and scoffed at the idea.

"I'll wait until I get home," he insisted. "But I'll love to lie down and have a nap whilst you eat your sandwiches."

"We'll see," she murmured drowsily. "Isn't it lovely to feel your things drying on you like this?"

"Heavenly," he agreed.

They met a stronger wind for a few minutes, went across on another tack and finally glided into a shallow pool, rocky and shingled. Large let down the anchor, and the girl rose reluctantly to her feet.

"Get out carefully," she advised her companion. "It's a rough bottom."

At Large's suggestion they put on their shoes and scrambled ashore on to a small grass-tufted spit of land— a swamp in the wet season swept by every tide, a pleasant little oasis now, with shade, if one needed it, on the far side of the hillocks. Large followed them in his sea boots, handed the girl her packet of sandwiches and jerked his thumb towards a distant hillock.

"I'll take my pipe and a bite there, Missie," he announced. "The gentleman can just give a holloa when you're ready."

They found a perfect spot in a sandy hollow, with their backs to the wind, and their faces to the sea and the sun. At her bidding, Peter Cradd untied the string of her parcel. There were four sandwiches of reasonable size, two of beef and two of ham, a somewhat withered looking apple, and a slice of cake.

"You can have the sandwiches," the girl invited. "I'll take the cake and the apple. That will be quite enough for me."

He divided the sandwiches, waving away her remonstrances, and leaving her the cake and the apple.

"I have no right to anything," he protested. "I feel rather greedy, as it is. Perhaps you'll let me give you some tea when we get back?"

"Rather!" she agreed, taking a bite out of one of her sandwiches. "Makes you hungry, this bathing, doesn't it?"

"It does indeed," he assented. "By-the-by, doesn't it seem a little quaint that I don't even know your name? Mine is Peter Cradd."

"I like the Peter," she observed. "Mine's Eileen Bates. So you're from London?"

"Yes," he admitted. "And so are you?"

She nodded.

"Business in Cannon Street, home at Stoke Newington. Doesn't sound very exciting, does it?"

"I've been living in Ealing, and I think that's worse," he told her. "My business was in Bermondsey, but I've given it up."

"Retired?"

"Yes," he acknowledged; "I think I may say that I have retired."

They ate in silence for several moments. He watched her strong, white teeth which crunched through the apple, when she arrived at that stage of her meal, with shameless noise and vigour.

"When you say that you're in business," he ventured, a little timidly, "what do you do?"

"The usual job," she yawned; "secretary typist. They sometimes say I'm a secretary when the boss has a buyer in he wants to impress, and a typist when it comes to pay day."

Peter Cradd chuckled. A similar situation had existed in his late offices in Bermondsey.

"I suppose mine's a good-enough job as it goes," she reflected, throwing away the core of her apple, after she had glanced round it to see if there was another mouthful. "I get enough to live on, and enough to pay something at home. Get taken out sometimes too, and a few presents, of course. Life goes on all right whilst you're there. You fit into it, and you seem to belong. It's when you get away to places like this, and look back that you begin to wonder if there isn't something pretty rotten about it."

"Go on, please," he begged. "I love to hear you talk." She leaned a little farther back, her hands meeting behind her head, with its cluster of soft brown hair.

"Well, what I mean is," she explained, "I don't think girls have any right in the city at all. It's a putrid sort of game. It's all right in a big drapery establishment, or anywhere where there are hundreds of you together, but in a city office it's pretty rotten. They look you over on your first day, from the office boy to the cashier, and you know exactly what's in their minds."

Peter Cradd stirred uneasily upon his sand bed. He was not used to young women who talked so frankly—in fact, he had never met one before.

"They all want the same thing, of course," she went on, a little resentfully. "The boss has the first chance, because he can keep you after hours, or give you a holiday, or raise your salary, or anything of that sort. Then if he's not that kind, or if he's otherwise engaged—although sometimes that doesn't seem to make any difference? then the cashier comes along, or the town travellers, and after them the clerks. Sometimes the office boy's the biggest nuisance of the lot. Ours bought two new neckties the week before I came away, and he was always worrying me to go and see his mother who lives at Highgate." Peter Cradd chuckled.

"But after all," he ventured, "they can't bully you into anything, can they? What I mean to say is, you're not obliged to stand any nonsense from them. You look to me," he added, "like a girl who could take very good care of herself."

"Oh, I can take care of myself, all right," she admitted, her voice growing a little lazier. "The trouble is, is it worth while? You take care of yourself, and your salary stays where it is. You're 'Miss Bates' all the time, instead of 'Eileen', and you never get that little pat on the hand now and then which is certain to mean a box of chocolates at least. You never get a present of any sort. If there's anything goes wrong with your work, there's no one to stick up for you. You never get taken out. No one asks you when your birthday is. You have to buy all your own little luxuries, and if the staff has to be reduced, you're the first to go. The choice is up to you, all right. You can draw your hand away if the boss wants to hold it for a minute, or turn your lips away if he comes too near, and you can refuse a little dinner and a visit to the cinema with the salesman, or a supper and a dance with the cashier, but the question is, is it worth while? There are thousands of girls who can take down letters and type them well, and do my job — plenty of them waiting for it, if my people get bored with me. You see, Mr. Cradd," she went on, her voice growing drowsier and drowsier, "even a working girl has her problems in life."

"I wonder," he said, a little nervously, "how you deal with yours?"

There was no reply. He turned his head. Miss Eileen Bates had fallen asleep.