Читать книгу This Above All - Eric Knight - Страница 11
CHAPTER IX
ОглавлениеThe next night it was raining dismally, and he did not expect her to come. But he heard her feet squelching on the road, and heard the rustle of her mackintosh and the slap of rain on the hard fabric. Then he felt her beside him.
He jumped down and they stood, awkwardly and without ease.
“Nice of you to come,” he said. “I wouldn’t have blamed you if ...”
“Ghastly weather,” she said.
“Fearful. Certainly isn’t romantic.”
“See here, I shouldn’t have come.”
“I agree with you. I just said I wouldn’t have blamed you if you didn’t.”
“Not the weather. Just coming at all. Oh—I suppose it’s the feminine thing to say. You mustn’t mind if I say useless things, will you? You won’t mind, ever?”
“Go on and be feminine,” he said. “I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“No, you’re all right.”
She stood, waiting.
“Shall we be comfortable—as comfortable as we can?”
They sat on the low wall. The rain slatted and the night was close about them, shutting them in a sort of privacy.
“I suppose there’s not much help for these things,” she said, slowly.
“What things?”
“You know. Don’t crumble the defenses of my phrases.”
He did not answer.
“Tell me about you,” she said.
“No. You tell me. What do you do? Not in the Waffs—I mean in ordinary life.”
“There’s almost nothing to tell about me, I’m afraid.”
“Now you are speaking phrases. Everyone does something. Everyone’s life is full and important and dramatic—to himself at the very least.”
“That’s so. I studied art.”
“Art? What for?”
“You know, that’s what I wonder now. I wasn’t very good at it, really. It’s what you do—study art—it’s done. You wander round and wonder what you can do. You don’t like bridge, and you don’t like doing nothing, and—and you’re not the athletic type. So what can you do? You can get a job reading for a publisher through a friend—or start a hat shop with a woman who’s having trouble with her husband—or take up social service work—or dedicate your life to having direr illnesses than any of the others you know—or pretend you’re having a career. I started a career—art.”
“And now you’re in the Waffs.”
“Yes, and now I’m in the Waffs, sitting on a wall with a strange man—and in idiotic weather.”
She spoke the last as a sweep of wind shook the beech tree, sending the gathered rain down in a torrent on their hunched shoulders.
“It is idiotic of me to keep you here,” he said. “I’ll take you back, eh?”
“We were going to talk about you.”
“I’ll tell you some other time.”
“Yes,” she said, slowly. “You shall tell me.”
She got down from the wall and they walked along, slowly, in the pelting rain. Their feet dragged as if they wished it to last, this going along the road close together, with the storm making the world lonesome.
“You must leave me here,” she said, finally.
“You don’t want to be seen walking back with a man?”
“That isn’t it. I don’t care.”
“It is it, and of course you care.”
“Yes,” she said. “I do care, in a way. You have to get used to things.”
They stood waiting.
“Will you see me again, Prudence?”
“Why do you want to see me again?”
“Shall we complicate things by trying to express reasons?”
“It’s easier not to, I suppose. But we go through moves of defense—like a chess game—doing it all by instinct. We do it, even when we know there’s no defense there. It can’t be born in us. It’s instilled in us from the time we’re little girls.”
“Then you’ll meet me—not under the tree. Can’t I see you sometime—don’t you have time off?”
She paused, and then said:
“I could get off tomorrow afternoon.”
“Good,” he said, brightly. “What would madame like to do?”
“What do you suggest, sir?”
“Far be it from me to be suggestive, madame.”
“You do have a sense of humor, don’t you?”
“Oh, a very strong one, when it’s unbridled. But also I’ve got a tenacious mind. I still want to know what-where-when about tomorrow. Where do we go?”
“You think it up.”
“I’m a stranger here myself, madame. I don’t know the ways of the land.”
“Well—I’ll meet you at two. That’s the regular camp routine. Meet you by the bus stop at two.”
“Then what’s the routine?”
“You ride up to Wythe and you have tea, and then you go to the cinema, and then you come back on the last bus and tell everyone what a fine time you had. That’s supposed to be the thing to do.”
“Well, far be it from me to upset ordained schedules in these regimented times. I’ll see you at two, then, at the Gosley bus stop.”
“No, the high road one—it doesn’t matter. I’ll get on at the high road, and you can get on at Gosley. It will save a walk. Or—no. Please come to the high road and meet me there and we’ll get on together.”
“That was nice of you,” he said. “Good night.”
He stood, listening to her go away. Only when he turned about did he become conscious of how wet he was. His shoes squelched with the water.
“It has a High Street, a Main Street, one cinema and a war memorial,” she said.
He walked with his eyes ahead.
“And six pubs, one Wythe Community Center and one hotel.”
They walked in the sunlight. Now, because they could see each other, they were strangers and somehow uncomfortable.
“We’re not very bright, are we?” she said.
He knew what she meant.
“Perhaps I’d better take you back.”
She drew in her breath and walked without answering. Then she said:
“It has a nice church and a very pretty graveyard.”
He went with his eyes on the pavement.
“It’s a very pretty graveyard,” she said.
Her voice sounded small. He stopped impulsively, and looked at her face. Then he smiled.
“Is it very pretty?”
“Very, very pretty,” she said.
He thought she was going to cry.
“Well, if it’s very, very pretty—that makes it different,” he said.
He looked about him.
“Every teashop looked grimier than the last,” he said. “But even if this one is full of flies and corruption, it’ll have to do. Wait here.”
She stood in the sunlight, watching him go across the cobbled street. They had looked into every teashop in the town, and felt mutually repelled. She shut her eyes, and counted, childishly. At every ten she opened her eyes. She did that until, at the fifth count to ten, when she opened her eyes, he was coming back carrying paper bags.
“Rations ready,” he said.
“Was it full of flies?”
“Every kind. House, horse and bluebottle. Now—where’s this very, very pretty graveyard?”
“This way.”
They went along the road from town, past the last shops and a few houses of the suburbia inclination. The lane curved, and there, beneath the wineglass-shaped elms, the church was. The flat-topped wall, the stone green with age, fronted the stone-flagged pavement.
“Now, isn’t it nice?”
“Yes,” he said, quietly. “It is.”
She put a hand on the wall and jumped up quickly, turning so that she sat. He put the parcels on the wall, and then, about to jump, looked up at her face. He smiled and kept looking at her. Now, at last, he was looking frankly at her, there was no more self-consciousness.
He looked at her eyes. They were a fine gray-blue. Her hair, so light that it was almost silvery in texture, was drawn back tightly beneath her cap. Her skin was a blue-white color. Her mouth was somehow square and pugnacious. There were hints of freckles on the nose.
She was much prettier than he had imagined. Pretty? She was quite beautiful. Certainly one would never dare hope, meeting a girl at random in the darkness, to have any better luck. He was lucky!
“Well,” she said, happily.
He knew then that she must have seen gladness in his face.
“So you’re the girl I met in the dark,” he said.
“Well, what did you expect me to look like?”
“You look exactly like I imagined you.”
“You liar. You were afraid I might be cross-eyed, or have a mole on my nose.”
“I did not. I knew you had no moles.”
“Well, I have.”
“Where?”
“I can’t show you.”
He laughed quickly.
“When you went home last night,” she went on, “you suddenly realized that you didn’t know what I looked like. And then you drew in your breath, and said: ‘My God! She might look like a pan of sour milk.’ ”
“By God,” he said, “I did. How did you know that?”
She put her hands between her knees and leaned back, laughing.
“Because,” she said, “I did the same thing.”
“Oh,” he said, a little ruefully. “I suppose that is so. Well. What did you expect me to be like?”
“Exactly as you are, sir.”
“No. Truthfully.”
“I’m telling the truth. I expected you to be just as handsome as you are.”
“Oh, come.”
“You are handsome—a nice sort of face—the nose a little too fine and the mouth a little on the large side. One of your ears sticks out a little more than the other—you know your face is quite lopsided? I can see it now.”
“That’s enough.”
“No. And your eyes are very nice. A good, deep brown. They’re a little tired-looking—too late hours, that is. But your eyes are your best feature. Yes, I should say that. Rather tender eyes you have ...”
“Tender?”
“And on the whole, it’s quite a good face. The lean type. A little too lean, but I’m glad you’re not fat-faced. I hate soggy faces, don’t you?”
He looked up into her face, without answering.
“Go on,” he said. “I don’t count in this conversation.”
“You’re vain—you want me to go on talking about you. All men are vain.”
He whistled.
“What a remarkable generalization.”
“And you shouldn’t wrinkle your forehead so much,” she said. “It’s a bad habit. Now that’s all.”
He jumped up on the wall beside her and opened the parcels.
“Ham sandwiches,” he said, “guaranteed to taste like damp cardboard. Rock buns—very rocky. And—milk!”
“Very nice, sir.”
She took a sandwich and a bottle of milk. He watched her as she ate, her uniformed figure trim. He looked down at her leg, swinging—then he watched her low-heeled shoe. When she turned he looked up. She smiled and looked away again.
“Nice,” she said. “We seem to be fated for walls. But it’s always nice—away from people.”
He nodded and laughed, but did not answer.
“What are you thinking?”
He looked up at her face. He thought: She is quite beautiful.
“It’s all funny,” he said. “Us. Sitting here. Wondering about each other. Like people newly met. Now we can see each other in daylight—partly shy, partly ill at ease, partly curious. Wondering about everything that happened before we met—and everything that happened after. Wondering about our lives, stretching back with no knowledge of each other, somehow winding tortuously right up to this point where we, two people, should sit on this wall, all full of curiosities and suspicions and defenses.”
“Not suspicions,” she said.
“Yes. Suspicions, too. Not so much of each other as at circumstance—touching the tentacles of relationship gladly one second, drawing back quickly the next for fear of possession—suspecting that and suspecting captivity.”
“Captivity! My goodness. You mustn’t think I want to capture you.”
“We all do,” he said. “We all desire to possess avidly.”
He swung about on the wall and stared at a gravestone.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “Listen to this one. ‘Jonathan Stanginghorn of the Parish of Wythe. 1739-1818. Look on me as ye pass by; as ye are now so once was I. As I am now so ye shall be. Prepare for God and Eternity.’ Cheerful blighter, wasn’t he?”
“Ghoulish,” she said.
She swung her legs over the wall so that she sat facing the stone with him. He felt curiously pleased that she handled skirts so expertly and neatly. Some women were so clumsy....
“But they liked it that way, I suppose,” she said. “They believed in the hereafter and were quite happy about facing it. Made it all very nice for them.”
He looked at her, hearing the clarity of her voice. He put his hand on hers.
“You’re very nice,” he said.
“Please don’t start that.”
He took his hand away angrily.
“I’m not starting anything. I was just saying you’re nice, that’s all. It was a natural thing to say—since I really haven’t seen you before.”
“What you’re trying to say is that I was quite a lucky packet to pick out of the blackout.”
“Why do you suddenly talk bitterly like that?”
“Well, I am a lucky packet. And you. You’re ...”
“It seems to me we’ve been through this conversation before.”
“I know, but it’s hard to talk. I was going to say you were handsome, so don’t get angry. I couldn’t say that though, because it would sound unmaidenly. You wouldn’t like to have me unmaidenly, would you?”
“I think you’re very nice unmaidenly. You can’t be a maid any more.”
“That’s true. Neither maid, wife, nor widow,” she said.
She swung her legs back over the wall.
“It’s all right,” she said. “I’m one of the Waffs that a soldier took out in the dark. If it’s like that there’s some honesty somewhere in it, so it’s all right to leave it like that.”
“It isn’t much use talking about it one way or another, if that’s what you mean.”
“That’s what I mean,” she said.
He turned, facing the road. They swung their legs. A bus went by, its engine pinging badly. He shuddered at the sound, and crumpled the paper bags. Then he halted, his arm upraised. At last he put the paper in his pocket. She looked at him and smiled.
“Can’t strew things around—by a very pretty graveyard, can I?”
“No,” she agreed. She touched his knee with her hand. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Let’s talk. What did you do—before you joined up?”
He sat up, hugging his knee.
“Rotifera,” he said.
“For goodness’ sake. What’s that?”
“Bugs.”
“Horrid word. Like bedbugs?”
“Much nicer. You’ve heard of photomicrography?”
“Emphatically not.”
“That’s good, because there’s photomicrography, and microphotography—which are entirely different things. Now you know all you need to about both, so worry no more about it, and we’ll continue up the Ganges to this tiny dot. Well, that’s a wonderful beggar named a rotifer. He’s a cheerful chap who lives in the marvelously beautiful jungle of slimy water, in which he goes around by turning himself into a paddle wheel. He’s the only animal in the world that uses the wheel as part of his body instead of using fins or legs or wings.”
“You’re not kidding?”
“S’welp me, it’s true. He invented the wheel millions of years before man got round to it.”
“And what do you do about it?”
“I don’t do much. I got a job with an old chap who cuts them up and mounts them on slides. He’s a wonderful old chap. The only man in the world who has dissected rotifers properly. But he’s after something more important now.”
“They’re tiny, then.”
“Very minute.”
“Did you always do that? How did you start?”
“Oh—well, once I was in a secondhand camera repair shop. That’s how I picked up the photography part. I’m handy at picking things up—machinery, you know.”
“Did you study it?”
“No. Just sort of came naturally—through a long series of fortuitous industrial wanderings. Once I was a dog dietitian.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“What does a dog dietitian do?”
“Well, it sounds fine. Mostly what it means is driving a delivery truck. Delivering ready-made meals for dogs—chock full of vitamins and stuff, and balanced. We deliver to your door daily. No trouble to you. Have our dog dietitian bring freshly prepared meals of highest quality ingredients for your pet every day. You know—people too thick-headed or lazy to look after their own pets.”
“No.”
“It’s true. Most everyone in cities nowadays is too busy to look after a dog. So it’s a mass business. Chopped liver and meal and stuff, all prepared in a dainty frilled paper dish. It’s quite a business. You ask anyone in the dog game.”
“How on earth did you get into such a business?”
“I could repair the truck. I told you—I’m quite handy with machines.”
“But what a curious business.”
“That’s nothing. Once I was a canary whistler.”
She laughed.
“You’re fooling. What’s a canary whistler?”
“Chap who teaches canaries to whistle.”
“Why, canaries know how to whistle. It’s—it’s nature.”
“Says you. I take my oath on it. You think canaries sing naturally, well, they don’t. Good ones—they have to be taught. They can learn from older birds, or from a canary whistler, or from a machine.”
“Oh, come. What machine?”
“A trilling machine. It has compressed air and a water pipe, and it goes on rolling and trilling all day. That’s how I got the job. I fixed the chap’s machine, and then I stayed on—feeding, you know, and cleaning and caging for market. I stuck at my post and progressed upward to special whistler for fine birds. Listen.”
He put a finger on his lower lip, and the sound of a canary trilling, higher and higher, rolled out over the quietness of the afternoon.
“Good heavens,” she said. “How do you do it?”
“It’s a secret,” he grinned. “And it takes years of practice.”
“You’re talented!”
“That’s nothing. Wait till you see me tap dance.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve been an actor. I couldn’t stand it.”
“Lady, I have my code of decency, strange as it may be. I never fell that low, but I worked in an agency once—you know, that hires actors.”
“And you’ve worked with bugs and dog food.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“And canaries.”
“And canaries. Lady, you believe me I worked with canaries. Why, if I ever see another canary—or hear one—or smell one, I’ll be sick. Bloody canaries!”
“Well, what did you do it for, then?”
“What did I do it for? Hark to her! Lady, I did it to eat. You know eating?—meals, food? That stuff—you get the bad habit of wanting some two—and very often even three—times a day. Hence the checkered career of employment.”
“It has been checkered, I’d say.”
“Oh, but you haven’t heard anything yet.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve had other exploits.”
“Oh, dozens. Garage repairman, safety-glass demonstrator, padlock inspector ...”
“Padlock inspector! You go around inspecting padlocks at night?”
“No. In a factory. A lock factory.”
“How do you inspect a padlock? Give a demonstration. You look in the keyhole?”
“No. You have a tray of padlocks. You take a rawhide mallet. You tap the first padlock in its most ticklish spot. Voilà, the hasp flies open! What does that mean?”
“The lock’s no good.”
“No! That means it’s perfect. If you can’t rap it open, it’s faulty and you reject it.”
“What makes it fly open?”
“Lady, my job wasn’t to ask questions. It was to rap padlocks on piecework. They said: ‘Hit ’em here!’ So I hit ’em and didn’t worry about the causes—only the results. Like the old chap who hits the train axles with a hammer at the railway stations. He’d been tapping ’em for sixty years and was retired on pension, and they gave him a gold button for his lapel, and shook his hand at a farewell dinner. And he said it was nice of them, after all those years, but one thing—he always wished someone had told him what the hell he was rapping the axles for.”
“No. But what do they rap ’em for?”
He glanced up at her.
“You can tell by sound whether a wheel’s true or not, or has a crack in it, can’t you? Test by resonance.”
He held his knee with his clasped hands, and leaned backward slightly. The day was fading to the endless quality of summer evening. The smell of sweetly new dust was in the air, and he heard a thrush singing in the close of the churchyard—saying that the twilight was coming at last.
She wrinkled her nose in thought.
“But you mean you can take a rawhide mallet and go around tapping padlocks and make them fly open without a key?”
“Most common types will.”
“Aren’t you a dangerous man to be loose?”
“I’m saving the talent for special occasions.”
“And you don’t know what makes it happen?”
“Of course I do—but it would take too long to explain. I’d have to explain all about spring locks, and lever tumbler locks, and pin tumbler locks. Would you like a comprehensive dissertation?”
“We’ll save it for our old age. Tell me more about you. What else have you done?”
“Lots of things—anything that was a living.”
“But where were you educated?”
“I’m not educated, lady.”
“But you must be—you are!”
“I’m not. I’m half-educated—like ninety per cent of the people in this country. I know a little more than nothing about a little less than everything.”
“But what do you intend to be?”
“Just myself. That’s all. It’s all I can be. You see, it isn’t a case of what you want to be. It’s a case of what job a chap can get to make a living, isn’t it? You come from a fairly well-off family, don’t you?”
“It’s all right. What would you be—if you could choose?”
“An undertaker, lady.”
“No, seriously.”
“I still say an undertaker. It’s the only business never has any slack times.”
“No, please tell me. Seriously.”
“What’s the use?” he said. “What’s the use of thinking things like that with all this—this mess going on?”
She looked down at her feet.
“How much time have you got left?” she said. “You know—leave?”
“Don’t let’s talk about it. I hate to count it.”
She looked up at him, and their glances were held for a moment. She put her hand to her throat, and then jumped from the wall. She spoke quickly.
“Shouldn’t we go?” she said. “It’s getting on. If we want to go to the cinema ...”
He looked straight ahead.
“Do you want to go to the cinema?”
“It’s customary,” she said. “Isn’t that what we came for?”
“I asked if you wanted to go?”
“What else? What do you want to do, then?”
He did not answer.
“All right,” she said, finally. “Let’s go find another haystack.”
“Good God,” he said. “A martyr. No thanks.”
“Well, isn’t that what you want?”
“Do you have to talk about it like that?”
“How do you expect me to talk about it? That’s what you mean, isn’t it?”
He got down from the wall and held her arm. Then he lifted his head.
“It’s all right,” he said. “There’s a hundred reasons—you’re afraid, and upset, and muddled. You should be. It’s all right. Let’s go to the cinema.”
He lifted her arm over his and started back toward the town. For a while they went in silence. Then she said:
“Will you do something for me?”
“Anything you wish.”
“I don’t mind, but haystacks, they ...”
“Sound a little sordid.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you meant it.”
“Please, I don’t mean it. I mean, talking about it seems a little so. It isn’t really itself—when we’re there. It’s just—planning it.”
“So, we go to the cinema.”
“No. Will you—take me to the hotel?”
“Then it won’t be so sordid?”
“I didn’t use that word,” she said. “You did.”
“I’m helping your thoughts out, that’s all. Now we’ll go to the cinema if you wish.”
She stopped and clenched her fists.
“You’re exactly like a woman,” she said. “Now will you please decide on something definite and let’s not argue. I say, clearly and distinctly, we’ll go to the hotel.”
He stood a moment, then clasped her hand.
“Forgive me,” he said. “You’re a little honester and braver than I am.”
Arm in arm, walking quickly, they went to the town, and to the Wythe Hotel with its remodeled front, done in pseudo half-timbered style. It was the fake aged fronting set out hopefully to catch the summer tourist trade that now seemed nonexistent. There were no people in the chairs set about the front room. Behind the desk a girl about sixteen sat reading, her toffee-colored hair hanging wispily down toward the magazine. She looked up like a suddenly alarmed animal.
“I want a room—for my wife and myself,” Clive said. “Have you a double room?”
“That we ’ave,” she said.
She jumped down from the stool and ran toward the back. She called down the three stairs.
“Pa! Pa! There’s a lady and gent wants a double!”
She clarioned it, gladly, excitedly. Clive and Prue, standing there, felt suddenly naked and as if hundreds of people were watching them.
They saw the little man come up the steps, wiping his mustache with the back of his hand in a half-finished-meal gesture. They saw, too, the professional smile of welcome on his face drop away as he looked at Prue and saw her uniform.
“What you want?” he said.
“My wife and I—I’ve come down to visit her. We’d like accommodations.”
“You ’ave luggage?”
“I’m sorry, we didn’t have time ...”
“We don’t ’ave no room.”
“But the girl said ...”
“I don’t care what she said. I said, we don’t ’ave no room. We don’t operate that sort of plyce!”
The little man began to bristle with his own self-righteousness. His voice became more sharply accented.
“D’y’understand? We hoperyte a decent plyce ’ere and ...”
“But dirty,” Clive said.
Prue began to tug Clive’s arm, but he shook her away.
“Now look ’ere,” the little man said. “Look ’ere!”
“I have a friend named Joe ...” Clive began.
“I don’t give a bugger if y’ave.”
“... And if he were here, he’d put it all neatly. He’d tell you your place is dirty. You’re filthy too. Both you and your place smell. If you’d go in and scrub some of the grime off yourself ...”
“Please,” Prue said. “Please!”
Clive looked around and she felt as if he were seeing her for the first time. Then, slowly, he smiled.
“Hello,” he said. “You’re very nice.”
He took her arm and put it over his and they left. They went along the street, walking heedlessly, not speaking. He patted her arm, endlessly. They went past the cinema, along the darkening streets. Beyond the town, she drew a deep breath.
“Phew!” she said.
“Think nothing of it,” he said.
“But I do feel grimy.”
“Don’t think of it. I’m sorry—for you.”
“No, you were right. Haystacks are—much nicer.”
“Cleaner, anyhow.”
“And not sordid at all,” she said. “Not at all.”
He held her arm closely, and they turned a corner going in step.
“You know something?” he said.
“What?”
“You’re damned nice.”
“Am I?”
“Yes, shall I tell you?”
“I’d like something to cheer me up. I don’t want to cry. He was such a grimy little man—it was contagious.”
Her voice sounded small and far away. He patted her arm.
“You’re real,” he said.
“Am I?”
“Yes. You’re much nicer than a smack on the lug.”
“What does that mean?”
“That’s what a chap in my bunch says. Chap named Montague. Old Monty. He’s a great chap. He says that when he feels good. You’re much better than a smack on the lug.”
“Then I’m all right?”
“That and more.”
“You know, sometimes you can be very nice and understanding, Mr. Briggs?”
“Thank you, Miss Cathaway. You know, that’s a funny name—but pretty, too. At first, it sounded false. But—since I’ve seen you, it really sounds all right—as if it fits.”
“Thank you. It isn’t too common, especially down here. I was born in London, but it’s a North Country name. My grandfather’s place is up there—in Yorkshire.”
“Why, I’m Yorkshire myself.”
“You are? Our family’s place is Oddale—beyond Otley. Do you know it?”
“No. I come from—a more crowded area.”
“But you don’t sound Yorkshire.”
“Oh, you lose it, knocking around. But I can talk it. Eigh lass, tha’ knaws us tongues nivver loise it.”
She laughed quickly.
“You sound like grandfather when he loses his temper.”
She looked up as they turned the corner.
“Oh, we’re back by the War Memorial,” she said.
“So we are. I don’t know how we got back here.”
He looked at the silhouette against the western sky—the bulk of carved stone.
“The hen of the British Empire setting on the sun,” he said. “I wonder what it will hatch out. Shall we take a bus?”
“If you will. It’s been such a nice outing.”
“I was glad to show you such a nice time, Miss Cathaway.”
They climbed into the bus. Now, jammed among people, they spoke no more. The vehicle went through the darkening day, and their bodies swayed together in the rhythm. After they had left the bus they went along, silently, until they reached the beech tree.
“This is far enough for you, isn’t it?”
“I’d—I wouldn’t mind if you took me a little further.”
They went slowly on the road, their feet kicking ahead of them.
“You’ve been a good sport about today,” he said.
“Don’t give it another thought.”
After a pause he said:
“Shall I see you again?”
“Do you wish to?”
“My God, the defenses we poor humans have. This fencing!”
She did not answer.
“Prudence.”
“Yes?”
“Will you come away with me?”
She stood a moment unmoving in the blackness. Then she said:
“Yes. When?”
“It would have to be—soon.”
“How much more leave have you?”
He drew his breath. “Ten more days. Ten, beginning tomorrow. It’s up the twenty-fifth.”
She stood silently so long he said:
“You don’t want to?”
“It isn’t that,” she said. “There’s so many things to figure out. I might get a weekend. Weekend after next.”
He considered.
“Now you hesitate,” she said.
He laughed.
“No—there’s things for me to figure out. I promised to meet Old Monty in London on the twentieth and go on a binge. But I could call that off.”
“I wouldn’t have you do that.”
“It’s all right.”
“No, wait a moment,” she said. “I forgot about the most important thing. The end of next week—wouldn’t be any good.”
“What do you mean, wouldn’t be any good?”
“Don’t be masculinely dense, please. I mean, I won’t be any good.”
“Oh.”
They stood in silence.
“Can’t you get this coming week off?” he asked. “We’d go away somewhere—for a holiday.”
“I don’t know.”
“Couldn’t you ask? Have you had leave?”
“Not yet.”
“Well, don’t you come due for leave—like we do in the army?”
“We’re supposed to. I haven’t been in service long enough, though. There’s other girls ahead of me. But they’re very decent. I could ask.”
“You’ll ask, then?”
“Of course.”
“Shall I meet you—by the tree—tomorrow?”
“No. I’ll drop you a note.”
“That’s too long. Couldn’t you telephone? Down the pub. The Ram’s Head. They have a telephone. I’ll be there at eight tomorrow night. I’ll be in the bar.”
“All right,” she said. “I’ll telephone.”
He touched her with his hands. It was dark at last. He drew her near and kissed her.
They did not speak. Then they parted in the blackness. He stood, listening to her footsteps going away.
