Читать книгу Royal Regiment - Gilbert Frankau - Страница 41
Оглавление§ 1
Over dinner—served by butler, footman and soldier servant in a long narrow room whose dark panels swallowed most of the light—the Hawk was all the brigadier. Alternately he hectored the three men—and even Mrs. Clarkford. Only once, however, did he turn his guns on his wife.
“Won’t drink anything but iced water”, he said. “Serves me right for marrying a teetotaller.”
“Well, you would”, smiled Camilla; and again Rockingham wondered whether she could be in love with her husband.
A gross man, the Hawk!
The women withdrew before the coffee was served. Port circulated. Talk turned on shop.
“What we really need”, puffed Clarkford, “is conscription.”
“What we really need”, retorted the Hawk, “is a government that’ll tell these dictators where they get off. You can’t expect fellows to enlist while there’s all this namby-pambying.”
But for once such talk was of no interest to Rockingham.
“Clarkford will have something to live for after he’s finished with the army”, he caught himself thinking. “Bryce-Atkinson’s got kids, too. And the Hawk’s got ... Camilla.”
It was such a shock to find himself already thinking of his C.R.A.’s wife as “Camilla” that he plunged into the conversation at once.
§ 2
The Hawk said, “It’s about time we were making a move. Don’t forget to bring that lad of yours to see me, Clarkford”.
The four men rose from the table. As they did so, Rockingham remembered that sudden envy he had conceived for William. But once they rejoined the ladies in that natural history museum of a hall, his envy, though sharper, was less particularised.
“We’re seven”, he thought suddenly. “And I’m the odd man out.”
Thought went as he joined in conversation again.
Mrs. Clarkford, knitting fanatically, wanted to know, “What you men have been talking about all this time?” Diana Bryce-Atkinson queried a caption in the photograph album. Camilla—standing boylike, her hands behind her, back to the fire—said:
“We’ve been listening to the radio. But it’s poor. Do you feel up to a game of snooker, Guy?”
Her eyes met Rockingham’s once more.
“He doesn’t play bridge”, she went on. “Only poker.”
“I don’t play bridge either”, puffed Clarkford. “Waste of time in my opinion.”
Hawk Wethered chimed in, “Camilla rather fancies herself with a cue. I’ve just given her a new table. Come along and take a dekko at it”.
They followed him obediently, down a warmed corridor, into a beamed billiard room, where Mrs. Clarkford resumed her knitting. Diana, who had brought the album with her, said, “I’ve a perfect genius for cutting cloths. So you’d better leave me out”. The Hawk said, “I don’t fancy standing up more than I can help. But I don’t mind marking”.
He limped to a seat by the board. The two junior officers stripped the cover from the table. Clarkford, peeling off his dinner jacket and picking a cue from the rack, suggested, “As we’re only four, why don’t we play proper billiards?”
“I’d much rather”, smiled Camilla.
The Hawk shot at her, “I’ll lay you ten bob you don’t make a twenty-five break, and five bob you lose if you don’t play with Clarkford. He’s rather hot stuff at this game”.
“Done with you, Guy.”
She took the red and a white ball from the table, put both hands behind her again.
“Right or left, Major Rockingham? If it’s the red, we’re partners.”
He chose her left hand. The Hawk laughed, “You’re the lucky man, Rusty”.
She put the balls on the table. Lovely hands, she had. Lovely eyes, too. And her throat was so like Gail’s.
Once more, thought went from Rockingham.
Bryce-Atkinson broke the balls. Camilla gave a careful miss; but Clarkford scored the cannon, and made eleven before he failed at a difficult loser.
“Twenty-eight-fifty-two”, laughed Hawk Wethered some minutes later. “I’ll take seven and sixpence net cash to let you off, Camilla.”
It was her shot. She chalked a careful cue before she bent over the cushion.
“No”, she said. “This is where I make the twenty-five break.”
“Three to one in pounds against that.”
“You’re on, Guy.”
She struck as she spoke. The cue ball dropped into the left-hand middle pocket; red joined white at the top of the table. Two cautious cannons followed. “Seven”, counted the Hawk.
She potted the red twice.
“Thirteen”, counted the Hawk. “Unlucky number.”
Rockingham saw her face harden. She made no retort, only scrutinised the position with cool appraising eyes. He decided, “It’d take more than a little remark like that to shake her nerve”. Then she turned to him, saying, “The loser’s the easiest. But it won’t leave much”; and leaned to the table once more.
The screw cannon, as beautifully executed as the dropshot he had watched on the tennis court, brought the balls together again. He was conscious of mounting excitement as she scored two more cannons, leaving the red almost exactly on the spot.
“Nineteen”, counted the Hawk; and, as the red dropped, “Twenty-two.”
“Thirty shillings cash to let you off”, chaffed Camilla.
“I should take it if I were you, Wethered”, puffed Clarkford.
But the Hawk shook his head; and Rockingham saw that the lovely face hardened again as he restored the red to the spot.
“The loser this time”, he suggested.
“Yes. I think so.”
She played the shot very slowly. For the fraction of a second it seemed to her partner that the cue ball meant to stay on the lip of the pocket. Then it sank, and he was aware of the most extraordinary exhilaration.
“Splendid”, he heard himself say; and, just for the split of another second, his eyes met those of his host.
§ 3
That momentary look puzzled Rockingham. There was no anger in his host’s dark eyes—only a queer sardonic humour.
“Like her, don’t you?” he seemed to be saying. And of course one did!
“Good for you, young woman.” The Hawk spoke aloud now. “You’ll be quite a player before you’ve done.”
“Thanks for the compliment, sir”, said Camilla, stressing the final word.
She added another ten to her break. Clarkford missed an easy red winner. It was Rockingham’s turn again. Camilla examined the position.
“If you play a follow through”, she said, “you ought to be able to put both of them in.”
This—rather pleased with himself for the effort—he did; and a few minutes later Hawk Wethered was counting, “Ninety-six all. Your shot, Bryce-Atkinson. If you can’t make four out of that, you ought to be cashiered”.
It was Rusty Rockingham, however—the other three all missing their shots—who polished off the game, and at once Camilla was holding out her hand to him, was saying, “Thank you, partner”.
On which he again experienced that extraordinary exhilaration; although his, “Glad I didn’t let you down, Lady Wethered”, sounded rather stiff, because, despite the exhilaration, he had experienced his old selfconsciousness with women.
It seemed almost a relief, indeed, when her fingers released their light hold.
They played a revenge after that; but lost badly; and, when the Hawk suggested a conqueror, Mrs. Clarkford intervened with a quiet, “It’s past eleven, Henry”; and the infantry brigadier shrugged himself back into his dinner jacket.
“She always did wear the trousers”, chuckled the Hawk, as the five of them listened to the cold engine backfiring down the drive. “Wouldn’t even let him stay for a stirrup cup. Did anyone remember to put out the lights in the billiard room?”
“I did”, said Camilla. “And now I’m going to bed. Coming, Diana?”
“Rather. I can hardly keep my eyes open. What about you, Herbert?”
“Just a snifter, I think.”
“Good night, then.”
The Bryce-Atkinsons, who were occupying separate rooms, kissed perfunctorily. Hawk Wethered grunted, “I’ll be up in about half an hour, my dear”. Camilla smiled, “Don’t hurry”. The two women went out of the hall. The two younger men approached the drink table; the elder commanded, “Make mine a B. and S.”.
“Blast this knee”, he said, subsiding into a big chair. “I believe I’ll have to see a doctor about it after all. Pass me a weed, will you, Rusty? There are some in that box over there.”
His brigade major gave him a light for his cigar. He demanded a stool; propped his leg on it; took a long drink.
“Phoebe Clarkford”, he went on, “never was a beauty. Used to dance with her when I was a subaltern. Tried to kiss her once, I remember. Must have had a couple, I suppose. Got a nice clip on the ear for it. Not like these modern girls.
“Hussies, most of these modern girls”, he continued; and, after ruminating a moment:
“Met that filly of Lampson’s the other day. She’s typical. Nineteen—and up to all the tricks. Probably had her first affair before she left school. Gives you that impression anyway.”
“I think you’re a bit hard on them, sir.” Bryce-Atkinson spoke.
The Hawk’s riposte was Rabelaisian; but for once his staff officer stood his ground.
“It’s the fashion for girls to make themselves out sophisticated”, he said. “Sweet seventeen and never been kissed isn’t popular any more. I don’t think they’ve really changed—except superficially. Of course they get more liberty than they used to.”
“Liberty. Licence, I call it.”
The Hawk went off at full cry. Listening to him, and to the other’s occasional interruptions, Rockingham’s thoughts strayed back to Camilla. What a glorious figure she had. The grace of her, as she leaned over the table ...
“Licence”, repeated the Hawk. “These modern women can’t carry their corn. If I had my way, they’d be put back where they belong—in the harem. The damn fools who altered our divorce laws have a good deal to answer for. Take your own case, Bryce-Atkinson. Here are you, married to a perfectly nice young woman, who happens to have a bit of money. Right. Now, let’s say you go up to town for some regimental dinner or other. Say you have a couple over the odds and go on to one of these night clubs. Say you find a wench who happens to take your fancy. Say you happen to take her fancy ... And your missus finds out about it. Well, she’s only got to fire in a petition—and bang goes your marriage, kids and all, just because you’ve had a bit of fun.
“For one night only”, he concluded. “Mark that. Is it commonsense? Of course it isn’t. A man isn’t built the same way as a woman. And he never will be, whatever the law has to say about it. You agree with me, I hope, Rusty?”
“Well, sir——” began Rockingham.
But, before he could continue, the clock struck midnight; and Colonel Sir Guy Wethered, Bart., cursing his knee again, grasped for his stick.
“Curfew”, he laughed. “I shall be for it if I stay down here yapping any longer. These modern ladies don’t like to be kept waiting.”
And again—or so it seemed to Rockingham—he saw one flash of that queer sardonic humour in his host’s dark eyes.
