Читать книгу The Magnetic Girl - Richard Marsh - Страница 5

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Was it strange that I was in a pretty state of mind? Was it to be wondered at that I hardly knew if I was standing on my head or heels?

When I got into my room I slammed the door, and turned the key. I tore my hat off and threw it on to the bed. I could have cried; but I make it a rule never to cry—or hardly ever. Besides, I was only too well aware that if I once started I never should leave off; and then I should have jumped from the frying-pan into the fire, with a vengeance. They would tear me to pieces if I did not make haste and get the rubbish they wanted.

I went to the looking-glass. There was no mistake about it, I did look hideous. There was some excuse for some of the things they said. It has always been a conviction of mine that if they would let me dress as I pleased I might look presentable. But they won’t let me. They all dress like fashion-plates, and nothing could suit them better; and they make me dress like the fashion-plates, and nothing could suit me less. I believe they are afraid of me getting out of the picture; or, rather, of my being a sort of picture all by myself, and so diverting attention from them. As it is I am a kind of raree show. So whenever they take me out with them—which is very seldom; for, in any case, five sisters are a frightful crowd—I am either a perpetual wallflower, or an ideal gooseberry, neither of which rôles I care for in the very least.

I am big—taller than Lilian, and much broader. I have great limbs—I cannot help it if they are like a man’s, though mamma is always throwing it in my teeth. I like all sorts of exercise. The only form of exercise they really like is dancing. They dance exquisitely. My dancing is like an elephant’s—I am always having to apologise for getting on my partner’s toes. I should like to spend the whole of my life in the open air. I sometimes fancy that mamma thinks there is something improper in being out-of-doors. She is always exclaiming against what she calls masculine women—by which she means girls who golf, and row, and ride bicycles, and all that sort of thing. I should like to go in for everything athletic, but they won’t let me. They keep me fastened in a tight pair of corsets, which sometimes make me feel as if I were being held in a vice. I am in a dreadful condition—soft as putty, instead of hard as nails. I cannot walk a quarter of a mile, at anything like a decent pace, without perspiring. Then they laugh at me. If they would let me go in for some real hard work, like lots of other girls do, I would soon show them. By nature I am a sort of female Hercules; it is a shame that they insist on making me a jelly-fish.

I want to have plenty of room inside my clothes. I want my hair to do itself; it would not look so bad with just a touch or two, even if it ran a trifle wild. I want my boots and shoes to humour my feet, I do not want my feet to have to humour them; I am not ashamed of their being large. I do not want to be screwed into an imitation Paris costume, which is too tight everywhere, and bursts when I lift my arms. I know I look a gawk in it, and I always shall. If they would let me be natural—my own self—I do believe I should pass muster. Girls of my build are not meant to be made up in imitation of Dresden china, or Watteau drawings.

The result of such attempts was to be seen there in the mirror. A great picture hat, with the flowers all anyhow. Flowers never will look as they ought to on my big hats—flopping about in a lop-sided fashion, on the crest of a draggly handful of sandy-coloured hair. It does not look a handful; but that is because they make me wear pads and frames, and all sorts of horrors, which will show through; and they call it sandy, though it is my private opinion that it is a sort of light chestnut. If they would only let me do it up in a simple twist, and wear it on the top of my head, I am persuaded that it would not look half bad, though I am aware that the colour is unusual. Under the floppity hat, a good-sized face, with big grey eyes, a straight nose, largish mouth—it is a decent shape if it is large, and the lips are nice ones. The freckles I do not deny; but there are not more than twelve or thirteen altogether, and they are principally on the left side of my nose. But the perspiration I was in! It made me disgusted to see that my skin was positively greasy, and there were beads upon my forehead. The truth is, I am built for work, or, at any rate, for plenty of hard out-of-doors exercise; and if I cannot get it, I am bound to be a nuisance to myself, and an object to others. Mr Morgan, if one of his shoulders is a little higher than the other, is an all-round athlete, though he was so weak as a child. It is because he has gone in for everything that he is now as strong as a horse. If I went in for everything, I believe that inside twelve months I should be a different person.

I only wished that I had a chance of trying.

When I saw what a sight I looked in that glass, and how unfitted I was to fill the fashion-plate rôle for which they insisted on casting me, I did feel that some people had all the luck, while others had none. My chances for having a good time were slipping away—twenty-three is an age. The good marriage I was expected to make was a dream of the mater’s: as she was beginning bitterly to realise: unless I married Ben Morgan, which, of course, would be absurd. Compared with my sisters, I was not in it. Not a man would ever look at me when they were by, or even near. Considering that it was supposed to be my mission in life to attract men, it was really tragic what an awful failure I was. Among the dozens who were proud to call themselves my sisters’ friends, I doubt if there were many who even knew my Christian name. I was quite aware how they talked of me.

“You know that youngest O’Brady girl? Sort of understudy for a grenadier, who looks as if she got her clothes from a dealer in decayed wardrobes, and put them on inside out.”

“You don’t mean to say that that’s the youngest?”

“She’s the youngest in years and sense; but so far as looks and that sort of thing is concerned, she might have come out of the ark. Can’t think what they call the creature.”

“What does it matter what they call a girl like that?”

That was part of a conversation I once overheard at a dance. The first speaker had been recently entrapped into having a waltz with me, which I doubt if he had enjoyed. I know I hadn’t—a possible explanation of his exceeding bitterness. But that his remarks were typical of the kind of thing which was being said of me on all sides I had every reason to suppose.

What could people be expected to say of such an object as I saw before me in that looking-glass?

“Oh,” I cried, “if only for a short time I could have my time! If I could only make those girls feel what I have felt—the insolence of masculine imbeciles, the snubs of conceited boys, the contemptuous impertinence of their uncles and their fathers, even of their grandsires! If only I could treat some of those men as all of them have treated me I’d give—well, it’s no use my talking about giving anything, because I’ve just simply nothing to give; but wouldn’t I like to have the chance.”

I had my comb in my hand at the moment. I had torn off my hat, and was trying to do something to my hair, without letting it down, and taking my bodice off, and all the rest of the fuss which a girl has to go through if she wants to titivate herself. I brought the comb down bang whack against the dressing-table to emphasise my concluding aspiration.

“If only every masculine thing had to fall madly in love with me at sight! There; now I’ve done it!”

I had—broken the comb into two clear halves. And I had only had it a week. I cannot think how it is that my things do break so. I should have to buy a new one that very afternoon; though it would only be a shilling one, because funds were low, and combs were waste of money.

As I was surveying the broken pieces with a pretty wry face—it was a tortoise-shell comb; I happened to know that mamma had paid twelve-and-six for it, to match my toilet-set; she would go on when she knew what had happened—I became conscious that something very odd indeed was taking place. On the top of the little drawers which was on one side of my dressing-table was half a sheet of notepaper. Just an ordinary half-sheet which I had torn off somebody’s letter and left there; I have a trick of keeping half-sheets. A second ago that half-sheet was blank. Now I became aware that someone—or something—was writing on it. I heard a faint scratching noise. Turning, I saw that letters were forming upon the paper—how, I cannot say. They appeared to be written in ink, though there were no signs of a pen, and certainly none of anybody holding it.

It was the strangest feeling, to stand there and watch words apparently writing themselves upon that piece of paper. I know it sounds incredible, and it is incredible; but it’s true, for all that. It was just simply the most extraordinary thing that ever happened—and lots of people know that extraordinary things do happen. When you have lived to my time of life, and have had my experience, you know that as a solemn fact. Though, I repeat once more, that that was the most wonderful experience even I ever had.

I cannot describe my sensations as I stood there watching. The two halves of the comb in my hands, my hair all anyhow, my bodice positively maddening beneath my arms, and, I was convinced, unhooked behind, rage in my bosom, perspiration on my brow. It was so frightfully mysterious; there is nothing I dislike like things I do not understand, they make you feel yourself so insignificant. Then the letters went on forming themselves before my eyes, and there I remained looking on like a stuck pig, until I could endure it no longer. I snatched up the paper, exclaiming:

“What are you doing?”

Though to whom I addressed the inquiry I have not the faintest notion. On that half-sheet of paper, staring me in the face, were the words:

“Your wish shall be gratified u——”

The sentence ended with the letter “u,” just that, and nothing more. It seemed that I had snatched it up before it was finished, so that what the conclusion would have been was still another mystery. Though, beside the first and chief mystery of how those words came there at all, other considerations were but trifles. What did they mean? “Your wish shall be gratified u——” What wish? I was continually wishing. I never have anything, and nothing ever happens that I really want, so it is only natural. To what wish was the reference made? For what particular thing had I been wishing recently?

Why—not a minute ago—with what wild words had I been easing my mind? In my temper—my usual temper. I certainly am the worst-tempered girl I ever met, though I believe that, as a rule, girls are worse tempered than men—they have more cause to be, poor things. In some things it is horrid being a girl—what was it I had said? Something about every masculine creature tumbling head over heels in love with me at sight. Had I not wished that that fate were mine?

Was that the wish? No; absurd! ridiculous! preposterous! What could put such nonsensical thoughts into my head? It just showed, when your head was empty, what stuff could get in. But—still——

My gracious! If that was the wish which was to be gratified, would it not be—wouldn’t it just be larks.