I Shall Not Want (37 page)

“I am going up West,” he said. “Will you come along to my Club for a drink?”

ii

As John Marco and Mr. Bulmer were driving down Ludgate Hill towards Pall Mall, Mr. Petter was just leaving his small shop in Harrow Street on his painful visit to Mr. Tuke.

There was something fugitive and surreptitious about him. He had not told Mary where he was going and he was conscious of the fact that he had deceived her. A moment before as he had kissed her, he had looked into her eyes and resolved that never, never so long as he was alive, should any hint of this terrible letter come to her. Between them, he and Mr. Tuke would protect her from the vicious, nasty world which lay without. He closed the front door behind him silently and almost ran round to the Presbytery.

Mr. Tuke saw him immediately. He stopped writing out in his expert, polished hand the text of the printed announcement for the forthcoming Dorcas and Zenana Mission Tea, and came straight down to his study. In that bleak room of deal bookshelves and upright chairs and views of the Holy Land, he heard Mr. Petter's whole story.

“I'm in trouble,” Mr. Petter began. “Dreadful trouble.”

“Tell me,” said Mr. Tuke rubbing his hands together. “Tell me everything.”

As he said it, the picture of Hesther rose suddenly before his eyes; it was in this same room that she had sat, on that calamitous evening when she had come to him. The room was not really like a study at all, he had often told himself: it was much more like a doctor's surgery. And apparently Mr. Petter was proposing to bare himself.

“We're quite alone,” he went on encouragingly. “You can begin.”

But now that Mr. Petter was actually there he found suddenly that he could tell him nothing. It was one thing to rehearse the words over and over in his head as he lay awake beside Mary in the night—but something very different to hear himself saying them aloud to another man. Instead, he felt in his pocket and dragged out the letter that was haunting him.

“Read this,” he said simply.

Mr. Tuke took the letter and inspected it. He handled
it gingerly at first as though fearing that it might be infectious; already a faint sickening fear was in his mind as to what this letter might contain. But he subdued this vague, foolish fancy and opened the thing, revealing as he did so that the creases down the back had all been stuck over and mended with stamp paper, the letter had been folded and unfolded so often. His eyes were burning and he began to read.

When he had finished it, Mr. Tuke curled his nostrils.

“Faugh!” he said.

“It came a week ago to-day,” Mr. Petter timidly said. “I've shown it to no one.”

“To no one at all?” Mr. Tuke exclaimed fastening on the point.

“To no one at all.”

“Then we will burn it,” said Mr. Tuke decisively. “We will destroy it utterly.”

A man of quick action he went down on his knees as he spoke and held the corner of the letter to the open grate. But Mr. Petter snatched it back from him.

“No,” he said. “I may need it. I may want to go to the police with it.”

Mr. Tuke eyed him fiercely. This was the last thing in the world that he wanted; at all costs he must prevent another scandal, must prevent one of the brethren from dragging a sister-in-God through the courts. And the whole thing was already dreadfully plain to him. The disguised, printed capitals, the makeshift note-paper, the absence of any signature or any address—these were nothing. But there was something else. He recognised in this letter, as plainly as if the writer had put her name to it, the last pathetic remedy of a desperate and jealous woman.

“It can't do any good,” he said, keeping it. “Anything as horrible as that can only go on doing harm.”

But Mr. Petter was obstinate.

“I want to keep it,” he replied. “I may be able to find out who wrote it.”

Mr. Tuke paused.

“Suppose I tell you,” he said softly, “that I think I know.”

There was silence for a moment as though Mr. Petter could not believe what Mr. Tuke had just told him.

“You know?” he repeated. “You think you know?”

“I believe so,” Mr. Tuke replied. “That is why I want you to burn it.”

“But tell me who it is,” said Mr. Petter eagerly. “Tell me and I'll go and accuse him of it.”

Mr. Tuke shook his head.

“It is someone whom you do not know,” he answered. “Someone who is very unhappy. Very unhappy and very much misguided. It is someone who needs our prayers, not our accusations.”

“But I'm not going to stand for it.” Mr. Petter declared. He was so angry that he was trembling; Mr. Tuke was quite startled to see him displaying so much emotion. “I insist on knowing.”

“And I refuse to tell you,” Mr. Tuke replied. “The person who wrote it is a woman. She has gone through such suffering that her mind is deranged.”

“You mean . . . you mean she's mad?” Mr. Petter asked.

Mr. Tuke bowed his head.

“She's not responsible,” he replied.

At that answer Mr. Petter temporarily broke down. There were tears in his eyes and his voice, always high, suddenly became childish.

“Oh, I'm so glad,” he said. “I can't tell you. There's nothing more to worry about.”

“Not from that quarter,” Mr. Tuke answered. “I'll make it my business to attend to that.”

Mr. Petter got to his feet and steadied himself.

“I'm so thankful I came to see you,” he said. “I nearly went round to John Marco himself to see if he knew who it was.”

“You were guided here,” Mr. Tuke corrected him.

“I must have been,” Mr. Petter agreed meekly. “And now no one need ever know. Oh, it's such a weight off my mind.”

But Mr. Tuke was paying no attention to him. To avoid scandal was only half the battle: he would be failing in his duties as a Minister if he allowed Mr. Petter to go home like that. The other half of the battle was the difficult part—it was Satan himself, and not a group of idle gossips, that he would be fighting this time.

“There is one thing perhaps that I ought to say,” he began with deliberate deceptive mildness.

“Yes?” asked Mr. Petter: he felt strong enough to face anything now.

“In view of this letter I wonder if it would be fair to Mary to allow Mr. Marco's visits to the house any longer,” he said slowly. “There's obviously been some talk about it to set this woman thinking.”

“But . . . but John Marco's my great friend,” Mr. Petter began.

“I know,” Mr. Tuke replied. “And you may have to deny yourself. It is only Mary's good name that I am thinking of.”

“But won't she wonder why?” Mr. Petter asked.

“It's better that she should wonder than that she should know,” Mr. Tuke replied cryptically.

“Know what?” Mr. Petter enquired: he had a resentful, injured tone as though he felt that Mr. Tuke was being unreasonable.

“That people are talking.”

“Only one person—the mad woman,” Mr. Petter corrected him.

But Mr. Tuke shook his head.

“Others as well,” he said. “I have noticed it myself.” Mr. Petter clasped his hands helplessly together.

“Mr. Marco will think it so strange if we suddenly stop seeing him,” he said miserably.

“It would be far stranger after this if you did see him,” Mr. Tuke retorted.

“But what can be the harm in it?” Mr. Petter asked. “It isn't as if the letter was true.”

“I am not saying whether the letter is true or is not true,” said Mr. Tuke. “I am saying that I should not have John Marco to the house again.”

“You mean never?”

Mr. Tuke nodded.

“Never,” he said firmly.

“But why?”

Mr. Tuke drew himself to his full height and took hold of the lapels of his coat like a judge.

“I reserve my reasons,” he replied.

Mr. Petter was suddenly sitting forward in his chair, his lips trembling and his heart jumping about inside him.

“You . . . you don't mean that you think there is anything in the letter? You don't mean ...”

“That is a question which I decline to be drawn into,” Mr. Tuke answered. “I have already told you that I should keep Mary and John Marco separate. Remember that her honour is in your keeping.”

“Then you do ...
do
believe it!” Mr. Petter said jerkily, “you do. ...”

But Mr. Tuke was already holding out his hand.

“Good-night, brother,” he said. “You can only pray—and watch.”

iii

Mr. Petter descended the stone steps of the Presbytery with limbs that were numb and almost useless. He gripped the iron balustrade as he moved and came down slowly, like a child, putting both feet onto one step before he trusted himself to the next. In those last few minutes in Mr. Tuke's study the whole snug world of Mary and Harrow Street and pharmaceutics had gone toppling over into destruction and had left him alone and frightened, groping blindly in the darkness.

For a second or two he stood, undecided, on the pavement and then mechanically began to walk forward. He had no purpose, no direction. The one thing that he wanted was to walk. If only Mr. Tuke had been more definite; if only he had said something. . . . But could he have borne to hear it? Could he have endured it while Mr. Tuke, his own friend and minister, had told him that his wife had been unfaithful? But it was impossible! He didn't believe it. He wouldn't let himself believe it. It couldn't be
his
wife whom he had kissed so fondly half-an-hour before, whom Mr. Tuke had doubted so appallingly. He reviled himself for his momentary weakness in even beginning to believe it, and resolutely held his head up higher. The evening air, it seemed, was reviving him.

By the time he had reached the Edgware Road he was a man again, and a bold plan had come into his head. John Marco, despite everything that Mr. Tuke had said and hinted, was still his friend. He was his best friend; the first person whom Mr. Petter would naturally turn to in time of trouble. And because he was in trouble now, he would go to him and put him to the test. He would show him the letter and tell him the things that people were saying: he would lay this ghost by a single visit. And when he was there he would be able to watch John Marco while he was reading the letter; he could study his face and see if he blenched under it—but no: that wasn't necessary; that was just another scene in the same silly nightmare from which he had now awakened.

When he rang the bell of John Marco's flat he was surprised to find how late it was: it was nearly eleven and Mary would be worrying. But the fact that John Marco was still up, was something: he had seen the light burning in his room as he crossed the street. And already he could hear the sound of footsteps coming down the last flight of stairs. They were slow footsteps, heavy and dragging, as if the man on the stairs were sleepy and tired-out;
Mr. Petter felt like apologising for getting him down at all at this time. Then the door opened and John Marco stood there.

He was wearing a dressing-gown and his shirt and trousers were on beneath it. Even his bow-tie was still knotted at his throat, though the collar itself had sprung the stud and was gaping. But it was his hair that Mr. Petter first noticed: it was all ruffled and untidy. Clearly, he must have dropped asleep in front of his fire and then come straight down to open the door.

“What do you want?” John Marco began roughly, and then, seeing who it was standing there, he came forward and put his arm round Mr. Petter's shoulders.

“Come on in,” he said. “Come in and keep me company.”

His voice, Mr. Petter noticed, sounded muffled and indistinct, and he uttered words as though he were stumbling over them. Mr. Petter felt all the more sorry for having disturbed him, and it was not until he was actually at the foot of the stairs that he realised that John Marco smelt of liquor.

Mr. Petter's first thought was to turn and run: he had the true Amosite's horror of alcohol. But John Marco was beside him and his arm was now through his.

“Come upstairs and talk to me,” he was saying. “Proudest day of my life.”

And Mr. Petter was helpless. He mounted the stairs hesitatingly, followed by this man who was not quite himself.

Once they had actually reached the flat, it was worse than Mr. Petter ever could have imagined. There was liquor openly displayed there. A decanter nearly full stood on the table beside John Marco's chair; and an empty bottle—the one from which John Marco had just filled the decanter—was standing over on the sideboard. To Mr. Petter's scandalised eyes it seemed, however, that
John Marco, having gulped down one bottleful of the fiery spirit was now preparing to do the same with the other.

John Marco brought a second glass and poured out a stiff measure. Then he paused.

“I forget,” he said. “You don't drink, do you?”

Mr. Petter drew in his breath.

“No, I don't,” he answered. “And I wish you didn't either.”

But John Marco only laughed at him. He was in a mood of dangerously good humour.

“Just as you please,” he said pleasantly. “Just as you please.”

Mr. Petter cleared his throat.

“I wanted to see you,” he said. “It's something important.”

“Well,” John Marco asked him, “and what's it all about?”

“It's about Mary,” Mr. Petter replied.

At the mention of her name, John Marco put down the glass that was in his hand and came over towards Mr. Petter. He was frowning.

“Why do you want to see me about
her?”
he asked.

John Marco was not very steady on his feet when he moved, and Mr. Petter became alarmed for himself once more. This wasn't the John Marco he knew; this man who could scarcely stand upright couldn't help him with any good advice.

“It's . . . it's nothing,” he said. “I'd rather talk to you some other time.”