Kissing Kin (20 page)

“Yes, but he—”

“How’s that any different from your marrying me, except that it’s the other way round?” he asked reasonably. “Be honest, now, what would Virginia say if you told her you wanted to? What would you father say?”

“Father asked you to come to Scotland for a visit,” she reminded him rebelliously.

“As a guest, yes. Maybe just to make me feel good, and because it was Christmas.”

“Honestly, Raymond, I believe you’re a worse snob than Fabrice!” Jenny accused him, with an uncertain laugh, and he said, “You haven’t answered my question.”

“I don’t know what Father would say,” she confessed. “But I’m not afraid to stand right up and tell him tomorrow. He couldn’t but see the difference between you and Gerald, anyway!”

“And how about the difference between me and somebody like that Adrian Carteret?”

“I’m not in love with Adrian Carteret!” she retorted.

“Well,” he said kindly, and withdrew his hands from hers, “let’s not worry about it any more now, shall we?”

“But you’ll promise not to—”

“I can’t promise anything,” he interrupted firmly.

“Promise to go on loving me,” said Jenny, and caught his eyes, and he looked back at her, still a little remote and cool.

“I’ve got no choice there, I guess,” he said.

Knowing that he was unconvinced and dangerous still, she rose and dried her cheeks with her fingers and wheeled him back into the house. When he reached the room and stretched himself gratefully on the bed again he realized with a kind of horror that he was shaking all over, and cursed the weakness of his own limbs. It was lunch-time, and Jenny went away to fetch the trays, and he lay very still with his eyes closed, fighting dizziness, and saw behind his closed lids the little town of Indian Landing, baking under a summer sun.

A
S
THE HOSPITAL
in St. James’s Square was for officers, Calvert was sent to another one way up in Camberwell, and Camilla had to be given extra time on her days off in order that the long bus trip each way would not eat up the few hours they might spend together. His leg could be saved, but there would be a long and painful convalescence.

Camilla, sitting on a hard ward chair beside his cot with her fingers laced in his, saw with agony the change in his beloved face, the hardening round the mouth, the vertical lines between the eyes, the sharp, somehow pitiful jaw line. This was what war had done to him—war and pain and patience and steadfast courage. Calvert had grown up, since she saw him last.
Something
of him had escaped her for ever. There was something new to be learned in him.

It wasn’t until her fourth visit, when he was noticeably
improved
, that she realized that as usual he was thinking the same thing she was.

“You’re different,” he said slowly, looking up at her from the pillow. “You’ve—got all grown-up while I was away. There’s a lot to catch up on between us, isn’t there.”

Her fingers tightened on his and she nodded.

“It’s hard to know where to begin.”

“You’re breaking your heart over something,” said Calvert, with his dreadful insight. “It couldn’t be the music, still?”

“Heavens, no, I’ve given that up. For the duration, anyway.”

“Don’t you ever sing any more?”

“There’s not much time for it, Calvert.” Her lips closed on the memory of the rainy afternoon at Farthingale, and Sosthène leaning on the piano.

“That’s what I mean,” said Calvert at once. “That look on your face. Where did it come from?”

“I don’t know,” she said, her head bent, for it was hard to tell about Sosthène at best, and this seemed no
time for it, in the open ward, and Calvert ought not to be worried yet…. “You do know. So do I, I think. You’ve fallen in love with somebody while my back was turned.”

“I don’t see why you—”

“You’re softer. You’ve got tears to shed.” The low voice from the pillow paused while her tell-tale eyes filled. “Perhaps I shouldn’t have mentioned it.”

“You’ve got to know r some time, I reckon.”

“I guessed right, then. It was only a guess.”

She nodded mutely.

“Somebody you nursed?”

She shook her head.

“Somebody in France?”

“Oh, Calvert, it’s going to be so desperately hard to explain. Let’s wait till you’re a bit better.”

“I’m better enough,” he said briefly. “I’d rather know than wonder any more. Have you got into some kind of mess?”

“No. At least—maybe you’d call it that.”

“Don’t let’s have mysteries,” he said gently. “I’m not such a crock I can’t hear about anything that’s happened to you. Who is this bird that makes you cry at the drop of a hat?”

“You remember I wrote you about Sosthène.”

“Cousin Sally’s beau. Yes.” He waited, Then it dawned. “Not—
Sosthène!
”

“Please don’t jump to the wrong conclusions, I only—”

“But, Camilla, for the love of God—”

“Don’t swear at me, Calvert, it—it isn’t anything. It can’t ever
be
anything. I don’t mean it to be. But—it’s happened, that’s all I can’t go back of that. I can’t—
not
be in love with him. I don’t think I want to.”

The boy in the cot might have said any one of a dozen futile, indignant, or commiserating things, and been wide of the mark. As usual he chose the only right thing and said it in the right way, almost without expression, reserving judgment so obviously that instead of going on the defensive or becoming apologetic she could answer without self-consciousness.

“What’s he like?” said Calvert. “You’ve given me only the haziest idea in your letters—or perhaps I just didn’t pay enough attention to that part.”

“I don’t know how to tell you,” she admitted quietly. “When you see him I think you’ll understand. He’s gentle—and civilized—and disciplined—and kind. He knows how I feel. But he pretends that he doesn’t. We both pretend that like mad.”

“You haven’t talked it over with him?”

“There’s nothing to say.”

“Then how does he know?”

“I let him see. I couldn’t help it.”

Calvert lay turning it over in his mind.

“How could it happen?” he asked at last. “You knew from the first that he—”

“That he belongs to Cousin Sally,” she nodded. “Don’t think I
meant
it to happen! It was like coming down with influenza. You can feel it creeping up on you, you know exactly what it is, and no power on earth can stop it. I’m finished, Calvert. Done for. There’s nobody else.”

“What about him?”

“He belongs to Cousin Sally,” she repeated doggedly, like a
lesson she had learned. “I’ve no right. I’ve no place. And I have to let her like me, and give me things, and do kindnesses
for me. It’s not her fault, and she must never suspect. She turned out her jewel case and made me presents, with Sosthène looking on. I had to smile and take them and thank her. I have to try not to hate them, because they stand for the wrong thing. I have to be
fond
of Cousin Sally—I
am
fond of her—and because Fabrice is a disappointment to her she has turned to me. It’s damnable. She’s so happy with him—so possessive—so serene. You couldn’t ever do anything to hurt her. You just have to bite on it.” Her breath caught in her throat, and she hurried on. “You know, it’s a queer feeling, I—never thought it would be me. I always thought you’d be the one to fall in love.”

“Give me time,” said Calvert rather wearily, suppressing the hope that he would manage a little better than she had.

“It’s a nice thing to hand you before you’re on your feet again,” she said ruefully. “Anyway, that’s all there is to it. And there’s nothing anybody can do about it. I’m not asking for advice—or sympathy—or anything like that. I’m just telling you the facts. Don’t worry about it—I mean try not to. I shall get used to it, I suppose.”

“I wish I could see him,” said Calvert with a restless
movement
which brought prompt pain.

“You will, fairly soon. When you can travel you’re to recuperate at Farthingale. I might get a few days there with you. Like old times together.” She tried to smile. “Don’t take it so hard, Calvert. I’ll live through it. Jenny lived through much worse. If the war ever ends I’ll go back to my music. You can live on music, they say.”

“Do they?” He smiled up at her palely. “You’ve still got me,” he reminded her.

“Thank God.”

“Thanks to Raymond, too. What’s the latest from him?”

“His letters aren’t much, are they! He’s still at Reading, I gather, learning flight theory and map-reading, and fretting to get up into the air and fly. He’s due for week-end leave in London soon and it looks as though Jenny might be coming
up about the same time to see the dentist. Virginia says we’ll have a real party if only we can match up dates—the first party since Christmas, theatre, supper, champagne, dancing,
everything
! And I’ll bring them both here to see you,” she added in quick compunction because Calvert could not come along.  

“Is Jenny coming up on account of Raymond?”

“Oh, no, it just happens that way. But as she nursed him through the operation they got to be very good friends, and we can make it a sort of reunion and celebrate Raymond’s recovery, Virginia thought.” She reached out and laid her hand along his thin cheek in a pitiful gesture. “You will be well enough for the
next
party,” she promised.

Camilla’s careless assurance that Jenny’s visit to the dentist had no connection with Raymond’s leave beyond coincidence was evidence that his obstinate discretion still ruled their lives. His few letters from the depot and the School of Military Aeronautics at Reading were sparse and formal and utterly exasperating to Jenny. His withdrawal from their first swift intimacy had persisted throughout the remaining days of his convalescence at the Hall, and except for one desperate, hasty kiss before his departure, which caught them both off guard, she had little comfort with which to face the long days and nights when he had gone.

Another man came into his bed in the yellow room, and she returned to her head cases in Ward B, and sank again into the dreary hospital routine. The brief, bright episode seemed finished, snapped off by his stubborn pride and ingrained sense of the fitness of things. He remained convinced that it was not his place to make love to the daughter of a duke, and he seemed willing to break her heart to prove it. Bewildered and hurt by his firmness, which amounted to hardness, Jenny pointed out to herself over and over again what always happened if you fell in love, and refused to permit herself the luxury of tears.

Her pride came into it too—not only ducal, but feminine pride. She had offered him something, everything, in fact, and
he had not accepted. There had never been any condescension in her feeling for him. But her upbringing was at last getting in the way a bit. Jenny Keane had never been a suppliant, and was not by nature meek, and generations of her ancestors had been accustomed to give lavishly and graciously favours which were received with due appreciation. Gerald, her equal in rank and background, had wilfully affronted her feelings as a woman. And now Raymond’s behaviour according to his own lights amounted to almost the same thing. Jenny’s punished but naturally imperious spirit strove against this second humiliation with growing resentment, not at Raymond, she would remind herself desperately, but at circumstances which could somehow contrive to inflict on her this second ordeal of denial.

And then, when he had been several weeks at Reading, came a letter mentioning the prospect of a week-end in London soon.
I might go to see Virginia in St. James’s Square,
he wrote in his firm, slanting hand.
And if you had happened to come up to Town just at that time to go to the dentist, let’s say, or to do some shopping—we could say Hullo without anyone thinking twice about it, couldn’t we?

It wasn’t much, but it set Jenny’s heart beating again, and a trip to the dentist was with some difficulty arranged to coincide with Raymond’s week-end. Their visits to Calvert’s bedside were made separately, Jenny with Camilla, Raymond on his own, and they did not meet there.

Virginia’s party was overshadowed by the news from France, where the long-dreaded German offensive had opened with the bombardment of Paris on Easter Sunday, followed by violent fighting on the Somme. Bapaume had gone back into German hands — Peronne — Montdidier — Armentières — Wytschaete, where Oliver had got his wound the first summer of the war—Messines—the terrible toll went on. The Germans were using gas. Rheims was again being pounded. The lines around flattened Ypres were drawing back. The rubble-filled streets of French villages which had long been secure behind the Allied
lines were deserted, and refugees twice homeless were on the road again. The British Air Force was taking heavy losses, and every man still in training in England was under double strain in his anxiety to take his place in the thinning ranks of the fighting pilots.

The London theatres were full, though, for men on leave from inferno and women stretched to breaking-point with uncertainty needed surcease from their own thoughts. The wounded were pouring in at Charing Cross again, and hospitals were overflowing, and the faces of nursing Sisters and VAD’s were drawn and heavy-eyed. A bit grimly, Virginia made her arrangements for a night off for herself and Camilla, knowing that the two girls would profit by a change, however brief. They all put on their prettiest clothes and dined early at the Savoy and went to see
Going
Up,
in which Miss Evelyn Laye sang like a lark and wore a pink charmeuse frock which was much admired.

Afterwards they went where there was music and dancing and a gaiety that was a little forced, and they drank champagne as promised by their hostess, and Jenny danced with Raymond. This time his right arm was firm and close about her waist, and they were both a little quiet and thoughtful.

“Takes you back, doesn’t it,” he said, looking down.

“We’ve come a long way since then,” she answered.

“We’ve got a lot further to go. I’m trying for Upavon.”

“That’s fighter training,” she said quickly, aware that he had aimed highest of all, for the stiffest course there was.

“That’s what I want,” he said cheerfully. “One of those new single-seater Camel planes—there’s where you can really have some fun.”

“When you’re gazetted and posted to Upavon—
then
will you be satisfied?”

His arm tightened ever so little.

“We’ll see,” he said gently.

He called on Calvert at the hospital in Camberwell next day and found him full of Jenny’s visit with Camilla. Calvert
wanted to know all about that Christmas house party he had missed, and complained that Raymond never told him
anything
in letters. Had Raymond heard the story about Jenny and Gerald and Fabrice? Had he seen Gerald? Had he seen Fabrice? Look at Jenny—what kind of siren
was
this Fabrice?

Raymond gave a succinct Anglo-Saxon opinion of Fabrice and then apologized because she was Calvert’s cousin.

“Oh, well,” said Calvert philosophically. “Jenny’s better off without him, I expect. She deserves better than that.”

“She certainly does,” Raymond agreed, and lighted cigarettes for both of them.

“She was your nurse for a while, wasn’t she. What luck for you! Nothing like that around here!” said Calvert disgustedly. “Why can’t
I
go to the Hall?”

“You could. Just tell ’em you want to,” said Raymond.

“Not while Camilla’s stuck here in London, I’d never see anything of her.” He grinned frankly into the brooding face above him. “That Jenny girl is just about what I’ve been looking for,” he confided.

“She is?” said Raymond, and breathed out smoke.

“She’s pretty cute,” said Calvert reminiscently. “Of course I’ve got to be sure of my leg first,” he added as an afterthought.