Twilight Sleep (23 page)

"Just five minutes to the second! Wonderful!" She was shaking
hands with each member of the amateur brigade in turn. "I can't
tell you how I congratulate you—every one of you! Such an
achievement … you really manoeuvre like professionals. No one
would have believed it was the first time! Dexter, will you tell
them a hot supper has been prepared downstairs!" To the guests she
was explaining in a triumphant undertone: "I wanted to give them
the chance to show off their new toy … Yes, I believe it's
absolutely the most perfected thing in fire–engines. Dexter and I
thought it was time the village was properly equipped. It's really
more on account of the farmers—such a sense of safety for the
neighbourhood… Oh, Mr. Motts, I think you're simply wonderful,
all of you. Mr. Manford and my daughter are going to show you the
way to supper… Yes, yes, you MUST! Just a sandwich and
something hot."

She dominated them all, grave and glittering as a goddess of
Velocity. "She enjoys it as much as other women do love–making,"
Manford muttered to himself.

Manford didn't know what first gave him the sense that Lita had
slipped out among the departing guests; slipped out, and not come
back. When the idea occurred to him it was already lodged in his
mind, hard and definite as a verified fact. She had vanished from
among them into the darkness.

But only a moment ago; there was still time to dash round to the
shed in the service court, where motors were sometimes left for the
night, and where he had dropped his Buick just in time to rush in
and dress for dinner. He would have no trouble in overtaking her.

The Buick was gone.

Hatless and coatless in the soft night air, he rushed down the
drive on its track. No moon tonight, but a deceptive velvet
mildness, such as sometimes comes in spring before the wind hauls
round to a frosty quarter. He hurried on, out of the open gate,
along the road toward the village; and there, at the turn of the
New York turnpike—just the road he had expected her to take—stood
his Buick, a figure stooping over it in the lamp–glare. A furious
stab of jealousy shot through him—"There's a man with her; who?"
But the man was only his own overcoat, which he had left on the
seat of the car when he dashed home for dinner, and which was now
drawn over Lita's shoulders. It was she who stood in the night,
bent over the mysteries of the car's insides.

She looked up and called out: "Oh, look here—give me a hand, will
you? The thing's stuck." Manford moved around within lamp–range,
and she stared a moment, her little face springing out at him
uncannily from the darkness. Then she broke into a laugh. "You?"

"Were you asking a total stranger to repair your motor? Rather
risky, on a country road in the middle of the night."

She shrugged and smiled. "Not as risky as doing it myself. The
chances are that even a total stranger would know more about the
inside of this car than I do."

"Lita, you're mad! Damn the car. What are you doing here anyhow?"

She paused, one hand on the bonnet, while with the other she pushed
back a tossed lock from her round forehead. "Running away," she
said simply.

Manford took a quick breath. The thing was, he admonished himself,
to take this lightly, as nearly as possible in her own key—above
all to avoid protesting and exclaiming. But his heart was beating
like a trip–hammer. She was more of a fool than he had thought.

"Running away from that dinner? I don't blame you. But it's over.
Still, if you want to wash out the memory of it, get into the motor
and we'll go for a good spin—like that one when we came back from
Greenwich."

Her lips parted in a faint smile. "Oh, but that ended up at
Cedarledge."

"Well—?"

"Bless you; I'm not going back."

"Where ARE you going?"

"To New York first—after that I don't know… Perhaps my
aunt's… Perhaps Hollywood…"

The rage in him exploded. "Perhaps Dawnside—eh? Own up!"

She laughed and shrugged again. "Own up? Why not? Anywhere where
I can dance and laugh and be hopelessly low–lived and irresponsible."

"And get that blackguard crew about you again, all those—. Lita!
Listen to me. Listen. You've got to."

"Got to?" She rounded on him in a quick flare of anger. "I wonder
who you think you're talking to? I'm not Gladys Toy."

The unexpectedness of the challenge struck him dumb. For challenge
it was, unmistakably. He felt a rush of mingled strength and fear—
fear at this inconceivable thing, and the strength her self–
betrayal gave him. He returned with equal violence: "No—you're
not. You're something so utterly different…"

"Oh," she burst in, "don't tell me I'm too sacred, and all that.
I'm fed up with the sanctities—that's the trouble with me. Just
own up you like 'em artificially fattened. Why, that woman's
ankles are half a yard round. Can't you SEE it? Or is that really
the way you admire 'em? I thought you wanted to be with me… I
thought that was why you were here… Do you suppose I'd have
come all this way just to be taught to love fresh air and family
life? The hypocrisy—!"

Her little face was flashing on him furiously, red lips parted on a
glitter of bright teeth. "She must have a sausage–machine, to cram
her into that tube she had on tonight. No human maid could do
it… 'Utterly different'? I should hope so! I'd like to see
HER get a job with Klawhammer—unless he means to do a 'Barnum,'
and wants a Fat Woman … I … "

"LITA!"

"You're STUPID … you're stupider than anything on God's earth!"

"Lita—" He put his hand over hers. Let the whole world crash,
after this…

Pauline sat in her upstairs sitting–room, full of that sense of
repose which comes of duties performed and rewards laid up. How
could it be otherwise, at the close of a day so rich in moral
satisfactions? She scanned it again, from the vantage of her
midnight vigil in the sleeping house, and saw that all was well in
the little world she had created.

Yes; all was well, from the fire–drill which had given a rather
languishing dinner its requisite wind–up of excitement to the
arrangements for the Cardinal's reception, Amalasuntha's skilful
turning of that Birth Control obstacle, and the fact that Jim
was philosophically remaining in the south in spite of his
father's unexpected return. The only shadow on the horizon was
Michelangelo's—Dexter would certainly be angry about that. But
she was not going to let Michelangelo darken her holiday, when
everything else in life was so smooth and sunshiny.

She remembered her resolve to write to Jim, and took up her pen
with a smile.

"I can guess what heavenly weather you must be having from the
delicious taste of spring we're having here. The baby is out in
the sunshine all day: he's gained nearly a pound, and is getting
almost as brown as if it were summer. Lita looks ever so much
better too, though she'd never forgive my suggesting that she had
put on even an ounce. But I don't believe she has, for she and
Nona and Dexter are riding or golfing or racing over the country
from morning to night like a pack of children. You can't think how
jolly and hungry and sleepy they all are when they get home for
tea. It was a wonderful invention of Dexter's to bring Lita and
the baby here while you were having your holiday, and you'll agree
that it has worked miracles when you see them.

"Amalasuntha tells me your father is back. I expected to hear that
he had got restless away from his own quarters; but she says he's
looking very well. Nona will go in and see him next week, and
report. Meanwhile I'm so glad you're staying on and making the
most of your holiday. Do get all the rest and sunshine you can,
and trust your treasures a little longer to your loving old

There—that would certainly reassure him. It had reassured her
merely to write it: given her the feeling, to which she always
secretly inclined, that a thing was so if one said it was, and
doubly so if one wrote it down.

She sealed the letter, pushed back her chair, and glanced at the
little clock on her writing–table. A quarter to two! She had a
right to feel sleepy, and even to curtail her relaxing exercises.
The country stillness was so deep and soothing that she hardly
needed them…

She opened the window, and stood drinking in the hush. The spring
night was full of an underlying rustle and murmur that was a part
of the silence. But suddenly a sharp sound broke on her—the sound
of a motor coming up the drive. In the stillness she caught it a
long way off, probably just after the car turned in at the gate.
The sound was so unnatural, breaking in on the deep nocturnal
dumbness of dim trees and starlit sky, that she drew back startled.
She was not a nervous woman, but she thought irritably of a
servants' escapade—something that the chauffeur would have to be
spoken to about the next day. Queer, though—the motor did not
turn off toward the garage. Standing in the window she followed
its continued approach; then heard it slow down and stop—somewhere
near the service court, she conjectured.

Could it be that Lita and Nona had been off on one of their crazy
trips since the guests had left? She must really protest at such
imprudence… She felt angry, nervous, uncertain. It was
uncanny, hearing that invisible motor come so near the house and
stop… She hesitated a moment, and then crossed to her own
room, opened the door of the little anteroom beyond, and stood
listening at her husband's bedroom door. It was ajar, all dark
within. She hesitated to speak, half fearing to wake him; but at
length she said in a low voice: "Dexter—."

No answer. She pronounced his name again, a little louder, and
then cautiously crossed the threshold and switched on the light.
The room was empty, the bed undisturbed. It was evident that
Manford had not been up to his room since their guests had left.
It was he, then, who had come back in the motor… She
extinguished the light and turned back into her own room. On her
dressing–table stood the little telephone which communicated with
the servants' quarters, with Maisie Bruss's office, and with Nona's
room. She stood wavering before the instrument. Why shouldn't she
call up Nona, and ask—? Ask what? If the girls had been off on a
lark they would be sure to tell her in the morning. And if it was
Dexter alone, then—

She turned from the telephone, and slowly began to undress.
Presently she heard steps in the hall, then in the anteroom; then
her husband moving softly about in his own room, and the
unmistakable sounds of his undressing… She drew a long breath,
as if trying to free her lungs of some vague oppression… It
was Dexter—well, yes, only Dexter … and he hadn't cared to
leave the motor at the garage at that hour… Naturally…
How glad she was that she hadn't rung up Nona! Suppose her doing
so had startled Lita or the baby…

After all, perhaps she'd better do her relaxing exercises. She
felt suddenly staring wide awake. But she was glad she'd written
that reassuring letter to Jim—she was glad, because it was
TRUE…

When Nona told her mother that she wanted to go to town the next
day to see Mrs. Bruss and Maisie, Mrs. Manford said: "It's only
what I expected of you, darling," and added after a moment: "Do
you think I ought—?"

"No, of course not. It would simply worry Maisie."

Nona knew it was the answer that her mother awaited. She knew that
nothing frightened and disorganized Pauline as much as direct
contact with physical or moral suffering—especially physical. Her
whole life (if one chose to look at it from a certain angle) had
been a long uninterrupted struggle against the encroachment of
every form of pain. The first step, always, was to conjure it,
bribe it away, by every possible expenditure—except of one's self.
Cheques, surgeons, nurses, private rooms in hospitals, X–rays,
radium, whatever was most costly and up–to–date in the dreadful art
of healing—that was her first and strongest line of protection;
behind it came such lesser works as rest–cures, change of air, a
seaside holiday, a whole new set of teeth, pink silk bed–spreads,
lace cushions, stacks of picture papers, and hot–house grapes and
long–stemmed roses from Cedarledge. Behind these again were the
final, the verbal defenses, made of such phrases as: "If I thought
I could do the least good"—"If I didn't feel it might simply upset
her"—"SOME doctors still consider it contagious"—with the
inevitable summing–up: "The fewer people she sees the better…"

Nona knew that this attitude was not caused by lack of physical
courage. Had Pauline been a pioneer's wife, and seen her family
stricken down by disease in the wilderness, she would have nursed
them fearlessly; but all her life she had been used to buying off
suffering with money, or denying its existence with words, and her
moral muscles had become so atrophied that only some great shock
would restore their natural strength…

"Great shock! People like mother never have great shocks," Nona
mused, looking at the dauntless profile, the crisply waving hair,
reflected in the toilet–mirror. "Unless I were to give her
one … " she added with an inward smile.

Mrs. Manford restored her powder–puff to its crystal box. "Do you
know, darling, I believe I'll go to town with you tomorrow. It was
very brave of Maisie to make the effort of coming here the other
day, but of course, I didn't like to burden her with too many
details at such a time (when's the operation—tomorrow?), and there
are things I could perfectly well attend to myself, without
bothering her; without her even knowing. Yes; I'll motor up with
you early."

"She'll always delegate her anxieties," Nona mused, not
unenviously, as Cécile slipped Mrs. Manford's spangled teagown over
her firm white shoulders. Pauline turned a tender smile on her
daughter. "It's so like you, Nona, to want to be with Maisie for
the operation—so FINE, dear."

Voice and smile were full of praise; yet behind the praise (Nona
also knew) lurked the unformulated apprehension: "All this running
after sick people and unhappy people—is it going to turn into a
vocation?" Nothing could have been more distasteful to Mrs.
Manford than the idea that her only daughter should be not only
good, but MERELY good: like poor Aggie Heuston, say… Nona
could hear her mother murmuring: "I can't imagine where on earth
she got it from," as if alluding to some physical defect
unaccountable in the offspring of two superbly sound progenitors.

They started early, for forty–eight hours of accumulated leisure
had reinforced Pauline's natural activity. Amalasuntha,
mysteriously smiling and head–shaking over the incommunicable
figures of Klawhammer's offer, had bustled back to town early on
Monday, leaving the family to themselves—and a certain feeling of
flatness had ensued. Dexter, his wife thought, seemed secretly
irritated, but determined to conceal his irritation from her. It
was about Michelangelo, no doubt. Lita was silent and sleepy. No
one seemed to have anything particular to do. Even in town Mondays
were always insipid. But in the afternoon Manford "took Lita off
their hands," as his wife put it, by carrying her away for the long–
deferred spin in the Buick; and Pauline plunged back restfully into
visiting–lists and other domestic preoccupations. She certainly
had nothing to worry about, and much to rejoice in, yet she felt
languid and vaguely apprehensive. She began to wonder if Alvah
Loft's treatment were of the lasting sort, or if it lost its
efficacy, like an uncorked drug. Perhaps the Scientific Initiate
she had been told about would have a new panacea for the mind as
well as for the epiderm. She would telephone and make an
appointment; it always stimulated her to look forward to seeing a
new healer. As Mrs. Swoffer said, one ought never to neglect a
spiritual opportunity; and one never knew on whom the Spirit might
have alighted. Mrs. Swoffer's conversation was always soothing and
yet invigorating, and Pauline determined to see her too. And there
was Arthur—poor Exhibit A!—on Jim's account it would be kind to
look him up if there were time; unless Nona could manage that too,
in the intervals of solacing Maisie. It was so depressing—and so
useless—to sit in a hospital parlour, looking at old numbers of
picture papers, while those awful white–sleeved rites went on in
the secret sanctuary of tiles and nickel–plating. It would do Nona
good to have an excuse for slipping away.

Pauline's list of things–to–be–done had risen like a spring tide as
soon as she decided to go to town for the day. There was hair–
waving, manicuring, dressmaking—her dress for the Cardinal's
reception. How was she ever to get through half the engagements on
her list? And of course she must call at the hospital with a big
basket of grapes and flowers…

On the steps of the hospital Nona paused and looked about her. The
operation was over—everything had "gone beautifully," as
beautifully as it almost always does on these occasions. Maisie
had been immensely grateful for her coming, and as surprised as if
an angel from the seventh heaven had alighted to help her through.
The two girls had sat together, making jerky attempts at talk, till
the nurse came and said: "All right—she's back in bed again"; and
then Maisie, after a burst of relieving tears, had tiptoed off to
sit in a corner of her mother's darkened room and await the first
sign of returning consciousness. There was nothing more for Nona
to do, and she went out into the April freshness with the sense of
relief that the healthy feel when they escape back to life after a
glimpse of death.

On the hospital steps she ran into Arthur Wyant.

"Exhibit, dear! What are you doing here?"

"Coming to inquire for poor Mrs. Bruss. I heard from
Amalasuntha…"

"That's kind of you. Maisie'll be so pleased."

She gave him the surgeon's report, saw that his card was entrusted
to the right hands, and turned back into the street with him. He
looked better than when he had left for the south; his leg was less
stiff, and he carried his tall carefully dressed figure with a
rigid jauntiness. But his face seemed sharper yet higher in
colour. Fever or cocktails? She wondered. It was lucky that
their meeting would save her going to the other end of the town to
see him.

"Just like you, Exhibit, to remember poor Maisie…"

He raised ironic eyebrows. "Is inquiring about ill people
obsolete? I see you still keep up the tradition."

"Oh, I've been seeing it through with Maisie. Some one had to."

"Exactly. And your mother held aloof, but financed the whole
business?"

"Splendidly. She always does."

He frowned, and stood hesitating, and tapping his long boot–tip
with his stick. "I rather want to have a talk with your mother."

"With mother?" Nona was on the point of saying: "She's in town
today—" then, remembering Pauline's crowded list, she checked the
impulse.

"Won't I do as a proxy? I was going to suggest your carrying me
off to lunch."

"No, my dear, you won't—as a proxy. But I'll carry you off to
lunch."

The choice of a restaurant would have been laborious—for Wyant,
when taken out of his rut, became a mass of manias, prejudices and
inhibitions—but Nona luckily remembered a new Bachelor Girls' Club
("The Singleton") which she had lately joined, and packed him into
a taxi still protesting.

They found a quiet corner in a sociable low–studded dining–room,
and she leaned back, listening to his disconnected monologue and
smoking one cigarette after another in the nervous inability to
eat.

The ten days on the island? Oh, glorious, of course—hot sunshine—
a good baking for his old joints. Awfully kind of her father to
invite him … he'd appreciated it immensely … was going to
write a line of thanks… Jim, too, had appreciated his father's
being included… Only, no, really; he couldn't stay; in the
circumstances he couldn't…

"What circumstances, Exhibit? Getting the morning papers twenty–
four hours late?"

Wyant frowned, looked at her sharply, and then laughed an uneasy
wrinkled laugh. "Impertinent chit!"

"Own up, now; you were bored stiff. Communion with Nature was too
much for you. You couldn't stick it. Few can."

"I don't say I'm as passive as Jim."

"Jim's just loving it down there, isn't he? I'm so glad you
persuaded him to stay."

Wyant frowned again, and stared past her at some invisible
antagonist. "It was about the only thing I COULD persuade him to
do."

Nona's hand hung back from the lighting of another cigarette.
"What else did you try to?"

"What else? Why to ACT, damn it … take a line … face
things … face the music." He stopped in a splutter of
metaphors, and dipped his bristling moustache toward his coffee.

"What things?"

"Why: is he going to keep his wife, or isn't he?"

"He thinks that's for Lita to decide."

"For Lita to decide! A pretext for his damned sentimental
inertness. A MAN—my son! God, what's happened to the young men?
Sit by and see … see… Nona, couldn't I manage to have a
talk with your mother?"

"You're having one with me. Isn't that enough for the moment?"

He gave another vague laugh, and took a light from her extended
cigarette. She knew that, though he found her mother's visits
oppressive, he kept a careful record of their number, and dimly
resented any appearance of being "crowded out" by Pauline's other
engagements. "I suppose she comes up to town sometimes, doesn't
she?"

"Sometimes—but in such a rush! And we'll be back soon now. She's
got to get ready for the Cardinal's reception."

"Great doings, I hear. Amalasuntha dropped in on me yesterday.
She says Lita's all agog again since that rotten Michelangelo's got
a film contract, and your father's in an awful state about it. Is
he?"

"The family are not used yet to figuring on the posters. Of course
it's only a question of time."

"I don't mean in a state about Michelangelo, but about Lita."

"Father's been a perfect brick about Lita."

"Oh, he has, has he? Very magnanimous.—Thanks; no—no cigar…
Of course, if anybody's got to be a brick about Lita, I don't see
why it's not her husband's job; but then I suppose you'll tell
me…"

"Yes; I shall; please consider yourself told, won't you? Because
I've got to get back to the hospital."

"The modern husband's job is a purely passive one, eh? That's your
idea too? If you go to him and say: 'How about that damned
scoundrel and your wife'—"

"What damned scoundrel?"

"Oh, I don't say … anybody in particular … and he answers:
'Well, what am I going to do about it?' and you say: 'Well, and
your honour, man; what about your honour?' and he says: 'What's my
honour got to do with it if my wife's sick of me?' and you say:
'God! But THE OTHER MAN … aren't you going to break his bones
for him?' and he sits and looks at you and says: 'Get up a prize–
fight for her?'… God! I give it up. My own son! We don't
speak the same language, that's all."

He leaned back, his long legs stretched under the table, his tall
shambling body disjointed with the effort at a military tautness, a
kind of muscular demonstration of what his son's moral attitude
ought to be.

"Damn it—there was a good deal to be said for duelling."

"And to whom do you want Jim to send his seconds? Michelangelo or
Klawhammer?"

He stared, and echoed her laugh. "Ha! Ha! That's good.
Klawhammer! Dirty Jew … the kind we used to horsewhip…
Well, I don't understand the new code."

"Why do you want to, Exhibit? Come along. You've got me to look
after in the meantime. If you want to be chivalrous, tuck me under
your arm and see me back to the hospital."

"A prize–fight—get up a prize–fight for her! God—I should
understand even that better than lying on the beach smoking a pipe
and saying: 'What can a fellow do about it?' DO!"

Act—act—act! How funny it was, Nona reflected, as she remounted
the hospital steps: the people who talked most of acting seldom did
more than talk. Her father, for instance, so resolute and
purposeful, never discoursed about action, but quietly went about
what had to be done. Whereas poor Exhibit, perpetually
inconsequent and hesitating, was never tired of formulating the
most truculent plans of action for others. "Poor Exhibit indeed—
incorrigible amateur!" she thought, understanding how such wordy
dilettantism must have bewildered and irritated the young and
energetic Pauline, fresh from the buzzing motor works at Exploit.

Nona felt a sudden exasperation against Wyant for trying to poison
Jim's holiday by absurd insinuations and silly swagger. It was
lucky that he had got bored and come back, leaving the poor boy to
bask on the sands with his pipe and his philosophy. After all, it
was to be supposed that Jim knew what he wanted, and how to take
care of it, now he had it.