The Misses Mallett (The Bridge Dividing) Part 17

'They call you Henrietta. It's only a name, but it doesn't describe you; n.o.body knows what it means except you, but it's convenient. It's the same with my hunting accident. Do you see?'

Henrietta said nothing. She had that familiar feeling of being in the dark, and now the evening shadows augmented it. She was conscious of the cat behind her, on the hearthrug.

'Do you see?' Christabel persisted.

'Things have to be called something,' Henrietta said.

'That's just what I have been telling you. And so Rose Mallett calls it a hunting accident.' A high-pitched and thin laugh came from the pillows. 'She was terribly distressed about it. And she actually told me she had suspected that mare from the first. She told me! It's funny--don't you think so?'

'No,' Henrietta said stoutly, 'not funny at all.' She spoke in a very firm and reasonable voice, as though only her common sense could combat what seemed like insanity in the other. 'I think it's very sad.'

'For me? Oh, yes, but I wasn't thinking of that. I was thinking of your charming aunt, the most beautiful woman in Radstowe. That's what I have heard her called. Yet why hasn't she married? Can't she find anybody'--the voice was gentle--'to love her? She suspected that mare but she warned n.o.body. Funny--'

Henrietta had a physical inward trembling. She felt a dreadful rage against the woman on the couch, a sickening disgust, such as she would have felt at looking down a dark, deep well and seeing slime and blind ugliness at the bottom. She felt as though her ears were dirty; she tried to move, but she sat perfectly still and, dreading what would come next, she listened, fascinated.

'Perhaps she is in love with somebody. Does she get many letters, Henrietta? She is very reserved, she doesn't tell me much; but, of course, I'm interested in her.' She laughed again. 'I am very anxious for her happiness. It would comfort me to know anything you can tell me.'

Henrietta managed to stand up. 'I know nothing,' she said in a slightly broken voice. 'I don't want to know anything.'

Christabel interrupted smoothly. 'Perhaps you are wise or you couldn't stay happily in that house. They're all like witches, those women.

They frighten me. You must be very brave, Henrietta.'

'I'm very grateful,' Henrietta said; 'and I shan't come here again, no, never. I don't know what you have been trying to tell me, but I don't believe it. It's no good crying. I shall never come back.

They're not witches.' She had a vision of them at the dinner table, Rose like a white flower, Caroline and Sophia jewelled, gaily dressed, a little absurd, oddly distinguished. 'Witches! They are my father's sisters, and I love them.'

'Ah, but you don't know Rose,' Christabel sobbed. 'And don't say you will never come again. And don't tell Francis. He would be angry.'

'How could I tell him?' Henrietta asked indignantly. 'No, no, I don't want to see either of you again. I shall go away--go away--' She left the room to the sound of a horrible, faint weeping.

She meant what she had said. She thought she would go away from Radstowe and forget Christabel Sales, forget Francis Sales, whom she would no longer pretend to love; forget those insinuations that Aunt Rose was guilty of a crime. This place and these people were abhorrent to her, she felt she had been poisoned and she rushed down the long avenue where, overhead, the rooks were calling, as though she could only be saved by the clean night air beyond the house. She was shocked; she believed that Christabel was mad; the thought of that warm room where the cat listened, made her gasp, and her horror extended to Francis Sales himself. The place felt wicked, but the clear road stretching before her, the pale evening sky and the sound of her own feet tapping the road restored her.

She was glad to be alone and, avoiding the short cut, she enjoyed the sanity of the highway used by ordinary men and women in the decent pursuit of their lives. But now the road was empty and though at another time she would have been afraid of the lonely country, to-night she had a sense of escape from greater perils than any lurking here.

And before long it all seemed like a dream, but it was a dream that might recur if she ran the risk.

No, she would never go there again, she would never envy Aunt Rose a lover from that house, she would never believe that the worst of Christabel's implications were true. They were the fabrications of a suspicious woman, and though her jealousy might be justified, it seemed to Henrietta that she deserved her fate. She was hateful, she was poisonous, and Henrietta felt a sudden tenderness for Aunt Rose and Francis Sales. They could not help themselves, for they were unfortunate, she longed to show them sympathy and she saw herself taking them by the hand and saying gently, 'Confide in me. I understand.' She imagined Aunt Rose melting at that touch and those words into tears, perhaps of repentance, certainly of grat.i.tude, but at this point Henrietta's fancies were interrupted by the sound of footsteps behind her. She quickened her pace, then began to run, and the steps followed, gaining on her. She could not outrun them and she stopped, turning to see who came.

'Miss Mallett!' It was the voice of Francis Sales. She sank down on a heap of stones, panting and laughing. He sat beside her. 'What's the matter?'

'I don't know. I hate to hear anybody coming behind me. It might have been a tramp. I'm very much afraid of tramps.'

'I said I would see you home.'

'Yes, I forgot. Let us go on.'

'You didn't stay long.'

'I don't think Mrs. Sales is very well.'

'She isn't. She gets hysterical and that affects her heart. I thought you would do her good.' He seemed to blame Henrietta. 'And I thought a walk with you would do me good, too. I have a pretty dull life.'

'Aren't you interested in your cows and things?'

'A man can't live on cows.'

'But you have other things and you live in the country. People can't have everything. I don't suppose you'd change with anybody really, if you could. People are like that. They grumble, but they like being themselves. Suppose you were a young man in a shop, measuring cloth or selling bacon. You'd find that much duller, I should think.'

He laughed a little. 'Where did you learn this wisdom?'

'I've had experience,' she said staidly. 'Yes, you'd find it duller.'

'Perhaps you're right. But then, you might come to buy the bacon. I should look forward to that.'

In the darkness, these playful words frightened her a little; they hurt her sense of what was fitting from him to her and at the same time they pleased her with their hint of danger.

'Would you?' she asked slowly.

He paused, saying, 'May I light a pipe?' and by the flame of the match he examined her face quite openly for a moment. 'You know I would,' he said.

She met his look, her eyes wavered and neither spoke for a long time.

She was oppressed by his nearness, the smell of his tobacco, her own inexplicable delight. From the trees by the roadside birds gave out happy chirrups, country people in their Sunday clothes and creaking boots pa.s.sed or overtook the silent pair; a man on a horse rode out from a gate and cantered with very little noise on the rough gra.s.s edging the road. Henrietta watched him until he disappeared and then it seemed as if he had never been there at all. A sheep in a field uttered a sad cry and every sight and sound seemed a little unreal, like things happening on a stage.

And gradually Henrietta's excitement left her. The world seemed a sad and lonely place; she remembered that she herself was lonely; there was no one now to whom she was the first, and she had a longing for her mother. She wished that instead of returning to Nelson Lodge with its cleanliness and richness and comfort, she might turn the key of the boarding-house door and find herself in the narrow pa.s.sage with the smell of cooking and the gas turned low; she wished she could run up the stairs and rush into the drawing-room and find her mother sitting there, sewing by the fire, and see her look up and hear her say, 'Well, Henry dear, what have you been doing?' After all, that old life was better than this new one. The troubles of her mother, her own young struggles for food and warmth, the woes of Mrs. Banks, had in them something n.o.bler than she could find in the distresses of Christabel and Aunt Rose and Francis Sales, something redeeming them from the sordidness in which they were set. She checked a sob.

'It's a long way,' she sighed.

'Are you tired?' His voice was gentle.

'Yes, dreadfully.'

'Then let us sit down again.'

'No, I must go on. I must get back.'

'If you would talk to me, you wouldn't notice the distance.'

'I don't want to talk. I'm thinking. When we get to the bridge you can go back, can't you? There will be lights and I shall be quite safe.'

'Very well, but I wish you'd tell me what's the matter.'

'I'm very unhappy,' Henrietta said with a sob.

'What on earth for? Look here,'--he touched her arm--'did Christabel say anything?'

'I don't know why it is.'

'Are you going to cry?'

'It's no good crying.'