The Raft
She hadn't noticed where Peter was leading her. She found herself in
a broad and quiet street, through which little traffic passed. The
pavements, on either side of it, were lined with plane-trees. Houses
stood far back from the road in gardens, with stone steps climbing up to
them.
She slipped her hand into Peter's arm. Now that Nan wasn't there to be
pleased by it, she was willing to let him know that she was proud of
him. In the silver twilight, when one sees with the imagination rather
than with the eyes, she found his face like to one which had looked up
at her suddenly and held her spell-bound in the gray blur of an Oxford
street.
“Is this the right way, Peter? Is it a short-cut? Are you taking me out
of my way to lengthen our talk?”
He laughed, rather excitedly she thought. “I like to hear you telling of
the old days---- Hulloa! Why here's the Misses Jacobite's house! You
remember what you said about women being on a raft--I think that
explains them. No one came out from the land to take them off. Let's
step inside and cheer them up.”
“But Peter, my train----.”
“Oh, there are plenty of trains--we needn't stop more than a second.”
“You rascal!” She gave his arm a little hug. “I believe you had this in
mind from the start.”
“Perhaps I had.”
When they were safe inside the hall and the door had closed behind them,
his manner altered. She was conscious of it in a second. He no longer
laughed, and he was more excited.
“There's someone here who wants to meet you,” he informed her.
“But who? Why didn't you tell me?”
“I wanted to give you a surprise.”
She looked annoyed and yet curious. “You must tell me. Is it a man or a
woman?”
He didn't dare to let her know that it was her husband.
“You'll see presently.”
She was beginning to protest; Miss Florence entered. Under her attempt
at cordiality her face betrayed dismay, and something still less
comfortable--judgment. Peter employed her entrance as an excuse for his
own rapid exit. He soon returned. “They want to see you now.”
Making the best of an awkward situation, Jehane exclaimed, “They! So
there are several of them! It was only 'someone' at first.”
She followed him up the stairs, trying to catch up with and question
him; he was careful to keep sufficiently far ahead to prevent
conversation. He opened a door on the landing--the door which led into
the white room. He made as if he were going to accompany her, but, as
she crossed the threshold, stepped back and closed the door.
“You!”
The man held out his arms. When she stood rigid and did not stir, he
dragged himself across the bed, as if to come to her.
“Don't.”
Her voice was sudden like a whip cracked.
His arms fell to his side. After all these years of absence,
her stronger will lashed down his desire. He began ramblingly,
shame-facedly, hinting at what he meant, not having the audacity to
finish his sentences. “I had to----. I made Peter promise. When they let
me out, I was thinking of you. All the time in there, for four years, I
was thinking of----. Jehane, I've been punished enough. Isn't it
possible that----? Jehane, I love you. I always have. I always shall.”
He was aching to touch her. Through the mist of twilight that drifted
through the room, he fed his eyes on every detail of this woman who had
once been familiar to him. She hadn't changed much; it was he who was
altered. She also made her sternly pitiful estimate--the shrunken body,
the loose-lipped, purposeless mouth, the hair growing thin and gray
about the temples.
He stretched out his arms. “I love you.”
She shuddered; it was as though a man from the grave had called to her.
“Love me!” Her voice was so low that his ears were strained to catch
what she said. “No. You never loved me; you weren't strong enough for
that. It was all a mistake; we never belonged to each other. If you had
loved me, you wouldn't have---- But we won't talk about it. I'm not
bitter; but we must go our own ways now.”
He was lying across the edge of the bed, threatening to reach across the
gulf that spread between them. The nearer he came, the more she saw what
had happened. He was old--a senile, night-robed caricature of the man
she had married. In the half-light her fear of his claim on her made him
ghastly.
He was moving--he was getting out of bed. She opened the door, running
as she would have run from a skeleton. He was following her down the
stairs. She fancied that he touched her. It seemed that he leapt through
the air. Something fell. In the hall people tried to stay her. She was
in the street where the plane-trees rustled; how she managed to get
there she could not tell. She ran on, fearing that he still followed.
She halted for want of breath. Where was she? Lighted trams were
passing. She jumped on the first, giving no thought to its direction.
Not until she was safe aboard and moving, did she dare to look back.
Nothing was there, nothing gaunt and hungry--only saunterers and girls
with their lovers, drifting dreamlike through the shadows under lamps
against whose glare moths hurled their fragile bodies, beating their
lives out flutteringly.
CHAPTER XXXIV--THE BENEVOLENT DELILAHS
Despite the Misses Jacobite's efforts to keep him ill, Ocky insisted
on getting better. His cork-like nature refused to be submerged by
adversity; it was warranted un-sinkable.
At first, after repeated and urgent requests, he was allowed to sit by
the window in a dressing-gown. Then he was allowed to get partly
dressed and to ramble about the house in carpet-slippers. At last he
was permitted to venture into the garden. There, for some days, his
adventures ended. His four benevolent Delilahs had the felicity of
watching their captive-man, pottering in the sunshine, watering the
grass and tying up the flowers, while leaves tapped against the walls
and birds flew over him.
They were terribly afraid that presently he would contemplate an exodus.
It was so very long since they had had anything to do with men--they had
almost forgotten what things amused them. In those far-off days when
the world was young and lovers were frequent, they had played and sung
a little. But the drawing-room was faded, their songs were out of date,
the piano was out of tune, and their voices----. Perhaps those lovers
had never really cared for their singing; appearing to care had afforded
an excuse for sitting close to the singers, as they turned the pages of
their music.
Mr. Waffles mustn't be allowed to get dull--that would be fatal. They
asked him if he would be so good as to keep an eye on the cats--to see
that they didn't pounce on any of the birds who made a home in their
garden. Mr. Waffles promised. But the cats still stole along the wall
and crept through the bushes, unmolested by the weary gentleman in
carpet-slippers.
Something had to be done. The case grew desperate. The four gray sisters
hunted through their father's library and searched out books--Dickens'
novels in paper-covers, issued in parts at a time when a new character
from Boz was more exciting than a new comet hurled through the night
from the unseen shores of eternity. Dickens left Mr. Waffles cold;
his tastes were not literary. He fell asleep with _David Copperfield_
face-down beside his chair, while the sunlight played leap-frog with the
shadows across the lawn.
He had to be amused. Providence sent a diversion. Seated beneath the
apple tree, where the shrubbery began, Miss Florence was assuring her
Samson for the hundredth time of how glad she and her sisters were
to have him with them. To enforce the sincerity of her words, she had
stretched out her hand to touch him--had almost touched him--when a
shocked voice exclaimed, “What the devil! What the devil! Poor father!
Oh, dear! Oh, dear!”
Miss Florence jumped back from Mr. Waffles. Had he accused her? She
saw that his lips were not moving--that in fact, he was as surprised
as herself. Both looked slowly round. Their astonished glances found
nothing more perturbing than the innocent greenness of the garden and
the noiseless hopping of birds.
The voice came again, maliciously strident. “Oh, dear! Oh, dear! What
the devil! What the devil!”
Overhead, perched on a branch, was a gray and scarlet parrot. From whom
had it escaped? How long had it been there? All they knew was that,
while taking refuge in their garden, it was not above reviling them. At
night it formed the habit of roosting in the apple tree. Before anyone
was out of bed, it could be heard profaning the early morning.
The energies of the entire household were now directed toward the
effecting of its capture. Ingenious plans were concocted. A topic of
conversation was never lacking.
The four elderly ladies placed themselves under their guest's
protection. What would the neighbors think if they were to hear a
constant stream of blasphemy issuing from their walls? And, besides, the
parrot in a cage could be taught better manners and made an attractive
pet.
Mr. Grace, on a visit, learnt of the situation and volunteered to lend
a hand. He and Mr. Waffles were provided with bags of grain and
butterfly-nets. They were instructed to creep with the stealth of
poachers behind ambuscades of trees and flowers, following the gray and
scarlet peril till it settled, and then----
But the triumphant moment was continually postponed; for, whenever
they approached the parrot, no matter how warily, it spread its wings,
mocking them and crying, “What the devil!”--or something even worse.
Ocky's days were fully occupied now. He had a morning-to-evening
interest. The Misses Jacobite urged on him the importance of his
task--the safeguarding of their reputation.
But even a trust so sacred and incessant failed to content Mr. Waffles.
Peter made this discovery when his uncle asked him for the loan of a
shilling. “Voluntary contributions thankfully borrowed,” was Ocky's
motto. No one ever gave him anything. It was always lent. Now money
implied an excursion into the larger world; Peter wondered what might be
its purpose. He knew next morning; his uncle had a sixpenny pipe in his
mouth and a tin of cheap tobacco in his pocket. He was stoking up to
renew life's battle; with a pipe between his teeth, Ocky Waffles was a
man.
He led Peter down the garden to the shrubbery, behind which were two
cane-chairs. The shrubbery was convenient for hiding the fact that he
was smoking.
“Peter,” he said, jerking his head across his shoulder, “I've been
noticing. They can't afford it. I've got to go to work, old chap.”
He spoke with his old swaggering confidence, as though the entire world
was waiting to engage his services. The carpet-slippers, which had been
Mr. Jacobite's, chafed one against the other thoughtfully.
“Got to go to work,” he repeated reflectively, in a tone which implied
regret. “I think I know a fellow---- We were in the coop together, and
he said---- But I'm not going to tell you till I'm more certain of my
plans.”
Had he been burdened with the weightiest of financial secrets, he could
not have made them more mysterious. Peter tried not to smile; he was
glad--this was the muddling self-deceived uncle he remembered.
Ocky knocked the ashes out of his pipe, waiting for the bowl to cool
before he filled it. “I hadn't an idea that they had so little. It's
come home to me gradually--the worn carpets and old things everywhere.
And here have I been eating my head off. We'll have to pay 'em back,
Peter--have to pay 'em back.”
Peter had reason to be sceptical about the paying back; he applauded
the intention. Except in imagination, his uncle had never been much of
a money-maker. He had always been unemployable; he was ten times more
unemployable now with a prison record. Peter spoke to his father,