“I do hope it isn’t badly damaged?” she said to him, at last.
“I can’t tell in this light, that’s just the trouble,” he sighed, standing upright from an inspection of the engine, “and my torch is nearly exhausted. I am anxious about you, too. I want to get you home. You shouldn’t be hanging about here after being in that stuffy place, you may catch a chill.”
“Oh, I’m perfectly happy. Don’t worry about me.”
“Mrs. Lucie-Browne will be anxious about you,” he said, and said no more.
So that’s it, thought Jean, putting her hands in her pockets. Oh well.
But when he tried to start the engine it would not move. It uttered not a sound: it would not even make the painful noise that means a car is at least
trying
. He became agitated, darting from dashboard to engine and back again, but in vain. At last he said sombrely:
“I am afraid the damage is serious.”
“Oh dear.”
“It’s too bad,” burst out Mr. Waite, wiping his face. “I use the car every day and all day—I don’t know what I shall do—it may take weeks to mend. And how am I to get you home?”
“She didn’t mean—at least—she wasn’t——” said Jean awkwardly. But she knew that Nancy had run into his car on purpose. She liked smashing things.
“All the worse,” he retorted, slamming the door and peering closely in order to insert the key. “I could see that you didn’t like being with your friend in that state, and I was glad of it.”
“She isn’t really a friend, she’s only an acquaintance. She was at school with Alda—Mrs. Lucie-Browne—and me.”
“It’s a dreadful sight, a lady in that state,” he said, sighing and dusting his hands. “I can never get used to it, never.”
“She’s had an awful life,” said Jean, standing upright and
taking
her hands out of her pockets. She shivered slightly; she felt a little chilled but her headache had vanished.
“That’s no excuse,” said Mr. Waite severely. “A great many people have had hard lives; I have myself, but I haven’t taken to drink. It’s a good thing she didn’t drive you home, there might have been a dreadful accident.”
“When she was sixteen she was simply lovely,” said Jean absently. “Poor Nancy.”
Mr. Waite ignored this, for sounds from the passage leading to the yard now indicated that some patrons were coming out. He said quickly: “I am sorry, but we shall have to walk home. Do you feel equal to it?” She nodded, and he went on quietly:
“Please take my arm,” and she was so surprised that she did so without comment.
She was afraid of seeing the white face, the huge eyes, looking out at her from the door of the saloon bar; she only wanted to get home as quickly as possible, and he also seemed to fear an encounter. They walked quickly out of the yard and across the road.
She found that her step fell in comfortably with his and that his height matched well with her own; there was no bobbing or bumping or apologising; they walked on easily together through the spring dusk, along the dim road bordered by shadowy trees in bud. Unnoticed, the moon in its second quarter had risen over the dark fields and was now shining behind the elms and casting their shadows upon the road. The mildness, the gentleness and freshness of the air and scene soothed Jean’s senses, and she was trusting that they had done the same for him when he said, so explosively that he made her start:
“Yes! That’s what I must do. Telephone Fred Lowe (he keeps the garage on the London road and does my repairs) to pick up the car to-night. I can do that from the farm, they won’t mind, it isn’t late.”
“I’m giving you a lot of trouble, I’m afraid, Mr. Waite. I’m so sorry. I
could
have gone home by myself——”
“That would have been quite impossible,” he answered firmly. “You have had an unpleasant experience and I am happy to have been of any help.”
He suppressed a sigh: he was still very angry, and he wanted to be quiet to think about the car: the probable amount of damage, what the repairs would cost, whether he should send the bill to this Mrs. Peers, and so on. But to walk with Miss Hardcastle arm-in-arm in silence would be embarrassing to them both; besides, he wished to distract her attention from the evening’s disagreeable events, and he began determinedly:
“Do you drive, Miss Hardcastle?”
“I used to, but I never was much good. I——”
She suppressed the confession that she had several times run into things (not people), and concluded not quite truthfully:
“I never could get the knack, somehow.”
“Ladies seldom can,” replied Mr. Waite, feeling better disposed towards her and glancing down at the gilt, turbaned head level with his shoulder, “and yet it is perfectly simple. I don’t suppose you fully understand the principle upon which the combustion engine is constructed, do you?”
“Not quite, I’m afraid. I’m not bright about that sort of thing.”
Mr. Waite was now at ease (or nearly so; he completely relaxed only in company with Mother and the Girls) and he at once began.
On they walked, at a pace neither irritatingly slow nor tiringly fast, and myriads of clouds, in hue a bright, tender grey and in shape curved like shells, gradually covered the sky and veiled the moon, and the only sound was the pacing of their feet upon the road and Mr. Waite’s slightly harsh but not unpleasing voice explaining the combustion engine. His earnest wish to make all perfectly clear to her added a gentler note to its usual dictatorial or disapproving tones, and Jean, glancing from time to time at his regular profile, wondered why she was not thrilled about him, for he was better-looking than Captain Ottley and far, far
kinder
than Mr. Potter. Still, it was pleasant to walk peacefully thus, enjoying the night, and comprehending not one word of what he was saying.
She glanced again at Mr. Waite. He was without charm, he was narrow-minded and not always polite; he fussed; he was always taking thought for the morrow and he never even glanced at the lilies of the field, but no one could deny that he had been exceedingly kind. He had shown no especial desire for
her
company, no personal concern for
her
(and that was not flattering) but he had rendered, through her, homage to that remote, gracious Goddess of Womanhood enthroned in his mind. Jean wondered whence he got his ideals about Ladies. Not from his mothers and sisters, she felt sure, for he had dropped remarks which indicated that they were bustling, practical, active women, making Christmas presents in July with one hand and nursing sick cousins with the other. Perhaps some Sunday School teacher or elegant young stranger seen at a party had set the standard years ago when he was a boy. Women were no longer like Mr. Waite’s Ideal Lady; perhaps they never had been; but there was a lingering irritating fascination about her charms and her code.
They had now passed the camp and in a little while they would be home. Mr. Waite broke a silence by hoping that she was not tired.
“Oh no, not a bit, thanks. But I am wondering if I’ve had it so far as Nancy is concerned. She’s very touchy.”
“Alcohol has that effect upon people, in time,” said Mr. Waite in his stiffest voice. “Your friend has no right to be annoyed with you; you only did what was right. I hope it will make her ashamed of herself.”
Jean gave a tiny shake of her head, unseen in the dim moonlight. Mr. Waite did indeed live in a world of his own.
“Where is her husband? Not demobilised yet?” he went on. “I heard from the milkman that she is not a widow.”
“Er—he doesn’t—they aren’t together any more. He is her third husband, as a matter of fact.”
Mr. Waite gave a movement of the head, a compression of the lips, that Alda would have called pussyish.
“Married for her money, I suppose. She seems to have plenty.”
Jean gently withdrew her arm from his in order to make an unnecessary adjustment to her turban.
“I don’t know about that. She’s always been very attractive to men.”
“But the money helped them to make up their minds,” with a little laugh.
“I expect so,” answered Jean, and then she was silent. She was remembering that the solicitors had assured her of an income of three thousand pounds a year clear, after death duties had been paid and annual income tax met, from her father’s business. Mr. Waite’s little laugh, combined with the knowledge of her own wealth, had started an unpleasing train of thought and one which was unfamiliar to her, for she had always been so blinded by her romantic longing for marriage that it had actually never occurred to her that it might be possible to buy it.
Unfortunately Mr. Waite seemed in a moralising mood, and went on to deplore Mrs. Peers’s frequent marriages, pointing out that the more often you were married the more were the opportunities for failure. Some people, of course, were sensible enough to avoid marriage completely.
“Like me,” concluded Mr. Waite, with another laugh. “No, Miss Hardcastle, I’ve seen too much of married life to want to tie
my
self down; I’ve had married friends; I’ve seen them worried almost into their graves over school bills and rent and doctors’ bills and holidays, no peace, no opportunity to put a little bit by for that rainy day we’re always hearing about (it’s been raining for the last thirty years, it seems to me) no time to realise the Highest in your Self; no thank you, I’m not having any.”
This was not pleasant hearing; it never is, even if you are not in love with the man who says it, but Jean’s spirits did not sink
as
they would have if Mr. Potter or the Blakewell boy had uttered such words. She only thought
Poor Mr. Waite
, and answered cheerfully:
“Oh, I think you’re so right. I shan’t marry, either.”
Indeed, the only thought in her head at the moment was
Thank goodness I haven
’
t got to marry, what with poor Nancy
’
s example and Mr. Waite being so depressing
.
But Mr. Waite at once became grave; he shook his head, he turned to look down at the face smiling up into his own, and he said:
“I don’t like to hear a lady say that, Miss Hardcastle. You’re doing some poor chap out of a happy home.”
She laughed, but the laugh covered some exasperation. She was tempted to exclaim, “And they call women illogical!” but refrained. His speech was illogical, but it was also pretty, and she believed that he meant it. I like him, she decided.
A light shone in the window of Pine Cottage and it was only nine o’clock, but Mr. Waite, halting at a distance of some two hundred yards from the gate, declined Jean’s invitation to come in and have a cup of tea. She said she was sorry that it would only be tea, and he replied austerely that surely they had seen enough that evening of what alcohol could do? standing, as he said it, with his hat in his hand and his eyes carefully not wandering towards the light in the window. He then explained that he had a letter to write to the Egg Board, cut short her thanks, said good night and walked quickly away.
Alda was listening to a snarling voice telling her how awful everything was in America. She switched it off when Jean entered, and sat upright, eager for all the news, and listened with great interest to her account of the evening’s events. When at last she heard of the moonlit walk home, her face sparkled with approval; she cast an anxious eye over her friend to see how she must have appeared to Mr. Waite by that transforming light, then nodded approvingly, and was not at all dismayed when Jean repeated his views on marriage, assuring her that men always
talked
like this when they were attracted by that particular subject, and adding firmly, “It’s like moths.”
She told Jean that everything between herself and Mr. Waite was going well: he had rescued her, he had taken her arm, and he had begun to fulminate against marriage. She ended by reminding her again that down here there was no competition for his interest, but Jean, who had emptied her handbag on to the table and was tearing up bills and bus tickets and rearranging her purse, a cigarette case, a lipstick, and a tiny New Testament, thought to herself that there was Competition, only it did not know that it was competing.
The personal excitement, the sensation of herself as heroine, which had always accompanied these discussions with Alda like a chorus of violins, had ceased: the violins were silent and she felt only weariness and some distaste, but Alda seemed to enjoy her own part as much as ever.
The next morning Nancy’s car drew up at the crossroads as usual to take up Jenny and Louise, but the driver was a pale girl in bright clothes, with that oversweet manner which, as Miss Berta Ruck has wisely observed, invariably conceals bad temper. She informed Alda that Mrs. Peers had suddenly got sick of the country and gone to a hotel in town, leaving herself in charge of the place and darling Egg. Alda received this information with relief, and when at the end of two days Jenny and Louise announced their intention of walking to and from school “because it’s fine weather now and Magda is so beastly to us,” she gladly agreed.
In what precise way Magda was beastly, she never found out; questions only drew forth the answer “Oh—I don’t know—she’s so unkind,” and she was content to leave it at that, knowing that while a child is still a child, kindness is the only quality which it finds irresistible: wit, authority, imagination, personal beauty, even a real love of children, are nowhere beside a simple, even a stupid, person who is unfailingly kind. In a week the
convent
heard that Eglantine had been whisked away to join her mother; the unkind Magda vanished too; and the Peers incident was over.