The Song of the Flea (32 page)

“Why not?”

“Oh, Pym, Pym! I don’t like it. So many men have fallen in love with me, or said they had; and the deeper they fell the more I had to despise them in the long run—it brought out the worst in them in the end. Please don’t fall in love with me, Pym.”

“Love makes weak people weaker and strong people stronger, Jo,” said Pym. “And in any case there’s nothing you can do about it. I have already fallen in love with you.”

“I don’t want to be in love with you,” said Joanna. “I don’t like Love.”

Pym said: “Even fishes and birds know the meaning of love—even wolves—even foxes and cows and mice. That’s about the only thing that ever makes them noble!”

“I’m not a cow or a fox, or a mouse. I don’t need any spurs to make me run, or any calves to make me brave; or any litter of sucking pigs to make me bite. I don’t need any man to stimulate me. I daresay I shock you.”

“Not exactly,” said Pym. “In a way you make me laugh.”

“Do you know what?” said Joanna Bowman, “I’m very glad I make you laugh.”

“Are you? Why?”

“I’ve made so many men cry. I hate making men cry. If I’d made you cry I couldn’t possibly have anything more to do with you. And I like you, Pym,” said Joanna. “I’d dislike you if you cried over me. Go on laughing. Don’t ever on any account let me make you cry over me … Go on letting me make you laugh.”

Later Pym said: “I won’t repeat this if it’s offensive to you, but I want to put it on record that I am deeply devoted to you, and love you.”

Joanna Bowman said: “You are something like what I was led to believe that a man might be, physically and otherwise.”

*

Soon she was gone. Pym sniffed at the pillow upon which her head had rested, and then went to his typewriter and began to write. Relaxed and happy, he wrote calmly until he was tired. This was at five o’clock in the morning. He ate sardines and strawberry jam, drank bottled beer, and went to bed, where he slept happily. He had written the first two thousand words of
The
Road
to
the
Iron
Door;
big work was begun, and he was in love.

Pym slept as honest workmen sleep.

M
R
. M
ELLISH
spent most of the morning in bed. His
housekeeper
knocked at his door at eight o’clock, by which time he was invariably wide awake, reading a book, sitting upright against three fat white pillows and buttoned up to the chin in a blue-and-white flannel sleeping suit. “Come in, Mrs. Moore,” he said, and she came in with a tray that had four moveable legs, which she arranged so that he could reach without effort a pot of tea, a boiled egg, six fingers of hot buttered toast, the
Daily
Telegraph,
and the letters. Then he always said: “Thank you very much, Mrs. Moore. And how are you this morning, Mrs. Moore?”

She replied: “Thank you, Mr. Mellish, and how’s yourself?”

“Blooming, blooming, Mrs. Moore.”

Mrs. Moore used to stand smiling at the old gentleman while he opened his egg. He always insisted on her eating the top of it, saying: “Albumen, albumen Mrs. Moore. Good for the blood, good for the blood.” They talked a little while he opened
his letters. Most of his correspondence was with fellow architects. Most of the letters he received were addressed in familiar handwriting. Mr. Mellish was afraid of typewritten addresses, franked envelopes and strange handwriting: he always left them till the last and sighed with relief when his little ivory paper-knife cut out something harmlessly
commonplace
. Mrs. Moore always sat with him when he opened his letters: he liked her to do so. If she didn’t talk while he was reading he would say: “What’s the matter with you this morning, Mrs. Moore? Are you in love? He-he!”

She always said: “My loving days are over.”

So he looked at his mail, putting one letter on his left knee and another on his right, and (having examined the postmarks) neatly folded the fastidiously-cut envelopes before throwing them aside. When he had eaten his egg, poured himself another cup of tea, and opened his newspaper Mrs. Moore went out, very quietly, and went downstairs. About an hour later she came up again and asked him what he would like for lunch. “Now let me see. What would you suggest, Mrs. Moore?” he always asked. She pretended to think and then said brightly: “I know. What about a nice cutlet?” It was one of their little jokes. For the last forty-seven years Mr. Mellish had eaten a cutlet for lunch every day: he had a harmless passion for lamb cutlets very well done.

Then he would dress slowly and carefully and, if the weather was warm, went for a walk smoking a purple calabash pipe comfortably curved like the top of his old walking stick. If it was raining he sat by the fire and read the
Daily
Telegraph
—every word of it. Mrs. Moore bringing him a cup of coffee and a biscuit at eleven o’clock always found him poring over the small advertisements, and invariably said: “Don’t tell me you’re looking for a job, Mr. Mellish!” And he invariably replied: “Well, I don’t know, Mrs. Moore. I may yet come to want in my old age.”

When he had finished his newspaper he refolded it neatly and put it aside for Mrs. Moore, and then sat smoking his pipe and thinking, sometimes looking up at the gold-framed portrait of his wife; the pretty little widow whom he had married so late
in life and who had died so young. Then he grew sad and went to the window to look at the rain and think of flesh and grass, youth and old age, life and death, the world and the hereafter.

Sometimes his friend, a fiery, decrepit retired admiral, also a widower, came to play chess and stayed to lunch, and then Mr. Mellish opened a bottle of claret. “What’s this, hey? Lamb cutlets? God bless my soul, this is a surprise!” said the admiral, and the two old men laughed heartily and settled down to eat and drink and talk of things that had been in times that were so woefully changed. But this day started badly.

Mrs. Moore knew that something was wrong when Mr. Mellish tore open the flimsy blue envelope instead of cutting it, and with an unsteady hand ripped out its contents as if he was gutting a rabbit. One of the sheets slipped through his fingers and floated to the floor. Mrs. Moore picked it up. She recognised the handwriting—that loose, self-conscious scrawl so expressive of idleness, from the lines of which little curly flourishes sprouted in all directions like hairs in an armpit … that dreaded, routine-wrecking writing which made her think of spiders and was associated, in her mind, with treachery, selfishness and conceit. It made her think of all the things she instinctively hated—two-facedness, untruthfulness, unscrupulousness,
greediness
, cowardice, thievishness, false sweetness, and sluttishness. Above all, it upset Mr. Mellish, her kindly, clean old gentleman. She gave him the sheet of notepaper, holding it between two fingertips, and said: “I couldn’t help recognising the writing, sir. Don’t tell me it’s from Miss Winifred!”

“I’m afraid it is from Miss Winifred,” said Mr. Mellish.

“I should never have thought anybody could have the impudence!” said Mrs. Moore, “after all that——”

“Mind your own business, Mrs. Moore!” cried Mr. Mellish, in a breaking voice, “Why can’t you mind your own business, Mrs. Moore? What do you want to have a finger in every pie for? My family affairs are …
my
family affairs, and not your affair, Mrs. Moore. I’ll thank you to mind your own business, Mrs. Moore!” He waved a shaky old hand so that the unread letter crackled and rustled. “Take all this stuff away, Mrs. Moore. Why don’t you take this infernal rubbish away?
What has my correspondence got to do with you?”

She took away the tray and, when she saw that the old gentleman’s eyes were heavy with tears, her tightened mouth relaxed and she said: “I’m sorry, Mr. Mellish. I didn’t mean to poke my nose in where it wasn’t wanted. I’ll just clear this away. Now don’t you upset yourself, please now, don’t.”

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Moore. I didn’t mean to speak to you like that. I apologise. You must forgive me. I’m very sorry.”

“God bless your heart, sir, that’s all right.”

“Don’t go, Mrs. Moore. Stay. I’d rather you stayed.”

He smoothed the letter on his knees, glanced at it and looked away, turning his head. He was afraid of it. There never had been a letter from Winifred, or about Winifred, that had not been a forerunner of trouble, sordid, disgusting trouble. He covered the upper sheet with his hands and, as he looked at Mrs. Moore a heavy old tear found its way out on to his cheek.

“Ah, there now …” she said, shaking up the pillows behind him. “Poor thing, don’t you read it, then. Don’t read it, Mr. Mellish. You only upset yourself.”

“I must read it, Mrs. Moore. How do I know what it is this time?”

“Well now, look at it like this, Mr. Mellish: it couldn’t be any worse this time than what it was last time—now could it?”

“I daresay you’re right, Mrs. Moore. I don’t suppose it could be very much worse, could it?—But it might be, though, it still might be. And of course, it could be better news. There’s always a possibility. No, I’d better see, if you wouldn’t mind leaving me alone now, just for a minute or two, Mrs. Moore. And forgive me if I was a little hasty just now.”

“Bless your heart, there’s nothing to forgive,” said Mrs. Moore, going out with the tray.

*

Mr. Mellish compelled himself to read:

*

“Oh, unjust! Unkind!” cried old Mr. Mellish, and then Mrs. Moore came in, deliberately calm, consciously composed, and asked him what he fancied for lunch that day.

“Cold meat.”

She put a hand to her bosom and tried to laugh. “How about a nice cutlet?” she said.

“Cold meat. And will you please send Roberts to Admiral Pope and ask him if he’d care to step across the street for luncheon?”

“The cold beef, Mr. Mellish? Not a nice lamb cutlet? They’re lovely to-day. Just one little teeny lamb cutlet, eh? Just one.”

“The admiral will have the cutlets. To-day I want cold meat.”

“With a nice salad?”

“Bread.”

“Shall I open a bottle of claret?”

“Yes, open a bottle of claret by all means.”

As soon as Mrs. Moore left the bedroom she began to cry. When she came back, half an hour later, old Mr. Mellish was lying on his back. The
Daily
Telegraph
was still unopened. She said: “Admiral Pope will be glad to come, sir. And you left these three letters on your tray.”

“Good, Mrs. Moore. See that the angostura bitters are out. … Letters? I don’t want any letters. Put them on my desk. I’ll deal with them another time. Just leave me alone for a minute, Mrs. Moore.”

“Oh, Mr. Mellish, let me get you some Bovril. Or a nice glass of nice warm milk.”

“Go away and leave me alone.”

“Very good, Mr. Mellish.”

“Oh, Mrs. Moore!”

“Sir?”

“Once again, I’m sorry if I’ve been a little short with you this morning, but the fact of the matter is, I’m a little upset.”

“I know you are, you dear kind soul.”

In the kitchen Mrs. Moore threw her apron over her face and wept. Mr. Mellish got out of bed. He dressed perfunctorily. His collar was a nuisance and his buttons were a burden. Mrs. Moore lifted his feet on to a little padded stool. He smoked his pipe mechanically. When she came in with coffee and a biscuit at eleven o’clock she saw that the
Daily
Telegraph
was still
unfolded. “Aren’t you looking for a job to-day?” she asked.

He replied: “Job? No, Mrs. Moore, I’m not looking for a job to-day.”

“Aren’t you going to read your paper?”

“I think I have had all the news I can assimilate for to-day, Mrs. Moore, thank you.”

*

The admiral arrived at twelve o’clock, brushing raindrops from the silky surface of his fine white beard. “Well?” he said, according to formula, “what dirty trick have you thought up this time, hey? Not another Queen’s Knight gambit, I hope.” Five years ago Mr. Mellish had opened a game of chess with a Queen’s Knight gambit, and the admiral had beaten him.

“I hope you don’t mind if we don’t play this morning, Pope,” said Mr. Mellish.

“Lost your nerve, hey? Lost your nerve, is that it?” said the admiral. Then he saw Mr. Mellish’s face and said: “You look a little hipped, young feller,” and put the little bundle of veins and tendons that was his right hand on his friend’s shoulder. “What’s the matter, young feller?” He was on the
churchyard
side of seventy, five years older than Mr. Mellish, who urged him forward with a hand in the small of his back, saying, mechanically:

“Age before beauty.”

The admiral had lived thirty years in an iron corset. His spine had been broken in an explosion off Trieste. An old manservant who had been a Master-at-Arms—a tattooed pessimist with eyebrows like dried pine cones—washed him and dressed him, laced him up and sent him out in the morning, and, having unlaced him at night, listened to his every sigh.

“How is the back?” asked Mr. Mellish.

“Improving, improving. What’s up with you?”

“Pope,” said Mr. Mellish; and choked.

“None of that, none of that!” The admiral saw a letter in his friend’s hand and said: “Ah!”

Mr. Mellish gave him the letter and said:

“Can you tell me what I ought to do, Pope? This isn’t fair.
It’s not right. It isn’t just. For the life of me I can’t see what I’ve done wrong, Pope. I’ve tried to do everything for the best. What can I do? It’s cruel. It’s unkind. How could she speak of her dear mother like that? How could I possibly have been jealous of her? What does she mean by that? Of course her mother loved her more than me. Who denied it? I never denied it—I know it. Why
should
her mother have loved me? What was I but a silly old man? And her mother was very young and beautiful. She was
fond
of me, yes, but
love
me? I never hoped for that. I never expected it. I was just a husband, somebody to be comfortable and contented with. Pope, it stands to reason I expected she should love her child better than me, doesn’t it? Then why say things like that? I tried to make them both happy. I do honestly assure you, Pope, I loved her mother very dearly, and I gave Winifred all I could, within reason. How could she say what she said about … the grandson? It’s not true, you know. She says that she’s glad he’s dead, because of my comforts! It’s not fair, Pope—it’s untrue, it’s unjust, it’s unkind! But how can you tell these things to these young people? Anybody who knows me ought to know that all I ever wanted was a child about the house. When I was ever so much younger I used to think how nice it would be to have a son who’d get a Prix de Rome, a great man. Laura and I often talked about it. … And Winifred writes to me about cutlets! Why
cutlets?
What do I care about cutlets? I’d gladly have given everything I have. I’d have sold everything to keep the little fellow alive. And then she talks about one person less to interfere with my nice little comforts and come between me an
my
Mrs. Moore!
My
Mrs. Moore! Why, Pope, you know as well as I do how much Laura, her mother, liked Mrs. Moore. Is it decent, Pope? Pope, is this proper?”