Chapter XX

1

But, of course, Turner did not need to call him; and Ivor was striding along the road to Hungerford by eight o’clock. He had plenty of time in which to do the just over two miles before the train was due to leave, but his impatience needed swift movement.

Ivor never could loiter: not even on a fine morning in Berkshire; and even in his pacings up and down he would sometimes go at a furious rate and find himself perspiring--about nothing at all! Ivor didn’t, couldn’t, notice the country when there was anything on his mind: it was an inability, like that of those tiresome people who can _not_ appreciate poetry unless it’s read to them by some one they like. A mountain would have to be an enormous mountain before Ivor, with anything on his mind, could become aware of it; and even then he would be more aware of it if there was a man on top of it. A landscape would have to be an amazing landscape before Ivor, with anything on his mind, could become aware of it; and even then he would feel it more acutely if there was a figure against the landscape. People were important to Ivor; that is why he was a solitary, and that is why men become solitaries, because people are important to them. People could make places beautiful or ugly for Ivor.... And now he simply tore along the road to Hungerford as though it had been a street in a slum, and through the fine September mist as though he hated cigarette smoke. And as he strode along his mind was gay on life and Virginia, and his hat swung from his hand, and his thick hair shone black and brown with the water of its brushing.

It was about a mile from Hungerford that, as he turned the corner which led to a path across the fields directly to the station, he almost collided with the little telegraph-boy on his bicycle. The boy jumped off sulkily, and tugged at his pocket.

“Tel’gram,” said the boy.

Ivor read: “Please come back.--Virginia.” And he saw that it had been sent off at 5.45 the day before.

“Why didn’t I get this last night?” he asked sharply.

“Office closes 6.30,” the boy explained. “Can’t deliver tel’grams Nasyngton after 6.”

“Ought to live in Hungerford,” the boy said cheekily.

The tall, dark man looked suddenly ferocious.

“If----” he began, and then, to the boy’s amazement, he started to run away.

Ivor pulled himself up with a kind of fierce laugh. No good running to catch a train before it’s in a station, he thought. It was the “Please” in the wire that had set him running--suddenly, the idea of it! “_Please!_” One was always hearing and saying that word, and yet it had that amazing and potent meaning! The pity of it, and the generosity in it! “Please,” she had written. It stabbed his heart, that word. He saw her lips saying it, those taut and dry and beautiful lips that liked the rush of a chill wind--he heard them saying it in his ears: “Please, Ivor!” And all his gaiety was lost in regret for his folly of yesterday--his folly of “wisdom” in not having gone to her before. He had let her write “please” to him! God, Virginia and her beastly men!

It was beyond his power to prevent himself walking quickly; and he had a long wait at Hungerford Station, up and down the far end of the London platform--it seemed like hours--before any one but a porter or two was visible. But at last motors began to twist round the slope from Hungerford and down to the station, and soon the platform was dotted with people and suitcases. Then the train from London bustled in at the opposite platform, and soon a boy came round with papers.

Ivor bought _The Times_, and, as an afterthought, _The Daily Mirror_: thinking to while away the minutes before his train came in, and one arm not being sufficient to cope with _The Times_ in the open. With that pressed under his arm he held up the picture-paper at an angle: and then, with a frown, he held it up straight: as he did so, dropping _The Times_ from under his arm. He didn’t pick it up: he stared at one of the several pictures on the front page--a face he knew, looking so strange! so odd, just there! And he knew the photograph too, it was an old one and often reproduced, for it was a “stock” photograph and used on the smallest provocation. They had often laughed at it together, calling it “Virginia arrogant.” ... It was a little blurred.... But why _there_? And though he saw the large type above it, though his eyes read it, and then read it again, he simply could not take it in. Oh, absurd! “Death of the Viscountess Tarlyon.” Oh, but rot! His hand trembled ever so little as he held the paper higher to read the small type below “Virginia arrogant.”

“We regret to announce the sudden death of the beautiful Viscountess Tarlyon at her house in Belgrave Square towards eight o’clock last night----” Ivor very consciously, very determinedly, closed his eyes and then he opened them again. Yes, there was “Virginia arrogant” in front of him. Then he looked about the platform--it seemed suddenly to be crowded with people, and they all seemed to be yelling about something. He turned to the small type again: “Lady Tarlyon, who will perhaps be better remembered as the Hon. Virginia Tracy and later as Mrs. Hector Sardon, underwent a serious operation some weeks ago, from which it was thought she had quite...” he skipped a few words “ ..presumably went out too soon, walking in the rain of the day before yesterday, and contracted a chill which, in her weak state of health, only too soon.... Every one will regr---- Viscount Tarly----” He simply couldn’t see any more of the type, his eyes wouldn’t take it in; and there was a frightful noise in his ears, every one seemed to be yelling right at him. People shouting, people pushing, porters.... “LONDON train! Stop at Newbury and Reading! LONDON TRAIN!” bang into his ear. Doors slammed to, and then the train seemed to move across his eyes, kept on moving....

“Come on, sir, come _on_!” a voice cried impatiently. Ivor shook his head at the voice and bent down to pick up _The Times_ at his feet. Someone had trodden on it.

He left the station very slowly: the way he had come, through the turnstile into the fields, clutching the papers. Oh, rot.... “In the rain of the day before yesterday,” it said. He stopped and looked at the paper again; and, somehow dropping them both on to the path, left them both there.... But that was the day she had sent him the first wire! How then?... He couldn’t understand it at all, he couldn’t make head or tail of the thing. Why, damn it, she’d sent him a wire only yesterday evening--5.45! And then, quite clearly, he knew that Virginia hadn’t written that wire herself--she had told little Smith to write it! Virginia wouldn’t have signed the wire “Virginia”--she would never have signed a wire to him--she hadn’t signed the wire that had taken him to Cimiez--she hadn’t signed the first wire. “In the rain of the day before yesterday.” ... Oh, my God!

He must have been walking at a furious pace, for he had to stop to wipe his face with his handkerchief. His face was wet, dripping wet.... That wire, that first wire! “Come back!” He saw it now, all of it, everything. His thoughts tore round that first wire in a kind of fierce circle, a clear circle, round and round it, round and round every detail of it. “In the rain of the day before yesterday!” He saw and heard Virginia, very white of face. As though he was there now, he saw Virginia on that day. Just after luncheon. Virginia always called it luncheon, never lunch. “And where shall we luncheon to-day?” she’d say.... Drizzling outside. He heard her voice, rather sharp and hard.

“I’m going out, Smith.”

“_Oh, mais il pleut, milady!_” That anxious little Smith! so fearful of and for her mistress!

“I am going out, Smith. To send a wire.”

And he saw the sharp and dangerous gesture with which Virginia cut short poor little Smith’s cry that she could send the wire. “_Mais il pleut, milady!_”

“But I _wish_ to send it myself! No more now. You can come with me if you like.... No, I can’t wait for the car. And I want to walk. Good God, why shouldn’t I walk just for once!” The sudden and sweeping impatience! “_Oh, milady, milady!_”

And he saw Virginia walking. Long swift strides through the drizzle towards the Post Office in Knightsbridge. She wanted to send it herself! It was an idea.... Oh, he knew, he knew! He saw everything--he saw Virginia’s heart! She wanted to send that wire herself! Ivor would know....

And the anxious little Smith trotting along just behind her, breathlessly. “_Oh, milady, milady!_” Holding up an umbrella in front of her, trying to cover Virginia with it, panting a little after those swift Virginian strides. Never in her life had Virginia walked under an umbrella, you couldn’t conceive it! Always she had been just ahead of an umbrella, just outside it, and someone panting, laughing, crying behind her. Not an umbrella-woman, Virginia.... Striding towards Knightsbridge with set white face, so determined, heroically set. But she was heroic! Eyes straight ahead--a soldier’s eyes, fearless eyes! Those curious eyes that could make molehills out of mountains--Ah, why had he never thought of that before? And agonised little Smith in her blue waterproof, panting behind with her umbrella inclined forwards. “_Oh, milady, milady!_”

And then she had sent that first wire. Those two words: “Come back.” Everything was in those two words--imperious and humble, ashamed and forgiving--and so generous! Everything of Virginia and of love was in those two quick words--and he hadn’t seen it! He hadn’t seen Virginia’s heart, that lovely and mysterious heart! He had been like a swine before the two pearls in that wire. He just hadn’t seen! And then she had gone back home, maybe not so swiftly; and happily--oh, yes, happily! He could see the light in her eyes as she walked back home, not so swiftly: the merry light in Virginia’s eyes--trusting Ivor! He would come back quickly. And little Smith had been glad.... But he hadn’t gone. And when she had got back to the “mausoleum,” she had shivered a little from the damp, and was soon in bed with a chill: quite slight at first, “Oh, very minor!” but quick to feed on Virginia’s so weak health, terribly quick and wanton in its fierceness: and to her lungs, easily.... And he had not gone. My God, he had not gone!

And then that second wire--5.45 yesterday! Virginia had waited all day, growing worse all day. She had waited for him. And at last--at 5.30, say!--she had commanded Smith to send that wire: “Please....” And she had commanded Smith on pain of death to say nothing of her being ill. “Just write ‘Please come back.’” Weaker and weaker every minute, the chill in her lungs--poor Virginia, brave Virginia! “_Oh, milady, milady!_” Pitiful at last! Dying ... maybe she knew she was dying when she told Smith to send that wire, maybe she was at last seeing the “dead-end” of her fears--and no Ivor in the “dead-end” this time! Ah, she was _fey_, this Virginia. He had always known.... And how he had started to run this morning--ages ago! He had known something. “Please,” she had said. And now in his ears.... And he had wanted everything! He! “And haven’t I given you everything, Ivor?” she softly asked. He heard her.... How she would say, “Ivor!” telling him that the name pleased her heart.... Funny Virginia, she was so mysterious.... Every woman has a legend, there is a legend to every woman.... His was a terrible crime. From a silly, trivial thing this crime had been born, but it was a terrible crime. He had killed Virginia, ... he had closed the reckless light in Virginia’s eyes. The brave and hazardous eyes ... of white Virginia! But why did he see her, think of her, as white? And his mind searched furiously, and at last his mind found a dream in which was a column of marble.... Oh, yes, that funny dream! and the naked white figure clinging to that column, so white she looked up there, clinging to it with white arms and legs, and destroying it with kisses.... That dream had given him Virginia and him to Virginia. And as he walked headlong up the roads of Berkshire he dreamed that dream again.

2

The first shock Turner received that day was on seeing a tall figure approaching from Hungerford. “Well!” he thought. Turner and luggage were in the Nasyngton grocer’s cart on their way to the station.

“’Ere, pull up!” he said to the man. “’E’s coming the wrong way.”

“Coming quick, whichever way!” murmured the Nasyngton grocer.

And the figure was coming quick! As he approached them, drawn up at the side of the road, Turner cried, “I say, sir!” But though he cried “I say, sir!” twice more, the figure passed them without stopping. The figure certainly glanced at them, but seemed to see or hear nothing. “Balmy,” said the Nasyngton grocer. And the figure strode on, his hat swinging furiously from his one hand. Turner took off his Derby and scratched his head.

“Right about turn,” he said at last, patiently.

The old nag wheeled slowly round, and ambled after the figure with the waving right arm.

“’E looks dark,” commented the Nasyngton grocer.

Turner was perturbed.

“Like the Wandering Jew,” he said softly. “No less....” And Turner whistled softly, patiently.

The Nasyngton grocer’s horse was old and unused to hurrying: it did not hurry now; and the striding figure of his master was soon lost to Turner’s solicitous eye round a bend.

But when he reached the house he was offended to find no one there. “Well!” Turner muttered. Whereupon the Nasyngton grocer thought fit to ask a question.

“Oh, go ’ome!’ said Turner sharply. Then he waited for a long time. And he got bored to death; for there was nothing for him to do about the house, he didn’t know whether they were to stay or go to London. “’Anging about!” he muttered. Turner, like his master, liked to know where he _was_; and now he wasn’t anywhere, unless being between Nasyngton and London and going without lunch was being somewhere.

He waited for hours; it was after two o’clock, and he was hungry; and, examining the kitchen, he found half a loaf of bread and one egg. “Scramble it!” he mimicked viciously. He boiled it.... And then Turner had a curious feeling: he felt that he didn’t belong to this Nasyngton house to-day, he belonged to Upper Brook Street, where he would have been this moment but for having said “Right about turn.” And so, having that curious feeling, Turner stood on the front door steps and smoked a cigarette. He stared at the Kennet. It was still, placid. “Nothing rising.” ...

And then he had to throw his cigarette away--for round the corner of the drive strode a dark figure. Right at him.... Turner was shocked. “Talk about sweat!” he said later to Mrs. Hope. His master’s face glistened with it, it dripped from him; if he had been wearing a hard collar it would have melted; his dark hair was all over the place, and there was a dry, red rim around his eyes as though he had been in a great wind. Turner pulled himself together and took a letter out of his pocket. It was addressed in pencil, and he had great hopes of that letter.

“Letter, sir,” he muttered. “Came just after you left this----”

The dark figure was gone into the house.

3

In the sitting-room Ivor looked at the letter. That pencilled scrawl, so careless always--so much more careless on this envelope, so faint! But how? He stared at it.... Dear God, she had written it in bed yesterday, just in case he might not come! Fearing.... Forgiving him, humbling herself. And then, for the first time, he gave a sob. He knew everything that was in that letter, every word. Her lips were by his ear, telling him the words of that letter. “I’m sorry to have been a beast, Ivor, I’m so sorry. Everything is all right, Ivor, everything. I’m so sorry I hurt you ... only, you see, you aren’t casual enough.... Keep your eyebrows straight for me, my darling, don’t bring them down into the darkness. Be a little more casual, Ivor....” Oh! _he_ not casual enough!... And it was impossible for him to open that thin envelope crushed in his hand.

Turner tiptoed to the door of the sitting-room. He had heard that sob, and was amazed and afraid. And then Turner saw a strange thing. He saw a one-armed man without resource in his mind trying to tear across an unopened envelope. The one-armed man had his knee up to and pressed against the edge of the table, and under the knee was half the envelope, and his fingers were childishly tearing at the other half; and at last the other half came away in his fingers.... Then eyes looked at Turner at the door; and Turner ran away.

“Like a lot of mad babies crying in a man’s inside,” he tried to explain that look to Mrs. Hope.