Chapter IX: Book II: Her Book (5)

His honour as a chauffeur was at stake. His blood was up. His knowledge had begun to work in him and he adored his master. He knew what he was trying to do.

We could do it if we kept our heads; if we exceeded the speed limit; if we had luck; if we didn't break down; if neither the county constabulary nor the country traffic held us up.

Kendal declared we could do it easily and allow for accidents. At Horsham Junction you have nearly half an hour to wait between the arrival of the Midhurst and Selham train and the departure of the London express. And the local trains take more than half an hour to get from Selham to Horsham. At a pinch you could speed the car up to the limit of the local train. And, as we had to allow for accidents, we did speed her up whenever we saw a clean track before us.

The run to Selham was nothing to it. It was as if we were racing the train with its three minutes start, as if, positively, we might overtake it at any of the intermediate stations, as if it were in this hope that we dashed up the long white slope to Petworth.

The heat of the day gathered over our heads and smouldered in the east.

And as we ran I realized at last why we were running and what the race was and the hunt, and what our quarry. I remembered that other slower chase that was yet so keen and so agonizing; that hunting down of the same tender flesh and blood, over the Channel and across a foreign country. That was bad enough; but it was not like this. For then I was alone in my hunting of Viola; there was nobody but me, who loved her, to see her run to earth and caught crouching in her corner. That she would crouch, this time, and hide herself, I had no doubt. This hunt that I shared with her sister and her servant was abominable to me and shameful. And between the shame of that flight of hers and this flight there was no comparison. You don't go looking at belfries with Charlie Thesiger. I could not reconcile that enchanting and enchanted Viola of the garden of Bruges with this dreadful flying figure.

I hated myself; I hated Kendal, the chauffeur, as I sat behind his tight, efficient body that quivered with the fury of the hunt. (To think that _his_ blood should be up and against Viola!) I hated the car that seemed more than ever a living thing, that breathed and snorted and vibrated with the same passion, and was endowed with this incredible speed and this superhuman power. With its black nose and white flanks, and its black hood and the black wings of its splash-boards, it was some terrible and sinister and malignant monster of prey hunting down Viola. Its body had been built, its engines had been forged, to hunt down Viola. The infernal thing had been invented to hunt down Viola.

Somewhere between Petworth and Fittleworth Kendal stopped to water his engine. It was then that we noticed how the gathering heat was piled into a bank of cloud over the east. At the back of our necks we could feel a little hot puff of wind that came up from the west.

"Shouldn't wonder if there was a storm," said Kendal. He added, with the ghost of a grin, "If Mr. Jevons sees that cloud, sir, he'll not wire to be met at Midhurst. He'd crawl home on his 'ands and knees first."

He slipped into his seat and we dashed on.

At Fittleworth, within a stone's-throw of the railway and the road, there is a patch of moor where the ground rises in a hillock. In July and August when the heather's out this hillock is a crimson landmark above the water meadows.

When we came within sight of it Kendal suddenly slowed down, then jammed his brakes hard, and with an awful grinding and snorting the car came to a stand-still.

Kendal stood up. He muttered something about being blowed. Then he turned.

"Got the glasses there, sir?"

I found the glasses, but I didn't give them to Kendal. I stood up too and looked through them.

I couldn't see anything at first.

"There, sir," said Kendal, pointing. "No. You're looking too much to the left. You got to get right o' thet sandy patch--against thet there clump of heather. Now d'you see, sir?"

I did.

Kendal had made out with the naked eye a figure, the figure of a woman, seated on the hillside, a white figure that showed plainly against the red background of the heather.

"It's Mrs. Jevons, sir," he stated.

It was.

I could see her quite distinctly through the field-glasses. She was sitting on the clump of heather to the right of the sandy patch, settled and motionless, in the attitude of one who waited at her ease, with hours before her. And she was alone.

We went on as far as we could towards the moor. Norah and I left the car and struck across the moor by the sandy track that led to the bare patch and the clump of heather.

The seated figure must have been aware of us from the first moment of our approach. You couldn't miss that black and white car as it charged along the highway, or as it stood now, with its engines still humming, by the roadside. But the figure remained seated in its attitude of waiting. It waited while we crossed the moor; and as we climbed the hillock we became intensely aware of it and of its immobility.

We saw its face fixed on us with an expression of tranquil patience and expectation. I may say that I felt an intolerable embarrassment before this quietness of the hunted thing that we had run to earth; especially as it was on me, and not Norah, that Viola's face was fixed as we came nearer.

Then she smiled at me; there was neither conciliation nor defiance in her smile, but a sort of serene assurance and--yes, it was unmistakable--contempt.

She said, "Whatever do you think you're doing _now_?"

I said we might not know what we were doing, but we knew what we were going to do. We were going to take her back with us in the car.

At that she asked us (but without any sign of perturbation) if we had got Jimmy there?

Norah said No, our idea was to run back to Amershott before Jimmy got there.

"Where were you running to when you saw me sitting up here?" she said.

I said we'd meant to catch her at Selham but we missed the train and were trying to get to Horsham before the London train started.

She was looking at me now with a sort of compassion, the tenderness of her contempt.

"I see," she said. "You _were_ clever, weren't you?"

She looked at her watch. "Well, as you _are_ here," she said, "I'd let you run me down to Horsham, if you want a run, only I can't very well use Jimmy's car."

I think it was Norah who asked her what on earth she was doing at Fittleworth.

"Can't you see," she said, "that I'm waiting for the next train?"

"Did you walk here from Amershott, or what?" I said.

She said, "Rather not. I was in the train."

Then Norah said, "What happened?"

It had dawned on us both how odd it was that Viola should be here, apparently alone, at Fittleworth. It was also odd how we were all ignoring Charlie. I believe I had a sort of idea that she had got him hidden somewhere in the landscape.

Viola smiled a reminiscent smile. "If you _must_ know," she said, "what happened was that Charlie was in that train, too--he came bursting out on to the platform at Selham, awfully pleased with himself, because he'd picked my luggage up at Midhurst and bagged a corner seat for me, and made faces at people to keep them out."

"Did you know he was going up to town?" I said.

"No, of course I didn't. He didn't know it himself. There was no reason why he shouldn't go. And you'd have thought there was no reason why we shouldn't go together. He was all right till we got to Petworth. But after that he lost his head and made such an ass of himself that I had to get out here and make him go on by himself. Silly idiot!"

We were sitting in the heather, one on each side of her, and I saw my wife slip her arm into hers and hug it to her.

"Did _you_ know," she said, "that Charlie'd gone?"

We didn't answer. We simply couldn't.

And then Viola said, "Poor little Norah!"

And she told her to run away for ten minutes while she talked to me.

"Why poor little Norah?" I asked when we were alone.

"Because," she said, "you frightened her."

"I? Frightened her?"

"Yes," she said. "You made her think I was going to run away with Charlie. There's no good trying to look as if you didn't. You're quite awful, Furny, in the things you think. You can't help it, I know. You're so good, so shockingly good, and you can't bear other people to be naughty. You thought I'd run away to Belgium with Jimmy and you came rushing after me and fetched me back. You thought I'd run away with Charlie and you came rushing--in your dreadful rectitude, and in Jimmy's motor-car that he won't let anybody look at. You'll have an awful time with Jimmy when you get back. It's going to rain, and there'll be mud on the car, and he'll dance with rage when he sees it. And he won't think it's any excuse if you tell him you thought I was running away with Charlie, and you took the car to fetch me back; he'll say you'd no business to think it and in any case you'd no business to take the car out. And poor Kendal will be sacked.

"That's all you've done," she said, "by your fussy interference."

She went on. "It wouldn't matter what you think about me--but it was beastly of you to go and make Norah think it."

I said I didn't suppose either of us thought anything, except that since she was going up to town with the idea of leaving her husband, it was not desirable that she should go up with Charlie Thesiger.

"Who could possibly have supposed," she said, "that Charlie would be such an ass?"

I said I for one could.

"Oh, you--haven't I told you you're always supposing things?"

"Surely?" I said, "you must have seen--yourself--"

She smiled. "My dear--I couldn't see anything but poor Jimmy."

"And yet," I said, "you could think of leaving him?"

She moaned. "You fool--you fool--that's _why_ I'm thinking of it."

She pressed her hands to her eyes as if she shut back the sight of him.

"You aren't thinking of it," I said. "You haven't left him. You've only been for a good long walk to Fittleworth, and we've come to fetch you back in the car."

"Haven't I told you that I can't and won't use Jimmy's car?"

"You can't use it to run away from him in; but you can very well use it to go back to him."

"I'm not going back to him," she said. "Can't you see that I've burnt my boats?"

"You may have burnt the old ones, Viola," I said. "But you can build new."

"You must give me time, Wally. It'll take a long time. And you don't understand me. I _want_ to get away from Jimmy. That's why I'm going away now, while he isn't there. That's what I mean by burning my boats. If I go back to him--if I see him--I shall never get away. I shan't have the courage. I shall just crumple up with the first sight of him--with the first word he says--"

"Why not," I said, "crumple up?"

She lifted her head as I had seen her lift it before.

"Because," she said, "I wish to be straight."

I asked her if running away behind Jimmy's back was her idea of straightness? To which she replied that _my_ rectitude was excruciating and that I'd twist anything to a moral purpose, but it was twisting all the same. Couldn't I see that _the_ awful thing would be to come sneaking back and pretend to Jimmy that she hadn't run away from him?--If that was my idea of straightness she was sorry for me.

I said, "My dear child, you must see that running away by yourself is one thing, and running away with Charlie Thesiger is another. It would be all very well if Charlie hadn't got into that train."

She wanted to know what that mattered when she had got out of the train? I suggested that the people who saw Charlie get in hadn't seen her get out, and that she must look at the thing as it appeared to other people.

"Look," I said, "at the facts. Mrs. Jevons walks to Selham Station for the London train. Captain Thesiger joins her there, presumably by pre-arrangement, leaving by Midhurst station so that they may not be seen going away together. She is, however, seen entering his compartment at Selham. At Fittleworth she is seized with prudence and with panic. She is seen getting out on to the platform. And she is seen two hours later following the Captain up to London by the next train."

She seemed to be considering it.

"How many people," she said, "know that Charlie was in that train? People that matter--I don't mean you and Norah."

"Your butler, your parlourmaid, your housemaid, your cook, your gardener--by this time--and Baby's nurse--"

("And Baby," she interrupted.)

"--The guard of the train, the booking clerks and porters at Midhurst and Selham, and the station-masters at Midhurst and Selham and Petworth (probably) and Fittleworth. Quite a number of important people, to say nothing of Kendal, who is perhaps the most important of them all."

"And who was it who brought Kendal into it?"

I was silent.

"Nobody but you, Furny, or a born fool, would have dreamed of bringing Kendal in."

I said that a little reflection would show her that it was impossible to keep him out. To this she said, "Please go and find Norah. I want her."

I found Norah. I warned her that Viola was going to be extremely difficult. She said it would be all right if I left Viola to her.

As we approached, Viola turned to her sister with an air of outraged and long-suffering dignity.

"Norah," she said. "I do wish you would make Wally see what an ass he's making of himself."

My wife said, in her admirable, judicial way, "How an ass?"

"Well--trying to make me go back and bringing Kendal out here to fetch me. He doesn't seem to see that if I do go back with him it'll be as good as proclaiming to everybody that I ran away with Charlie and was found out by my clever brother-in-law who tracked me down in my husband's motor-car and brought me back in it. Whereas, if I go quietly on to London, as I meant to and as everybody knows I meant to, it'll be all right."

"It won't," I said, "as long as Charlie's there. It will be if you come home with us in the car now, and go up to town with Norah and me on Monday."

"I've told you," she said wearily, "that I can't go back because I shall never get away if I do. And I _must_--I must--and I will."

"Yes, dear, and you shall," my wife said, as if she were humouring somebody who was mad.

But for a mad woman Viola, I must say, was extraordinarily lucid.

"What excuse did you give to Kendal for following me in this way?"

"We told him we had an important message to give you before you started."

"Important message! That was pretty thin. I'd have thought of something cleverer than that if I'd been you. You _are_ a precious pair of conspirators. Can't you see that it's you--with your ridiculous suspicions--that have given me away?"

Norah answered her.

"Oh, Vee-Vee," she said, "we hadn't any suspicions. The message was to tell you that Charlie was in the train. We knew you didn't know it."

To this Viola said coldly, "Walter didn't."

I tried to reassure her, but she waved me away with her hands and implored me to "let her think."

"Well," she said presently, "it isn't as bad as you've tried to make it, even with Kendal thrown in. You came rushing after me to give me a message, and you _have_ given me a message, and now you'll go and tell Kendal that it's all right, and thank him nicely for catching me up, and _you_ rush home again, and I go on quietly to London by the next train."

"Yes, dear," said Norah. "And I'm going up with you while Wally rushes home and follows with Nurse and Baby and the luggage by the morning train."

"That's all very well," said Viola, "but who explains to Jimmy?"

"Oh," said my wife, "Wally does that. You can trust him. Besides you haven't got to explain things to Jimmy."

Well, we settled it that way. It was the only possible solution. The more she thought of it, Viola said, the more she liked it. And she rubbed it into me that it was Norah's solution, and not mine.

Her last words to me as I saw them off at Fittleworth Station were that I needn't worry. It was going to rain. And when poor Jimmy saw his car come in all splashed with rain and covered with mud--"It won't be me," she said, "you'll have to explain about."

And it wasn't.

The storm came down just as we were leaving Fittleworth, and we brought that car back in an awful state. You wouldn't have known it had ever been a black-and-white car. And Jevons (in a mackintosh) was waiting for me in the lane by the courtyard gates. He had caught the early train, but he had seen the storm coming and had walked up from Midhurst, and, as I say, he was waiting for us.

Well--neither Viola nor Norah was with us, and the language, that Jimmy poured out over me and Kendal recalled all the freshness and the vigour of his earliest inspirations; it was steeped, you might say, in all the colours of the sunset; it had flashes of tropic splendour; it was such a gorgeous specimen of an art in which Kendal dabbled, as he said modestly, a little himself, that it "fair took the shine out of him." The chauffeur was prostrated with admiration.

"When Mr. Jevons lays himself out to express himself, sir," he said to me as we retreated, "he pulls it off what you may call a bleedin' masterpiece."

I tried to explain about Viola an hour later. But he wouldn't listen to me. That was all right, he said. He was going to ask us to take her for a month or so anyhow. It was getting a bit stuffy for her down here.

Then he fixed me with "Did Thesiger go up with her?"

There was no good trying to lie to Jevons, so I said that had been Thesiger's idea, but Viola hadn't cared much about having him, for she had got out at Fittleworth and taken Norah on with her.

"I suppose the young ass tried to make love to her. He's fool enough for anything," said Jimmy. But he reverted. "I still can't see why you took the car out. Anybody but an idiot would have known it was going to rain."