The Complete Short Stories of Evelyn Waugh - Evelyn Waugh [244]
So the autumn grew into winter and a new year began. And the turnkey was lame and his face was scarred with pox and his mouth was drawn with laughing at the sorrow about him; and daily he came to the cell and no other man did the Lady Elizabeth see, except Antony who had been her lover. And as winter grew into spring and the hate increased in the eyes of Elizabeth, so there grew also desire for the love of that man that was lost to her. And Antony who slept on the wet stones and ate the rotten bread was agued and sick and too weak to move from his corner; only his eyes followed Elizabeth as she moved in the cell.
One day when the food had been set before her, the Lady Elizabeth said, “Turnkey, am I still beautiful?”
And the turnkey answered:
“Not with the beauty in which I first saw you, Lady Elizabeth; for your cheeks are grown pale and your hair dull and coarse, and all your fair skin is blotched and dirty. Yet are you still very beautiful.”
“I have not seen my image for many months. Let me look in your eyes and see if I am still beautiful.”
So the turnkey thrust his face which was pock-marked and drawn with derision near to the face of the Lady Elizabeth; and there was desire in their eyes. And she put her hands in his hair and she leaned her breast against his and so the Lady Elizabeth, who had known the white arms of Antony, loved this turnkey who was ugly and low born. And Antony made no sound but lay in his corner burdened with his ague and the great chain which he could barely move; but in his eyes there was pain as is seldom seen in men.
And the turnkey said, “I will go and bring wine and we will make a feast for this new love which we have found.” And they spoke of this new thing which had come to them, and how they would entertain it; and the turnkey promised that she should leave the cell and live with him in his lodgings, where there should be water for her to wash herself and clean food for her to eat and a small courtyard to walk in, whence could be seen the tops of trees. And she cried, “O my love, return to me soon.”
Thus was she left with Antony.
And Antony was weak and burdened with his chain but there was pain in him which raised him from his corner; and he spoke no word but crept to Elizabeth, who had been his lover, silently, as the foul things on the walls. And she rose in alarm and made to escape him, but he caught at her ankle and drew her to the floor. And between his hands was the heavy chain and he stretched it across her throat and knelt on the two ends between his wrists so that the great links pressed into her neck. And Elizabeth, who had been his lover, struggled with him, but the pain lent him strength and he prevailed; and the struggling of her hands ceased and thus the Lady Elizabeth died.
And so the turnkey found them when he returned; and he uttered a cry and the flask of wine slipped from his fingers and scattered itself on the wet floor. And he ran to where the Lady Elizabeth lay and laid his hand on her breast and knew that she was dead. And spoke no word but left her with Antony and shut the great door and locked it and threw the key into the Castle moat. And he never returned to the cell to tend the body of Elizabeth, for he had known love there.
These things he told Cazarin, who had been educated at Paris, before the people of St. Romeiro killed him.
EDWARD OF UNIQUE
ACHIEVEMENT
A TALE OF BLOOD AND ALCOHOL
IN AN OXFORD COLLEGE
I have for a long time hesitated to tell this story of Edward. For six weeks past, since Edward late one evening interrupted my essay to grow expansive over my whiskey, I have done the manly thing and told no one—at least practically no one. But lately this wasting of “copy”—as all good journalists are wont to describe the misfortunes of