The Death of the Heart - Elizabeth Bowen [116]
"I wondered if there were letters..."
"There are letters, of course. But nothing at all funny. However, darling, here they all are." She dropped the letters on to the bed beside him, and went across to the mirror, where she took off the net cap that kept the waves in her hair. Making a harsh face at her reflection, she began to rub in complexion milk with both hands. Tapping about among the pots and bottles, she had found everything in its known place—the familiarity of all these actions made something at once close in on her: the mood of her London dressing-table. With her back to Thomas, who sat raking through letters, she said: "Well, here we are back."
"What did you say?"
"I said, we are back again."
Thomas looked all round the room, then at the dressing-table. He said: "How quickly Matchett's unpacked."
"Only the dressing case. After that, I turned her out and told her to come back and finish later. I could see from her face she was going to say something."
Thomas left the letters and sat leaning forward. "Perhaps she really had got something to say."
"Well, Thomas, but what a moment—really! Did you hear me say just now that here we were, back?"
"I did, yes. What do you want me to say?"
"I wish you would say something. Our life goes by without any comment."
"What you want is some sort of a troubadour."
Anna wiped complexion milk off her fingers on to a tissue, smartly re-tied the sash of her wrapper, walked across and gave Thomas's head a light friendly-unfriendly cuff. She said: "You are like one of those sitting images that get moved about but still always just sit. I like to feel some way about what happens. We're home, Thomas: have some ideas about home—" More lightly, less kindly, she hit at his head again.
"Shut up: don't knock me about. I've got a headache."
"Oh dear, oh dear! Try a bath."
"I will later. But just now, don't hit my head....
I thought Portia gave us a welcome."
"Poor child, oh poor child, yes. She stood about like an angel. It was we who were not adequate. I wasn't very, was I?"
"No, I don't think you were."
"But you think you were? You bolted into the study. What's in your mind, I suppose, is, why should you rise to occasions when I don't? Let's face it—who ever is adequate? We all create situations each other can't live up to, then break our hearts at them because they don't. One doesn't have to be in love to be silly—in fact I think one is sillier when one's not in love, because then one makes a thing about everything. At least, that is how it is with me. Major Brutt sending those carnations has made me hysterical. Did you see them? They were cochineal pink."
"I don't create situations, I don't think."
"Yes, you do; you're creating one by having a headache. Besides you are making creases in my quilt."
"I'm sorry," said Thomas rising. "I'll go down."
"Now you are making another situation. What I really want to do is to dress and not have to talk, but I can't have you walk out into the night. And Matchett is simply waiting to pop back and rustle about and spring something on me. I know I am disappointing you, darling. I'm sure you would be happier in the study."
"Portia's down there, writing to Major Brutt."
"And if you go down, you'll feel you will have to say, 'Well, Portia, how are you getting on with your letter to Major Brutt?'"
"No, I shouldn't see the least necessity to."
"Well, Portia would look up until you did. Now, Major Brutt having sent me those carnations is just the sort of thing that Portia really enjoys," said Anna, sitting down by the dressing-table, unrolling and putting on a pair of silk stockings. "Yes, it often does seem to me that you and I are not natural. But I also say to myself, well, who is natural, then?"
Having put his glass down on the carpet, Thomas boldly swung his legs up on to the bed and stretched out on the immaculate quilt. "I don't think that bath has done you much good," he said. "Or is this the way you talk most of the time? We so seldom talk; we're so seldom together."
"I must be tired; I do feel rather unreal. As I keep saying,