• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

By Root 5801 0

be right about small things, liked having foretold this change in the weather. The first week the tulips were out, no sun shone on them; they stood in their mauves, corals and crimsons, fleshily damp, with no one by to see. No, this May afternoon was not like that May afternoon when old Mr. Quayne had crept about in the park. Portia did not see Eddie till the end of that week, when she came in on Saturday afternoon to find him at tea with Anna. He seemed very much pleased, greatly surprised to see her, jumped up, smiled all over, took her hand and exclaimed to Anna: "Doesn't she look well, still!" He made her sit down where he had been sitting, while he sat on the arm of the chair. Meanwhile, Anna, with just the hint of a flicker, rang for another cup. Portia was in the wrong; she was not expected; she had said she would have tea with Lilian that afternoon. "Do you know," went on Eddie, "it must be months since we have all three met?"

St. Quentin, the previous Wednesday, had been more enthusiastic. Portia had met him walking briskly, aimlessly along Wigmore Street—black Homburg hat cocked forward, gloves tightly clasped in both hands behind his back. Half stopping now and then, and turning his whole body, he gave the luxury objects in dark polished windows glances of a distracted intensity. His behaviour was, somehow, not plausible: Portia felt uncertain, as she approached him, whether St. Quentin really did not see her, or did see her and wished to show that he did not. She hesitated—ought she to cross the street?—but then made on down the pavement, swinging her despatch case, like a too light little boat before a too strong wind: she could find no reason to stop. Something about her reflection in a window caught St. Quentin's eye, and he turned round.

"Oh, hullo," he said rapidly, "hullo! So you're back, too: how nice! What are you doing?"

"Going home from lessons."

"How lucky you are—I am not doing anything. That's to say, I am putting in time. Do you go down Mandeville Place? Shall we walk down Mandeville Place?"

So they turned the corner together. Portia shifted her despatch case from one hand to the other and said: "How is your new book?"

Instead of replying, St. Quentin looked up at the windows. "We'd better not talk too loud: this is full of nursing homes. You know how the sick listen.... Have you had a nice time?" he continued, pitching his voice low.

"Yes, very," she said almost down to a whisper. She had an inner view of white high beds, fever charts, waxy flowers.

"I'm afraid I can't remember where you were."

"At Seale. The seaside."

"Delightful. How you must miss it. I wish I could go away. In fact I think I shall; there is no reason why I shouldn't, but I'm in such a neurotic state. Do tell me about something. How is your diary?"

He saw Portia's face flash his way; she at once threw him a look like a trapped, horrified bird's. They pulled up to let someone, stepping out of a taxi, cross the pavement and carry a sheaf of flowers up the stark steps of a nursing home. When they walked on again, St. Quentin was once more up to anything, while Portia looked ahead steadily, stonily, down the overcast canyon of the street that was threatening in this sudden gloom of spring. He said: "That was just a shot in the dark. I feel certain you should keep a diary. I'm sure you have thoughts about life."

"No, I don't think much," she said.

"My dear girl, that is hardly necessary. What I'm certain you do have are reactions. And I wonder what those are, whenever I look at you."

"I don't know what they are. I mean, what are reactions?"

"Well, I could explain, but must I? You do have feelings, of course?"

"Yes. Don't you?"

St. Quentin bit at his upper lip moodily, making his moustache dip. "No, not often; I mean, not really. They're not so much fun for me. Now what can have made me think you kept a diary? Now that I come to look at you, I don't think you'd be so rash."

"If I kept one, it would be a dead secret. Why should that be rash?"

"It is madness to write things down."

"But you write those books you write