Friendly Young Ladies (16 page)

It was supposed to be his free afternoon; but an emergency, coming in after his relief was already occupied with another, had kept him till half-past five. It had been one of those depressing cases which spin out an infinitesimal chance of life until every expedient has been exhausted, and then die leaving an undeserved sense of failure behind. Peter felt discouraged in proportion to his efforts, which had been wholehearted. He now remembered that he had intended taking one of the nurses out to tea—a first-year probationer, wide-eyed and pretty and rather promising—and that her off-duty time was already over. Norah was in charge of a diabetic bishop in Regent’s Park, and would not be free till nine. Peter picked up a copy of
Razzle
(May of the previous year) and studied without amusement a joke about a blonde leaving part of her underwear in a taxi.

Miss Perkins had been discharged that morning; perhaps, he thought, this had contributed to his disillusioned mood. He had put a good deal into Miss Perkins—two blood transfusions, liver extract, Vitamin B, and (he felt) his immortal soul. As for her anæmia, it had improved; but a student could have seen to that. For a case in his own line, she had been bitterly unrewarding. Miss Perkins was a schoolteacher of thirty-nine, with a thin sad face, straight hair, and spectacles. The deficiency of her red cells, as his experience had recognized at once, had only been symptomatic of a lack more fundamental. It was palpably obvious that the only men to whom the poor creature ever spoke were the Vicar and the Board of Education inspector. He had gone out of his way to remedy this. He had lent her books, progressively advanced; sat with her much longer than the taking of her simple history demanded; sympathized with her; talked about himself; and, when she became confidential, held her hand. At first she had responded beautifully, and become, now and then, animated and almost pretty. She had left her glasses off, and put rachel powder on. The ward sister reported that her appetite had improved. Encouraged, he had visited her again, talking more and further; about human relationships, about God, about his views on marriage, about the way in which he and Norah intended to put these into practice at some still unspecified date. And then, suddenly, she had relapsed, gone back into herself, ceased to respond. One might almost say that she had frozen up on him. She had gone out, in the end, as plain and apathetic as when she had arrived. Peter simply could not see any reason for it. And, when he had related the case history to Norah, she had actually laughed.

Sometimes he found himself on the verge of thinking that Norah had not been entirely rewarding either. Her departure to Mrs. Craven’s Nursing Co-operation had seemed to him odd and unnecessary; and her explanation, that she thought they had been seeing too much of one another lately, still had him completely baffled.

Except for this unaccountable remark, and a somewhat escapist enthusiasm for eighteenth-century prints, there had been only one respect in which she had failed to model herself on his precepts; and this, one day, he had pointed out to her, with the truthfulness on which they prided themselves. He didn’t want her to think he looked upon her possessively, he had explained, or that he wished to keep her in a rut; if she felt like a diversion or experiment elsewhere now and again, he promised to extend to this event all the toleration which, in like case, he would expect for himself. She had received this with a lack of comment which was a little unlike her; merely thanking him and saying she would bear it in mind; but she had appeared to be pondering the matter—or, at any rate, to be pondering—and it seemed strange that so soon afterwards she should have betaken herself to private nursing, where leisure was so limited and the opportunities for social contact were so few. He had not, of course, so far forsaken his principles as to question the step, still less to argue it; but sometimes he wondered. He was wondering this evening, when the disregarded wireless gave its signal for the news.

It was one of those happy seasons when no urgent world events were pending, so he continued with his thoughts, and it must have been his subconscious mind which, listening on its own, arrested them.

“Missing from her home,” said the well-bred impersonal instrument, “since Monday last, Elsa Lane, aged seventeen and a half; height five feet five inches, dark bobbed hair, pale complexion, brown eyes; when last seen was wearing a brown hat and coat, dark brown marocain dress with lace collar, brown stockings and shoes, small gold cross and chain. This girl has been ill recently and it is thought that she may be suffering from loss of memory. She is known to have taken a ticket to Bristol and it is possible that she may have obtained employment there. Will any person having information as to her whereabouts please communicate. …”

“Good Lord!” said Peter aloud, and dived for his jacket pocket. He had only just remembered the letter he had received that morning; a letter of, he had felt, rather daunting thickness, which he had put aside to read when occasion served. His first thought, as he began slitting it open, was that it had been unexpectedly smart of her to rebook at Bristol, where she was sure to pass unnoticed in the crowds; his second, that she might arrive at the hospital at any moment. Such was the effect of this on a hand normally steady, that he found he had torn the envelope almost in half.

The first sentences were such a relief that for a few minutes his eye ran on with little co-operation from his brain. A striking phrase or two, however, recalled his attention, and when he had finished he turned back and read the letter a second time. It was then that the postcript, which was overleaf, first attracted his notice. He gazed at it, in thought, for a moment or two; finally he tore off the address, and put it in his pocket-book, before throwing the rest on the fire.

“D
ON’T YOU FEEL LIKE
writing today?” asked Elsie. Leo had got up late that morning and, breakfast cleared away, was reading the magazine pages of the newspaper in the manner of one who may as well do that as anything else.

“Not much.” Leo put the paper down, and stretched apathetically. “Well, one can’t do nothing all morning, I suppose. I think I’ll get through some of Helen’s mending. She’s done a lot of mine.”

Moved partly by lack of occupation, and partly by curiosity—the picture of Leo sewing was difficult to form, though one supposed she must have done it sometimes at home—Elsie went upstairs half an hour later to look. Leo had spread a dust-sheet or something similar on the floor; a heap of satin and
crêpe de Chine
lay on one side of her, on the other the necessary implements, arranged in rows like tools on a bench. Sitting on a cushion in the middle, Leo was stitching with dogged, but workmanlike application; in her serge slacks and fisherman’s jersey, she put Elsie in mind of a sailor doing something to a sail. The result looked, however, on closer inspection, quite competent.

“Got something to amuse yourself with?” asked Leo, looking up. Her face looked, Elsie thought, a shade lighter-brown than usual; but she seemed cheerful enough.

“Yes, thank you. I’ve got lots to do.” Leo did not look in need of help; indeed she never did. Elsie, who had been used to her mother’s more leisurely and diffuse household methods, always found herself a beat or two behind, and had got out of the way of offering; Leo had never seemed to miss it. This morning she had her diary to write up; for two different and, it seemed to her, very significant thoughts about life had occurred to her last night in bed, and she had memorized them carefully. She took the volume (it was already a third full) into the living-room, and flattened it on the table; re-read the last entry, and chewed her pen with lingering anticipation. There had been nothing for her in the morning post; but it was only three days since she had written, and there would be another post in the afternoon.

She had got to the second thought when a voice outside shouted “Le—o!” from the water. Elsie, who had recognized it, withdrew herself reluctantly from composition, and went out on the floating deck. She found, however, that Leo had forestalled her by appearing on the balcony half-way up. She had hitched a knee on the rail and looked, in contrast with her earlier lethargy, quite brisk.

“Wotcher, Joe,” she called, with a vulgarity for which Elsie remembered their mother reproving her. “Come in and help yourself. How’s life?”

Joe eased in his punt, which contained a large enamel water-can, towards the deck.

“Hullo,” he said, smiling up at her. “Shame to rouse you out. I could have asked Elsie, I didn’t see her. Morning, Elsie.” To Leo he added, “Get on, don’t mind me, you look busy.”

“I’m only charing round. Leo balanced on the rail. I’m dead from the neck up. I thought you were in London.”

“I’ve just got up,” said Joe, with what appeared to be complete satisfaction. It was then a quarter to twelve.

“You needn’t be so filthily smug about it.” They grinned at one another, downward and upward, with vague morning cheerfulness, posed like a heavy burlesque of
Romeo and Juliet.
“What time did you go to bed?”

“About eleven. Then I woke up and worked till four. It went rather well.”

“Have you had breakfast, or lunch or anything?”

“Both, thanks. If you’re really not busy, can I ask you about something?”

“I don’t see why not.” Leo came down, and sat on the rail of the floating deck. It did not occur to Elsie, as it might have done with other people, to disappear; Leo and Joe never had the least appearance of having anything private to say to one another.

“Well”—Joe anchored himself and the punt to the rail with one arm—“You know Alcox’s page in
The Centaur,
and all those significant little thumbnail what-have-you’s they scatter about the columns? Can’t call them illustrations exactly, sort of relevant notions. Frenchman called Brunier did them. He’s going to Russia, indefinitely. They’ll certainly want to keep the layout if they can find someone else. I’m seeing Alcox this afternoon, and it struck me some of those doodles of Helen’s might fetch him. It’s nominally up to the art editor, but anything Alcox says will go. I don’t know, of course. Anyway I could try. Is she around?”

“No, she’s in town for the day. But Joe, not really? It’s awfully good of you. It’s just the sort of thing she’s always wanted to get her foot into. I’m glad she’s out, let’s not tell her until it comes off. Look, I’ll get you her stuff and you can go over it and pick out what you think. Shan’t be a minute.”

She disappeared. Joe, who seemed full this morning of surplus energy and animal spirits, stepped from his punt into the canoe, which was moored ready for use at the rail, undid its painter, and, standing, began to manoeuvre it along with the punt-pole.

“Well, I’m damned,” said Leo in the doorway. She put down Helen’s portfolio on the table, and came out. “What have you been holding out on me, Joe? You never told me you could pole a canoe.”

“Undergraduate stuff,” said Joe, rocking precariously. “Looks flash and serves no useful purpose whatever. Haven’t tried in ten years. The sight of this barge has the most unwholesome psychological effect on me.” He reeled and recovered, remarking to Elsie, disjointedly, “My college barge, this was. They scrapped it after it sank one year. Leo and I met that way. Had to come over and see who was using it. Top floor’s built on, of course.”

Leo remarked, “If you sink that canoe, you can go down after it and get it up again.”

Spurred by this, Joe gave his undivided attention to the matter in hand. He swung the pole; travelled, with great dash and efficiency, for twenty yards; turned half-round to wave to Leo, and went spectacularly into the river. The canoe itself he saved, at the penultimate instant, by performing a kind of vault out of it on the pole. Elsie, much alarmed, was reassured by the sight of Leo standing with her hands in her pockets and laughing whole-heartedly.

Joe came to the surface with unruffled cheerfulness; his short wiry hair, as he shook the water out of it, looked like a wet retriever’s. He appeared to be enjoying himself. Having shoved the canoe and pole in the direction of the deck, where Leo collected them, he heaved himself up and, squatting on the planks, wrung water from the surplus parts of his trousers. Elsie now found their normal state easier to understand. His upper half gave him no trouble, being, fortunately, unclad.

“O.K., try it yourself,” he said to Leo, who was still laughing. “I bet you a pint you don’t get it any further than I did. Elsie can see fair.”

“Done,” said Leo immediately. “You stand there, Elsie. And don’t move till I get there. Where did you start off?”

“About here. No, I’ll give you the benefit, call it here. Done it before?”

“You’ll see.”

“Why not change into a swim-suit first; I would.”

“Oh, you would, would you?” Leo stepped neatly into the centre of the canoe, balanced, and picked up the pole.

Elsie thought, suddenly and embarrassingly, of her letter to Peter. She had thought much about the moment of his arrival, and prayed inwardly that his first impressions might be good. Last evening, the technician from Elstree had dropped in and talked about montage, and Leo had been expert-sounding and intelligent. That would have been an excellent moment. But it was depressingly likely that it would be this kind of thing which would be going on. Only once, so far, had she heard Leo and Joe engaged in anything like a serious intellectual discussion, and that had been in the galley, where she had surprised them one morning peeling potatoes into the sink and arguing about Prince Henry’s treatment of Falstaff as if these characters had been personal acquaintances and it had all happened yesterday. Elsie almost wished that she hadn’t said Leo wrote at all. Lost in gloomy forebodings, she moved away from her station, lengthening Leo’s course by several yards.

Leo was off. She made a good start; but even Elsie’s inexpert eye noticed the difference made by three stone less of stabilizing weight. The canoe, several inches higher in the water, frisked like a dancer. Her sureness of foot would have made up deficiences, if it had not been for the heaviness of Joe’s pole, which was stout and, as poles must be in that part of the river, very long. Even so, she got ten or twelve yards before the inevitable happened. She came up laughing, and towed in the canoe; she was too light for her fall to overturn it. Joe leaned out from where he sat, and reached a hand to haul her in.