Keep the Aspidistra Flying (20 page)

‘Look,’ said Gordon. ‘Those swans have followed us all the way up here.’

Sure enough, there were the two swans sailing vaguely to and fro over the dark green water. And at this moment the sun burst out again and the dreary aquarium of a dining-room was flooded with pleasant greenish light. Gordon and Rosemary felt suddenly warm and happy. They began chattering about nothing, almost as though the waiter had not been there, and Gordon took up the bottle and poured out two more glasses of wine. Over their glasses their eyes met. She was looking at him with a sort of yielding irony. ‘I’m your mistress,’ her eyes said; ‘what a joke!’ Their knees were touching under the small table; momentarily she squeezed his knee between her own. Something leapt inside him; a warm wave of sensuality and tenderness crept up his body. He had remembered! She was his girl, his mistress. Presently, when they were alone, in some hidden place in the warm, windless air, he would have her naked body all for his own at last. True, all the morning he had known this, but somehow the knowledge had been unreal. It was only now that he grasped it. Without words said, with a sort of bodily certainty, he knew that within an hour she would be in his arms, naked. As they sat there in the warm light, their knees touching, their eyes meeting, they felt as though already everything had been accomplished. There was deep intimacy between them. They could have sat there for hours, just looking at one another and talking of trivial things that had meanings for them and for nobody else. They did sit there for twenty minutes or more. Gordon had forgotten the waiter—had even forgotten, momentarily, the disaster of being let in for this wretched lunch that was going to strip him of every penny he had. But presently the sun went in, the room grew grey again, and they realised that it was time to go.

‘The bill,’ said Gordon, turning half round.

The waiter made a final effort to be offensive.

‘Ze bill, sare? But you do not wish any coffee, sare?’

‘No, no coffee. The bill.’

The waiter retired and came back with a folded slip on a salver. Gordon opened it. Six and threepence—and he had exactly seven and elevenpence in the world! Of course he had known approximately what the bill must be, and yet it was a shock now that it came. He stood up, felt in his pocket and took out all his money. The sallow young waiter, his salver on his arm, eyed the handful of money; plainly he divined that it was all Gordon had. Rosemary also had got up and come round the table. She pinched Gordon’s elbow; this was a signal that she would like to pay her share. Gordon pretended not to notice. He paid the six and threepence, and, as he turned away, dropped another shilling onto the salver. The waiter balanced it for a moment on his hand, flicked it over and then slipped it into his waistcoat pocket with the air of covering up something unmentionable.

As they went down the passage, Gordon felt dismayed, helpless—dazed, almost. All his money gone at a single swoop! It was a ghastly thing to happen. If only they had not come to this accursed place! The whole day was ruined now—and all for the sake of a couple of plates of cold beef and a bottle of muddy wine! Presently there would be tea to think about, and he had only six cigarettes left, and there were the bus fares back to Slough and God knew what else; and he had just eightpence to pay for the lot! They got outside the hotel feeling as if they had been kicked out and the door slammed behind them. All the warm intimacy of a moment ago was gone. Everything seemed different now that they were outside. Their blood seemed to grow suddenly cooler in the open air. Rosemary walked ahead of him, rather nervous, not speaking. She was half frightened now by the thing she had resolved to do. He watched her strong delicate limbs moving. There was her body that he had wanted so long; but now when the time had come it
only daunted him. He wanted her to be his, he wanted to
have had
her, but he wished it were over and done with. It was an effort—a thing he had got to screw himself up to. It was strange that that beastly business of the hotel bill could have upset him so completely. The easy carefree mood of the morning was shattered; in its place there had come back the hateful, harassing, familiar thing—worry about money. In a minute he would have to own up that he had only eightpence left; he would have to borrow money off her to get them home; it would be squalid and shameful. Only the wine inside him kept up his courage. The warmth of the wine, and the hateful feeling of having only eightpence left, warred together in his body, neither getting the better of the other.

They walked rather slowly, but soon they were away from the river and on higher ground again. Each searched desperately for something to say and could think of nothing. He came level with her, took her hand and wound her fingers within his own. Like that they felt better. But his heart beat painfully, his entrails were constricted. He wondered whether she felt the same.

‘There doesn’t seem to be a soul about,’ she said at last.

‘It’s Sunday afternoon. They’re all asleep under the aspidistra, after roast beef and Yorkshire.’

There was another silence. They walked on fifty yards or so. With difficulty mastering his voice, he managed to say:

‘It’s extraordinarily warm. We might sit down for a bit if we can find a place.’

‘Yes, all right. If you like.’

Presently they came to a small copse on the left of the road. It looked dead and empty, nothing growing under the naked trees. But at the corner of the copse, on the far side, there was a great tangled patch of sloe or blackthorn bushes. He put his arm round her without saying anything
and turned her in that direction. There was a gap in the hedge with some barbed wire strung across it. He held the wire up for her and she slipped nimbly under it. His heart leapt again. How supple and strong she was! But as he climbed over the wire to follow her, the eightpence—a sixpence and two pennies—clinked in his pocket, daunting him anew.

When they got to the bushes they found a natural alcove. On three sides were beds of thorn, leafless but impenetrable, and on the other side you looked downhill over a sweep of naked ploughed fields. At the bottom of the hill stood a low-roofed cottage, tiny as a child’s toy, its chimneys smokeless. Not a creature was stirring anywhere. You could not have been more alone than in such a place. The grass was the fine mossy stuff that grows under trees.

‘We ought to have brought a mackintosh,’ he said. He had knelt down.

‘It doesn’t matter. The ground’s fairly dry.’

He pulled her to the ground beside him, kissed her, pulled off the flat felt hat, lay upon her breast to breast, kissed her face all over. She lay under him, yielding rather than responding. She did not resist when his hand sought her breasts. But in her heart she was still frightened. She would do it—oh, yes! she would keep her implied promise, she would not draw back; but all the same she was frightened. And at heart he too was half reluctant. It dismayed him to find how little, at this moment, he really wanted her. The money-business still unnerved him. How can you make love when you have only eightpence in your pocket and are thinking about it all the time? Yet in a way he wanted her. Indeed, he could not do without her. His life would be a different thing when once they were really lovers. For a long time he lay on her breast, her head turned sideways, his face against her neck and hair, attempting nothing further.

Then the sun came out again. It was getting low in the sky now. The warm light poured over them as though a membrane across the sky had broken. It had been a little cold on the grass, really, with the sun behind the clouds; but now once again it was almost as warm as summer. Both of them sat up to exclaim at it.

‘Oh, Gordon, look! Look how the sun’s lighting everything up!’

As the clouds melted away a widening yellow beam slid swiftly across the valley, gilding everything in its path. Grass that had been dull green shone suddenly emerald. The empty cottage below sprang out into warm colours, purply-blue of tiles, cherry-red of brick. Only the fact that no birds were singing reminded you that it was winter. Gordon put his arm round Rosemary and pulled her hard against him. They sat cheek to cheek, looking down the hill. He turned her round and kissed her.

‘You do like me, don’t you?’

‘Adore you, silly.’

‘And you’re going to be nice to me, aren’t you?’

‘Nice to you?’

‘Let me do what I want with you?’

‘Yes, I expect so.’

‘Anything?’

‘Yes, all right. Anything.’

He pressed her back upon the grass. It was quite different now. The warmth of the sun seemed to have got into their bones. ‘Take your clothes off, there’s a dear,’ he whispered. She did it readily enough. She had no shame before him. Besides, it was so warm and the place was so solitary that it did not matter how many clothes you took off. They spread her clothes out and made a sort of bed for her to lie on. Naked, she lay back, her hands behind her head, her eyes shut, smiling slightly, as though she had considered everything and were at peace in her mind. For a long time
he knelt and gazed at her body. Its beauty startled him. She looked much younger naked than with her clothes on. Her face, thrown back, with eyes shut, looked almost childish. He moved closer to her. Once again the coins clinked in his pocket. Only eightpence left! Trouble coming presently. But he wouldn’t think of it now. Get on with it, that’s the great thing, get on with it and damn the future! He put an arm beneath her and laid his body to hers.

‘May I?—now?’

‘Yes. All right.’

‘You’re not frightened?’

‘No.’

‘I’ll be as gentle as I can with you.’

‘It doesn’t matter.’

A moment later:

‘Oh, Gordon, no! No, no, no!’

‘What? What is it?’

‘No, Gordon, no! You mustn’t!
No!
’

She put her hands against him and pushed him violently back. Her face looked remote, frightened almost hostile. It was terrible to feel her push him away at such a moment. It was as though cold water had been dashed all over him. He fell back from her, dismayed, hurriedly re-arranging his clothes.

‘What is it? What’s the matter?’

‘Oh, Gordon! I thought you—oh, dear!’

She threw her arm over her face and rolled over on her side, away from him, suddenly ashamed.

‘What is it?’ he repeated.

‘How could you be so
thoughtless?
’

‘What do you mean—thoughtless?’

‘Oh! you know what I mean!’

His heart shrank. He did know what she meant; but he had never thought of it till this moment. And of course—oh, yes!—he ought to have thought of it. He stood up and
turned away from her. Suddenly he knew that he could go no further with this business. In a wet field on a Sunday afternoon—and in mid-winter at that! Impossible! It had seemed so right, so natural only a minute ago; now it seemed merely squalid and ugly.

‘I didn’t expect
this
,’ he said bitterly.

‘But I couldn’t help it, Gordon! You ought to have—you know.’

‘You don’t think I go in for that kind of thing, do you?’

‘But what else can we do? I can’t have a baby, can I?’

‘You must take your chance.’

‘Oh, Gordon, how impossible you are!’

She lay looking up at him, her face full of distress, too overcome for the moment even to remember that she was naked. His disappointment had turned to anger. There you are, you see! Money again! Even in the most secret action of your life you don’t escape it; you’ve still got to spoil everything with filthy cold-blooded precautions for money’s sake. Money, money, always money! Even in the bridal bed, the finger of the money-god intruding! In the heights or in the depths, he is there. He walked a pace or two up and down, his hands in his pockets.

‘Money again, you see!’ he said. ‘Even at a moment like this it’s got the power to stand over us and bully us. Even when we’re alone and miles from anywhere, with not a soul to see us.’

‘What’s
money
got to do with it?’

‘I tell you it’d never even enter your head to worry about a baby if it wasn’t for the money. You’d
want
the baby if it wasn’t for that. You say you “can’t” have a baby. What do you mean, you “can’t” have a baby? You mean you daren’t; because you’d lose your job and I’ve got no money and all of us would starve. This birth-control business! It’s just another way they’ve found out of bullying us. And you want to acquiesce in it, apparently.’

‘But what am I to do, Gordon? What am I to do?’

At this moment the sun disappeared behind the clouds. It became perceptibly colder. After all, the scene was grotesque—the naked woman lying in the grass, the dressed man standing moodily by with his hands in his pockets. She’d catch her death of cold in another moment, lying there like that. The whole thing was absurd and indecent.

‘But what else am I to do?’ she repeated.

‘I should think you might start by putting your clothes on,’ he said coldly.

He had only said it to avenge his irritation; but its result was to make her so painfully and obviously embarrassed that he had to turn his back on her. She had dressed herself in a very few moments. As she knelt lacing up her shoes he heard her sniff once or twice. She was on the point of crying and was struggling to restrain herself. He felt horribly ashamed. He would have liked to throw himself on his knees beside her, put his arms round her and ask her pardon. But he could do nothing of the kind; the scene had left him lumpish and awkward. It was with difficulty that he could command his voice even for the most banal remark.

‘Are you ready?’ he said flatly.

‘Yes.’

They went back to the road, climbed through the wire and started down the hill without another word. Fresh clouds were rolling across the sun. It was getting much colder. Another hour and the early dusk would have fallen. They reached the bottom of the hill and came in sight of the Ravenscroft Hotel, scene of their disaster.

‘Where are we going?’ said Rosemary in a small sulky voice.

‘Back to Slough, I suppose. We must cross the bridge and have a look at the signposts.’