Twopence Coloured (14 page)

And this causes a certain amount of comment and hostility amongst the company (to whom Belles Lettres are
anathema
), but she does not mind that. Indeed she is intensely proud of the book, and it is as though she is telling them that she has a friend of her own now, and doesn’t care a hang for anybody.

And shortly after the interval she has a long time off the stage, and she takes it into the o.p. corner, and hugs it to herself, perfectly content, and watches the show. A Swiss scene is in progress at the moment, and Mr. Jack Laddon is causing great amusement with an alpenstock. He is also Yodelling with great skill, and receiving, with great
inconsequence
, ventriloquial slaps in the face from Miss Beryl Joy, who plainly considers him revolting…. And Jackie watches this dreamily, and listens dreamily, to the great hoarse roars of laughter that each movement of Mr. Laddon evokes in this Saturday multitude….

And in this corner she is quietly joined, after a little, by Miss Cherry Lambert and Mr. Lew Craik, who also want a glimpse. And these two have evidently been having some conversation before, for Miss Lambert comes up saying, “Oh, Lew, but you gave me a shock, then, you really did,” and Mr. Craik comes up saying that he will smack her backside for her in a moment — as though Miss Lambert is in the regular habit of chastising herself, and he is merely displaying
practical
and active sympathy with the disciplinary principle. And Miss Lambert replies, “Oh, will you, Lew?” very intrigued; and then, “Hullo, here’s Jackie. Still got your book?”

“Yes,” says Jackie.

“She’s always reading, Lew — this little girl,” says Miss Lambert.

“Oh — thasso?” says Mr. Craik, without looking at Jackie,
and with some asperity, for this little girl is not at all the type of little girl with whom Mr. Craik has sympathy. But Miss Lambert has a kinder heart.

“I used to read Poetry at one time, Jackie,” she says.

“Did you?” says Jackie, smiling encouragingly….

There is a long pause.

“Used to read Carlyle, too,” adds Miss Lambert, and there is another pause….

And all three stand there, with painted, blanched faces, watching the show…. And Miss Lambert used to read Carlyle…. And an even greater roar of laughter goes up, and with it, simultaneously, the music begins. And a
lightning
and exquisite reconciliation takes place between Mr. Jack Laddon and Miss Beryl Joy, and they take hands, and face the audience, and dance together along the floor. And still the three look on, in the blare of the band — Mr. Craik dreamy and sophisticated, Miss Lambert dreamy and vague, and Jackie very dreamy, but very contented, and with a little eager thoughtful look behind her dreaminess. And under her arm her present of Shelley….

I
T was in the seventh week of her association with “Little Girl,” and when she was at Liverpool, and on her
twentieth
birthday, that Jackie had news of the death of Lady Perrin. She had been corresponding with the old lady a week before this, and it was a great blow, and sickened her very much.

From Lady Perrin’s death she received the sum of seven hundred and eighty pounds; and she was, at first, delighted and intrigued by this amount, which she played about with mentally and brooded and speculated deliciously on every kind of imaginary expenditure. Ultimately, however, it was this bequest which brought her to an understanding of her true situation, and caused her to take stock of her affairs. For with the death of Lady Perrin her last ship had been burnt, and she had herself and her own exertions alone to rely upon. There was now no turning back. And in some measure she was scared by this, and in some measure she was braced.

For although Jackie had undergone multitudinous and varying emotions since she had left Brighton, her primary ambition remained as clear as it ever had been. She still held that to endeavour to rise to the utmost heights of the profession she had chosen was a self-evidently noble and splendid aspiration: and she was still convinced of her talents and perfect capabilities in this direction. As for the vulgar and alien society in which she was now moving, and the slow grey depression of the northern towns through which she was now passing — she took them on sufferance, and regarded them as purely temporary inflictions. She would come properly into touch with her profession soon.

And to all this there was one solution, she told herself. There was one clear, too simple solution. Too absurdly simple and too absurdly beautiful. And because it was that, by now she had begun to put it away from herself, half in fear. It was a thing beyond her, and no purpose could be served by contemplating it. “This has got to stop,” said Jackie, very firmly, one night in Newcastle; and she had succeeded since then in divorcing it from her (as it were) practical emotions. It lay somewhere apart, where it need no longer trouble her.

And yet when (and she was at Sheffield when this
occurred
) she had one night a wire from him saying that he was coming to spend the day with her, she might have known, from the pure glad gaiety and sudden unreasoning happiness that she took in the news, how far she had been deceiving herself in thinking that she could detach this thing from her existence.

It was almost like a reprieve — the prospect of seeing him again. And even if the sentence were passed anew, when he had gone — she could not trouble to think about that…. 

*

It was a very pleasant meeting at the station — on a cold, biting, cloudy Sheffield afternoon. And from the first
moment
there was a kind of new intimacy established, a
reasonless
and champagne-like affability, such as had, inexplicably, never been before between them. And to Jackie, at least (though she felt somehow sure that it was the same with him), the lowering sky over this sombre city, in which the first evening lights were peeping out, was dashed with all the beauty, and all the mystery and romance, in the world. She could not think of the future. This was enough.

And they walked round about for a long while, in no particular direction, until at last the sky had cleared to deep, bitter blue, and the stars had come out: and then they
went into a quiet, rather deserted hotel, near the station, and had tea.

And here they were all alone, in a high narrow room, with a single and attentive waiter, and a very old gentleman at another table (who made very unique grunting noises, but subsequently departed). And their cheeks were red from contact with the thin, cold air; and the fire near by was blazing red. And the night was falling, and the tea was more than gratifying. And they talked, in low tones, unceasingly — talked until they knew nothing but the tune of their own low voices along the high, narrow room.

Until at last, the night outside looming more and more mysterious, and the red fire within blazing ever more ardently from the dark, and the waiter having deserted them, and left them altogether alone — a sudden feeling of oppression and nervousness seemed to steal upon them both, and they looked out of the window, and there was a long silence…. It was, indeed, for a moment, as though they were suddenly face to face with something, and had nothing to say. As though their talk and ebullience had been obviously leading up to something, and then fallen dead.

And it was more than a sense of oppression with Jackie: it was a fear, almost — a fear of the night ahead and outside, of the theatre to which she must return, of the chillness of life itself — an aching longing for him to gladden and
reassure
her now, to say the word, and make her exalted. But he did not speak, and they looked out of the window, and were silent….

“Then where have you come from to-day?” asked Jackie, at last. “You haven’t told me yet.”

“Come from? London. Why?”

“London?” said Jackie, in surprise.

“Why — what’s the matter?”

“Are you on business up here, then?” asked Jackie.

“No. I came to see you.”

“
Me!
” cried Jackie, smiling, and sitting up and pointing at her self.

“Yes. What did you think?”

“Good Lord,” said Jackie….

And there was another very long and very heavy, and very complimentary and embarrassed silence….

“And are you going to perform in anything again soon?” asked Jackie.

“No. I’ve retired, I think. Anyway, I shan’t go back unless I have to. I’ve got this book on hand now, and I’ve got to concentrate on that for about six months.”

“What book’s that?” asked Jackie.

“Oh — the usual stuff….”

And there was another pause.

“Do you — sort of,” asked Jackie, “make money from that?”

“No. Not a penny.” He was looking at her now. “And with a wife to support and one thing and another, that’s where I’m always getting into a mess. You see, I’d cut out this acting business altogether if I could only ——”

“Oh, are you married, then?” said Jackie, suddenly, but she did not hear herself saying this. And she scarcely knew where she was or what she was doing. She only knew that she wanted to run away into the night, and cry, and forget — cry and forget. She could forget, she was sure, if you gave her the time. And she wanted to think. She wanted to think.

And outside a large car, with two glaring headlights, like some irresistible monster, snarled slowly up to the door of the hotel. And she was watching this car, and thinking of nothing at all.

He had replied that he was married.

“I thought you must have been,” said Jackie. And he did not reply to this.

And then the waiter came in and lit the gas.

*

And all at once there was no more night, and no more mystery, and sinister red fire, and trembling, romantic
desolation
. They were two rather wearied, and jaded, and
commonplace
earthlings, sitting opposite each other in the muddy gas-light of a hotel dining-room in Sheffield. And there was cigarette-ash sprinkled messily over the cups and table-cloth, and it was time to go to the theatre.

“Oh, well,” he said, and clumsily affected a yawn, with his knuckle on his mouth.

“Oh, well,” said Jackie, and sat straight up.

“Will you have your bill, sir?”

“Yes, please.”

There was a scribbling silence.

“The lady had two cakes, sir?”

“Two cakes…. Did you have two cakes, Jackie?”

“Two cakes? Let’s see, now. Yes. Two cakes. That’s right.”

“Two cakes, sir? … Thankyousir…. Thankyousir….”

“All right.”

“Thankyouverymuchsir. Thankyousir.”

He was helping her on with her coat.

They were out in the cold night air.

“Well, what happens now?” asked Jackie. “Are you going back, or what?”

“Well, shall we go and look up the trains?”

“Right you are…. Isn’t it cold?”

“Yes. Foul up here.”

The life had gone out of both of them.

“Will you wait here?” he said. “And I’ll go and ask.”

He was gone nearly five minutes, and she waited alone, tremblingly cold, amid the noise of engines and station cries. She might never see him again, she reflected, after this.

“Well, there’s one in ten minutes, really,” he said, and stood above her, looking down on her.

“Oh,” said Jackie, and looked about her.

There was a pause. His face was strained. He also seemed to feel the cold.

“Of course, I shall stay the night here in a minute….”

She giggled feebly, as though that was a very idle thing to have suggested, and there was another pause.

“Come on, Jackie.” He took her arm and began to lead her away. “I’ll stay here the night, and see you down to the theatre. I can’t face a journey now.”

“But how can you? You haven’t got any things….”

“Doesn’t matter. I’ll buy them.”

“Oh, don’t be silly. How
can
you?”

“Come along. We’ll buy them now. We’ve got three quarters of an hour before you need go in, and then I’ll meet you after the show, and we’ll have supper.”

Supper…. It was not all over yet….

And because of this sudden reprieve, the cloud and chill which had fallen upon them seemed suddenly and
unreasoningly
to be lifted. And he took her arm, and they walked snugly away into the cold wind as though there had been no interruption.

But she forced herself to ask him, in a conversational way, some more about the subject which had so upset her. And it transpired that he was not living with her, and had not done so for four years. And he described it as having been a very foolish business altogether. And this, too, made her feel a little happier….

And indeed a kind of sad gaiety, a mutual agreement to be gay, came upon them both. And the shopping that followed was a very delightful shopping — in which they were two humorous conspirators against the servile grandiosity of the shops. And in the Men’s Department of the big store they entered he was very amusing about his pyjamas, implacably insisting upon wide stripes, and vacillating, with great earnestness, and constant appeals to her, between mauves and reds. And it was even more fun in the chemist’s over the way, where he held out tenaciously for green as the sole decent shade in tooth-brushes, sneering at innumerable whites (as being full of integrity but without sensuous appeal), and at last coming round to Jackie’s notions, which had been from the beginning in favour of a mild pink. And when they came out of this there were the most delightful arguments on the subject of Carrying, in which she said she would not go any farther unless she did, and was at last granted the tooth-brush, which she bore with great courage and intrepidity from then on. And equally delightful was a subsequent debate upon Shaving, in which he wondered whether he could Go for a day, and submitted to her decision,
while she, in an exquisite little surge of possessiveness,
examined
his face in the light of a shop-window, and at last, on her own responsibility, allowed that he might. And at last they came to the Stage Door, where it was arranged that she should keep the Pyjamas, as well as the Tooth-brush,
because
she easily could, and because he was meeting her after the show, and could give them to him then. And he was going in front, and would probably be round in the interval.

*

And in the interval there he was, with his hands in his pockets, and his hat and coat off, talking fluently yet
languidly
to Julius Cæsar, at the back of the stage. And he was talking thus to Julius Cæsar, but he had come up from London to see
her.
And he was excusing himself from Julius Caesar, with a polite smile, and coming over to her. And he was smiling at her, as only he could smile, and they were saying “Hullo” softly, and standing together without a word, but with perfect cognizance of mutual happiness and harmony in their silence. And they were joined by Miss Biddy Maxwell.

“Hul
lo-o-o,
Richard!” said Miss Maxwell. “What do you think you’re doing up here?”

“Hullo, Miss Maxwell,” he replied, and they had a little conversation, and she passed on.

Everybody seemed to know him, thought Jackie, and everybody seemed to love him, as she did. How
unintelligent
and irrational had she been in thinking she could have had this individual, this patently attractive and desirable and unique individual, to herself.

“Hullo!” said Miss Cherry Lambert. “You here, Mr. Gissing?”

“Rather.”

This was getting too much for her.

After a short conversation, including a hint that she should be entertained by him to-night (which was courteously
rebuffed
), Miss Lambert passed on.

“You seem to know everybody,” said Jackie.

“Yes,” he said. “I do seem to. Misspent youth, I
suppose
….”

“Hullo, Gissing,” said Mr. Jack Laddon. “I heard you were in front to-night. How’s things?”

“Very well, thanks, Mr. Laddon. And how are you?”

“Oh, not so bad. What are we like from the front?”

“Very good indeed.”

“What are you up for, then?”

“I came up to see Miss Mortimer.”

“Oh,” said Mr. Laddon, glancing at Jackie, and rather at a loss. And “Ah-ha,” he added, encouragingly….

There was something about Mr. Gissing which seemed to steal from Mr. Laddon his natural easy arrogance. “Well — so long.”

“Good-bye.” There was a pause.

“How do you get on with Mr. Laddon, Jackie?”

“Well, I don’t see much of him. I don’t like him very much, though.”

“Yes. Isn’t he foul?”

And at this point Jackie herself had to go, and he returned to the front.

*

In the dressing-room, at the end of the show, Miss
Maxwell
, ruminatively cutting her toe-nails, brought the
subject
up.