Twopence Coloured (20 page)

“Hullo, Charles. This is Jackie.”

“Howd’youdo.”

“Howd’youdo.”

It was very awkward. “You’re coming to stay with us, aren’t you?” he said. He bore little resemblance to Richard. His clean-shaven features were thinner, harder, than
Richard’s
, and he was brown — almost alarmingly brown — as brown as a Red Indian. This made his teeth whiter and his eyes more blue. In the teeth and eyes one noticed what there was of resemblance. He wore breeches and a very old coat. Remembering Lord’s, she remembered she was in the presence
of genius, and felt this unassuming costume to be fitting. Genius, she knew, was pre-eminently unassuming. His hands were, at the moment, very dirty, but he was a very clean person. He was very slow in his speech and gestures.

After a little talk they wandered out into the garden. There was an unexpressed but mutual feeling that she was being shown round. She walked between them, and they towered above her, each side. Their hands were in their pockets, and she was awed and enraptured by their height. Also by their quietude and friendliness. Charles offered her a cigarette, which she took. He lit it for her, and they walked on. For the moment it seemed that they were both equally charming in their eyes. As brothers they seemed to be on the friendliest and easiest terms, making several leisurely
allusions
to local and garden matters, which they never failed to explain to her. Such things formed the staple of the
conversation
. Then, after about half an hour, at the conclusion of which they warmed up considerably in a humorous
discussion
of the horse which Richard had that night to ride upon the stage, they went in to tea.

The tea was served in the drawing-room, and there were strawberries and cream for tea. They gorged themselves upon these without restraint — Jackie, in an ostensibly
diffident
but actually methodical way, winning by a clear dozen. After tea they wandered out again, in the best of spirits. Then Richard, suddenly crying “Mrs. Gribble’s seats!” dashed into the house to telephone. They smiled at each other and walked on in silence.

“Of course I’ve seen you before now,” she said.

“Really?” He put little interest into the answer, and she was momentarily annoyed by his slowness. Through tea she had flattered this slowness as a brown steadiness, but there were limits. Was he an antagonist after all?

“At Lord’s,” she said.

“What? Were you at Lord’s? The last time?”

“Yes. Rather. I saw you batting.”

“Sixty-four?”

“That’s right. It was wonderful….”

“Well,” he said, as though this was really good news, “I never knew
you
were there.”

There was a pause. He was the most enchanting creature on earth.

“I saw you fielding, too. You were just near me, but I couldn’t see you properly because of the sun.”

“Did I get in your way?”

She laughed.

“But you’ve got to get in somebody’s way,” he said. “If you stand still.”

“I suppose you have,” said Jackie. His simplicity, also, was ravishing.

He led the way mechanically through to the kitchen-garden.

“Richard show you this?”

“Yes. He brought me through this way.”

“Let’s look at the chickens,” he said.

On their way to the chickens they encountered two dogs, and one cat, all of whom betrayed curt recognition of their owner: and after the chickens themselves they met a pony, who came stamping towards them as they stood at the edge of the field, and for whom he had a lump of sugar from the depths of his pocket. The pony munched this, and went immediately away. All these animals had that unique
preoccupation
and detachment of dumb things — a detachment which was partially a welcome, though — and although he did not speak to them, the understanding was perfect. She was all at once alive to the mystery of animals, and knew she was with a priest of these mysteries. And in the yellowing sunlight she was very happy.

Richard was waiting for them when they reached the house again. He was, for the first time in his life, rather pathetic, she thought, standing there….

She was introduced to the housekeeper, Mrs. Bradley, who was extremely welcoming and reassuringly stout, and who showed her her room. After this she had a cocktail with Charles and Richard in the dining-room, where a blurred but ineffable frame of mind intervened: and the next thing she knew she was sitting in the front of a car, which Charles
was cranking up, and which Richard was going to drive into Brighton. In Brighton the public awaited him…. They were already late.

They bumped down the lanes, hooted through Southshore, and whizzed along the open road by the sea. The air was fresh, her shoulder touched his vibrating shoulder, and they did not speak. She was lost in adoration of life and of him — the two were mystically blended.

A
T the time that Jackie first met him, Charles Gissing was thirty-five years of age — one year, that is, older than his brother. Their father had died ten years ago, and he had thus, at the age of twenty-five, come into his property. This comprised the greater part of the downs for several miles around, was severely mortgaged, and in a very low
condition
altogether. Knottley Lodge was the Dower-house, the family place having been let, at some profit. The last ten years of Charles’ life had been given over to the steady
improvement
of his estate — and the results had been astonishingly good. So much so that he was now esteemed luckier than his brother, Richard, who, as a younger son, had taken an income from his father’s investments and been cast adrift.

Charles was a very different character from his father, though strongly allied to him in temperament. His father had been a slow but indisputably benign old gentleman, who trundled about all day in the saddle advising his farmers on their crops — and who, at the age of seventy, had had a seizure in his rose-garden, at the time of sunset, and was taken into the room in which Jackie now slept, where, giving lingering, incoherent, but still loving instructions for the bringing home of the harvest, he died. The sunset was appropriate. He was said to have been one of the last of the squires. Much was said to have died with him, but actually there expired little more than the old style of
entertainment
at Knottley Lodge, and the practice of curtseying in the village of Old Southshore. It was from the first found impracticable to curtsey to a public-school tie. One or two of the very much older feminine generation did, as it happened,
when Charles entered the village, still manage to achieve this fluttering drop, and he tolerated it as something affording recognizable pleasure to the giver: but this was becoming very rare. The younger feminine generation was not a
generation
of curtseyers. It was a rather touchy younger generation, on the other hand, and its forte lay, rather, in the pillion — which involved cosmetics, knees, and an air of tart superiority to one and all. A young squire might now even be expected to provide the pillion — such indeed was the case with the three young sons of the Graysing family, whose estate adjoined Charles’. Charles, however, being from the first a young man of intensely and serenely independent character, had kept his pillion to himself. He had no more taste for knees than he had for the go-up-to-London-to-see-the-Queen atmosphere they had superseded. Hence it was that, despite his leisured amiability to all, he had no great popularity in the neighbourhood, and from what remained of the local society he was permanently, though not openly, estranged. His political opinions (of which he had none) were
suspicious
, and although he did his hereditary duty in the way of local bazaars, and fêtes, and committees for Ex-Service-men’s clubs, etc., he could not be prevailed upon to have any
dealings
with the fast-rising local Fascist organizations. At
Knottley
Lodge he hardly ever entertained, except to tea, at which his strawberries were famous. Occasionally he shot rooks with his neighbours, but he did not hunt. He was, on the contrary, a confirmed enemy of the fox, having made himself conspicuous in a much-discussed encounter with one of these creatures, which, having entered Charles’ chicken-house one pitch-dark morning at half-past one, was discovered by an awakened and suspicious Charles at half-past three. There were seven chickens in all, two of which were consumed — the rest in a loathsome state of wreckage. An uncanny two hours. Not one had escaped, and the red animal had lost its sprightliness when found by Charles, who, in a moment of calm hatred of the bloody scene, fired two bullets from his Webley revolver into its head. This, in the opinion of his neighbours, and in view of the scarcity of the fox, was held
to be an unprecedented and impermissible course of action to have adopted.

Thus it was that Charles was voluntarily out of touch with both the modern and the elder set around Southshore. Nor did his alliance with his brother, an actor and a writer and a manifestly heretical character, improve matters here. Together they were too formidable.

He was a quiet figure — very. He spoke little and slowly, as his father had done, and he had the appearance of having little to do throughout the day. This was partly because he rose at half-past five and got through all his correspondence and estate business before breakfast, and partly because combined slowness and skill gave an appearance of idleness. In the last few years he had been continually absent in the summer on account of his cricket. He appeared to take this talent very much for granted, but actually it was his one passion in existence. It was only lately that he had struck an odd streak of form in batting, and he was now included whenever available. Before the war he had had some notoriety as a promising young bowler, but had subsequently failed completely in that line. But he still bowled a little, and was one of the finest fields in the country.

His response to Jackie had been immediate. He had not been with her five minutes before clearly and unemotionally apprehending that he desired to have her for his own. That this was out of the question did not perturb him. He merely recorded the fact. He was aware that, had she not had the moral weight of his brother’s approval behind her, it would have taken him much longer to realize this; but with that approval she was immediately and obviously flawless.

As they walked in the garden he experienced no tremor — no disappointment — no envy. As she stood patting the pony’s head he looked at her and listened to her friendly speech. Every line of her face, every word she spoke, the colour of her hair, her eyes, her mouth — all conformed to his precise ideal. But this was not adoration — it was calm identification. His brother deserved no praise for discernment. The thing was patent.

She awoke at seven o’ clock to a washed blue sky and the tops of wet green trees, and a cup of tea brought her by Mrs. Bradley. And all the world was in a green conspiracy of quietude, and she was neither happy nor unhappy, but a part of that quietude around her. What the day held in store for her she could not imagine, but she was to have him the entire day.

She was out in the garden by eight o’ clock, and amongst the roses — drunk amongst the roses. She had never seen so many roses in her life.

It had been wet and stormy in the night, and their petals were scattered everywhere in the dew. They were roses that had had a pillow-fight overnight, and spilt their
water-jugs
, and distracted their sheets, and flung themselves about, and then suddenly and inconsequently gone to sleep…. Debauched roses — overblown but luscious young harlots of roses — regardless of their mess…. Jackie could have cried.

And up above in the house, various signs of life. Charles and Richard, just returned from a bathe in the sea, calling in swimmers’ voices to each other from their rooms — a girl laying the table in the dining-room — a dog in the front doorway, already prone and winking in the amber sunlight. And then the sight of a hurrying Mrs. Bradley, and the
welcoming
prolonged tinkling of a gong…. Every one was contented in a silent, brisk routine — a routine which came to her like a memory, and thrilled her, after a year in rooms. Particularly was she pleased by the dog. That old dog had lain winking in that light, of a morning, without her knowing it, year in and year out. He knew how to live, did that dog, but took it all for granted. This atmosphere was his. She revelled in her sudden participation in his amber secrets and wisdom.

And the smell of bacon, and silver dishes again, and a sideboard. How could she ever face rooms and tragedies again? And two powerful young or youngish men, who,
while remaining quite civil, were of the united opinion that they were in the presence of the most perfect young woman on earth. And Jackie reciprocating the sentiment, though also remaining herself. As for her love for Richard, she felt for the moment that that could wait.

And after breakfast they strolled for a long while in the garden, seeing some more of the chickens, and some more of the pony, to whom Jackie this time (in a rather frightening moment, but it was all right if you held your hand right out flat) gave a lump of sugar — and after that they got the car, and pottered about on Charles’ business in the town of Southshore. And after that they went for a drive to
Worthing
, via Lancing, and then came back to lunch.

And after lunch Richard had to go into Brighton to see Mr. Carters, and she was left alone with Charles. And they talked about books for some time (they were in perfect agreement with each other), and he showed her his collection of Richard’s books, which were seven in number and of a technical nature, and then they had another stroll, which again ended laughingly in Pony, to whom Jackie gave another lump, this time with the utmost confidence and intrepidity. And then Richard returned and they had tea, at which there were again strawberries, and at which Jackie made the same rather revolting pig of herself. And after tea they had a game of cricket.

Charles had a nice pitch and a large net for this, at the end of one of his fields, and a very pleasant hour was had. Charles batted, and Richard bowled with a hard ball, as became a man, and Jackie bowled with a soft one, as became a woman. And Richard’s balls were treated with brusque respect, and Jackie’s balls were treated with courteous solemnity — which was rather difficult to keep up, as they were aimed at his head. For Jackie was an underhand bowler, who took great pride in her pace. After this Jackie batted herself for ten minutes or so. But as Jackie’s principles for striking the ball were to stand on one leg, close both eyes, clench thirty-two teeth, and swing the bat round violently to the sky; or, failing that, and when completely baffled by
a ball, to wabble about insecurely but earnestly on a high heel, and then collapse in a defeated heap upon the ground — the play lost in pace what it gained in good nature. After this Richard batted, and she went behind the net to Watch. She enjoyed that most of all.

And after this there was the large feeling wrought by exercise, consummated by cocktails: and then she was against the vibrating shoulder, flying back on the straight sea road to Brighton. If she had never lived in the past and would never live again, she was living now. She did not speak to him.