57

 

 

 

 

LUCIA'S PROGRESS

 

PART 5

 

CHAPTER V

 

The cause that chiefly conduced to the reconciliation of these two ultimate candidates was not Christian Charity so much as the fact that their unhappy estrangement wrecked the social gaieties of Tilling, for Georgie and Lucia would not meet Mallards and Mallards would not meet Irene as long as it continued, and those pleasant tea-parties for eight with sessions of Bridge before and after, could not take place. Again, both the protagonists found it wearing to the optic nerve to do their morning's shopping with one eye scouting for the approach of the enemy, upon which both eyes were suddenly smitten with blindness. On the other hand the Padre's sermon the next Sunday morning, though composed with the best intentions, perhaps retarded a reconciliation, for he preached on the text, "Behold, how good and joyful a thing it is, brethren, to dwell together in unity," and his allusions to the sad dissensions which arose from the clash of ambitions, highly honourable in themselves, were unmistakable. Both protagonists considered his discourse to be in the worst possible taste, and Elizabeth entirely refused to recognise either him or Evie when next they met, which was another wedge driven into Tilling. But inconvenience, dropping like perpetual water on a stone, eventually wore down dignity, and when, some ten days after the election, the market-baskets of Lucia and Elizabeth came into violent collision at the door of the fishmonger's, Lucia was suddenly and miraculously healed of her intermittent blindness. "So sorry, dear," she said, "quite my fault," and Elizabeth, remembering with an effort that Lent was an appropriate season for self-humiliation, said it was quite hers. They chatted for several minutes, rather carefully, with eager little smiles, and Diva who had observed this interesting scene, raced up and down the street, to tell everybody that an armistice at least had been signed. So Bridge parties for eight were resumed with more than their usual frequency, to make up for lost time, and though Lucia had forsworn all such petty occupations, her ingenuity soon found a formula, which justified her in going to them much as usual.

 

"Yes, Georgie, I will come with pleasure this afternoon," she said, "for the most industrious must have their remissions. How wonderfully Horace puts it: 'Non semper arcum tendit Apollo.' I would give anything to have known Horace. Terse and witty and wise. Half-past three then. Now I must hurry home, for my broker will want to know what I think about a purchase of Imperial Tobacco."

 

That, of course, was her way of putting it, but put it as you liked, the fact remained that she had been making pots of money. An Industrial boom was on, and by blindly following Mammoncash's advice, Lucia was doing exceedingly well. She was almost frightened at the speed with which she had been growing richer, but remembered the splendid career of great Dame Catherine Winterglass, whose picture, cut out of an illustrated magazine, now stood framed on the table in her office. Dame Catherine had made a fortune by her own skill in forecasting the trend of the markets; that was not due to luck but to ability, and to be afraid of her own ability was quite foreign to Lucia's nature.

 

The financial group at Mallards, Mapp & Flint, was not displaying the same acumen, and one day it suffered a frightful shock. There had been a pleasant Bridge-party at Diva's, and Elizabeth shewed how completely she had forgiven Lucia, by asking her counsel about Siriami. The price of the shares had been going down lately, like an aneroid before a typhoon, and, as it dwindled, Elizabeth had continued to buy. What did Lucia think of this policy of averaging?

 

Lucia supported her forehead on her hand in the attitude of Shakespeare and Dame Catherine.

 

"Dear me, it is so long since I dealt in Siriami," she said. "A West African gold mine, I seem to recollect? The price of gold made me buy, I am sure. I remember reasoning it out and concluding that gold would go up. There were favourable reports from the mine too. And why did I sell? How you all work my poor brain! Ah! Eureka! I thought I should have to tie up my capital for a long time: my broker agreed with me, though I should say most decidedly that it is a promising lock-up. Siriami is still in the early stage of development, you see, and no dividend can be expected for a couple of years--"

 

"Hey, what's that?" asked Benjy.

 

"More than two years, do you think?" asked Lucia. "I am rusty about it. Anyone who holds on, no doubt, will reap a golden reward in time."

 

"But I shan't get any dividends for two years?" asked Elizabeth in a hollow voice.

 

"Ah, pray don't trust my judgment," said Lucia. "All I can say for certain, is that I made some few pounds in the mine, and decided it was too long a lock-up of my little capital."

 

Elizabeth felt slightly unwell. Benjy had acquired a whisky and soda and she took a sip of it without it even occurring to her that he had no business to have it.

 

"Well, we must be off," she said, for though the reconciliation was so recent, she felt it might be endangered if she listened to any more of this swank. "Thanks, dear, for your views. All that four shillings mine? Fancy!"

 

It was raining hard when they left Diva's house, and they walked up the narrow pavement to Mallards in single file, with a loud and dismal tattoo drumming on their umbrellas, and streams of water pouring from the ends of the ribs. Arrived there, Elizabeth led the way out to the garden-room and put her dripping umbrella in the fender. It had been wet all afternoon and before going to Diva's, Benjy had smoked two cigars there.

 

"Of course, this is your room, dear," said Elizabeth, "and if you prefer it to smell like a pothouse, it shall. But would you mind having the window open a chink for a moment, for unless you do, I shall be suffocated."

 

She fanned herself with her handkerchief, and took two or three long breaths of the brisker air.

 

"Thank you. Refreshed," she said. "And now we must talk Siriami. I think Lucia might have told us about its not paying dividends before, but don't let us blame her much. It merely isn't the way of some people to consider others--"

 

"She told you she was selling all the Siriami shares she held," said Benjy.

 

"If you've finished championing her, Benjy, perhaps you'll allow me to go on. I've put two thousand pounds into that hole in the ground, for, as far as I can see, it's little more than that. And that means that for the next two years my income will be diminished by seventy pounds."

 

"God bless me," ejaculated Benjy. "I had no idea you had invested so heavily in it."

 

"I believe a woman, even though married, is allowed to do what she likes with her money," said Elizabeth bitterly.

 

"I never said she wasn't. I only said that I didn't know it," said Benjy.

 

"That was why I told you. And the long and short of it is that we had better let this house as soon as we can for as long as we can, because we can't afford to live here."

 

"But supposing Mrs. Lucas is wrong about it? I've known her wrong before now--"

 

"So have I," interrupted Elizabeth, "usually, in fact: but we must be prepared for her being right for once. As it is, I've got to let Mallards for three or four months in the year in order to live in it at all. I shall go to Woolgar & Pipstow's to-morrow and put it in their hands, furnished (all our beautiful things!) for six months. Perhaps with option of a year."

 

"And where shall we go?" asked Benjy.

 

Elizabeth rose.

 

"Wherever we can. One of those little houses, do you think, which Lucia wanted to pull down. And then, perhaps, as I told you, there'll be another little mouth to feed, dear."

 

"I wish you would go to Dr. Dobbie and make sure," he said.

 

"And what would Dr. Dobbie tell me? 'Have a good rest before dinner.' Just what I'm going to do."

 

With the re-establishment of cordial relations between the two leading ladies of Tilling, the tide of news in the mornings flowed on an unimpeded course, instead of being held up in the eddies of people who would speak to each other, and being blocked by those who wouldn't, and though as yet there was nothing definite on the subject to which Elizabeth and Benjy had thus briefly alluded, there were hints, there were signs and indications that bore on it, of the very highest significance. The first remarkable occurrence was that Major Benjy instead of going to play golf next morning, according to his invariable custom, came shopping with Elizabeth, as he had done when she was busy canvassing and carried his wife's basket. There was a solicitous, a tender air about the way he gave her an arm as she mounted the two high steps into Twistevant's shop. Diva was the first to notice this strange phenomenon, and naturally she stood rooted to the spot in amazement, intent on further observation. When they came out there was not the shadow of doubt in her mind that Elizabeth had let out the old green skirt that everyone knew so well. It fell in much ampler folds than ever before, and Diva vividly recollected that strange talk about dolls and twilight sleep: how pregnant it seemed now, in every sense of the word! The two popped into another shop, and at the moment the Padre and Evie debouched into the High Street, a few yards away, and he went into the tobacconist's, leaving Evie outside. Diva uprooted herself with difficulty, hurried to her, and the two ladies had a few whispered remarks together. Then the Mapp-Flints came out again, and retraced their way, followed by four eager detective eyes.

 

"But no question whatever about the skirt," whispered Evie, "and she has taken Major Benjy's arm again. So unusual. What an event if it's really going to happen! Never such a thing before in our circle. She'll be quite a heroine. There's Mr. Georgie. What a pity we can't tell him about it. What beautiful clothes!"

 

Georgie had on his fur-trimmed cape and a new bright blue beret which he wore a little sideways on his head. He was coming towards them with more than his usual briskness, and held his mouth slightly open as if to speak the moment he got near enough.

 

"Fiddlesticks, Evie," said Diva. "You don't expect that Mr. Georgie, at his age, thinks they're found under gooseberry bushes. Good morning, Mr. Georgie. Have you seen Elizabeth--"

 

"Skirt," he interrupted. "Yes, of course. Three inches I should think."

 

Evie gave a little horrified squeal at this modern lack of reticence in talking to a gentleman who wasn't your husband, on matters of such extreme delicacy, and took refuge in the tobacconist's.

 

"And Major Benjy carrying her basket for her," said Diva. "So it must be true, unless she's deceiving him."

 

"Look, they've turned down Malleson Street," cried Georgie. "That's where Dr. Dobbie lives."

 

"So do Woolgar & Pipstow," said Diva.

 

"But they wouldn't be thinking of letting Mallards as early as March," objected Georgie.

 

"Well, it's not likely. Must be the doctor's. I'm beginning to believe it. At first when she talked to me about dolls and twilight sleep, I thought she was only trying to make herself interesting, instead of being so--"

 

"I never heard about dolls and twilight sleep," said Georgie, with an ill-used air.

 

"Oh, here's Irene on her motor-bicycle, coming up from Malleson Street," cried Diva. "I wonder if she saw where they went. What a row she makes! And so rash. I thought she must have run into Susan's Royce, and what a mess there would have been."

 

Irene, incessantly hooting, came thundering along the High Street, with foul fumes pouring from the open exhaust. She evidently intended to pull up and talk to them, but miscalculated her speed. To retard herself, she caught hold of Georgie's shoulder, and he tittuped along, acting as a brake, till she came to a standstill.

 

"My life-preserver!" cried Irene fervently, as she dismounted. "Georgie, I adore your beard. Do you put it inside your bedclothes or outside? Let me come and see some night when you've gone to bed. Don't be alarmed, dear lamb, your sex protects you from any frowardness on my part. I was on my way to see Lucia. There's news. Give me a nice dry kiss and I'll tell you."

 

"I couldn't think of it," said Georgie. "What would everybody say?"

 

"Dear old grandpa," said Irene. "They'd say you were a bold and brazen old man. That would be a horrid lie. You're a darling old lady, and I love you. What were we talking about?"

 

"You were talking great nonsense," said Georgie, pulling his cape back over his shoulder.

 

"Yes, but do you know why? I had a lovely idea. I thought how enlightening it would be to live a day backwards. So when I got up this morning, I began backwards as if it was the end of the day instead of the beginning. I had two pipes and a whisky and soda. Then I had dinner backwards, beginning with toasted cheese, and I'm slightly tipsy. When I get home I shall have tea, and go out for a walk and then have lunch, and shortly before going to bed I shall have breakfast and then some salts. Do you see the plan? It gives you a new view of life altogether; you see it all from a completely different angle. Oh, I was going to tell you the news. I saw the Mapp-Flints going into the house agent's. She appeared not to see me. She hasn't seen me since dinner-bell day. I hope you understand about living backwards. Let's all do it: one and all."

 

"My dear, it sounds too marvellous," said Georgie, "but I'm sure it would upset me and I should only see it from the angle of being sick. . . . Diva, they were only going into Woolgar & Pipstow's."

 

Diva had trundled up to them.

 

"Not the doctor's, then," she said. "I'm disappointed. It would have made it more conclusive."

 

"Made what more conclusive?" asked Irene.

 

"Well, it's thought that Elizabeth's expecting--" began Diva.

 

"You don't say so!" said Irene. "Who's the co-respondent? Georgie, you're blushing below your beard. Roguey-poguey-Romeo! I saw you climbing up a rope-ladder into the garden-room when you were supposed to be ill. Juliet Mapp opened the window to you, and you locked her in a passionate embrace. I didn't want to get you into trouble, so I didn't say anything about it, and now you've gone and got her into trouble, you wicked old Romeo, hoots and begorra. I must be godmother, Georgie, and now I'm off to tell Lucia."

 

Irene leapt on to her bicycle and disappeared in a cloud of mephitic vapour in the direction of Grebe.

 

 

 

With the restoration of the free circulation of news, it was no wonder that by the afternoon it was universally known that this most interesting addition to the population of Tilling was expected. Neither of the two people most closely concerned spoke of it directly, but indirectly their conduct soon proclaimed it from the house-roofs. Benjy went strutting about with his wife, carrying her market-basket, obviously with the conscious pride of approaching fatherhood, pretty to see; and when he went to play golf, leaving her to do her marketing alone, Elizabeth, wreathed in smiles, explained his absence in hints of which it was impossible to miss the significance.

 

"I positively drove my Benjy-boy out to the links to-day," she said to Diva. "I insisted, though he was very loth to go. But where's the use of his hanging about? Ah, there's quaint Irene: foolish of me, but after her conduct at the elections, it agitates me a little to see her, though I'm sure I forgive her with all my heart. I'll just pop into the grocer's."

 

Irene stormed by, and Elizabeth popped out again.

 

"And you may not have heard yet, dear," she continued, "that we want to let our sweet Mallards for six months or a year. Not that I blame anybody but myself for that necessity. Lucia perhaps might have told me that Siriami would not be paying any dividends for a couple of years, but she didn't. That's all."

 

"But you were determined to do the opposite of whatever she advised," said Diva. "You told me so."

 

"No, you're wrong there," said Elizabeth, with some vehemence. "I never said that."

 

"But you did," cried Diva. "You said that if she bought Siriami, you would sell and versy-visa."

 

Instead of passionately denying this, Elizabeth gave a far-away smile like Lucia's music smile over the slow movements of Sonatas.

 

"We won't argue about it, dear," she said. "Have it all your own way."

 

This suavity was most uncharacteristic of Elizabeth: was it a small piece of corroborative evidence?

 

"Anyhow, I'm dreadfully sorry you're in low water," said Diva. "Hope you'll get a good let. Wish I could take Mallards myself."

 

"A little bigger than you're accustomed to, dear," said Elizabeth with a touch of the old Eve. "I don't think you'd be very comfortable in it. If I can't get a long let, I shall have to shut it up and store my furniture, to avoid those monstrous rates, and take a teeny-weeny house somewhere else. For myself I don't seem to mind at all, I shall be happy anywhere, but what really grieves me is that my Benjy must give up his dear garden-room. But as long as we're together, what does it matter, and he's so brave and tender about it . . . Good morning, Mr. Georgie. I've news for you, which I hope you'll think is bad news."

 

Georgie had a momentary qualm that this was something sinister about Foljambe, who had been very cross lately: there was no pleasing her.

 

"I don't know why you should hope I should think it bad news," he said.

 

"I shall tease you," said Elizabeth in a sprightly tone. "Guess! Somebody going away: that's a hint."

 

Georgie knew that if this meant Foljambe was going to leave, it was highly unlikely that she should have told Elizabeth and not him, but it gave him a fresh pang of apprehension.

 

"Oh, it's so tarsome to be teased," he said. "What is it?"

 

"You're going to lose your neighbours. Benjy and I have got to let Mallards for a long, long time."

 

Georgie repressed a sigh of relief.

 

"Oh, I am sorry: that is bad news," he said cheerfully. "Where are you going?"

 

"Don't know yet. Anywhere. A great wrench, but there's so much to be thankful for. I must be getting home. My boyikins will scold me if I don't rest before lunch."

 

 

 

Somehow this combination of financial disaster and great expectations raised Elizabeth to a high position of respect and sympathy in the eyes of Tilling. Lucia, Evie and Diva were all childless, and though Susan Wyse had had a daughter by her first marriage, Isabel Poppit was now such a Yahoo, living permanently in an unplumbed shack among the sand-dunes, that she hardly counted as a human being at all. Even if she was one, she was born years before her mother had come to settle here, and thus was no Tillingite. In consequence Elizabeth became a perfect heroine; she was elderly (it was really remarkably appropriate that her name was Elizabeth) and now she was going to wipe the eye of all these childless ladies. Then again her financial straits roused commiseration: it was sad for her to turn out of the house she had lived in for so long and her Aunt Caroline before her. No doubt she had been very imprudent, and somehow the image presented itself of her and Benjy being caught like flies in the great web Lucia had been spinning, in the centre of which she sat, sucking gold out of the spoils entangled there. The image was not accurate, for Lucia had tried to shoo them out of her web, but the general impression remained, and it manifested itself in little acts of homage to Elizabeth at Bridge-parties and social gatherings, in care being taken that she had a comfortable chair, that she was not sitting in draughts, in warm congratulations if she won her rubbers and in sympathy if she lost. She was helped first and largely at dinner, Susan Wyse constantly lent her the Royce for drives in the country, so that she could get plenty of fresh air without undue fatigue, and Evie Bartlett put a fat cushion in her place behind the choir at church. Already she had enjoyed precedence as a bride, but this new precedence quite outshone so conventional a piece of etiquette. Benjy partook of it too in a minor degree, for fatherhood was just as rare in the Tilling circle as motherhood. He could not look down on Georgie's head, for Georgie was the taller, but he straddled before the fire with legs wide apart and looked down on the rest of him and on the entire persons of Mr. Wyse and the Padre. The former must have told his sister, the Contessa Faraglione, who from time to time visited him in Tilling, of the happy event impending, for she sent a message to Elizabeth of so delicate a nature, about her own first confinement, that Mr. Wyse had been totally unable to deliver it himself, and entrusted it to his wife. The Contessa also sent Elizabeth a large jar of Italian honey, notable for its nutritious qualities. As for the Padre, he remembered with shame that he had suggested that a certain sentence should be omitted from Elizabeth's marriage service, which she had insisted should be read, and he made himself familiar with the form for the Churching of Women.

 

But there were still some who doubted. Quaint Irene was one, in spite of her lewd observations to Georgie, in her coarse way she offered to lay odds that she would have a baby before Elizabeth. Lucia was another. But one morning Georgie, coming out of Mallards Cottage, had seen Dr. Dobbie's car standing at the door of Mallards, and he had positively run down to the High Street to disseminate this valuable piece of indirect evidence, and in particular to tell Lucia. But she was nowhere about, and, as it was a beautiful day, and he was less busy than usual, having finished his piece of petit point yesterday, he walked out to Grebe to confront her with it. Just now, being in the Office, she could not be disturbed, as Grosvenor decided that a casual morning call from an old friend could not rank as an urgency, and he sat down to wait for her in the drawing-room. It was impossible to play the piano, for the sound, even with the soft pedal down, would have penetrated into the Great Silence, but he found on the table a fat volume called Health in the Home, and saw at once that he could fill up his time very pleasantly with it. He read about shingles and decided that the author could never have come across as bad a case as his own: he was reassured that the slight cough which had troubled him lately was probably not incipient tuberculosis: he made a note of calomel, for he felt pretty sure the Foljambe's moroseness was due to liver, and she might be induced to take a dose. Then he became entirely absorbed in a chapter about mothers. A woman, he read, often got mistaken ideas into her head: she would sometimes think that she was going to have a baby, but would refuse to see a doctor for fear of being told that she was not. Then, hearing Lucia's step on the stairs, he hastily tried to replace the book on the table, but it slipped from his hand and lay open on the carpet, and there was not time to pick it up before Lucia entered. She said not a word, but sank down in a chair, closing her eyes.

 

"My dear, you're not ill, are you?" said Georgie.

 

Lucia kept her eyes shut.

 

"What time is it?" she asked in a hollow voice.

 

"Getting on for eleven. You are all right, are you?"

 

Lucia spread out her arms as if measuring some large object.

 

"Perfectly. But columns of figures, Georgie, and terrific decisions to make, and now reaction has come. I've been telephoning to London. I may be called up any moment. Divert my mind, while I relax. Any news?"

 

"I came down on purpose to tell you," said Georgie, "and perhaps even you will be convinced now. Dr. Dobbie's car was waiting outside Mallards this morning."

 

"No!" said Lucia, opening her eyes and becoming extremely brisk and judicial. "That does look more like business. But still I can't say that I'm convinced. You see, finance makes one look at all possible sides of a situation. Consider. No doubt, it was the doctor's car: I don't dispute that. But Major Benjy may have had an upset. Elizabeth may have fallen downstairs, though I'm sure I hope she hasn't. Her cook may have mumps. Lots of things. No, Georgie, if the putative baby was an industrial share--I put it badly--I wouldn't touch it."

 

She pointed at the book on the floor.

 

"I see what that book is," she said, "and I feel sure you've been reading about it. So have I. A rather interesting chapter about the delusions and fancies of middle-aged women lately married. Sometimes, so it said, they do not even believe themselves, but are only acting a kind of charade. Elizabeth must have had great fun, supposing she has been merely acting, getting her Benjy-boy and you and others to believe her, and being made much of."

 

Lucia cocked her head thinking she heard the telephone. But it was only a womanly fancy of her own.

 

"Poor dear," she said. "I am afraid her desire to have a baby may have led her to deceive others and perhaps herself, and then of course she liked being petted and exalted and admired. You must all be very kind and oblivious when the day comes that she has to give it up. No more twilight sleep or wanting to buy dolls or having the old green skirt let out--Ah, there's the telephone. Wait for me, will you, for I have something more to say."

 

Lucia hurried out, and Georgie, after another glance at the medical book applied his mind to the psychological aspect of the situation. Lucia had doubtless written under the growing ascendency of Elizabeth. She knew about the Contessa's honey, she had seen how Elizabeth was cossetted and helped first and listened to with deference, however abject her utterance, and she could not have liked the secondary place which the sentiment of Tilling assigned to herself. She was a widow of fifty, and Elizabeth in virtue of her approaching motherhood, had really become of the next generation, whose future lies before them. Everyone had let Lucia pass into eclipse. Elizabeth was the great figure, and was the more heroic because she was obliged to let the ancestral home of her Aunt. Then there was the late election: it must have been bitter to Lucia to be at the bottom of the poll and obtain just the same number of votes as Elizabeth. All this explained her incredulity . . . Then once more her step sounded on the stairs.

 

"All gone well?" asked Georgie.

 

"Molto bene. I convinced my broker that mine was the most likely view. Now about poor Elizabeth. You must all be kind to her, I was saying. There is, I am convinced, an awful anti-climax in front of her. We must help her past it. Then her monetary losses: I really am much distressed about them. But what can you expect when a woman with no financial experience goes wildly gambling in gold mines of which she knows nothing, and thinks she knows better than anybody? Asking for trouble. But I've made a plan, Georgie, which I think will pull her out of the dreadful hole in which she now finds herself. That house of hers, Mallards. Not a bad house. I am going to offer to take it off her hands altogether, to buy the freehold."

 

"I think she only wants to let it furnished for a year if she can," said Georgie, "otherwise she means to shut it up."

 

"Well, listen."

 

Lucia ticked off her points with a finger of one hand on the fingers of the other.

 

"Uno. Naturally I can't lease it from her as it is, furnished with mangy tiger-skins, and hip baths for chairs and Polynesian aprons on the walls and a piano that belonged to her grandmother. Impossible."

 

"Quite," said Georgie.

 

"Due. The house wants a thorough doing up from top to bottom. I suspect dry rot. Mice and mildewed wallpaper and dingy paint, I know. And the drains must be overhauled. I don't suppose they've been looked at for centuries. I shall not dream of asking her to put it in order."

 

"That sounds very generous so far," said Georgie.

 

"That is what it is intended to be. Tre. I will take over from her the freehold of Mallards and hand to her the freehold of Grebe with a cheque for two thousand pounds, for I understand that is what she has sunk in her reckless speculations. If she accepts, she will step into this house all in apple-pie order and leave me with one which it will really cost a little fortune to make habitable. But I think I ought to do it, Georgie. The law of kindness. Che pensate?"

 

Georgie knew that it had long been the dream of Lucia's life to get Mallards for her own, but the transaction, stated in this manner, wore the aspect of the most disinterested philanthropy. She was evidently persuaded that it was, for she was so touched by the recital of her own generosity that the black bird-like brightness of her eyes was dimmed with moisture.

 

"We are all here to help each other, Georgie," she continued, "and I consider it a Providential privilege to be able to give Elizabeth a hand out of this trouble. There is other trouble in front of her, when she realizes how she has been deceiving others, and, as I say, perhaps herself, and it will make it easier for her if she has no longer this money worry and the prospect of living in some miserable little house. Irene burst into tears when I told her what I was going to do. So emotional."

 

Georgie did not cry, for this Providential privilege of helping others, even at so great an expense, would give Lucia just what she wanted most. That consideration dried up, at its source, any real tendency to tears.

 

"Well, I think she ought to be very grateful to you," he said.

 

"No, Georgie, I don't expect that; Elizabeth may not appreciate the benevolence of my intentions, and I shall be the last to point them out. Now let us walk up to the town. The nature of Dr. Dobbie's visit to Mallards will probably be known by now and I have finished with my Office till the arrival of the evening post. . . . Do you think she'll take my offer?"

 

Marketing was over before they got up to the High Street, but Diva made a violent tattoo on her window, and threw it open.

 

"All a wash-out about Dr. Dobbie," she called out.

 

"The cook scalded her hand, that's all. Saw her just now. Lint and oiled silk."

 

"Oh, poor thing!" said Lucia. "What did I tell you, Georgie?"

 

 

 

Lucia posted her philanthropic proposal to Elizabeth that very day. In consequence there was a most agitated breakfast duet at Mallards next morning.

 

"So like her," cried Elizabeth, when she had read the letter to Benjy with scornful interpolations. "So very like her. But I know her well enough now to see her meannesses. She has always wanted my house and is taking a low advantage of my misfortunes to try to get it. But she shan't have it. Never! I would sooner burn it down with my own hands."

 

Elizabeth crumpled up the letter and threw it into the grate. She crashed her way into a piece of toast and resumed.

 

"She's an encroacher," she said, "and quite unscrupulous. I am more than ever convinced that she put the idea of these libellous dinner-bells into Irene's head."

 

Benjy was morose this morning.

 

"Don't see the connection at all," he said.

 

Elizabeth couldn't bother to explain anything so obvious and went on.

 

"I forgave her that for the sake of peace and quietness, and because I'm a Christian, but this is too much. Grebe indeed! Grab would be the best name for any house she lives in. A wretched villa liable to be swept away by floods, and you and me carried out to sea again on a kitchen table. My answer is no, pass the butter."

 

"I shouldn't be too much in a hurry," said Benjy. "It's two thousand pounds as well. Even if you got a year's let for Mallards, you'd have to spend a pretty penny in doing it up. Any tenant would insist on that."

 

"The house is in perfect repair in every respect," said Elizabeth.

 

"That might not be a tenant's view. And you might not get a tenant at all."

 

"And the wicked insincerity of her letter," continued Elizabeth. "Saying she's sorry I have to turn out of it. Sorry! It's what she's been lying in wait for. I have a good mind not to answer her at all."

 

"And I don't see the point of that," said Benjy. "If you are determined not to take her offer, why not tell her so at once?"

 

"You're not very bright this morning, love," said Elizabeth, who had begun to think.

 

This spirited denunciation of Lucia's schemings was in fact only a conventional prelude to reflection. Elizabeth went to see her cook; in revenge for Benjy's want of indignation, she ordered him a filthy dinner, and finding that he had left the dining-room, fished Lucia's unscrupulous letter out of the grate, slightly scorched, but happily legible, and read it through again. Then, though she had given him the garden-room for his private sitting-room, she entered, quite forgetting to knock and ask if she might come in, and established herself in her usual seat in the window, where she could observe the movements of society, in order to tune herself back to normal pitch. A lot was happening: Susan's great car got helplessly stuck, as it came out of Porpoise Street, for a furniture van was trying to enter the same street, and couldn't back because there was another car behind it. The longed-for moment therefore had probably arrived, when Susan would have to go marketing on foot. Georgie went by in his Vandyck cape and a new suit (or perhaps dyed), but what was quaint Irene doing? She appeared to be sitting in the air in front of her house on a level with the first storey windows. Field-glasses had to be brought to bear on this: they revealed that she was suspended in a hammock slung from her bedroom window and (clad in pyjamas) was painting the sill in squares of black and crimson. Susan got out of her car and waddled towards the High Street. Georgie stopped and talked to Irene who dropped a paintbrush loaded with crimson on that blue beret of his. All quite satisfactory.

 

Benjy went to his golf: he had not actually required much driving this morning, and Elizabeth was alone. She had lately started crocheting a little white woollen cap, and tried it on. It curved downwards too sharply, as if designed for a much smaller head than hers, and she pulled a few rows out, and began it again in a flatter arc. A fresh train of musing was set up, and she thought, with strong distaste, of the day when Tilling would begin to wonder whether anything was going to happen, and, subsequently, to know that it wasn't. After all, she had never made any directly misleading statement: she had chosen (it was a free country) to talk about dolls and twilight sleep, and to let out her old green skirt, and Tilling had drawn its own conclusions. "That dreadful gossipy habit," she said to herself, "if there isn't any news they invent it. And I know that they'll blame me for their disappointment. (Again she looked out of the window: Susan's motor had extricated itself, and was on its way to the High Street, and that was a disappointment too.) I must try to think of something to divert their minds when that time comes."

 

Her stream of consciousness, eddying round in this depressing backwater, suddenly found an outlet into the main current, and she again read Lucia's toasted letter. It was a very attractive offer; her mouth watered at the thought of two thousand pounds, and though she had expressed to Benjy in unmistakable terms her resolve to reject any proposal so impertinent and unscrupulous, or, perhaps, in a fervour of disdain, not to answer it at all, there was nothing to prevent her accepting it at once, if she chose. A woman in her condition was always apt to change her mind suddenly and violently. (No: that would not do, since she was not a woman in her condition.) And surely here was a very good opportunity of diverting Tilling's attention. Lucia's settling into Mallards and her own move to Grebe would be of the intensest interest to Tilling's corporate mind, and that would be the time to abandon the role of coming motherhood. She would just give it up, just go shopping again with her usual briskness, just take in the green skirt and wear the enlarged woollen cap herself. She need make no explanations for she had said nothing that required them: Tilling, as usual, had done all the talking.

 

She turned her mind to the terms of Lucia's proposal. The blaze of fury so rightly kindled by the thought of Lucia possessing Mallards was spent, and the thought of that fat capital sum made a warm glow for her among the ashes. As Benjy had said, no tenant for six months or a year would take a house so sorely in need of renovation, and if Lucia was right in supposing that that wretched hole in the ground somewhere in West Africa would not be paying dividends for two years, a tenant for one year, even if she was lucky enough to find one, would only see her half through this impoverished period. No sensible woman could reject so open a way out of her difficulties.

 

The mode of accepting this heaven-sent offer required thought. Best, perhaps, just formally to acknowledge the unscrupulous letter, and ask for a few days in which to make up her mind. A little hanging back, a hint conveyed obliquely, say through Diva, that two thousand pounds did not justly represent the difference in values between her lovely Queen Anne house and the villa precariously placed so near the river, a heartbroken wail at the thought of leaving the ancestral home might lead to an increased payment in cash, and that would be pleasant. So, having written her acknowledgment Elizabeth picked up her market-basket and set off for the High Street.

 

Quaint Irene had finished her window-sill, and was surveying the effect of this brilliant decoration from the other side of the street. In view of the disclosure which must come soon, Elizabeth suddenly made up her mind to forgive her for the dinner-bell outrage for fear she might do something quainter yet: a cradle, for instance, with a doll inside it, left on the doorstep would be very unnerving, and was just the sort of thing Irene might think of. So she said:

 

"Good morning, love: what a pretty window-sill. So bright."

 

Regardless of Elizabeth's marriage Irene still always addressed her as "Mapp."

 

"Not bad, is it, Mapp," she said. "What about my painting the whole of your garden-room in the same style? A hundred pounds down, and I'll begin to-day."

 

"That would be very cheap," said Mapp enthusiastically. "But alas, I fear my days there are numbered."

 

"Oh, of course; Lucia's offer. The most angelic thing I ever heard. I knew you'd jump at it."

 

"No, dear, not quite inclined to jump," said Mapp rather injudiciously.

 

"Oh, I didn't mean literally," said Irene. "That would be very rash of you. But isn't it like her, so noble and generous? I cried when she told me."

 

"I shall cry when I have to leave my sweet Mallards," observed Elizabeth. "If I accept her offer, that is."

 

"Then you'll be a crashing old crocodile, Mapp," said Irene. "You'll really think yourself damned lucky to get out of that old ruin of yours on such terms. Do you like my pyjamas? I'll give you a suit like them when the happy day--"

 

"Must be getting on," interrupted Elizabeth. "Such a lot to do."

 

Feeling slightly battered, but with the glow of two thousand pounds comforting her within, Elizabeth turned into the High Street. Diva, it seemed, had finished her shopping, and was seated on this warm morning at her open window reading the paper. Elizabeth approached quite close unobserved, and with an irresistible spasm of playfulness said "Bo!"

 

Diva gave a violent start.

 

"Oh, it's you, is it?" she said.

 

"No, dear, somebody quite different," said Elizabeth skittishly. "And I'm in such a state of perplexity this morning. I don't know what to do."

 

"Benjy eloped with Lucia?" asked Diva. Two could play at being playful.

 

Elizabeth winced.

 

"Diva, dear, jokes on certain subjects only hurt me," she said. "Tiens! Je vous pardonne."

 

"What's perplexing you then?" asked Diva. "Come in and talk if you want to, tiens. Can't go bellowing bad French into the street."

 

Elizabeth came in, refused a low and comfortable chair and took a high one.

 

"Such an agonizing decision to make," she said, "and its coming just now is almost more than I can bear. I got un petit lettre from Lucia this morning offering to give me the freehold of Grebe and two thousand pounds in exchange for the freehold of Mallards."

 

"I knew she was going to make you some offer," said Diva. "Marvellous for you. Where does the perplexity come in? Besides, you were going to let it for a year if you possibly could."

 

"Yes, but the thought of never coming back to it. Mon vieux, so devoted to his garden-room, where we were engaged. Turning out for ever. And think of the difference between my lovely Queen Anne house and that villa by the side of the road that leads nowhere. The danger of floods. The distance."

 

"But Lucia's thought of that," said Diva, "and puts the difference down at two thousand pounds. I should have thought one thousand was ample."

 

"There are things like atmosphere that can't be represented in terms of money," said Elizabeth with feeling. "All the old associations. Tante Caroline."

 

"Not having known your Tante Caroline I can't say what her atmosphere's worth," said Diva.

 

"A saint upon earth," said Elizabeth warmly. "And Mallards used to be a second home to me long before it was mine." (Which was a lie.) "Silly of me, perhaps, but the thought of parting with it is agony. Lucia is terribly anxious to get it, on m'a dit."

 

"She must be if she's offered you such a price for it," said Diva.

 

"Diva, dear, we've always been such friends," said Elizabeth, "and it's seldom, n'est ce pas, that I've asked you for any favour. But I do now. Do you think you could let her know, quite casually, that I don't believe I shall have the heart to leave Mallards? Just that: hardly an allusion to the two thousand pounds."

 

Diva considered this.

 

"Well, I'll ask a favour, too, Elizabeth," she said, "and it is that you should determine to drop that silly habit of putting easy French phrases into your conversation. So confusing. Besides everyone sees you're only copying Lucia. So ridiculous. All put on. If you will, I'll do what you ask. Going to tea with her this afternoon."

 

"Thank you, sweet. A bargain then, and I'll try to break myself: I'm sure I don't want to confuse anybody. Now I must get to my shopping. Kind Susan is taking me for a drive this afternoon, and then a quiet evening with my Benjy-boy."

 

"Tres agréable," said Diva ruthlessly. "Can't you hear how silly it sounds? Been on my mind a long time to tell you that."

 

 

 

Lucia was in her office when Diva arrived for tea, and so could not possibly be disturbed. As she was actually having a sound nap, her guests, Georgie and Diva, had to wait until she happened to awake, and then, observing the time, she came out in a great hurry with a pen behind her ear. Diva executed her commission with much tact and casualness, but Lucia seemed to bore into the middle of her head with that penetrating eye. Having pierced her, she then looked dreamily out of the window.

 

"Dear me, what is that slang word one hears so much in the City?" she said. "Ah, yes. Bluff. Should you happen to see dear Elizabeth, Diva, would you tell her that I just mentioned to you that my offer does not remain open indefinitely? I shall expect to hear from her in the course of to-morrow. If I hear nothing by then I shall withdraw it."

 

"That's the stuff to give her," said Georgie appreciatively. "You'll hear fast enough when she knows that."

 

But the hours of next day went by, and no communication came from Mallards. The morning post brought a letter from Mammoncash, which required a swift decision, but Lucia felt a sad lack of concentration, and was unable to make up her mind, while this other business remained undetermined. When the afternoon faded into dusk and still there was no answer, she became very anxious, and when, on the top of that, the afternoon post brought nothing her anxiety turned into sheer distraction. She rang up the house agents to ask whether Mrs. Mapp-Flint had received any application for the lease of Mallards for six months or a year, but Messrs. Woolgar and Pipstow, with much regret, refused to disclose the affairs of their client. She rang up Georgie to see if he knew anything, and received the ominous reply that as he was returning home just now, he saw a man, whom he did not recognise, being admitted into Mallards: Lucia in this tension felt convinced that it was somebody come to look over the house. She rang up Diva who had duly and casually delivered the message to Elizabeth at the marketing hour. It was an awful afternoon, and Lucia felt that all the money she had made was dross if she could not get this coveted freehold. Finally after tea (at which she could not eat a morsel) she wrote to Elizabeth turning the pounds into guineas, and gave the note to Cadman to deliver by hand and wait for an answer.

 

Meantime, ever since lunch, Elizabeth had been sitting at the window of the garden-room, getting on with the conversion of the white crocheted cap into adult size, and casting frequent glances down the street for the arrival of a note from Grebe, to say that Lucia (terrified at the thought that she would not have the heart to quit Mallards) was willing to pay an extra five hundred pounds or so as a stimulant to that failing organ. But no letter came and Elizabeth in turn began to be terrified that the offer would be withdrawn. No sooner had Benjy swallowed a small (not the large) cup of tea on his return from his golf, than she sent him off to Grebe, with a note accepting Lucia's first offer, and bade him bring back the answer.

 

It was dark by now, and Cadman passing through the Landgate into the town met Major Benjy walking very fast in the direction of Grebe. The notes they both carried must therefore have been delivered practically simultaneously, and Elizabeth, in writing, had consented to accept two thousand pounds, and Lucia, in writing, to call them guineas.

 

To be continued

 

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