The Sleeping Fury (2 page)

“Yes, I felt that,” said Eric. “But I can't live up to such flawless self-possession. It freezes me. Do you think, John, that she ever breaks out … or breaks down … or breaks through?”

“Certainly not. What a question!”

“But don't you think there's something rather terrible in that? For instance, can you imagine her in love?”

“No, frankly, I can't. One does feel, I admit, that Lady Mardale is protected from the commoner facts of life. But can we, to choose another aspect, picture her stepping into a bath? And yet, being an English lady, and such an English lady, she undoubtedly does step into a bath every day of her life. You will allow, Eric, that it's undeniable.”

“Oh, absolutely.”

“And so, you see, she must be a little different from what we suppose. Let us make another test. Can you imagine her weeping?”

Eric gave a little frown of distress. “I'd rather not try,” he said.

“But why not, if she seems to you so inhuman?”

“Well, I don't know. …” He paused. “I feel, somehow,” he said at last, “that there would be something more than usually tragic in
her
breaking down.”

“And so it would appear that you don't really deny her humanity. In fact, I suspect, Eric, that you are confusing dignity—or, if you like, austerity—with humanity. You have allowed that she steps stark naked every day into a bath, so that perhaps you will believe me when I tell you that twenty or twenty-one years ago she produced a very beautiful daughter whom we saw playing tennis when we were sitting over there.”

“What? The one in white, with the … with the blue in her hat?”

John turned his head, and saw that Eric was blushing and gaping like a schoolboy. “A … h, Eric!” He shook a reproachful finger. “You must take a few lessons in self-possession from Lady Mardale. So I've convinced you at last, have I, you unmitigated old Casanova?”

“Yes, you've convinced me,” said Eric. “But you must admit that she hides her humanity very successfully.”

“Oh, I admit that. And you, on your side, must admit that she's a work of art, a
grande dame
if ever there was one, and admirably adapted to be the wife of a parson-peer.”

“A parson?”

“Yes, Lord Mardale is both a lord and a servant of the Lord. Very compendious, isn't it?”

“And he, I suppose, is as austere as his wife?”

“Austere? Far from it. He's the most human creature I know. Unusual in a parson, isn't it? But he isn't primarily the parson; in fact, you wouldn't, I think, take him for a parson if it wasn't for his dog-collars. But you would guess at once that he was an aristocrat, and what you do feel about him at once is that he's that rare bird, a good man. The Halnakers have always rather run to goodness. Real goodness, I mean; not mere piety.”

“Halnaker is the family name?”

“Yes. Spelt H-a-l-n-a-k-e-r and pronounced Hannaker, with the accent on the Hann—the pro-penultimate, as we were taught to call it at school. The propenultimate, if you please. What unmitigated nonsense! Why not the last-but-two?”

Eric made no reply to these scholastic ruminations
of John's. His eyes were following the two figures that were now pacing slowly along the grass six or seven yards away. They were far enough from where he and John sat to be unaware of them, yet near enough for him to be able to inspect Lady Mardale as he had not dared to do when she had talked to him at tea; and he studied her intently, his interest reinforced now by the knowledge that she was the mother of his delightful girl.

She was a large woman, but there was nothing ungainly in her size, for she was tall—taller than he had supposed when he had stood by her chair at tea—and she carried her head and body with an ease and assurance which gave her an air of elegance. Though she appeared old in Eric's young eyes, she gave him the impression also of being physically strong; she might almost, he thought to himself, have been called athletic. The alertness and confidence which had so charmed him in the girl had evidently come from the mother. He examined her face. No, he thought again, she could not strictly be called handsome. The nose was too large, the large cheeks were somewhat pouched, and so was the chin. There was something grim and yet kindly about the long, narrow mouth, turned down a little at the corners. From where he sat he noticed again the large, care-worn eye-sockets, but he could not see the eyes—those eyes he had especially noticed at tea, brownish-grey like agates, piercing yet kind. No, thought Eric, she was not really handsome, and yet she produced the effect of handsomeness much more than many handsome women. How entirely in her appropriate surroundings she seemed to be
in this beautiful old place. But wasn't she, after all, Eric reflected, one of those very people of whom he had spoken just now to John, who have always been surrounded by exquisite things, and take them all for granted? Was she as entranced as he was? Was she even conscious of the place at all as something marvellously rich and moving? No, Eric felt certain that she was not. She had driven over, probably in a large closed car so that her hair and hat should not be disturbed, to carry out a formal duty, bringing with her her admirable social distinction. Convention demanded that she should be there, and there she was, and the occasion was certainly the richer for her presence. She was deep in conversation now with John's father, and, from the seriousness of their faces, Eric judged that they were talking business. He turned to John. “Yes,” he said, “she certainly is a work of art.”

John nodded. “A national monument,” he said. “But come along; we ought to go back to the tennis. I'm supposed to keep an eye on it, and make up new sets when necessary. And I'll tell you what I'll do, Eric, though it will go sorely against my conscience. I'll lead the lamb to the slaughter: I'll make up a four with you and Sylvia Halnaker as partners.”

• • • • • • • •

Half an hour later the guests were already thinning away and the set was over. Eric had hoped for another stroll with Sylvia Halnaker, but she had told him that she must go to the house, as her mother and father would probably be waiting for
her. “Will you come and help me to find them?” she said, and Eric went with her across the lawn and through the house to the front hall. There they found Lady Mardale talking to Mr. and Mrs. Pennington.

“Ah, there you are, my child,” she said. “I was just going to send Hanson to hunt for you.” She smiled at Eric. “Mr. Pennington tells me,” she said, “that you will be here for a week or two. I hope we shall see you at Haughton next Tuesday.”

Eric glowed with pleasure. How comforting to know that he was to see Sylvia again in a few days! Everything seemed to be uniting to make his holiday happy. Lady Mardale and Sylvia shook hands with him, and, as they turned to go, they were joined by a short, clean-shaven man with grey hair. He was dressed as a clergyman. His eyes met Eric's for a moment, and it seemed to Eric that he had never seen eyes so benevolent and so understanding.

When the car was clear of the lodge gates of the Manor House Lady Mardale leaned back and closed her eyes. She felt old and tired. The emotions of the last two hours had worn her out; yet even now she might have appeared to a casual observer the same self-possessed and impassive creature that she had seemed to young Danver at the garden-party. But Eric, if he had been able to inspect her again now, would have noticed the bluish discoloration of the weary eye-sockets and the hint of an increased bitterness in the droop of the mouth.

Two hours earlier, as she had sat on the right of her husband, as she sat now, in the deep-cushioned Daimler on her way to the garden-party, she had looked forward with sharply conflicting feelings to revisiting that place which she had not seen for over twenty years, half dreading and half hungering for the emotions which the sight of the place would certainly arouse. But of one thing she had been certain—that, however deeply those emotions might be stirred, she would not lose her self-possession. No one would suspect the storm beneath the quiet surface. And, admitting that to herself, she recognised bitterly that even the most passionate feeling submits in the end to time. Even now, after twenty years, she was not convinced that her surrender had been for the best. It had been for her husband's sake
that she had surrendered; and yet, would the damage to him have been irreparable? Time can do so much. If it had tamed her own feelings, how much more easily would it have soothed his who had so many other resources of comfort. And as for the scandal, the public memory for such things is short. The scandal would have blown over years ago. In any case, her husband would have been blameless; he would have received nothing but sympathy. As the twenty-five miles between Haughton, their own place, and the Manor House had slipped past, she had paid no attention to the familiar landscape until the car had reached the point where the wandering by-road that led to the Penningtons' struck off from the main turnpike. There she had roused herself and begun to look out at the gliding country. She had not been down that by-road since old Mr. Pennington had let the Manor House and had gone to live in a smaller place in Devonshire. The Mardales had not known the new people who had rented the place, and so there had been nothing during all these years to take them down the once familiar road. If the Penningtons had not left, the Mardales would, of course, have continued to frequent the place, and so the precious associations which, in one brief week, the place had acquired for her would have worn off by slow degrees. But her long absence had preserved them intact. Even the winding by-road had for her the sharp, heart-searching intensity of things too strongly charged with the past. She glanced sideways at her husband. Did he, she wondered, realise what she must be feeling? It had
seemed that he did not, for he had met her eyes with his usual clear open look, and had begun to speak of the Penningtons.

“Well, twenty years is a big price to pay for backing a losing horse, isn't it, Charlotte? I'm glad Roger doesn't follow in his father's footsteps.”

“And yet,” she had replied, “there was something about old Mr. Pennington that one misses in Roger.”

Lord Mardale smiled. “Yes, it's undeniable that he was a fine old boy, a gentleman of the old school. Yes, good or bad, he was more of a person than Roger.”

“It was sad for him to die away from his old home,” said Lady Mardale, and there was in her voice a depth of sadness greater than her regret of the old man's death.

They had swung into the Penningtons' lodge gates and up the shady drive, and soon they had drawn up at the front door, where three or four other cars had just deposited guests. These had kept Lady Mardale's attention upon the fact of the garden-party, and shielded her from the memories which now began to crowd about her. It was a hot July day, and the flower-scented air of the wide hall struck deliciously cool as they entered from the blaze of sunshine which flooded the front of the house. Lady Mardale glanced round the hall like one in a dream, and noticed with profound relief that nothing had been altered. But yes; the curtain over the door into the dining-room was different. The old murrey-coloured one had gone, and a blue one hung in its place. That small change
brought her a little stab of pain. She hoped that she would find no others; for each change in scenes which had become so precious to her would be for her the death of something to which, she now realised, she had clung desperately all these years. Would it not have been wiser to have remained at home and let these old memories rest? With what clearness she recalled the bright gold of his head as she had seen it once against the murrey-coloured curtain when he had risen from his chair to be introduced to her; and at that vision he himself came back to her now with an actuality beside which the people moving past her in the hall seemed no more than ghosts. “Maurice! Maurice!” Her heart called out his name though her lips remained closed. How was it possible to realise that a creature so vivid was dead? That his hair, that bright golden hair … For a moment her mind plunged helplessly in mist. Then, with a violent effort, she controlled herself. Something was touching her hands; she was standing in the hall, and a cheerful voice was saying: “Dear Charlotte, how nice to see you again.” Amy Pennington had taken both her hands, and now she and her husband and Sylvia were being led by their hostess across the hall to the garden door.

As she stepped out into the garden, it had seemed to her that she was two women. The one talked to Amy Pennington and took stock of the company of men and women scattered over the paths and lawns and among the shadows of the trees, recognising friends and acquaintances, making mental notes of those that she must seek out and talk to, and
impassively aware of that other woman within her, crying out inaudibly and stretching out her hands to the beloved garden which had so faithfully preserved her precious memories through all these years, and waited now to receive her again. How she longed for the crowd to melt away, so that she could throw aside all pretence and revisit alone all those dear spots where the memories crowded most thickly—the grass walk under the elm-avenue, where they had strolled together that afternoon, talking happily and freely as if they had known each other all their lives; the broad walk where they had stopped to admire the late dahlias and Michaelmas daisies; and, most of all, the centre of the yew-garden, where in the early morning they had sat by the little fountain, enclosed safely within the triple yew-hedge, with the yew-tree birds and beasts standing fantastically against the blue sky. “What a good thing,” she thought to herself, “that I'm no longer alive as I was then.” It would have been impossible, if the passionate half of her had not been numbed and starved, to preserve appearances as she was preserving them now. No, there was no fear now of her breaking down; yet she wished that she had not come, for she felt painfully that it was sacrilege to preserve such calm self-possession in that place; to behave, and to be able to behave, as if it were no more to her than to all those other guests. Ah, but wasn't the fact that it really
was
so much more enough? He would know, if the dead can know anything of the living, all that was in her heart, all that the hidden, inarticulate woman was suffering. And, if he had no
knowledge of her now, at least she herself knew, and that was sufficient. She shook hands and talked for a moment with Roger Pennington, and then turned to meet a woman in dark red who was hurrying towards her and Sylvia. Lord Mardale had moved away and was talking to a tall woman in navy-blue and a red-faced man in a large black-and-white check. “The Crofts. Yes, I must talk to the Crofts later,” she thought as she grasped the outstretched hand of the woman in red. “Why, Winifred, this is an unexpected pleasure! And what are you doing here?”