The Spring Madness of Mr Sermon (47 page)

^{"You sir? I thought you was still away like the kids . . . !"}

^{His mind jumped ahead at once. "Kids? Jonquil and Keith? They're . . . not back yet?"}

^{"Why no, not till Saturday, sir. The boy stayed on in camp an extra week so Mrs. Sermon 'phoned Portsmouth and said Miss Jonquil could stay with her aunt if she'd a mind to, but she didn't tell me about you coming home!"}

^{"No," said Sebastian, slowly, "she ... er ... she didn't know for certain. Have you been paid, Mrs. Balcombe?"}

^{"It don't matter until Wednesday," she told him, "I'm leavin' an hour early today and would have told Mrs. Sermon but I didn't like to bust in because she don't like me to, so I left a note."}

^{Mr. Sermon, disconcerted by the unexpected presence of six of Sybil's intimates, now began to feel that the cards were falling his}

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^{way. "I'll give Mrs. Sermon the message, Mrs. Balcombe-here," and he handed her a pound note.}

^{"I got no change," she told him, "it's on'y fifteen bob this week, five hours instead o' six on account o' me having to see me sister-in-law in hospital."}

^{"Well, we certainly can't penalise you for that," said Sebastian gaily, "keep the change!"}

^{"Well, thank you sir," she said, but he had already slipped round the side of the house and entered the kitchen, taking Mrs. Balcombe's note and stuffing it into his pocket. Jonquil and Keith away and Mrs. Balcombe gone an hour before her time! This was surely advance information he could turn to account and he stood thinking for a moment before crossing the hall, softly opening the front door and stepping outside. He pressed the bell twice and waited, hearing Sybil shout for Mrs. Balcombe and then, after a pause, somebody got up and opened the garden-room door. Stepping inside he said, loudly, "Thank you, Mrs. Balcombe!" and returned to the hall where he suddenly came face to face with Miss Teake, the Club Secretary.}

^{The sight of him stopped her dead and Sebastian realised at once that she was privy to the secret that lay behind his prolonged absence. He thought, spitefully, 'I wonder if she knows about Scott-James and his photographic trap ?' but he beamed at her and said, "Is my wife there, Miss Teake? I've just arrived," and walked swiftly past her into the room. They must have' heard his voice in the hall for everyone was looking towards him with interest as he strode in with apologetic breeziness and then came to a sudden stop.}

^{"I say, I'm sorry, I didn't know you were in session! Why on earth didn't you warn me, Sybil? I could easily have caught a later train." Sybil was by no means an easy person to astonish but he congratulated himself that she was astonished now, not only by his appearance but more, he thought, by his perfidy. He noticed also that each member of the committee instinctively shifted their glance from him to her and that under their collective scrutiny colour flooded into her face, giving him the opportunity to walk the length of the table and plant a resounding kiss on her cheek.}

^{"Look here," he said generously, "I'll make myself scarce! You}

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^{won't be very long will you? I've had rather a long journey and I could do with a wash and brush up, it was insufferably hot in the train!" and he smiled thinly at them so that first Endsleigh, then his wife and then young Marcheson shuffled to their feet and Endsleigh murmured: "We ... er ... we were pretty well through, Sermon; you'll want a ... a meal, I dare say and we could adjourn until Wednesday, couldn't we?" and he appealed rather pathetically to his rat-toothed wife who was now looking at Sybil for an explanation.}

^{'God damn them, they all know what's happened!' thought Sebastian, 'and they didn't learn it from Sybil but from putting their long noses together and sniggering across the tables at Martyr Cafe coffee sessions!' and he felt glad that he had adopted this particular strategy and given them all something to discuss on the way down there for tea, a tea, he reflected, that they would otherwise have enjoyed right here at Sybil's expense.}

^{As Sybil said nothing, Mrs. Endsleigh spoke. "Thursday would have been better after all dear," and said it in a slightly aggrieved tone. "Of course, there is still the matter of the junior lead for the April play but there's no real rush about that!" and with a loud sniff she walked deliberately out of the French window.}

^{Sybil lost her rigidity. "Wait Vera!" she said, reaching out her hand but Vera Endsleigh had gone, having contrived to leave behind her the impression that she had suffered a grave indignity. Her husband, shuffling a little, said: "Don't worry my dear, I . . . er ... I imagine you have things to discuss. Any afternoon next week will do. Well ... er ... !" and he trailed off, nodding towards Sebastian and hurrying after his wife. Aubrey Marcheson's exit had slightly more dignity for he paused to kiss Sybil's hand and Sebastian thought he had never seen a more affected gesture performed inside an English house. Then 'Bubbles' Endsleigh went out and after her Mrs. Beckett and last of all a flustered Miss Teake, who made a kind of half-curtsy to Sybil and dropped some papers in her confusion. For the space of about three seconds they were alone with a line of blotters and ashtrays and then, moving like a mechanical doll, Sybil went after them without a glance in his direction.}

^{He heard a good deal of muttering and whispering and then the}

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^{cars moved off almost simultaneously and Sybil returned to the room, her features very composed and holding herself very erect. He said, quietly, "I'm sorry, Sybil, but I had to get rid of them! What I have to say is important and they aren't, believe me!"}

^{Sybil gave no sign of having heard but swept past him into the hall. He heard her rustle swiftly upstairs and then, faintly, the bang of the bedroom door. The sound roused him and he thought, 'If she's reverting to those tactics again she's got a shock coming to her. The time I let a ninepenny bolt and socket stand between me and my future is past,' but for a few moments he did not move but stood with hands deep in his trouser pockets staring into the garden, forcing himself to review the situation calmly and carefully.}

^{Keith was in camp and Jonquil was in Portsmouth. Mrs. Balcombe had left but Sybil did not yet know they were alone in the house, for the daily usually stayed on another hour. It was Monday, not a gardener's day, and it was unlikely at this hour that a tradesman would call. Thinking it over he realised that he could not have improved his chances if he had planned it this way.}

^{He shut the French windows and returned to the kitchen, locking the door and putting the key on the shelf over the stove. He returned to the hall, slipped the yale catch of the front door and lifted the telephone receiver from the hook. Then, treading softly, he went upstairs and along the corridor to their room.}

^{The door was not locked as he had expected it to be and when he entered she was gathering clothes and putting them into a suitcase that lay open on the bed. She did not look up but went on opening drawers and selecting toilet accessories' and items of clothing. He noticed that her lip quivered and that her hands, usually so deliberate in their movements, were clumsy handling small objects. He said, standing by the door, "Where are you off to now, Sybil?"}

^{She paused in the act of crossing from dressing-table to bed. "I'm going to Dora's at Portsmouth and there's absolutely no point at all in your following me or making any more trouble Sebastian! I haven't the least idea what prompted you to behave like that or why, in fact, you came back here at all!"}

^{"I can tell you that, Sybil," he said, doggedly, "I'm here to make an end of this nonsense and take you back with me to Kingsbay.}

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^{I've learned rather more than how to supervise a foreshore since I've been away! I've learned, for instance, that I'm still very much in love with you!"}

^{Her head came round and for a split second their eyes met, then she threw up her chin as though checking an impulse and said, primly: "I can't accept that, Sebastian! You behaved intolerably when you went away, you've remained away all this time, and when you eventually return the first thing you do is to humiliate me in front of my friends. All that doesn't add up to love or even good manners. In fact, I don't know what it does demonstrate, except perhaps a childish kind of spite and obstinacy."}

^{"You wouldn't admit to obstinacy yourself, Sybil, not even as a basis of discussion ?"}

^{She flung the garment she was holding on the bed and whipped round, facing him squarely.}

^{"How dare you say that? What have I done but wait here for you to come to your senses and court fresh humiliation by coming all the way to Devon? Do you expect me to go on pleading with you to come home and accept a normal husband's responsibilities ?"}

^{"I haven't any responsibilities here," he said, slowly, "and now I realise that I never did have any. It was lack of them that sent me away."}

^{A little of her self-possession left her.}

^{"You never told me you were unhappy or upset! You never gave me the slightest sign . . . !"}

^{"Yes, I did, the night I left but you wouldn't unbend for a second, or have you forgotten already?"}

^{"No, I haven't forgotten," she said, breathing hard, "and if you hadn't been in such a crazy hurry I . . . !"}

^{She stopped, biting back an admission of what had occurred that evening immediately after he had presented his ultimatum and walked out into the night. Even at this distance she could still recall the humiliation of standing almost naked at the landing window and watching his shadow pass under the street lamp.}

^{Well," he said, coming into the room and sitting on the bed, "we shan't get very far discussing the past, Sybil. Right now I'm interested in our future and if yon say we haven't got one as man}

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^{and wife I won't accept that. In fact, that's why I took the bull by the horns and sold the house!"}

^{"The house? This house?"}

^{He saw that he had shocked her out of her defensive sulkiness and went on, "This house, and I've bought another in Kingsbay! I mean to take that job at Barrowdene because I shall never have a chance like that again and I'm taking you back with me, if necessary, tonight! There's no immediate hurry, however, and you can leave your packing for a moment."}

^{He saw her eyes dart to the door as though she feared a repetition of the scene enacted here the last time they were together in this room but he was not bothered. They were secure from interruption and his easy victory downstairs had restored his confidence in the powers of reason.}

^{"It was the only way to make sure that you gave it a trial," he went on. "This house has become a sort of status symbol to you and as long as you remain here those bloody amateurs will always have far more of you than me!"}

^{She was looking at him in a way that she had never done before, not even when he had emerged, crowned with his yachting cap, from the beleaguered ladies' lavatory.}

^{"You . . . you can't have sold the house," she said, at last, "it isn't yours to sell! You know it isn't yours to sell! I ... I could prosecute you for even advertising it!"}

^{"Legally it's mine," he said, "and the deal has already been approved by a solicitor. There's no question of money involved because I've already made the other house over to you. As a matter of fact there's a small profit and I'll put that to your account."}

^{"But I don't want to sell!" she screamed, advancing on him and waving her hands as though she itched to box his ears. "How dare you go behind my back and do a thing like that! How dare you take advantage of my generosity in putting the house in your name all those years ago. It's the most despicable trick I've ever heard of!"}

^{"Talking of despicable tricks," he said, calmly, "what's happened to Scott-James, the Private Eye? Has he reported yet?"}

^{"Don't try and sidetrack me!" she snapped, "this house . . ."}

^{"Oh damn the house!" he cut in, irritated by the implication that}

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^{she cared more for bricks and mortar than what happened to their marriage. "What the devil possessed you to send a man like Scott-James to spy on me? How could you be such a fool, Sybil?"}

^{"So that's why you're here, that's why you're acting like a criminal lunatic? If Kelvin did pay a call on you I expect he told you what action I've decided to take."}

^{"He didn't have time," said Sebastian, grinning, "because I knocked him down and smashed his camera! Somehow I didn't think he'd be in a great hurry to report what happened!"}

^{"It's no good," she said, "I've been a fool to go on hoping you'd come to your senses. I'm not going to try any more and we can continue this discussion in front of a solicitor!" and she suddenly turned away and walked towards the door.}

^{Her withdrawal caught him at a disadvantage. For one thing he had not been expecting it and for another he was sitting and she was standing between him and the bathroom. It was not that he was afraid of the bathroom bolt but he realised that if she did get inside and lock it against him she could get to the telephone before he could stop her and in her present state of excitement she was capable of shouting for help. He leaped up and was just in time to seize her by the shoulder, spinning her round and holding her in the narrow angle of the door and window. It was the first time he had touched her in months and-it had a surprising effect upon him for as she shrank under the pressure of his fingers all the resentment and temper left him.}