A Modern Tragedy (27 page)

“Oh, I see,” murmured Elaine, relaxing.

“Did you think I meant: tell him about us?” demanded Walter, overjoyed that the idea had even entered her head.

Elaine would not answer, which was answer enough for Walter. The lovers smiled into each other's eyes, made the usual agreement not to tell their happiness to anyone for a little while, kissed passionately, and parted.

Walter mechanically drove himself down into Hudley, and out to Moorside Place.

When he had reached his home he sat in his car for a minute or two, deliberately and determinedly took his mind from his love, and tried to recall to himself all the circumstances it was necessary to bear in mind in the Moorside Place house—which things it was safe to mention there, and which it was not.

He thus reluctantly reminded himself of the Lumbs, Heights, Tasker, the threatened bankruptcy, the meeting, the statement of assets, the suggested flotation.

So much had happened since the meeting of the afternoon that the new company seemed to Walter, as he sat there, quite an old established fact, which it was no use anybody making a fuss about; but he now reminded himself that it was an essential part of his relations with Elaine; she had accepted his achievement; it was hers, and must be defended by every means in his power, maintained at all costs. But Moorside Place seemed so irrelevant to his schemes—an interlude
there was a terrible waste of time. Why did it matter so much what his family thought about the company? It was a nuisance to have to go to the house at all. For a moment Walter toyed with the notion of not entering it; but he was still too untrained in deceit to imagine himself facing Henry Clay Crosland calmly at their next meeting with a direct personal lie, so he descended from his car rather sulkily, but with determination, and rang the front door bell energetically.

The door was opened to him by Mrs. Haigh.

“Well, mother,” said Walter with kindly patronage, stepping in.

His mother exclaimed: “Walter!” and took him in her arms.

She strained him to her, kissing him, gasping—or, perhaps, sobbing—a little as she pressed her lips deep into his firm young cheek. After a moment she released him, with a little smile of deprecation.

Walter, rather startled by the vehemence of her embrace, hung up his hat, then turned to her with a question about his father. She seemed smaller, more shrunken, older than he remembered; he felt uneasy in her presence, not sure whether he was very sorry for her or very much irritated by her pathos.

Without answering his question, Mrs. Haigh led her son into the living room, and murmuring: “Your father'll be all right for a few minutes,” gently drew him down to the sofa beside her, and took his hand.

“Well, Walter, lovey,” she said, gazing at him fondly from her loving brown eyes. “It's nice to see you.”

As she made him no reproach on the length of time which had lapsed since he last came, Walter's mechanism of defence was lulled to rest, and his natural feelings had full play. He felt suddenly that she was very dear to him, reproached
himself on her behalf, and remarked apologetically.

“I've been so terribly busy, Mother.”

“Business is very bad, isn't it?” said Mrs. Haigh mildly. Her tone did not cast serious blame on business for being so awkward, but seemed a little shocked and bewildered by its naughtiness. She had used the same tone towards her children's misdemeanours in their youth.

“I daresay it is, but I haven't felt it so,” replied Walter, not without pride. “I'm doing very well, Mother.”

“I'm very glad, love,” said Mrs. Haigh simply. “I thought, perhaps, you were rather worried—you look so much older, and so tired.”

“I'm not at all tired,” snapped Walter, annoyed. And suddenly moved by an irresistible impulse, he blurted: “Mother, I'm in love.”

Mrs. Haigh's large soft eyes opened more widely, and she gazed at him in loving admiration. “Well, Walter!” she said in tones of admiring delight. “I've often wondered … Who is she, lovey?”

“She's Henry Clay Crosland's grand-daughter,” said Walter: “Elaine.” His voice stuck in his throat on her name; he looked down quickly in the hot agonised embarrassment of young love; and tears of sympathy came into Mrs. Haigh's beautiful eyes as she saw how deeply he was feeling about his girl.

“And is she very pretty, Walter?” she asked in her soft loving tones.

“She's lovely,” said Walter, breathless.

“And good?” enquired Mrs. Haigh, hopefully.

“She's sweet,” gasped Walter.

“And is she going to have you?” pursued Mrs. Haigh with the mild simplicity which could not give offence.

“Yes, yes—that is, I think so—I don't know!” exclaimed Walter, wondering how to tell her the wonderful event of
the evening without breathing a word of it—only thus, he felt, could he satisfy his own feeling of delicacy towards Elaine. He jumped up, and excitedly paced the room from end to end.

Immediately there was a thumping noise on the ceiling above his head. Walter looked up, surprised. “Is that father?” he asked doubtfully.

Mrs. Haigh, who heard the sound of her husband's stick twenty or thirty times a day, smiled and stood up.

“Yes—he heard voices, and you walking about, I expect,” she said. “He gets so tired of himself, you know. Come up with me,” she went on, leading the way upstairs. “He will be glad to see you, Walter.”

“Don't say anything to him about—Elaine,” gasped Walter.

“Of course not, love,” said his mother soothingly.

She entered the room where Dyson lay in bed, bloodless, emaciated, very spruce and clean, between spotless sheets, propped up on plain white pillows.

“You've been a long time, Emily,” began Mr. Haigh peevishly. “Who is it you're talking to, downstairs?”

“It's Walter, Dyson,” announced Mrs. Haigh, with her gentle smile. “Come to see you.”

Dyson turned his head round quickly towards his son. At once his emaciated features lost their querulous look, and brightened into a pleased, childlike smile. Walter bent over him and kissed him. He was touched to feel his father's cold, dry lips moving against his cheek in response. Dyson lifted his hand and placed it on Walter's wrist, seeming to feel a joyous pride in its steady pulse, its warm roundness.

“Well, Walter!” he said in a weak but happy tone: “You
are
getting into a man nowadays. Sit ye down and tell us a bit of something. I never hear owt now of what's going on.” As Walter seated himself in a chair at the foot of the bed,
the old man went on, frowning: “The Lumbs never come near me now. How are they getting on?”

“Where's Rosamond?” enquired Walter, to change the subject.

“She's been out all day, walking with another High School mistress,” explained her mother, sitting on the edge of the bed. “They took their lunch.”

“But they'll be in to supper,” broke in Dyson eagerly. “You ought to stay and see them, Walter. She's a very nice young lady.” He wandered off into a long, rambling account of the girl which Walter found very wearying. He had never had very much interest in Rosamond's friends; before his departure from Moorside Place he had been afraid of them, and now every girl was overpoweringly boring except Elaine. As his father's narrative continued, his tenderness drooped and died.

“Aye, she's a real nice girl,” concluded Dyson. “And well educated. Very well educated.”

“Well, never mind her now, father,” said Mrs. Haigh mildly, “Let's hear Walter's news.”

“Aye—tell us something, lad,” urged Dyson. “What's on at Lumb's now? How are things going?”

“I've no idea, father,” said Walter cheerfully. “I don't see anything of them nowadays, you know.” He was aware that in thus grasping his nettle firmly, and in using a light indifferent tone to veil a real concern, he was imitating Tasker's methods, and consciously “handling” a situation. He had done it once before this evening with Henry Clay Crosland, and he found again that it gave him an agreeable sense of skill and power. He decided to take the opportunity of breaking his own textile news now, while it would also serve the purpose of turning Dyson aside from the awkward subject of the Lumbs, and remarked: “The only news I've
heard lately is that Leonard Tasker's floating a new company.”

“Leonard Tasker?” repeated Dyson in an astonished tone.

“Yes—you remember him, surely?” said Walter impatiently. “Victory Mills, you know.”

“Oh, aye. I know Leonard Tasker well enough,” said Dyson with sarcastic emphasis. “Well enough—and is he floating a company again, you say? He's always at it, one way or another, as far as I can see. It was in 1925 t'last time. What sort is it this time, eh?”

“Himself—his own mills—perhaps I didn't put it clearly,” said Walter, his nerves ruffled. “He's taking in more capital, that's what it comes to, really.”

“Well!” exclaimed Dyson with profound conviction. “Well, upon my word! If they float that, they'll float owt! They will and all!”

Exhausted by this vehement expression of feeling, he closed his eyes and sank at once into a doze.

Walter coloured—but not with alarm; with irritation at Dyson's unconscious criticism of his son, his unconscious attempt to thwart and rule him, to keep him from his love. All Walter's psychological defences rose in arms, and for the first time in his life he felt contempt for his father's judgment. His naturally kind disposition lent this a tinge of pity. “Poor old chap!” he thought. “He doesn't know anything of what's going on nowadays; he's hopelessly behind the times.”

And the tedium of his sojourn in Dyson's room, with its heavy old-fashioned furniture, its dark curtains, its religious texts and pictures, began to be insufferable to him. He felt intensely restless, longed to leave Moorside Place, to return to his own bright quick contemporary life of work and play, of love, Elaine.

Presently the front door-bell rang. Mrs. Haigh went down
to open the door, and voices and laughter rang up from the hall.

Dyson half opened his eyes, and gleamed up at Walter slyly. “That'll be Rosamond and her friend,” he said. “You go down, Walter. She's a very nice-looking young woman.”

Walter bade his father good-night and left him; not that he took the slightest interest in Rosamond's friend, but glad of the excuse to go.

He found the two young women cheerfully preparing a meal in the kitchen; their sun-reddened faces and tangled hair, serviceable old clothes and worn knapsacks seemed rather repulsive to him, accustomed as he was now to see everything done to a higher degree of perfection. He was glad to see Rosamond looking so happy, however, though whether he felt this from real unselfish kindly gladness in another's joy, or because it soothed his conscience, would be difficult to say. He stated firmly that he could not stay for supper, though he was, in fact, hungry and did not know where he should secure a meal, as it was now past the time when Mrs. Lewry would be expecting him.

Rosamond thereupon drew him aside into the little-used front room, and produced from the drawer of an inlaid table which gleamed with polish, a pile of papers—bills, rate-notes, all the official paperasserie with which householders of that period were inundated.

“As you are here, Walter,” she said, “perhaps you'll just look at all these papers, will you? And fill them up and sign them for father? They've accumulated so since you last came.”

“Why don't you send them to me by post?” said Walter in a kind, if rather patronising, tone, sitting down at the coldly shining table and tackling the papers with methodical competence.

“Mother won't let me—she keeps hoping that you'll come,”
said Rosamond, standing beside him, and offering the blotting-paper. “I expect she thinks that if I send you the papers, there's nothing to bring you here.”

Her mild and indifferent tone—which Rosamond was maintaining by an effort of will, mindful of her brother's previous resentment at her interference in his affairs—stung Walter, who thought resentfully that she had soon forgotten him, and did not miss him much herself.

“I've been very busy—almost distracted with business, in fact,” he said in an aggrieved tone. “But now things are settling down a bit I shall have more time. By the way, Rosamond,” he went on, lowering his voice: “You may see my name—in fact, you probably will—in the prospectus of a new company that's being formed. I daresay it will be advertised in the
Yorkshire Observer
. I'm one of the directors. You'd better not mention it to father.”

“Is it a company of Mr. Tasker's?” demanded Rosamond in a clear full tone. She raised her head; her cheeks flushed and her eyes sparkled.

Walter nodded.

“Well, you know what I think of that, Walter,” said Rosamond emphatically. “So I needn't tell you. I won't mention it to father, however, since you specially ask me not to do so. But, Walter,” she went on in a gentler tone: “Seriously I think I ought to have father's power of attorney instead of you. Sometimes papers come which require immediate handling, and I can't keep rushing off up to Heights in term-time;
I
haven't a car at my disposal.” Immediately she had said this, she despised it for a piece of meanness, and added hastily: “Besides, it wouldn't be suitable to interrupt you constantly. And to get poor father to sign anything now costs him so much time and trouble; it really exhausts him. I think you ought to transfer the power to me, I do, indeed.”

A chilly air seemed to blow down Walter's spine, and he became very conscious indeed of the relevance of the Moorside Place household to his financial schemes, which while sitting in his car outside he had been unable to remember. But this momentary alarm was succeeded by a warm flush of confidence. How odd that Rosamond should ask him this now, on the very first day when such a transfer was really possiblel To have given his sister power over his father's affairs, while the Tasker 1925 shares reposed in Dyson's name at the bank, would have been out of the question; unlikely though it was that Rosamond would ever take it into her head to investigate her father's securities, the consequences of such an act on her part had for nearly a year been too disagreeable, and for the last few weeks too terrible, to be risked. But now, in a few weeks, the danger would be past; he need not refuse Rosamond's request. Really the stars in their courses seemed to fight for him!