I'll Never Be Young Again (30 page)

‘Dick - I do understand you, don’t I, better than anyone?’

‘Sure, sweetheart.’

‘Better than your friend, that man you went away with, who got drowned?’

I did not want to talk about Jake.

‘Oh! that’s different,’ I said; ‘never mind about that. Darling, you’re so lovely, so lovely, come close to me, near; can I do anything to you I like, can I sort of tear you in pieces?’

She was still thinking, though; she was still staring up at the trees.

‘Oh! Hesta, beloved,’ I said, ‘don’t let’s be serious.You said you wouldn’t ever be serious. Life’s too short, darling . . .’

And I put my arms round her and kissed her, and held her, and now it was she who smiled, and she who clung to me, saying: ‘I love you, I love you.’

It was not very satisfactory, this business of Hesta living at the pension and me in my room in the Rue du Cherche-Midi. She was always having to get back just when I most wanted her to stay. Her music lessons, too, interfering with everything. Then even though she did come round to my room most days, it had to be at a definite time, and that spoilt things. Perhaps I would not be in a good mood until just before she was leaving, and then there was no time. Or she would be in a bad mood, nervy or tired. We would have little scenes over nothing at all. I used to say it was her fault and she would not answer, but I felt she thought it was mine. We went on like this through the summer.

Some days it was marvellous, a Sunday perhaps, and we would have gone to St Cloud by a steamer up the Seine, amusing ourselves with the people, and come back in the evening to dine at the Coupole, and so home to my room, where she would stay until it was time to go. That was perfect; we loved each other and it was finished, and anyway there was tomorrow.

Other days were bad. She would arrive when I was trying to get some work done on the book, hopelessly difficult at all times, and perhaps at that moment a flash of something like the truth and meaning of writing would come upon me, so that I could not bear to let it go, and she would sit on the edge of the bed smoking a cigarette, while I tried to convey my flash into words of meaning. It wouldn’t be any good, though. It was impossible to concentrate; however still and unobtrusive she would be I knew that she was there. She worried me, she sent away the flash, she crept into my mind.

‘It’s no good,’ I said, pushing away my paper and pen, ‘I can’t write.’

‘I’ll go,’ said Hesta, ‘I’m in the way.’

‘No,’ I said, going over to her, ‘I want you more than I want the book.’

But somehow even that was not true. I was not any good for either, writing or loving. They would not work side by side. The memory of that flash spoilt the loving. I could not surrender myself entirely to Hesta, nor she to me. We were aware of that hidden flash between us all the time. We were not either of us happy. We were not together.There was not satisfaction in anything that happened. Afterwards it would be late, she would have to go, and it all went for nothing. It was a waste. She would smile at me, but I felt all the time she was wondering why she had bothered to come. She was only being kind, and her kindness had not helped me. The thought of the good days would no doubt force itself into both our minds, and we would wonder why it was not always the same.We would not reproach each other, but we would put a black mark against the day for having been a failure.

It left us uneasy, bewildered, not knowing what to do about it.

Then she went, and there was not even a moment to talk, to be ordinarily affectionate, to be glad about being with each other; there was only time for the mechanical, ‘I love you, darling,’ and ‘See you tomorrow.’

One day I said to Hesta: ‘It’s hopeless, you know, this life of yours at the pension. It spoils everything.’

She looked at me thoughtfully.

‘I wish,’ she said, ‘I wish that we could be married.’

‘Oh! darling.’ I stared at her in amazement. ‘You can’t mean that. Why, marriage is terrible. You know how often we used to talk about it.’

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘but somehow it doesn’t seem so bad now.’

‘We can’t,’ I went on, ‘we wouldn’t love each other half so much. Being with you wouldn’t be a thrill any more. You’d just be my wife. We should take each other for granted.’

‘I don’t see that it would matter,’ she said.

‘Darling, you don’t really want to be married. You haven’t thought what it would be like. Seriously now, have you?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘No, Hesta, you can’t have. Why, at once life is stale, ordinary, going on the same day after day. Surely you haven’t suddenly got moral scruples, have you?’

‘Oh! Dick - that’s horrid of you . . .’

‘Sweetheart, I’m not being horrid. But marriage - you’d feel tied and so would I. The very respectability of it would finish things for me. It’s perfect as we are, never being quite sure.’

‘Sure of what?’

‘Sure of life, love, you - I don’t know. Listen, do you really want to get married?’

‘Not if you don’t want to.’

‘Don’t you see it would be awful?’

‘Perhaps . . .’

‘You do see?’

‘I expect you’re right, Dick.’

‘Besides, there’s no need. We don’t have to worry over other people. You’re independent and so am I. That guardian doesn’t mean a thing, does he?’

‘No.’

‘It’s not as if you were poor.’

‘No.’

‘What made you think of it?’

‘Just an idea. We won’t say anything about it again, Dick.’

‘Darling, it’s wonderful in a way, just to think you thought of it - I mean, as if you cared about me a bit - but it would be awful, wouldn’t it?’

‘Yes.’

‘The thing is, you must leave the pension and come and live with me here.’

‘There wouldn’t be room.’

‘Sure - I’ll get the room next door. It’s empty. I asked about it the other day. It’ll be all right. It doesn’t matter what you do here, anyway. Tell you what. We’ll sleep in one room and use this as a sitting-room.’

‘What about my piano?’ she said.

‘Oh! Lord. Listen, have you got to go on with your music after this term?’

‘I can’t give it up, Dick.’

‘Couldn’t you give it up for a bit?’

‘I don’t want to . . . P’raps I could go and practise somewhere; there must be places.’

‘We might buy a piano if it comes to that,’ I said.

‘No, it would disturb your writing.’

‘Well, I don’t know.’

‘What can we do?’

‘It’s up to you, darling. I want you to come and live with me more than anything in the world, but if there’s going to be a scene about your music . . .’ I shrugged my shoulders.

‘I might give it up for a little while.’

‘Honestly, darling, I don’t see that it would do you any harm,’ I said.

‘It will be so hot, too, later on, won’t it?’

‘Terribly hot.’

‘And, anyway, term ends in a few weeks. Perhaps if I don’t practise through the summer the rest might help my fingers.’

‘I’m sure it would, sweetheart.’

‘I’d like to have worked up for the concert next term, though. The Professor is giving a concert, Dick; it’s very important, famous people go, and he only picks out his best pupils to play. It sounds conceited, but - he said something about me.’

‘Well, you can always see, can’t you, later?’ I said, rather bored.

‘Yes - I suppose so. . . .’

‘And you’ll leave the blasted pension and come here, won’t you?’

‘Yes, Dick.’

‘We’ll have the most perfectly marvellous time, darling. It won’t seem true at first, when you don’t go back at nights.’

‘It will be nice. . . .’

‘You can do whatever you like all the time; we might go away a bit in August, we might go to Fontainebleau and stay.’

‘Could we go to the sea?’ she said.

‘Oh no - not the sea. I hate the sea.’

‘The mountains?’

‘Mountains are bloody. . . . No darling, we’ll go somewhere, never mind now.’

‘I’m going to look after you, Dick.’

‘Sweetheart - I don’t need looking after.’

‘Yes, you do.’

‘Darling. . . .’

‘You need looking after more than anyone, and I’ve wanted to for so long, Dick. I’m going to do so much for you.’

‘Are you?’ I said.

‘Yes, as if I were years older than you, and you were dependent on me. I shall love it. All day - getting sausages for you, anything.’

‘Sweetheart. . . .’

‘Running out and buying you Gruyère cheese. Mending things - I can’t mend at all. You don’t mind, do you?’

‘No.’

‘When I think about it I have a pain here, in my heart, as though I can’t breathe, because it’s too much - too much.’

‘Oh! Hesta, beloved.’

‘Dick - I do wish I could have a baby.’

‘A baby? Good Lord! whatever for?’

‘I don’t know. Sometimes I think I’ll die unless I have a baby.’

‘Hesta, darling, you’re crazy! I can’t imagine anything more of a cope. Think of it screaming about the place.’

‘Yes.’

‘Gosh! you make me laugh more than anyone. You - and a baby. What a mad idea. It’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard. It’s a joke, isn’t it?’

‘Yes . . . it’s a joke.’ She turned away.

‘I guessed you couldn’t be serious. Listen, when are you going to leave the pension. Soon, very soon?’

‘I’ll try.’

‘This week?’

‘No.’

‘Next week?’

‘Perhaps.’

‘I can’t wait to have you here, Hesta.’

‘It won’t be long.’

‘You’ll get fed up with me, sweet.’

‘Why?’

‘I shan’t ever leave you alone.’

‘I don’t mind.’

‘You’re not going yet, are you?’

‘What’s the time?’

‘We’ve nearly an hour, beloved.’

‘Shall we go to the Dôme?’

‘No, Hesta.’

‘We can’t go on staying here. . . .’

‘Yes, darling. Darling, come here. You’re going to stay. I want you to stay.’

She came and lay down beside me, and put her arms round me, and we were together.

And I said later: ‘This is our thing, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Nobody else, ever?’

‘No, never.’

‘We’ll always go on being happy?’

‘Yes, always.’

 

Hesta’s term finished at the end of June, and she came to live with me in the Rue du Cherche-Midi. She told the people at the pension that relations had come over from England and taken a flat in Paris, and they wanted her to be with them. To her vague guardian she wrote that she was sharing a room with a girl who had left the pension and was studying music, too. She said that it was quieter in the new place, and it would improve her French. Nobody made any attempt to find out the truth. It did not seem to matter at all what she did.There were no worries of that kind. I was afraid that Hesta would be lost without her piano at first, but she said it was all right, and I forgot to ask if she missed it after a while. She said there was fun in buying things to make the two rooms attractive. She loved the Rue du Cherche-Midi; she used to wander up and down in it in the mornings, while I sat in my room trying to write, and she would come back very excited with an old chair under her arms, or a little cupboard, or a quaint picture dragged from the depths of one of the dusty little shops.

‘It’s nice, isn’t it?’ she said, and I smiled. ‘Yes, that’s fun,’ and went on with my writing. I had left the book for a while and had started a play. I had written the first act. I was very pleased with it; it seemed such an achievement to have written the first act of a play. I was uncertain about the length, though; I was not sure how long an act should last. It did not take any time to read through. Perhaps that was only because I knew it so well, and the words flipped by, scarcely read, known from memory. I finished the act one evening, flushed and proud, and we went out to celebrate.

We had dinner, and then drove in a taxi round the Bois. We had drinks at the Grande Cascade. It was good, leaning back in a chair, looking at Hesta, lovely in a blue frock, and knowing we loved each other and lived together in a couple of rooms in Montparnasse, and we were both young, but we knew a lot, and I had just written the first act of a play.

I read it to her the next day, and she said it was wonderful. I was not sure if I could go by her, though.

‘You mustn’t say that just because you love me,’ I said; ‘you must tell me what you really think, without any prejudice. I shan’t mind.’

‘Honestly I like it,’ she said; ‘I shouldn’t tell you if I didn’t. Of course, one thing strikes me - it’s lovely to listen to, but you know what people are about action in a play - nothing seems to happen very much, does it?’

‘I don’t know what you mean,’ I said; ‘there’s action the whole time. It keeps going from one thing to another, it all comes in the dialogue.’

‘Yes,’ said Hesta, ‘but people like to see things too, they don’t just want to be told what’s going on. And that man - I think his speeches are just a little too long. Nobody in real life could go on like that without getting out of breath. A good deal of what he says doesn’t seem to have much to do with the story.’

‘Hang it, darling, all those lines are pretty nearly epigrams, though I say so myself. They’re supposed to give polish; haven’t you ever read Wilde?’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, then?’

‘But, Dick, Wilde’s lines were very short and to the point; this man goes on and on.’

‘He’s a great thinker; that’s his character.’

‘I see.’

‘And, anyway, you have to have talk in a play. Dialogue is the main thing. I couldn’t write the sort of stuff that’s full of pistol-shots, and murders, and rot.’

‘No.’

‘There’ll be more action in the second act, of course; the first is more like a prologue.’