The Blue Rose (4 page)

“Do I have to put on evening dress there?”

“No, wear what you wore the other evening—or what you’ve got on now. Or anything you like. It’s
you
I want to see again
...
Is that a date? Promise you’ll turn up?”

“I promise,” she said quietly.

“And now I suppose I’ve got to go and look after my guests. It’s all your fault. What a waste of an evening. I’
ll
try and take you home but I don’t suppose I shall be allowed to
...
While you’re here you might as well meet one of the nicest people in the room—a very old friend of mine—Robin Johnson. He’s a barrister.”

He took her up and introduced her to a tall, fair man of about his own age or a little older, and left her with him. He had been talking to another girl with great earnestness and Rose couldn’t help feeling that she was an intruder, for now they were obliged out of politeness to talk to her. The girl’s name was Gai Spalding and she was tall and dark and very pretty.

Sandwiches were brought in at about eleven o’clock, and soon afterwards, when it became apparent that there was to be no more music, the party began to break up.

Clare came in search of Rose. “Clive wants to go home,” she said, and Rose thought she detected a slight tinge of annoyance in her tone, “so we’ll drop you.”

Rose said good-night to Robin Johnson and the girl, and followed Clare across the room to where Stephen was standing talking to some friends. “We’re off now,” Clare said. “It’s been a lovely evening. I’ll ring you up in the morning.”

“I’m sure Miss Woodhouse doesn’t want to go yet,” Stephen said quickly. “If she would like to stay I will take her home.”

“No, she’ll come with us,” Clare said quite definitely. “I’ve promised her cousin to see her home.”

There was nothing Rose could do but submit with a good grace. She held out her hand. “Thank you so much,” she said, “for such a lovely party.” She wished he would then say: “I shall see you to-morrow,” but he said nothing beyond: “Good-night, I am so glad you were able to come.” She didn’t want to deceive Clare but surely it was for
him
to make their plans known rather than for her. Evidently, however, he wanted to keep their meeting a secret, and she found it rather difficult now—no, she found it impossible—to say anything to Clare about it.

Clive was driving the car home and Clare sat in front beside him, but she turned to talk to Rose in the back. “I hope you enjoyed yourself,” she said. “It’s a lovely little house, isn’t it? But, my dear, at the risk of your thinking me impertinent I must just say one word of warning to you. Don’t take Stephen too seriously. Keep your head. He’s sure to want to see you again and there’s no earthly harm in it as long as you don’t take him seriously. Don’t you agree, Clive?”

“Yes, my love, I most certainly do.”

“I know him very well,” Clare went on, “so I hope you won’t resent my saying this; but I’m sure there’s a wise little head on those pretty shoulders of yours.”

Somehow it was Clive’s agreement even more than Clare’s warning which sent a chill through Rose. And hadn’t Francie said just the same thing? And why had he wanted to keep their meeting secret? Yes, she must at all costs keep her head and be on her guard. But to-morrow evening she would have to go and meet him because she had promised.

CHAPTER FOUR

ROSE felt obliged to tell Francie the next morning that she was going to dine that evening with Stephen Hume, but Francie made no comment beyond “Have a good time” as she was setting off. Francie had warned her once and there was really nothing more she could say or do, though she was a good deal worried about it.

Rose was in a state of strange agitation all that day. She did not know whether she was dreading the evening or wildly looking forward to it, but certainly she could think of nothing else, and a dozen times she told herself that whatever happened she must not lose her head. And then when the time at last came to dress (she was wearing again the kingfisher blue skirt she had worn at Clare’s party) she found herself thinking: “Perhaps he won’t be there after all; perhaps he has forgotten all about it,” and she knew that that would be worse than anything.

She took a taxi again to the Mirabelle, extravagant though it was, but it seemed all-important to arrive as cool and collected as possible; and in order to avoid arriving early she was five minutes late. There was a grand entrance in Curzon Street and a commissionaire to open the taxi door for her, but the restaurant itself was in the basement. As she went down the stairs Stephen rose from the table at which he had been sitting watching the people come in, and came to meet her. “I thought you weren’t coming,” he said in a low voice as he took her hand, and at that moment all the warnings she had received were as nothing and she was aware only of her intense joy at seeing him again and her sense of safety at being in his presence.

“Would you like a drink here outside or shall we go straight in?” he asked.

“Just what you like.”

“Let’s go in then and have a drink at the table.”

He was greeted by the head-waiter as if he had been royalty and they were shown to a discreet
corner
table. The lighting was softly pink and the whole place had an air of great luxury. As yet there were only very few people, for it was early for dining out in London.

“Bring us two dry martinis right away,” Stephen ordered, “Now what do you want to eat? Or would you like to leave it to me?”

“Oh, yes I’d like to leave it to you.”

“Is there anything you don’t like?”

“Nothing except sweetbreads.”

“I don’t like them either
...
Do you feel like a steak?”

“Not really. I’m not awfully hungry.”

“You’re all right?” he asked, suddenly anxious.

“Oh, yes. I feel wonderful.” She couldn’t tell him that she felt too excited to eat.

“We’ll have something light then. Some kind of fish to start with and a Montrachet to go with it.” He consulted with the waiter and while he did so Rose had a chance to look at him unobserved. She had never seen a more beautiful profile in any man. She felt that she knew for the first time what was meant by “a pure outline”.

“That’s over,” he said at last, sitting back. “Now we can get down to important things
...
Are you happy?”

It was such an unexpected question that she found herself answering “Yes” from her heart.

“There’s so much I want to say to you and so much I want to hear from you that I don’t know where to begin.
...
Rose
...
Rose
...
But tell me one thing first: is there anyone else?”

“No.” Her voice was almost inaudible.

“Something so extraordinary has happened to me that I don’t know whether I’m asleep or awake. When I first saw you the other evening something seemed to break inside me. I can’t explain it. It was as if I understood for the first time what life was all about. As if I’d suddenly come out of a fog in which I had been living all my life into the sunshine. You looked just like Botticelli’s Venus rising from the sea.”

“I had pollen on my nose,” she put in.

“That was when I realized that you must be as wonderful as you looked. Any other girl would have taken out a mirror and made a great song and dance about it, but you just held your face up for me to rub it off. I may tell you that I came as near as anything to kissing it off. I wonder what you would have done? How shocked all those people would have been! But what would I have cared? I would only have minded what you thought of me
...
Rose, do you feel at all as I do? I feel something so tremendous that it’s impossible to imagine that you’re not feeling it too. There’s such a current between us that you
must
be aware of it. Are you?”

She nodded, struggling against a longing to abandon herself to him, but remembering all the warnings she had received.

“I feel as if I’m bewitched,” he went on. “This must be what it’s like to drink a love potion.”

“Then it’s not real,” she said. “You’ll wake up. The effect of the potion will wear off and you’ll discover that I’m just a very ordinary person after all
...
You
know nothing about me.”

Their first dish, a
sole bonne femme,
was brought at that moment but neither of them had any appetite. “We oughtn’t to be sitting here,” he said. “We ought to be on some grassy bank on midsummer night. You should have a wreath of flowers round your hair and I should be wooing you with my lute.”

She struggled against the intoxication of his imagery. She could see him so well in the tights and tunic of an Elizabethan minstrel. The story of the blue rose came to her mind again. “This is madness,” she said. “We know nothing about each other.”

“What do you want to know about me? There’s nothing I won’t tell you.”

“I know
nothing
about you. Your interests, your family, your work, your ambitions
...
We seem to be starting at the wrong end.”

“That’s not my fault. You shouldn’t have bewitched me. I’ve only got one interest and that’s you. But tell me about yourself. I asked Clare, of course, but she hardly knows anything. What sort of girl are you when you are not ensnaring men? Or don’t you do anything else at all?”

“That’s not fair. I
don’t
ensnare men. I hate hurting people.”

“Do you mean to tell me that nobody has ever before been in love with you?”

Her heart turned over at the words “ever before” for was it not tantamount to him saying that he was in love with her now? “Well, of course, there have been one or two. It happens to every girl.”

“And have
you
been in love before?” he demanded almost angrily.

“Before?”

“Are you going to deny that you are in love with me now?”

“I—I don’t know. I hardly know you
...”
she stammered in her confusion.

“And how long do you have to know someone before you are in love? Do you really think it is a question of time?”

“I don’t know; I don’t think I’ve ever been in love
...

“Before,” he put in, but she would not say the word.

“What about you?” she asked.

“I have never felt anything like this,” he answered seriously. “Nothing approaching it.”

The waiter came to take their plates away and Stephen explained that they were not hungry and that it was nothing to do with the food, which was delicious. “Do you want anything more?” he asked Rose. She shook her head. “Then cancel the next course,” he said to the waiter, “and just bring us the salad. We may have something else later on.” The waiter filled up their glasses with the cool dry wine.

“Rose, what sort of a girl are you? Are you really flesh and blood or will you disappear at the wave of a fairy’s wand? You mustn’t go. I can’t lose you now. I have waited so long for you. I shall win you if it’s the last thing I ever do.”

Rose remembered uncomfortably Francie’s warning: “And when he’s had all the fun of conquering you he’ll drop you like a glove.”

“You are very silent,” he said. “Perhaps you think I’m going too fast. You said just now that we were starting at the wrong end. Very well, let’s go back to the other end and go through all that boring stage of acquaintanceship. How long have you been in London, Miss Woodhouse?”

“About ten days,” Rose replied, relieved to get back on to solid ground.

He drew her out to tell him about herself, and gradually everything emerged—the whole of her short but tragic life’s story, though she tried to keep the tragedy out of it as much as possible; but the bare recital of the facts was perhaps more moving than a more emotional account would have been. “The whole family but me went to the sea one day in father’s new car; there was an accident and father and both my brothers were killed and mother broke her hip which never set properly
...
I left school
...”
Stephen understood all that she didn’t say—how she had longed to go to the university; how confined her life had been in that small cottage, pinned down to domestic work. He drew out of her too all about the boy at home who wanted to marry her (though she did not give his name), and how she had come to London to begin to live and how she was going to work with Francie and Derek in the new coffee bar.

“Poor little girl,” he said tenderly. “I’ve got a lot to make up to you.”

“Now you know everything about me and have told me nothing about yourself,” she said.

“I’ll tell you everything, but there isn’t very much to tell.” His mood was subdued now. “Like you I’m an orphan, only I don’t remember my mother. She died when my sister Deirdre was bo
rn
. Deirdre’s three years younger than me—and our father died when I was seventeen. I went straight from school into the bank. It’s our family business. My great-grandfather started it but I’m the only Hume left in it now. None of my partners are relations. We had no guardians so I took care of my sister. We lived together and I suppose I tried to be much older and more responsible than I was
...”

“I should like to meet your sister,” she put in.

“She’s married and lives in Karachi now. They only come home on leave every two or three years. He’s in business there. I did my National Service and the Bank sent me abroad to get wider experience. That’s when I got to know Florence; and since then I’ve been back there every year. Apart from that I just do my work and lead rather a stupid social life—a pointless one, anyway, but when you’re a bachelor you get asked out so much that it’s difficult to refuse sometimes without being churlish. You take the road of least resistance and allow people to persuade you to do things when you would much rather be doing something else.”

“Such as?”

“Spending a little time in your own home—reading, listening to music
...”

“Are you very fond of music?”

“Very.”

“And of reading?”

“Isn’t that like asking whether one is fond of breathing?”

“I don’t think so. Everyone has to breathe but it isn’t everyone by any means who cares for reading.”

“You do?”

“Oh, yes, I do.”

“And music?”

“I haven’t heard very much.”

“We can easily remedy that.”

“Will you take me to some concerts? My musical education has been terribly neglected.”

“No one’s education has been neglected if they are anxious to learn,” he said. “The only point of education is to stimulate interest. Have you ever noticed that the so
-
called best educated people are often those who have the least curiosity in later life? They suffer from the illusion that they know everything, which is absolutely fatal to real knowledge
...
What would you like now?” The waiter had come to take their salad plates away. “A sweet of some kind?
...
No?
...
Just coffee?
...
Two coffees, please.”

“It seems suc
h
a waste of all this lovely food,” Rose said regretfully.

“Music is the food of love,” he replied. “Your loss of appetite is the only encouragement you have given me.”

She blushed. “It has never happened to me before. I suppose it has often happened to you?”

“Now at last you are showing the right kind of curiosity and I realize that you are a mortal woman after all. You are asking me to tell you all about my other loves.”

She did not deny it
.
“Aren’t you?”

“Well, it is always interesting, and I have told you all about myself.”

“I
have
searched for love, if you want to know the truth, because a man alone, or a woman alone for that matter, is incomplete as a human being. I have felt very incomplete at times—and unbearably self-sufficient at others. Once or twice I thought I had found the person I was looking for
—
but I was mistaken.”