Ah King (21 page)

“‘No, no, no,’ she gasped.

“Tight-clenched in her hand I saw that she had a letter and I guessed that it was Tim’s.

“‘What does he say?’ I asked.

“She gave a frightened movement and clutched the letter to her heart as though she thought I would take it from her.

“‘He says he couldn’t help himself. He says he had to. What does it mean?’

“‘Well, you know, in his way he’s just as attractive as you are. He has so much charm. I suppose he just fell madly in love with some girl and she with him.’

“‘He’s so weak,’ she moaned.

“‘Are they coming out?’ I asked.

“‘They sailed yesterday. He says it won’t make any difference. He’s insane. How
can
I stay here?’

“She began to cry hysterically. It was torture to see that girl, usually so calm, utterly shattered by her emotion. I had always felt that her lovely serenity masked a capacity for deep feeling. But the abandon of her distress simply broke me up. I held her in my arms and kissed her, her eyes and her wet cheek and her hair. I don’t think she knew what I was doing. I was hardly conscious of it myself. I was so deeply moved.

“‘What shall I do?’ she wailed.

“‘Why won’t you marry me?’ I said.

“She tried to withdraw herself from me, but I wouldn’t let her go.

“‘After all, it would be a way out,’ I said.

“‘How can I marry you?’ she moaned. ‘I’m years older than you are.’

“‘Oh, what nonsense, two or three. What do I care?’ “‘No, no.’

“‘Why not?’ I said.

“‘I don’t love you,’ she said.

“‘What does that matter? I love you.’

“I don’t know what I said. I told her that I’d try to make her happy. I said I’d never ask anything from her but what she was prepared to give me. I talked and talked. I tried to make her see reason. I felt that she didn’t want to stay there, in the same place as Tim, and I told her that I’d be moved soon to some other district. I thought that might tempt her. She couldn’t deny that we’d always got on awfully well together. After a time she did seem to grow a little quieter. I had a feeling that she was listening to me. I had even a sort of feeling that she knew that she was lying in my arms and that it comforted her. I made her drink a drop more whisky. I gave her a cigarette. At last I thought I might be just mildly facetious.

“‘You know, I’m not a bad sort really,’ I said. ‘You might do worse.’

“‘You don’t know me,’ she said. ‘You know nothing whatever about me.’

“‘I’m capable of learning,’ I said.

“She smiled a little.

“‘You’re awfully kind, Mark,’ she said.

“‘Say yes, Olive,’ I begged.

“She gave a deep sigh. For a long time she stared at the ground. But she did not move and I felt the softness of her body in my arms. I waited. I was frightfully nervous and the minutes seemed endless.

“‘All right,’ she said at last, as though she were not conscious that any time had passed between my prayer and her answer.

“I was so moved that I had nothing to say. But when I wanted to kiss her lips, she turned her face away, and wouldn’t let me. I wanted us to be married at once, but she was quite firm that she wouldn’t. She insisted on waiting till Tim came back. You know how sometimes you see so clearly into people’s thoughts that you’re more certain of them than if they’d spoken them; I saw that she couldn’t quite believe that what Tim had written was true and that she had a sort of miserable hope that it was all a mistake and he wasn’t married after all. It gave me a pang, but I loved her so much, I just bore it. I was willing to bear anything. I adored her. She wouldn’t even let me tell anyone that we were engaged. She made me promise not to say a word till Tim’s return. She said she couldn’t bear the thought of the congratulations and all that. She wouldn’t even let me make any announcement of Tim’s marriage. She was obstinate about it. I had a notion that she felt if the fact were spread about it gave it a certainty that she didn’t want it to have.

“But the matter was taken out of her hands. News travels mysteriously in the East. I don’t know what Olive had said in the amah’s hearing when first she received the news of Tim’s marriage; anyhow, the Hardys’ seis told the Sergisons and Mrs Sergison attacked me the next time I went into the club.

“‘I hear Tim Hardy’s married,’ she said.

“‘Oh?’ I answered, unwilling to commit myself.

“She smiled at my blank face, and told me that her amah having told her the rumour she had rung up Olive and asked her if it was true. Olive’s answer had been rather odd. She had not exactly confirmed it, but said that she had received a letter from Tim telling her he was married.

“‘She’s a strange girl,’ said Mrs Sergison. When I asked her for details she said she had none to give and when I said: ‘Aren’t you thrilled?’ she didn’t answer.

“‘Olive’s devoted to Tim, Mrs Sergison,’ I said. ‘His marriage has naturally been a shock to her. She knows nothing about Tim’s wife. She’s nervous about her.’

“‘And when are you two going to be married?’ she asked me abruptly.

“‘What an embarrassing question!’ I said, trying to laugh it off.

“She looked at me shrewdly.

“‘Will you give me your word of honour that you’re not engaged to her?’

“I didn’t like to tell her a deliberate lie, nor to ask her to mind her own business, and I’d promised Olive faithfully that I would say nothing till Tim got back. I hedged.

“‘Mrs Sergison,’ I said, ‘when there’s anything to tell I promise that you’ll be the first person to hear it. All I can say to you now is that I do want to marry Olive more than anything in the world.’

“‘I’m very glad that Tim’s married,’ she answered. ‘And I hope she’ll marry you very soon. It was a morbid and unhealthy life that they led up there, those two, they kept far too much to themselves and they were far too much absorbed in one another.’

“I saw Olive practically every day. I felt that she didn’t want me to make love to her, and I contented myself with kissing her when I came and when I went. She was very nice to me, kindly and thoughtful; I knew she was glad to see me and sorry when it was time for me to go. Ordinarily, she was apt to fall into silence but during this time she talked more than I had ever heard her talk before. But never of the future and never of Tim and his wife. She told me a lot about her life in Florence and her mother. She had led a strange lonely life, mostly with servants and governesses, while her mother, I suspected, engaged in one affair after another with vague Italian counts and Russian princes. I guessed that by the time she was fourteen there wasn’t much she didn’t know. It was natural for her to be quite unconventional: in the only world she knew till she was eighteen conventions weren’t mentioned because they didn’t exist. Gradually, Olive seemed to regain her serenity and I should have thought that she was beginning to accustom herself to the thought of Tim’s marriage if it hadn’t been that I couldn’t but notice how pale and tired she looked. I made up my mind that the moment he arrived I’d press her to marry me at once. I could get short leave whenever I asked for it, and by the time that was up I thought I could manage a transfer to some other post. What she wanted was change of air and fresh scenes.

“We knew, of course, within a day when Tim’s ship would reach Penang, but it was a question whether she’d get in soon enough for him to catch the train and I wrote to the P. & O. agent asking him to telegraph as soon as he had definite news. When I got the wire and took it up to Olive I found that she’d just received one from Tim. The ship had docked early and he was arriving next day. The train was supposed to get in at eight o’clock in the morning, but it was liable to be anything from one to six hours late, and I bore with me an invitation from Mrs Sergison asking Olive to come back with me to stay the night with her so that she would be on the spot and need not go to the station till the news came through that the train was coming.

“I was immensely relieved. I thought that when the blow at last fell Olive wouldn’t feel it so much. She had worked herself up into such a state that I couldn’t help thinking that she must have a reaction now. She might take a fancy to her sister-in-law. There was no reason why they shouldn’t all three get on very well together. To my surprise Olive said she wasn’t coming down to the station to meet him.

“‘They’ll be awfully disappointed,’ I said.

“‘I’d rather wait here,’ she answered. She smiled a little. ‘Don’t argue with me, Mark, I’ve quite made up my mind.’

“‘I’ve ordered breakfast in my house,’ I said.

“‘That’s all right. You meet them and take them to your house and give them breakfast, and then they can come along here afterwards. Of course I’ll send the car down.’

“‘I don’t suppose they’ll want to breakfast if you’re not there,’ I said.

“‘Oh, I’m sure they will. If the train gets in on time they wouldn’t have thought of breakfasting before it arrived and they’ll be hungry. They won’t want to take this long drive without anything to eat.’

“I was puzzled. She had been looking forward so intensely to Tim’s coming, it seemed strange that she should want to wait all by herself while the rest of us were having a jolly breakfast. I supposed she was nervous and wanted to delay as long as possible meeting the strange woman who had come to take her place. It seemed unreasonable, I couldn’t see that an hour sooner or an hour later could make any difference, but I knew women were funny, and anyhow I felt Olive wasn’t in the mood for me to press it.

“‘Telephone when you’re starting so that I shall know when to expect you,’ she said.

“‘All right,’ I said, ‘but you know I shan’t be able to come with them. It’s my day for going to Lahad.’

“This was a town that I had to go to once a week to take cases. It was a good way off and one had to ferry across a river, which took some time, so that I never got back till late. There were a few Europeans there and a club. I generally had to go on there for a bit to be sociable and see that things were getting along all right.

“‘Besides,’ I added, ‘with Tim bringing his wife home for the first time I don’t suppose he’ll want me about. But if you’d like to ask me to dinner I’ll be glad to come to that.’

“Olive smiled.

“‘I don’t think it’ll be my place to issue any more invitations, will it?’ she said. ‘You must ask the bride.’

“She said this so lightly that my heart leaped. I had a feeling that at last she had made up her mind to accept the altered circumstances and, what was more, was accepting them with cheerfulness. She asked me to stay to dinner. Generally I left about eight and dined at home. She was very sweet, almost tender, and I was happier than I’d been for weeks. I had never been more desperately in love with her. I had a couple of gin pahits and I think I was in rather good form at dinner. I know I made her laugh. I felt that at last she was casting away the load of misery that had oppressed her. That was why I didn’t let myself be very much disturbed by what happened at the end.

“‘Don’t you think it’s about time you were leaving a presumably maiden lady?’ she said.

“She spoke in a manner that was so quietly gay that I answered without hesitation:

“‘Oh, my dear, if you think you’ve got a shred of reputation left you deceive yourself. You’re surely not under the impression that the ladies of Sibuku don’t know that I’ve been coming to see you every day for a month. The general feeling is that if we’re not married it’s high time we were. Don’t you think it would be just as well if I broke it to them that we’re engaged?’ “‘Oh, Mark, you mustn’t take our engagement very seriously,’ she said.

“I laughed.

“‘How else do you expect me to take it? It is serious.’ “She shook her head a little.

“‘No. I was upset and hysterical that day. You were being very sweet to me. I said yes because I was too miserable to say no. But now I’ve had time to collect myself. Don’t think me unkind. I made a mistake. I’ve been very much to blame. You must forgive me.’

“‘Oh, darling, you’re talking nonsense. You’ve got nothing against me.’

“She looked at me steadily. She was quite calm. She had even a little smile at the back of her eyes.

“‘I can’t marry you. I can’t marry anyone. It was absurd of me ever to think I could.’

“I didn’t answer at once. She was in a queer state and I thought it better not to insist.

“‘I suppose I can’t drag you to the altar by main force,’ I said.

“I held out my hand and she gave me hers. I put my arm round her, and she made no attempt to withdraw. She suffered me to kiss her as usual on her cheek.

“Next morning I met the train. For once in a way it was punctual. Tim waved to me as his carriage passed the place where I was standing, and by the time I had walked up he had already jumped out and was handing down his wife. He grasped my hand warmly.

“‘Where’s Olive?’ he said, with a glance along the platform. ‘This is Sally.’

“I shook hands with her and at the same time explained why Olive was not there.

“‘It was frightfully early, wasn’t it?’ said Mrs Hardy. “I told them that the plan was for them to come and have a bit of breakfast at my house and then drive home.

“‘I’d love a bath,’ said Mrs Hardy.

“‘You shall have one,’ I said.