Love and the Loveless (50 page)

Everyone under the lamp-post looked at the swinging figure.

“Three hundred degrees,” announced Hugo.

“The question is, will he whirl?” said Freddy.

“Three hundred and twenty degrees—keep it up, Bobby!” cried Hugo.

Grunts seemed to tear the swinger. Up one side almost to the vertical—a pause——

“Three hundred and forty degrees. You’ll do it, Bobby!”

“Oh dear, he’s almost
en
déshabillé
!” exclaimed Freddy, with an assumed lisp, “How shocking! Indecent exposure, my dear!”.

The kilt was almost an inverted parachute.

“Goodness gracious, I hope he won’t catch cold, Hugo!”

The rise; first showing his front almost vertical, then his back. The kilt was on the point of collapse when the police officers came down.

“Move along,” said one. “Don’t you know there’s a war on?”

“Keep going, Bobby. Three hundred and fifty degrees, old boy!”

“Come along, get a move on!”

“Wait, constable, wait, dear boy!” said Freddy. “The great question is—will Colonel Parmachene-Belle be able to make it, as the Yanks say? Don’t forget it’s adding to the gaiety of nations, and therefore to the war effort, officer!”

“Are you trying to be funny?”

“All my life, alas, I am trying to be funny, officer,” said Freddy. “I must send you some tickets for my play. Good God, can you beat that? Three months on the Western Front, just home on leave, and as fit as a fiddle! The war’s as good as over, officer!”

Cheering broke out around the lamp post. As though frozen, the swinger remained inverted, exactly upright, on balance at 90 degrees to the ground, while his eyes stared down at the police. At that moment searchlights opened up, in the reflected light of which the white figure, clothed from the waist downwards by the kilt, was clearly revealed.

“We’ve seen enough,” said the policemen. Names were taken; and Colonel Parmachene-Belle, carrying an armful of clothes, was pushed into the Black Maria. Hugo and others went to bail him out; Phillip slipped back to the hotel.

*

Sometime later he went up to his bedroom, leaving the noisy throng below. He was in bed, with the bed-light still on, wondering if he dare go in to see ‘Spectre’ in the adjoining bedroom, when Sasha, wearing a dressing-gown, came in. “Oh, darling, I’ve found you at last!”

She sat on the edge of the bed. “Where have you been?” He told her. “You looked so surprised when I came in. As though you’d seen a ghost.”

“I thought that perhaps you’d——”

“Given you up? Oh, Phillip, how little you know women.”

“How is Rollo?”

“Sleeping blissfully, the babe. You look tired, my lamb. You’re shivering. You’re cold! I must warm you.” She got in beside him, turned over, and looked at his face. “You have such a gentle mouth, darling. Are you still thinking about Lily, that saintly person?”

“I think of her sometimes, Sasha.”

“She would want you to be happy, darling. The dead are not jealous, I am sure. A little curious perhaps—faintly curious. They know, I believe, in some remote way, that love is the same in life as in death.”

“Yes, Sasha.”

“Darling Phillip.”

“Sasha, have you seen Westy?”

“Not since I said goodnight to him downstairs, darling.”

“I was wondering about you and him.”

“Of course, how natural! I love Harold, but I am not much good for him, darling. He’s
quite
locked away. And so desperately sad, deep inside. Don’t be too sad for your friend, darling. You’re not too deeply sad inside, are you? You mustn’t be. Lily loves you, and wants you to be happy.”

He felt a hypocrite. Lily was poetry, which was beauty, and truth; but it was not of Lily that he had been thinking all the evening. And yet now that Sasha was beside him, he was thinking of Lily.

“You sighed, darling. I’ll leave you to sleep.”

“Don’t go, Sasha.”

“Very well, darling. Now sleep—and do not worry that dear head of yours.” She turned off the light.

There was another switch, for a central light, by the door. When this opened, and the light was switched on, ‘Spectre’ West was seen standing there.

“Oh. I beg your pardon,” he said distinctly, before switching off.

Sasha called out, “Hullo, darling!” as she turned over to reach the switch of the bed-head lamp. “Phillip and I were just talking about you. Were your ears burning, darling? Oh don’t go! Darling, look! I’m in my dressing-gown!” She followed him through the door. He heard her say, “I was just coming, darling, cross my heart, but dropped in to say good-night to Phillip, and found him shivering with cold——”

She came back a minute or two later, and said, “I suppose I am the Scarlet Woman of Flowers’ hotel after all.”

“Is that what he called you, Sasha?”

“Oh heavens no! Someone called me that once—who was it—Lord Something—one of the new ones—‘Streaky’ Southbend, the Golden Grocer. I suppose I am a bit that way, if one comes to consider it in the light of Methodism.”

“Where did Harold go, Sasha?”

“Back to his room. Only he’s locked the door. I don’t think I
quite
deserved that, darling.”

“I ought to go to him.”

“No, leave him alone, darling. I’ll go and calm him later on. He’s such a poor lost child, really. All you soldier boys are lost children.”

She got in beside him, and bent over to kiss him. He felt a tear fall on his forehead. He lay tense, thinking of Westy. What would he think of him? Had he come between Westy and Sasha, as he had between Desmond and Lily? He must go to Westy. He lay still.

“You hold on to your ideals, darling,” she said, kissing him on the cheek. “I love you dearly, you are so sweet.”

He lay unhappily still, until he heard footfalls along the
passage. He got out of bed, pulled on slacks and tunic, and in bare feet hurried to Westy’s room. It was unlocked and empty. Returning along the passage he put on socks and shoes and ran down the stairs. The night porter was in his lodge, stirring a cup of tea beside an open bottle of saccharine tablets.

“Have you seen Major West?”

“’Im as just went out? With a black patch over one eye?”

“Yes. Is he coming back, d’you know?”

“All ’e said to me was Good night and a ’Appy Noo Year, as ’e give me a dollar. Took ’is ’aversack wi’ ’im, so I reckon he’s gone, sir.”

Phillip went back to find Sasha. The bed was empty. He dressed, and went after Westy.

Devon.

May
1957–May
1958

by Henry Williamson in Faber Finds

THE FLAX OF DREAM

The Beautiful Years

Dandelion Days

The Dream of Fair Women

The Pathway

The Wet Flanders Plain

A CHRONICLE OF ANCIENT SUNLIGHT

The Dark Lantern

Donkey Boy

Young Phillip Maddison

How Dear Is Life

A Fox Under My Cloak

The Golden Virgin

Love and the Loveless

A Test to Destruction

The Innocent Moon

It Was the Nightingale

The Power of the Dead

The Phoenix Generation

A Solitary War

Lucifer Before Sunrise

The Gale of the World