Poor Caroline (38 page)

'We'll go to Greece - Athens, the Parthenon.'

'Athens is an awful hole,' she said. 'All the hotels have
bed-bugs and you can't get a decent cocktail.'

She was not really surprised that Johnson kissed her, for men were taken that way quite frequently, it seemed to her.
Indeed, she had been kissed so often and in so many ways
that his boisterous onslaught hardly interrupted her specula
tions about Monte Carlo, and the word Athens only fitted itself into her plans for Basil's health.

But she consented to dine with him after Basil's departure,
because she would then be lonely and she felt in need of
some diversion. Johnson amused her, as a bear or a sheep
dog or a bad film might amuse her. She did not even object to his clumsy and grotesque love-making. She knew how to take care of herself. She had never been fastidious, and she could amuse Basil by recounting the big man's absurdities. Her solicitous and constant affection for her husband was a
sentiment untouched by any casual adventure. It was the
normal attitude of her heart and mind, the pole to which the needle of her life's compass swung. Basil was her child, her
lover, her husband and her friend; he was part of herself,
and she was part of him. Johnson, posturing dramatically
on the surface of her consciousness, simply did not touch her.
It did not even occur to her that he was taking seriously the possibilities of her promise to dine at his flat. But later that
night she recounted his absurdities to her husband.

'And how was our friend Johnson?' asked Basil.

'More he-mannish, dirty, and businesslike than ever. I
wish he'd trim his finger-nails before he tries to make love.'

'Did he make love to you?'

'Of course he did. A little. He wants us to dissolve the
C.C.C.
What do you think?'

'I don't care a damn. It was a farce from the beginning.
I can't think why I thought it would amuse me. I suppose
that we can cut our losses and just let the thing die a natural
death. If Johnson wants to take the trouble of doing it, let
him."

And that, so far as Basil St. Denis was concerned, was the
end of the Christian Cinema Company.

§4

Supper was ready, and not supper only. Fate was ready. Life was ready. All time and circumstances stood waiting with Johnson in his sitting-room at the Battersea flat. The
lobster lay pink and exquisite, swimming in a bath of white
wine sauce, needing only five minutes over a gas-flame to bring
it to perfection. The table was spread with olives and cold chicken and salad and trifle in glass goblets. The cham
pagne reclined opulently in a bucket of ice. Red carnations
cast their shadows like purple petals across the damask
cloth. The fire leapt on ruddy wings. The cigarettes lay in
their silver box. Johnson stood gazing down upon his handi
work, and with jubilant appreciation found it good.

This was the night, and at any moment Gloria might
arrive. She was coming, his own, his sweet, with the majesty
of a ship in full sail, with the gallant port of a queen. The
Battersea flat had known former festivals, but nothing could
be like this. And to-morrow, to-morrow they would cross
to Paris together. All the plans were laid. Gloria should
have the whole day in which to pack her boxes, to tell her
firm in Hanover Square that her husband had been taken ill, then she could join Johnson at Victoria for the night
boat-train. Oh, it was easy, when the practical brain was lifted on the winds of high imagination, to devise, to risk,
to scheme, to conquer. It was sublime. What if he had,
while helping Caroline to straighten the affairs of the
Christian Cinema Company, contrived to divert to his own pockets £437 17
s.
6
d.?
What if, in the eyes of the law, he
was no longer merely an adventurer, but a felon too?
His love was greater than the law, and to-morrow he
would have escaped. He was going to take his Gloria to
Greece.

For the hundredth time he crossed to the window, brushed
back the curtains and looked out across the park. The pale
grey evening lay in delicate silence. Before her coming
spring had cast a faint enchantment upon the air, so that the
trees in the park and the hidden line of the river seemed to
be hushed and waiting. Johnson felt that he too was hushed
and waiting. He felt as though the black buds on the trees
must swell with his swelling heart, that the ground must
tingle with apprehension, while the crocuses unfolded and the flowers - he was a trifle vague about which flowers -pierced the dark soil with their green spears. All the world
sang one song. She is coming. She is coming. She is com
ing. Spring? Gloria? Who knew, who cared? For were
they not all one? Oh, this was ecstasy. He could have wept with pity for the poor, dull,
lifeless creatures who had never
known this rapture of expectation.

Then, just when his imagination had leapt beyond it, so that for the moment he expected it no longer, he heard the
door bell ring. He dropped the curtains and stood facing
the little room. Everything in it was perfect to his eyes. If never again he was to taste perfection, he would have had this hour.

He went down the passage, flung the door open, and saw,
not Gloria, but Miss Doreen Weller.

'Good evening,' said Miss Weller. Her voice was high and
unnatural. 'You were expecting me, weren't you?' And
before he had time to collect his scattered wits, she was in
the flat. She was in the sitting-room. She had seen the
supper-table.

Johnson was horrified. His sense of decency was outraged
by the thought that this ugly, untidy, stupid, revolting crea
ture should peer through her pince-nez on to the room
prepared for Gloria. There she stood gaping down upon the
table, the carnations and the champagne.

'Oh,' she said. 'Oh.' And then her face hardened and a
gleam of vindictive cunning lit her eyes. 'Oh, but you can't get away with it like that, you know. I haven't come to be made a fool of. I've got a boy friend now, and he's waiting
outside, and I've come for my twenty pounds, and if you don't let me have it within ten minutes, he's going for the
police.'

Thank God she was in a hurry. Thank God she would
go soon.

'Now, now, young lady,' he said, with a mild severity. 'Now just remember that you've got no right here, and that you are in a very awkward position. If I chose to give you
up to the police as a common thief, I could. I have no
legal responsibility whatsoever for you or your manuscript.
'Smatter of fact, I've made inquiries, and your stuff is still
on its way round publishers. One day you may be getting
a letter to say it's been taken, and you'll be sorry then that
you let yourself jump to conclusions.'

Johnson was playing for time. The truth was that until
the moment when she entered his flat he had completely
forgotten Miss Weller and her twenty pounds. Her visit to
him had taken its place among the many other perplexities which he would escape by his retreat from England. Eng
land was full of troubles. Its civilization had become too
complex. A man never knew where he was in it. At any
moment Miss Weller might appear demanding twenty
pounds, creditors might issue writs, or women like Mollie
might write distressing letters.

'Do you realize,' he repeated, 'that this is blackmail, and
that the penalties for blackmail are even higher than the
penalties for theft? You can't come here and demand
twenty pounds like this. You paid that money to me under legal conditions which have been fulfilled. You remember that in my prospectus,' his resourceful brain was supplying him with new expedients as he talked, 'I definitely declared
that I only accepted manuscripts at my clients' risk. I can
not possibly undertake that every novel submitted to me will
be published.'

'But you said you'd help me.' Her defiance was melting
before his stern solemnity.

'Yes and I wanna help you. I don't like to see a girl like
you ruin all her chances in life for an act of folly. I've been
thinking a great deal about you since you came to me, an'
how I could help you best. But it seems to me that you
gotta face the music. If I gave you the money now, I'd be
an accessory after the act, an' I hold myself in
patria potestas -'
He meant
loco parentis,
but one Latin phrase was really as
good as another. 'I've gotta think what's the best for you in
the long run.' He was temporizing, for he had not yet made
up his mind whether to give her the money and get rid of
her before Gloria arrived, or to get rid of her without paying. He had bank-notes in the house, but giving her these
would leave him short for his journey. Oh Hell, what a life!
Wasn't it just too bad that this wretched sordid accident should break in upon his mood of ecstasy?

'But you must help me. I tell you, I've got a friend.
I know your correspondence college is rotten - I've been to other girls. What happened to Miss Holden's stories,
and Mr. Peter's? Where's Mr. Osborne now? Tell me
that!' She was growing hysterical again. Her voice rose to a scream. All her doubts of the integrity of the Corre
spondence School returned to her. 'Why do you run that
correspondence school? Why aren't you writing books your
self? Isn't it true that only the men who can't publish their
own stuff try to teach other people how to write? How many of your pupils have you got into real jobs? How much have you ever really
done
for any of us? You cheat, you swindle,
you take our money under false pretences. To buy cham
pagne.' Gasping with sobs she seized the gold-covered neck
of a bottle. 'Champagne. Champagne! and I shall have to
go to prison.' Suddenly losing all control of herself, she
flung the bottle across the table. It caught the vase of carna
tions and went crashing to the floor. Violence led to violence. Miss Weller caught up the tablecloth, and Johnson's
supper fell round him in chaos. He lumbered round the
table and caught the girl's hands, wrestling against her hysterical violence, as she snatched at his collar and tried
to scratch his face.

'I'll kill you, I'll kill you,' sobbed Miss Weller. 'Thief!
Swindler! Beast! Beast! Beast!'

'Well, really,' said a cool deep voice from the doorway.
'This is a pretty spectacle. Is it a private fight, or can anyone join in?'

Johnson and Miss Weller sprang from their struggling em
brace, and faced Gloria, who stood contemplating them
with calm amusement.

'The door was open, and hearing somebody sound all hot
an' bothered I walked in. Is this the party you promised
me?'

Johnson caught at his disordered collar and stared, and
stared. For the first time in his life, he could find no word
to say.