Return to Night (31 page)

When they were in the stable yard, she said, “Did you really mean it when you offered to let me try Biscuit? I feel rather tempted, today.”

With the warm generous smile that never failed to move her, he said, “Why, of course. Get up and I’ll fix the leathers.”

As soon as Biscuit ceased to feel his hands, she realized how fresh the horse really was, how powerful, and how much bigger than anything she had ridden before. Pride, as well as the resolution she had taken, nerved her; after a few strenuous minutes, she was aware of having won a guarded toleration and respect. Julian, for his part, had mounted Pascoe’s second best as if nothing could be pleasanter. He looked so naively happy at being permitted to spoil his ride for her sake, that she felt sickened with herself; but her mind was fixed. He would have taken the lane they had used before, the one that went up to the open downs; but she suggested a detour across the fields.

It was easy country; the fences were good, mostly dry-walled stone topped with grass. She had taken the car out before, to confirm her memories of the terrain, and now she knew exactly where to go; but, without putting anything into words, she affected a little unfamiliarity with the neighborhood, looking at him questioningly once or twice before taking the direction she had meant to take all along. She was reassured to see that he knew every inch of the way, a point on which everything depended.

At last they were in the field for which she had been making: a long sloping pasture of coarse grass, contoured so that the fence at its distant end bounded the near horizon; the usual wall, with a hedge, a little higher, on its far side. Toward it, the slope was sharper; she had been right in believing that even from saddle height, one would have to come within yards of it to see beyond.

All this while, she had not given Biscuit his head; if she had, Julian would have been left far behind. As it was, she was leading; looking back, she saw that already he was turning off toward the gate on the left. He waved, and pointed to it with his crop. She smiled uncomprehendingly. “Over there,” she called, with a vague cheerful gesture toward the fence; and urged Biscuit into a gallop.

Behind her she heard the hoofbeats change, the sharp slap of a crop brought down, and his horse’s startled response; but in a moment the sounds fell away; she was gaining fast. Biscuit had been impatient all along. To Hilary, he seemed to go, now, like a charger of the Apocalypse. For the first time she knew how easily he might get away from her. The field seemed, suddenly, not nearly as long as she had believed. The final slope, whose crest was the stone fence, was rising only a little way ahead. It was not steep enough to slow him much. Already, perhaps, she had left it too late. Her hair whipped in the wind. She suddenly ceased to care. Present effort checked imagination ; she had a blurred memory of being told by some survivor that it hadn’t hurt much, at the time. Biscuit’s great shoulders began to breast the foot of the slope.

“Look-out! Hilary!
Stop!
”

The raw, harsh shout behind her might have belonged to a stranger, if she had not heard her name. She flung her strength against Biscuit’s, to get him round; he pulled angrily, uncertain of her and having begun already to gather himself for the jump. He would rear at the last moment, she thought, and probably roll on her. But he was answering the rein. When she brought him round, she was near enough to the fence to see over it, down the twenty-foot embankment into the sunken lane below.

A glove came down over hers on the rein; Biscuit snorted, slowed, and stopped. Julian’s face, so set with strain that its lines were like those of anger, stared into hers. Both of them were too breathless to speak.

He said, at last, “Look over there.” His voice was tight and husky, but still quite audible.

“I know. Thanks, Julian. I’m sorry.”

“By God, I should hope you are.”

“I think perhaps you’d better have Biscuit, now.”

“So do I,” said Julian through his teeth. He dismounted, and held Biscuit’s head.

When she was on her feet, he gripped her by the sleeves of her coat, and stood looking down at her. She felt none of the tender and triumphant emotions she had earned; she was, in fact, more frightened, having more leisure to feel it, than when Biscuit had begun to mount the slope. She murmured weakly, “Dear Julian.”

“Don’t dear-Julian me. I could beat the life out of you.”

Before she had time to think, she had actually braced herself in his hands. She relaxed, shamefacedly. “I might have killed Biscuit. I don’t wonder you’re annoyed.”

“Shut up.” His grip shifted from her sleeves to her arms. Quite consciously this time, she braced herself again. Even so, the violent embrace in which he gripped her was more than she had been ready for. Remembering that the horses must make them, even from a distance, conspicuous in this large and empty space, she tried to loosen his hold.

Pausing at last for breath, he said, “I hope I never live through a minute like that again. Did you go crazy, or what? Charging a blind fence like a drunken sailor?”

“He got away from me.” She had meant to manage without telling a lie; but the united efforts of Biscuit and Julian had shaken her nerve, “I was too busy pulling him in to notice.”

Julian kept her locked in his arms. One of them was threaded through Biscuit’s rein, and he was twitching at it irritably, producing as little effect as Hilary’s effort to get free. With equal indifference, Julian ignored both. He was talking into her hair. All she took in was “… all that stuff about one’s past life flashing before one’s eyes. And the future as well.”

“I’m not worth it.”

“After this I’ll be afraid to let you out of my sight.”

She realized that his voice had become perfectly normal. It would be better, probably, not to leave him to discover it by himself. She said, “Did it hurt, shouting like that?”

“Good Lord, do you think I had time to notice? As far as I remember, I just kept on till something gave way.”

His good faith was wholly transparent, if she had ever doubted it. He felt at his throat and said, “Seems all right now. A bit rough, that’s all. Must have shifted something, I suppose.”

“I don wonder. Well, it was more than I deserved. Darling; if we stand like this much longer, the whole neighborhood will be arriving on bicycles to take a look.”

On the way back, she wondered what had ever made her suppose that she would feel self-satisfied with her success. It had worked: oh, yes. But he had put a trust in her which he had never demanded in return; she had not enjoyed deceiving it.

The following day was a Sunday. Opening her paper, she turned first to the dramatic column. (Once it had been the book reviews; but at some stage in recent months the routine of years had undergone a change.) The critic had concerned himself with provincial repertory, giving a longish paragraph to Barchester. Commenting on the enterprise shown by this company, he noted that its director, Mr. Padraic Finnigan, had decided to tour the American little theaters in search of new ideas, and would be, the critic understood, outward bound by the time those lines went to press.

Hilary almost longed, for the sake of emotional escape, to make the false judgment which it was no longer in her power to form. But long ago the image of Julian, working inward, had passed from the mind into the blood; she knew him; she could trace almost the processes by which his memory had edited some advance rumor or printed line. He had believed what he had told her. Loving her, and conditioned to lying, he had fought himself to keep truth with her, even while she had entangled him in a whole new course of lies. Something had cracked in the tug-of-war; playing Sancho to the Quixote of his will, his body had taken over, a better liar than he. She might just as well have made a holiday of yesterday’s ride, for today’s news would have cured him. It was a judgment on her, she thought.

He came round to see her a few nights later, full of the news about Finnigan; charming, sincere, apologetic, unable to think how he could have made such a muddle, been such a damned fool. That this should happen, just when his voice was right again, was typical of the perversity of things. He had brought her a new book she had been wanting, a new embrace which only lack of imagination had kept her from wanting, and Faustus’s invocation to Helen, delivered in a thrilling undertone in the dark. He had had no more bad dreams, he assured her, but rather a good one, which he would tell her if she wouldn’t be shocked. He was irresistible; at the top of his form. A sorcerer innocent of his own devices, he offered her forgetfulness like an enchanted cup. She took it, and entered with him his kingdom of escape.

I
T WAS ONE OF
HILARY’S
DAYS FOR AN EVENING SURGERY
. She drove into the little market town, where she had two rooms on the ground floor of a small Victorian house, just off the High Street, converted by her predecessor. No one ever came in the evening but the working people, whom she liked and got on with. There was the usual rush about six o’clock. The concentration needed to combine thoroughness and courtesy with speed was just what she had been needing. By ten minutes to eight, everyone had gone; she relaxed at her desk with a cigarette, thinking she might safely close a few minutes early. Precisely at seven fifty-five, the bell on the waiting-room door sounded. She called, “Come in.”

The communicating door opened. Julian came in, his hair streaked across his forehead from the wind. His eyes looked drawn; he gave her a quick, over-bright smile. A handkerchief was wrapped clumsily round his left hand.

“My dear.” She went through, locked the outer door, and came back to him. “Show me your hand. What have you done to it?”

“Done?” He looked down, took off the handkerchief and put it in his pocket. “Sorry, I forgot. I thought if there were other people they might wonder why I was here.”

“But, Julian, you can’t do that. You can’t come to me as a patient. Whatever you do, never try that again.”

He began, impatiently, “What does it—” and then, his face changing, “You mean, because we—Oh, God, I didn’t think. Do you mean you could be struck off the register or something? Of course. I must be crazy.”

“Really, darling!” She laughed; it partly relieved her tension. “Struck off for what? You’re past the age of consent, and single unless you’ve been deceiving me all this while. What do you suppose they could charge me with? Indecent assault?”

His strained face relaxed in a faint grin. “That black eye wouldn’t have looked too good.”

“About the only advantage a female enjoys in this profession is that she isn’t exposed to accusations of rape. But, seriously, my dear, seducing patients from another doctor ranks nearly as high. If you’d been seen, it might easily have trickled round to Lowe. What made you do it? Has anything happened?”

“No. I just wanted to see you.” He began wandering round the consulting-room, opening drawers and peering inside. “You know, I’ve never been in here before.”

“Everything’s put away.” She was used to seeing these things handled by men who knew how to use them: Julian, vaguely picking up objects of unrelated purpose by the wrong ends, looked irritatingly out of keeping. “… No, I shan’t tell you what it’s for, you’d think it disgustingly sordid. … Don’t undo that, it’s sterile. For goodness’ sake come away, it’s worse than having a child about the place. Here, have a cigarette. And now tell me all about it.”

“There’s nothing to tell.” He sat down beside her on the edge of the desk, and put his arm round her waist. “I just felt like seeing you, that’s all.”

“But why here? You wouldn’t do a queer thing like this without some reason.”

He said, with a constrained smile, “Don’t be so cast-iron rational about everything. Why shouldn’t I suddenly want to see you? What’s queer about it? Let’s go out somewhere; this place smells forbidding, it puts me off.”

“Lisa’s expecting me in to dinner. Now look, darling, obviously you came here to tell me something.” She felt her nerves tightening; the effort of control hardened her voice. “I’m not moving from here till I know what it is.”

He slid down from the desk, crossed the room, and suddenly wheeled round on her. “For God’s sake. What’s the point of keeping this up? If you don’t want me about, say so. I can find something else to do.” She was too much taken aback to answer; he went on, sullenly, “If you’d told me straight away I was nothing but a damned nuisance, it’d have saved time. I’d have been gone by now.”

“Don’t let me keep you,” said Hilary instinctively. Almost before she realized that she had said it, he was at the door. Her heart jerked; he was opening it without a backward glance. “Julian. Come here.”

He came back, looking wary and ashamed. She pulled down his head, and gave him one of those caresses which are in the nature of a private joke. “Another time, when you feel in a filthy mood and want something done about it, you can just tell me. That’d save time, too.”

“I’m sorry.” He suddenly strained her to him. “Kiss me. No, properly. Don’t stop, for a minute … If you’d let me walk out of that door, I’d have gone nuts.”

“You’re impossible, aren’t you?” But flippancy broke on him unheeded. His love-making was exhausting, because it was the desperate expression of a demand not physical at all. They stood among the hard consulting-room furniture, while he told her, at irregular intervals, that he knew he wasn’t fit to be with, that he had had to come, that it was nothing; that he got like this from time to time, he really couldn’t say why; that it would be all right now that he had seen her, if she could put up with him a minute or two more.

Worse than the strain of all this was the effort required to keep from questioning him again. She came from a family which had believed strongly in talking everything out. It had usually worked, and the belief that this remedy would solve all personal problems was ingrained in her. Forcing herself to silence, she resented, more than she realized, the denial of an outlet which her nature required. But she was, at the moment, too much concerned for him to think about this. It ended with her ringing up Lisa to say, with equivocal truth, that she had had an urgent call, and letting him drive her out to an appalling meal in an obscure country hotel. He had, as a rule, a healthy and unfastidious appetite; tonight he ate almost nothing. Over coffee in the little smoke room, which fortunately they had to themselves, she asked him whether he had had dinner already at home.