The Innocent Moon (28 page)

The curve of her knee was beautiful. He wanted to gaze at it, but Annabelle pushed off, followed by Marcus. He stood there, disturbed and self-critical. He had read of the knee being beautiful in one of Jefferies’ novels,
The
Dewy
Morn,
which he had borrowed from cousin Willie’s derelict cottage; but he had not known the feeling until that moment. Annabelle and Marcus returned, followed by the old cattle dog who was beginning to know that visitors meant strokings, scratchings, and sometimes food.

“Is that rag-bag yours?” asked Annabelle.

“Rag-bag? It’s a prize wall-jumper! You ought to see it go with a leg of mutton in its jaws!”

She pretended to kick the old dog with her gym shoe. “What’s its name?”

“Buzzoffquickski. He hatched out of the horse skin.”

Marcus thought this very funny. Annabelle also laughed, showing teeth and tip of pink tongue. Her beauty hurt. Seeing his eyes she said, “We must go, come on, Marcus!” but she moved a yard only, her shadow thrown sharply across the threshold. Then, “Come on, Marcus! Leave the old owl to his own blinking devices. He
is
an owl—if you’ve ever seen an owl with blue eyes!”

The boy stooped to pat the dog, which was trying to detect, by smell, the rest of the bully beef.

“Are you coming? I’m off!” And pushing away from the wall, Annabelle went.

“Is he yours, Phillip?”

“Well, sort of. During a thunderstorm he creeps in here for reassurance. He’s scared of thunder. Or as the farmer says, ‘The bliddy dog clears at the first clap’. There’s good English for you.”

“I say, how fast can your Norton go?”

“It has done seventy-three.”

Annabelle’s shadow reappeared. “Still jawing? Oh, I forgot to ask you. Mother says, would you care to come to dinner? And there’s a tennis court. Do you play?”

“Do I
not
play? My cannon-ball service is terrific—fifty per cent of the balls burst into flame.” She laughed, balancing on the bicycle. “You priceless ninny!”

“Are you seventeen yet, Annabelle?”

“Her birthday’s next wee——” began Marcus, but “Don’t tell him!” she cried. “I don’t want any books of poetry! Anyhow, it’s a long way off.”

“I’ll give you my Norton.”

“Is it dud?”

“Dud? I’ve been tuning the engine. Just listen to the tick-over!” He wheeled it out, bleached bathing dress tied to handlebars, and put it on the stand.

“Phillip will now swank,” remarked Annabelle.

Before he could pull round the back wheel there came the sound of hooves. Then down the lane came a slight figure riding astride.

“Hullo, Queenie.” She was neat and cool in dark grey riding kit. He was surprised to see the cob he usually rode. “How d’you like him?”

“You mean this awful hack?” The cob, used to sugar from Phillip, tried to take her into the cottage. “Get back, you brute!”

“Sammy’s all right, Queenie. He knows this cottage. Bestways let him have his head. He’s got a mouth like a moodook.”

“Whatever is that?”

“Yorkshire for anchor—‘mud hook’. I heard it first at a crown-and-anchor party in 1914 at Hazebrouck.”

Queenie, her eyes wide and innocent, looked around the kitchen.

“Ask him to show you his skin, Queenie! Go on!”

“His skin?” said Queenie, demurely. “Why, has he got some awful disease?”

“It can do seventy-three,” said Marcus, beside the Norton. “It’s a Brooklands Road Special!”

“What, your skin?” asked Queenie. “How very amusing. Do show me.”

“It’s a pony-skin. It’s upstairs. Do you mind?”

“Why should I mind? If Annabelle’s seen a skin that can do seventy-three why shouldn’t I? Seventy-three what, by the way?”

He followed her up the stairs. “How thrilling to think this is where you write your books!” Her voice became whisperingly intimate on the landing. “One day this cottage will be famous. Then I shall tell my friends I once went into Pee Maddison’s bedroom. Is that the horse-skin? Where did you get it?” He told her, but she appeared not to be listening. “Aren’t you terribly uncomfortable in here? I should loathe it.”

There seemed nothing else to say. He followed her down the stairs again. “Would you like my horse-skin, Queenie?”

“Who’s giving away horse-skins? Hullo, Phillip!”

Mrs. Selby-Lloyd—Sophy after the first evening at Turnstone—stood on the threshold. Her voice was slightly quivering, colour was in her cheeks. He noticed again how gentle and slender was her hand, which remained in his.

“We’ve been looking at Phillip’s horse-skin, Mother. I say, is my hair too frightful? I can’t find a looking-glass anywhere,” said Queenie. In the open doorway Annabelle’s shapely black legs were turning pedals backwards as she strove for balance on her bicycle.

“What an abode of tranquillity,” said Sophy, looking at Phillip. “Well, how are you? Have you been working hard? No wonder you can write here.” She dipped a fingertip in the bowl of washing-up water, which was tepid, and saw the Beatrice stove. “Have you any matches? Let me wash up for you.”

“No, really, thanks. I’ll do it later.”

“But I’d like to. And look at your poor socks!” She laughed gently. “You need looking after, I can see that. If you like, I’ll do any darning you require. I’ve got a basket here, and can take some back with me now. Are you coming over today?”

“Thanks, I’d like to.”

The bicycle rattled on the sett-stones. He ran out—it was only the bicycle. He went back to the kitchen.

“Annabelle, dear, be careful of the handle-bars against the door. Did you paint those flowers on the door, Phillip? They look like early Van Gogh.”

“Oh, I’m not much good at painting.”

“Anyone can see that!” called out Annabelle, now leaning against the door.

“I think they’re rather twee,” said Queenie.

“May I see the bedrooms?”

“Be careful not to stay too long upstairs, Mother,” called out Queenie, as Phillip and Sophy went up. “Remember you’re at the dangerous age!”

“Silly child,” murmured Sophy, looking around. “I hope our intrusion hasn’t interfered with your work, Phillip. What’s this you’re writing now? Oh, yes, you told me about that. It should be good. I’m looking forward to hearing it. That’s your real line, you know.”

She looked out of the tiny casement window. From behind her head he watched Annabelle and Marcus pedalling furiously round the bend of the lane, apparently having a race. Annabelle’s plait was swinging and flying. A black butterfly of hair-ribbon fluttered down.

“Excuse me a moment, Sophy.” He returned with the frayed black bow in his pocket. “I thought I saw a rare butterfly.”

“‘Excuse me’,” remarked Sophy, in the kitchen, as she lit the Beatrice stove-wick, “is a very genteel expression, don’t you think?”

“I’m sorry, Sophy. What should I have said?”

“‘Will you forgive me a moment’, or just, ‘I’ll be back in a moment’. And you needn’t say ‘Sorry’ to me, ever. I only want to help you, you see, my dear. Now while I’m washing up, you turn out any socks that need mending, and be a good boy.” When the washing-up was done she said, “I must be getting back now. Come over whenever you want to, won’t you. Dinner tonight? Very well, we’ll expect you at the usual time.”

The day seemed empty after they had gone. He prepared to get on with his short story about a badger.

“Hullo, P.M.”

Barley had come in almost without him noticing her movements. “Oh, you’ve done the washing up.”

“Someone more or less insisted on doing it.”

“Are you busy?”

“Only disrupted. No, that’s rude. My friends have honoured me with a visit. Would you like to go for a walk?”

“Yes please!”

They walked to a plantation on higher ground, where they climbed a tree and sat in the branches, seeing the sky shining above the spaces in the green leaves. Climbing down again they wandered over fields and saw a linnet shivering and twittering on a blackthorn twig. Below was an adder rising open-mouthed
to take it. Before he could act Barley was beside the thorn, and the linnet flying away.

“The snake might have struck at you!”

“Oh, no, for I was not afraid.”

He felt calm and happy as he lay on the grass to feel the sun on his face, arms under head. She lay beside him in the same attitude. Curious, a little amused by her almost dog-like attachment to him, he raised himself on an elbow to look at her. Her hair, cut short of her shoulders, was coarse, thick, ripply, the colour of barley straw in August. While he looked at her she rose on an elbow to look at him, duplicating his attitude. She seemed to be without normal feelings; her eyes were not those of a girl but of a seer, almost sexless in their lack of warmth. They were wide-spaced and of a gem-hardness. She had a wide forehead, the hair grew away from it in two diverse waves.

“I can stare you out, Barley.” But he couldn’t; his mouth quivered, he laughed.

“Your way of talking is that of a naturally poised mind or personality, Barley.” He remembered Irene telling him that she had sat up at three months, and had never cried after learning to talk. The falling masses of bright hair, the strange direct look, the effortless movement, the calm firmness of purpose, her playfulness and unusual strength had gotten her in the Straits Settlement the nickname of Puma Cub.

“How old are you, Barley?”

“Fifteen and a half.”

“You don’t look it!”

“How old are you, P.M.?”

“Oh, ever so old. Twenty-six last April!”

“You don’t look it! Anyway, age doesn’t matter.”

“Matter for what?”

She hesitated briefly and said, “I’m not too young to be your true friend. I know what you think, because I think the same. I wish I hadn’t to go back to school. I want to stay here all my life.”

They lay and watched swifts wheeling in the sky, pretending that the circles of their hands were binoculars.

“I would like to be a bird.”

“So would I.”

“You are a bird, P.M. Mummie says you’re an owl. But I think you’re really a falcon. You’ll come and see her, won’t you?”

“Your mother doesn’t want to see me, perhaps.”

“Yes, she does, P.M.”

“Did she say so?”

“Not in words, but I know she does. Do swifts beat first one wing, then the other?”

These strange, unearthly birds were whistling with faint shrillness a thousand feet in the air, barely visible to his eyes.

“Now I come to think of it, they do! What good eyes you have.”

“I watched them flying round the church tower last night.”

They strolled back over the fields. She took his hand and led him to Verbena Cottage. Irene smiled sweetly, and invited him to lunch, leading him in by the least touch of her fingers on his hand. He was introduced to the new companion, Mrs. O’Malley, whom Irene called B. When Julian came in he seemed unusually quiet, even subdued. Mrs. O’Malley did not speak to him.

During the meal the question of schooling arose. “We shall have to find you somewhere, Barley darling, perhaps they’ll take you at my old school at Eastbourne.”

“Oh, Mummie!” said the girl, wrinkling her forehead.

“Isn’t she just like a puma cub, P.M.? But I prefer Barley—Oh, your tangled hair, my baby! No school would have you!”

“I’ll tutor her!” cried Phillip. “My fees are a penny a month!”

“You’d be a very good tutor,” said Irene, calmly regarding him. “But your work——?”

“The idea of old Philip as m’tutor is most amusing,” said Julian. “The Barleybright will learn a great deal from old Phillip.” He added, with a chuckle, “But only about old Phillip!”

“Mummy, may I really be taught by P.M.?”

“If you let me wash your hair, darling.”

It was arranged that Miss Lushington should go to Captain P. S. T. Maddison for an hour every morning from noon until one o’clock, and that in return he would come to luncheon and any other meals he cared to have at Verbena Cottage.

*

The Selby-Lloyds went back at the beginning of May, for the children—Annabelle and Marcus—to return to school. Queenie had not yet decided, he learned, whether to go to Paris to finish her official education, or take a course of domestic
economy—with others “out of the top drawer”, Sophy explained—in London S.W.1. Before they left, Sophy gave Phillip her address; and with almost a shock he saw that it was the house where he had stayed during the early days of the war: Tollemere Park, in Essex, then owned by the Kingsmans. Father and son had been killed in the war; Mrs. Kingsman had not long survived them. The usual story: the best were killed, the family land was lost through death duties.

“Do come and see us if ever you find yourself in the Rodings,” said Sophy. “If you come in the winter, there’s the hunting. We’ve got three good packs, all within hacking distance.”

Annabelle—Annabelle was gone! Over and over again he played the record of Edgar Allan Poe’s poem set to music. Barley listened too, sitting still in the cottage kitchen, as though without a thought in her head.

“Now, we really must do some work. For prep. tonight, write me 400 words on the saying of Horace Walpole, ‘Life is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel’.”

In the morning, giving neither excuse nor explanation, she said she hadn’t done it.

*

Julian was almost a different man. His fingernails were actually grown enough to be trimmed by nail-scissors. By some mysterious means the bill at the Ring of Bells—where Julian had made a reputation for talk, and also for capacity to absorb ale, that was to remain during the lifetime of the publican—had been settled. Two tailors in Queensbridge had each made him a new suit. He avoided the village inns; the puffy look left his face; the redness on brow and cheek was replaced by sun-burn. He walked more, he bathed occasionally, he wrote with less irregularity. Phillip rejoiced that the pain behind his friend’s eyes had cleared, he was less ironic, he was at times almost peaceful. Sometimes he came to show Phillip what he had written, usually in sonnet form. Some of the lines were startling and clear, Phillip said: go on writing, Julian! Most of it was love poetry; but some was about the War, wherein he identified himself with the men he had killed in air-battle. These were, Phillip thought, derived from the poems of Wilfred Owen; but they were good on their own.