The Forsyte Saga, Volume 3(176)
Dinny finished dressing quickly and ran downstairs. Blore was in the dining-room.
‘Aunt Em says I may have a key, Blore, and I want a taxi, please.’
Having telephoned to the cab-stand and produced a key, the butler said: ‘What with her ladyship speaking her thoughts out loud, miss, I’m obliged to know, and I was saying to Sir Lawrence this morning: “If Miss Dinny could take him off just now, on a tour of the Scotch Highlands where they don’t see the papers, it would save a lot of vexation.” In these days, miss, as you’ll have noticed, one thing comes on the top of another, and people haven’t the memories they had. You’ll excuse my mentioning it.’
‘Thank you ever so, Blore. Nothing I’d like better; only I’m afraid he wouldn’t think it proper.’
‘In these days a young lady can do anything, miss.’
‘But men still have to be careful, Blore.’
‘Well, miss, of course, relatives are difficult; but it could be arranged.’
‘I think we shall have to face the music.’
The butler shook his head.
‘In my belief, whoever said that first is responsible for a lot of unnecessary unpleasantness. Here’s your taxi, miss.’
In the taxi she sat a little forward, getting the air from both windows on her cheeks, which needed cooling. Even the anger and vexation left by that review were lost in this sweeter effervescence. At the corner of Piccadilly she read a newspaper poster: ‘Derby horses arrive.’ The Derby tomorrow! How utterly she had lost count of events! The restaurant chosen for their dinner was Blafard’s in Soho, and her progress was impeded by the traffic of a town on the verge of national holiday. At the door, with the spaniel held on a leash, stood Stack. He handed her a note: ‘Mr Desert sent me with this, miss. I brought the dog for a walk.’
Dinny opened the note with a sensation of physical sickness.
DINNY DARLING,
Forgive my failing you tonight. I’ve been in a torture of doubt all day. The fact is, until I know where I stand with the world over this business, I have an overwhelming feeling that I must not commit you to anything; and a public jaunt like this is just what I ought to avoid for you. I suppose you saw The Daily Phase – that is the beginning of the racket. I must go through this next week on my own, and measure up where I am. I won’t run off, and we can write. You’ll understand. The dog is a boon, and I owe him to you. Good bye for a little, my dear love.
Your devoted
W.D.
It was all she could do not to put her hand on her heart under the driver’s eyes. Thus to be shut away in the heat of the battle was what, she knew now, she had been dreading all along. With an effort she controlled her lips, said ‘Wait a minute!’ and turned to Stack.
‘I’ll take you and Foch back.’
‘Thank you, miss.’
She bent down to the dog. Panic was at work within her breast! The dog! He was a link between them!
‘Put him into the cab, Stack.’
On the way she said quietly:
‘Is Mr Desert in?’
‘No, miss, he went out when he gave me the note.’
‘Is he all right?’
‘A little worried, I think, miss. I must say I’d like to teach manners to that gentleman in The Daily Phase.’
‘Oh! you saw that?’
‘I did; it oughtn’t to be allowed is what I say.’
‘Free speech,’ said Dinny. And the dog pressed his chin against her knee. ‘Is Foch good?’
‘No trouble at all, miss. A gentleman, that dog; aren’t you, boy?’
The dog continued to press his chin on Dinny’s knee; and the feel of it was comforting.
When the cab stopped in Cork Street, she took a pencil from her bag, tore off the empty sheet of Wilfrid’s note, and wrote:
DARLING,
As you will. But by these presents know: I am yours for ever and ever. Nothing can or shall divide me from you, unless you stop loving
Your devoted
DINNY.
You won’t do that, will you? Oh! don’t!
Licking what was left of the gum on the envelope, she put her half sheet in and held it till it stuck. Giving it to Stack, she kissed the dog’s head and said to the driver: ‘The Park end of Mount Street, please. Good night, Stack!’
‘Good night, miss!’
The eyes and mouth of the motionless henchman seemed to her so full of understanding that she turned her face away. And that was the end of the jaunt she had been so looking forward to.
From the top of Mount Street she crossed into the Park and sat on the seat where she had sat with him before, oblivious of the fact that she was unattached, without a hat, in eveningdress, and that it was past eight o’clock. She sat with the collar of her cloak turned up to her chestnut-coloured hair, trying to see his point of view. She saw it very well. Pride! She had enough herself to understand. Not to involve others in one’s troubles was elementary. The fonder one was, the less would one wish to involve them. Curiously ironical how love divided people just when they most needed each other! And no way out, so far as she could see. The strains of the Guards’ band began to reach her faintly. They were playing – Faust? – no – Carmen! Wilfrid’s favourite opera! She got up and walked over the grass towards the sound. What crowds of people! She took a chair some way off and sat down again, close to some rhododendrons. The Habanera! What a shiver its first notes always gave one! How wild, sudden, strange and inescapable was love! ‘L’amour est enfant de Bohème’…! The rhododendrons were late this year. That deep rosy one! They had it at Condaford…. Where was he – oh! where was he at this moment? Why could not love pierce veils, so that in spirit she might walk beside him, slip a hand into his! A spirit hand was better than nothing! And Dinny suddenly realized loneliness as only true lovers do when they think of life without the loved one. As flowers wilt on their stalks, so would she wilt – if she were cut away from him. ‘See things through alone!’ How long would he want to? For ever? At the thought she started up; and a stroller, who thought the movement meant for him, stood still and looked at her. Her face corrected his impression, and he moved on. She had two hours to kill before she could go in; she could not let them know that her evening had come to grief. The band was finishing off Carmen with the Toreador’s song. A blot on the opera, its most popular tune! No, not a blot, for it was meant, of course, to blare above the desolation of that tragic end, as the world blared around the passion of lovers. The world was a heedless and a heartless stage for lives to strut across, or in dark corners join and cling together…. How odd that clapping sounded in the open! She looked at her wrist-watch. Half past nine! An hour yet before it would be really dark. But there was a coolness now, a scent of grass and leaves; the rhododendrons were slowly losing colour, the birds had finished with song. People passed and passed her; she saw nothing funny about them, and they seemed to see nothing funny about her. And Dinny thought: ‘Nothing seems funny any more, and I haven’t had any dinner.’ A coffee stall? Too early, perhaps, but there must be places where she could still get something! No dinner, almost no lunch, no tea – a condition appropriate to the love-sick! She began to move towards Knightsbridge, walking fast, by instinct rather than experience, for this was the first time she had ever wandered alone about London at such an hour. Reaching the gate without adventure, she crossed and went down Sloane Street. She felt much better moving, and chalked up in her mind the thought: ‘For love-sickness, walking!’ In this straight street there was practically nobody to notice her. The carefully closed and blinded houses seemed to confirm, each with its tall formal narrow face, the indifference of the regimented world to the longings of street-walkers such as she. At the corner of the King’s Road a woman was standing.