Chapter III.
MICHAEL WALKS AND TALKS
The face Michael drew began by being Victorine’s, and ended by being Fleur’s. If physically Fleur stood up straight, was she morally as erect? This was the speculation for which he continually called himself a cad. He saw no change in her movements, and loyally refrained from enquiring into the movements he could not see. But his aroused attention made him more and more aware of a certain cynicism, as if she were continually registering the belief that all values were equal and none of much value.
Wilfrid, though still in London, was neither visible nor spoken of. “Out of sight and hearing, out of mind,” seemed to be the motto. It did not work with Michael—Wilfrid was constantly in his mind. If Wilfrid were not seeing Fleur, how could he bear to stay within such tantalising reach of her? If Fleur did not want Wilfrid to stay, why had she not sent him away? He was finding it difficult, too, to conceal from others the fact that Desert and he were no longer pals. Often the impetus to go and have it out with him surged up and was beaten back. Either there was nothing beyond what he already knew, or there was something—and Wilfrid would say there wasn’t. Michael accepted that without cavil; one did not give a woman away! But he wanted to hear no lies from a War comrade. Between Fleur and himself no word had passed; for words, he felt, would add no knowledge, merely imperil a hold weak enough already. Christmas at the ancestral manor of the Monts had been passed in covert-shooting. Fleur had come and stood with him at the last drive on the second day, holding Ting-a-ling on a lead. The Chinese dog had been extraordinarily excited, climbing the air every time a bird fell, and quite unaffected by the noise of guns. Michael, waiting to miss his birds—he was a poor shot—had watched her eager face emerging from grey fur, her form braced back against Ting-a-ling. Shooting was new to her; and under the stimulus of novelty she was always at her best. He had loved even her “Oh, Michaels!” when he missed. She had been the success of the gathering, which meant seeing almost nothing of her except a sleepy head on a pillow; but, at least, down there he had not suffered from lurking uneasiness.
Putting a last touch to the bobbed hair on the blotting paper, he got up. St. Paul’s, that girl had said. He might stroll up and have a squint at Bicket. Something might occur to him. Tightening the belt of his blue overcoat round his waist, he sallied forth, thin and sprightly, with a little ache in his heart.
Walking east, on that bright, cheerful day, nothing struck him so much as the fact that he was alive, well, and in work. So very many were dead, ill, or out of a job. He entered Covent Garden. Amazing place! A human nature which, decade after decade, could put up with Covent Garden was not in danger of extinction from its many ills. A comforting place—one needn’t take anything too seriously after walking through it. On this square island were the vegetables of the earth and the fruits of the world, bounded on the west by publishing, on the cast by opera, on the north and south by rivers of mankind. Among discharging carts and litter of paper, straw and men out of drawing, Michael walked and sniffed. Smell of its own, Covent Garden, earthy and just not rotten! He had never seen—even in the War—any place that so utterly lacked form. Extraordinarily English! Nobody looked as if they had anything to do with the soil—drivers, hangers-on, packers, and the salesmen inside the covered markets, seemed equally devoid of acquaintanceship with sun, wind, water, earth or air—town types all! And—Golly!—how their faces jutted, sloped, sagged and swelled, in every kind of featural disharmony. What was the English type amongst all this infinite variety of disproportion? There just wasn’t one! He came on the fruits, glowing piles, still and bright—foreigners from the land of the sun—globes all the same size and colour. They made Michael’s mouth water. ‘Something in the sun,’ he thought; ‘there really is.’ Look at Italy, at the Arabs, at Australia—the Australians came from England, and see the type now! Nevertheless—a Cockney for good temper! The more regular a person’s form and features, the more selfish they were! Those grape-fruit looked horribly self-satisfied, compared with the potatoes!
He emerged still thinking about the English. Well! They were now one of the plainest and most distorted races of the world; and yet was there any race to compare with them for good temper and for ‘guts’? And they needed those in their smoky towns, and their climate—remarkable instance of adaptation to environment, the modern English character! ‘I could pick out an Englishman anywhere,’ he thought, ‘and yet, physically, there’s no general type now!’ Astounding people! So ugly in the mass, yet growing such flowers of beauty, and such strange sprigs—like that little Mrs. Bicket; so unimaginative in bulk, yet with such a blooming lot of poets! How would old Danby like it, by the way, when Wilfrid took his next volume to some other firm; or rather what should he—Wilfrid’s particular friend!—say to old Danby? Aha! He knew what he should say:
“Yes, sir, but you should have let that poor blighter off who snooped the ‘Copper Coins.’ Desert hasn’t forgotten your refusal.” One for old Danby and his eternal inthe-rightness! ‘Copper Coin’ had done uncommonly well. Its successor would probably do uncommonly better. The book was a proof of what he—Michael—was always saying: The ‘cockyolly-bird period’ was passing. People wanted life again. Sibley, Walter Nazing, Linda—all those who had nothing to say except that they were superior to such as had—were already measured for their coffins. Not that they would know when they were in them; not blooming likely! They would continue to wave their noses and look down them!
‘I’M fed-up with them,’ thought Michael. ‘If only Fleur would see that looking down your nose is a sure sign of inferiority!’ And, suddenly, it came to him that she probably did. Wilfrid was the only one of the whole lot she had ever been thick with; the others were there because—well, because she was Fleur, and had the latest things about her. When, very soon, they were no longer the latest things, she would drop them. But Wilfrid she would not drop. No, he felt sure that she had not dropped, and would not drop Wilfrid.
He looked up. Ludgate Hill! “Near St. Paul’s—sells balloons?” And there—sure enough—the poor beggar was!
Bicket was deflating with a view to going off his stand for a cup of cocoa. Remembering that he had come on him by accident, Michael stood for a moment preparing the tones of surprise. Pity the poor chap couldn’t blow himself into one of those coloured shapes and float over St. Paul’s to Peter. Mournful little cuss he looked, squeezing out the air! Memory tapped sharply on his mind. Balloon—in the square—November the first—joyful night! Special! Fleur! Perhaps they brought luck. He moved and said in an astounded voice: “YOU, Bicket? Is this your stunt now?”
The large eyes of Bicket regarded him over a puce-coloured sixpennyworth.
“Mr. Mont! Often thought I’d like to see you again, sir.”
“Same here, Bicket. If you’re not doing anything, come and have some lunch.”
Bicket completed the globe’s collapse, and, closing his tray-lid, said: “Reelly, sir?”
“Rather! I was just going into a fish place.”
Bicket detached his tray.
“I’ll leave this with the crossing-sweeper.” He did so, and followed at Michael’s side.
“Any money in it, Bicket?”