‘Your interest is touching, Miss Trevelyan,’ he laughed. ‘I shall appreciate it in many desert places.’
He was trying to bring her down.
But she had crossed her fingers against the Devil.
‘I do not believe in your gratitude,’ she said wryly; ‘just as I do not believe that I fully understand you. But I will.’
As they continued to walk beneath the black branches of the trees, the man and woman were of equal stature, it seemed, and on approaching the spot at which the most solemn rites of the picnic were in the course of being celebrated, in the little clearing, with its smell of boiling water and burnt sticks, its jolly faces and acceptable opinions, the expression of the two late arrivals suggested that they shared some guilty secret of personality. Only, nobody noticed.
The men, who had climbed up from the rocks by a less circuitous way, were herding together. Pressed by Mrs Pringle herself, a governess, and two children’s nurses, everybody was busy eating. Little boys were holding chops over the coals on sticks specially sharpened by the coachmen, so that an incense of green bark mingled with the odour of sacrificial fat. Girls blew on hot tea, and dreamily watched circles widen. Ladies, suffering the occasion on carpet stools that had been brought out and set amongst the tussocks, were nibbling at thin sandwiches and controlling their shawls.
Now it could have been noticed that the German fellow was still standing at the side of Laura Trevelyan, no longer for protection, rather, one would have said, in possession. He was lording it, and it was by no means disagreeable to the girl, who accepted food without, however, looking up.
Only once she did look down, upon his wrist, where the cuff cut into it, pressing the little dark hairs.
‘As I was saying, a slight domestic upheaval,’ confided Mrs Bonner, made more mysterious by the passes of her recalcitrant shawl. ‘More than slight, perhaps. Time will decide. Rose Portion has given us cause for anxiety.’
‘Oh, dear,’ groaned Mrs Pringle, as if she were suffering internally.
And waited.
Mrs Bonner caught the shawl.
‘I am in honour bound, Mrs Pringle, not to go into details.’
But she would, of course.
Both ladies nursed this prospect deliciously on their unreliable stools.
Then Laura Trevelyan saw Rose standing in her brown dress, her knuckles pressed tight together. The harelip was fearful.
‘No, thank you, Mr Voss,’ Laura said. ‘Not another crumb.’
And with that decision, she moved, so that she was standing somewhere else, protected by smeary children.
‘Look, Laura,’ said Jessie Pringle, ‘how I have polished the bone of my chop.’
‘She is a dog,’ said Ernest.
Then there were blows.
Laura was glad of the opportunity to act, and was at once separating, admonishing, soothing, with the tact and firmness expected of her. She was saying:
‘Now, Jessie, there is no need to cry. Look. Wash your fingers in this tin of warm water, and dry them on your handkerchief. There. Everybody knew you to be a sensible girl.’
But Rose Portion was bringing hot water in the little brass can, which she wrapped in a towel, as if it had been precious, and left in the basin of the washing-stand. Rose Portion took the brush and brushed Laura’s hair, holding it in one long switch, brushing it out and down, in long sweeps. Sometimes the back of the brush thumped on Rose’s big breasts, as she brushed monotonously on.
Laura Trevelyan looked. It was impossible not to see the German where he was standing in the grey scrub, his dry lips the moister for butter, fuller in that light. The light was tangling with his coarse beard.
Ah, miss, said Jack Slipper, you have come out for a breather, well, the breeze has got up, can you hear it in the leaves? Whatever the source of the friction of the bamboos, it usually sounded cooler in their thicket. But in summer there were also the murmurous voices of insects, and often of men and women, which would create a breathlessness in that corner of the garden. Full moonlight failed to illuminate its secrets. There was a hot, black smell of rotting. The silver flags, breaking, and flying on high, almost escaping from their lacquered masts, were brought back continually by the mysterious ganglion of dark roots.
‘Come now, Laura,’ said Mrs Pringle, ‘many hands make light work. There are all these things to collect. We shall be late, as it is, for the children’s baths,’ she added, consulting a small watch in blue enamel suspended from her person by a little chain.
Laura Trevelyan had held back, dreaming, in her moss-green jacket. She was rather pale. Little points of perspiration glittered on her forehead, at the roots of her hair. In less oblivious company, her shame might have become exposed. As it was, she received Mrs Pringle’s suggestion with relief. She began to help Miss Abbey, the governess, to gather forks into bundles, scrape plates, wrap remainders. In this way she was able to avoid actual sight of the German, even if her mind’s eye dwelt on the masculine shape of his lips, and his wiry wrist with the little hairs. By moving still faster, she could perhaps destroy these impressions. So she did, in a fury of competence. He was terribly repulsive to her.
And the journey home was even more oppressive than the journey out, for Uncle had been added to those already in the enclosed carriage. He was all jokes, now that he need not be ashamed of Voss. He loved the German when he could openly admire the purpose for which the latter had been bought. He would tap his protégé on the knee, both to emphasize ownership, and to assist language.
But Voss grunted, and looked sideways out of the window. They were all tired of one another, all except Mr Bonner, one of those fleshy men who never for a moment suffer the loss of a dimension.
When they reached that place where the road turned into Potts Point, Voss at once edged forward, and said:
‘I will alight here, if you please.’
‘No, no, Voss,’ Mr Bonner protested, with that congestion of enthusiasm which suggests a throttling. ‘Stay with us till we reach the house. Then Jim will drive you to your lodgings.’
Regrettably, his kind offer sounded something like a command.
‘It is unnecessary,’ said Voss, wrestling with the wretched carriage door.
The sash was against him. He was tearing his nails.
Mrs Bonner began to make some sound that vaguely signified distress.
‘If you halt the carriage, I will descend here,’ repeated Voss, from the region of his knotted throat.
He was desperate to escape from that carriage.
Then Mr Bonner, by shouting, perhaps even by oaths, did attract the attention of Jim Prentice on the box, and as the vehicle stopped, himself leaned forward to touch with a finger the door that delayed the German’s freedom.
The trapped crow stalked out. Although rusty and crumpled, he had triumphed, and the last blaze of evening light will help enlarge most objects to heroic proportions. The man would be ludicrous, Laura saw, if it were not for his arrogance; this just saves him, terrible though it is. His eyes were glittering with it in the mineral light of evening.
‘I thank you for the pleasant Ausflug,’ he began, but struck his hands together in frustration; ‘for the pleasant day, Mrs Bonner,’ he added.
He had not quite escaped. Round him, words continued to writhe.
Aunt Emmy was, of course, charmed, and formed her mouth into several appropriate shapes.
Uncle, who was under the impression that foreigners understood only what was shouted at them, proceeded to mutter his views on a certain individual.
‘I will communicate with you, Mr Bonner,’ said Voss, looking in all other directions, ‘on any matter of importance. The time is now so short for me to impose upon your goodness.’