XXV
The room still had the same radiant air. Nothing looked worn. There was not a spot anywhere. Bowls of flowers stood about. The Coalport tea service was set out on the little black table. The drawn-thread work table cover. … She had arranged the flowers. That was probably all she did; going in and out of the garden, in the sun, picking flowers. The Artist’s Model and The Geisha and the Strand Musicals still lay about; the curious new smell came from the inside of the piano. But there was this dreadful tiredness. It was dreadful that the tiredness should come nearer than the thought of Harriett. A pallid worried disordered face looked back from the strip of glass in the overmantel. No need to have looked. Always now, away from London, there was this dreadful realisation of fatigue, dreadful empty sense of worry and hurry … feeling so strong riding down through London, everything dropping away, nothing to think of; off and free, the holiday ahead, nothing but lovely, lonely freedom all round one.
Perhaps Harriett would be nervous and irritable. She had much more reason to be. But even if she were it would be no good. It would be impossible to conceal this frightful fatigue and nervousness. Harriett must understand at once how battered and abject one was. And it was a misrepresentation. Harriett knew nothing of all one had come from; all one was going to in the distance. Maddening. … Lovely; how rich and good they looked, more honest than those in the London shops. Harriett or Mrs. Thimm or Emma had ordered them from some confectioner in Chiswick. Fancy being able to buy anything like that without thinking. How well they went with the black piano and the Coalport tea-service and the garden light coming in. Gerald did not think that women were inferior or that Harriett was a dependent. … But Gerald did not think at all. He knew nothing was too good for Harriett. Oo, I dunno, she would say with a laugh. She thought all men were duffers. Perhaps that was the best way. Selfish babies. But Gerald was not selfish. He would never let Harriett wash up if he were there. He would never pretend to be ignorant of “mysteries” to get out of doing things. I get out of doing things—in houses. But women won’t let me do things. They all know I want to be mooning about. How do they know it? What is it? But they like me to be there. And now in houses there’s always this fearful worry and tiredness. What is the meaning of it?
Heavy footsteps came slowly downstairs.
“I put tea indoors. I thought Miss Miriam’d be warm after her ride.”
A large undulating voice with a shrewd consoling glance in it. She must have come to the kitchen door to meet Harriett in the hall.
“Yes, I’ke spect she will.” It was the same voice she had had in the nursery, resonant with practice in speaking to new people. Miriam felt tears coming.
“Hullo, you porking? Isn’t it porking?”
“Simply porked to death my dear. Porked to Death,” bawled Miriam softly, refreshed and delighted. Harriett was still far off, but she felt as if she had touched her. Even the end of the awful nine months was not changing her. Her freshly shampooed hair had a leisurely glint. There was colour in her cheeks. She surreptitiously rubbed her own hot face. Her appearance would improve now with every hour. By the evening she would be her old self. After tea she would play The Artist’s Model and The Geisha.
“Let’s have tea. I was asleep. I didn’t hear you come.” She sank into one of the large chairs, her thin accordion pleated black silk tea-gown billowing out round her squared little body. Even her shoulders looked broader and squarer. From the little pleated white chiffon chemisette her radiant firm little head rose up, her hair glinting under the light of the window behind her. She looked so fine—such a “fine spectacle”—and seemed so strong. How did she feel? Mrs. Thimm brought the teapot. The moment she had gone Harriett handed the rich cakes. Mrs. Thimm beaming, shedding strong beams of happiness and approval. …
“Come on,” said Harriett. “Let’s tuck in. There’s some thin bread and butter somewhere but I can’t eat anything but these things.”
“Can’t you?”
“The last time I went up to town Mrs. Bollingdon and I had six between us at Slater’s and when we got back we had another tea.”
“Fancy you!”
“I know. I can’t ’elp it.”
“I can’t ’elp it, Micky. Lovelay b-hird.”
The fourth cup of creamy tea; Harriett’s firm ringed hand; the gleaming serene world; the sunlit flower-filled garden shaded at the far end by the large tree the other side of the fence coming in, one with the room; the sun going to set and bring the evening freshness and rise tomorrow. Twenty-eight leisurely teas, twenty-eight long days; a feeling of strength and drowsiness. Nothing to do but clean the bicycle and pump up the tyres on the lawn, tomorrow. Nothing—after carrying the bicycle from the coal cellar up the area steps and through the house into the Tansley Street back yard. Nothing more but setting out after two nights of sleep in a cool room.
“That your machine in the yard, Mirry?”
“Yes; I’ve hired it, thirty bob for the whole month.”
“Well, if you’re going a sixty mile ride on it I advise you to tighten up the nuts a bit.”
“I will if you’ll
