“I’ll have a look at it all over if you like.”
“Oh Gerald you saint. …”
“Now he’s happy,” said Harriett as Gerald’s white flannelled figure flashed into the sunlight and disappeared through the yard gate.
“Ph—how hot it is; it’s this summerhouse.”
“Let’s go outside if you like,” said Miriam lazily, “it seems to me simply perfect in here.”
“It’s all right—ph—it’s hot everywhere,” said Harriett languidly. She mopped her face. Her face emerged from her handkerchief fever-flushed, the eyes large and dark and brilliant; her lips full and drawn in and down at the corners with a look of hopeless anxiety.
Anger flushed through Miriam. Harriett at nineteen, in the brilliant beauty of the summer afternoon facing hopeless fear.
“That’s an awfully pretty dress,” she faltered nervously.
Harriett set her lips and stretched both arms along the elbows of her basket chair.
“You could have it made into an evening gown.”
“I loathe the very sight of it. I shall burn it the minute I’ve done with it.”
It was awful that anything that looked so charming could seem like that.
“D’you feel bad? Is it so awful?”
“I’m all right, but I feel as if I were bursting. I wish it would just hurry up and be over.”
“I think you’re simply splendid.”
“I simply don’t think about it. You don’t think about it except now and again when you realise you’ve got to go through it and then you go hot all over.”
“The head’s a bit wobbly,” said Gerald riding round the lawn.
“Does that matter?”
“Well, it doesn’t make it any easier to ride, especially with this great bundle on the handlebars. You want a luggage-carrier.”
“I daresay. I say Gerald, show me the nuts tomorrow, not now.”
The machine was lying upside down on the lawn with its back wheel revolving slowly in the air.
“The front wheel’s out of the true.”
“What do you think of the saddle?”
“The saddle’s all right enough.”
“It’s a Brooks’s, B. 40; about the best you can have. It’s my own and so’s the Lucas’s Baby bell.”
“By Jove, she’s got an adjustable spanner.”
“That’s not mine nor the repair outfit; Mr. Leyton lent me those.”
“And vaseline on the bearings.”
“Of course.”
“I don’t think much of your gear-case, my dear.”
“Gerald, do you think it’s all right on the whole?”
“Well, it’s sound enough as far as I can see; bit squiffy and wobbly. I don’t advise you to ride it in traffic or with this bundle.”
“I must have the bundle. I came down through Tottenham Court Road and Oxford Street and Bond Street and Piccadilly all right.”
“Well, there’s no accounting for tastes. Got any oil?”
“There’s a little oil can in the wallet wrapped up in the rag. It’s lovely; perfectly new.”
XXVI
There was a strong soft grey light standing at the side of the blind … smiling and touching her as it had promised. She leaped to the floor and stood looking at it swaying with sleep. Ships sailing along with masts growing on them, poplars streaming up from the ships, all in a steam of gold. … Last night’s soapy water poured away and the fresh poured out ready standing there all night, everything ready. … I must not forget the extra piece of string. … Je‑ru‑sa‑lem the Gol‑den, with-milk-and-hun‑ney—blest. … Sh, not so much noise … beneath thy con, tem, pla, tion, sink, heart, and, voice, o, ppressed.
I know not, oh, I, know, not.
Sh—Sh … hark hark my soul angelic songs are swelling O’er earth’s green fields, and ocean’s wave-beat shore … damn—blast where are my bally knickers? sing us sweet fragments of the songs above.
The green world everywhere, inside and out … all along the dim staircase, waiting in the dim cold kitchen.
No blind, brighter. Cool grey light, a misty windless morning. Shut the door.
They stand those halls of zi‑on
All jubilant with song.
As she neared Colnbrook the road grew heavier and a closer mist lay over the fields. It was too soon for fatigue but her knees already seemed heavy with effort. Getting off at the level crossing she found that her skirt was sodden and her zouave spangled all over with beads of moisture. She walked shivering across the rails and remounted rapidly, hoisting into the saddle a draggled person that was not her own and riding doggedly on beating back all thoughts but the thought of sunrise.
“Is this Reading?”
The cyclist smiled as he shouted back. He knew she knew. But he liked shouting too. If she had yelled Have you got a soul, it would have been just the same. If everyone were on bicycles all the time you could talk to everybody, all the time, about anything … sailing so steadily along with two free legs … how much easier it must be with your knees going so slowly up and down … how funny I must look with my knees racing up and down in lumps of skirt. But I’m here, at the midday rest. It must be nearly twelve.
Drawing into the curb near a confectioner’s she thought of buying two bars of plain chocolate. There was some sort of truth in the Swiss Family Robinson. If you went on, it was all right. There was only death. People frightened you about things that were not there. I will never listen to anybody again; or be frightened. That cyclist knew, as long as he was on his bicycle. Perhaps he has people who make him not himself. He can always get away again. Men can always get away. I am going to lead a man’s life always getting away. …
Wheeling her machine back to the open road she sat down on a bank and ate the cold sausage and bread and half of the chocolate and lay down to rest on a level stretch of grass in front of a gate. Light throbbed round the edges of the little high white fleecy clouds. She swung triumphantly up. The earth throbbed beneath her with the throbbing of her heart … the sky steadied and stood further off, clear peaceful blue with light neat soft bunches
