"If you can keep me!" echoed Peter, and it was as if an ice-cold finger had suddenly been laid on his heart. For one second he saw what might be.
But he banished it. "What!" he exclaimed. "Cannot you trust me, Julie?
Don"t you know I love you? Don"t you know I want to make you the very centre of my being, Julie?"
"I know, dearest," she whispered, and he had never heard her speak so before. "You want, that is one thing; you can, that is another."
Peter stared up at her. He felt like a little child who kneels at the feet of a mother whom it sees as infinitely loving, infinitely wise, infinitely old. And, like a child, he buried his head in her lap. "Oh, Julie," he said, "you must marry me. I want you so that I can"t tell you how much. I don"t know what you mean. Say," he said, looking up again and clasping her tightly--"say you"ll marry me, Julie!"
She sprang up with a laugh. "Peter," she said, "you"re Mid-Victorian. You are actually proposing to me upon your knees. If I could curtsy or faint I would, but I can"t. Every sc.r.a.p of me is modern, down to Venns"
cami-knickers that you wouldn"t let me talk about. Let"s go and eat kippers; I"m dying for them. Come on, old Solomon."
He got up more slowly, half-smiling, for who could resist Julie in that mood? But he made one more effort. He caught her hand. "But just say "Yes" Julie," he said--"just "Yes.""
She s.n.a.t.c.hed her hand away. "Maybe I will tell you on Monday morning,"
she said, and ran out of the room.
As he finished dressing, he heard her singing in the next room, and then talking to the maid. When he entered the sitting-room the girl came out, and he saw that there were tears in her eyes. He went in and looked sharply at Julie; there was a suspicion of moisture in hers also. "Oh, Peter," she said, and took him by the arm as the door closed, "why didn"t you tell me about Jack? I"m going out immediately after breakfast to buy her the best silver photo-frame I can find, see? And now come and eat your kippers. They"re half-cold, I expect. I thought you were never coming."
So began a dream-like day to Peter. Julie was the centre of it. He followed her into shops, and paid for her purchases and carried her parcels: he climbed with her on to buses, which she said she preferred to taxis in the day-time; he listened to her talk, and he did his best to find out what she wanted and get just that for her. They lunched, at her request, at an old-fashioned, sober restaurant in Regent Street, that gave one the impression of eating luncheon in a Georgian dining-room, in some private house of great stolidity and decorum. When Julie had said that she wanted such a place Peter had been tickled to think how she would behave in it. But she speedily enlightened him. She drew off her gloves with an air. She did not laugh once. She did not chat to the waiter. She did not hurry in, nor demand the wine-list, nor call him Solomon. She did not commit one single Colonial solecism at table, as Peter had hated himself for half thinking that she might. Yet she never had looked prettier, he thought, and even there he caught glances which suggested that others might think so too. And if she talked less than usual, so did he, for his mind was very busy. In the old days it was almost just such a wife as Julie now that he would have wanted. But did he want the old days? Could he go back to them? Could he don the clerical frock coat and with it the clerical system and outlook of St. John"s? He knew, as he sat there, that not only he could not, but that he would not.
What, then? It was almost as if Julie suggested that the alternative was madcap days, such as that little scene in the bathroom suggested. He looked at her, and thought of it again, and smiled at the incongruity of it, there. But even as he smiled the cold whisper of dread insinuated itself again, small and slight as it was. Would such days fill his life?
Could they offer that which should seize on his heart, and hold it?
He roused himself with an effort of will, poured himself another gla.s.s of wine, and drank it down. The generous, full-bodied stuff warmed him, and he glanced at his wrist-watch. "I say," he said, "we shall be late, Julie, and I don"t want to miss one sc.r.a.p of this show. Have you finished? A little more wine?"
Julie was watching him, he thought, as he spoke, and she, too, seemed to him to make a little effort. "I will, Peter," she said, not at all as she had spoken there before--"a full gla.s.s too. One wants to be in a good mood for the Coliseum. Well, dear old thing, cheerio!"
Outside he demanded a taxi. "I must have it, Julie," he said. "I want to drive up, and have the old buffer in gold braid open the door for me.
Have a cigarette?"
She took one, and laughed as they settled into the car. "I know the feeling, my dear," she said. "And you want to stroll languidly up the red carpet, and pa.s.s by the pictures of chorus-girls as if you were so accustomed to the real thing that really the pictures were rather borin", don"t you know. And you want to make eyes at the programme-girl, and give a half-crown tip when they open the box, and take off your British warm in full view of the audience, and...."
"Kiss you," said Peter uproariously, suiting the action to the word.
"Good Lord, Julie, you"re a marvel! No more of those old restaurants for me. We dine at our hotel to-night, in the big public room near the band, and we drink champagne."
"And you put the cork in my stocking?" she queried, stretching out her foot.
He pushed his hand up her skirt and down to the warm place beneath the gay garter that she indicated, and he kissed her pa.s.sionately again. "It doesn"t matter now," he said. "I have more of you than that. Why, that"s nothing to me now, Julie. Oh, how I love you!"
She pushed him off, and s.n.a.t.c.hed her foot away also, laughing gaily. "I"m getting cheap, am I?" she said. "We"ll see. You"re going to have a d.a.m.ned rotten time in the theatre, my dear. Not another kiss, and I shall be as prim as a Quaker."
The car stopped. "You couldn"t," he laughed, helping her out. "And what is more, I shan"t let you be. I"ve got you, old darling, and I propose to keep you, what"s more." He took her arm resolutely. "Come along. We"re going to be confoundedly late."
Theirs was a snug little box, one of the new ones, placed as in a French theatre. The great place was nearly dark as they entered, except for the blaze of light that shone through the curtain. The odour of cigarette-smoke and scent greeted them, with the rustle of dresses and the subdued sound of gay talk. The band struck up. Then, after the rolling overture, the curtain ran swiftly up, and a smart young person tripped on the stage in the limelight and made great play of swinging petticoats.
Julie had no remembrance of her promised severity at any rate. She hummed airs, and sang choruses, and laughed, and was thrilled, exactly as she should have been, while the music and the panorama went on and wrapped them round with glamour, as it was meant to do. She cheered the patriotic pictures and Peter with her, till he felt no end of a fellow to be in uniform. The people in front of them glanced round amusedly now and again, and as like as not Julie would be discovered sitting there demurely, her child"s face all innocence, and a big chocolate held between her fingers at her mouth. Peter would lean back in his corner convulsed at her, and without moving a muscle of her face she would put her leg tip on his seat and push him. One scene they watched well back in their dark box, his arm round her waist. It was a little pathetic love-play and well done, and in the gloom he played with the curls at her ears and neck with his lips, and held her hand.
When it was over they went out with the crowd. The January day was done, but it was bewildering for all that to come out into real life. There was no romance for the moment on the stained street, and in the pa.s.sing traffic. The gold braid of the hall commissionaire looked tawdry, and the pictures of ballet-girls but vulgar. It is the common experience, but each time one feels it there is a new surprise. Julie had her own remedy:
"The liveliest tea-room you can find, Peter," she demanded.
"It will be hard to beat our own," said Peter.
"Well, away there, then; let"s get back to a band again, anyhow."
The great palm-lounge was full of people, and for a few minutes it did not seem as if they would find seats; but then Julie espied a half-empty table, and they made for it. It stood away back in a corner, with two wicker armchairs before it, and, behind, a stationary lounge against the wall overhung by a huge palm. The lounge was occupied. "We"ll get in there presently," whispered Peter, and they took the chairs, thankful in the crowded place to get seated at all.
"Oh, it was topping, Peter," said Julie. "I love a great place like that.
I almost wish we had had dress-circle seats or stalls out amongst the people. But I don"t know; that box was delicious. Did you see how that old fossil in front kept looking round? I made eyes at him once, deliberately--you know, like this," and she looked sideways at Peter with subtle invitation just hinted in her eyes. "I thought he would have apoplexy--I did, really."
"It"s a good thing I didn"t notice, Julie. Even now I should hate to see you look like that, say, at Donovan. You do it too well. Oh, here"s the tea. Praise the Lord! I"m dying for a cup. You can have all the cakes; I"ve smoked too much."
"Wouldn"t you prefer a whisky?"
"No, not now--afterwards. What"s that they"re playing?"
They listened, Julie seemingly intent, and Peter, who soon gave up the attempt to recognise the piece, glanced sideways at the couple on the lounge. They did not notice him. He took them both in and caught--he could not help it--a few words.
She was thirty-five, he guessed, slightly made-up, but handsome and full figured, a woman of whom any man might have been proud. He was an officer, in Major"s uniform, and he was smoking a cigarette impatiently and staring down the lounge. She, on the other hand, had her eyes fixed on him as if to read every expression on his face, which was heavy and sullen and mutinous.
"Is that final, then, George?" she said.
"I tell you I can"t help it; I promised I"d dine with Carstairs to-night."
A look swept across her face. Peter could not altogether read it. It was not merely anger, or pique, or disappointment; it certainly was not merely grief. There was all that in it, but there was more. And she said--he only just caught the sentence of any of their words, but there was the world of bitter meaning in it:
"Quite alone, I suppose? And there will be no necessity for me to sit up?"
"Peter," said Julie suddenly, "the tea"s cold. Take me upstairs, will you? we can have better sent up."
He turned to her in surprise, and then saw that she too had heard and seen.
"Right, dear," he said, "It is beastly stuff. I think, after all, I"d prefer a spot, and I believe you would too."
He rose carefully, not looking towards the lounge, like a man; and Julie got up too, glancing at that other couple with such an ordinary merely interested look that Peter smiled to himself to see it. They threaded their way in necessary silence through the tables and chairs to the doors, and said hardly a word in the lift. But in their sitting-room, cosy as ever, Julie turned to him in a pa.s.sion of emotion such as he had scarcely dreamed could exist even in her.
"Oh, you darling," she said, "pick me up, and sit me in that chair on your knee. Love me, Peter, love me as you"ve never loved me before. Hold me tight, tight, Peter hurt me, kiss me, love me, say you love me..." and she choked her own utterance, and buried her face on his shoulder, straining her body to his, twining her slim foot and leg round his ankle.
In a moment she was up again, however, and glanced at the clock. "Peter, we must dress early and dine early, mustn"t we? The thing begins at seven-forty-five. Now I know what we"ll do. First, give me a drink, a long one, Solomon, and take one yourself. Thanks. That"ll do. Here"s the best.... Oh, that"s good, Peter. Can"t you feel it running through you and electrifying you? Now, come"--she seized him by the arm--"come on! I"ll tell you what you"ve got to do."
Smiling, though a little astonished at this outburst, Peter allowed himself to be pulled into the bedroom. She sat down on the bed and pushed out a foot. "Take it off, you darling, while I take down my hair," she said.
He knelt and undid the laces and took off the brown shoes one by one, feeling her little foot through the silk as he did so. Then he looked up.
She had pulled out a comb or two, and her hair was hanging down. With swift fingers she finished her work, and was waiting for him. He caught her in his arms, and she buried her face again. "Oh, Peter, love me, love me! Undress me, will you? I want you to. Play with me, own me, Peter.
See, I am yours, yours, Peter, all yours. Am I worth having, Peter? Do you want more than me?" And she flung herself back on the bed in her disorder, the little ribbons heaving at her breast, her eyes afire, her cheeks aflame.
"Well," said Peter, an hour or two later, "we"ve got to get this dinner through as quickly as we"ve ever eaten anything. You"ll have to digest like one of your South African ostriches. I say," he said to the waitress in a confidential tone and with a smile, "do you think you can get us stuff in ten minutes all told? We"re late as it is, and we"ll miss half the theatre else."
"It depends what you order," said the girl, rather sharply. Then, after a glance at them both: "See, if you"ll have what I say, I"ll get you through quick. I know what"s on easiest. Do you mind?"
"The very thing," said Peter; "and send the wine-man over on your way, will you? How will that do?" he added to Julie.