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Authors: Elswyth Thane
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her,” Virginia prophesied gloomily. “And she doesn’t even think he’s funny. I think Oliver is awfully funny, don’t you, Phoebe?” she asked suddenly of the silent figure beside her. “I saw you two laughing together like anything.”
“Yes, he—said some very funny things, I thought,” Phoebe agreed hastily, while the green world beyond the dog-cart tipped and spun before her eyes and she felt something beating in the roof of her mouth which seemed to be her heart. Oliver had put his silly head into the noose. Oliver was engaged to be married. But so am I, Phoebe told herself as though reassuring a small, whimpering child. So am I engaged—to Miles.
3
B EFORE nightfall Oliver was inclined to regret his hasty offer of a horse and the anemones, for he found he could think of nothing else but seeing Virginia’s American cousin again, and he was forced to remind himself that there was no sense in that, because of Maia.
It was a new sensation to Oliver, who had always been a free soul, to have to remember Maia.
Like everybody else, except possibly Maia herself, he was still uncertain exactly how it had happened, though he hated to admit that even to himself. He had been confined to his rooms in London by bad weather and his wound, and Clare insisted that he needed cheering up and would be better off in her Belgrave Square establishment. His batman, on whom he depended for everything, had had a bad go of fever and was able only to creep about to do for them both, and needed a bit of leave himself. Under Clare’s persuasion, Oliver arranged for Simmons to go to his own people near Oxford for a month and allowed himself to be transplanted, bag and baggage, to Clare’s luxurious household, until he should be well enough to leave London and enjoy a bit of air and mild exercise at the Hall.
He had been given his own sitting-room in Clare’s house, and he got very dull in it, keeping rather quiet because of the unhealed hole in his back, playing patience and reading himself blue by choosing all the wrong sort of books. Maia had been a diversion. She was easy to look at, she brought him grapes and gossip, and she poured out his afternoon tea and plumped up his tired pillows and didn’t seem to mind that he was seedy and low in his spirits. Having had very little experience of being ill, Oliver was impressed at how pleasant a woman’s ministrations can be. One day he kissed Maia’s hand as she did him some trifling service, and was not rebuked. The next day when she came her eyes were expectant, and it was raining outside and cosy inside, and life was beginning to flow back into him, and still he was tied to his invalid routine and the doctors wouldn’t let him off the lead—he was bored—she was kind—he was grateful—she was clever, passing so close to his chair as she moved about the room that her soft skirts dragged across his feet, bending above him so that her perfume reached his nostrils, offering his teacup with lingering, manicured hands—sympathetic, entertaining, preferring his company to gayersurroundings—he said too much—she was too willing—there was no retreat.
After she had gone he sat a while alone in the dusky room, bidding good-bye to certain cherished aspects of his existence—contemplating the possibilities of the new life ahead. He suspected within twenty-four hours that he had made a mistake, and promised himself that no one else would ever suspect, least of all Maia. He had always maintained that you could make a life with whatever you had, if you tried. He would have an attractive wife, with money of her own, who knew how to be a pleasant companion and who would be a suitable mother to the children he would like to have before he got much older. What more could a man ask, he would demand of himself in his solitude. The rapture and agony and intricacies of falling wildly in love? That was for people in novels. Besides, he was getting on for that sort of thing—thirty next
“Yes, he—said some very funny things, I thought,” Phoebe agreed hastily, while the green world beyond the dog-cart tipped and spun before her eyes and she felt something beating in the roof of her mouth which seemed to be her heart. Oliver had put his silly head into the noose. Oliver was engaged to be married. But so am I, Phoebe told herself as though reassuring a small, whimpering child. So am I engaged—to Miles.
3
B EFORE nightfall Oliver was inclined to regret his hasty offer of a horse and the anemones, for he found he could think of nothing else but seeing Virginia’s American cousin again, and he was forced to remind himself that there was no sense in that, because of Maia.
It was a new sensation to Oliver, who had always been a free soul, to have to remember Maia.
Like everybody else, except possibly Maia herself, he was still uncertain exactly how it had happened, though he hated to admit that even to himself. He had been confined to his rooms in London by bad weather and his wound, and Clare insisted that he needed cheering up and would be better off in her Belgrave Square establishment. His batman, on whom he depended for everything, had had a bad go of fever and was able only to creep about to do for them both, and needed a bit of leave himself. Under Clare’s persuasion, Oliver arranged for Simmons to go to his own people near Oxford for a month and allowed himself to be transplanted, bag and baggage, to Clare’s luxurious household, until he should be well enough to leave London and enjoy a bit of air and mild exercise at the Hall.
He had been given his own sitting-room in Clare’s house, and he got very dull in it, keeping rather quiet because of the unhealed hole in his back, playing patience and reading himself blue by choosing all the wrong sort of books. Maia had been a diversion. She was easy to look at, she brought him grapes and gossip, and she poured out his afternoon tea and plumped up his tired pillows and didn’t seem to mind that he was seedy and low in his spirits. Having had very little experience of being ill, Oliver was impressed at how pleasant a woman’s ministrations can be. One day he kissed Maia’s hand as she did him some trifling service, and was not rebuked. The next day when she came her eyes were expectant, and it was raining outside and cosy inside, and life was beginning to flow back into him, and still he was tied to his invalid routine and the doctors wouldn’t let him off the lead—he was bored—she was kind—he was grateful—she was clever, passing so close to his chair as she moved about the room that her soft skirts dragged across his feet, bending above him so that her perfume reached his nostrils, offering his teacup with lingering, manicured hands—sympathetic, entertaining, preferring his company to gayersurroundings—he said too much—she was too willing—there was no retreat.
After she had gone he sat a while alone in the dusky room, bidding good-bye to certain cherished aspects of his existence—contemplating the possibilities of the new life ahead. He suspected within twenty-four hours that he had made a mistake, and promised himself that no one else would ever suspect, least of all Maia. He had always maintained that you could make a life with whatever you had, if you tried. He would have an attractive wife, with money of her own, who knew how to be a pleasant companion and who would be a suitable mother to the children he would like to have before he got much older. What more could a man ask, he would demand of himself in his solitude. The rapture and agony and intricacies of falling wildly in love? That was for people in novels. Besides, he was getting on for that sort of thing—thirty next
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