3
Thrale’s estimate proved excessive. They reached Richmond on the fourth day out from Marlow, having opened another nine weirs—the one at Old Windsor had been swept away, and the one below Richmond Bridge Thrale opened that afternoon.
During those four days they had seen few signs of life. They had moved, keeping to the main stream for the most part, in the midst of a wide expanse of water; exploring a desolate and wasted country.
Once they had been hailed by three women, who looked out at them from a house in Windsor, and shouted something they did not catch; and a woman had been standing on Staines Bridge as they careered intrepidly through the centre arch—they had no time even to distinguish her dress. But with these exceptions they might have come through the land of an extinct civilization, devoid of life; a land in which deserted houses and church towers stood up from the silver sheet of a vast lake, that was threaded by this one impetuous torrent of swelling river.
Richmond, also, was deserted. The emigrants had passed on over the river or southwards to Petersham and so into Surrey.
“Well!” said Eileen, wiping her oil-blackened hands on a bunch of cotton waste, “that job’s done. We’ve fairly drawn the plug of the cistern now. And how are we going to get back?”
“We’ll find a couple of bicycles somewhere here,” said Thrale.
It had been a clear day, and there was a suggestion of frost in the air. The sun was setting very red and full behind the bare trees across the river. Save for the gurgle and hiss of the eddying flood, everything was very still. The little launch which had served them so well, and bore the marks of its great adventure in broken rails and bruised sides, was run aground by the side of the bridge. Thrale was standing in the road, but Eileen still sat by her engine.
“I hate to leave the launch,” she said, after a long pause.
“We can come back and fetch her up when the flood goes down,” returned Thrale.
“We’ve done pretty well, the three of us.”
“Yes, the three of us,” he echoed.
“It has been great fun,” sighed Eileen.
Thrale did not reply. He was thinking himself back into the past. He saw a street in Melbourne on a burning December evening, and the figure of a gaily-clad little brunette who spoke purest cockney and asked him why he looked so glum. “We ain’t goin’ to a funeral,” she had said. Yet afterwards he had believed that something had been buried that night. He had faced his own passion and the sight of it had disgusted him. He had seen the shadow of a demon who might master him, and he had grappled with it; he believed that he had slain and buried lust in Melbourne ten years ago. It had not risen up to confront him when the plague had put a world of women at his command. He had not been forced to fight, he was not tempted—surely the thing was dead and buried. Only once, on that warm September night, had he felt a sudden furious desire to take this girl into his arms and fly with her into the woods. The desire had come and gone, he was master of it, and in any case it bore no resemblance to the brutal thing he had faced in Melbourne.
Nor, as he stood now by Richmond Bridge watching the vault of the sky deepen to an intenser blue, did the feeling that possessed him in any way resemble that old cruel passion which had flared up and died—surely it had died. He could not analyse his feeling for this brave, clear-eyed companion, who had faced with him all the dangers of the past four days without a sign of fear. She had made no advances to him, they were friends, she might have been some delightfully clean, wholesome boy. And then his thought was pierced and broken by a horrible suggestion.
A picture of the hill to Handy Cross flashed before him, and he saw a little lonely figure creeping furtively away from Marlow. He drove his nails into his palms and suddenly cried out.
“What’s up?” said Eileen, turning round and looking up at him. “Have you forgotten anything?”
He stepped into the boat and sat down beside her. “I want to know—I must know,” he said.
She looked at him and smiled. “All right, old man,” she said. “Fire away.”
“I told you once that I was frightened of you,” said Thrale. “I want to know if you have ever been frightened of yourself—or of me?”
“I could never be frightened of you,” she replied, and looked away towards the rising darkness of the shadows across the hurrying river, “and I haven’t been afraid of myself—yet. I don’t think——”
“Wouldn’t you be frightened of me if I picked you up and ran shouting into the woods?” he asked, fiercely.
Her eyes met his without reserve. “Dear old man,” she said. “I should love it. I’m so glad you understand. That was the one thing that prevented our being real friends. I’ve wanted so much to be frank and open with you. It’s all these silly reserves that make love abominable. Now we can be two jolly, clean human beings who understand each other, can’t we? And we shall be such ripping good friends always; quite open and honest with each other.”
He drew a deep, sighing breath and put his arms round her, drew her close to him and laid his face against hers. “I’ve been such an awful ass,” he said. “I’ve always thought that love was unclean. I’ve been like that Jenkyn woman. I’ve been prurient and suspicious and evil-minded. I’ve been like the people who cover up statues. But there was an excuse for me—and for them, too. I didn’t know, because there was no woman like you to teach me. All the women I’ve known have been secretive and sly. They’ve fouled love for me by making it seem a hidden, disreputable thing. Oh! we shall be ripping good friends, little Eileen—magnificent friends.”
“This is a jolly old boat, isn’t it?” replied Eileen, inconsequently. “Don’t smother me, old man. And, I say, do you think we’ll be able to raid some soap from somewhere? Do look at my hands! You couldn’t be friends with a chap who had hands like that!” ...
“There’s one thing I’d like to remark,” said Eileen the next morning. There had been a frost in the night, and there was every promise of an easy ride back to Marlow.
“Yes?” said Thrale, examining the deflated tyres of two bicycles they had chosen from a shop in the High Street.
“We’d never have understood each other so well if we hadn’t worked together on the same job,” said Eileen.
“Well, of course not,” returned Thrale. His tone seemed to imply that she had stated a truth that must always have been obvious to sensible people.
“That and there being no footle about marriage,” concluded Eileen.