XXXII
News of the war kept coming; better and better news. The Germans were falling back now, all along the line. The German Front was breaking, the Allied troops were pressing forward everywhere. Bulgaria made peace, then Austria. President Wilson and the German Government were exchanging notes on peace.
‘It will end now very soon . . . any week . . . any day. . . Germany is beaten. . . . The war is won now. . .’ people said.
And then, on October 11th, Hugo was ‘wounded and missing.’
I read his name in the Casualty List, in the morning, at breakfast:
‘Hugo John Laurier, Second Rifle Brigade.’
Wounded and missing . . . wounded and missing . . . wounded and missing . . .
I thought:
‘It is not true . . . it is quite impossible . . .’
I thought:
‘It is quite certain that there must be a mistake . . .’
I thought:
‘. . . But the war is over now . . . so nearly over . . . that could not happen now . . .’
I stared at the words till my eyes ached. They seemed to grow larger and darker than the other words on the page.
I had not expected it.
Walter said:
‘Is there any news?’
And I said:
‘Yes . . . there is something . . . about the Americans . . . they have been fighting somewhere, I think.’
Walter said:
‘That is not important, what about the German retreat??’
I turned over the pages of the newspaper, and began to read aloud. My voice sounded to myself very odd, and remote, and unnatural, but Walter did not notice it.
I read that the German Front was breaking, that Allied troops were pressing forward at all points. I could not tell if the words I read made sense, but he seemed satisfied.
I could not tell him about Hugo. He did not care for Hugo enough.
After breakfast, I bathed the baby, and took the little girls for their walk. The morning passed so uneventfully, in so ordinary a way, that I thought again:
‘That could not have been true!’
When they were in bed for their midday rest I took the paper up again and looked, and it was there:
‘Hugo John Laurier, Second Rifle Brigade . . .’
And I turned all cold . . . cold like a stone . . . and I thought:
‘I must see Guy . . . I must see Guy at once . . .’
I could not go out yet, not till the afternoon; then I went upstairs and put on my hat and coat; then I went out and along to the tube station, and got into the tube. I changed at Leicester Square, and got into another tube, and that went very fast, and I got to Dover Street. Then I got out and walked into Park Lane, and along Park Lane to the hospital where Guy was. It was not the time for visitors, not for another hour, the nurse told me so at the door, but I said it was important, I said it was bad news. She looked at me hard, oddly I thought too, and then she told me to wait. She went away and came back, and then she told me to go upstairs. I knew my way to Guy well enough by this time, and I walked up the stairs, wondering what to do.
Diana met me at the top of the stairs. She smiled her flashing smile.
‘Hulloa,’ she said, ‘what a funny time to come!’
I said:
‘Has Guy seen the paper yet, this morning’s paper I mean?’
And she said:
‘I don’t know; I don’t think he has yet to-day.’
I said:
‘His brother is missing . . . it is in the paper to-day. . .’
She said:
‘I say! . . . how rotten! . . . how absolutely rotten!’
The smile died from her face.
‘Poor old chap,’ she said, ‘he’ll be awfully cut up! He thought no end of his brother . . . must have been jolly decent,’ she said, and then: ‘I suppose you knew him too?’
I said:
‘Yes, I did know him.’
She said:
‘Was he like Guy?’
I said:
‘No, different from Guy.’
And then I sat down on the stairs . . . and the whole place seemed to swim . . . the stairs and the banisters . . . and the doors of the rooms in the passage . . . bright mahogany doors with panels that shone like glass . . . and she said:
‘I say, what’s up? I say, you do look rotten!’
And she stared at me, perplexed.
Then she said:
‘I’ll get you some tea . . . that’ll buck you up no end!’
She said:
‘Come on to my room, I’ve got a decent chair.’
I said:
‘I’d rather stay here, thank you. I’m going away in a minute.’
She said:
‘Aren’t you going to see Guy?’
I said:
‘You had better tell him. I don’t think I can.’
I said:
‘His mother will be coming. She is sure to come and see Guy.’
Diana gave a whistle.
‘Lord! There will be an upset! . . . Our wedding’ll be put off . . . if Guy’s brother’s killed . . . sure to be, don’t you think?’
I said good-bye to Diana.
She gave me a cup of tea.
I thought:
‘I must go to Yearsly, to Cousin Delia now. . . .’
I got into a bus in Piccadilly, and off it at Waterloo. I walked up the long sloping entrance, under the bridge.
The station was very big and full of people. The wide arch of the roof seemed bigger than usual, higher, and further off. It seemed very full of smoke and noise.
I went to the booking-office where we always went for our tickets, but it was shut.
I thought:
‘There is no train . . . I cannot go to Yearsly . . .’
I came out again from the booking-office, to the open space of the station.
There were lights in the station, and people shouting; a porter was shouting at me; then he knocked me with a barrow, and hurt my knee.
I thought:
‘It is no use going . . . why should I go to her? She has Cousin John . . . and the people . . . and the garden . . . and the trees . . . everything there will be sorry . . . everything there loved Hugo . . . what use could I be to her . . . or she to me?’
I thought:
‘It is beyond that . . . beyond being good at all. . . .’
And I turned and went out of the station, and down the long sloping road, and under the bridge again. And there was the noise of the traffic, of trams, and buses, and cars, and people thick all round me, and shops, and the smell of fish . . . and there was mud in the street, and the pavement too was muddy. . . . The shops gleamed darkly through the chinks of the shutters, and the people jostled and bustled round me, about the shops.
I thought:
‘I must get away . . . I cannot bear these people . . .’
It was beginning to rain now. I turned down a side street, away from the crowd and the noise. The rain beat against my face, cold, steady October rain. I thought of the open country, in France, as I had seen it in pictures. Shell holes half full of water, distorted piles of wire, stunted remnants of trees . . . and the cold rain beating down. . . .
I walked on, faster and faster; I was almost running now. I knocked into some one . . . a policeman . . . I begged his pardon and hurried on. I felt that I must get away, by myself, alone, and the longing for this, superseded everything else. But there was nowhere to go . . . only houses, and streets, and people . . . and at home, there was no room where I could be alone.
I began to be out of breath. I stood still. My skirt was all wet now, it clung about my knees. I leaned with my hand against a lamp post. There was a seat beside it, and I sat down. I bent down in the shadow, and covered my eyes; and still I could not think. The rain beat down on the nape of my neck. It trickled down my back under the collar of my coat . . . and then, I was calling Hugo. . . . I called to him through the rain and the darkness, across the expanse of sea and land. . . . I stretched out my hands to him, and called again, and I felt that he must hear me, if he was anywhere. Was he somewhere lying alone, deserted, and wounded? I pressed my hands against my eyes, trying to see in the dark, to force myself to see, to hear his voice, answering me through the emptiness of the night. But I saw and heard nothing. Only whirligigs of light, as my fingers pressed against my eyeballs, and the splashing sound of rain on the pavement and in the puddles, and it was very cold.
I got up again from the seat, and turned to go home. I had come much farther than I knew, and it took a long time to find the way.
When I got home, Walter opened the door. There was light behind him in the hall, and I saw him black against the light.
He said:
‘Where in the world have you been? I waited an hour for dinner!’
The rain dripped off from my clothes, in a pool, on the step where I stood. I saw it dark, like a blot, growing bigger, in the light from the door.
I said:
‘Hugo is missing. You didn’t know, I think.’
Walter stood very still; then he pulled me into the hall.
‘When did you hear?’ he asked. ‘How do you know?’
I said:
‘This morning, at breakfast. It was in The Times, you know.’
He said:
‘You never told me! Why didn’t you tell me then?’
I said:
‘I couldn’t tell you. It was too bad for that.’
We stood and looked at each other.
I thought:
‘He doesn’t care . . .’
He put out his hands towards me and drew me close to him.
‘My poor dear Helen,’ he said. ‘Oh, my poor dear!’