The Crowded Street

by Winifred Holtby

XV

It had all happened so quickly that Muriel found no time to readjust her thoughts to the hurried sequence of events, Delia's engagement, Connie's queerness about it, and the invitation to tea at the Vicarage.

"Go by all means," Connie had said. It was a wet day, and she could not even play golf, and nobody had asked her out, and she was bored. "If you like to be patronized all over about this Twentieth Century Reform League, or whatever it is that Delia runs, go by all means. But don't expect me."

"Didn't Mrs. Cartwright say that he was quite a distinguished man?" Mrs. Hammond murmured dreamily. It was hard that Delia should not only have defied Marshington, but have defied it with success, moving steadily from college to a secretaryship in London, and from this to the organization of the Twentieth Century Reform League. Mrs. Hammond could not approve of the Reform League, but she had to admit that the list of Vice-Presidents impressed her. And now, here was this Martin Elliott added to Delia's triumphal procession through life. She sighed, aware that she had never thought before of Delia with such toleration. The girl might be unpleasant, but she was not negligible. Perhaps Muriel had been wise to maintain with her that queer, half wistful, half antagonistic friendship.

"His book, Prosperity and Population, is supposed to have revolutionized sociology," said Muriel.

"The warden of a slum settlement," Connie sneered. "She's welcome to him. Still, it's surprising really that she's caught anything. She must be over thirty, and that skinny figure of hers and then all those stories about her being a suffragette, and going to prison. It's just the kind of thing that all nice men hate."

So Connie, in spite of Mrs. Hammond's protests, had refused Delia's half-smiling invitation to meet Mr. Elliott at tea at the Vicarage, and Muriel found herself walking down the road alone. She felt strangely excited, because of the absurd though insistent feeling that there existed between her and Delia some tie. It was as though Delia in her London office, looking up from the work which her brilliant, courageous mind directed, might think of Muriel in Marshington, living her drab ineffectual life among tea-parties, and nursing accounts and faded dreams, and might say to herself, "There, but for the grace of God, goes Delia Vaughan." Most successful people, thought Muriel sadly, have a shadow somewhere, a personality sharing their desires, and even part of their ability, but without just the one quality that makes success.

"All the same, I was right," she told herself fiercely. "I had to look after Mother. I had no choice. It was not my fault, but theirs. People don't choose."

She stopped to unfasten the bars of the big Vicarage gate. It had been wet all day, and the garden was musical with the manifold noises of the rain, of the murmuring runnels through the clean washed pebbles of the drive, of the ceaseless rustle of water in the branches. All the spring garden sang with youth and promise. The crocus chalices had overflowed. Here and there the wind had overturned their brimming cups, showering their burden to the grass below, in a mystical communion of earth and rain.

Muriel stood by the gate, listening and looking. As though this were the last hour that she would look on beauty, she opened her heart eagerly to scent and sound and colour. The deep significance of the spring oppressed her. Beyond the sodden trees, a firelit window glowed like a jewel of warm liquid light. Undoubtedly that was where Delia now sat with her lover.

Muriel had no part in the silent movement of nature's slow regeneration. Delia, who had striven in the artificial world of books and men and jangling rules of government, was now to be akin to wind and water, obedient to an older law than man's. She had won the best from both worlds, because she had been selfish. Wise, fortunate, beloved Delia! Was there no justice in life's scheme of things?

Muriel, who had neither success nor love, nor any great emotion, moved forward slowly, a small grey figure beneath the dripping trees.

Delia opened the door for her.

"Did you get wet? You must be washed away." She was a new creature, thought Muriel, gentler, saner, with an indefinable bloom of happiness that lent to her real charm. "If I had known that you were going to walk, I should have told that idle creature Godfrey Neale to call for you with his car."

"Father does not like us to use our car when it's wet. I did not know that Godfrey Neale was coming." She had not met him since that dance in Kingsport when the girl had laughed. She did not want to meet him now, when she had intended to forget everything except her sympathy with Delia's happiness.

They entered the comfortable, book-lined room, splashed with liquid firelight. The chairs and tables and people seemed to float as in a fiery sea. She could see nothing clearly until Delia followed her with a lamp.

"Father, Martin, Miss Hammond. Muriel, this is Martin. Godfrey Neale you know."

The room seemed to be full of books, tea-cups, and men. Mr. Vaughan smiled blandly through his spectacles. Godfrey rose and bowed beautifully. Then Muriel found herself shaking hands with Martin Elliott.

He was not at all as she had expected him to be, ironic, lean and scholarly. She stared openly at the short, stocky man, dressed like the shabbier kind of farmer, and smiling at her from a broad humorous face. His untidy hair stood up on end, his tie was crooked, giving a curious effect below his unexpectedly pugnacious mouth and chin, so that he always looked as though he had just emerged from a street row, which indeed, more frequently than most people, he had. Altogether the effect of him was so surprising that Muriel forgot her manners.

He bore her scrutiny for a moment. Then he turned to Delia.

"Delia, she doesn't like me. She doesn't like me a bit."

"I'm not surprised. You look like a perfect hooligan. Have you been arguing with Father again? Muriel, don't mind them. Clear some books off that seat and sit down."

"But I do like him," exploded Muriel, not sitting down, because she found nowhere to sit, except a pile of formidable looking volumes crowned by an ink-pot.

"Delia, you are a shocking hostess," remarked the vicar mildly, handing Muriel his own plate and a half-eaten scone with the well-intentioned vagueness that characterized his dealings with all such mundane objects as tea-things and collar-studs.

"Sorry, Muriel. It's all right, Father." Delia quietly transferred the scone to its rightful owner, cleared a seat for Muriel and passed her a clean plate. "Muriel's used to me. I scandalized her years ago, when I told her that she was wasted in Marshington, and she came prepared for an uncomfortable afternoon."

"My dear, how arrogant of you to say such things to Miss Hammond," reproved the vicar, stirring his tea absently. "That's so like all these strenuous young people who call themselves reformers, isn't it, Neale? They think all activity except their own a waste of time. They forget that if every one thought as they did, they would be out of work."

"Think, think!" cried Delia, laughing. "We don't expect them to think at all. That would be hoping for too much."

"Delia wants to teach people so many things," continued the vicar calmly. "She is certain that human nature can be rendered perfectible by parliamentary institutions. I am an old man. And I have written three standard textbooks upon parliamentary institutions. And I should hesitate to put into the minds of my parishioners anything but some simple and final expression of wisdom like the Gospels."

"Of course you are right as far as you go, sir," broke in Martin Elliott, obviously resuming some hot but interrupted argument. "My contention was simply that in a district like the Brady Street area in Bethnal Green people cannot understand the Gospels; and in a case like that to sell all that you have and give it to the poor simply is unsound economics. Don't you agree with me, Neale?"

"I'm afraid it's not much in my line." Godfrey was sitting upright in his chair, glowering a little, as he always did if the conversation passed beyond his sphere of interest.

"Muriel is the person to argue with on economics—and on morals," interposed Delia. "Try her, Martin. She has the mind of a mathematician. She ought to have been on the staff of the Statistician instead of giving sewing-classes in Marshington."

Martin Elliott crossed to Muriel's side. "How much am I to take seriously from that madwoman? Do you really take sewing-classes? I think that must be rather interesting, because all teaching is rather fun, I think, don't you? If only one's pupils are kind to one; but sewing must be more satisfactory than most things, because you can actually see the work growing under your fingers."

"I know what you mean. But I don't really do much sewing."

"You read then?"

"Not much now. I used to, but the books in the Kingsport libraries are all so much alike, and one gets out of the way of ordering other things."

She spoke diffidently. It was incredible that a man should really want to talk to her about herself. Men talked about motors, or their own insides, or hunting.

Martin Elliott smiled at her. "Have you found that too? Don't you think about the books in most circulating libraries that they are nearly all the wrong way round. Short stories with happy endings and long stories with sad ones. Quite wrong."

"Why that?"

"Ah, surely the short story should end with tragedy, for only sorrow swoops upon you with a sudden blow. But happiness is built up from long years of small delightful things. You can't put them into a short story."

It was true. Muriel looked across at Delia sitting by the tea-table in her red dress. She thought, "This is what he means. Years of sitting by Delia in a firelit room full of books and talking pleasant nonsense. Friends who know what you mean and speak your own language. Rain-washed gardens when the birds call. Work that's fine and hard and reaches somewhere. Marriage, such as theirs will be. Children, perhaps, and laughter that they share. You can't put all those into a short story."

She felt cold and dull, shut out from a world of small delightful things. She made no answer, sitting with her chin on her hand, while the talk flowed round her, talk of books, and socialism, and plays, and people that they knew, and what you ought to take on a walking tour, and whether Sir Rabindranath Tagore should have won the Nobel prize, and school care committees. (They weren't really any use, Mr. Vaughan said.) And all the time she felt herself being drawn to Martin Elliott by surprised delight. She was at home at last, among people who spoke her own language, even though the things of which they spoke were strange. She felt as though after many years she had returned to her own country. But she never spoke.

Then she became aware that her thoughts had slipped away from the conversation altogether, and that Delia was teasing Godfrey, and that he was protesting, half uncomfortable, half amused, because he could never become really angry with the vicar's daughter.

"Now, look here, D—Delia. That's not true."

An impish spirit had seized upon Delia.

"Oh, yes, it is, isn't it, Muriel? Godfrey's never yet proposed to any girl because he knows that he'd be accepted, and if he had to marry that would upset his habits. Godfrey dear, you don't realize how much you hate to be upset."

"You know t—that's untrue."

"No, no, no. You're afraid that you won't be able to afford both a wife and hunters, and you prefer the hunters. Martin, Godfrey is one of those people who pretend to cultivate the earth in order that they may destroy its creatures. He is that odious relic of barbarism, a sporting farmer."

"I—I'm not a farmer," stammered Godfrey.

It was a shame, thought Muriel. Delia had no right to tease him so. How he must hate being chaffed in front of her.

"Then if you aren't a farmer, you are simply a social parasite, and your existence would not be tolerated in any ordinary, sane society. Oh, I don't mean that you aren't very much tolerated to-day, because this society is neither ordinary nor sane. But when Martin and I and the Twentieth Century Reform League have been at work for a score of years or so, say seventy-five . . ."

She rattled on, foolishly, happily, teasing him with the kindest smile in the world on her thin face. But Godfrey was not happy. His sense of humour had become atrophied from want of use. He did not understand Delia's fooling, and to him the incomprehensible was the unpleasant. He passed from boredom to indignation, and yet felt too much his old debt of friendship to show indignation before Delia's lover. He was not going to have the fellow think him jealous.

Muriel watched him and, as she watched, she too grew indignant with Delia. It was unlike the vicar's daughter to go so far, but she had always said that Godfrey needed teasing. All the same, it wasn't fair. She took him at a disadvantage, and he really hated it. Muriel leaned forward, quiet but resourceful.

"Delia," she interposed unexpectedly, "I do wish you'd tell me, for we hear nothing up here, what do they really think in London about the Irish Question?"

Now Godfrey really did know something about the Irish Question. He had once been asked to stand as the Conservative member for the Leame Valley Division, and although he had rejected the offer, as he always rejected the unknown at this time, yet a faintly political flavour still clung to his mental palate.

He drew a deep breath, like a diver emerging from the sea, then, slowly, with solemnity, he began to contradict Delia's picturesque but unorthodox opinion on the Irish Question.

Not, however, until he was seated again in his small covered car driving back to the Weare Grange did he recover his usual composure. Muriel had been tucked in at his side by Delia, to be dropped at the gates of Miller's Rise. The familiar feel of brakes and wheel, and the smooth running of the little car, reminded Godfrey that there was a sane and ordinary world in which to live. He sighed comfortably.

"I don't think that that fellow Elliott has improved Delia much. She tries to show off a bit, I think."

"Oh, no. It isn't that. She's just happy, and when Delia's happy she talks nonsense."

"All very well for her to be happy at other people's expense," Godfrey grumbled. He was enjoying himself now. The car responded to his touch, and the Hammond girl responded to his mood. The world was all right.

"Oh, I know that she teases. But one doesn't mind, because you know all the time what a splendid person she is. I do hope that Mr. Elliott will make her happy. But I think that he will."

Godfrey liked girls who stuck up for one another. She had her wits about her too, the little mouse of a thing. The Irish Question! He had given Delia as good as she gave about the Irish Question. Delia was a clever woman, but when women got on to politics it just showed. Now Muriel Hammond showed her good sense by keeping quiet when there was a subject which she did not understand. On the whole, he liked quiet girls. Besides, there was another reason why he should feel rather tenderly towards Muriel Hammond.

"You've not been to see us for a long time," he said.

"No. It is a long time," said Muriel dreamily, thinking of Martin Elliott, and what life might be like, if one could meet such men as he. "Not since that time Clare stayed with us, and Connie tried to ride your horse, and it ran away with her."

"No." The car jerked forward under Godfrey's hands. He did remember, ah, how he remembered, the turn of her head, the laughter in her eyes, her clear, triumphant voice. "Yes. I remember, of course. Clare Duquesne." He liked to say her name again. "By Jove, what years ago, and what kids we were!" He turned the car carefully in to the winding, elm-shadowed drive of Miller's Rise. "Do you ever hear from her now, at all?"

"No. I haven't heard for years. She married, you know. A Spaniard. They went to live in South America. I have not heard since, but I should think that the life there would suit her. She loved warmth and sunshine and gaiety. He was rich, I believe, and musical too. I don't know much more, but I should think that she would be happy. You somehow can't imagine Clare unhappy."

"No. You can't." He was bringing the car to the circle of gravel before the door. She could not see his face, but something told her that he had been profoundly moved. She became immensely sorry for him and yet glad that he had loved Clare, glad that he had not forgotten. His faithfulness belonged to her romantic dreams of him, when she had been a child, and had worshipped with the rest of Marshington. "If by any chance you should see her again, or be writing," he said very slowly, trying to control his stammer, "you might remember me to her, and say that I—I hope that she's very happy."

The car had stopped before the pillars of the porch. Muriel unwrapped herself from the rugs.

"If I ever am writing, I will," she said. "Thank you for the ride. The car runs beautifully."

"Yes, she's not a bad old perambulator, is she? Are you keen on cars? Would you care to come out for a spin in her in better weather?"

"Thank you. I should like it very much."

It was the first time that a man had asked her to come for a ride in his car. She felt the occasion to be immense.

As they shook hands in the rain, he held her small glove for just the fraction of an inch longer than was necessary. She forgot to ask if he would care to come inside.

"Good-bye, and thank you."

"So long, and we must fix up a day for a run, a fine day."

She passed into the house.

"Well, dear," said Mrs. Hammond, "did you have a nice party?"

"Yes."

"You're back early, aren't you? Did I hear a car just now?"

"Yes. Godfrey Neale brought me back."

"Oh." Mrs. Hammond smiled. She was tired, and the day had been difficult for many reasons. Muriel knew this. She felt the passion of admiring pity for her mother, which was always her strongest emotion over any person.

"He has asked me to go for a ride in his new car, some day soon," she remarked indifferently.

Mrs. Hammond threaded the needle that she was holding.

"Well, dear, that will be nice, won't it?" was all that she said, but as Muriel turned to leave the room she looked at her, and for a moment they waited, smiling a little at each other.