Introduction to Sally

by Elizabeth Von Arnim

And leading him carefully out, Sally thought, ‘Poor old gentleman,’ and minded nothing at all that he said. Her hair, her eyes, all that Oh my ain’t you beautiful business, of which she was otherwise both sick and afraid, didn’t matter in him she called the Jewk. He was just a poor old gentleman, an ancient and practically helpless baby, towards whom she felt like a compassionate mother; and when he said, sitting in the sunny sheltered seat she had lowered him on to and taking her hand and looking at her with his watery old eyes, that he was going to give her Crippenham, and that the only condition he made was that he might come and do a rest-cure there rather often, she smiled and nodded as sweetly and kindly as she smiled and nodded at everything else he said.

Like the croonings of a baby were the utterances of the Duke in Sally’s ears; no more meaning in them, no more weight to be attached to them, than that. Give her Crippenham? Poor old gentleman. Didn’t know what he was talking about any more, poor old dear. She humoured him; she patted his arm; and she wished to goodness Laura would be quick and come and take her to her husband.

Sally now longed to get to Jocelyn as much as if she had passionately loved him. He was her husband. He was the father of the little baby. Her place was with him. She had had enough of this fleshpot business. She was homesick for the things she knew,—plain things, simple things, duties she understood. Kind, yes; kind as kind, the picks were, and they meant well; but she had had enough. It wasn’t right it wasn’t, at least it wasn’t right for her, to live so fat. What would her father have said if he had seen her in the night in Laura’s bedroom, among all that lot of silver bottles and brushes and laces and silks, and herself in a thin silk nightgown the colour of skin, making her look stark naked? What would he have said if he had seen her having her breakfast up there as though she were ill,—and such a breakfast, too! Fleshpots, he’d have said; fleshpots. And he would have said, Sally, strong if inaccurate in her Bible, was sure, that she had sold her husband for a mess of fleshpots.

This was no life for her, this was no place for her, she thought, her head bowed and the sun playing at games of miracles with her hair while the Duke talked. She drew impatient patterns with the tip of her shoe on the gravel. She hardly listened. Her ear was cocked for the first sounds of Laura. She ached to have done with all this wasting of time, she ached to be in her own home, getting on with her job of looking after her man and preparing for her child. ‘Saturday today,’ she mused, such a lovely look coming into her eyes that the Duke, watching her, was sure it was his proposed gift making her divinely happy. ‘We’d be ’avin’ shepherd’s pie for dinner—or p’raps a nice little bit of fish....’

And, coming out of that pleasant dream with a sigh, she thought, ‘Oughtn’t never to ’ave met none of these ’ere. All comes of runnin’ away from dooty.’

Apologetically she turned her head and looked at the Duke, for she had forgotten him for a moment, besides having been thinking on lines that were hardly grateful. Poor old gentleman—still keeping on about giving her Crippenham. Crippenham? She’d as soon have the cleaning of Buckingham Palace while she was about it as of that great, frightening house—or, come to that, of a prison.

But how like a bad dream it was, being kept there with the morning slipping past, and she unable to reach him across the gulf of his deafness. By eleven o’clock she was quite pale with unhappiness, she could hardly bear it any longer. Would she have to give manners the go-by and take to her heels once more? This time, though, there would be no kind father-in-law to lend her a car; this time she would have to walk,—walk all the way, and then when she got there find Jocelyn unaided. And the old gentleman kept on and on about Crippenham being hers, and everything in it....

’E’s nothin’ but a nimage,’ she said to herself in despair. ‘Sits ’ere like a old idol. Wot do ’e know about a married woman’s dooties?’

‘Where’s Charles?’ asked the Duke.

Sally shook her head. She hadn’t seen a sign of him that morning.