Children of No Man's Land

by G. B. Stern

“And we had such a jolly talk—and laughed—and sat side by side—and no harm at all,” she whispered to her memory of the half-hour on the balcony with Blair. “And I meant to be so nice to Samson ever afterwards.”... But how would Samson interpret a confession that she had not heard him telephoning, because she was at that moment visiting Blair Stevenson? It would be rather fun to hear him thunder the inevitable accusations. And yet—and yet—Deb was conscious that she had rather outgrown this sort of cheap fun—outgrown masquerade—outgrown rebellion. She wanted her child, Samson’s child, to be born in this harbourage of comfort and tenderness and soft wrappings and people to make things easy—yes, even the Phillips family. After all, it would be a Phillips’ infant; and they were kind—always kind. She could not face the shawl-and-cold-stone-step business, with a baby to be born in December. Deb looked at Samson, her eyes very dark and grave.... Should she propitiate him? If this time—then for always. Can you do it, Deb? Kick away indecision and folly and petulance, little passions and the big passion?... “Suppose I went to Blair altogether, as he has asked me to come?”... And for the kiddie—what? No Man’s Land again, a thousand times worse than her own experience of the between-region; the outer edge of things; no established identity.... What was the old game they used to play at Daisybanks? She and Richard and the Rothenburg children?—Touch Wood ... Touch Wood ... and (triumphantly) “Home!”... But oh, the awful dogged exhaustion of being chased without a blessed knowledge of “home” to be gained at a dash.

Deb made up her mind.

Then she crossed the room to her husband, and put both her arms round his neck—he was looking more than ever like Oliver Cromwell, with his features set into those harsh lines—and propitiated him. Whispered futile childish explanations of her conduct the night before ... dawdling about in her room till late—knew she was naughty to dawdle—didn’t care!—heard the ’phone bell and was too lazy to go down to answer it.... “Didn’t know it was you, Samson ... please! Thought it was Marty being cross at the other end ’cos I was keeping them all waiting.... Sorry! very sorry.... Oh, do pull out those furrows on each side of your mouth—one could grow potatoes in them.... Samson, don’t you believe me?” Head snuggling and rubbing his cheek——

It was so much less bother this way—the way of least resistance. And anyhow, she had started all wrong, years ago, from the very beginning. Let others beat out the pioneer track—hers to make “home” for the little daughter. “Touch Wood,” “Touch Wood”—and already Samson was smiling at her, fondling her ear.... He did not quite believe her; he would recur to his suspicions later on; but for the moment Deb’s sweet ways had placated him. He thought: “She is growing ever so much more tractable, with happiness....”

CHAPTER III

I

“I’ve come to say good-bye,” David Redbury explained jubilantly to La llorraine; “the Jewish regiment sails to-morrow, and I’ve dragged this fellow out to see me through my farewell visits,” indicating Richard, who leant in the doorway of the drawing-room with “buck-up-and-get-it-over” expressed in every reluctant line of his figure.

“He’s steadier than I am, you know, and one is liable to make such wild strange promises on these occasions. Supposing, for instance, Madame, that I were to send for you the minute the war is over, and I pitch my tent by the shores of Jordan ... would you come?”

“I say to you, my dee-urr,” and the prima-donna, in an incongruously correct sports-shirt, collar and tie, smiled whimsically over her owlish spectacles at his gallantry; “I say to you vot I zay to zat ozzer little fellow I see last night at the Tube corner—ah, he was a beauty, that one, with the skin of a peach ... and he watch me a little, I, in my black gown and my black hat, very tall, very femme du monde—you see it? And he say to himself—‘It is for the first time I adventure—perhaps one wiz experience?—I learn somsing—Better so. Vot should I with a pretty flapper, and she so innocent and I so ignorant—Awful! A desperate affair.’ So I watch him make that reflection. And presently he move closer sideways, and he make his little proposition.... And I put my two hands on his shoulders, surprising him. And I say: ‘My boy—you are moch too young—and I am moch too old ... is it not so?’”