An Engagement of Convenience: A Novel

by Louis Zangwill

"This is a discovery," declared Lady Betty. "It is as interesting here in its way as the Rialto at Venice."

And indeed they had reason to admire. To the right lay the Bridge of Bridges, whose endlessly rolling traffic was at this distance softened to an artistic suggestion that by no means disturbed their sense of solitude. At the adjoining wharf on the left a Dutch boat was being unladen, actively, yet with a strange sense of stillness and calm. And over all the river and shipping hung a faint grey-blue mist, muffling and enveloping all things out of proportion to its density, and absorbing the sunlight into a haze that already seemed to foretell the chills of the coming twilight of the winter's day. They saw the sun, a large red ball, hanging extraordinarily low in the sky over a long squat warehouse with symmetrical rows of windows. And across the river, under the shadow of the opposite structures, lay strange families of craft and barges, moored in the water, or high on the mud; rusty and silent, some half-broken up, some swinging lazily, touched with the mellow decay of the centuries.

Lady Betty thought it would be ideal to stay here awhile, so they settled down on one of the garden-seats, and sat in quiet happiness, unheeding of the sharp touch of the afternoon air. More pigeons flew down from neighbouring roofs and walked tamely around them. And from all the mighty activity of surrounding London, that beat strenuous, feverish, far-reaching, there flowed to them only a serenity, an almost phantasmal calm: they were alone, supremely alone—far from their world of everyday existence.

The time slipped by deliciously. Their enjoyment was as spontaneous as of two children at play. And children they were in the perfect simplicity of their happiness. They watched the afternoon deepen, the haze of sunshine weaken and yield to greyer moods; they rose, too, and moved along the edge of the waters, and examined the shipping and barges. They spoke to the pigeons, gave them names, endowed them with romances; they spoke to each other endearingly, yet still as the two children who had played together always, who had wandered into this strange world, and were as enchanted with it as with each other.

At last they realised the light was already fading; the mist on all things was ghostlier, and damp in the throat and nostrils. Now and again a spasmodic wind caught up dry leaves and swirled them around playfully. Lady Betty gave a little shiver.

"Night will soon be on us," she said. "A million points of light will be springing up as by magic. It would be enchanting to stay and watch the darkness deepen and the river-fog steal down; to sit here through the mysterious hours, and study the shadows and silhouettes, and listen to all the strange sounds of the night, and watch all those lights glimmer on and on, till at last they show yellow in the pale dawn, and life again is swarming over the bridges. Must we go back, dear?—we have left our world ever so far away—and years ago, was it not, dear?"

A sadness had descended on them both. With the approach of evening, they could not but feel the precious time was fleeting; they could no longer immerse themselves with such wholeheartedness in the simple appreciation of the moment. The terror of the parting to come rose in the hearts of both. Yet they made a brave resistance.

"Come, darling," she said at last; "the hours still belong to us. We have indulged our day-mood. Let us search for something fresh now; our good star shall watch over us and send us happy adventures."

So they passed again into the street, and, absorbed in their talk, were scarcely aware whither they were turning. They knew they were in a network of by-ways, flanked by warehouses and offices, and sometimes they stumbled on terraces of decrepit old dwelling-houses. They were vaguely conscious that they were leaving the river far behind, and that they must have crossed Eastcheap again at some narrower part without recognising it. After some leisurely wandering they came into a more important thoroughfare with pretentious edifices, yet with archaic touches here and there, the relics of another epoch, worn and decaying, yet more suggestive of coming stone buildings to supplant them than of the glory of their own century.

At a street-corner, under the light of a lamp that was still pale in the gathering dusk, a shivering flower-seller with a red shawl over her shoulders stood with a basket of deliciously fresh violets, and Wyndham stopped to get a big bunch of them put together for his companion. Lady Betty was immensely gratified; she breathed in the odour of the violets with rapture, then fastened them in her bosom. She was herself again now, overflowing with good fellowship, and amused at every trifle. He caught her exhilaration. "We shall fill our evening with a whirl of gaiety!" he cried. "Rockets and fireworks; I wonder if the good star you spoke of will be kind enough to set down in our path some unheard-of theatre."