'Well, s'pose I do,' grumbled the cherub. 'Think I do it for pleasure? Tell you what, if I hadn't got squiffy at the beginning I'd have gone off me bloomin' chump. I was in Buenos Ayres, went off with a waiter to get married. He was in a restaurant, Highgate way, where I was in service. I found out all about it when I got there. O Lor! Why, we jolly well had to drink, what with those Argentines who're half monkeys and the good of the house! Oh, Lor!' She smiled. 'Those were high old times,' she said inconsequently, overwhelmed by the glamour of the past. There was silence.
'I see,' said Victoria suddenly. 'I've never seen it before. If you want to get on, you've got to run on business lines. No ties, no men to bleed you. Save your money. Don't drink; save your looks. Why, those are good rules for a bank cashier! If you trip, down you go in the mud and nobody'll pick you up. So you've got to walk warily, not look at anybody, play fair and play hard. Then you can get some cash together and then you're free.'
There was silence. Victoria had faced the problem too squarely for two of her guests. Lissa looked dreamily towards the garden, wondering where Fritz was, whether she was wise in loving; Duckie, conscious of her heavy legs and incipient dropsy, blushed, then paled. Alone, Zoé, stiff and energetic like the determined business woman she was, wore on her lips the enigmatic smile born of a nice little sum in French three per cents.
'I must be going,' said Duckie hoarsely. She levered herself off the sofa. Then, almost silently, the party broke up.
CHAPTER XIII
Life pursued its even tenour; and Victoria, watching it go by, was reminded of the endless belt of a machine. The world machine went on grinding, and every breath she took was grist thrown for ever into the intolerable mill. It was October again, and already the trees in the garden were shedding fitful rains of glowing leaves. Alone the elder tree stood almost unchanged, a symbol of the everlasting. Now and then Victoria walked round the little lawn with Snoo and Poo, who were too shivery to chase the fat spiders. Often she stayed there for an hour, one hand against a tree trunk, looking at nothing, bathed in the mauve light of the dying year. Already the scents of decay, of wetness, filled the little garden and struck cold when the sun went down.
Every day now Victoria felt her isolation more cruelly. Solitude was no longer negative; it had materialised and had become a solid inimical presence. When the sun shone and she could walk the milky way of the streets, alone but feeling with every sense the joy of living time, there was not much to fear from solitude; there were things to look at, to touch, to smell. Now solitude no longer lurked round corners; at times a gust of wind carried its icy breath into her bones.
She was suffering, too, a little. She felt heavy in the legs, and a vein in her left calf hurt a little in the evening if she had walked or stood much. Soon, though it did not increase, the pain became her daily companion, for even when absent it haunted her. She would await a twinge for a whole day, ready and fearful, bracing herself up against a shock which often found her unprepared. At all times too the obsession seemed to follow her now. Perhaps she was walking through Regent's Park, buoyant and feeling capable of lifting a mountain, but the thought would rush upon her, perhaps it was going to hurt. She would lie awake too, oblivious of the heavy breathing by her side, rested, all her senses asleep, and then though she felt no pain the fear of it would come upon her and she would wrestle with the thought that the blow was about to fall.
Sometimes she would go out into the streets, seeking variety even in a wrangle between her Pekingese and some other dog. This meant that she must separate them, apologise to the owner, exchange perhaps a few words. Once she achieved a conversation with an old lady, a kindly soul, the mistress of a poodle. They walked together along the Canal, and the futile conversation fell like balm on Victoria's ears. The freshness of a voice ignorant of double meanings was soft as dew. They were to meet again, but the old lady was a near neighbour and she must have heard something of Victoria's reputation, for when they met again opposite Lord's, the old lady crossed over and the poodle followed her haughtily, leaving Snoo and Poo disconsolate and wondering on the edge of the pavement.