menu_book Chapter 10

chapter ten of consequences by e m delafield this librivox recording is in the public domain noel in the ensuing days alex met that look very often a look of pleased speculative approval pregnant with unspoken meanings noel sought her company incessantly and every opportunity was given them of spending time in one another's society for five glowing heather surrounded days and five breathless moonlit evenings they became the centre of their tiny world then lady isabel said one night to her daughter you've enjoyed this visit haven't you darling i'm sorry we're moving on oh said alex faintly are we really leaving to-morrow to-morrow morning by the early train her mother assented cheerfully the true instinct of the feeble to clutch at an unripe prize lest it be taken from them made alex wonder desperately if she could not postpone her departure but she dared not make any such suggestion and lady isabel looking at her dismayed face laughed a little as though at the unreason of a child alex blushed with shame as she thought that her mother might have guessed what was in her mind that evening however lady isabel came into her room as she was dressing for dinner i thought you'd like to put this over your shoulders alex she said negligently it will improve that cream-coloured frock of yours

it was a painted scarf that she held out and she stood gazing critically while the maid laid it across alex's shoulders you look so nice darling child are you ready yes mother they went downstairs together alex was acutely conscious of a certain maternal pride and tenderness such as she had not experienced from lady isabel since the first days of her return from lige when she had finally left school she did not let herself speculate to what such unusual emotion might portend but at the sight of noel cardew better looking than ever in evening clothes a chaotic excitement surged up within her in anticipation of their last evening together almost as she sat down beside him at the dinner-table she said piteously i wish we weren't going away to-morrow you're not oh yes didn't you know i hadn't realised it said noel and although she avoided looking at him she noted with a feeling of triumph the dismay in his voice oh i say what a shame must you really go we're going to pay two more visits and then leave scotland altogether

i shan't stay much longer myself observed noel nonchalantly alex was conscious of keeping the words as it were at the back of her mind with the implication which she attached to them while the conversation at the small table became general as she followed her hostess and lady isabel from the room noel holding open the door said to her in a rapid anxious tone very low you'll come out into the garden afterwards won't you an enigmatic perhaps was not in alex's vocabulary she gave him a quick radiant smile and nodded emphatically it never occurred to her eager prodigality that she ran any risk of cheapening the favours that so few had ever coveted in the garden she moved along the gravelled walk beside him actually breathless from inward excitement there was heaps more i wanted to say to you about the book noel remarked disconsolately i shan't have any one to exchange ideas with now they're all so old and besides i don't think english people as a rule care much about psychology and that sort of thing they're so keen on games so am i in a way but i must say it seems to me that the study of human nature is a good deal more worth one's while people are so interesting said alex she was perfectly aware of the futility of her remark as she made it

but in some undercurrent of her consciousness there floated the conviction that one need not put forth any great powers of originality in order to obtain response from noel i can be perfectly natural with him we think alike she defended herself against her own unformulated accusation with inexplicable anger i think they're frightfully interesting said noel with conviction of course men are far more interesting than women if you don't mind my saying so simply from the psychological point of view i hope you don't think i'm being rude oh no you see women as a general rule are rather shallow though of course there are a great many exceptions but you know what i mean as a rule they're rather shallow that's what i feel about women they're shallow perhaps you're right said alex rather discouraged she would not admit to herself that his sweeping assertion awoke no echo whatever within her to her immaturity the essence of sympathy lay in complete agreement and abstract questions meant nothing to her when weighed in the balance against her desire to establish to her own satisfaction at least

the existence of such sympathy between herself and noel cardew i've got another mad plan said noel slowly you'll think i'm always getting insane ideas and this one rather depends on you oh what i hope you won't mind my suggesting such a thing he paused so long that alex's imagination had time for a hundred foolish ecstatic promptings such as her reason knew could not be forthcoming but for which her whole undisciplined sense of romance was crying well look here what should you think of collaborating with me over the book i'm sure you could write if you tried and anyway you could probably give me side-lights on the feminine part of it it would be most awfully helpful to me if you would oh said alex uncertainly she was invaded by unreasoning disappointment but how could we do it oh well notes you know just keep notes of anything that struck us particularly and then put it in together later we should have to do a good deal of it by correspondence of course i say are you a conventional person not in the least said alex hastily i'm glad of that i'm afraid i'm rather desperately unconventional myself of course in a way it might be rather unconventional you and me corresponding but would that matter

not to me said alex resolutely that's splendid we could do a lot that way and then i hope of course that you'll let me come and see you in london of course cried alex eagerly i don't know the exact date when we shall be back but i could let you know have you got the address clevedon square she hastily supplied the number of the house oh that's all right i'm sure to forget it said noel easily but i shall find you in the books i suppose yes said alex feeling suddenly damped she herself would have been in no danger of forgetting the number of a house wherein dwelt any one whom she wished to see but with disastrous and quite unconscious humility she told herself that it was of course not to be expected that any one else should go to lengths equal to her own in her one-sided experience alex had always found herself to be unique that noel cardew was not in despair at the idea of her departure was evident but he repeated several times that he wished she were not going so soon and even asked whether she would stay on if invited to do so i'm sure they'd all love you two he assured her then lady isabel could pay the other visits and call for you on her way back i'm sure i shouldn't be allowed to stay on by myself said alex dolefully

there you are conventionality again my daughters said noel instructively if i ever have any shall be brought up quite differently i've made up my mind to that i dare say you'll laugh at all these theories of mine but i've always been keen on ideas if you remember but for once noel did not receive the habitual ready disclaimer called for by his speech his easy allusion to his hypothetical daughters had reduced alex to utter silence afterwards alone in the darkness of her own room she wondered why such a startling sense of protest had revolted within her at his words but her mind shied away instinctively from the question and she found herself unable to pursue it the next morning in the unromantic atmosphere induced by an early breakfast and sir francis's anxiety to make sure of catching the connection politely concealed but quite evident to the perceptions of his wife and daughter noel cardew and alex exchanged their brief and entirely public farewell i'll write about the book was his cheerful parting assurance don't forget said alex

lady isabel was rather humorous on the subject of fantasiacal emancipation amongst the house-party in the midst of which she and her daughter found themselves that evening what are boys and girls coming to i hear young men gaily promising to write to alex on all sorts of subjects and making private assignations with her she declared amusedly aren't you and that nice-looking cardew boy writing a book in collaboration or something darling the slight jest was made popular amongst her seniors and alex was kindly rallied about her modern freedom and assumption of privileges undreamed of by the older generation the inference obviously placed upon her friendship with noel cardew was evident and pleased her starved vanity even more than the agreeable amount of flattery and attention which at last was being bestowed upon her it was her first hint of success achieved amid standards which she had been taught to believe were all prevalent brushed lightly by the passing wing of triumph she became eager and self-confident

even rather over clamorous in the assertion of her own individuality as had been the child alex in the nursery at clevedon square lady isabel did not check her she made subtle exploitation of alex's youth and sudden rather boisterous gaiety and occasionally laughed a little and alluded to the collaboration scheme between her and noel cardew but all the same darling child she observed to alex in private i can't have you corresponding with young men all over the country unbeknown to me once in a way it's all very well perhaps but you'll have to let me see the letters i think alex was only mindly resentful of the injunction she surmised shrewdly enough that her mother was more anxious to establish the authentic existence of a correspondence between noel cardew and herself than to supervise the details of it she herself waited with frantic furtive eagerness for his first letter it did not reach her until after her return to london secretly bitterly disappointed she read the short conventional phrases and the subscription i never know how to end up a letter but hope this will be all right yours very sincerely noel e cardew across the top of the front page was a postscript next month i shall be in town don't forget that i'm coming to call upon you i hope you won't be out

alex to whom nothing was trivial saw the proposed call looming enormous upon the horizon of her days every afternoon she either sat beside lady isabel in the carriage in an agony with only one thought in her mind the expectation of finding noel's card upon the hall-table on their return or else took her part disjointedly and with obvious absent-mindedness in the entertainment of her mother's visitors when during a crowded at-home afternoon in the course of which she had necessarily ceased to listen for the sound of the front door-bell mr cardew was at length announced alex felt almost unable to turn round and face the entering visitor her own imagination untempered either by humour or by experience had led her to picture the next encounter between herself and noel so frequently and with such a prodigal folly of romantic detail that it seemed incredible to her that the reality should take place within a few instants amidst brief conventional words and gestures noel did not talk about the book that they were to write together although he remained beside alex most of the afternoon only just as he was leaving he asked cheerfully you've not forgotten our collaboration have you partner i've heaps of things to discuss with you only you were so busy this afternoon looking after all those people

we shall be in on sunday alex told him eagerly and there won't be such a crowd oh good said noel perhaps we'll meet in the park before that though i hope so said alex they met in the park and elsewhere and noel all through the ensuing weeks before christmas called often at the house in clevedon square lady isabel twice asked him to dinner but although he was once placed next her on neither occasion to alex's astonished resentment was he assigned to her as a partner alex for the first time conscious of being sought after and receiving with avidity the fragments that fell to her share forced herself to believe that they would eventually constitute that impossible whole of which she had dreamed wildly and extravagantly all her life into the eager assents which she gave to all knowles many theories she read a similarity of outlook into her almost trembling readiness to falling with his every suggestion a community of tastes and into his interminable expositions of his own views an appeal to her deeper sympathies that surely denoted the consciousness of affinity between them she was happy although principally in a nervous anticipation of happiness to come

she was able when alone to imagine that from absolutely impersonal good comradeship noel would suddenly plunge into the impassioned declarations of her own fancy but when she was actually with him his cool pleasant boyish voice dispelled the folly and her fundamental shyness that never deserted her save in the realm of her own thoughts was relieved with an intense and involuntary relief that it should be so she saw noel's father and mother again and was greeted by the latter with a bright and conditional affectionateness that inspected even while it acclaimed it was after this that the trend of noel's thoughts appeared suddenly to change and he spoke to alex of the place in devonshire one's first duty is to the place of course he said reflectively and i'm not at all sure that i oughtn't to look into the management of an estate and all that sort of thing very thoroughly some day a long long time hence of course i shall have to run our own place and i'm rather keen about the duties of a landlord and improving the conditions of the people i used to be a socialist as you know and i must say one's ideas alter a bit as one goes on through life and i've had some talks with the pater lately

he broke off and looked rather oddly at alex for a moment they want me to think of settling down i believe he said almost shyly alex spent that night in feverishly placing possible and impossible interpretations on the words and on the look he had given her the sense of an approaching crisis terrified her so much that she felt she would have given worlds to avoid it the following evening it came most conventionally she met noel cardew at an evening reception and he conducted her rather solemnly to a small conservatory where two chairs were placed conspicuously enough beneath a solitary palm an orchestra was just audible above the hum and buzz of conversation it's luck getting in here said noel i wanted to see you very particularly to-night i must say i never thought i should find myself particularly wanting to see any girl in fact i practically made up my mind never to have anything to do with women but i see now that two people who had very much the same sort of ideas about life in general could do a tremendous lot for a place and for the country generally don't you agree and of course he became hopelessly incoherent

knowing one another's people it all makes such a difference i could never understand fellows running after gaiety girls and marrying them myself after all one's duty to the estate is-and then later on perhaps if one thought of parliament alex felt that the pounding of her heart was making her physically faint and she raised her head desperately in the hope of stopping him noel met her eyes courageously i wish you'd let me tell our people that you-that we're we're engaged he said hoarsely his words struck on alex's ear almost meaninglessly "'Irrationally in love as she was, with love, "'she knew only that he was asking something of her,

"'that she had at last an outlet "'for that which no one had ever yet desired. "'Unable to speak, and unconscious of Bathos, "'she vehemently nodded her head. "'Noel immediately took both her hands

"'and shook them wildly up and down. "'Thank heaven it's over!' he cried boyishly. "'You can't imagine how I've been funking asking you. "'I thought you'd say yes, but one feels such an awful fool, and I've never done it before. I say Alex. I can call you Alex

now, can't I? You're like me, aren't you? You don't want sentimentality. If there's one thing I bar, said the newly accepted lover, it's sentimentality. End of chapter 10.