The Second Penguin Book of English Short Stories Read online

  ‘I – believe – I – did,’ said William, facing him with level eyes. She was no longer white.

  ‘Did you understand?’

  ‘Why you didn’t ride in? Of course I did.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because you couldn’t, of course. I knew that.’

  ‘Did you care?’

  ‘If you had come in – but I knew you wouldn’t – but if you had, I should have cared a great deal. You know I should.’

  ‘Thank God I didn’t! Oh, but I wanted to! I couldn’t trust myself to ride in front of the carts, because I kept edging ’em over here, don’t you know?’

  ‘I knew you wouldn’t,’ said William, contentedly. ‘Here’s your fifty.’

  Scott bent forward and kissed the hand that held the greasy notes. Its fellow patted him awkwardly but very tenderly on the head.

  ‘And you knew, too, didn’t you?’ said William, in a new voice.

  ‘No, on my honour, I didn’t. I hadn’t the – the cheek to expect anything of the kind, except … I say, were you out riding anywhere the day I passed by to Khanda?’

  William nodded, and smiled after the manner of an angel surprised in a good deed.

  ‘Then it was just a speck I saw of your habit in the – ’

  ‘Palm-grove on the Southern cart-road. I saw your helmet when you came up from the nullah by the temple – just enough to be sure that you were all right. D’you care?’

  This time Scott did not kiss her hand, for they were in the dusk of the dining-tent, and, because William’s knees were trembling under her, she had to sit down in the nearest chair, where she wept long and happily, her head on her arms; and when Scott imagined that it would be well to comfort her, she needing nothing of the kind, she ran to her own tent; and Scott went out into the world, and smiled upon it largely and idiotically. But when Faiz Ullah brought him a drink, he found it necessary to support one hand with the other, or the good whisky and soda would have been spilled abroad. There are fevers and fevers.

  But it was worse – much worse – the strained, eye-shirking talk at dinner till the servants had withdrawn, and worst of all when Mrs Jim, who had been on the edge of weeping from the soup down, kissed Scott and William, and they drank one whole bottle of champagne, hot, because there was no ice, and Scott and William sat outside the tent in the starlight till Mrs Jim drove them in for fear of more fever.

  Apropos of these things and some others William said: ‘Being engaged is abominable, because, you see, one has no official position. We must be thankful that we’ve lots of things to do.’

  ‘Things to do!’ said Jim, when that was reported to him. ‘They’re neither of them any good any more. I can’t get five hours’ work a day out of Scott. He’s in the clouds half the time.’

  ‘Oh, but they’re so beautiful to watch, Jimmy. It will break my heart when they go. Can’t you do anything for him?’

  ‘I’ve given the Government the impression – at least, I hope I have – that he personally conducted the entire famine. But all he wants is to get on to the Luni Canal Works, and William’s just as bad. Have you ever heard ’em talking of barrage and aprons and wastewater? It’s their style of spooning, I suppose.’

  Mrs Jim smiled tenderly. ‘Ah, that’s in the intervals – bless ’em.’

  And so Love ran about the camp unrebuked in broad daylight, while men picked up the pieces and put them neatly away of the Famine in the Eight Districts.

  Morning brought the penetrating chill of the Northern December, the layers of wood-smoke, the dusty grey blue of the tamarisks, the domes of ruined tombs, and all the smell of the white Northern plains, as the mail-train ran on to the mile-long Sutlej Bridge. William, wrapped in a poshteen – silk embroidered sheepskin jacket trimmed with rough astrakhan – looked out with moist eyes and nostrils that dilated joyously. The South of pagodas and palm-trees, the over-populated Hindu South, was done with. Here was the land she knew and loved, and before her lay the good life she understood, among folk of her own caste and mind.

  They were picking them up at almost every station now – men and women coming in for the Christmas Week, with racquets, with bundles of polo-sticks, with dear and bruised cricket-bats, with fox terriers and saddles. The greater part of them wore jackets like William’s, for the Northern cold is as little to be trifled with as the Northern heat. And William was among them and of them, her hands deep in her pockets, her collar turned up over her ears, stamping her feet on the platforms as she walked up and down to get warm, visiting from carriage to carriage, and everywhere being congratulated. Scott was with the bachelors at the far end of the train, where they chaffed him mercilessly about feeding babies and milking goats; but from time to time he would stroll up to William’s window, and murmur: ‘Good enough, isn’t it?’ and William would answer with sighs of pure delight: ‘Good enough, indeed.’ The large open names of the home towns were good to listen to. Umballa, Ludhiana, Phillour, Jullundur, they rang like the coming marriage-bells in her ears, and William felt deeply and truly sorry for all strangers and outsiders – visitors, tourists, and those fresh-caught for the service of the country.

  It was a glorious return, and when the bachelors gave the Christmas ball, William was, unofficially, you might say, the chief and honoured guest among the stewards, who could make things very pleasant for their friends. She and Scott danced nearly all the dances together, and sat out the rest in the big dark gallery overlooking the superb teak floor, where the uniforms blazed, and the spurs clinked, and the new frocks and four hundred dancers went round and round till the draped flags on the pillars flapped and bellied to the whirl of it.

  About midnight half a dozen men who did not care for dancing came over from the Club to play ‘Waits’, and – that was a surprise the stewards had arranged – before any one knew what had happened, the band stopped, and hidden voices broke into ‘Good King Wenceslaus’, and William in the gallery hummed and beat time with her foot:

  Mark my footsteps well, my page,

  Tread thou in them boldly.

  Thou shalt find the winter’s rage

  Freeze thy blood less coldly!

  ‘Oh, I hope they are going to give us another! Isn’t it pretty, coming out of the dark in that way? Look – look down. There’s Mrs Gregory wiping her eyes!’

  ‘It’s like home, rather,’ said Scott. ‘I remember – ’

  ‘H’sh! Listen! – dear.’ And it began again:

  When shepherds watched their flocks by night –

  ‘A-h-h!’ said William, drawing closer to Scott.

  All seated on the ground,

  The Angel of the Lord came down,

  And glory shone around.

  ‘Fear not,’ said he (for mighty dread

  Had seized their troubled mind);

  ‘Glad tidings of great joy I bring

  To you and all mankind.’

  This time it was William that wiped her eyes.

  T. F. Powys

  THE BUCKET AND THE ROPE

  A BUCKET once lay upon its side in a little shed, that was a short way down a by-lane, near to the village of Shelton.

  This bucket, a large one, had been kicked over by a man who had hanged himself up by the neck, by means of an odd piece of rope that he had tied to a strong beam.

  The man’s name who had hanged himself was Mr Dendy, who rented a few pleasant fields that he used to plough happily, and, besides keeping a few good cows, he fattened some nice pigs.

  Every servant, be he never so humble, is interested in his master, whose habits of life, goings and comings, loves and hates, are watched and commented upon. Mr Dendy’s movements as well as his behaviour had always been of great interest to the bucket and to the rope; who, when together, which was often the case, for they lived in the same shed, would speak of all that Mr Dendy did, and endeavour to find out as best they might a reason for h
is actions.

  Both were interested in any kind of life that was not like themselves, such as mankind, because both were humble and did not consider, as so many do, that they or their own kind deserved the most notice.

  In order to study men, both the bucket and the rope decided to take Mr Dendy as an example of humanity, believing, as they well might, that the ways and notions of a simple countryman ought to be easier to understand than those of one more sly and cunning. They wished to study Mr Dendy in order to find out from his behaviour what other men were like; to learn from his doings how they did, to find out the causes of their sorrows and joys, so as to journey a little nearer to the Truth that is always so hard to discover.

  Now and again the two friends had been a little puzzled by Mr Dendy, who did not often act as they would have expected him to, for sometimes he would seem to be troubled, when, according to the bucket’s ideas of cause and effect, there was no reason for him to be so.

  And now that Mr Dendy had hanged himself, pressing both of them into this last service, to forward his self-destruction, the bucket and the rope thought they would review the man’s life, in the hope of finding one true reason at least for his final act.

  ‘Is it not a little curious, if not altogether surprising,’ observed the bucket, ‘that we should have been put to so sad a use in helping our good master to die? Perhaps you can remember as well as I the joyful day when we were first purchased, which happened to be the very day before Mr Dendy was married.

  ‘He married, as you know, a woman, a creature created to ease a man of the heavy burden of desire, a burden as troublesome to carry as a kicking ass.’

  ‘And who also,’ observed the rope, ‘was intended to cook and prepare a man’s food, to rear his children and to clean his house.’

  ‘That should certainly be so,’ said the other.

  ‘The day we were purchased,’ continued the rope, ‘happened to be one of those delightful May days when all things, animate and inanimate, that exist under the sun, are entirely happy.

  ‘I was coiled up in the shop window of Mr Johnson, the ropemaker, a man whose shirt-sleeves were always turned up, so that his hairy arms made the children stare. The sun shone upon me, and in its pleasant warmth I soon fell asleep. I dreamed of my happy childhood, when I grew up in a large field, beside a million brothers and sisters who were all beautiful flowers. But I did not sleep long, for as soon as the sun rose too high to shine into the window I awoke and looked out into the street.

  ‘Anyone with a proper desire for knowledge, if he has eyes, can always see something of interest in what goes on in a street. He has only to look and something will be sure to come near.

  ‘I began to watch the folk who moved along the pavement in front of the shop, and a few of them particularly attracted my notice. Two old women came by, whose feet seemed to stick to the stones at every step, while their tongues cackled and gabbled about the ill-conduct of their neighbours.

  ‘A grand military gentleman sauntered past, who saw his own reflection in every window that he went by, and became prouder than ever. A lady who followed him at a little distance wished to see herself too, but did not dare to look, because she feared that a servant girl who walked behind might notice what she did.

  ‘Presently there was a fine clatter of running feet; some schoolboys came by, pulling the caps from one another’s heads, and then an alderman passed, who looked about him as if the town were all his own.

  ‘After him came two young and pleasing girls, who were ready for love; they watched coyly every young man in the street, and laughed in order to show what they longed for. The clock in the church tower at the top of the town struck three, but no one seemed to give any heed to it, except a poor debtor, whose examination was to be at that very hour in the town hall, and who wished he had taken his wife’s advice earlier and drowned himself.

  ‘The clock had hardly finished striking when a young man, who had the joyful looks of a would-be bridegroom, together with a young girl entered the shop. I looked at her with admiration, and at him with pleasure. They seemed made for one another. Anyone could see that she had the sweetest of natures, that would be unlikely, for fear of being cruel, to refuse anything a man might ask of her. The man was Mr Dendy, and she was to be his wife.’

  ‘Her arms had been opened to another before him,’ murmured the bucket.

  ‘Only a grave could have prevented that,’ answered the rope; ‘but allow me to continue:

  ‘Mr Dendy came forward to the window and looked at me, together with Mr Johnson. The girl looked elsewhere. Mr Johnson’s hands, that were as hairy as his arms, took me up, uncoiled me, and stretched me out. Our master examined me for a little, satisfied himself that I was what he needed, and made the purchase.’

  ‘Mr Dendy was about twenty-nine years old then, and the young girl about eighteen,’ remarked the bucket.

  ‘So she was,’ said the rope, ‘but it is curious to think now what she did next. While Mr Johnson and Mr Dendy were talking, she coiled and uncoiled me, and then, in her girlish amusement, for she looked at him lovingly, she made a running noose of me, slipped it over our master’s head, and pulled it tight.’

  ‘Mr Johnson laughed, I suppose?’

  ‘Yes, but a little uneasily. While she toyed with me,’ said the rope, ‘I had the chance to look at her the more narrowly. She seemed just the creature to delight any man with her sweetness and eagerness for love. She had a yielding kindness, but no wickedness in her. She showed her good nature to a young man, the son of the lawyer, who happened to pass her in a by-street when Mr Dendy slipped into a small inn. The lawyer’s son looked unhappy and she allowed him to kiss her, while Mr Dendy was out of the way.’

  ‘She had a little foot,’ observed the bucket, ‘and a winning gait, and had Mr Dendy peeped through the dingy bar-window, when he was having a merry jest with Farmer Pardy, he should have been glad to see that the lawyer’s son thought her as nice as he did.’

  ‘A rope would have fancied so,’ said the other dryly.

  ‘Mr Dendy had no sooner bought you,’ said the bucket, ‘than he went to the ironmonger’s and purchased me. We were carried off together, and so we became acquainted, and that very evening I was made use of to collect the swill for the pigs; I remember even now the unpleasant smell of the rotten potatoes.’

  ‘It was not the stink of the sour garbage that made our master hang himself,’ observed the rope thoughtfully, ‘for he would be often whistling when he brought you in, full of the nastiest stuff. Neither could it have been the weight of you that troubled him, for he would ever carry you jauntily, as if the burden of a few gallons of swill was nothing to so powerful an arm as his.’

  ‘Oh no, he never minded carrying me,’ said the bucket, ‘for whatever the time of year was, whether the summer sun shone or whether a dreary autumn rain fell, Mr Dendy would bear me along with the same sprightliness. He would perhaps tarry at a cottage gate, and have a merry word with the occupants, telling a droll story of country matters for the young girls to smile at, and bidding them to ask of his kind Betty what the fancies were that she had found the most useful in the getting of a husband.’

  ‘We could watch nearly all that he did,’ remarked the rope, ‘and he certainly appeared to be living a very happy life: the sweet country air, the plain and wholesome food that he ate, as well as his constant though not too tedious toil, gave him health and joy, and he was never in want of a shilling to spend when he needed one.’

  ‘Only once,’ observed the bucket sadly, ‘did I notice Mr Dendy act in a way that was not usual for a village man. He was bearing me, full, along a path from a small cottage where he bought swill. On each side of the path there were flowers, both white and yellow. Mr Dendy set me down, a rotten orange bobbed up on my surface. Mr Dendy rested by the path, plucked some of the flowers, and seemed to take delight in holding them in his hand.’

  ‘What did he do ne
xt?’ asked the rope.

  ‘He carried the flowers home to his wife,’ replied the bucket …

  ‘The summer pleased Mr Dendy, and so did the winter,’ said the rope.

  ‘In the winter we saw more of him, for we were used the more. During the winter the horses lay in, and straw had to be carried to them, and in the winter there were more pigs to be fattened. In the winter, too, a strong man feels his strength and his happiness more than in the summer. He learns to brave the keenest wind without a shudder, and cares nothing when the rain soaks him to the skin. No weather daunted Mr Dendy, and the more he bore with the storms outside the pleasanter was his parlour, with its cheerful light, and the warm presence of a wife who loved him.’

  ‘Why, then, did he hang himself?’ asked the bucket.

  ‘The winter weather was certainly not to blame,’ answered the rope, ‘for I cannot think of those happy days without being sure that he enjoyed them. I was stouter then, and yet I think not, for I appear to be strong enough now to hold a pretty fair burden. Mr Dendy, who is carried by me, could carry a bundle then, he thought nothing of carrying as much straw with me as was enough for three men to bear. However large the bundle was, he would somehow get it upon his back, so that the straw upon either side of him would sweep the hedges in the lane, almost as though a whole stack was out a-walking.’

  ‘Yes, there was Mr Dendy!’ exclaimed the bucket, ‘a true and joyful countryman, doing his proper tasks. What could harm him? What could prevent him from living out his life contentedly and going down, as a good man should, gently into the grave? Surely never was a poor man created who meant so well.’

  ‘Look at him now,’ said the rope quietly; ‘at first when he kicked you over I wondered if I should be strong enough to hold him. He struggled horribly, and I fancy that when he first felt me tighten round his throat he would have changed his mind. He tried to catch me to lessen the dreadful feeling of suffocation.’

  ‘You must have hurt him very much,’ observed the bucket, ‘for his face became quite black, and his eyes bulged out of his head. I wonder you did not let him fall, for in his death agony he kicked his legs and swung round, but you held him fast. Why did he do it?’