page break

Chapter Eighteen
Farewell and Adieu

‘You don't want to marry me, do you?’

‘I came down here with a perfectly open mind.’

‘But you don't want to. Well, you haven't got to. Listen. I'm going away to Sydney. Nobody need know. I haven't told. I've got my passage money, but not much else. I'm afraid you'll have to help.’

‘Of course I'll help. But what about the baby?’

‘You'll have to marry me if it lives—if I live. Somehow I don't think I will.’

‘Don't talk like that.’

‘Do you mind promising—if that happens?’

‘Of course I promise.’

‘I do wish the waitresses wouldn't clatter so. I suppose they can't help it, poor little devils. I've often thought, of all beastly jobs a waitress's is about the worst. This seems such a funny place to talk.’

‘Best place; we're two in a crowd here. Look, will this be enough to go on with, for the time being? I'll send you more later.’

‘Money changes hands.… It looks too much. I hate having to take it. Poor Jim: you made a rotten bargain.’

‘Sydney's a big place. Do you have to go so far away?’

‘Yes, I must.’ Anything to get away from eyes.

‘You're very young to go all alone.’

‘Can't be helped, can it? I'll be all right.’

‘How do you feel?’

‘A bit sick. All right, really. I fainted the night before I brought you down—fainted in the tramcar. It was the first time ever in my life—the weirdest sensation. You get cold in the middle of your forehead, and your arms won't lift up. Don't they make a noise? This is a horrible place—chattering, chattering, like an aviary.’

‘Have you told anyone at all?’

‘Only Simone Purcell. She knows—but not your name.’

‘Girl friends aren't usually discreet.’

‘Simone's all right.’

‘Won't you eat something?’

page 192

‘No, thank you. Jim—’

‘What?’

‘I'm sorry if I seem chilly about it. I did love somebody once, frightfully. This is just like a dream. I was trying to get over the other, and I couldn't. Perhaps you were, too. It's no use our getting married unless we can't help it. It wouldn't work, would it?’

‘I suppose not. I came down here—’

‘With a perfectly open mind. I know. And not wanting me. Unless I can't help it, you're not going to have me, either. But you do understand, don't you?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then all we've got to do is to stick together and stand firm. If I die and the baby shouldn't, you promise you'll have it for your son? You do promise, don't you? I'd leave your letters with Simone.…’

‘You wouldn't need to. I promise.’

‘Then that's all, isn't it?’

‘Just about all, except that I'm sorry, too. Where shall I write to you?’

‘Oh, care G.P.O. I'll be Mrs White. Nice and contradictory. Mother would say Mrs Unmitigated Scarlet.’

‘Very well, Mrs White. Do you want me to stay down until you've sailed? I had to make rather a rush trip of this, and some of them will be wondering.’

‘No. I'd much rather you didn't.’

‘Then this is auf wiedersehen.’

‘Yes. I thought that about you before, the last night at the boarding-house, but you see, it didn't happen so. You've got tears in your eyes, Jim. Is it the first time this has ever happened to you?’

‘Yes. Is it the first time with you?’

‘You ought to know that.’

‘I do. Then auf wiedersehen, and good luck. Don't forget to cable me if you're in any sort of hole.’

‘I'll be all right. If they only wouldn't clatter the dishes. Good-bye and good luck, Jim.’

‘I suppose you hope you'll never see me again?’

‘It just happened like this, didn't it? Neither of us could help it—much. We're so nearly in the same box. Good luck.’

At the last moment, Simone came down to the wharf. Toby Brian was with her—fair-haired, good-humoured, obstinate in a bulldoggy sort of way; a bodyguard for Simone against Simone. Her eyes were very bright, her hair, against the fur coat which had cost her a year's page 193 skimping, looked finer, cleaner gilt than ever, almost as fine as it was before Simone had it cut short and waved. Simone sat on the bunk.

‘Darling, you've got a cabin all to yourself. Monarch of all you survey.’

‘It is nice, isn't it? Look at my little green portholes.’

‘Write darling. These are for you. Miniatures.’ She fled, and was standing beside Toby Brian, waving and waving from the wharf. The Hannays were there, a forlorn little row. Eliza knew that Augusta's shoes were hurting her, but that she had put on her best because Eliza's going to Sydney, where she might really strike it rich, was a kind of festive event; and John, uneasy, worried, thin in his shabby suit, was muttering under his breath, ‘I can't understand her—can't understand her at all. Why can't she stay home and behave, like any other girl?’ Blue streamer broke, rose streamer held. Long green seam of water, lapping, widening. Not since the war, when the troopships sailed camouflaged. The wharfies were nice, they gave us half-crowns for the Copper Trail. Sandra sang Three Cheers for the Red, White, and Blue, but I kissed my wharfie.

Little round New Zealand, blue and brown, with bright unfinished samplers of gorse. Eliza opened Simone's parcel to see the miniatures. She expected Simone had painted something funny, a souvenir. But the miniatures were quilted blue baby shoes, embroidered with cherry blossom. She looked at them blankly, then put her head down into the crack between the flawless narrow pillows. Timothy darling… you fool, stop crying, do you hear me, stop crying.… Timothy, come back quickly, come back.