Anne’s voice say, “You might just as well let me write to Nellie Collins. She’s quite harmless.” A man’s voice said in a carrying whisper, “That is not for you to say.”
Lyndall took her hand away from the door and turned round. Her heart had begun to beat with suffocating violence. She felt ashamed and inexplicably frightened. If she let herself move quickly, panic might take hold of her. She must get away. She must move quickly, but she mustn’t make any noise. She was very near to feeling that she couldn’t move at all.
Warmth and scented steam met her between the cubicles. She passed the curtained archway, and found the scene in the shop unchanged—the two women by the counter, the babble of voices, the assistant, with her back still turned, shifting bottles. She passed out into the street and shut the door behind her. No one had seen her come or go.
CHAPTER 15
Pelham Trent was, as Mr. Codrington had called him, a very pleasant fellow. Lyndall Armitage certainly found him so. He dropped in as often as he could at Lilla Jocelyn’s flat, and Lilla was delighted to see him come. As she said to Milly Armitage, “They are just friends. At least, that’s all it is with her—I’m not so sure about him. But it’s exactly what she wants just now—someone to take her out and make her feel she matters.”
Lyn went out with Pelham Trent. She found him a most agreeable companion and the best of hosts. It was better than sitting at home and feeling as if your world had come to an end. When you felt like that, the thing to do was to get into somebody else’s world as quickly as you could. It was her world which had crashed—hers and Philip’s. Perhaps Anne’s too. But Pelham Trent’s world kept its steady orbit. It was a safe, cheerful world in which you could laugh and have a good time—dance, see a film, a play, or a cabaret, and put off for as long as possible the return to the cold, shattered place where your own warm world had been.
They did not always go out. Sometimes they stayed in Lilla’s charming drawing-room and talked. Sometimes he played to them. Those rather square hands of his with the strong, blunt fingers were quite extraordinarily agile on the keys of the Steinway baby grand. He would sit there playing one thing after another whilst the two girls listened. When the time came to say good-night he would hold Lyndall’s hand for a moment and say, “Did you like it?” Sometimes she would say, “Yes,” and sometimes she would only look, because when she felt deeply she never found it at all easy to translate her feelings into words. Except with Philip, who nearly always knew what she was thinking, and so, because no words were needed, they came quite easily.
Music let her into a world which was neither hers nor Pelham Trent’s, though his playing was the gate through which she entered it. It was a world where feeling and emotion were sublimated until they possessed nothing except beauty, where sorrow spent itself in music and loss was solaced. She came back from this world rested and refreshed.
After all Milly Armitage did not stay on at Jocelyn’s Holt. It was not in her to refuse what Philip asked, but she had never responded to any of her sister-in-law Cotty Armitage’s not infrequent appeals with more alacrity. Cotty enjoyed poor health. For twenty-five years or so she had had recurring attacks to which no doctor had ever been able to give a name. They involved the maximum of trouble to her family with the minimum of discomfort to herself. She had worn a husband into his grave, two daughters into matrimony, and the third to the brink of a breakdown. It was when Olive appeared likely to go over this brink that Cotty took up pen and paper and invited her dearest Milly to visit them. And Milly, incurably soft-hearted, invariably went.
“Of course what she really wants is for someone to pour a hogshead of cold water over her.”
“Then why don’t you?” said Lilla, with
Lyndall took her hand away from the door and turned round. Her heart had begun to beat with suffocating violence. She felt ashamed and inexplicably frightened. If she let herself move quickly, panic might take hold of her. She must get away. She must move quickly, but she mustn’t make any noise. She was very near to feeling that she couldn’t move at all.
Warmth and scented steam met her between the cubicles. She passed the curtained archway, and found the scene in the shop unchanged—the two women by the counter, the babble of voices, the assistant, with her back still turned, shifting bottles. She passed out into the street and shut the door behind her. No one had seen her come or go.
CHAPTER 15
Pelham Trent was, as Mr. Codrington had called him, a very pleasant fellow. Lyndall Armitage certainly found him so. He dropped in as often as he could at Lilla Jocelyn’s flat, and Lilla was delighted to see him come. As she said to Milly Armitage, “They are just friends. At least, that’s all it is with her—I’m not so sure about him. But it’s exactly what she wants just now—someone to take her out and make her feel she matters.”
Lyn went out with Pelham Trent. She found him a most agreeable companion and the best of hosts. It was better than sitting at home and feeling as if your world had come to an end. When you felt like that, the thing to do was to get into somebody else’s world as quickly as you could. It was her world which had crashed—hers and Philip’s. Perhaps Anne’s too. But Pelham Trent’s world kept its steady orbit. It was a safe, cheerful world in which you could laugh and have a good time—dance, see a film, a play, or a cabaret, and put off for as long as possible the return to the cold, shattered place where your own warm world had been.
They did not always go out. Sometimes they stayed in Lilla’s charming drawing-room and talked. Sometimes he played to them. Those rather square hands of his with the strong, blunt fingers were quite extraordinarily agile on the keys of the Steinway baby grand. He would sit there playing one thing after another whilst the two girls listened. When the time came to say good-night he would hold Lyndall’s hand for a moment and say, “Did you like it?” Sometimes she would say, “Yes,” and sometimes she would only look, because when she felt deeply she never found it at all easy to translate her feelings into words. Except with Philip, who nearly always knew what she was thinking, and so, because no words were needed, they came quite easily.
Music let her into a world which was neither hers nor Pelham Trent’s, though his playing was the gate through which she entered it. It was a world where feeling and emotion were sublimated until they possessed nothing except beauty, where sorrow spent itself in music and loss was solaced. She came back from this world rested and refreshed.
After all Milly Armitage did not stay on at Jocelyn’s Holt. It was not in her to refuse what Philip asked, but she had never responded to any of her sister-in-law Cotty Armitage’s not infrequent appeals with more alacrity. Cotty enjoyed poor health. For twenty-five years or so she had had recurring attacks to which no doctor had ever been able to give a name. They involved the maximum of trouble to her family with the minimum of discomfort to herself. She had worn a husband into his grave, two daughters into matrimony, and the third to the brink of a breakdown. It was when Olive appeared likely to go over this brink that Cotty took up pen and paper and invited her dearest Milly to visit them. And Milly, incurably soft-hearted, invariably went.
“Of course what she really wants is for someone to pour a hogshead of cold water over her.”
“Then why don’t you?” said Lilla, with
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