Told by an Idiot by Rose Macaulay Page A

that all else is gone. Forgive and forget, eh, Franya Maryavitch? You and I must keep one another warm. . . . Aie, aie, aie, my poor papa,” she wailed in Russian. “I keep seeing his face as they took him, and my poor Feodor’s. As to mamma, she is dazed; she will never get over it. We must keep her always with us, poor little mamma. . . . Tea at once, Franya. I am going to be sick,” she added in Magyar, and was.
    Mr. Jayne laid his wife on his bed and took off her shoes and bathed her forehead, while she moaned in Polish. Then he made tea for her and the children and his mother-in-law, who sat heavily in a chair and drank five cups, and looked at him with drowsy, inimical eyes, saying never a word. He felt like a dead man, in a world full of ghosts. Who were these, who had this claim upon him? Their clinging hands were pulling him down, out of life into a tomb. The February evening shadows lay coldly on his heart. These poor, distraught women, these little children—he must take infinite care of them, and let them lack for nothing, but he must not let them come close into his life; they would throttle it. His life, his true life, was with Rome. Rome, the gallant, fastidious dandy, with her delicate poise, her pride, her cool wit and grace. Not with this violent, unhappy, inconsequent Slav, chattering in several tongues upon his bed.
    To-morrow he would go and talk to Rome . . . explain to Rome. . . .

7
English Tragedy
     
    Miss Garden received Mr. Jayne. Neither had slept much, for Mr. Jayne had given his bed to his family and lain himself on a horsehair couch, and Miss Garden had been troubled by her thoughts. Their faces were pale and shadowed and heavy-eyed.
    Miss Garden said, “This is the end, of course. I shan’t need a week now. Fate has intervened very opportunely.”
    “No,” said Mr. Jayne, with passion. “No. Nothing is changed. For God’s sake, don’t think that our situation is changed. It is not. She wants protection and security and a home, and I will provide all those for her and her mother and the children. Me she does not want. They shall have everything they want. But I shall not live with them.”
    “You still think that you and I can live together?” Miss Garden was sceptical of his optimism. “I don’t think your wife would tolerate that. No, Frank, it’s no use. They belong to you. They need you. I can’t come between you. It would be heartless and selfish. Imagine the situation for a moment . . . it is impossible.”
    They both imagined it. Mr. Jayne shuddered, like a man very cold.
    “You don’t want to be involved in such a—such a melodrama,” he said, bitterly.
    “Put it at that if you like. I take it we are neither of us fond of melodrama. But, apart from that, Isaid all along, and meant it, that if your wife wants you I can’t take you. She has first claim.”
    “I shall not live with Olga Petrushka and her mother.”
    “That’s your own affair, of course. You are very likely right, since you don’t get on well together. But you must see that you and I can’t . . .”
    Miss Garden stopped, for her voice began to shake. How she loved him! She pressed her hands together in her lap till the rings bruised her fingers.
    Mr. Jayne gazed at her gloomily, observing her lightly poised body, slim and elegant in a dark blue taffeta dress which stood out behind below the waist in a kind of shelf, and made her shape rather like that of a swan. He saw her slight, anguished hands that hurt each other, and the pale tremor of her face.
    “She’s been through hell, and she wants you,” said Miss Garden, trying to keep control.
    “I tell you I can’t live with her, nor she with me. Do you want to turn my life into a tragi-comic opera?”
    “Most life is a tragi-comic opera,” said Rome, trying to smile. “Perhaps all.”
    “But you’re resolved anyhow to keep yours clear of
my
tragi-comedies,” he flung at her.
    Then he apologised.
    “I don’t mean that; I don’t know