The Death of the Heart - Elizabeth Bowen [110]
"No, they said you hadn't."
"No. It's a pity, really. Well, it's nice to see you again. Is everything going well?"
"Yes, thank you. I'm enjoying the spring."
"Yes, it is nice," said Thomas. "It feels to me cold, of course.... Would you care to go for a turn in the park, later?"
"That would be lovely. When?"
"Well, I think later, don't you?... Where did you say Anna was?"
"She's just having her bath. She asked me to write something to Major Brutt. I wonder, Thomas, if I might write at your desk?"
"Oh yes, by all means do."
Having discharged himself of this good feeling, Thomas unostentatiously left the study while Portia opened the blotter to write to Major Brutt. He got himself a drink, carried the drink upstairs, and took a look round the drawingroom on his way. Not a thing had been tweaked from its flat, unfeeling position—palpably Anna had not been in here yet. So then he carried his drink into Anna's room, and sat on the big bed till she should come from her bath. His heavy vague reflections weighted him into a stone figure—Anna jumped when she came round the door at him, her wrapper open, the bunch of steam-blotched opened letters in her hand. Superfluously, she said: "How you made me jump!"
"I wondered if there were letters..."
"There are letters, of course. But nothing at all funny. However, darling, here they all are." She dropped the letters on to the bed beside him, and went across to the mirror, where she took off the net cap that kept the waves in her hair. Making a harsh face at her reflection, she began to rub in complexion milk with both hands. Tapping about among the pots and bottles, she had found everything in its known place—the familiarity of all these actions made something at once close in on her: the mood of her London dressing-table. With her back to Thomas, who sat raking through letters, she said: "Well, here we are back."
"What did you say?"
"I said, we are back again."
Thomas looked all round the room, then at the dressing-table. He said: "How quickly Matchett's unpacked."
"Only the dressing case. After that, I turned her out and told her to come back and finish later. I could see from her face she was going to say something."
Thomas left the letters and sat leaning forward. "Perhaps she really had got something to say."
"Well, Thomas, but what a moment—really! Did you hear me say just now that here we were, back?"
"I did, yes. What do you want me to say?"
"I wish you would say something. Our life goes by without any comment."
"What you want is some sort of a troubadour."
Anna wiped complexion milk off her fingers on to a tissue, smartly re-tied the sash of her wrapper, walked across and gave Thomas's head a light friendly-unfriendly cuff. She said: "You are like one of those sitting images that get moved about but still always just sit. I like to feel some way about what happens. We're home, Thomas: have some ideas about home—" More lightly, less kindly, she hit at his head again.
"Shut up: don't knock me about. I've got a headache."
"Oh dear, oh dear! Try a bath."
"I will later. But just now, don't hit my head....
I thought Portia gave us a welcome."
"Poor child, oh poor child, yes. She stood about like an angel. It was we who were not adequate. I wasn't very, was I?"
"No, I don't think you were."
"But you think you were? You bolted into the study. What's in your mind, I suppose, is, why should you rise to occasions when I don't? Let's face it—who ever is adequate? We all create situations each other can't live up to, then break our hearts at them because they don't. One doesn't have to be in love to be silly—in fact I think one is sillier when one's not in love, because then one makes a thing about everything. At least, that is how it is with me. Major Brutt sending those carnations has made me hysterical. Did you see them? They were cochineal pink."
"I don't create situations, I don't think."
"Yes, you do; you're creating one by having a headache. Besides you are making creases in my quilt."
"I'm sorry," said Thomas rising. "I'll go down."
"Now you are making another situation. What I really want to do is to dress and not have to talk, but I can't have you walk out into the night. And Matchett is simply waiting to pop back and rustle about and spring something on me. I know I am disappointing you, darling. I'm sure you would be happier in the study."