The Death of the Heart - Elizabeth Bowen [117]
"Oh, I shouldn't say that."
That had been on Wednesday. This Saturday, Portia soon moved out of Eddie's chair, which he slipped gladly back to, to take her accustomed place on the stool near the fire. A pallid flare and a rustling rose from the logs; the windows framed panoramas of wet trees; the room looked high and faint in rainy afternoon light. Between Portia and Anna extended the still life of the tea-tray. On her knees, pressed together, Portia kept balanced the plate on which a rock cake slid. Beginning to nibble at the rock cake, she sat watching Anna at tea with Eddie, as she had watched her at tea with other intimate guests.
By coming in, however, she had brought whatever there was to a nonplussed pause. The fact that they let her see such a pause happen made her the accessory she hardly wanted to be. Eddie propped an elbow on the wing of his chair, leaned a temple on a palm and looked into the fire. His eyes flickered up and down with the point of flickering flame. Desultorily, and for his private pleasure, he began to make mouths like a fish—curling his lower lip out, sucking it in again, Anna, using her thumb nail, slit open a new box of cigarettes, then packed her tortoise-shell case with them. Portia finished her cake, approached the tray and helped herself to another—taking his eyes from the fire for one moment, Eddie accorded her one irresponsible smile. "When do we go for another walk?" he said.
Anna said: "Are you ready for more tea?"
"A fortnight ago," said Portia, for no reason, going back for her cup, "I was having tea at Seale golf club with Dickie Heccomb and Clara—a girl there that he sometimes plays golf with."
Anna ducked in her chin and smiled vaguely and nodded. Absently, she said, "Was that fun?"
"Yes, the gorse was out."
"Yes, Seale must have been fun."
"There's a picture of you there, in my room."
"A photograph?"
"No, a picture holding a kitten."
Anna put her hand to her head. "Kitten?" she said. "What do you mean, Portia?"
"A black kitten."
Anna thought back. "Oh, that black kitten. Poor little thing, it died.... You mean, when I was a child?"
"Yes, you had long hair."
"A chalk drawing. Oh, is that in her spare room? But who is Clara? Tell me about her."
Portia did not know how to begin—she glanced at Eddie. He came to himself and said with the greatest ease: "Clara? Clara's position was uncertain. She was hardly in the set. All the same, she haunts me—perhaps because of that. She spends ever so much money hoping to marry Dickie—Dickie Heccomb, you know. Besides money, she keeps inside her handbag a sort of mouse's nest that she dives into whenever things get too difficult. Doesn't she, Portia? We saw Clara do that."
Anna said: "I wish I could."
"Oh, you would never need to, Anna darling.... Well, we made Clara pop into her handbag that night at the E.C.P. When we all behaved so badly. I was the worst, of course. It was really dreadful, Anna: Portia and I had been for a nice walk in some woods, then I ruined the day by getting tight and rowdy. I had made a fine impression when I first got to Waikiki, but I'm afraid that spoiled it." Eddie gave Portia an equivocal sidelong look, then turned his head and went on talking to Anna. "Clara's position was really trying, you see: she had eyes only for Dickie, and Dickie had eyes only for Portia here."
She made a dumbfounded movement. "Oh, Eddie, he hadn't!"
"Well, there were goings-on—they were perfectly onesided, but there were goings-on as far as Dickie does go. I heard him breathing over you at the movies. He breathed so much that he even breathed over me."
"Eddie," Anna said, "you really are very common." She looked remotely, sternly down at her finger-nails, but after a minute could not help saying: "Did you all go to the movies? When?"
"That first evening I got there," Eddie said fluently. "Six of us. All the set. I must say, I really was shocked by Dickie: not only is he an old Fascist, but he does not know how to behave at all. At the seaside, they really do go the pace."
"How dreadful for you," said Anna. "And so, what did you do?"