Encounters: stories by Elizabeth Bowen, Robarts - University of Toronto Read Free Book Online Page B

garden with what had been pent up in

    him so long; then he knew that he must leave her to live out her days in the immunity of finished grief. The silence of imperfect sympathy would still lie between them, as it had always lain; his harshness could no longer cast a shadow in her world, that was now as sunless as an evening garden. His lips were sealed still, and for ever, by fear of her and shame for his dead loyalty to Howard. The generosity of love had turned to bitterness within him, and he was silent from no fear to cause her pain.
    "Beautiful,"he said, when they reached the pergola and could look down on lake and garden through the clustered roses.
    "Will you be long at Varenna?"
    "I don't expect so, no. Some friends want me to join them on Lake Maggiore, and I think of going on to-morrow afternoon."
    "That will be better,"she said slowly."It is lonely seeing places alone—they hardly seem worth while."
    "I'm used to it—I'm going back to India in six months,"he said abruptly.
    "Oh, I didn't know."Her voice faltered.

    He had not known himself till then. Her face was whiter than ever in the dusk of the pergola, and her hands were plucking, plucking at the creepers, shaking down from the roses above white petals which he kept brushing from his coat.
    "I'm sorry you're going back,"she said."Everybody will be sorry."
    "I won't go until I have finished everything that I can do for you."
    An expression came into her eyes that he had never seen before."You have been a friend,"she said."Men make better things for themselves out of life than we do."
    "They don't last,"he said involuntarily.
    "I should have said that so far as anything is immortal"He watched a little tightening of her hps.
    "It takes less than you think to kill these things; friendship, loyalty"
    "Yours was unassailable, yours and his"; she spoke more to herself than to him."In those early days when we three went about together; that time in France, I realised that."
    "In France?"he said stupidly.
    "Yes. Don't you remember?"

    He remembered France; the days they had spent together, and the long evenings in starlight, and the evening he had strolled beside her on a terrace while Majendie tinkered with the car. It was a chilly evening, and she kept drawing her furs together and said very little. The night after, he had lain awake listening to her voice and Majendie's in the next room, and making up his mind to go to India.
    "Yes,"he said."Now, will you let me have the papers and we could go through them now? I could take any that are urgent back to town with me; I shall be there in a week."
    She twisted her hands irresolutely."Could you come to-morrow, before you go? I would have them ready for you then, if you can spare the time. I'm tired this evening; I don't believe I would be able to understand them. Do you mind?"
    "No, of course not. But may I come in the morning? I am going away early in the afternoon."
    She nodded slowly, looked away from him and did not speak. She was evidently very much tired.

    "I think I ought to go,"he said after a pause.
    "If you hurried you could catch that steamer down at Cadenabbia."
    "Then I'll hurry. Don't come down."
    "I won't come down,"she said, holding out her hand."Good-bye, and thank you."
    He hurried to the end of the pergola, hesitated, half turned his head, and stopped irresolutely. Surely she had called him? He listened, but there was no sound. She stood where he had left her, with her back towards him, leaning against a pillar and looking out across the lake.
    Turning, he pushed his way between the branches, down the overgrown path. The leaves rustled, he listened again; somebody was trying to detain him. As the slope grew steeper he quickened his steps to a run, and, skirting the terrace, took a short cut on to the avenue. Soon the lake glittered through the iron gates.
    She leant back against the pillar, gripping in handfuls the branches of the climbing rose. She heard his descending footsteps hesitate for a long