Swamp Angel by Ethel Wilson Read Free Book Online Page B

frighteningly. She blew smoke slowly and contemplated the tip of her cigarette.
    “In the evening,” said Mrs. Severance, “when you get off the bus or out of your car or whatever it is and go into your house, you don’t want to go in. It feels dreadful and I grant you – it is. It looks messy and it is. You hate eating tinned things. The ashes are cold and days old in the grate … yes? … and the house is dead and after a bite to eat you sit down to read the paper and then you have a drink and then you have another but you cannot concentrate on the paper, and you begin your regular evening hate of her….” Mrs. Severance dropped her voice and said very softly, “And then you startthinking revenge … and murder would be a pleasure….”
    “Oh!” said Edward Vardoe. He clapped a hand to his mouth, but he did not contradict her.
    “And then,” continued the soft voice of Mrs. Severance, “you have another drink, and you get to
wishing
murder, and if she came in at the door…. Listen. I know all about you.” (She does, thought Edward, with unhappy eyes.) “You’re sorry for yourself…. Be quiet! … self-pity is dynamite, you should know that at your age. It’s … what? a month and more since she went away. When two months to the day have gone, you must get in touch with my daughter Hilda, and she will come and help you pack every single thing that belongs to your wife. You can store it in our basement, or anywhere you like, or you can give it away or sell it, or burn it.”
    “That’s right! Burn it!” said Edward Vardoe, leaning forward, seeing the flames licking up and up. “She walked out on me!”
    “She forfeited it by going away.”
    “That’s right, that’s right, sure, she forfeited it! That’s what she did by acting like that! She …”
    “She forfeited it,” went on Mrs. Severance, and thought: It was cheap for her at that price. “Then you must empty the house, sell what you want, and keep what you want. I’d keep nothing, if I were you, except your clothes of course. Sell the house. Take a small bright flat – two rooms in the West End. Entertain at dinner once a week.”
    “Who’ll I entertain?” asked Eddie Vardoe. Mrs. Severance found the question shocking in its simplicity and its need.
    “Your partner and his wife – hasn’t he got a wife? – and some woman friend of theirs. I tell you, Vardoe, if you keep on as you’re going now, you’ll go down, and out of sight.”
    Through the turmoil of Eddie’s mind the face ofOctavius Weller looked at him in a way that made him uneasy, and he knew that what this formidable woman said was true.
    “And as to finding her and punishing her, which you know you’ve thought about, don’t be ridiculous. Even killing her wouldn’t hurt her … it would only hurt you … it wouldn’t touch her. She’s not that kind. She is punishing herself….” and Mrs. Severance paused for a long moment. “If,” she said slowly, “in a year’s time you need to marry again, come and talk to me about it.” Edward’s spaniel eyes swam with tears but he did not speak. “Now leave me.” He stood up. “You should wait out the two months so that you can always say to yourself ‘I waited.’ But between now and then you’d be wise to pack a bag and go to a hotel, any hotel, a boarding house, it’d be easier for you and you can find a flat and sell your house. Do as you like about that … and then telephone my daughter in two weeks’ time. You’ve got a new life ahead” (you poor fool, she thought), “if you’ll do as I say. Now go. You shouldn’t exhaust me like this. I’m old. There’s your hat. Don’t stand talking. I’m not strong, I tell you. I have to go to bed. All right. All right. Just slam it. It locks.”
    She heaved herself out of her chair, the powerful willful old woman, and stood at the window watching Edward Vardoe getting into his new car. She smiled a faint smile but her face was not happy because she saw