Christopher and Columbus by Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim

C >> Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim >> Christopher and Columbus

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"You've forgotten the sugar," said Anna-Felicitas's gentle voice behind
Mr. Twist as he was putting down the tray; and there she was, sure
enough, looking smugger than ever.

"This is Mr. Twist," said Anna-Felicitas with an amiable gesture. "That
I was telling you about," she explained to the young man.

"When?" asked Mr. Twist, surprised.

"Before," said Anna-Felicitas. "We were talking for some time before I
went in to order the tea, weren't we?" she said to the young man,
angelically smiling at him.

"Rather," he said; and since he didn't on this introduction remark to
Mr. Twist that he was pleased to meet him, it was plain he couldn't be
an American. Therefore he must be English. Unless, suddenly suspected
Mr. Twist who had Germans badly on his nerves that day and was ready to
suspect anything, he was German cleverly got up for evil purposes to
appear English. But the young man dispersed these suspicions by saying
that he was over from England on six months' leave, and that his name
was Elliott.

"Like us," said Anna-Felicitas.

The young man looked at her with what would have been a greater interest
than ever if a greater interest had been possible, only it wasn't.

"What, are you an Elliott too?" he asked eagerly.

Anna-Felicitas shook her head. "On the contrary," she said, "I'm a
Twinkler. And so is my sister. What I meant was, you're like us about
coming from England. We've done that. Only our leave is for ever and
ever. Or the duration of the war."

Mr. Twist waved her aside. "Anna-Felicitas," he said, "your sister is
waiting for you in the office and wants you badly. I'll see to Mr.
Elliott."

"Why not bring your sister here?" said the young man, who, being in the
navy, was fertile in resourcefulness. And he smiled at Anna-Felicitas,
who smiled back; indeed, they did nothing but smile at each other.

"I think that's a brilliant idea," she said; and turned to Mr. Twist.
"You go," she said gently, thereby proving herself, the young man
considered, at least his equal in resourcefulness. "It's much more
likely," she continued, as Mr. Twist gazed at her without moving, "that
she'll come for you than for me. My sister," she explained to the young
man, "is older than I am."

"Then certainly I should say Mr. Twist is more likely--"

"But only about twenty minutes older."

"What? A twin? I say, how extraordinarily jolly. Two of you?"

"Anna-Felicitas," interrupted Mr. Twist, "you will go to your sister
immediately. She needs you. She's upset. I don't wish to draw Mr.
Elliott behind the scenes of family life, but as nothing seems to get
you into the office you force me to tell you that she is very, much
upset indeed, and is crying."

"Crying?" echoed Anna-Felicitas. "Christopher?" And she turned and
departed in such haste that the young man, who luckily was alert as well
as resourceful, had only just time to lean over and grab at a chair in
her way and pull it aside, and so avert a deplorable catastrophe.

"I hope it's nothing serious?" he inquired of Mr. Twist.

"Oh no. Children will cry."

"Children?"

Mr. Twist sat down at the table and lit a cigarette. "Tell me about
England," he said. "You've been wounded, I see."

"Leg," said the young man, still standing leaning on his stick and
looking after Anna-Felicitas.

"But that didn't get you six months' leave."

"Lungs," said the young man, looking down impatiently at Mr. Twist.

Then the swing doors swung to, and he sat down and poured out his tea.

He had been in the battle of Jutland, and was rescued after hours in the
water. For months he was struggling to recover, but finally tuberculosis
had developed and he was sent to California, to his sister who had
married an American and lived in the neighbourhood of Acapulco. This Mr.
Twist extracted out of him by diligent questioning. He had to question
very diligently. What the young man wanted to talk about was
Anna-Felicitas; but every time he tried to, Mr. Twist headed him off.

And she didn't come back. He waited and waited, and drank and drank.
When the teapot was empty he started on the hot water. Also he ate all
the cakes, more and more deliberately, eking them out at last with
slowly smoked cigarettes. He heard all about France and Mr. Twist's
activities there; he had time to listen to the whole story of the
ambulance from start to finish; and still she didn't come back. In vain
he tried at least to get Mr. Twist off those distant fields, nearer
home--to the point, in fact, where the Twinklers were. Mr. Twist
wouldn't budge. He stuck firmly. And the swing doors remained shut. And
the cakes were all eaten. And there was nothing for it at last but to
go.

So after half-an-hour of solid sitting he began slowly to get up, still
spreading out the moments, with one eye on the swing doors. It was both
late and cold. The Germans had departed, and Li Koo had lit the usual
evening wood fire in the big fireplace. It blazed most beautifully, and
the young man looked at it through the window and hesitated.

"How jolly," he said.

"Firelight is very pleasant," agreed Mr. Twist, who had got up too.

"I oughtn't to have stayed so long out here," said the young man with a
little shiver.

"I was thinking it was unwise," said Mr. Twist.

"Perhaps I'd better go in and warm myself a bit before leaving."

"I should say your best plan is to get back quickly to your sister and
have a hot bath before dinner," said Mr. Twist.

"Yes. But I think I might just go in there and have a cup of hot coffee
first."

"There is no hot coffee at this hour," said Mr. Twist, looking at his
watch. "We close at half-past six, and it is now ten minutes after."

"Then there seems nothing for it but to pay my bill and go," said the
young man, with an air of cheerful adaptation to what couldn't be
helped. "I'll just nip in there and do that."

"Luckily there's no need for you to nip anywhere," said Mr. Twist, "for
surely that's a type of movement unsuited to your sick leg. You can pay
me right here."

And he took the young man's five dollars, and went with him as far as
the green gate, and would have helped him into the waiting car, seeing
his leg wasn't as other legs and Mr. Twist was, after all, humane, but
the chauffeur was there to do that; so he just watched from the gate
till the car had actually started, and then went back to the house.

He went back slowly, perturbed and anxious, his eyes on the ground. This
second day had been worse than the first. And besides the continued and
remarkable absence of Americans and the continued and remarkable
presence of Germans, there was a slipperiness suddenly developed in the
Annas. He felt insecure; as though he didn't understand, and hadn't got
hold. They seemed to him very like eels. And this Elliott--what did he
think _he_ was after, anyway?

For the second time that afternoon Mr. Twist set his teeth. He defied
Elliott. He defied the Germans. He would see this thing successful, this
Open Arms business, or his name wasn't Twist. And he stuck out his
jaw--or would have stuck it out if he hadn't been prevented by the
amiable weakness of that feature. But spiritually and morally, when he
got back into the house he was all jaw.

CHAPTER XXXIV

That night he determined he would go into Acapulco next morning and drop
in at his bank and at his lawyer's and other places, and see if he could
pick up anything that would explain why Americans wouldn't come and have
tea at The Open Arms. He even thought he might look up old Ridding. He
didn't sleep. He lay all night thinking.

The evening had been spent _tete-a-tete_ with Anna-Felicitas. Anna-Rose
was in bed, sleeping off her tears; Mrs. Bilton had another headache,
and disappeared early; so he was left with Anna-Felicitas, who slouched
about abstractedly eating up the remains of ice-cream. She didn't talk,
except once to remark a little pensively that her inside was dreadfully
full of cold stuff, and that she knew now what it must feel like to be a
mausoleum; but, eyeing her sideways as he sat before the fire, Mr. Twist
could see that she was still smug. He didn't talk either. He felt he had
nothing at present to say to Anna-Felicitas that would serve a useful
purpose, and was, besides, reluctant to hear any counter-observations
she might make. Watchfulness was what was required. Silent watchfulness.
And wariness. And firmness. In fact all the things that were most
foreign to his nature, thought Mr. Twist, resentful and fatigued.

Next morning he had a cup of coffee in his room, brought by Li Koo, and
then drove himself into Acapulco in his Ford without seeing the others.
It was another of the perfect days which he was now beginning to take
as a matter of course, so many had there been since his arrival. People
talked of the wet days and of their desolate abundance once they
started, but there had been as yet no sign of them. The mornings
succeeded each other, radiant and calm. November was merging into
December in placid loveliness. "Oh yes," said Mr. Twist to himself
sardonically, as he drove down the sun-flecked lane in the gracious
light, and crickets chirped at him, and warm scents drifted across his
face, and the flowers in the grass, standing so bright and unruffled
that they seemed almost as profoundly pleased as Anna-Felicitas, nodded
at him, and everything was obviously perfectly contented and happy, "Oh
yes--I daresay." And he repeated this remark several times as he looked
round him,--he couldn't but look, it was all so beautiful. These things
hadn't to deal with Twinklers. No wonder they could be calm and bright.
So could he, if--

He turned a corner in the lane and saw some way down it two figures, a
man and a girl, sitting in the grass by the wayside. Lovers, of course.
"Oh yes--I daresay," said Mr. Twist again, grimly. They hadn't to deal
with Twinklers either. No wonder they could sit happily in the grass. So
could he, if--

At the noise of the approaching car, with the smile of the last thing
they had been saying still on their faces, the two turned their heads,
and it was that man Elliott and Anna-Felicitas.

"Hello," called out Mr. Twist, putting on the brakes so hard that the
Ford skidded sideways along the road towards them.

"Hello," said the young man cheerfully, waving his stick.

"Hello," said Anna-Felicitas mildly, watching his sidelong approach
with complacent interest.

She had no hat on, and had evidently escaped from Mrs. Bilton just as
she was. Escaped, however, was far too violent a word Mr. Twist felt;
sauntered from Mrs. Bilton better described her effect of natural and
comfortable arrival at the place where she was.

"I didn't know you were here," said Mr. Twist addressing her when the
car had stopped. He felt it was a lame remark. He had torrents of things
he wanted to say, and this was all that came out.

Anna-Felicitas considered it placidly for a moment, and came to the
conclusion that it wasn't worth answering, so she didn't.

"Going into the town?" inquired Elliott pleasantly.

"Yes. I'll give you a lift."

"No thanks. I've just come from there."

"I see. Then _you'd_ better come with me," said Mr. Twist to
Anna-Felicitas.

"I'm afraid I can't. I'm rather busy this morning."

"Really," said Mr. Twist, in a voice of concentrated sarcasm. But it had
no effect on Anna-Felicitas. She continued to contemplate him with
perfect goodwill.

He hesitated a moment. What could he do? Nothing, that he could see,
before the young man; nothing that wouldn't make him ridiculous. He felt
a fool already. He oughtn't to have pulled up. He ought to have just
waved to them and gone on his way, and afterwards in the seclusion of
his office issued very plain directions to Anna-Felicitas as to her
future conduct. Sitting by the roadside like that! Openly; before
everybody; with a young man she had never seen twenty-four hours ago.

He jammed in the gear and let the clutch out with such a jerk that the
car leaped forward. Elliott waved his stick again. Mr. Twist responded
by the briefest touch of his cap, and whirred down the road out of
sight.

"Does he mind your sitting here?" asked Elliott.

"It would be very unreasonable," said Anna-Felicitas gently. "One has to
sit somewhere."

And he laughed with delight at this answer as he laughed with delight at
everything she said, and he told her for the twentieth time that she was
the most wonderful person he had ever met, and she settled down to
listen again, after the interruption caused by Mr. Twist, with a ready
ear and the utmost complacency to these agreeable statements, and began
to wonder whether perhaps after all she mightn't at last be about to
fall in love.

In the new interest of this possibility she turned her head to look at
him, and he told her tumultuously--for being a sailor-man he went
straight ahead on great waves when it came to love-making--that her eyes
were as if pansies had married stars.

She turned her head away again at this, for though it sounded lovely it
made her feel a little shy and unprovided with an answer; and then he
said, again tumultuously, that her ear was the most perfect thing ever
stuck on a girl's cheek, and would she mind turning her face to him so
that he might see if she had another just like it on the other side.

She blushed at this, because she couldn't remember whether she had
washed it lately or not--one so easily forgot one's ears; there were so
many different things to wash--and he told her that when she blushed it
was like the first wild rose of the first summer morning of the world.

At this Anna-Felicitas was quite overcome, and subsided into a
condition of blissful, quiescent waiting for whatever might come next.
Fancy her face reminding him of all those nice things. She had seen it
every day for years and years in the looking-glass, and not noticed
anything particular about it. It had seemed to her just a face.
Something you saw out of, and ate with, and had to clean whatever else
you didn't when you were late for breakfast, because there it was and
couldn't be hidden,--an object remote indeed from pansies, and stars,
and beautiful things like that.

She would have liked to explain this to the young man, and point out
that she feared his imagination ran ahead of the facts and that perhaps
when his leg was well again he would see things more as they were, but
to her surprise when she turned to him to tell him this she found she
was obliged to look away at once again. She couldn't look at him. Fancy
that now, thought Anna-Felicitas, attentively gazing at her toes. And he
had such dear eyes; and such a dear, eager sort of face. All the more,
then, she reasoned, should her own eyes have dwelt with pleasure on him.
But they couldn't. "Dear me," she murmured, watching her toes as
carefully as if they might at any moment go away and leave her there.

"I know," said Elliott. "You think I'm talking fearful flowery stuff.
I'd have said Dear me at myself three years ago if I had ever caught
myself thinking in terms of stars and roses. But it's all the beastly
blood and muck of the war that does it,--sends one back with a rush to
things like that. Makes one shameless. Why, I'd talk to you about God
now without turning a hair. Nothing would have induced me so much as to
mention seriously that I'd even heard of him three years ago. Why, I
write poetry now. We all write poetry. And nobody would mind now being
seen saying their prayers. Why, if I were back at school and my mother
came to see me I'd hug her before everybody in the middle of the street.
Do you realize what a tremendous change that means, you little girl
who's never had brothers? You extraordinary adorable little lovely
thing?"

And off he was again.

"When I was small," said Anna-Felicitas after a while, still watching
her feet, "I had a governess who urged me to consider, before I said
anything, whether it were the sort of thing I would like to say in the
hearing of my parents. Would you like to say what you're saying to me in
the hearing of your parents?"

"Hate to," said Elliott promptly.

"Well, then," said Anna-Felicitas, gentle but disappointed. She rather
wished now she hadn't mentioned it.

"I'd take you out of earshot," said Elliott.

She was much relieved. She had done what she felt might perhaps be
regarded by Aunt Alice as her duty as a lady, and could now give herself
up with a calm conscience to hearing whatever else he might have to say.

And he had an incredible amount to say, and all of it of the most highly
gratifying nature. On the whole, looking at it all round and taking one
thing with another, Anna-Felicitas came to the conclusion that this was
the most agreeable and profitable morning she had ever spent. She sat
there for hours, and they all flew. People passed in cars and saw her,
and it didn't disturb her in the least. She perfectly remembered she
ought to be helping Anna-Rose pick and arrange the flowers for the
tea-tables, and she didn't mind. She knew Anna-Rose would be astonished
and angry at her absence, and it left her unmoved. By midday she was
hopelessly compromised in the eyes of Acapulco, for the people who had
motored through the lane told the people who hadn't what they had seen.
Once a great car passed with a small widow in it, who looked astonished
when she saw the pair but had gone almost before Elliott could call out
and wave to her.

"That's my sister," he said. "You and she will love each other."

"Shall we?" said Anna-Felicitas, much pleased by this suggestion of
continuity in their relations; and remarked that she looked as if she
hadn't got a husband.

"She hasn't. Poor little thing. Rotten luck. Rotten. I hate people to
die now. It seems so infernally unnatural of them, when they're not in
the fighting. He's only been dead a month. And poor old Dellogg was such
a decent chap. She isn't going anywhere yet, or I'd bring her up to tea
this afternoon. But it doesn't matter. I'll take you to her."

"Shall you?" said Anna-Felicitas, again much pleased. Dellogg. The name
swam through her mind and swam out again. She was too busy enjoying
herself to remark it and its coincidences now.

"Of course. It's the first thing one does."

"What first thing?"

"To take the divine girl to see one's relations. Once one has found her.
Once one has had"--his voice fell to a whisper--"the God-given luck to
find her." And he laid his hand very gently on hers, which were clasped
together in her lap.

This was a situation to which Anna-Felicitas wasn't accustomed, and she
didn't know what to do with it. She looked down at the hand lying on
hers, and considered it without moving. Elliott was quite silent now,
and she knew he was watching her face. Ought she, perhaps, to be going?
Was this, perhaps, one of the moments in life when the truly judicious
went? But what a pity to go just when everything was so pleasant. Still,
it must be nearly lunch-time. What would Aunt Alice do in a similar
situation? Go home to lunch, she was sure. Yet what was lunch when one
was rapidly arriving, as she was sure now that she was, at the condition
of being in love? She must be, or she wouldn't like his hand on hers.
And she did like it.

She looked down at it, and found that she wanted to stroke it. But would
Aunt Alice stroke it? No; Anna-Felicitas felt fairly clear about that.
Aunt Alice wouldn't stroke it; she would take it up, and shake it, and
say good-bye, and walk off home to lunch like a lady. Well, perhaps she
ought to do that. Christopher would probably think so too. But what a
pity.... Still, behaviour was behaviour; ladies were ladies.

She drew out her right hand with this polite intention, and
instead--Anna-Felicitas never knew how it happened--she did nothing of
the sort, but quite the contrary: she put it softly on the top of his.

CHAPTER XXXV

Meanwhile Mr. Twist had driven on towards Acapulco in a state of painful
indecision. Should he or shouldn't he take a turning he knew of a couple
of miles farther that led up an unused and practically undrivable track
back by the west side to The Open Arms, and instruct Mrs. Bilton to
proceed at once down the lane and salvage Anna-Felicitas? Should he or
shouldn't he? For the first mile he decided he would; then, as his anger
cooled, he began to think that after all he needn't worry much. The
Annas were lucidly too young for serious philandering, and even if that
Elliott didn't realize this, owing to Anna-Felicitas's great length, he
couldn't do much before he, Mr. Twist, was back again along the lane. In
this he under-estimated the enterprise of the British Navy, but it
served to calm him; so that when he did reach the turning he had made up
his mind to continue on his way to Acapulco.

There he spent some perplexing and harassing hours.

At the bank his reception was distinctly chilly. He wasn't used, since
his teapot had been on the market, to anything but warmth when he went
into a bank. On this occasion even the clerks were cold; and when after
difficulty--actual difficulty--he succeeded in seeing the manager, he
couldn't but perceive his unusual reserve. He then remembered what he
had put down to mere accident at the time, that as he drove up Main
Street half an hour before, all the people he knew had been looking the
other way.

From the bank, where he picked up nothing in the way of explanation of
the American avoidance of The Open Arms, the manager going dumb at its
mere mention, he went to the solicitors who had arranged the sale of the
inn, and again in the street people he knew looked the other way. The
solicitor, it appeared, wouldn't be back till the afternoon, and the
clerk, an elderly person hitherto subservient, was curiously short about
it.

By this time Mr. Twist was thoroughly uneasy, and he determined to ask
the first acquaintance he met what the matter was. But he couldn't find
anybody. Every one, his architect, his various experts--those genial and
frolicsome young men--were either engaged or away on business somewhere
else. He set his teeth, and drove to the Cosmopolitan to seek out old
Ridding--it wasn't a place he drove to willingly after his recent
undignified departure, but he was determined to get to the bottom of
this thing--and walking into the parlour was instantly aware of a hush
falling upon it, a holding of the breath.

In the distance he saw old Ridding,--distinctly; and distinctly he saw
that old Ridding saw him. He was sitting at the far end of the great
parlour, facing the entrance, by the side of something vast and black
heaped up in the adjacent chair. He had the look on his pink and
naturally pleasant face of one who has abandoned hope. On seeing Mr.
Twist a ray of interest lit him up, and he half rose. The formless mass
in the next chair which Mr. Twist had taken for inanimate matter,
probably cushions and wraps, and now perceived was one of the higher
mammals, put out a hand and said something,--at least, it opened that
part of its face which is called a mouth but which to Mr. Twist in the
heated and abnormal condition of his brain seemed like the snap-to of
some great bag,--and at that moment a group of people crossed the hall
in front of old Ridding, and when the path was again clear the chair
that had contained him was empty. He had disappeared. Completely. Only
the higher mammal was left, watching Mr. Twist with heavy eyes like two
smouldering coals.

He couldn't face those eyes. He did try to, and hesitated while he
tried, and then he found he couldn't; so he swerved away to the right,
and went out quickly by the side door.

There was now one other person left who would perhaps clear him up as to
the meaning of all this, and he was the lawyer he had gone to about the
guardianship. True he had been angry with him at the time, but that was
chiefly because he had been angry with himself. At bottom he had carried
away an impression of friendliness. To this man he would now go as a
last resource before turning back home, and once more he raced up Main
Street in his Ford, producing by these repeated appearances an effect of
agitation and restlessness that wasn't lost on the beholders.

The lawyer was in his office, and disengaged. After his morning's
experience Mr. Twist was quite surprised and much relieved by being
admitted at once. He was received neither coldly nor warmly, but with
unmistakable interest.

"I've come to consult you," said Mr. Twist.

The lawyer nodded. He hadn't supposed he had come not to consult him,
but he was used to patience with clients, and he well knew their
preference in conversation for the self-evident.

"I want a straight answer to a straight question," said Mr. Twist, his
great spectacles glaring anxiously at the lawyer who again nodded.

"Go on," he said, as Mr. Twist paused.

"What I want to know is," burst out Mr. Twist, "what the hell--"

The lawyer put up a hand. "One moment, Mr. Twist," he said. "Sorry to
interrupt--"

And he got up quickly, and went to a door in the partition between his
office and his clerks' room.

"You may go out to lunch now," he said, opening it a crack.

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