No More Learning

Spending, or rather owing, fabulous sums on clothes, he yet lived almost as ascetically as
a monk. He exercised himself ceaselessly and brutally, rationed his drink and his
cigarettes, slept on a camp bed (in silk pyjamas) and bathed in cold water in the bitterest
winter. Horsemanship and physical fitness were the only gods he knew. The stamp of
hoofs on the maidan, the strong, poised feeling of his body, wedded centaurlike to the



saddle, the polo-stick springy in his hand — these were his religion, the breath of his life.
The Europeans in Burma — boozing, womanizing, yellow-faced loafers — made him
physically sick when he thought of their habits. As for social duties of all descriptions, he
called them poodle-faking and ignored them. Women he abhorred. In his view they were
a kind of siren whose one aim was to lure men away from polo and enmesh them in tea-
fights and tennis-parties. He was not, however, quite proof against women. He was
young, and women of nearly all kinds threw themselves at his head; now and again he
succumbed. But his lapses soon disgusted him, and he was too callous when the pinch
came to have any difficulty about escaping. He had had perhaps a dozen such escapes
during his two years in India.

A whole week went by. Elizabeth had not even succeeded in making Verrall’s
acquaintance. It was so tantalizing! Every day, morning and evening, she and her aunt
walked down to the Club and back again, past the maidan; and there was Verrall, hitting
the polo-balls the sepoys threw for him, ignoring the two women utterly. So near and yet
so far! What made it even worse was that neither woman would have considered it decent
to speak of the matter directly. One evening the polo-ball, struck too hard, came swishing
through the grass and rolled across the road in front of them. Elizabeth and her aunt
stopped involuntarily. But it was only a sepoy who ran to fetch the ball. Verrall had seen
the women and kept his distance.

Next morning Mrs Lackersteen paused as they came out of the gate. She had given up
riding in her rickshaw lately. At the bottom of the maidan the Military Policemen were
drawn up, a dust-coloured rank with bayonets glittering. Verrall was facing them, but not
in uniform — he seldom put on his unifonn for morning parade, not thinking it necessary
with mere Military Policemen. The two women were looking at everything except
Verrall, and at the same time, in some manner, were contriving to look at him.

‘The wretched thing is,’ said Mrs Lackersteen — this was a propos de bottes, but the
subject needed no introduction — ‘the wretched thing is that I’m afraid your uncle simply
MUST go back to camp before long. ’

‘Must he really? ’


‘I’m afraid so. It is so HATEFUL in camp at this time of year! Oh, those mosquitoes! ’



‘Couldn’t he stay a bit longer? A week, perhaps? ’


‘I don’t see how he can. He’s been nearly a month in headquarters now. The firm would
be furious if they heard of it. And of course both of us will have to go with him. SUCH a
bore! The mosquitoes — simply terrible! ’

Terrible indeed! To have to go away before Elizabeth had so much as said how-do-you-
do to Verrall! But they would certainly have to go if Mr Lackersteen went. It would never
do to leave him to himself. Satan finds some mischief still, even in the jungle. A ripple
like fire ran down the line of sepoys; they were unfixing bayonets before marching away.
The dusty rank turned left, saluted, and marched off in columns of fours. The orderlies
were coming from the police lines with the ponies and polo-sticks. Mrs Lackersteen took
a heroic decision.

‘I think,’ she said, ‘we’ll take a short-cut across the maidan. It’s SO much quicker than
going right round by the road. ’

It WAS quicker by about fifty yards, but no one ever went that way on foot, because of
the grass-seeds that got into one’s stockings. Mrs Lackersteen plunged boldly into the
grass, and then, dropping even the pretence of making for the Club, took a bee-line for
Verrall, Elizabeth following. Either woman would have died on the rack rather than
admit that she was doing anything but take a short-cut. Verrall saw them coming, swore,
and reined in his pony. He could not very well cut them dead now that they were coming
openly to accost him. The damned cheek of these women! He rode slowly towards them
with a sulky expression on his face, chivvying the polo-ball with small strokes.

‘Good morning, Mr Verrall! ’ Mrs Lackersteen called out in a voice of saccharine, twenty
yards away.

‘Morning! ’ he returned surlily, having seen her face and set her down as one of the usual
scraggy old boiling-fowls of an Indian station.

The next moment Elizabeth came level with her aunt. She had taken off her spectacles
and was swinging her Terai hat on her hand. What did she care for sunstroke? She was
perfectly aware of the prettiness of her cropped hair. A puff of wind — oh, those blessed



breaths of wind, coming from nowhere in the stifling hot- weather days! — had caught her
cotton frock and blown it against her, showing the outline of her body, slender and strong
like a tree. Her sudden appearance beside the older, sun-scorched woman was a
revelation to Verrall. He started so that the Arab mare felt it and would have reared on
her hind legs, and he had to tighten the rein. He had not known until this moment, not
having bothered to inquire, that there were any YOUNG women in Kyauktada.

‘My niece,’ Mrs Lackersteen said.

He did not answer, but he had thrown away the polo-stick, and he took off his topi. For a
moment he and Elizabeth remained gazing at one another. Their fresh faces were
unmarred in the pitiless light. The grass-seeds were tickling Elizabeth’s shins so that it
was agony, and without her spectacles she could only see Verrall and his horse as a
whitish blur. But she was happy, happy! Her heart bounded and the blood flowed into her
face, dyeing it like a thin wash of aquarelle. The thought, ‘A peach, by Christ! ’ moved
almost fiercely through VerraU’s mind. The sullen Indians, holding the ponies’ heads,
gazed curiously at the scene, as though the beauty of the two young people had made its
impression even on them.

Mrs Lackersteen broke the silence, which had lasted half a minute.

‘You know, Mr Verrall,’ she said somewhat archly, ‘we think it RATHER unkind of you
to have neglected us poor people all this time. When we’re so PINING for a new face at
the Club. ’

He was still looking at Elizabeth when he answered, but the change in his voice was
remarkable.

‘I’ve been meaning to come for some days. Been so fearfully busy — getting my men into
their quarters and all that. I’m sorry,’ he added — he was not in the habit of apologizing,
but really, he had decided, this girl was rather an exceptional bit of stuff — ‘I’m sorry
about not answering your note. ’



‘Oh, not at all! We QUITE understood. But we do hope we shall see you at the Club this
evening! Because, you know,’ she concluded even more archly, ‘if you disappoint us any
longer, we shall begin to think you rather a NAUGHTY young man! ’

‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated. ‘I’ll be there this evening. ’

There was not much more to be said, and the two women walked on to the Club. But they
stayed barely five minutes. The grass-seeds were causing their shins such torment that
they were obliged to hurry home and change their stockings at once.

Verrall kept his promise and was at the Club that evening. He arrived a little earlier than
the others, and he had made his presence thoroughly felt before being in the place five
minutes. As Ellis entered the Club the old butler darted out of the card-room and waylaid
him. He was in great distress, the tears rolling down his cheeks.


‘Sir! Sir! ’


‘What the devil’s the matter now! ’ said Ellis.

‘Sir! Sir! New master been beating me, sir! ’

‘What? ’

‘BEATING me sir! ’ His voice rose on the ‘beating’ with a long tearful wail — ‘be-e-e-
eating! ’

‘Beating you? Do you good. Who’s been beating you? ’

‘New master, sir. Military Police sahib. Beating me with his foot, sir — HERE! ’ He
rubbed himself behind.

‘Hell! ’ said Ellis.

He went into the lounge. Verrall was reading the Field, and invisible except for Palm
Beach trouser-ends and two lustrous sooty-brown shoes. He did not trouble to stir at
hearing someone else come into the room. Ellis halted.



‘Here, you — what’s your name — Verrall! ’


‘What? ’

‘Have you been kicking our butler? ’

Verrall’ s sulky blue eye appeared round the corner of the Field, like the eye of a
crustacean peering round a rock.

‘What? ’ he repeated shortly.

‘I said, have you been kicking our bloody butler? ’

‘Yes. ’

‘Then what the hell do you mean by it? ’

‘Beggar gave me his lip. I sent him for a whisky and soda, and he brought it warm. I told
him to put ice in it, and he wouldn’t — talked some bloody rot about saving the last pieces
of ice. So I kicked his bottom. Serve him right. ’

Ellis turned quite grey. He was furious. The butler was a piece of Club property and not
to be kicked by strangers. But what most angered Ellis was the thought that Verrall quite
possibly suspected him of being SORRY for the butler — in fact, of disapproving of
kicking AS SUCH.

‘Serve him right? I dare say it bloody well did serve him right. But what in hell’s that got
to do with it? Who are YOU to come kicking our servants? ’

‘Bosh, my good chap. Needed kicking. You’ve let your servants get out of hand here. ’

‘You damned, insolent young tick, what’s it got to do with YOU if he needed kicking?
You’re not even a member of this Club. It’s our job to kick the servants, not yours. ’

Verrall lowered the Field and brought his other eye into play. His surly voice did not
change its tone. He never lost his temper with a European; it was never necessary.



‘My good chap, if anyone gives me lip I kick his bottom. Do you want me to kick yours? ’


All the fire went out of Ellis suddenly. He was not afraid, he had never been afraid in his
life; only, Verrall’s eye was too much for him. That eye could make you feel as though
you were under Niagara! The oaths wilted on Ellis’s lips; his voice almost deserted him.
He said querulously and even plaintively:

‘But damn it, he was quite right not to give you the last bit of ice. Do you think we only
buy ice for you? We can only get the stuff twice a week in this place. ’

‘Rotten bad management on your part, then,’ said Verrall, and retired behind the Field,
content to let the matter drop.

Ellis was helpless. The calm way in which Verrall went back to his paper, quite
genuinely forgetting Ellis’s existence, was maddening. Should he not give the young
swab a good, rousing kick?

But somehow, the kick was never given. Verrall had earned many kicks in his life, but he
had never received one and probably never would. Ellis seeped helplessly back to the
card-room, to work off his feelings on the butler, leaving Verrall in possession of the
lounge.

As Mr Macgregor entered the Club gate he heard the sound of music. Yellow chinks of
lantern-light showed through the creeper that covered the tennis-screen. Mr Macgregor
was in a happy mood this evening. He had promised himself a good, long talk with Miss
Lackersteen — such an exceptionally intelligent girl, that! — and he had a most interesting
anecdote to tell her (as a matter of fact, it had already seen the light in one of those little
articles of his in Blackwood’s) about a dacoity that had happened in Sagaing in 1913. She
would love to hear it, he knew. He rounded the tennis-screen expectantly. On the court, in
the mingled light of the waning moon and of lanterns slung among the trees, Verrall and
Elizabeth were dancing. The chokras had brought out chairs and a table for the
gramophone, and round these the other Europeans were sitting or standing. As Mr
Macgregor halted at the corner of the court, Verrall and Elizabeth circled round and
glided past him, barely a yard away. They were dancing very close together, her body
bent backwards under his. Neither noticed Mr Macgregor.



Mr Macgregor made his way round the court. A chilly, desolate feeling had taken
possession of his entrails. Good-bye, then, to his talk with Miss Lackersteen! It was an
effort to screw his face into its usual facetious good-humour as he came up to the table.

‘A Terpsichorean evening! ’ he remarked in a voice that was doleful in spite of himself.

No one answered. They were all watching the pair on the tennis court. Utterly oblivious
of the others, Elizabeth and Verrall glided round and round, round and round, their shoes
sliding easily on the slippery concrete. Verrall danced as he rode, with matchless grace.
The gramophone was playing ‘Show Me the Way to Go Home,’ which was then going
round the world like a pestilence and had got as far as Burma:

‘Show me the way to go home, I’m tired an’ I wanna go to bed; I had a little drink ‘bout
an hour ago, An’ it’s gone right TO my head! ’ etc.

The dreary, depressing trash floated out among the shadowy trees and the streaming
scents of flowers, over and over again, for Mrs Lackersteen was putting the gramophone
needle back to the start when it neared the centre. The moon climbed higher, very yellow,
looking, as she rose from the murk of dark clouds at the horizon, like a sick woman
creeping out of bed. Verrall and Elizabeth danced on and on, indefatigably, a pale
voluptuous shape in the gloom. They moved in perfect unison like some single animal.
Mr Macgregor, Ellis, Westfield and Mr Lackersteen stood watching them, their hands in
their pockets, finding nothing to say.
The mosquitoes came nibbling at their ankles.
Someone called for drinks, but the whisky was like ashes in their mouths. The bowels of
all four older men were twisted with bitter envy.

Verrall did not ask Mrs Lackersteen for a dance, nor, when he and Elizabeth finally sat
down, did he take any notice of the other Europeans. He merely monopolized Elizabeth
for half an hour more, and then, with a brief good night to the Lackersteens and not a
word to anyone else, left the Club. The long dance with Verrall had left Elizabeth in a
kind of dream. He had asked her to come out riding with him! He was going to lend her
one of his ponies! She never even noticed that Ellis, angered by her behaviour, was doing
his best to be openly rude. It was late when the Lackersteens got home, but there was no
sleep yet for Elizabeth or her aunt. They were feverishly at work till midnight, shortening
a pair of Mrs Lackersteen’ s jodhpurs, and letting out the calves, to fit Elizabeth.



‘I hope, dear, you CAN ride a horse? ’ said Mrs Lackersteen.


‘Oh, of course! I’ve ridden ever such a lot, at home. ’

She had ridden perhaps a dozen times in all, when she was sixteen. No matter, she would
manage somehow! She would have ridden a tiger, if Verrall were to accompany her.

When at last the jodhpurs were finished and Elizabeth had tried them on, Mrs
Lackersteen sighed to see her. She looked ravishing in jodhpurs, simply ravishing! And
to think that in only a day or two they had got to go back to camp, for weeks, months
perhaps, leaving Kyauktada and this most DESIRABLE young man! The pity of it! As
they moved to go upstairs Mrs Lackersteen paused at the door. It had come into her head
to make a great and painful sacrifice. She took Elizabeth by the shoulders and kissed her
with a more real affection than she had ever shown.

‘My dear, it would be such a SHAME for you to go away from Kyauktada just now! ’

‘It would, rather. ’

‘Then I’ll tell you what, dear. We WON’T go back to that horrid jungle! Your uncle shall
go alone. You and I shall stay in Kyauktada. ’


CHAPTER 19

The heat was growing worse and worse. April was nearly over, but there was no hope of
rain for another three weeks, five weeks it might be. Even the lovely transient dawns
were spoiled by the thought of the long, blinding hours to come, when one’s head would
ache and the glare would penetrate through every covering and glue up one’s eyelids with
restless sleep. No one, Oriental or European, could keep awake in the heat of the day
without a struggle; at night, on the other hand, with the howling dogs and the pools of
sweat that collected and tonnented one’s prickly heat, no one could sleep. The
mosquitoes at the Club were so bad that sticks of incense had to be kept burning in all the



comers, and the women sat with their legs in pillowslips. Only Verrall and Elizabeth
were indifferent to the heat. They were young and their blood was fresh, and Verrall was
too stoical and Elizabeth too happy to pay any attention to the climate.

There was much bickering and scandal-mongering at the Club these days. Verrall had put
everyone’s nose out of joint. He had taken to coming to the Club for an hour or two in the
evenings, but he ignored the other members, refused the drinks they offered him, and
answered attempts at conversation with surly monosyllables. He would sit under the
punkah in the chair that had once been sacred to Mrs Lackersteen, reading such of the
papers as interested him, until Elizabeth came, when he would dance and talk with her for
an hour or two and then make off without so much as a good-night to anybody.
Meanwhile Mr Lackersteen was alone in his camp, and, according to the rumours which
drifted back to Kyauktada, consoling loneliness with quite a miscellany of Burmese
women.

Elizabeth and Verrall went out riding together almost every evening now. Verrall’ s
mornings, after parade, were sacred to polo practice, but he had decided that it was worth
while giving up the evenings to Elizabeth. She took naturally to riding, just as she had to
shooting; she even had the assurance to tell Verrall that she had ‘hunted quite a lot’ at
home. He saw at a glance that she was lying, but at least she did not ride so badly as to be
a nuisance to him.

They used to ride up the red road into the jungle, ford the stream by the big pyinkado tree
covered with orchids, and then follow the narrow cart-track, where the dust was soft and
the horses could gallop. It was stifling hot in the dusty jungle, and there were always
mutterings of faraway, rainless thunder. Small martins flitted round the horses, keeping
pace with them, to hawk for the flies their hooves turned up. Elizabeth rode the bay pony,
Verrall the white. On the way home they would walk their sweat-dark horses abreast, so
close sometimes his knee brushed against hers, and talk. Verrall could drop his offensive
manner and talk amicably enough when he chose, and he did choose with Elizabeth.

Ah, the joy of those rides together! The joy of being on horseback and in the world of
horses — the world of hunting and racing, polo and pigsticking! If Elizabeth had loved
Verrall for nothing else, she would have loved him for bringing horses into her life. She



tormented him to talk about horses as once she had tormented Flory to talk about
shooting. Verrall was no talker, it was true. A few gruff, jerky sentences about polo and
pigsticking, and a catalogue of Indian stations and the names of regiments, were the best
he could do. And yet somehow the little he said could thrill Elizabeth as all Flory’s talk
had never done. The mere sight of him on horseback was more evocative than any words.
An aura of horsemanship and soldiering surrounded him. In his tanned face and his hard,
straight body Elizabeth saw all the romance, the splendid panache of a cavalryman’s life.
She saw the North-West Frontier and the Cavalry Club — she saw the polo grounds and
the parched barrack yards, and the brown squadrons of horsemen galloping with their
long lances poised and the trains of their pagris streaming; she heard the bugle-calls and
the jingle of spurs, and the regimental bands playing outside the messrooms while the
officers sat at dinner in their stiff, gorgeous uniforms. How splendid it was, that
equestrian world, how splendid! And it was HER world, she belonged to it, she had been
bom of it. These days, she lived, thought, dreamed horses, almost like Verrall himself.
The time came when she not only TOLD her taradiddle about having ‘hunted quite a lot’,
she even came near believing it.

In every possible way they got on so well together. He never bored her and fretted her as
Flory had done. (As a matter of fact, she had almost forgotten Flory, these days; when
she thought of him, it was for some reason always his birthmark that she remembered. ) It
was a bond between them that Verrall detested anything ‘highbrow’ even more than she
did. He told her once that he had not read a book since he was eighteen, and that indeed
he ‘loathed’ books; ‘except, of course, Jorrocks and all that’. On the evening of their third
or fourth ride they were parting at the Lackersteens’ gate. Verrall had successfully
resisted all Mrs Lackersteen’s invitations to meals; he had not yet set foot inside the
Lackersteens’ house, and he did not intend to do so. As the syce was taking Elizabeth’s
pony, Verrall said:

‘I tell you what. Next time we come out you shall ride Belinda. I’ll ride the chestnut. I
think you’ve got on well enough not to go and cut Belinda’s mouth up. ’

Belinda was the Arab mare. Verrall had owned her two years, and till this moment he had
never once allowed anyone else to mount her, not even the syce. It was the greatest



favour that he could imagine. And so perfectly did Elizabeth appreciate Verrall’s point of
view that she understood the greatness of the favour, and was thankful.

The next evening, as they rode home side by side, Verrall put his ann round Elizabeth’s
shoulder, lifted her out of the saddle and pulled her against him. He was very strong. He
dropped the bridle, and with his free hand, lifted her face up to meet his; their mouths
met. For a moment he held her so, then lowered her to the ground and slipped from his
horse. They stood embraced, their thin, drenched shirts pressed together, the two bridles
held in the crook of his ann.

It was about the same time that Flory, twenty miles away, decided to come back to
Kyauktada. He was standing at the jungle’s edge by the ha nk of a dried-up stream, where
he had walked to tire himself, watching some tiny, nameless finches eating the seeds of
the tall grasses. The cocks were chrome -yellow, the hens like hen sparrows. Too tiny to
bend the stalks, they came whirring towards them, seized them in midflight and bore
them to the ground by their own weight. Flory watched the birds incuriously, and almost
hated them because they could light no spark of interest in him. In his idleness he flung
his dah at them, scaring them away. If she were here, if she were here! Everything —
birds, trees, flowers, everything — was deadly and meaningless because she was not here.
As the days passed the knowledge that he had lost her had grown surer and more actual
until it poisoned every moment.

He loitered a little way into the jungle, flicking at creepers with his dah. His limbs felt
slack and leaden. He noticed a wild vanilla plant trailing over a bush, and bent down to
sniff at its slender, fragrant pods. The scent brought him a feeling of staleness and deadly
ennui. Alone, alone, in the sea of life enisled! The pain was so great that he struck his fist
against a tree, jarring his ann and splitting two knuckles. He must go back to Kyauktada.
It was folly, for barely a fortnight had passed since the scene between them, and his only
chance was to give her time to forget it. Still, he must go back. He could not stay any
longer in this deadly place, alone with his thoughts among the endless, mindless leaves.

A happy thought occurred to him. He could take Elizabeth the leopard-skin that was
being cured for her in the jail. It would be a pretext for seeing her, and when one comes
bearing gifts one is generally listened to. This time he would not let her cut him short



without a word. He would explain, extenuate — make her realize that she had been unjust
to him. It was not right that she should condemn him because of Ma Hla May, whom he
had turned out of doors for Elizabeth’s own sake. Surely she must forgive him when she
heard the truth of the story? And this time she SHOULD hear it; he would force her to
listen to him if he had to hold her by the arms while he did it.

He went back the same evening. It was a twenty-mile journey, by rutted cart-tracks, but
Flory decided to march by night, giving the reason that it was cooler. The servants almost
mutinied at the idea of a night-march, and at the very last moment old Sammy collapsed
in a semi-genuine fit and had to be plied with gin before he could start. It was a moonless
night. They made their way by the light of lanterns, in which Flo’s eyes gleamed like
emeralds and the bullocks’ eyes like moonstones. When the sun was up the servants
halted to gather sticks and cook breakfast, but Flory was in a fever to be at Kyauktada,
and he hurried ahead. He had no feeling of tiredness. The thought of the leopard-skin had
filled him with extravagant hopes. He crossed the glittering river by sampan and went
straight to Dr Veraswami’s bungalow, getting there about ten.

The doctor invited him to breakfast, and — having shooed the women into some suitable
hiding-place — took him into his own bath-room so that he could wash and shave. At
breakfast the doctor was very excited and full of denunciations of ‘the crocodile’; for it
appeared that the pseudo-rebellion was now on the point of breaking out. It was not till
after breakfast that Flory had an opportunity to mention the leopard-skin.

‘Oh, by the way, doctor. What about that skin I sent to the jail to be cured? Is it done
yet? ’

‘Ah — ’ said the doctor in a slightly disconcerted manner, rubbing his nose. He went
inside the house — they were breakfasting on the veranda, for the doctor’s wife had
protested violently against Flory being brought indoors — and came back in a moment
with the skin rolled up in a bundle.

‘Ass a matter of fact — ’ he began, unrolling it.


‘Oh, doctor! ’



The skin had been utterly ruined. It was as stiff as cardboard, with the leather cracked and
the fur discoloured and even rubbed off in patches. It also stank abominably. Instead of
being cured, it had been converted into a piece of rubbish.

‘Oh, doctor! What a mess they’ve made of it! How the devil did it happen? ’

‘I am so sorry, my friend! I wass about to apologize. It wass the best we could do. There
iss no one at the jail who knows how to cure skins now. ’

‘But, damn it, that convict used to cure them so beautifully! ’

‘Ah, yes. But he iss gone from us these three weeks, alas. ’

‘Gone? I thought he was doing seven years? ’

‘What? Did you not hear, my friend? I thought you knew who it wass that used to cure
the skins. It was Nga Shwe O. ’

‘Nga Shwe O? ’

‘The dacoit who escaped with U Po Kyin’s assistance. ’

‘Oh, hell! ’

The mishap had daunted him dreadfully. Nevertheless, in the afternoon, having bathed
and put on a clean suit, he went up to the Lackersteens’ house, at about four. It was very
early to call, but he wanted to make sure of catching Elizabeth before she went down to
the Club. Mrs Lackersteen, who had been asleep and was not prepared for visitors,
received him with an ill grace, not even asking him to sit down.

‘I’m afraid Elizabeth isn’t down yet. She’s dressing to go out riding. Wouldn’t it be better
if you left a message? ’


‘I’d like to see her, if you don’t mind. I’ve brought her the skin of that leopard we shot
together. ’



Mrs Lackersteen left him standing up in the drawing-room, feeling lumpish and
abnormally large as one does at such times. However, she fetched Elizabeth, taking the
opportunity of whispering to her outside the door: ‘Get rid of that dreadful man as soon
as you can, dear. I can’t bear him about the house at this time of day. ’

As Elizabeth entered the room Flory’s heart pounded so violently that a reddish mist
passed behind his eyes. She was wearing a silk shirt and jodhpurs, and she was a little
sunburned. Even in his memory she had never been so beautiful. He quailed; on the
instant he was lost — every scrap of his screwed-up courage had fled. Instead of stepping
forward to meet her he actually backed away. There was a fearful crash behind him; he
had upset an occasional table and sent a bowl of zinnias hurtling across the floor.

‘I’m so sorry! ’ he exclaimed in horror.

‘Oh, not at ALL! PLEASE don’t worry about it! ’

She helped him to pick up the table, chattering all the while as gaily and easily as though
nothing had happened: ‘You HAVE been away a long time, Mr Flory! You’re quite a
STRANGER! We’ve SO missed you at the Club! ’ etc. , etc. She was italicizing every
other word, with that deadly, glittering brightness that a woman puts on when she is
dodging a moral obligation. He was terrified of her. He could not even look her in the
face. She took up a box of cigarettes and offered him one, but he refused it. His hand was
shaking too much to take it.

‘I’ve brought you that skin,’ he said flatly.

He unrolled it on the table they had just picked up. It looked so shabby and miserable that
he wished he had never brought it. She came close to him to examine the skin, so close
that her flower-like cheek was not a foot from his own, and he could feel the wannth of
her body. So great was his fear of her that he stepped hurriedly away. And in the same
moment she too stepped back with a wince of disgust, having caught the foul odour of the
skin. It shamed him terribly. It was almost as though it had been himself and not the skin
that stank.



‘Thank you EVER so much, Mr Flory! ’ She had put another yard between herself and the
skin. ‘Such a LOVELY big skin, isn’t it? ’

‘It was, but they’ve spoiled it, I’m afraid.