What Not. A Prophetic Comedy Read online

  Betty said, "Surely that's your Minister with Miss Grammont."

  Ivy looked at them, down the length of the platform. It seemed to her that Miss Grammont's walk with the Minister hadn't been altogether a success; they both looked so pale and tired, and Miss Grammont, surely, had been crying.

  Something suddenly passed into Ivy's consciousness about these two people whom she admired, and her soft mouth dropped open a little with the amazement of her thoughts. The Minister—and Miss Grammont! It was surely incredible. Ministers didn't; they were too high, too superior. Besides, what had love to do with this Minister, who was uncertificated for matrimony? Ivy told herself she was mistaken, she had misread the look with which they had looked at each other as they parted.

  "Are they thick?" Betty was asking, with careless, inquisitive interest. Betty wouldn't think it odd; Betty didn't know anything about ministers in general or this minister in particular.

  "Oh, I think they know each other quite well," replied Ivy. "Miss Grammont's jolly clever, you know. I shouldn't wonder if he talks about quite important things to her."

  "How dull," returned Betty, swinging her primroses. "Don't let's get into the same carriage as her. I never know if I know those End House people or not; Daddy and mother think I don't, and it's awkward.... I'd rather enjoy knowing Miss Ponsonby and that ducky baby, even if they aren't respectable, she looks so sweet, and I'd like to hear all about the stage. But I've no use for your Miss Grammont. Her clothes are all right, but I'm sure she's stuck up.... Fancy going out for Sunday with the Minister of a government department! Rather her than me."

  Ivy said, "Don't you worry, my child. No Minister'll ever trouble you to go out with him. As for Chester, I should think he'd have you executed after one talk; he's great on ridding the world of the mentally deficient." But what she was thinking was, "How fearfully interesting if there is anything between them." She wondered what the other people at the office thought about it, or if they had ever thought about it at all.

  * * *

  CHAPTER VIII

  ON FIXED HEARTS AND CHANGING SCENES

  1

  To Kitty it was manifest that the time had come for a change of employment. Such times came frequently in her life; often merely because she got bored, yawned, wanted a change, heard life summoning her to fresh woods and pastures new, and obeyed the call. Many occupations she had thus thrown up lightly; this is one reason why those who regard life as a variety entertainment do not really get on; they forget that life is real, life is earnest, and departing leave behind them no footprints on the sands of time. They do not make a career; they do not make good; they do not, in the long run, even make much money, though that rolls in by fits and starts, and at times plentifully. They do not so much hide their talents in napkins as play ball with them.

  This is as much as to say that it was not to Kitty Grammont the effort and the wrench that it would have been to many people to contemplate a change of avocation. And it certainly seemed desirable. Chester had said, "We needn't meet"; but the fact remained that when two people who love each other work in the same building, however remote their spheres, they disturb each other, are conscious of each other's nearness. And Chester's presence pervaded the whole Ministry; he had stamped himself everywhere; there was no getting away from him. His name was constantly on the lips and on the pens of his subordinates, and clicked forth from every typewriter; you could not so much as write an official letter without beginning "I am directed by the Minister of Brains to state," and signing it "for the Minister of Brains." Besides which, he was to be seen going out and coming in, to be met in passages and lifts, to be observed taking his food in the canteen, and his Personal Assistant demanded continual attention to him on the telephone. No, there was no getting away from the Minister. And that meant no peace of mind, none of the old careless light-hearted living and working; nothing but a continual, disturbing, restless, aching want. Kitty had no intention of facing this, so she told Vernon Prideaux that when she found another job she was going to leave. He looked at her in annoyance and dismay, and said, "Good lord, why?"

  Kitty said, "I'm bored. I want a change. I'm tired of working for this autocratic government. I want something with more variety in it, and more soul—a travelling circus, or a companionship to a rich American seeing the world; or any old thing, so long as it amuses me."

  "There's going to be quite enough amusement in this circus," said Prideaux, "before we're through with it, to satisfy anyone, I should say.... Really, Kitty, I think you're foolish. You're throwing up your chances; you're climbing up, and will climb higher if you stay. Even if the thing founders, as is quite likely, you'll climb out of it into another job, you're good enough. You ought to think of your career. And besides, you can't be spared. Who on earth do you think is going to do your job? I think you ought to see this thing through."

  But Kitty did not think so. "It will go to its own place quite quickly enough without my help. And as for my career—funny word—I'm not sure I've got one. If I have it's such a chequered one that a few more ups and downs won't make much difference to it. And as for being spared, oh anyone can be spared, out of any ministry; there are too many of us. Anyhow—well anyhow I must go."

  Prideaux thought this so frivolous, so foolish, so unworthy, so tiresome, and so like a woman, that he was exasperated. He rang for a shorthand typist, remarking, "If you must you must. Miss Egerton" (Miss Egerton had succeeded Miss Pomfrey, and was better), "send to the Establishment Branch for Miss Grammont's papers sometime," which closed the subject for the present.

  Kitty went back to her table and wrote a letter to the A.S.E. about some unfortunate agreement which had been made with them concerning the exemption of some of their members from the Mind Training Course. Personally Kitty was of the opinion that it was a pity the agreement had not been made as extensive as the A.S.E. desired; she thought that this Union were already too clever by half. She almost went to the length of thinking it was a pity the promises made to them had not been kept; a revolutionary opinion which in itself indicated that it was time she left. Having dealt with the A.S.E. she turned her attention to a file sent down from M.B. 1 and minuted "Passed to you to deal with this man's imaginary grievance." The imaginary grievance was that the wife of the man in question had been killed by a motor bus, and he wanted a week's postponement of his Mind Training Course in order that he might arrange about the funeral. M.B. 1 were like that; they did not mean to be unkind, but were a little lacking in flexibility and imagination.

  Ivy Delmer, who had answered Prideaux's bell, sat with her pencil ready and her round face bent over her notebook. She had heard Prideaux's order to his secretary, and concluded, correctly, that Miss Grammont was either going to have her pay raised or to leave, and from Prideaux's manner and voice she thought it was the second. She wondered whether this could have anything to do with the Minister, and what he had been saying to Miss Grammont on Sunday. She was curious and interested, even more so than she had been on Sunday, because the people to whom she had mentioned the subject had all noticed the intimacy; everyone seemed to have seen the Minister out with Miss Grammont at one time or another. No one but Ivy thought it was anything more than friendship, but no one else had seen them look at one another on Beaconsfield platform. Ivy had, and said so....

  Kitty was right; nothing remained hidden in government departments, or, indeed, anywhere else. Healthily, persistently, inevitably, everything pushed up towards the clear light of day; and quite right, too.

  2

  In the evenings Kitty, seeking jobs, studied the advertisement columns of the daily papers. She had always read them; they, with Mr. Selfridge and the Pelman system, form the lighter and more entertaining part of any daily paper; but now she took to perusing them with care. The personal column of the Times she found peculiarly edifying.

  "Quiet, refined gentleman (served in war, musical) would like to get into touch with bright and sympathetic lady." Kitty rejected that; she was not sur
e that she was sympathetic, and the terms were too vague. Better was "Lady, high standard of taste and culture and large means, wants capable travelling companion. Knowledge of art essential, good breeding preferred. Must talk continental languages fluently and understand railway guides." Kitty, making a mental note of that (for, with the possible exception of the breeding, she had all these qualifications), ran her eyes down the column, past "Write to me, darling, all is forgiven," "Will the lady in a fur toque riding in a Hammersmith aero on Saturday last at 3.30 communicate with A.C.", "No man hath seen God, at any time," until she came to "Young, accomplished, well-educated War Widow would like position as secretary or confidential clerk to nobleman, member of parliament, or gentleman." She rested her finger on that. "I'll put one in like this," she remarked to her cousin. "War Widow. That's what I've always wanted to be. It sounds so well. Elspeth, I shall buy some weeds and commence widow. A war widow...."

  "If you want a new job, and a job with travel and life in it," said her cousin, sounding her, "I don't know why you don't go out to the Pacific Islands and join Neil. You may be sure that wherever Neil is there'll be travel enough and life enough." She watched Kitty idly through a little whirl of cigarette smoke. But Kitty looked no more than bored, bending over the Times and manicuring her nails.

  "Neil would tire me. I've grown too old for Neil. Besides, it wouldn't be proper; I've broken off my engagement. I've not had the last letter back yet, you know, so he may have got it. Besides..." Kitty paused only for a moment, and added in the same casual tone, "besides, I'm too much in love with Nicky Chester, though I can't have him, to have any use for anyone else just now."

  Her cousin nodded. "I knew that, darling, of course. And so you've renounced each other. How silly. But it won't last. It never does. Go and be a Young Accomplished War Widow, then, to pass the time."

  3

  But there were hours of the night when it seemed to Kitty that she could not go and be a Young Accomplished War Widow, that she could not be companion, however capable, to any travelling lady of taste, culture and means, or clerk, however confidential, to any peer, M.P., or even gentleman; that none of these careers (were they careers? She still sought to define that word) would pass the time at all; that nothing, in fact, would pass it except working for Nicholas Chester, seeing him sometimes, hearing his voice.... Always addicted to metaphysical speculation in the night, even in nights of anguish, she would speculate on this queer disease, so common to the race, which had overtaken (and not, as they had both candidly remarked, for the first time, possibly not even for the last) herself and Nicholas Chester. What was it, this extraordinary driving pressure of emotion, this quite disproportionate desire for companionship with, for contact with, one person out of all the world of people and things, which made, while it lasted, all other desires, all other emotions, pale and faint beside it? Which so perverted and wrenched from its bearings the mind of a man like Nicholas Chester that he was for throwing overboard the cherished principles which were the cargo he had for long been so desperately bent on carrying, through storm and stress, to the country of his dreams? Which made him say, "No one will find out, and if they do, let them and be damned to them"?... Desire for a person; it had, it had always had, an extraordinarily dynamic effect on the lives of men and women. When it came into play, principle, chivalry, common sense, intellect, humour, culture, sweetness and light, all we call civilisation, might crumple up like match-board so this one overwhelming desire, shared by all the animal creation, might be satisfied. On this rock the world, the pathetic, eager, clever, foolish, so heavily handicapped world, might be wrecked. It was, perhaps, this one thing that would always prevent humanity from being, in fact, a clever and successful race, would always keep them down somewhere near the level of the other animals.

  Faces passed before Kitty's wakeful eyes; the fatuous, contented faces of mothers bending over the rewards of love clinging to their breasts; slow, placid, married faces everywhere.... This thing was irresistible, and certainly inevitable; if it ceased, humanity itself would cease, since it is the one motive which impels the continued population of the already over-populated earth. There it was; one had to accept it; there was, perhaps, no one who grew to years of maturity who escaped it, no one whose life would not, at some period, be in some degree disorganised by this strange force. It was blind instinct; its indulgence did not, in the end, even make for good, so far as good meant adventure, romance, and the gay chances of life, the freedom of the cities of the world—anything beyond mere domesticity. For what, after all, was marriage? A tying down, a shutting of gates, the end of youth, the curbing of the spirit of adventure which seeks to claim all the four corners of the world for its heritage. It meant a circumscribed and sober life, in one place, in one house, with, perhaps, children to support and to mind; it meant becoming respectable, insured, mature, settled members of society, with a stake in the country. No longer may life be greeted with a jest and death with a grin; both these (of course important but not necessarily solemn) things have come to matter too much to be played with.

  To this sedate end do the world's gay and careless free-lances come; they shut the door upon the challenging spirit of life, and Settle Down. It is to this end that instinct, not to be denied, summons men and women, as the bit of cheese summons the mouse into the trap.

  Musing thus, Kitty turned her pillow over and over, seeking a softer side. How she detested stupidity! How, even more, Nicholas Chester loathed stupidity! To him it was anathema, the root of all evil, the Goliath he was out to destroy, the blind beast squatting on men's bones, the idiot drivelling on the village green. And here he was, caught in the beast's destroying grip, just because he had, as they call it, fallen in love.... What a work is man!... And here was Kitty herself, all her gay love of living in danger, tottering unsteadily on its foundations, undermined by this secret gnawing thing.

  At last, as a sop to the craving which would not be denied, she sat up, with aching, fevered head, and turned the light on, and wrote on a piece of paper, "Nicky, I'll marry you any time you like, if you want me to," and folded it up and laid it on the table at her side, and then lay quite quiet, the restless longing stilled in her, slow tears forcing themselves from under her closed lashes, because she knew she would not send it. She would not send it because Chester too, in his heart, knew that they had better part; he too was fighting for the cause he believed in; he wanted her, but wanted to succeed in doing without her. She must give him his chance to stick by his principles, not drag him down below them.

  There were moments when Kitty wished that she could believe in a God, and could pray. It must, she thought, be a comfort. She even at times wished she were a Christian, to find fulfilment in loss. That was, at least, what she supposed Christians to do.

  But she could not be a Christian, and she could not pray; all she could do was to nerve herself to meet life in the spirit of the gay pierrette, with cap and bells on her aching head, and a little powder to hide the tears, and to try not to snap at Elspeth or the people at the office. This last endeavour usually failed. The little gaping messengers who answered (when they thought they would) Miss Grammont's bell, told each other Miss Grammont was cross. The typists grew tired of having letters sent back to be retyped because of some trifling misapprehension of Miss Grammont's caligraphy or some trifling misspelling on their own account. Surely these things could be set right with a pen and a little skill.

  These moods of impatience, when frustration vented itself in anger, alternated with the gaiety, the irreverent and often profane levity, which was Kitty's habitual way of braving life in its more formidable aspects. Some people have this instinct, to nail a flag of motley to the mast of the foundering ship and keep it flying to the last.

  4

  While Kitty was debating as to her future, toying with the relative advantages and entertainment to be derived from the careers of War Widow, Confidential Clerk, Travelling Companion, archæological explorer in Macedonia or Crete, beginner
on the music-hall stage, under Pansy's auspices, all of which seemed to have their bright sides, two suggestions were made to her. One was from a cousin of hers who was sub-editor of Stop It, and offered to get her a place on the staff.

  "Would it bind me to a point of view?" Kitty enquired. "I can't be bound to a point of view."

  "Oh dear no," her cousin assured her. "Certainly not. Rather the contrary," and Kitty said, "All right, I'll think it over." She was rather attracted by the idea.

  You cannot, of course, exactly call it being bound to a point of view to be required to hint every week that certain things want stopping, in a world whose staunchest champions must admit that this is indeed so.

  Stop It was certainly eclectic, in its picking out, from all the recognised groups associated for thought and action, activities whose cessation seemed good to it. The question that rather suggested itself to its readers was, if Stop It had its way, what, if anything, would be left?

  "Very little," the editor would have answered. "A clean sheet. Then we can begin again."

  Stop It had dropped some of the caution with which it had begun: it was now quite often possible to deduce from its still cryptic phraseology what were some of the things it wanted stopped. Having for some time successfully dodged Dora, it was now daring her. As in all probability it would not have a long life, and appeared to be having a merry one, Kitty thought she might as well join it while she could.

  To desert abruptly from the ranks of the bureaucracy to those of the mutineers seemed natural to Kitty, who had always found herself at home in a number of widely differing situations. Really this is perhaps the only way to live, if all the various and so greatly different needs of complicated human nature are to be satisfied. It is very certain that they cannot be satisfied simultaneously; the best way seems, therefore, to alternate. It is indeed strange that this is not more done, that Radicals, Tories, and Labour members, for instance, do not more frequently interchange, play general post, to satisfy on Tuesday that side of their souls and intellects which has not been given free play on Monday; that Mr. Ramsay Macdonald and Lord Curzon do not, from time to time, deliver each other's speeches, not from any freakish desire to astonish, but from the sheer necessities of their natures; that Mr. Massingham and Mr. Leo Maxse, or Mr. A. G. Gardiner and Mr. Gwynne, or Mr. J. C. Squire and Mr. J. St. Loe Strachey, or Mr. Garvin and Mr. J. A. Spender, do not from time to time arrange together to change offices and run each other's papers; or that Mr. Arthur Ransome and Mr. Stephen Graham do not, during their tours of Russia, sometimes change pens with each other when they write home. There must be in many people some undemocratic instinct of centralisation, of autocratic subversion of the horde of their lesser opinions and impulses to the most dominant and commanding one, a lack of the true democrat's desire to give a chance to them all. They say with the Psalmist, "My heart is fixed," and "I have chosen the way and I will run it to the end," and this is called, by some, finding one's true self. Perhaps it may be so; it certainly entails the loss of many other selves; and possibly the dropping of these, or rather their continual denial and gradual atrophy, simplifies life.