After this he turned and walked on. Annette trembled, gathered her dress up and followed him, walking a pace or two behind. Mischa stopped and began fumbling in his pocket for keys. Annette saw that they were standing outside a garage.
‘Is this where you keep your car?’ asked Annette.
‘Yes,’ said Mischa. He was pressing the key into the lock.
‘It’s a long way from the house,’ said Annette.
‘No,’ said Mischa, ‘the house is here.’ He pointed above their heads and Annette saw a line of lighted windows. They had come round in a circle. She shuddered.
‘Let’s go quickly,’ she said. Mischa opened the door of a low grey car and she got in. The light came up on the dashboard, the engine gave a low purr rising to a roar, and then they were away.
The powerful headlights of Mischa’s car showed to Annette first a long unfolding series of familiar streets, then a series of unfamiliar streets, then a great main road, and at last green hedges and avenues of trees and grass verges scattered with primroses and stained white with chalk. The car was climbing.
‘Wrap that rug round yourself,’ said Mischa.
Annette curled up in the front seat with the rug tucked about her knees. In the dim mysterious light that came from the dashboard she could see his profile. He never looked at her. She tried to remember, but could not, whether it was his blue eye or his brown eye which was nearest. It was too dark to see. Once they reached the open country the car leapt forward like a mad thing. An indefinite time passed. A grey hazy light showed woods and villages which touched the car for an instant and flashed by. But within, there was a deep quiet. Annette moved, and her knee touched Mischa’s side. She said nothing, but as the speedometer needle reached seventy she felt herself to be in paradise. She had never been so happy in her life before.
The car was descending. The wheels were grating sharply upon gravel and then grinding upon stones. Then suddenly Mischa began to brake violently and the car came bucking to a standstill. He turned off the engine. With the abrupt ending of its roar Annette could not at first realize whether what succeeded it was a silence or not. A thick mist surrounded them. Mischa stepped out of the car. Annette uncurled her legs. She felt very stiff. She opened the door and a cold wind blew straight into her face. She wished that the journey had not ended. She found herself standing upon damp stones and tumbled and almost fell. Mischa had moved ahead of her and taken a few steps. Then he stood still. A strange roaring sound was ringing in Annette’s ears. It was very close, it was deafening. She took a step forward. Then she realized what it was. Mischa had driven the car almost into the sea. He was standing now with the waves breaking at his feet.
Annette was completely dazed. She came down to stand beside Mischa, picking her way carefully across a line of crackling shells and yielding seaweed. It was a beach of large flat stones which crunched awkwardly underfoot. Annette felt suddenly in danger. The mist hemmed them in. She looked back towards the car. Only the tip of the radiator was visible behind her. The rest was lost in the mist. She looked towards the sea. She could see just as far as the place where the waves appeared out of the grey wall, already beginning to curl over and fall. They crashed violently upon the stones, came foaming forward in a great sheet of water, and then withdrew, drawing the beach after them with a rattling grinding sound. The endless rhythmical noise covered Annette and held her for a while motionless and appalled. Her hand at her breast became one with the intense beating of her heart. Then she turned to look at Mischa.
The amazement which had gripped her she read again upon his face. His lips were parted and his eyes seemed to start from his head. He was staring at the waves like a man cornered by a strange animal. Terror and fascination were upon his brow. When Annette saw him she was yet more afraid. He was breathing hard and every now and then his mouth moved as if he were saying something the sound of which was lost in the roar of the sea. Already the water was covering his shoes. Then he bent down, plunged his hand into the foam at his feet, and put his fingers to his lips. He licked his lips, tasting the brine.
‘Mischa!’ said Annette. She could hardly hear her voice, so deafening and continuous was the clatter of the waves upon the stones. He paid no attention. Perhaps he had not heard or perhaps he had forgotten that she was with him. Annette felt suddenly that she was alone upon the beach. The mist was lifting a little and the daylight was growing. Now she could see beyond the breaking point of the waves where the great rollers were coming in, their backs glistening in the silver light of the mist and the daybreak. Everything about her was beginning to glisten and become radiant with the unseen sun. She turned about and felt but could not hear the stones shifting and groaning under her feet. She was wet to the ankles. In an agonizing flash of memory the events of the night came back to her. She saw the fish lying struggling upon the dry cushions and upon the carpet. She wanted to weep, to scream; above all she wanted Mischa’s attention.
‘Mischa!’ cried Annette, and seized him by the arm. He shook himself and moved away from her, his lips still moving, without turning his head.
Annette looked at him for a moment, her face screwed up with pain. Then gathering up her long skirt she turned from him and with a loud cry she began to run into the sea. After three stumbling steps through the withdrawing sheet of foam the next wave struck her at the knee. Annette kept her balance and managed to take another step. With an icy shock the water was swirling violently about her waist. She cried out shrilly at the intense cold. She saw the next roller rising above her. Her feet left the ground. The she felt a fierce jerk upon her arm, and Mischa was dragging her back out of the sea. Annette struggled, and for a moment they swayed to and fro upon the stones, and the great wave drenched them. Then as Mischa pulled her on, she slipped, grating her leg upon the shingle, and an instant later he had dragged her, half running and half slithering on her knees, well up beyond the water line.
Mischa turned on her. ‘You little idiot!’ he shouted, and shook her violently.
Annette sat down upon the stones. She was almost beyond thought and feeling. Her leg was hurting. She wanted nothing now but to be left alone. ‘Go away,’ she said to Mischa.
Mischa leaned over her with the face of a demon. He pulled her to her feet and dragged her to the car. ‘Get into the back seat,’ he shouted, ‘and take your clothes off. Then put this coat on and put the rug round you.’
Somehow, trembling with cold, Annette slid out of the remnants of her green dress and for a moment she was naked, with one long damp leg trailing behind her on the stones and the other in the soft warmth of the car. Then she slipped on Mischa’s velvet smoking-jacket, which had been left behind and was quite dry. She gathered the rug about her and collapsed on to the back seat. Then she saw Mischa. He had taken off his shirt and was wringing the water out of it. His chest and shoulders were entirely covered with long black hair which clung close to his body now in damp streaks. The hair of his head, darkened by the water, streamed down each side of his face and water-drops stood upon his cheeks like tears. When Annette saw this she began to cry.
With a tremendous jolt the car started. Annette closed her eyes, feeling the wet tyres slipping and grinding upon the shingle. The mist had turned from grey to silver and now to gold. Through clouds of gold they climbed up to the main road, and the long drive home had begun. The roar of the engine rose to a crescendo and Annette’s tears flowed without intermission. She had never felt so wretched in her life before. By the time she was able to control herself a little and look at the back of Mischa’s head, from which the sea-water was still dripping, they were passing through the outskirts of London. Mischa said nothing until, as they were nearing the Thames, he said, ‘You’d better put your own clothes on again before you go in.’
Annette could hardly attach meaning to his words, but she managed, for the last time, to make the rags of the green dress cling about her. Then she pulled the velvet jacket on again. As she completed this operation she saw with astonishme
nt that they were outside the house in Campden Hill Square. The engine stopped and made a terrible silence. Mischa got out and opened the door of the car.
‘I can’t go in there,’ said Annette in a clear voice.
‘Come along,’ said Mischa. Again she had the feeling that he was not looking at her, that he was looking past her or through her. Annette unpacked herself awkwardly and hobbled out on to the pavement. Mischa went up to the door and rang the bell. Then he got into the car and drove away, leaving Annette standing on the pavement.
She stood there for a moment in a trance of misery, clutching Mischa’s coat about her. Then she climbed up the steps and opened the door, which was unlatched. She began to trail up the stairs. As she passed Hunter’s room he emerged and watched her. He said nothing. When Annette reached the landing below her own room she saw Rosa standing at the top of the flight of stairs. The door into Annette’s room stood open. If only I could get that far, thought Annette. She was unable to focus her eyes on Rosa. She realized that she had the most terrible headache. She leaned against the banister to rest. Rosa was standing beside the door of her room like a fatal archangel.
‘Wherever have you been, Annette?’ asked Rosa.
Annette could think of nothing to say. She just felt too tired, far too tired. She pulled herself up another step. Then Rosa saw Mischa’s coat.
‘Annette — ’ said Rosa, and then stopped. For a moment the house trembled. Hunter began to say something inaudible on the landing below.
Suddenly Rosa turned into Annette’s room and began to drag open the drawers of her dressing-table. She seized an armful of clothes and hurled them down into Annette’s face. Then pulling out one of the drawers entire she upended it at the top of the stairs. A surge of silk and nylon came cascading down.
‘Don’t!’ cried Annette. She took a step back and then tried to spring up the remaining stairs. But weakened as she was by cold and exhaustion her hands were slipping on the banisters and her feet slithering on the soft torrent of clothing. She lost her balance, fell heavily backwards, and crashed violently upon the landing at Hunter’s feet.
Rosa, who had given a cry of alarm when she saw Annette fall, began to pick her way down, kicking the clothes aside. Annette was sitting on the landing rocking herself to and fro. She began to let out a high-pitched wail.
‘Oh God!’ said Hunter. ‘Oh, my God!’
He tried to help Annette up, but she shook herself free and fell back wailing more than ever. ‘I think,’ she sobbed out, ‘I think my leg’s broken’ — and she abandoned herself to grief. Rosa came and sat beside her upon the floor. Hunter could see that in a moment she was going to start crying too.
‘Oh, my God!’ said Hunter. He made for the telephone.
Seventeen
THERE had been complete silence for some time in Peter Saward’s room. It was late in the afternoon and the lamp on his desk had been lit for more than half an hour. Outside the window a sad green light still lingered under the plane tree. Peter was never anxious to pull the curtains. He was not afraid of the spirits who come to press against lighted windows. He had laid his pen aside and was looking gloomily at the sheets of hieroglyphs. They were as impenetrable as ever. At last he stacked them into a neat pile. Then he reached out for his paper-knife and drew towards him a pair of thick volumes which had just arrived from Paris. He looked at his watch. He began to cut the pages. A short time passed.
There was a knock on the door, and Mischa Fox came in. ‘I’m late,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘That’s all right,’ said Saward. ‘I haven’t been wasting my time!’ He swung his chair round and Mischa sat down on the floor at his feet. They sat for a short while without speaking, Mischa looking moodily into the corner and Peter Saward studying Mischa.
‘You’re looking tired,’ said Peter Saward.
Mischa shook his head. ‘Everybody has been going mad as usual!’ he said.
‘You make them mad,’ said Peter.
Mischa considered this. ‘I don’t make you mad,’ he said. He looked up at Peter. ‘Did you hear what happened at the party after you left?’
‘Yes,’ said Peter Saward. ‘Rainborough came and told me.’ He frowned and shook his head.
‘Ah, well — ’ said Mischa. He spoke with the air of someone who has got over with an unpleasant duty and can now get on to brighter matters. ‘Did you get the photographs?’
‘Yes,’ said Peter. He pulled out from a drawer in his desk a large shabby book with a green cover. The book bumped to the floor and Peter followed it to sit beside Mischa. Mischa was already turning the pages, almost tearing them in his eagerness.
‘Oh, splendid,’ he cried, ‘these are the best ones I’ve ever seen! So detailed, and not just the usual things. How clever of you, Peter!’ He was like a child in his delight, he almost clapped his hands, and his face was transfigured by a look of mingled joy and pain, quite unlike the tense expression of irritated distress which it had worn a moment ago.
‘Oh, if you knew, Peter,’ said Mischa, ‘how this moves me. How astonishing photographs are! There is a thing in my heart which these pictures touch and which will soon be restored to me. I feel it turning already. What a miracle it is to feel that, after all, nothing dies.’
Peter Saward was sitting awkwardly upon the floor, his arm resting on the seat of the chair. He was absorbed in watching Mischa. A sea of books surrounded them both.
Mischa had paused over a photograph. ‘Do you see that little street?’ he said. ‘There was a shop there, you can almost see the edge of it, where I used to buy sweets. Our house was that way. There was a street and a square and then the street where we lived.’ He turned another page.
‘Now here,’ said Mischa, ‘you should be able to tell me where this is! Can you say what would be just round this corner?’ He showed Peter Saward one of the pictures.
Peter reflected for a moment. ‘Your school?’ he suggested.
‘That’s right!’ cried Mischa. He was so delighted by this he almost embraced Peter. ‘Do you know,’ he said, ‘since I last saw you I’ve remembered the name of the German schoolmaster, the one I was trying to think of. He was called Kuneberg.’
‘Kuneberg,’ said Peter Saward He looked at Mischa, feeling again the puzzlement and tenderness with which these curious encounters always filled him. Mischa was a problem which, he felt, he would never solve — and this although be had got perhaps more data for its solution than any other living being. Yet it seemed that the more Mischa indulged his impulse to reveal himself in these unexpected ways to Peter, the more puzzling he seemed to become. It was now a long time since Mischa had taken it into his head to talk to Peter about his childhood; and since he had started to talk he had sketched a picture of the most astonishing detail. At first Peter had not been at all sure that everything that Mischa told him was true; now he was certain that it was true as Mischa could make it and that the pursuit, here, of exactness and completeness was for him a terrible necessity.
Sometimes when they were together Mischa would sit for minutes on end trying to remember something, such as the name of this schoolmaster — and at such times his face would pucker and contract and become for the moment like the face of a child. It was Mischa who had suggested that a really good set of photographs might aid his memory further — and Peter Saward had been able to obtain some from a friend at the Warburg Institute.
‘And here,’ said Mischa, he had before him a picture of a fountain, ‘there was a bronze fish. How strange, I had forgotten this completely! You can’t see him here, he’s on the other side. And the water came, not out of his mouth but out of his eyes. I remember asking my mother why he was crying. And in that square,’ he went on, turning a page, ‘there used to be a big fair every autumn. It was a terrible thing, that fair.’ He fell silent suddenly, biting his lip.
‘Why?’ asked Peter Saward.
‘There were — competitions, side-shows,’ said Mischa, ‘the children would all take part. And
do you know what they would give us as prizes? Little chickens, a day old.’
‘Oh?’ said Peter Saward.
‘Well, just that,’ said Mischa. ‘We would play with them until in a day or two they died. They could not survive. Everyone knew that. The fairmen knew, my parents knew — ’ His voice died away. Peter Saward looked at him quickly for a moment. Mischa’s eyes had filled with tears. Peter Saward was not unduly startled. During these strange conversations Mischa often wept.
‘I remember that so clearly,’ said Mischa, ‘the first time. I was very small. I could not understand what had happened to my chicken. Someone explained, as if it were the most ordinary thing.’
Peter Saward was silent. He felt, as he so frequently did during Mischa’s reminiscences, tormented in some incomprehensible way.
‘After that,’ said Mischa, ‘I watched other animals to see if they would die. But no — one does not see animals die. One is not so privileged. Even dead animals one does not see. Think of all the creatures that there are which live their lives about us, birds and animals and all kinds of insects. Helpless creatures and who do not live for long. Yet one hardly ever sees one dead. Where do they go to? The surface of the world ought to be covered with dead animals. When I thought about this,’ said Mischa, ‘I used sometimes to — ’
‘To what?’ said Peter Saward after a moment.