Somerset Maugham - The Collected Works of W. Somerset Maugham (33 Works in One Edition)

“Afternoon, Miss Bertha.”

He showed no sign of pausing, and the girl’s heart sank at the thought that he might go on with only a commonplace word of greeting.

“I thought it was you I saw coming up the hill,” she said, stretching out her hand.

He stopped and shook it; the touch of his big, firm fingers made her tremble. His hand was massive and hard as if it were hewn of stone. She looked up at him and smiled.

“Isn’t it cold?” she said. It is terrible to be desirous of saying all sorts of passionate things, while convention debars you from any but the most commonplace.

“You haven’t been walking at the rate of five miles an hour,” he said, cheerily. “I’ve been into Blackstable to see about buying a nag.”

He was the very picture of health; the winds of November were like summer breezes to him, and his face glowed with the pleasant cold. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes glistened. His vitality was intense, shining out upon others with almost a material warmth.

“Were you going out?” he asked.

“Oh no,” Bertha replied, without strict regard to truth. “I just walked down to the gate and I happened to catch sight of you.”

“I am very glad—I see you so seldom now, Miss Bertha.”

“I wish you wouldn’t call me Miss Bertha ” she cried, “it sounds horrid.” It was worse than that, it sounded almost menial. “When we were boy and girl we used to call each other by our Christian names.”

He blushed a little and his modesty filled Bertha with delight.

“Yes, but when you came back six months ago, you had changed so much—I didn’t dare; and besides, you called me Mr. Craddock.”

“Well, I won’t any more,” she said, laughing; “I’d much sooner call you Edward.”

She did not add that the word seemed to her the most beautiful in the whole list of Christian names, nor that in the past few weeks she had already repeated it to herself a thousand times.

“It’ll be like old days,” he said. “D’you remember what fun we used to have when you were a little girl, before you went abroad with Mr. Ley?”

“I remember that you used to look upon me with great contempt because I was a little girl,” she replied, laughing.

“Well, I was awfully frightened the first time I saw you again—with your hair up and long dresses.”

“I’m not really very terrible.”

For five minutes they had been looking into one another’s eyes, and suddenly, without obvious reason, Craddock blushed. Bertha noticed it, and a strange little thrill went through her; she reddened too, and her dark eyes flashed even more brightly than before.

“I wish I didn’t see you so seldom, Miss Bertha,” he said.

“You have only yourself to blame, fair sir. You perceive the road that leads to my palace, and at the end you will certainly find a door.”

“I’m rather afraid of your aunt.”

It was on the tip of Bertha’s tongue to say that faint heart never won fair lady, but for modesty’s sake she refrained. Her spirits had suddenly gone up and she felt extraordinarily happy.

“Do you want to see me very badly?” she asked, her heart beating at quite an absurd rate.

Craddock blushed again and seemed to have some difficulty in finding a reply; his confusion and his ingenuous air were new enchantments to Bertha.

“If he only knew how I adored him!” she thought; but naturally she could not tell him in so many words.

“You’ve changed so much in these years,” he said, “I don’t understand you.”

“You haven’t answered my question.”

“Of course I want to see you, Bertha,” he said quickly, seeming to take his courage in both hands; “I want to see you always.”

“Well,” she said, with a charming smile, “I sometimes take a walk after dinner to the gate and observe the shadows of night.”

“By Jove, I wish I’d known that before.”

“Foolish creature!” said Bertha to herself with amusement, “he doesn’t gather that this is the first night upon which I shall have done anything of the kind.”

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With swinging step Bertha returned to the house, and like a swarm of birds a hundred amorets flew about her head; Cupid leapt from tree to tree and shot his arrows into her willing heart; her imagination clothed the naked branches with tender green, and in her happiness the gray sky turned to azure.... It was the first time that Edward Craddock had shown his love in a manner which was unmistakable; if before, much had suggested that he was not indifferent, nothing had been absolutely convincing, and the doubt had caused her every imaginable woe. As for her, she made no effort to conceal it from herself; she was not ashamed, she loved him passionately, she worshipped the ground he trod on; she confessed boldly that he of all men was the one to make her happy; her life she would give into his strong and manly hands. She had made up her mind firmly that Craddock should lead her to the altar.

Times without number already had she fancied herself resting in his arms—in his strong arms—the very thought of which was a protection against all the ills of the world. Oh yes, she wanted him to take her in his arms and kiss her; in imagination she felt his lips upon hers, and the warmth of his breath made her faint with the anguish of love.

She asked herself how she could wait till the evening; how on earth was she to endure the slow passing of the hours? And she must sit opposite her aunt and pretend to read, or talk on this subject and on that. It was insufferable. Then, inconsequently, she asked herself if Edward knew that she loved him; he could not dream how intense was her desire.

“I’m sorry I’m late for tea,” she said, on entering the drawing-room.

“My dear,” said Miss Ley, “the buttered toast is probably horrid, but I don’t see why you should not eat cake.”

“I don’t want anything to eat,” cried Bertha, flinging herself on a chair.

“But you’re dying with thirst,” added Miss Ley, looking at her niece with sharp eyes. “Wouldn’t you like your tea out of a breakfast cup?”

Miss Ley had come to the conclusion that the restlessness and the long absence could only be due to some masculine cause. Mentally she shrugged her shoulders, hardly wondering who the creature was.

“Of course,” she thought, “it’s certain to be some one quite ineligible. I hope they won’t have a long engagement.”

Miss Ley could not have supported for several months the presence of a bashful and love-sick swain. She found lovers invariably ridiculous. She watched Bertha drink six cups of tea: of course those shining eyes, the flushed cheeks and the breathlessness, indicated some amorous excitement; it amused her, but she thought it charitable and wise to pretend that she noticed nothing.

“After all it’s no business of mine,” she thought; “and if Bertha is going to get married at all, it would be much more convenient for her to do it before next quarter-day, when the Browns give up my flat.”

Miss Ley sat on the sofa by the fireside, a woman of middle-size, very slight, with a thin and much wrinkled face. Of her features the mouth was the most noticeable, not large, with lips that were a little too thin; it was always so tightly compressed as to give her an air of great determination, but there was about the corners an expressive mobility, contradicting in rather an unusual manner the inferences which might be drawn from the rest of her person. She had a habit of fixing her cold eyes on people with a steadiness that was not a little embarrassing. They said Miss Ley looked as if she thought them great fools, and as a matter of fact that usually was her precise opinion. Her thin gray hair was very plainly done; and the extreme simplicity of her costume gave a certain primness, so that her favourite method of saying rather absurd things in the gravest and most decorous manner often disconcerted the casual stranger. She was a woman who, one felt, had never been handsome, but now, in middle-age, was distinctly prepossessing.