Джеймс Хилтон - So Well Remembered

“Yes, of course.” Winslow rang the bell again and told the butler: “Mr Boswell will be catching the nine-forty. Will you telephone the stationmaster?”

“Very good, your lordship.”

“Why do you have to worry the stationmaster about me?” George asked. “I can find a seat, or if I can’t, it doesn’t matter.”

Winslow smiled. “My dear chap, if I didn’t telephone, you wouldn’t even find a train. The nine-forty’s fast from Bristol to London unless I have it stopped for you.”

“You mean you can stop an express at that little local station just to pick up one passenger? And in war-time?”

“Certainly—but it isn’t done by favour. It’s a legal right, dating back to the time the railway was built a hundred years ago. My great-grandfather wouldn’t sell land to the company except on that condition —in perpetuity. Damned thoughtful of him, I must say.”

Soon afterwards Lord Winslow shook hands most cordially with George, and the latter was driven to Castle Winslow station in the Rolls-Royce. The station was normally closed at that time of night, but the stationmaster had opened it for the occasion and personally escorted him along the deserted platform.

“First-class, sir?”

“No, third,” George answered grimly.

After that they conversed till the train came in. The stationmaster agreed that England was changing, but he also thought he never remembered farmers so prosperous or farmland selling at so high a price.

“How about taxes?” George asked. “I suppose the big estates are pretty hard hit?”

“Oh, they’re all right if they did what Lord Winslow did. He made himself into a company years ago. He’s a smart chap.”

“Aye… Knows how to keep up with the old and play around with the new, is that it?”

But the stationmaster was cautious. “He’s smart,” he repeated. “Travels third like yourself, as often as not… Because the firsts are just as crowded and he don’t see why he should pay extra for nothing. You can’t blame him, can you?”

George agreed that you could not.

But on the way to London the stopping of the express became a symbol —and a very handy one—of the kind of thing he found himself rather passionately against. And it was equally handy as a symbol of the kind of thing he felt Charles would be unlucky to inherit.

The University term was nearly over, and soon Charles would have to decide where to go for the vacation. His mother, he told George, wanted him to spend it with her in Ireland (she had been pulling wires, as only she knew how, to get the necessary permits); but Uncle Howard had asked him to Winslow Hall; and Julie, of course, though she would never suggest it, naturally hoped he would stay in Cambridge, like many other undergraduates in war-time. As for Charles himself, he didn’t exactly know what he wanted to do. He was so damned sorry for his mother and anxious to give her a good time— especially after the nice letter she had written him about George’s visit. So had Uncle Howard. In fact Charles showed George the two letters, and George, reading between the lines, deduced in both writers a desire to enlist him as an ally against the other. He did not, however, worry the boy with this interpretation, but kept it filed, as it were, in that department of his mind where the shrewder things took place.

Of course what Charles would really like best, he admitted, was to stay where he could see Julie, at least for part of the vacation. The only objection was that this, he felt sure, would either bring his mother to Cambridge forthwith (in which case he couldn’t see Julie at all), or else she would guess there was some girl in the case, and make a scene about it.

“What makes you think she’d do that?” George asked.

“Oh, just a few odd hints in letters and so on. And once in an air- raid shelter just after she landed. Some girl was a bit scared, and as I was too, we talked together till the raid was over. Mother of course couldn’t understand it.”

“That you talked—or that you were scared?”

“Both… Anyhow, I can’t stand scenes, and I know if she were to learn about Julie she’d make another one.”

“But you can’t keep it a secret indefinitely.”

“I’ll let her know, when I know for certain I’m going to get all right. Because, as I told you, I wouldn’t marry at all otherwise.”

“You’ll get all right.”

“That’s what everybody says, but of course saying so is part of the treatment. You can’t really believe them—least of all doctors— in a matter like that.”

“Well, what do YOU think? Don’t YOU believe you’re going to get all right?”

“Sometimes I do, sometimes not. So many things change my mind about it. Trivial—ridiculous things… Sometimes I stop in front of a lamp-post as if the future of the world depended on which side I walk round. Of course you may say it DOES depend on that. I mean, if you believe in predestination, every little thing must be charted out in advance, so that if it were possible for even a caterpillar to walk just once on the wrong side of a lamppost, then the whole cosmic blueprint goes to pot. On the other hand, you can say that my hesitation in front of the lamp- post was itself predestined, so that—”

“That’s enough,” George interrupted. “You’re much too clever for me. And if that’s what you get from studying philosophy at a university—”

“No, George. That’s what I got from piloting a bomber over Germany. You have to think of SOMETHING then. Something fearful and logical, like predestination, or else mystic and mathematical, like the square root of minus one.” The boy’s eyes were streaked now with flashes of wildness. “Anyway, how did we get on to all this?”

“I was saying you’re going to get better—and meaning it too. That is, if you tackle the future the right way.”

“I know. And avoid scenes. Scenes don’t help. And when I feel better enough to tell my mother about Julie there’ll be a scene. And then I’ll feel worse again… Sort of a vicious circle, isn’t it?”

George nodded. “All the same, though, I wouldn’t wait too long.”

“You mean, before I tell her?”

“Nay, don’t bother your head about that. I mean, before you marry the girl.”

A strained smile came over Charles’s face. “Where’s the hurry?” he asked, with sudden excitement. “What makes you give me that advice?”

George answered: “Because it seems to me there’s another vicious circle knocking around. You say you won’t marry till you know for certain you’re going to get all right, but perhaps marriage is one of the things that would help to MAKE you certain.”

Charles laughed. “I see! Doctor Boswell’s advice to those about to get married—DO! Advice based on his own experience of long, happy, and fruitful wedlock!” After a wilder outburst of hilarity, the laughter drained suddenly from the boy’s face and a scared look took its place. He clutched frantically at George’s arm. “Oh God, I’m sorry—I didn’t mean that… I never thought… I forgot for the moment… George… Oh, George, PLEASE forgive me…” His voice and body began to shake convulsively.

It was the first time George had seen the kind of thing Julie had told him about, and it shocked him immeasurably. He put his arms round the boy and fought the enemy with a silent, secret strength of his own. There was not much to say. He kept saying: “Steady, lad… it’s all right… all right…”

“George, I didn’t mean… I swear I didn’t mean anything personal—”

“Aye, I know you didn’t. And what if you did, for that matter? To blazes with everything except you getting well again… Quiet down a bit more, lad, and then let’s take a walk…”