Джеймс Хилтон - Morning Journey

And all this while, during the interval of wasted time, Austen’s relations with Carey were in some danger of languishing. Knowing more of the complications than she did, his were doubtless the greater restraints, yet she too had her own, and it was an extra anxiety that he could not always discern them. That she was happy with him he was confident, but he wished he could see into her mind and heart about Paul, yet he knew better than to ask, or even to mention Paul’s name. He had the feeling once or twice that the pending case had disappeared from her thoughts, which was almost too much what he had wished for; and when papers had to be signed she did so with such little apparent interest that he remembered a remark of hers about the play fiasco—that she had sleep-walked into it. He hoped she was not sleep-walking into marriage with him, though even if she were, he would still want her.

The only thing she asked about fairly often was the Everyman picture, and there was nothing more to tell for the reason that though Paul was no longer claiming ownership, the actual physical film had so far been impossible to locate. Here, too, was bafflement that made Austen feel not so much defeated by an adversary as scorned by a child who thumbs his nose from a safe distance. He wanted a print of that film as part of the establishment of adult discipline, though if it should arrive he had decided to conceal the fact from Carey. Whether it was good or bad (or perhaps especially if it were good), he did not wish her to see it yet; as a product of Paul’s mind he was afraid of it.

Towards spring the print still had not come, but he was no longer baffled, merely determined. For he had sized up Paul’s outlandish weapons, and had devised counter-weapons of his own; one of them was guile. In this new mood (not really so new, for guile was part of his professional equipment), he made a fresh approach to the major problem. Hitherto Nevada had been thought of as the place to bring suit, but now, in face of Paul’s continued inaccessibility, Mexico came under consideration. A divorce there would be more dubious legally, but there were procedures in certain of the Mexican states by which Paul’s tactics could be circumvented if it could be shown, evidentially, that he had expressed an intention not to contest the case. And he had—though only in that letter to his mother which Carey had seen.

Thus, at the extreme of the dilemma, Austen found himself acting in a way so contrary to what he would have said were all his normal principles that he could only conclude that his affection for Carey amounted to sheer self-abandonment. He was startled to discover this, for he had not suspected himself capable of it; and perhaps he was secretly gratified, for to a man of his age a grand passion is a renewal of youth. He had loved Fran very deeply, but never to such a point, unless it was merely that he had won her against fewer obstacles and had thus escaped the test. Like all men who govern themselves austerely he was shocked to think he was in the throes of any desire that he could not control, and ashamed to employ the ruthlessness which a weaker man would have enjoyed. Yet here again he was secretly excited; it was a new thing in his life at a time when most things were already getting to be old. Actually his self-knowledge did not go far enough to see the whole thing in perspective—to realize that the average routine of his daily business was just as ruthless as his behaviour now in a different field, and that most of his desires were uncontrollable in the sense that if he wanted something enough there were few plans he would not put into operation to get it. His shock and shame, therefore, were in the nature of sentimental luxuries—or at most, the fastidiousness of a man who normally does unpleasant things at such long range that he escapes all personal contact with the event.

There came a day when he called at his lawyers’ office and was told that certain information he had asked for could now be furnished.

“But you understand, Mr. Bond, that’s as far as we can go. We’ve no idea what kind of organization these people have—we certainly do NOT guarantee or recommend them in any way. The whole thing is really far outside our province.”

“I know all that. And if they do what I want it won’t be a testimonial to their respectability—I know that too. I hate this sort of thing, but I can’t see an alternative.”

“Then be sure you take precautions. There’s always a chance of blackmail, especially if they find out who’s paying them.”

“They won’t. Dunne will arrange everything, and for cash. He’s discreet.”

“So long as you realize there’s a risk.”

“I don’t think there’s much, but what there is I’ll have to take.”

A week or so afterwards, Dunne returned to the house late in the evening after a day filled with Oppenheimerish detail, for he had used a variety of subways uptown and downtown, and had taken several taxis in confusing directions. Entering the library with a tray, he approached Austen in a manner so carefully customary that he was obviously relishing the drama of the occasion. Austen had been dozing in a chair and woke to stare sharply, then exclaimed: “You’re back, then?… What happened?”

“It’s here, sir. In this envelope.”

“WHAT?… You’ve got it? ALREADY?”

“Sure. And I paid them. They didn’t try to welsh on a bargain either.”

Austen stared at the envelope, controlling his excitement. “Did they tell you how they managed it?”

“I didn’t ask for details. After all, you couldn’t expect them to reveal their methods.”

“I suppose not. I was just curious.”

“I got the impression, though, that they used the daily maid, and they did say it was stuffed away in a drawer with a lot of other letters. So it may not be missed, and if it is the old lady may think she lost it.”

“Fine… So there was no hitch of any kind?”

“Apparently not. They’re reliable people, I should guess, in their way.”

“But WHAT a way!”

Now that he knew the thing was in his possession he had no eagerness to inspect it. He did not open the envelope till some time after Dunne had gone; then he read the letter once before mailing it special delivery to his lawyers. Photostatted, it might do the trick, but he could not forgive Paul for having made all this necessary. Again, it was his blind spot; he did not realize that the daily tricks of his trade were so similar in degree that their difference in kind was not fundamental.

Two months later Carey obtained a decree of divorce, and the next day, in the same Mexican state, she married Austen. She did not know the devious means by which Paul had been held to be a consenting party or the high cost of deviousness in fees to all the deviators, and as the documents were in Spanish, there was not much likelihood of her finding out. Publicity, too, was at a minimum, for the story did not leak till it was already stale, and the news item as reported lacked sensation. The pair stayed in Mexico for several weeks, then took an extended motor trip in New Mexico and Arizona. They were in Santa Fe when Austen received news from his German lawyers that Paul was showing Everyman in Berlin, and what should they do about it? He cabled them to take no action, but to send him news of what the film was like, how it had been received, and so on. And in the meantime he still said nothing about it to Carey.

Not till they were back at the farm in July did he decide to mention it, partly because for some time she had not asked, and he thought her silence might have been deliberately aimed to please him at a cost to herself. He said one morning when the mail arrived: “Oh, by the way, here are some clippings from Berlin papers about the Everyman film. You know German? Quite good notices on the whole.”