Archibald Cronin - The Stars Look Down

But David turned away. He felt suddenly revolted. He made a pretence of stirring up the fire, then he faced her again.

“Remember!” he said in a low, serious tone, “I expect you to look after Robert when I’m away!”

“I will, David,” she gushed. “Oh, you know I will.”

He left for Tynecastle the following day and from there he was drafted straight away to camp at Catterick. Three months later, on the 5th of April, he went with the field ambulance unit attached to the fifth battalion of the Northumberland Fusiliers to France.

On that second Sunday of September, 1915, Hetty’s car drew up briskly on the gravel drive of the Law. As he stood at the dining-room window with his hands in his pockets Arthur watched Hetty get out, very smart in her khaki, and advance towards the front door.

Arthur had known that Hetty was coming to the Law today. Impossible not to know of Hetty’s coming. Aunt Carrie had mentioned it, his mother had mentioned it, and at lunch, on Saturday, Barras had looked down the table and remarked with unusual significance:

“Hetty will be here for tea to-morrow. She has asked the day off specially.”

Arthur had not answered. Did they take him for a fool? It was too obvious; that “specially” had a grim humour all its own.

During these last eight months Hetty had been frequently at the Law. Hetty, as one of the first to join the Women’s Emergency Corps, had now secured a commission in the W.V.R., executive headquarters, Tynecastle. She was often useful to Barras in his activities, dashing between Tynecastle and Sleescale in her two-seater runabout, bringing official papers for his signature. But on this Sunday Arthur was fully aware that Hetty’s duties would not be official. Hetty was having a day off to be sweetly unofficial. He saw it plainly and for all his bitterness he could have laughed.

She came into the room. And at the sight of him there, by the window, she smiled brightly and extended her hands with a little twitter of pleasure.

“You’ve been looking out for me,” she said. “How nice of you, Arthur.”

She was extremely bright; but he had anticipated that. He did not smile back. He said flatly:

“Yes, I expected you.”

His tone might perhaps have warned her, but she was not dismayed.

“Where are the others?” she asked lightly.

“They’ve all disappeared,” he said. “They’re all conveniently out of the way so that we can be alone.”

She laughed reprovingly:

“You sound as if you didn’t want us to be alone. But I know you don’t mean to be unkind. I know you better than you do yourself. Come on, now, what shall we do? Shall we go for a walk?”

He coloured slightly and looked away from her. But in a moment he said:

“All right, then, Hetty, let’s go for a walk.”

He got his hat and coat and they set out on the walk they usually took together, though they had not taken it for some months now, the walk through Sluice Dene. The autumn day was calm, the dene was full of russet colour, the bracken crackled under their feet. They walked in silence. When they reached the end of the dene they sat down on the high root of an oak tree which a subsidence had unearthed. It was their usual seat. Below, the town lay subdued in the Sunday quiet and the sea stretched out beyond, shimmering away into the distance and merging with the sky. The headstocks of the Neptune rose up black and high against the clear background of sea and sky. Arthur stared at the headstocks, the gallows headstocks of the Neptune pit.

And presently, having tucked her skirt round her trim legs with seductive modesty, Hetty followed his gaze.

“Arthur,” she exclaimed. “Why do you look at the pit like that?”

“I don’t know,” he said bitterly. “Business is good. Coal selling at fifty shillings a ton.”

“It isn’t that,” she said with an impulse of curiosity. “I do wish you’d tell me, Arthur. You’ve been so queer lately, so unlike yourself. Do tell me, dear, and perhaps I can help you.”

He turned to Hetty, a warmth penetrating through his bitterness. He had an impulse to tell her, unburden himself of the awful weight that pressed upon him and crushed his very soul. He said in a low voice:

“I can’t forget the disaster at the Neptune.”

She was staggered, but she concealed it. She said as she might have humoured a troubled child:

“In what way, Arthur dear?”

“I believe the disaster could have been prevented.”

She stared at his melancholy face, exasperated, feeling that she must get to the bottom of this irritating enigma.

“Something is really worrying you, Arthur dear. If you could only tell me?”

He looked at her. He said slowly:

“I believe the lives of all these men were thrown away, Hetty.” He broke off. What was the use? She would never understand.

Yet she had a vague glimpse of the morbid obsession that burned in his mind. She took his hand. She humoured him. She said gently:

“Even if it were so, Arthur, don’t you think the best way is to forget about it? It’s so long ago now. And only a hundred men. What’s that compared with the thousands and thousands of brave fellows who have been killed in the war? That’s what you’ve got to remember now, Arthur dear. There’s a war on now. A world war, and that’s a very different affair from the tiny disaster in the pit.”

“It is not different,” he said, pressing his hand against his brow. “It’s the same thing exactly. I can’t see it any other way. I can’t separate them in my mind. The men at the front are being killed just like the men in the pit, needlessly, horribly. The disaster and the war mean exactly the same thing to me. They’ve become united in one great mass murder.”

Hetty took the situation in hand. She abandoned the tortuous labyrinths into which he was leading her and took the short cut home. She was, in a way, quite fond of Arthur. She was practical, prided herself on being practical. And she meant to be kind.

“I’m so glad you’ve told me, Arthur,” she said briskly. “You’ve been worrying yourself sick and all about nothing. I’ve seen you were queer lately, but I hadn’t the least idea, I thought, well, I didn’t know what to think.”

He stared at her glumly.

“What did you think?”

“Well,” she hesitated, “I thought maybe you were, well, that you didn’t want to go to the war.”

“I don’t,” he said.

“But I meant, Arthur dear, I meant afraid to go.”

“Perhaps I am afraid,” he said dully. “I may be a coward for all I know.”

“Nonsense!” she said decisively and patted his hand. “You’ve got yourself into a perfect state of nerves. The very bravest of people get like that. Why, Alan told me before he went over the top and got his M.C. he was in a complete blue funk. Now you listen to me, my dear. You’ve been thinking and worrying far too much. You want a little action for a change. It’s high time I was taking you in hand.”

Her look became inquiring. She smiled, very sweet and sure of herself, aware of her sex, her attraction, her poise.

“Now listen to me, you dear silly boy. Do you remember, Arthur, that week-end at Tynecastle when you wanted us to be engaged and I said we were both too young?”

“Yes,” he said slowly. “I remember that day. I shan’t forget it in a hurry.”

She raised her dark-pupilled eyes towards him intimately, and began to stroke his hand. “Well… it would be different if you were in the army, Arthur dear.”

He stiffened. It had come at last, what he dreaded, come under the odious pretence of tenderness. But she did not notice the sudden aversion that held him rigid and speechless. She was carried away by her own feeling, which was not love but the sense of immolating herself. She came nearer to him and murmured: