THE CHINA MAIL FRIDAY SUPPLEMENT, JUNE 11, 1937
THE HOUSE IN THE WOOD
taken a chill we could at least get a hot-water bottle and a whisky and lemon for him. And I took another sidelong look at the man. I was astonished at the change in him. The mere sight of the house seemed to have returned him to the normal. He stood quite still, looking at it with a sort of appre- ciative smile.
"Well, here we are," I said at last, "and damn it, Robbie, you've almost walked me off my feet."
"Sorry," he replied. **You see, I got in a funk that I shouldn't be able to find it.”
So that was it. But fancy working oneself up into such a state! Thank God, I had an or- dinary workaday temperament that refused to fatigue itself!
It
Then, for the first time, I took a real look at the house itself. was a new house and that gave me a bit of a shock, because, for some absurd reason or other, I had expected an old one.
ance.
or
But this was quite new new, indeed, that the polygonum they meant to train up-its walls. was merely a row of spindly branches, and in the freshly laid. lawn one could still see the gaps between the turves. As for the house itself, it was pleasing en- ough to look upon built on two floors, with green shutters to the windows, which somehow other gave it a foreign appear- And yet, though it was an ordinary enough kind of house at first sight, there was something about it
some oddity which struck one, as`such things will, even before one has time to see exactly what it was. But in an- other second, as we were ap- proaching the front door, I saw what made the place look usual. The roof. From each end of the long, low house it rose, with a gentle slope, to a point in the centre. I'd never seen a roof built like that, and ΠΟΥ that I did I couldn't help feeling that, with a long, low house like that, the effect of that slight slope and the centre angle where it met was rather pleasing.
un-
I said as much to Robbie. “Curious kind of roof," I com- · mented, "but, in a way, rather effective don't you think?”
"Do you?" he said, with a cur ious eagerness. “Yes, I agree. I like it immensely, immensely !”
I thought his sudden ~ enthu- siasm rather odd, until I remem- bered that he was an architect, and that these things meant a great deal more to him than they did to me.
He rang the bell, and, in the interval before the door was opened, I noticed that it was as much as he could do to keep still.
A maid opened the door and recognised him immediately.
"Mr. McClaren," she said, and smiled at us; then she added: "I'll go and tell the master at once."
But Robbie stopped her. "And Miss Dorothy?" he said. "She is at home, isn't she?”
I
"Oh, yes, sir," answered the maid. "Miss Dorothy is at home." I thought then that understood everything. Robbie's. excitement, his embarrassment (for that, of course, was the ex- planation of his bad temper), everything But why on earth couldn't he have told me about Dorothy? After all, we had been friends for years.
I was congratulating myself on such a simple explanation ⠀⠀ of
1
what I had foolishly thought to be a feverish attack when I saw an old gentleman coming down the stairs to meet us. When I say old, I mean that he was what men of our age call old. I dare say he was round about sixty; and one of the most charming- looking men I've ever seen. His expression of welcome to us both,
but not only in his words
his face, made one feel in an instant that in that house one could never be a stranger again.
His arm went 'round Robbie's shoulder, but he smiled at both of us as he said: "Now, what would you two boys like? A drink right away-or a wash first, and join Dorothy and my- self for cocktails in a quarter of an hour?"
We chose the latter, and were shown to our rooms. Our host insisted on coming with us him- self. I remember when he left us, feeling what a pity Robbie's father hadn't been that kind of man.. He radiated everything that was generous, everything that was lovable. And evidently he was used to entertaining. My room looked as if I had been expected at this very moment.. Robbie.came în to me, after a wash and brush-up, and I com- mented on the readiness of things. I remember he walked to the window and sighed, a deep, contented sort of sigh. And then he turned and said quite simply:
RE But
you are Roger I've al- ways been expected here.”
We went downstairs, and Doro- thy gave us cocktails. She was a lovely girl, with a sly sense of fun that made one feel there was no barrier between the after all.
sexes
I'd begun to look on myself as a confirmed bachelor, because I believed that, in the really inti- mate concerns of life, it is im- possible to get on terms with a woman. But if you could
I mean if her mind really marches with your own ̈. - Well, I must admit that after my second glass of port I regarded Robbie as an undeserving young devil. Then those two disappeared somewhere or other, and Dorothy's father smiled at me and produced some old brandy, and said it was good to look at them, wasn't it? And I said it was. And I felt it, too. For there was something about that house and its occupants that somehow made you see life pro- perly.
And then Dorothy's father ask- ed if I would like to see over the place, and, of course, I said "Yes," and he showed me every hole and corner in a
way that made me know he loved it. And later Robbie and Dorothy joined us, and Robbie enthused over the place as if it were
his own, which, I reflected, it might well be, one day. And I may as well confess the thing I was a little Jealous of Robbie.
remember thinking, just-be- fore I dropped off to sleep that night, that it was rather a rotten sort of feeling to have had.
And the next day, off we went again. I tried to rag Robbie, in the silly way men do, about Dorothy, but he got savage about it and I shut up. We walked in silence for some time, and I had leisure in which to think that it isn't really such a grand joke people falling in love, I mean. Nobody sees anything tremen- dously funny about Primavera or Heloise and Abelard. What blasted cads we make of our. selves following
conven
Billy
tions! I remember I tried to apologise to Robbię, and he said, "That's all right,” and said it too, as if it didn't matter a damn what I'd said because, I sup- pose, I was too small to count in the world he was living in just then! And I thought how right he was, and I felt a bit humble, and, as a sort of punish- ment, I put up with the long silent walk that followed. I ask- ed no more questions, and I cer- tainly made no more silly jokes. We found our way to another country inn, and had the simple dinner they provided.
And it was there that it hap-
pened.
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the tears streaming down his face. I can't remember very much about what happened in that room. The doctor asked Robbie a question or two, and I remember him turning up his eye- lids. Then he drew the coverlet over Robbie's stark, twitching body, and he and I went outside.
"I'm going to ring up for an ambulance," he said, "and your friend will be taken to London."
"What's happened to him?” I asked.
"I can't tell you that," answer- ed the doctor; "I wish I could. If I could I'd be one of the world's greatest men. But I'm afraid I
"An Evening Standard" Story
By Arrangement
Suddenly-straight out
in the blue-în that shabby little coffee-room, Robbie gave a queer cry and burst into tears.
I got him up to his room some- how or other (I can still see the shocked and deprecating eye of a local farmer who had dined there, -too). In the bedroom Robbie
went mad. What I mean is, I believe that it was there his brain · actually snapped. He did -in- credible things, he said incredible things. I'm not going to set them down here. I locked the door, found the landlord and got him to send someone for the local doctor: By the grace of God he was a man who knew more than. he need of, in that little place. When I took him into Robbie's room Robbie was stretched full length on his bed, naked, with
can tell you his condition. He's insane, poor chap. I may be wrong, but I think he's been în- sane for a considerable time. Something has brought it to a head, that's all.
*
So they took Robbie to London, where certain formalities were gone through, and Robbie dis- appeared. to the place where now he is.
But, I being his friend, though felt helpless, yet imagined it was at least my duty to tell the old man in the house with the strange roof, and to ask him, as gently as he could, to tell, bis daughter Dorothy.
Perhaps you can guess what happened?
There was no house in the wood; there was no charming old
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Equal to a
fine liqueur
"I can tell
White Horse
blindfold! And to think that at one
time I used simply to ask for whisky-and-soda! White Horse is just like a fine liqueur!”
Sole Agents for S. China, JARDINE MATHESON & CO., LTD.
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