A Day Off Read online

  There were other reasons—not only the real Frau Groener—for his leaving Hamburg. He told her about them in one of his rare moments of sadness. She did not take it in very well, but gathered that he had had trouble with the police—but not in any way disgraceful. A meeting. He was a Socialist, he said. She knew nothing about it and thought him a fool to care.

  Those years, she thought—then stopped. She felt faintly that they had been easy (in spite of the work), the sun warmer and brighter, people different—she did not know how, but they had been different, younger, perhaps that was all. We were young enough, she said, and stared. Twenty-four. Then one day someone asked her and she had to think a minute before she knew. “We’ve been here four years about.” Twenty-eight—but she felt the same.

  That day she and Ernst went down to Brighton to look at a small hotel he thought of buying. It was in a back street, narrow and shabby. Ernst saw something in it. He said she would have an easier life of it—that made her laugh, and ask him whether he was tired of her. They roamed about Brighton all the afternoon, Ernst deep in calculations, and she exclaiming at everything, the shops, the gay people, the houses with green sunblinds over the steps, the glittering sea. “Look, Ernst.” She pulled at his arm. He smiled, his lips moving—he was considering the risk and balancing it against the tiny hoard in the bank.

  At last he made up his mind. They went back for a last look at the place, then had a meal, the first for four years she had eaten outside her own house. She wanted Ernst to note the fact. “I say, old boy, don’t you think we might go out oftener?”

  He did not answer.

  “What ho!” she said impatiently. “Wake up, old boy!”

  Without looking at her he laid a hand on her knee. He was listening to two men who had come in and taken the table next theirs. One of the men had a foreign newspaper sticking from his jacket. She listened too.

  “But I say there’s going to be war. And well time. Haven’t the Germans been asking for it since nineteen eleven? Of course they have.”

  “But——” his friend began.

  “Nothing of the kind. I know what you’re going to say and that’s all stuff. We’re going to fight them and we shall give them the licking of their lives—don’t you make any mistake about it.”

  “I must say I don’t like Germans,” the other man said.

  Ernst leaned forward. “I beg your pardon.” She looked at him, frightened. What was he going to say. All at once she saw that he did not look like an Englishman.

  “I beg your pardon,” he repeated. “Would you tell me—I have been away—is there a question of war?”

  “I should jolly well hope so,” the first man said. He sounded excited. “Here—I suppose this is no use to you?”

  He offered his newspaper to Ernst who drew back, smiling slightly. “We have to go,” he said.

  She dragged her scarf together and hurried from the place. On the station he bought a paper of his own and read it, taking not the least notice of her questions. At Horsham a man and a woman came into their carriage and began at once to talk like the two men. Only they spoke about Germany as if it were a country of devils, never guessing that the thin young man in the corner was a German. She grew frantic. Ernst would not speak to her, but the woman did. “Don’t you feel it’s time we settled with those people?”

  “I don’t know,” she said insolently. She hoped she had given the impression of a woman who did not choose to be spoken to by strangers.

  At home Ernst still said nothing. She rushed at him and shook his arm. “What is it all about? Why don’t you explain to me ? Show me the paper.” He gave it to her but she made nothing of it. “Tell me one thing,” she said. “What happens if you are still a German ?”

  “ I am still a German,” he answered.

  She went to bed, unable to hold her eyes open any longer though her brain was jumping. All this excitement was not unpleasant. So few things happened to break up the days—she quite hoped for a war. The consequences, to Ernst and herself, were still outside her grasp.

  In the morning she understood from the Sunday newspapers what had been hidden from her. England was not yet at war with Germany but already someone was writing : Watch the Germans in this country. She showed the place to Ernst.

  “Leave me alone,” he said.

  “I’m not touching you,” she protested. “I only want us to know.”

  When she could she watched him furtively. He was very quiet all that day, and the next. The other man, their waiter, did not turn up and she asked Ernst whether she should go round to the man’s lodgings. He shook his head.

  She began to worry. The day after that, when they were at war, a man, a customer with whom she had been friendly, asked Ernst if he were a German. Ernst smiled and spread out his fingers (watching, she spread hers), but he went very red.

  “It is true I am of no country,” he said apologetically. She saw the man look at him and notice.

  When the café shut at eleven he went directly to their bedroom and began to change his clothes to his outdoor suit. She followed him. He had bolted the door but he opened it to her frenzied knocking.

  “What are you up to?”

  “I must get away.” He looked at her from the corners of his eyes, ashamed.

  “You’re leaving me?”

  He turned to gather a few things into a parcel. “Don’t you know what’s happening?” he said bitterly.

  “No, I don’t. Ernst!” She stood close to him. “You can’t leave me. What am I to do?” Her mind could not grasp what was going on in the room, only she felt frightened. All at once he had become a foreigner. He might do anything, murder her—they did these things.

  Her head cleared and she saw that he was only Ernst, tired and worried. She snatched his hand from the parcel. “Ernst, will you take notice! I want to know where you’re going and what I’m to do, about the work and the customers.”

  Ernst suddenly lost his temper with her. He freed his hand and struck the table with it so that the things gathered there flew a dozen ways, the comb into the fire, where it flared up. “Do as you please,” he shouted. “Do you want that I stay here for the police, eh? Prison, eh? You would like that, I guess.” He swept his arms round the scattered clothes, half sobbing with rage and impatience. The paper tore when he dragged at it.

  “Here. Let me,” she said.

  She smoothed and folded, fetched more paper, string, her own comb. The neat parcel lay on the table between them.

  By the time she finished the simple task she was convinced that everything was all right. Ernst was calmer, too. He stood biting his fingers, watching her as she pulled the knots.

  “If I do not go at once I shall be caught and held,” he said in his usual manner. “The police may be coming now, this minute. I am an enemy.”

  “I suppose you are. It’s funny, isn’t it?”

  “I think so indeed!” Ernst said, mimicking her voice.

  Her own anger was rising. “I say. You haven’t said what’s to become of me.”

  This reasonable demand roused Ernst to fury. “I see what will become of you,” he said, looking at her with loathing. “You will get up every morning later. Nothing is done at the right time, the customers complain, then they do not come, the business dies, my work, my brain, my heart, all spoiled, ended. All because this miserable, fat, soft country is afraid of the Germans. Do you hear? England is a miserable fat soft rotten country. So are you soft and rotten. Soft—and—rotten. You think I couldn’t see it? Why have we no children?”

  “Search me,” she said angrily. “You got me to come here and I’ve done my best, slaved—four years it’s been—and now you——”

  Ernst sat down slackly in a chair and burst into tears, shivering. At first she was satisfied. She did not stop scolding him. She let him cry, and moved about straightening things for the next day. Something happened in her in a moment. She rushed across the room and put her arms round him. “Here,” she said, soothing him,
drying his face. His poor head fell against her. “You come to bed,” she said, “you’ll feel better in bed.”

  He let her half pull half coax him into the bedroom. She took off his jacket, his shoes, and left him to do the rest himself while she hurriedly removed her own clothes. He seemed dazed. She wanted to comfort him but she did not know what to say. She said : “What ho, old boy!” in a soft voice and stroked him clumsily with her free hand. In the end he slipped off into sleep so suddenly that she did not know he had gone.

  A light noise woke her. The room was barely light yet. Ernst was standing by the table, dressed, going through the money he had in his pockets. When he saw her eyes open he said : “Go to sleep, dear.”

  “Are you going?” she asked, stupid with sleep.

  “Yes, just. I am going.”

  “Good luck, Ernst. Goodbye.”

  “Goodbye.”

  Hours passed, while she slept. When she woke, punctually at six, she was still frightened by a dream she had had. Half turning, she remembered the truth, no dream: the door was open between the rooms and the silence took all the strength from her. She lay, feeling her heart thud. Slowly, with an extraordinary feeling of being warmed and soothed, she remembered that she need not get up : there was no cup of tea, no Ernst; she could lie in as late as she liked. Her body relaxed into the hollow it had made and warmed during the night : half asleep, she listened to the tap dripping in the next room, her thoughts circled slowly, lazily, seeking the level at which she would enter her mother’s house and hear without hearing the drip, drip of water into an enamel bowl.

  During the next few days she tried halfheartedly to carry on. She engaged a man and his wife to help her but they were dirty and incompetent. She had told them that her name was Green; but the woman found out the other name and addressed her by it, with an impudent smile. The next day they did not turn up. She could not cook; Ernst had always done that. To give herself time she drew the blinds of the café, locked the door, and stayed in the back room all day. A very few people tried the door. After dark she packed all she could carry and went away. If Ernst wrote to her she would not get the letter—but for some reason she felt sure that it was all over. He had gone : she never even knew whether he had got away or not.

  She felt strange, heavy. The light was now dazzling, as though the grass and trees had absorbed so much that they could only reject what came to them. A quiver of light ran in the air above the road; it came from the bonnet of a motor-car that droned slowly out of sight. Nothing else moved. The trees, the clouds, the stooping deer, were as still as stones. It was very hot.

  She felt as though something in her had broken. There was no way back for her to the young woman who comforted Ernst, tied his parcel up for him, spoke to him. She had forgotten too much. She could not recall the clothes he had worn when he left, and this vexed her—it was like forgetting the colour of that poor woman’s hair. “Ee, my memory,” she murmured, hurt. She felt that she had remembered what was of no use, the last day or two but not any of the other days when she was wholly Mrs. Groener and without thought of any other life. She could not remember a single dress she had worn as Mrs. Groener, nor where the wardrobe stood in their room, nor their dinner service—all, all had gone.

  Something in her cried that these endings were vile, cruel. To have finished with Mrs. Groener like that. It was horrible; it made out that you were nothing—she struck her breast—you, you here, nothing. She felt a deep—not grief exactly—confusion, a dull misery, as though all she did had been useless. You worked, cried, made plans, got up morning after morning in the dark, scrubbed the shelves—but it was nothing, it tailed off. “Oh my God, oh my God,” she gabbled. She did not feel that she had spoken. Fear had overcome her again, the fear of finding herself without money, without a home. Her fingers dug, quivering, into her flesh, seeking assurance.

  It came at the last moment. Something not courage, but it was not mere recklessness either, took hold of and steadied her. It had to use words she would know. “What ho she bumps!” it said, and—” You can’t keep a good girl down.”

  She laughed out, and swallowed with a dry mouth. A square meal is what I want, she thought. Nature abhors a vacuum. Holding the mirror to her face she tucked in stray hairs and dabbed carelessly with the greasy red at her mouth. Ups-a-daisy. Oh Lord. Oh I’m broken. I s’d think I’m marked for life.

  Swaying, she stood, and then walked painfully down the slope to the road. Easy does it, you don’t want to spoil yourself. What time is it, I wonder. Ask. Why not?

  An elderly gentleman approached, glossy hat, gloves, stick, like something in a play: He strolled past her with his eyes turned to the distant wood, and jumped at her question.

  “About two o’clock, my good woman.”

  She took offence at his voice and raised her own. “You could have looked at your watch, couldn’t you? What’s in a civil question if I may ask?” She stared after him, her good humour restored by the sight of his dismay. A happier gibe occurred to her when he was some distance away but she left it unsaid and walked on with more energy. The gates came in sight. She saw them with relief. I can’t go much longer. I ought to stand myself a glass of something. Port and lemon. No I can’t afford it.

  She stood rigid, struck. Here, you know—nine shillings won’t last forever. Might as well spend it then. Always throw away the last penny when you come to it—brings luck. Who told me that? The thought of food pricked her mind and she began to imagine herself—supplied by a miracle with a pile of money—taking a cab to the Café Royal. Her favourite waiter came forward, chairs were drawn, her favourite chair, a blind carefully adjusted—” And what today, madam. I can recommend the Plat du jour—pigeon and oyster pie.”—Now what would that be like? She ordered it to see. Leaning back in an easy manner, she caught the mournful glances of a gentleman near at hand. Recognition came slowly. “George!” No, no, let him make the first advances. “Let me see—your face is rather familiar—I’m afraid I—Why, of course. How silly of me—George isn’t it? I’d almost forgotten——” Clumsy explanations. His gaze devoured her face, her eyes, sparkling with happiness and that girlish laugh she had never lost, girlish eyes, figure, eyes. A rich fur lay flung down carelessly across the seat. He said hoarsely : “Youre well, I see?” “Oh yes, I—but don’t talk of me—how are you, my poor boy?” He winced at the well-remembered affection in her voice. His face was marked by his sorrows, and whatever he had done he had been well punished for it. A warm gentle excitement sprang in her. My lost darling. In the end, after a suitable period of suspense and delay, she forgave him. Their reconciliation took place in her room, which she had had done up to please herself, everything in the best taste, and of course spotless, with a fleeting fragrance of Puits d’Amour. With a deep sob he.

  Had she come to the right place? She hesitated, full of doubts, in the doorway of what had once been a private house and now with the most grudging effort had become a restaurant offering 3-course luncheons at 3s. 6d. She advanced along the passage. It was six years since she used to come here with Mr. Cohn. Six—a door opened to the left of the passage, and two young women in flowery dresses came out; thin and pretty, all smiles : they came towards her without looking. Throwing back her head she pushed between them roughly and into the room. It was all but empty : trembling with resentment she made for a table prominent in the window. A waiter stood in her way. “For one, madam? This way.” He led her to the back of the room : the table had a curtain at one side and the serving door was directly behind it. She wanted to protest, but exhausted by the effort in the passage her spirit failed and she sat heavily down. If I’d had a man with me they wouldn’t dare treat me like this. Her throat hardened. Feeling for it under the table she drew out a soiled powder-puff from her bag and passed it across her face. The injustice of it sickened her.

  She waited. “Here. Who’s the waiter for this table?” she said at last.

  “I’ll tell him.”

  Yes, tell him, te
ll him. Go on. Tell him he needn’t hurry himself for a woman.

  Her waiter came in from the service room, his jaws working. Daresay he’s hungry, too, she thought. She looked at him with an air of insolence. Well it’s the one used to serve us but I suppose he won’t—

  “A long time since we saw you here, madam!”

  Oh you do, do you? Her dejection vanished but she spoke to him in a morose voice. “I’m a bit late.”

  “If you’d come any earlier I couldn’t have found a table for you. Every place was full.”

  “Indeed!”

  He twitched the cloth cleverly to bring the worst stains out of sight. “And how’s the gentleman, madam?”

  “Quite well, thank you,” she said frigidly. A try on, of course. He knew she wasn’t—or why was she alone? “I’ll take the lunch.” She wanted to say : And be quick about it. Hunger gripped her at the smell of food.

  “No need to ask you what you’ll drink,” the waiter said in a quiet friendly tone.“Port and lemon, I remember”

  She had meant to do without anything but she agreed weakly. I need it to keep me going, she said to comfort herself. Leaning back, she gazed round the tables, all, except one in the corner, unoccupied. A man and woman lingered at it, hated by a weary dissatisfied waiter. The sense of her own unfriended days returned, a sour heavy feeling at the roots of her thought.

  Other belated customers wandered in and her waiter went off to attend them. He kept coming back to her between courses; when he spoke to her his face and voice changed to the easy looks of a friend. She saw that the people at the other tables noticed it.

  His behaviour vexed her. She did not want to be treated with familiarity but she felt helpless to stop him. She could be rude, of course, but then he might ignore her and that would be even worse. It had been a mistake to come to this place. Her annoyance brought the heat out all over her. Her face grew crimson.

  “Let me see now,” the waiter said, “it’ll be five—no, seven years since you were here. Time flies. We had a bad season last year.”