Four-Part Setting Read online

  Ann Bridge

  FOUR-PART

  SETTING

  A Novel

  To

  L

  with love

  NOTE

  The scene of this novel is laid in the China

  of a decade ago; it bears no relation to

  the conditions existing today.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  A Note on the Author

  Chapter One

  Captain Hargreaves shifted his position slightly on the rough wooden bench. In a moment he intended to put his arm round Mrs. Pelham’s waist, and he knew that such a manœuvre, to come off, must be executed with the utmost precision; there must be no fumbling between the surrounding arm and the following kiss, no awkward movement. He turned a little more towards her, so that instead of looking down across her knees to the sea, faintly silvered in the moonlight, he looked past the charming blunt end of her nose to where the beam of light, swinging round off Lighthouse Point, made a white bar across the water, shorter and shorter as it turned more towards them, vanished behind the black bulk of the Minister’s bungalow and travelled out again, to make a lengthening bar across the shadowy land. He was aware, for one thing, of a slight and quite unwonted sentiment of uncertainty about her, and about the whole proceeding. She so obviously belonged to the virtuous class—but then her husband was in Egypt and she was here, with the Lydiards, for no frightfully good reason that he could hear of; clearly there was something up.

  He had begun of course by treating her entirely as a member of the virtuous class. Captain Hargreaves got a lot of pleasure out of the virtuous class, small as it was—and he was always finding it even smaller than he thought. He could like and enjoy and value them, in the way appropriate to them; and in that way, precisely, he had at first liked and enjoyed Mrs. Pelham. She was delicious! He had never seen a woman with such subtle colouring—all her skin was of a pale tone like parchment, and there were pale parchmenty lights in her soft brown hair; no vivid colour anywhere; even her eyebrows were soft indeterminate pencillings above her large blue eyes. Antony Lydiard said that she was like one of Luca Signorelli’s yellow boys. Well, yellow was a bit crude—but she was like a boy, with her flat slenderness, her free ease of movement; and in spite of her efficient social manners, there was something else boyish about her too. Here at Pei-t’ai-ho, where she was in and out of the water all day long, swimming like a fish, diving better and better, she enjoyed all these things with the direct eagerness of a young man—there were no poses, no attitudinising; her pale brown legs and arms looked lovely as she shot through the air or hauled herself up onto the diving-boat, but she simply ignored them; she was as intent on getting her dives right as an athlete in training. He found this perfectly charming. It had occurred to him within the first week that if she didn’t belong in the virtuous class, she would be an enchanting person to make love with; and often those cool pale sub-blonde women had marvellous temperaments, actually.

  And then gradually it had struck him that there was something odd about her—in spite of her directness of manner and eager enjoyment, something almost like an appeal; he couldn’t put it into words, but it presently made him wonder if she really wanted to remain in the virtuous class. There had been that tiny episode on the walk in the rain. They had gone out, all four of them—Antony and Anastasia Lydiard, Mrs. Pelham and himself—on one of those wet days that occur in North China during July and August—days that feel so like England, with their grey sky, cooler air, and relentless steady downpour—for a good solid grind: to acquire merit, exercise, and an appetite. Trudging along in her burberry, the yellow mud splashing up on her sand-shoes and bare legs, her hair curling out from under a foolish little knitted cap, she had looked so English, so “home-side” that she had warmed his heart. And at one moment, as they walked in single file along a narrow path between tall green walls of dripping kaoliang, she had turned her head and called some gay remark to him over her shoulder. He couldn’t hear it, the kaoliang dripped and rustled so—and with this foolish homesick warmth strong in him, he ran three steps to overtake her, caught her by the elbow and cried “What did you say?” in her ear. She turned her head again then, and repeated her remark, smiling, her rain-washed face so close to his that he could see the drops shining on her lashes, the smooth wet surface of her cheeks—and there was something about that sudden smile, a happiness, a response, as he held her elbow, that had set him wondering. And since then there had been one little thing after another; all small in themselves, but together producing a certain sort of impression. He found himself watching her, thinking about her more and more; and the more he watched and thought, the more warmly he liked her. More frequently, then, he had tried on those tiny movements, and words, and looks; and there was no rebuff.

  And really, how much more exciting and amusing this uncertainty, this feeling one’s way was than the direct, stereotyped moves with the unvirtuous class. But all the same, he wished he knew a little more where he was. Because she was a damned nice girl, obviously, as well as being quite enchanting; he would hate to upset her. And yet if there was this sort of appeal, one couldn’t very well leave it at that. (Captain Hargreaves, at any rate, could not.) What about the husband? The Lydiards were as tight as clams about him—never gave one the least slant. Well, damn it, he was going to try it on, and see what came of kissing her. And expertly, gently, and skilfully, he did so.

  She shivered a little when he kissed her, but made no other movement, said nothing. “You’re not cold, you darling thing?” She just indicated the syllable No. That shiver stirred a protective tenderness in him curiously strongly. He settled his arm more firmly and comfortably round her, and kissed her again, murmuring the appropriate endearments. The things he said made no great demands in the way of intelligent replies, but as the moments passed Captain Hargreaves found himself once again being puzzled by her attitude. There was no ardent response—well, perhaps it was a little soon for that; but there was certainly no sign of a rebuff—only a gentle, an almost relieved acceptance of his caresses. So far, so good—but still he was puzzled. Captain Hargreaves combined a great experience in these matters with an almost uncanny instinct, and he had now the impression—yes, it was almost as if she had got something she wanted. But also it seemed as if she were perfectly contented with what she had got—just these light kisses, these expressions of tenderness; whereas if she knew her part, and the innocence business were all a blind, she ought now to have shown her hand a bit, and let him know that he could go ahead. But she was doing nothing of the sort; now that he had taken the plunge and kissed her, he really knew no more than before where he was. For perhaps the first time in his life Henry Hargreaves, that happy amorist, was thoroughly at a loss. There she was, with her head on his shoulder, quite quiet and passive, very sweetly letting herself be kissed and making no sign. Damn it, what did she want?

&n
bsp; The warm small waves of the Yellow Sea lapped gently on the sand below them; a slight movement of warm air brought the aromatic scent of the scrubby bushes which clothed the bluff on which they sat; away in the Chinese village a wonk dog bayed at the moon, and was suddenly and sharply criticised, from close by, by the Minister’s Aberdeen. This last sound reminded Captain Hargreaves that he ought to be thinking of going in; if Scottie was being given his evening walk, it must be getting latish, and old Miss Boggit had a regular spinster’s nose for sniffing out one’s movements. He didn’t in the least want to go in—in spite of his uncertainty, it was being extraordinarily delightful, this episode; and he would have liked to find out a little more. Darling creature, what was in her pretty head? In theory, of course, Captain Hargreaves held the belief that all women, consciously or unconsciously, ultimately only wanted one thing; and like all brilliantly instinctive and otherwise not very intelligent people, he set an inordinately high value on those theories which he succeeded in grasping—especially if they represented a rationalisation of his instinct. The theories—in a potted form—of Freud and Aldous Huxley have no more faithful disciples than men of the class and type of Henry Hargreaves. But somehow in the case of Rose Pelham he couldn’t feel that any theory fitted, absolutely. He looked down, thoughtfully, at her quiet face so close to his. Yes—quiet, contented, and good; undoubtedly good. And some gentler feeling came in and checked, for the moment, his internal questionings, his realist opportunism. He kissed her once more, very gently. “Are you happy, you dear thing?” he asked.

  She turned her face to look at him, with her contented smile. “Yes.”

  “That’s right. But I’m going to take you home now.” He rose and drew her up. “Come on—I’ll take you back.”

  “Don’t bother, Henry.”

  “I like to—and there are all these Chinks and wonks about—you oughtn’t to go alone.”

  Her only answer to that was a low laugh. She set off ahead of him along the narrow path, holding her dress closely round her to avoid the long curved thorns of the bushes—her figure moved from patches of moonlight to pools of shadow with beautiful ease; what a gift, he thought, following her, that real beauty of movement was. And watching her so, from a distance, and remembering that only a few moments before she had been in his arms, a sudden rush of feeling overtook him—she was unutterably sweet!

  When they reached the small low gate of the Lydiards’ bungalow she turned and said “Goodnight”. Without answering, he walked past her through it, turned and drew her in after him, and two or three steps along the path into the deep shadow of a thicket of polygonums. There he took her in his arms again, and kissed her with real fervour. “Goodnight, you darling. Will you come out again tomorrow night?”

  She gave a tiny sigh. “I’ll see if I can. Probably. Goodnight.” She slipped up the path and vanished.

  Captain Hargreaves remained standing in the thicket, looking at the place where she had disappeared. Why had she sighed? Contentment? Regret? The plain wistfulness of opening passion? He didn’t know. After a long pause he sighed himself, gustily. “Henry, my boy, you’ve been scalped,” he murmured aloud; and turned, and walked back towards the Minister’s bungalow.

  About himself, at least, Captain Hargreaves had learned something that night.

  Chapter Two

  The shopping centre at Pei-t’ai-ho consists of an untidy row of shacks, a sort of tumble-down tin-town, in which the big shops from Tientsin and Shanghai open ephemeral branches for the summer season; there the Europeans purchase such articles as cannot well be left to the discretion of their Number One boy—medicines and chemical supplies, tapes and buttons, fine groceries. The Number Ones make their own purchases elsewhere, in the Chinese village, a collection of brown barrel-vaulted houses lying in a hollow half-way along the three miles of sandy road which link the railway-station and West End, the stretch of villas beyond it, with the rest of the long straggling sea-side resort, which culminates, out in the direction of Lighthouse Point, in the British Legation Compound. Culminates less and less, since more bungalows are constantly springing up in the dusty fields beyond it—mostly the dwellings of missionaries, shadeless and exposed. This end of Pei-t’ai-ho is not smart; the smart part is at West End, where there are villas standing among trees, or in something approaching to real gardens—in between, all the way along the top of the bluffs which fringe the shore, lie bungalows of a medium sort, half hidden in the native growth of bushes and small trees, mimosas and thorns—their own small sandy paths lead from them down the bluffs to the shore, lead out to the main road.

  A couple of days after Captain Hargreaves had given that final and self-revealing kiss to Mrs. Pelham among the polygonums at her gate, Anastasia Lydiard was doing her morning shopping in the tin-town. Her ricksha followed her from shop to shop, accumulating parcels; she had walked down the mile from her bungalow, and would probably walk back—unlike many Europeans in China, she preferred to retain the use of her legs; but the ricksha was essential for carrying her purchases. Outside “Sincere” she was hailed by Madame di Porto Fino, a stout tiresome good-natured creature, whose husband was, like her brother Antony, employed in the Posts (the Chinese Postal Service, which like that of the Customs and the Salt Gabelle was mainly staffed, in its upper grades, by foreigners). Madame di Porto Fino wanted Anastasia to go to her beach party that morning, and pointed out with rolling eyes and a certain heaviness of innuendo that the rest of Anastasia’s “party”, Captain Hargreaves and Mrs. Pelham, were coming—“all, in fact, but your recluse of a brother”. Anastasia invented an excuse, and refused, with the warm-hearted regret which she assumed for these occasions. This was a bad plan, really, as Antony often pointed out, for people—as now Madame di Porto Fino—continued to press her, thinking she really wanted to come. Anastasia renewed her refusal. She didn’t care for Madame di Porto Fino’s—or indeed for any—beach parties; it didn’t amuse her either to bathe in company with forty other people, or to sit in a mat-shed on the sand and drink cocktails and cherry brandy, and eat savoury sandwiches, the whole morning long. Having got rid of the nice bothering woman at last, she made one or two more purchases and walked home, followed by her ricksha full of parcels—the coolie drew abreast of her once or twice, and paused hopefully, with an inviting monosyllable; she waved him off absently, as one might a fly, and walked on, her short-sighted brown eyes roaming vaguely over what they met, without registering anything, her mind hard at work. Anastasia in this state was apt to cut anybody who did not actually accost her—she did now so cut two or three people, who said to themselves resentfully that Miss Lydiard was really most strange, when their bows received only this wide-eyed half-smiling blankness.

  She was thinking about Rose Pelham. Madame di Porto Fino had spoken with intention when she referred to her and Captain Hargreaves, and this had not escaped Anastasia. It told her nothing new, except that others were beginning to notice those two; that was not in itself important, but it served to focus her thoughts afresh on something that was—Rose’s frame of mind.

  Rose was her cousin, and the feeling between them had always been strong—a little protective on Anastasia’s part for the pretty creature three years younger than herself. And strong it had remained; curiously enough it had perhaps actually been strengthened by Rose’s marriage to Charles Pelham, who was Anastasia’s own first love. She had never lost her feeling for him quite, and resignedly accepted the fact that in all probability she never would. That, and the wifely position which she had assumed towards her brother Antony when she came out to China, combined to keep her occupied and unmarried. They were rather an isolated couple—both parents were dead, and their elder brother, a creature of astonishing brilliance, had suddenly thrown up the Navy and become a monk, visible to his relations only once or twice a year, in the chilly and daunting atmosphere of the reception-room at the monastery. The loss to the other two was severe, and severely felt. It wasn’t only the repellent strangeness of the habit, it
was the entire disorientation of Laurence’s mind and interest from life as they had lived it with him, that strange guillotine-like shutting-down of an intangible door on a thousand intellectual activities, common loves and hopes—a door through which the permissible affections struggle weakly and vainly to creep. Neither brother nor sister was in the least irreligious, or hostile to the faith that Laurence had espoused with such devastating completeness; it was the being shut out, cut off from an adored person that caused their suffering. They had been one of those curiously self-sufficing and closely knit families; it was very hard for any Lydiard to feel that anyone else in the world was as interesting or valuable or enjoyable as any other Lydiard. And their loss of Laurence had driven Antony and Anastasia into a still closer mutual affection and dependence.

  Charles Pelham, however, had been as important to Anastasia as either of her brothers, for the better part of three years—and in a way, in spite of his marriage, he was so still. From his very first meeting with Rose, at their house, she saw what would almost certainly happen—and within a few months, happen it did. After a secret struggle, in which not even Antony was allowed to share, she managed to accept the situation, and to accept it in the only way which could leave her relation to both Charles and Rose unimpaired, and herself unfrustrated. A realist in everything, even about herself, she had made the necessary and painful beginning at the very bottom, at the humble matter-of-fact roots of things, and had recognised the limitations imposed on her by her face and figure—limitations at least relatively to such physical attributes as Rose possessed. Anastasia was short and dark, and would later be stout; her face, in spite of a good complexion and beautiful eyes, was too forcible to be pretty, with the wide, alarmingly decided mouth—until she smiled, the short arrogant nose and critical nostrils, the square forehead above the sceptical eyebrows. There was power in the face, and intelligence, even a certain charm—but no seduction whatever. She had accepted that final fact, and its correlative: that men, even such men as Charles, with his passion for the things of the mind and his connoisseurship about character, with his undoubted affection for and appreciation of herself, would reserve—would not be able to help reserving—the ultimate emotional surrender for women with a face and shape like Rose’s.