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Dodo: A Detail of the Day

<h4>CHAPTER NINE</h4> June was drawing to a close in a week of magnificent weather. It was too hot to do much during the middle of the day, and the Park was full of riders every morning from eight till ten. Dodo' was frequently to be seen there, usually riding a vicious black mare, that plunged and shied more than Lord Chesterford quite liked. But Dodo insisted on riding it. "The risks one runs every moment of one's life," she told him, "are so many, that one or two more really don't matter. Besides, I can manage the brute." On this particular morning Dodo descended the stairs feeling unusually happy. The period of enforced idleness was over, and she was making up for lost time with a vengeance. They had given a dance the night before, and Dodo had not gone to bed till after four; but for all that she was down again at half-past eight, and her mare was waiting for her. She turned into the dining-room to have a cup of tea before starting, and waited somewhat impatiently for Lord Chesterford to join her. He came in, in the course of a few minutes, looking rather worried. "You look as if you had not gone to bed for a week," said Dodo, "and your hair is dreadfully untidy. Look at me now. Here I am a weak little woman, and I feel fit to move mountains, and you look as if you wanted quinine and iron. Don't come, if you'd rather not. Stop at home and play with the baby." "I'm all right," said he, "but I'm rather worried about the boy. The nurse says he's not been sleeping much all night, but kept waking and crying, and he looks rather flushed. I think I'll send for the doctor." Dodo felt a little impatient. "He's as right as possible," she said. "You shouldn't worry so, Chesterford. You've wanted to send for the doctor a hundred times in the last month, either for him or me. But don't come if you'd rather not. Vivy is coming to breakfast at half-past nine; I quite forgot that. If you feel inclined to stop, you might give her breakfast, and I'll lengthen my ride. I shall be back at half-past ten. She's going to take me to see Wainwright's new Turner." "Are you sure you don't mind, Dodo?" said he, still wavering. "If you don't, I really think I will stop, and perhaps see the doctor about him. The nurse says she would like to have the doctor here." "Just as you like," said Dodo. "You'll have to pay a swinging bill anyhow. Good-bye, old boy. Don't worry your silly old head. I'm sure it's all right." Dodo went off perfectly at ease in her mind. Chesterford was rather fussy, she thought, and she congratulated herself on not being nervous. "A pretty pair we should make if I encouraged him in his little ways," she said to herself. "We should one of us, live in the nursery." She put her horse into a quick trot, and felt a keen enjoyment in managing the vicious animal. The streets were somewhat crowded even at this hour, and Dodo had her work cut out for her. However, she reached the Park in safety, and went up the Row at a swinging gallop, with her horse tearing at the rein and tossing its head. After a time the brute grew quieter, and Dodo joined a well-known figure who was riding some way in front of her. "Good old Jack," she cried, "isn't it splendid! I had no idea how I loved motion and exercise and dancing and all that till I began again. Didn't you think our ball went off rather well? Did you stop, to the end? Oh, of course you did. That silly dowager What's-her-name was quite shocked at me, just because we had the looking-glass figure in the cotillion. It's the prettiest of the lot, I think. Old Major Ewart gave me a pair of ivory castanets with silver mountings last night, the sweetest things in the world. I really think he is seriously gone on me, and he must be sixty if he's an hour. I think I shall appeal to Chesterford for protection. What fun it would be to make Chesterford talk to him gravely like a grandson. He stopped at home this morning to look after the baby. I think I shall get jealous of the nurse, and pretend that he's sweet on her, and that's why he goes to the nursery so much." Jack laughed. "Between you, you hit the right average pretty well," he said. "If it wasn't for Chesterford, the baby would certainly have fallen downstairs half a dozen times. You don't half realise how important he is." "Oh, you're entirely wrong, Jack," said Dodo calmly. "It's just that which I do recognise; what I don't recognise is that I should be supposed to find ineffable joys in watching it eat and sleep and howl. You know one baby is very much like another." "In other words, supposing the boy had no expectations," said Jack, "and was not the heir-apparent of half Staffordshire, you would find him much less interesting." "Would you think me very heartless if I said 'Yes'?" asked Dodo. "Well, I never held a very high opinion of your heart, you know," said Jack, laughing, "and I don't know that I think much worse of it now." "You judge so stupidly," said Dodo; "you elevate matrimony into a sacrament. Now I don't. It is a contract for mutual advantage. The husband gives wealth, position and all that, and the wife gives him a housekeeper, and heirs to his property. Don't frown, Jack. That's my eminently common-sense view of the question. It answers excellently, as I find by experience. But, of course, there are marriages for love. I suppose most of the lower middle-class marry for love, at least they haven't got any position or wealth to marry for. But we, the disillusioned and unromantic upper classes, see beyond that. I daresay our great grandfathers married for love, but the fact that so many of us don't, shows that ours is the more advanced and probably correct view. You know all wine-tasters agree on the superiority of one wine, and the inferiority of another. That's the result of education. The amateur thinks they are all more or less alike, and very probably prefers some sweet bad kind. That's the middle-class view of love-marriages. The more I think of it, the more I feel that love is an illusion. Think of all the people who marry for love, and get eternally tired of each other afterwards. They can't keep it up. The lovers grow into friends, and the friends into enemies. Those are the enviable ones who remain friends; but it is better to marry as a friend than as a lover, because in the latter case there is a reaction and a disappointment, which may perhaps ruin the friendship. Aren't I a wise woman, Jack? I think I shall set up a general advice office." Jack was, rather pale, and his fingers twitched nervously at his reins. "Have you never felt that illusion?" he asked, in a low voice. "Really, Jack," said Dodo, "you behave as if you were the inquisition. But I don't see why I shouldn't tell you. For Chesterford I never have. He is the most excellent husband, and I esteem and admire him immensely. Don't make your horse so fidgety, Jack. As I was saying, I don't see why I shouldn't tell you, considering you proposed to me once, and confessed to the same illusion yourself. Have you got over it, by the way? If I had married you, you certainly would have by this time." There was a long pause. Then Jack said,— "No, Dodo, I have never got over it." The moment after he had said it, he would have given his right hand to have it unsaid. Dodo was silent for a moment, and Jack found himself noticing the tiny, trivial things about him. He observed a fly trying to alight oh his horse's ear, but the animal flicked it off with a little jerk, before it got fairly settled. He wondered whether the fly had illusions about that ear, and whether it imagined that it would be happy for ever and ever, if it could once settle there. "You know we are saying the most frightfully unconventional things to each other," said Dodo. "I am very sorry for you, Jack, and I will administer consolation. When I said 'No' to you, I did it with real regret, with quite a different sort of feeling to that which I should have had if I had said 'No' to Chesterford. It was quite an unreasonable feeling, I couldn't define it, but I think it must have been because——" Then Jack recovered his self-respect in a moment, by one of those strange contradictions in our nature, which urged him to stop his ears to what, a week before, he had been almost tempting her to say. "Ah, stop, stop," he said, "you don't know what you are saying. Dodo, this won't do. Think of Chesterford." "Chesterford and the baby," said Dodo softly. "I believe you are right, Jack. This is unprofitable. But, Jack, since we renounce that, let us still be friends. Don't let this have made any difference to us. Try and realise that it is all an illusion." Dodo half turned towards him, with a long glance in her brown eyes, and a little smile playing about her mouth. "Yes, yes," said Jack, laughing nervously. "I told Bertie so the other day. I have been a madman for half an hour, but that is over. Shall we turn?" They wheeled their horses round, and cantered down the Row. "Oh, this beautiful world," exclaimed Dodo. "You've no idea what it is to me to come out of the house again, and ride, and dance and sing. I really believe, Jack, that I enjoy things more than anyone else I know. Everything that enjoys itself appeals to me. Jack, do enjoy yourself, although we settled you mustn't appeal to me. Who is that girl standing there with the poodle? I think I shall get Chesterford to buy me a poodle. There's a woman next her awfully like Vivy, do you see, shading her eyes with her hand. It is Vivy." Dodo's face suddenly grew grave and frightened. She reined her horse in opposite to where Mrs. Vivian was standing. "Quick, quick," she said, "tell me what has happened!" Mrs. Vivian looked up at Dodo with infinite compassion in her eyes. "Dodo, darling," she said, "give your horse to the groom. Please help her to dismount, Mr. Broxton." Dodo got off, and Mrs. Vivian led her to a seat. Dodo had a sudden flash of remembrance of how she had sat here with Jack a year ago. "Tell me quickly," she said again. "My poor Dodo," said Mrs. Vivian, softly stroking the back of Dodo's hand. "You will be brave, won't you? It is worth while being brave. It is all over. The baby died this morning, half an hour after you had gone." Dodo's first feeling was one of passionate anger and resentment. She felt she had been duped and tricked in a most unjustifiable manner. Fate had led her to expect some happy days, and she had been cruelly disappointed. It was not fair; she had been released from two tedious months of inactivity, only to be caught again. It was like a cat playing with a mouse. She wanted to revenge herself on something. "Oh, it is too awful," she said. "Vivy, what can I do? It is cruel." Then her better nature came to her aid. "Poor Chesterford, poor dear old boy," she said simply. Mrs. Vivian's face grew more tender. "I am glad you thought of him," she said. "His first thought was for you. He was there all the time. As soon as it was over he said to himself, 'Please, God, help Dodo to bear it.' You bear it very well, dear. Come, the carriage is waiting." "Oh, I can't, I can't," said Dodo passionately; "let me sit here a little while, and then go away somewhere else. I can bear it better alone. I can't see Chesterford." "No, Dodo," she said, "you must not be cowardly. I know it is the worst part of it for you. But your duty lies with him. You must comfort him. You must make him feel that he has got you left. He is terribly broken, but he will be brave for your sake. Be brave for his." Dodo sighed wearily. "I suppose you are right," she said; "I will come." She turned and looked round on to the gay scene. The Row was full of riders, and bright with the flooding sunlight. "Oh, it is cruel," she said. "I only wanted to be happy, and I mayn't even be that. What is the good of it all, if I mayn't enjoy it? Why was the baby ever born? I wish it never had been. What good does it do anyone that I should suffer?" Mrs. Vivian felt horribly helpless and baffled. How could she appeal to this woman, who looked at everything from only her own standpoint? "Come, Dodo," she said. They drove back in silence. Chesterford was standing in the hall as they entered, waiting for them. He came forward to meet Dodo. "My poor, poor darling," he said, "it is very hard on you. But we can bear it together, Dodo." Dodo turned from him passionately, and left him standing there. <hr class="tb" /> Dodo was sitting in the window of her morning-room late on the same afternoon. She and Lord Chesterford had been together to look at the baby as it lay there, with the little features that had been racked and distorted with pain, calm and set again, as if it only slept; and Dodo had at that moment one real pang of grief. Her first impulse, as we have seen, was one of anger and impatience at the stupidity of destiny. She had been enjoying herself, in a purely animal way so intensely, at that moment when she saw Mrs. Vivian waiting for her under the trees. She was just released from a tedious period of inactivity, and inactivity was to Dodo worse than anything in the Inferno. "I daresay I should get accustomed to being roasted," she had said once to Miss Grantham. "It really would be rather interesting seeing your fingers curling up like fried bacon, but imagine being put in a nicely-furnished room with nobody to talk to, and a view over Hyde Park one side and Melton Mowbray the other, and never being able to get out! The longer that lasted, the worse it would become." And so she had felt the sort of rapture with which "the prisoner leaps to loose his chains" when she had gone out that morning, and again knew the infinite delight of feeling a fine horse answer to her hand, under a sort of playful protest. Then this had come upon her, and Dodo felt that language, failed her to express her profound contempt and dislike for the destiny that shapes our ends. But her generosity and sense of fair play had come to her aid. She was not alone in this matter, and she quite realised that it was worse for Chesterford than herself. Chesterford had evinced the most intense interest in the baby in itself. Dodo, on the other hand, had frankly declared that the baby's potentialities possessed a far greater attraction, for her than its actualities. But she had voluntarily linked her life with his; and she must do her part—they had had a great loss, and he must not feel that he bore it alone. Dodo shook her head hopelessly over the unknown factor, that made her so much to him, and left him so little to her, but she accepted it as inevitable. Almost immediately after she had left him in the hall, she felt angry with herself for haying done so, just as she had been vexed at her reception of his proposal of family prayers, and a few minutes afterwards she sent for him, and they had gone together to see the baby. And then, because she was a woman, because she was human, because she was genuinely sorry for this honest true man who knelt beside her and sobbed as if his heart was broken, but with a natural instinct turned to her, and sorrowed more for her than for himself, her intense self-centredness for the time vanished, and with a true and womanly instinct she found her consolation in consoling him. Dodo felt as if she had lived years since this morning, and longed to cut the next week out of her life, to lose it altogether. She wanted to get away out of the whole course of events, to begin again without any past. From a purely worldly point of view she was intensely vexed at the baby's death; she had felt an immense pride in having provided an heir, and it was all no use; it was over, it might as well never have been born. And, as the day wore on, she felt an overwhelming disgust of all the days that were to follow, the darkened house, the quieted movements, the enforced idleness. If only no one knew, Dodo felt that she would fling herself at once, this very minute, into the outside world again. What was the use of all this retirement? It only made a bad job worse. Surely, when misfortune comes on one, it is best to forget it as soon as possible, and Dodo's eminently practical way of forgetting anything was to absorb herself in something else. "What a sensible man David was," she thought. "He went and oiled himself, which, I suppose, is the equivalent of putting on one's very best evening dress." She felt an inward laughter, more than half hysterical, as to what would happen if she went and oiled Chesterford. She got up and went languidly across to the window. Lord Chesterford's room was on the story below, and was built on a wing by itself, and a window looked out on her side of the house. Looking down she saw him kneeling at his table, with his face buried in his hands. Dodo was conscious of a lump rising in her throat, and she went back to her chair, and sat down again. "He is such a good, honest old boy," she thought, "and somehow, in a dim-lit way, he finds consolation in that. It is a merciful arrangement." She walked downstairs to his study, and went in. He had heard her step, and stood near the door waiting to receive her. Dodo felt infinitely sorry for him. Chesterford drew her into a chair, and knelt down beside her. "You've no idea what a help you have been to me, darling," he said. "It makes me feel as if I was an awful coward, when I see you so brave." Dodo stroked his hand. "Yes, yes," she said, "we must both be brave, we must help one another." "Ah, my own wife," he said, "what should I have done if it had been you? and I was dreadfully afraid at one time! You know you are both the baby and yourself to me now, and yet I thought before you were all you could be." Dodo felt horribly uncomfortable. She had been aware before that there had been moments when, as Jack expressed it, she was "keeping it up," but never to this extent. "Tell me about it, Chesterford," she said. "It was only half an hour after you went," he said, "that he suddenly got worse. The doctor came a few minutes after that. It was all practically over by then. It was convulsions, you know. He was quite quiet, and seemed out of pain for a few minutes before the end, and he opened his eyes, and put out his little arms towards me. Do you think he knew me, Dodo?" "Yes, dear, yes," said Dodo softly. "I should be so happy to think he did," said Lord Chesterford. "Poor little chap, he always took to me from the first, do you remember? I hope he knew me then. Mrs. Vivian came very soon after, and she offered to go for you, and met you in the Park, didn't she?" "Yes," said Dodo; "Jack and I were together. She is very good to us. Would you like to see her to-night?" "Ah no, Dodo," he said, "I can't see anyone but your dear self. But make her come and see you if you feel inclined, only come and talk to me again afterwards." "No, dear," said Dodo. "I won't have her, if you feel against it." "Then we shall have an evening together again, Dodo," he said. "I seem to have seen you so little, since you began to go about again," he added wistfully. "Oh, it must be so," said Dodo; "you have one thing to do, and I have another. I've seen so many different people this last week, that I feel as if I had seen no one person." "You are so active," he said; "you do half a dozen things while I am doing one." "Oh, but you do great important man things," said Dodo, "and I do silly little woman things." She felt the conversation was becoming much more bearable. Chesterford smiled. Dodo seized on it as a favourable omen. "I like seeing you smile, old boy," she said; "you look more yourself than you did two hours ago." He looked at her earnestly. "Dodo, you will not think me preaching or being priggish, will you, darling? You know me too well for that. There is one way of turning this into a blessing. We must try and see why this was sent us, and if we cannot see why, we must take it in faith, and go on living our lives simply and straightforwardly, and then, perhaps, we shall know sometime. Ah, my darling, it has taught me one thing already, for I never knew before how much I loved you. I loved you all I could before this, but it has somehow given me fresh power to love. I think the love I had for the boy has been added to the love I had for you, and it is yours, darling, all of it, always." <hr class="chap" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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