CHAPTER II

Margaret glanced at her sister’s note and pushed it over the

breakfast-table to her aunt. There was a moment’s hush, and then the

flood-gates opened.

“I can tell you nothing, Aunt Juley. I know no more than you do. We

met--we only met the father and mother abroad last spring. I know so

little that I didn’t even know their son’s name. It’s all so--” She

waved her hand and laughed a little.

“In that case it is far too sudden.”

“Who knows, Aunt Juley, who knows?”

“But, Margaret, dear, I mean, we mustn’t be unpractical now that we’ve

come to facts. It is too sudden, surely.”

“Who knows!”

“But, Margaret, dear--”

“I’ll go for her other letters,” said Margaret. “No, I won’t, I’ll

finish my breakfast. In fact, I haven’t them. We met the Wilcoxes on an

awful expedition that we made from Heidelberg to Speyer. Helen and I

had got it into our heads that there was a grand old cathedral at

Speyer--the Archbishop of Speyer was one of the seven electors--you

know--‘Speyer, Maintz, and Koln.’ Those three sees once commanded the

Rhine Valley and got it the name of Priest Street.”

“I still feel quite uneasy about this business, Margaret.”

“The train crossed by a bridge of boats, and at first sight it looked

quite fine. But oh, in five minutes we had seen the whole thing. The

cathedral had been ruined, absolutely ruined, by restoration; not an

inch left of the original structure. We wasted a whole day, and came

across the Wilcoxes as we were eating our sandwiches in the public

gardens. They too, poor things, had been taken in--they were actually

stopping at Speyer--and they rather liked Helen’s insisting that they

must fly with us to Heidelberg. As a matter of fact, they did come on

next day. We all took some drives together. They knew us well enough to

ask Helen to come and see them--at least, I was asked too, but Tibby’s

illness prevented me, so last Monday she went alone. That’s all. You

know as much as I do now. It’s a young man out of the unknown. She was

to have come back Saturday, but put off till Monday, perhaps on account

of--I don’t know.”

She broke off, and listened to the sounds of a London morning. Their

house was in Wickham Place, and fairly quiet, for a lofty promontory of

buildings separated it from the main thoroughfare. One had the sense of

a backwater, or rather of an estuary, whose waters flowed in from the

invisible sea, and ebbed into a profound silence while the waves without

were still beating. Though the promontory consisted of flats--expensive,

with cavernous entrance halls, full of concierges and palms--it

fulfilled its purpose, and gained for the older houses opposite a

certain measure of peace.

These, too, would be swept away in time, and another promontory would

arise upon their site, as humanity piled itself higher and higher on the

precious soil of London.

Mrs. Munt had her own method of interpreting her nieces. She decided

that Margaret was a little hysterical, and was trying to gain time by

a torrent of talk. Feeling very diplomatic, she lamented the fate of

Speyer, and declared that never, never should she be so misguided as to

visit it, and added of her own accord that the principles of restoration

were ill understood in Germany. “The Germans,” she said, “are too

thorough, and this is all very well sometimes, but at other times it

does not do.”

“Exactly,” said Margaret; “Germans are too thorough.” And her eyes began

to shine.

“Of course I regard you Schlegels as English,” said Mrs. Munt

hastily--“English to the backbone.”

Margaret leaned forward and stroked her hand.

“And that reminds me--Helen’s letter.”

“Oh yes, Aunt Juley, I am thinking all right about Helen’s letter. I

know--I must go down and see her. I am thinking about her all right. I

am meaning to go down.”

“But go with some plan,” said Mrs. Munt, admitting into her kindly voice

a note of exasperation. “Margaret, if I may interfere, don’t be taken by

surprise. What do you think of the Wilcoxes? Are they our sort? Are they

likely people? Could they appreciate Helen, who is to my mind a very

special sort of person? Do they care about Literature and Art? That is

most important when you come to think of it. Literature and Art. Most

important. How old would the son be? She says ‘younger son.’ Would he

be in a position to marry? Is he likely to make Helen happy? Did you

gather--”

“I gathered nothing.”

They began to talk at once.

“Then in that case--”

“In that case I can make no plans, don’t you see.”

“On the contrary--”

“I hate plans. I hate lines of action. Helen isn’t a baby.”

“Then in that case, my dear, why go down?”

Margaret was silent. If her aunt could not see why she must go down,

she was not going to tell her. She was not going to say, “I love my dear

sister; I must be near her at this crisis of her life.” The affections

are more reticent than the passions, and their expression more subtle.

If she herself should ever fall in love with a man, she, like Helen,

would proclaim it from the housetops, but as she loved only a sister she

used the voiceless language of sympathy.

“I consider you odd girls,” continued Mrs. Munt, “and very wonderful

girls, and in many ways far older than your years. But--you won’t be

offended? frankly, I feel you are not up to this business. It requires

an older person. Dear, I have nothing to call me back to Swanage.” She

spread out her plump arms. “I am all at your disposal. Let me go down to

this house whose name I forget instead of you.”

“Aunt Juley”--she jumped up and kissed her--“I must, must go to Howards

End myself. You don’t exactly understand, though I can never thank you

properly for offering.”

“I do understand,” retorted Mrs. Munt, with immense confidence. “I go

down in no spirit of interference, but to make inquiries. Inquiries are

necessary. Now, I am going to be rude. You would say the wrong thing; to

a certainty you would. In your anxiety for Helen’s happiness you would

offend the whole of these Wilcoxes by asking one of your impetuous

questions--not that one minds offending them.”

“I shall ask no questions. I have it in Helen’s writing that she and

a man are in love. There is no question to ask as long as she keeps to

that. All the rest isn’t worth a straw. A long engagement if you like,

but inquiries, questions, plans, lines of action--no, Aunt Juley, no.”

Away she hurried, not beautiful, not supremely brilliant, but filled

with something that took the place of both qualities--something best

described as a profound vivacity, a continual and sincere response to

all that she encountered in her path through life.

“If Helen had written the same to me about a shop assistant or a

penniless clerk--”

“Dear Margaret, do come into the library and shut the door. Your good

maids are dusting the banisters.”

“--or if she had wanted to marry the man who calls for Carter Paterson,

I should have said the same.” Then, with one of those turns that

convinced her aunt that she was not mad really, and convinced observers

of another type that she was not a barren theorist, she added: “Though

in the case of Carter Paterson I should want it to be a very long

engagement indeed, I must say.”

“I should think so,” said Mrs. Munt; “and, indeed, I can scarcely

follow you. Now, just imagine if you said anything of that sort to the

Wilcoxes. I understand it, but most good people would think you mad.

Imagine how disconcerting for Helen! What is wanted is a person who will

go slowly, slowly in this business, and see how things are and where

they are likely to lead to.”

Margaret was down on this.

“But you implied just now that the engagement must be broken off.”

“I think probably it must; but slowly.”

“Can you break an engagement off slowly?” Her eyes lit up. “What’s an

engagement made of, do you suppose? I think it’s made of some hard stuff

that may snap, but can’t break. It is different to the other ties of

life. They stretch or bend. They admit of degree. They’re different.”

“Exactly so. But won’t you let me just run down to Howards House, and

save you all the discomfort? I will really not interfere, but I do so

thoroughly understand the kind of thing you Schlegels want that one

quiet look round will be enough for me.”

Margaret again thanked her, again kissed her, and then ran upstairs to

see her brother.

He was not so well.

The hay fever had worried him a good deal all night. His head ached,

his eyes were wet, his mucous membrane, he informed her, in a most

unsatisfactory condition. The only thing that made life worth living was

the thought of Walter Savage Landor, from whose Imaginary Conversations

she had promised to read at frequent intervals during the day.

It was rather difficult. Something must be done about Helen. She must

be assured that it is not a criminal offence to love at first sight.

A telegram to this effect would be cold and cryptic, a personal visit

seemed each moment more impossible. Now the doctor arrived, and said

that Tibby was quite bad. Might it really be best to accept Aunt Juley’s

kind offer, and to send her down to Howards End with a note?

Certainly Margaret was impulsive. She did swing rapidly from one

decision to another. Running downstairs into the library, she cried:

“Yes, I have changed my mind; I do wish that you would go.”

There was a train from King’s Cross at eleven. At half-past ten Tibby,

with rare self-effacement, fell asleep, and Margaret was able to drive

her aunt to the station.

“You will remember, Aunt Juley, not to be drawn into discussing the

engagement. Give my letter to Helen, and say whatever you feel yourself,

but do keep clear of the relatives. We have scarcely got their names

straight yet, and, besides, that sort of thing is so uncivilised and

wrong.”

“So uncivilised?” queried Mrs. Munt, fearing that she was losing the

point of some brilliant remark.

“Oh, I used an affected word. I only meant would you please talk the

thing over only with Helen.”

“Only with Helen.”

“Because--” But it was no moment to expound the personal nature of love.

Even Margaret shrank from it, and contented herself with stroking

her good aunt’s hand, and with meditating, half sensibly and half

poetically, on the journey that was about to begin from King’s Cross.

Like many others who have lived long in a great capital, she had strong

feelings about the various railway termini. They are our gates to the

glorious and the unknown. Through them we pass out into adventure and

sunshine, to them, alas! we return. In Paddington all Cornwall is latent

and the remoter west; down the inclines of Liverpool Street lie fenlands

and the illimitable Broads; Scotland is through the pylons of Euston;

Wessex behind the poised chaos of Waterloo. Italians realise this, as is

natural; those of them who are so unfortunate as to serve as waiters in

Berlin call the Anhalt Bahnhof the Stazione d’Italia, because by it they

must return to their homes. And he is a chilly Londoner who does not

endow his stations with some personality, and extend to them, however

shyly, the emotions of fear and love.

To Margaret--I hope that it will not set the reader against her--the

station of King’s Cross had always suggested Infinity. Its very

situation--withdrawn a little behind the facile splendours of St.

Pancras--implied a comment on the materialism of life. Those two great

arches, colourless, indifferent, shouldering between them an unlovely

clock, were fit portals for some eternal adventure, whose issue might

be prosperous, but would certainly not be expressed in the ordinary

language of prosperity. If you think this ridiculous, remember that it

is not Margaret who is telling you about it; and let me hasten to add

that they were in plenty of time for the train; that Mrs. Munt, though

she took a second-class ticket, was put by the guard into a first (only

two “seconds” on the train, one smoking and the other babies--one cannot

be expected to travel with babies); and that Margaret, on her return to

Wickham Place, was confronted with the following telegram:

“All over. Wish I had never written. Tell no one--, HELEN.”

But Aunt Juley was gone--gone irrevocably, and no power on earth could

stop her.