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Speaker 1: The interval by Vincent O'Sullivan. Missus Wilton passed through a

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little alley leading from one of the gates which were

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around Regent's Park, and came out on the wide and

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quiet street. She walked along, slowly, peering anxiously from side

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to side so as not to overlook the number. She

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pulled her furs closer around her. After her years in India,

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this London damp seemed very harsh. Still. It was not

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a fog to day. A dense haze, gray and tinged

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ruddy lay between the houses, sometimes blowing with a little

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wet kiss against the face. Missus Wilton's hair and eyelashes

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and her furs were powdered with tiny drops, but there

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was nothing in the weather to blur the sight. She

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could see the faces of people some distance off, and

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read the signs on the shops. Before the door of

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a dealer in antiques and second hand furniture, she paused

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and looked through the shabby, uncleaned window at an unassorted

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heap of things, many of them of great value. She

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read the Polish name fastened on the pane in white letters. Yes,

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this is the place. She opened the door which met

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her entrance with an ill tempered jangle from somewhere in

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the black depths of the shop. The dealer came forward.

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He had a clammy white face with a sparse black beard,

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and wore a skull cap and spectacles. Missus Wilton spoke

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to him in a low voice. A look of complicity,

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of cunning, perhaps of irony, passed through the dealer's cynical

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and sad eyes, but he bowed gravely and respectfully. Yes,

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she is here, madam. Whether she will see you or not,

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I do not know. She is not always well. She

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has her moods, and then we have to be so careful.

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The police, not that they would touch a lady like you,

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But the poor alien has not much chanced these days.

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Missus Wilton followed him to the back of the shop,

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where there was a winding staircase. She knocked over a

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few things in her passage and stooped to pick them up,

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but the dealer kept muttering, It does not matter, surely,

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it does not matter. He lit a candle. You must

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go up these stairs. They are very dark. Be careful.

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When you come to a door, open it and go

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straight in. He stood at the foot of the stairs

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holding the light high above his head, and she ascended.

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The room was not very large, and it seemed very ordinary.

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There were some flimsy, uncomfortable chairs in gilt and red.

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Two large palms were in corners. Under a glass cover.

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On the table was a view of row. The room

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had not a business like look, thought Missus Wilton. There

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was no suggestion of the office or waiting room where

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people came and went all day. Yet you would not

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say that it was a private room which was lived in.

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There were no books or papers about. Every chair was

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in the place it had been placed when the room

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was last swept. There was no fire, and it was

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very cold. To the right of the window was a

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door covered with a plush curtain. Missus Wilton sat down

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near the table and watched this door. She thought it

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must be through it that the soothsayer would come forth.

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She laid her hands listlessly, one on top of the

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other on the table. This must be the tensy, as

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she had consulted since Hugh had been killed, she thought

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them over. No, this must be the eleventh. She had

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forgotten that frightening man in Paris who had said he'd

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been a priest. Yet of them all It was only

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he who had told her anything definite. But even he

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could do no more than tell the past. He told

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of her marriage, He even had the duration of it right,

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twenty one months. He told too, of their time in India.

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At least he knew that her husband had been a soldier,

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and said he had been on service in the colonies

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on the whole. Though he had been as unsatisfactory as

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the others, none of them had given her the consolation

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she sought. She did not want to be told of

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the past. If Hugh was gone forever, then with him

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had gone all her love of living, her courage, all

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her better self. She wanted to be lifted out of

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the despair, the dazed, aimless, drifting from day to day,

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longing at night for the morning, and the morning for

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the fall of night, which had been her life since

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his death. If somebody could assure her that it was

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not all over, that he was somewhere, not too far away,

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unchanged from what he had been here, with his crisp

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hair and rather slow smile and lean brown face, that

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he saw her sometimes, that he had not forgotten her, Oh,

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Hugh Darling. When she looked up again, the woman was

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sitting there before her. Missus Wilton had not heard her

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come in. With her experience wide enough now of seers

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and fortune tellers of all kinds, she saw at once

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that this woman was different from the others. She was

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used to the quicker, praising look, the attempts, sometimes clumsy,

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but often cleverly disguised, to collect some fragments of information

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whereupon to erect a plausible vision. But this woman looked

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as if she took it out of herself. Not that

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her appearance suggested intercourse with the spiritual world more than

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the other had done. It suggested that, in fact, considerably less.

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Some of the others were frail, yearning, evaporated creatures, and

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the ex priest in Paris had something terrible and condemned

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in his look. He might well sup with the devil

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that man, and probably did in some way or another.

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But this was a little, fat, weary faced woman about fifty,

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who only did not look like a cook, because she

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looked more like a sempstress. Her black dress was all

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covered with white threads. Missus Wilton looked at her with

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some embarrassment. It seemed more reasonable to be asking a

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woman like this about altering a gown than about intercourse

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with the dead. That seemed even absurd in such a

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very commonplace presence, The woman seemed timid and oppressed. She

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breathed heavily and kept rubbing her dingy hands, which looked

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moist one over the other. She was always wetting her

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lips and coughed with a little dry cough. But in

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her these signs of nervous exhaustion suggested over work in

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a close atmosphere. Bending too close over the sewing machine,

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her uninteresting hair, like a rat's pelt, was eked out

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with a false addition of another color. Some threads had

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got into her hair too. Her harried, uneasy look caused

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missus Wilton to ask compassionately, are you much worried by

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the police? Oh, police, why don't they leave us alone?

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You never know who comes to see you? Why don't

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they leave me alone? I'm a good woman. I only

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think what I do is no harm to any one,

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she continued in an uneven, querulous voice, always rubbing her

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hands together nervously. She seemed to the visitor to be

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talking at random, just gabbling like children do sometimes before

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they fall asleep. I wanted to explain, hesitated missus Wilton.

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But the woman, with her head pressed close against the

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back of the chair, was staring beyond her at the wall.

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Her face had lost whatever little expression it had. It

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was blank and stupid. When she spoke, it was very slowly,

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and her voice was guttural. Can't you see him? It

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seems strange to me that you can't see him. He

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is so near you. He is passing his arm round

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your shoulders. This was a frequent gesture of Hughes, and indeed,

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at that moment she felt that somebody was very near her,

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bending over her. She was enveloped in tenderness. Only a

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very thin veil, she felt prevented her from seeing. But

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the woman saw. She was describing Hugh minutely, even the

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little things like the burn on his right hand. Is

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he happy? Oh? Ask him? Does he love me? The

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result was so far beyond anything she had hoped for

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that she was stunned. She could only stammer the first

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thing that came into her head. Does he love me?

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He loves you? He won't answer, but he loves you.

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He wants me to make you see him. He is disappointed,

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I think because I can't. But I can't unless you

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do it yourself. After a while she said, I think

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you will see him again. You think of nothing else.

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He is very close to us now. Then she collapsed

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and fell into a heavy sleep, and lay there motionless,

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hardly breathing. Missus Wilton put some notes on the table

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and stole out on tiptoe. She seemed to remember that downstairs,

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in the dark shop, the dealer with the waxen face

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detained her to show some old silver and jewelry and

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such like, But she did not come to herself. She

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had no precise recollection of anything till she found herself

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entering a church near Portland Place. It was an unlikely

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act in her normal moments. Why did she go in there?

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She acted like one walking in her sleep. The church

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was old and dim, with high black pews. There was

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nobody there. Missus Wilton sat down in one of the

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pews and bent forward with her face in her hands.

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After a few minutes she saw that a soldier had

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come in noiselessly and placed himself about half a dozen

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rows ahead of her. He never turned round, but presently

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she was struck by something familiar in the figure. First

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she thought vaguely that the soldier looked like her hue.

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Then when he put up his hand, she saw who

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it was. She hurried out of the pew and ran

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towards him. Oh, Hugh, Hugh, have you come back. He

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looked round with a smile. He had not been killed.

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It was all a mistake. He was going to speak.

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Footsteps sounded hollow in the empty church. She turned and

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glanced down the dim aisle. There was an old sexton

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or verger, who approached. I thought I heard you call,

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he said, I was speaking to my husband. But Hugh

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was nowhere to be seen. He was here a moment ago.

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She looked about in anguish. He must have gone to

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the door. There's nobody here, said the old man gently,

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only you and me. Ladies are often taken funny since

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the war. There was one in here yesterday afternoon. Said

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she was married in this church, and her husband had

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promised to meet her here. Perhaps you were married here, No,

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said missus Wilton, desolately. I was married in India. It

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might have been two or three days after that when

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she went into a small Italian restaurant in the Bayswater district.

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She often went out for her meals. Now she developed

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an exhausting cough, and she found that it somehow became

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less troublesome when she was in a public place looking

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at strange faces. In her flat there were all the

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things that Hugh had used. The trunks and bags still

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had his name on them, with the labels of places

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where they'd been together. They were like stabs. In the restaurant,

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people came and went, many soldiers too, among them, just

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glancing at her in her corner. This day, as it chanced,

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she was rather late and there was nobody there. She

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was very tired. She nibbled at the food they brought her.

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She could almost have cried from tiredness and loneliness and

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the ache in her heart. Then suddenly he was before her,

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sitting there opposite at the table. It was as it

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was in the days of their engagement, when they used

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sometimes to lunch at restaurants. He was not in uniform.

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He smiled at her and urged her to eat, just

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as he used to in those days. I met her

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that afternoon as she was crossing Kensington Gardens. She told

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me about it. I have been with Hugh. She seemed

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most happy. Did he say anything, No, Yes, I think

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he did, but I could not quite hear, my head

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was so very tired the next time. I did not

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see her for some time after that. She found, I

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think that by going to places where she had once

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seen him, the old church, the little restaurant, she was

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more certain to see him again. She never saw him

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at home, but in the street or the park, he

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would often walk along beside her. Once he saved her

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from being run over. She said she actually felt his

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hand grabbing her arm suddenly, when the car was nearly

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upon her. She had given me the address of the clairvoyant.

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And it is through that strange woman that I know,

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or seemed to know, what followed. Missus Wilton was not

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exactly ill last winter, not so ill at least as

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to keep to her bedroom. But she was very thin,

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and her great handsome eyes always seemed to be staring

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at some point beyond searching. There was a look in

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them that seamen's eyes sometimes have when they are drawing

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on a coast of which they are not very certain.

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She lived almost in solitude. She hardly ever saw anybody,

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except when they sought her out. To those who were

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anxious about her, she laughed and said she was very well.

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One sunny morning, she was lying awake waiting for the

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maid to bring her tea. The shy London sunlight peeped

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through the blinds. The room had a fresh and happy look.

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When she heard the door open, she thought that the

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maid had come in. Then she saw that Hugh was

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standing at the foot of the bed. He was in

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uniform this time, and looked as he had looked the

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day he went away. Oh, Hugh, speak to me, Will

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you not say just one word? He smiled and threw

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back his head, just as he used to in the

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old days at her mother's house. When he wanted to

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call her out of the room without attracting the attention

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of the others, He moved towards the door, still signing

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to her to follow him. He picked up her slippers

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00:13:30,559 --> 00:13:32,480
on his way and held them out to her as

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00:13:32,519 --> 00:13:35,399
if he wanted her to put them on. She slipped

241
00:13:35,399 --> 00:13:40,320
out of bed hastily. It is strange that when they

242
00:13:40,360 --> 00:13:43,600
came to look through her things after her death, the

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00:13:43,639 --> 00:13:48,399
slippers could never be found. End of the interval