She Died a Lady Read Free

this is the real – well, grand passion. I’ve read about it and even written about it, but I never knew what it was like.’
    ‘Suppose you did run away with this fellow …’
    ‘I won’t do that, I tell you!’
    ‘Never mind. Suppose it. How would you live? Has he got any money?’
    ‘Not much, I’m afraid. But –’ Again Rita hesitated, on the brink of telling me something; and again, miserably, she decided against it. Her teeth fastened in her full under-lip. ‘I’m not saying it isn’t a practical consideration. But why bother about it at a time like this? It’s Alec I’m worried about. Always Alec, Alec, Alec, Alec!’
    Then she became literary. The dangerous thing about this high-flown talk was that she meant every word of it.
    ‘His face is a kind of ghost that keeps coming between me and Barry all the time. I want him to be happy and yet neither of us can be happy.’
    ‘Tell me, Rita. Were you ever in love with Alec?’
    ‘Yes, I was. In a way. He was perfectly charming when I first knew him. He used to call me Dolores. After Swinburne’s Dolores, you know.’
    ‘And now?’
    ‘Well? He doesn’t beat me, or anything like that. But –’
    ‘How long has it been since you’ve had physical relations with Alec?’
    Her face grew tragic.
    ‘I keep telling you, Dr Luke, it isn’t like that at all! This affair with Barry is something entirely different. It’s a kind of spiritual re-birth. Now don’t rub your hand over your forehead, and sit there looking at me over your spectacles and down your nose!’
    ‘I was only …’
    ‘It’s something I can’t describe. I can help Barry in his art, and he can help me in mine. He’s going to be a great actor one day. He laughs at me when I say that; but it’s true, and I can help him. All the same, that doesn’t solve my particular problem. I’m nearly going crazy under it. I want your advice, of course, though I know what it’ll be beforehand. But what I want most of all is something that will make me sleep for just one night. Can’t you please give me something that will make me sleep ?’
    Fifteen minutes later, Rita left. I stood and watched her go down the side path between the laurel hedges. Once, before reaching the gate, she looked into her handbag as though to make sure something was there. She had been on the edge of hysteria while telling her story. But hysteria was gone now. In the way she touched and smoothed her hair, in the very set of her shoulders, you could see a dreaminess as well as a defiance. She was eager to get back home to ‘Mon Repos’ and to Barry Sullivan.

TWO
    O N the evening of Saturday, the thirtieth of June I went out to the Wainrights’ house to play cards.
    It was thick, thundery weather. Matters were straining towards a breaking-point in more respects than one. France had capitulated; the Führer was in Paris; a disorganized weaponless British army had crawled back, exhausted, to dry its wounds on the beaches where it might presently have to fight. But we were still reasonably cheerful, with myself as complacent as the rest. ‘We’re all together now,’ we said; ‘it’ll be better’ – God knows why.
    Even in our little world of Lyncombe there was impending tragedy as clearly to be heard as a knocking at a door. I learned more about the Wainright-Sullivan business when I talked to Tom on the day after Rita’s visit.
    ‘May cause scandal?’ echoed Tom, who was fastening his bag preparatory to the morning round of calls. ‘ May cause scandal? It’s a flaming scandal already.’
    ‘You mean it’s being talked about in the village?’
    ‘It’s being talked about all over North Devon. If it weren’t for this war situation, you’d hear nothing else.’
    ‘Then why wasn’t I told about it?’
    ‘My dear governor,’ said Tom, in that irritatingly kindly way of his, ‘you can’t even see what’s under your own nose. And nobody ever tells you gossip anyway. You just wouldn’t be interested.