Return to Night: A Novel Read online

  It might have been after five minutes, or thirty-five, that she opened them again, with a start. Among the light rustlings and cracklings of small life in the undergrowth, a new noise, rhythmic and strong, was growing louder, the thud over turf of a cantering horse. It came from the ride she had left, facing her now across the clearing. She did not disturb herself about it; the wood was too dense behind her for anyone to ride that way, and, sunk in her form of bracken, it was unlikely that she would be seen. The hoofbeats slowed to a walk; a stick cracked quite near. In a dim curiosity to know whose solitude she was sharing, she raised herself a little.

  They came out into the lake of sunlight in the clearing, a big light dun, and a rider sitting loosely and at ease. Hilary stared, forgetting her trespass and the apologies she might need to improvise. She felt a little detached from reality. The light, the setting, the hour, seemed a theatrical extravagance, exaggerating, needlessly, what was already excessive, the most spectacularly beautiful human creature she had ever seen. Because her habit of mind had made her hostile to excess, she thought irritably, It’s ridiculous. It’s like an illustration to something.

  He had not seen her. If he came nearer, she would find that distance had been playing tricks. When he passed near enough for her to hear the creak of leather, she still did not quite believe in him. His boots and breeches, which were old and good, were topped off with a blue cotton shirt open at the neck; a carelessness natural to the hour, but transformed by its wearer to something traditional, the basic costume of equestrian romance. He was slender, but strongly boned. His hair was so black that the brightening sun did not touch it with brown; his face had the hard, faintly hollow planes in which art seems to have lost interest between the fourteenth century and the twentieth, the lines which invite not paint or marble, but stone or bronze. But sculpture would have missed the contrast of a fair skin and gray eyes with the blue-black hair, the slanted brows, and lashes which were emphatic even from that distance away. His grace in the saddle, flexible and erect, was something separable from good horsemanship, as if it would have cost him a deliberate effort to make any movement which was ugly or out of line. His head was up—he and the horse were getting their breath—and this chance pose gave him a look of medieval challenge and adventure which went with all the rest. It was fantastic that anyone unself-conscious and alone could look so faultlessly arranged.

  He looked quite unaware of himself, and happy. His long mouth had the rare mingling of sweetness and arrogance which can last only for a few years while youth holds them in suspension; for he was very young, perhaps twenty or so, perhaps not out of his teens. It was hard to say; his beauty was of that mind-arresting kind which silences other questions. Now, his face reflected only movement and the morning. Two magpies, scared up from the edge of the wood, flew suddenly out against the trees. He lit with a flash of pleasure as vivid as their flight, then touched his horse with his knee, and trotted away into an open aisle of the larches. The fallen needles muffled the sound, so that he seemed to vanish like a legend, leaving the sadness of mortality in his wake.

  Hilary sat up, and brushed bits of bracken smartly from her tweeds. With amused impatience, she dusted off also the impression from her mind. She naturally distrusted, and felt ill at ease with, physical perfection in either sex; not from envy—for she seldom troubled to improve on her own moderate good looks—but because she found it a confusing irrelevance, camouflaging the personality which interested her more. Within her own observation, the principal function of beauty had been to make a fool of intelligence, in one or two instances a tragic fool. The way to enjoy it was like this, impersonally, at a distance, for what it was worth; and she felt grateful for the absence of introductions, which had doubtless preserved her from hearty, illusion-shattering banalities about the clemency of the morning and the prospects of golf.

  These reflections carried her back to her car. As she drove home the air was still sweet and cool, but the early magic had dispersed; it was not sunrise but day, and already there was white dust on the road. Her mind began to travel on to the day’s work, and the glimpse in the larch wood only remained there as an incidental part of the pleasures of early rising, like dew and young rabbits, which in general cause one to say, “Why don’t I do this more often?” while knowing that one will not.

  Chapter Two: A PATIENT’S SUBCONSCIOUS

  HILARY SAT AT THE COTTAGE TABLE, holding a little glass pipette like a fountain-pen filler, and gazing down into a cardboard shoe box. In the box was cotton wool lined with a clean handkerchief of her own, and, embedded in the handkerchief, a tiny waxen face, no bigger than the palm of her hand. The face was full of an ancient ennui; the eyes were closed; the mouth was shut too, in remote obstinacy, passively resisting the pipette which Hilary was trying stealthily to introduce to it. With her fingertip she drew down the lower jaw, revealing a cavity much the size of the moon on a thumbnail. A few drops of brandy-and-water trickled in. The mouth sketched a grimace of languid, but definite, resentment, and out of it came a cry, thinner than the mew of a newborn kitten. Moving out from under the handkerchief in undirected protest, a hand, perfect and slender like an adult’s in miniature, closed round one of Hilary’s fingers and let go again in fastidious distaste.

  From the bed against the wall a dim voice said, “Was that her crying?”

  “Yes,” said Hilary cheerfully. “And about time, too.”

  “I couldn’t hardly hear it.”

  “Give her time. She’s not much over three pounds, by the look of her.”

  “Will I rear her, doctor?”

  “I hope so. But not here, you know. She’ll need everything rather special. Nurse has gone to ring for the ambulance to take both of you to hospital.”

  “Oh, dear, oh, doctor. Whatever will my husband say?”

  “Your husband has been very sensible about it. He wants to do what’s best for both of you.” Or if he doesn’t, she added to herself, he can be learning.

  “And what’s to become of the children, that’s what I can’t see, and Mother with her leg bad again.”

  “We’ll fix something. You’ve just got to concentrate on this one now. Would you like to see her?”

  The woman on the bed gave a harassed sigh; but her head craned a little over the worn sheet. Hilary carried the shoe box over, and tilted it. “We mustn’t uncover any more of her. They feel the cold.”

  Between the folds of the handkerchief, the tiny unmoving mask in the box lay with closed mouth and eyes, withdrawn and refusing. It had nothing to say to the life that had been thrust on it seven weeks too soon. Its arms and legs were folded in its prenatal posture; its whole grain of being seemed bent on affirming that the unpleasant fact of birth had not happened, or, if it had, could be decently ignored. Its composure made Hilary’s efforts toward its survival feel intrusive.

  The mother’s face puckered, and a tear slipped down her cheek. “The little love,” she whispered. “You do what’s best, doctor. Anything so’s I don’t lose her, bless her heart.”

  Hilary put down the box on the table, and went over to the window, in which tall geraniums excluded half the small available light and air. Looking out, she reflected that Mrs. Kemp had three small children already, one of them “backward,” and a husband who did little for her beyond ensuring that events like this were frequent and regular. She had tried to stop this one, as Hilary knew, by every means short of the criminal, and now—How on earth, she wondered, does Nature manage to pull this trick?

  The rattle of a parked cycle sounded outside; the district nurse came up the path and into the room.

  “The ambulance will be along in a few minutes, doctor. It was Matron herself I spoke to. She was ever so pleased to know you were here, because she was just going to ring you. Would you be able to come straight away, she said, because there’s an urgent casualty just come in, a head injury, she said, and the patient’s unconscious.”

  “Thank you, Nurse. I’ll go along now, if my instruments a
re boiled.” Hilary stood up briskly, shocked next moment by her own feelings of pleasure and excitement. In the days when she had worked for Sanderson, this would have been simply a typical moment in a packed unremitting routine. Grumbling mechanically, she would have picked up the internal telephone—any scalp lacerations, any bleeding from the nose or ears, any response to painful stimuli? She almost turned to ask the district nurse these questions, but stopped herself in time.

  Her instruments were ready. On her way out through the kitchen, she stopped for a few parting admonitions to the husband, by way of striking while the iron was hot. He lowered at her in sullen resentment—exactly, Hilary thought, as if I were responsible. By this time he has probably convinced himself that I am. Really, these men.

  The Cottage Hospital was in a flutter, with the Matron and Sister in violent circulation; Hilary, who liked smooth-running machinery, felt her irritability increased. The Matron was competent enough in her sphere, but the rare advent of something both acute and complex was apt to go to her head. Probably, Hilary thought, it gets under my skin because I’m going the same way. In reaction, she affected an easy social manner, which put the Matron on her dignity and produced a certain amount of simmering-down.

  It emerged that the history of the patient’s injury was unknown, for he had been found lying in the road and had not since recovered consciousness. She gathered that the signs of gross damage to the brain were so far absent. “Nurse Jones,” the Matron added, “has just finished undressing him.”

  Hilary stopped herself from saying, “Well, I hope she hasn’t been rolling him about.” Since her rustication she had trained herself out of many exigencies; but Nurse Jones, a plump china-eyed blonde, still seemed to her less intelligent than any citizen at large had a right to be. This opinion she had concealed less perfectly than she imagined; with the result that in her presence Nurse Jones was shaken out of what simple wit she had. Hilary knew this; found it shaming and infuriating; and began every fresh encounter with good intentions.

  The Matron led her to a small single-bedded ward on the ground floor, one generally reserved for the dying. The door stood open, a screen across it inside. Nurse Jones came out of it, a large enamel bowl of soapy water in her hands. Seeing Hilary and the Matron, she pulled up sharply, and the water slopped over the edge of the bowl.

  “I don’t think,” said Hilary, “that I should have bathed him just yet, Matron. Is there much shock?”

  The Matron, who had not ordered a bath but had forgotten to be explicit, said, “Nurse, you should have known better than to have bathed this patient. I left that to your common sense. Don’t you realize that cases like this are very shocked?”

  With the bowl wobbling in her hands, Nurse Jones began to stammer, “I didn’t do much, Matron. I thought, as I was admitting him—in case his feet were dirty or anything, you know. But he was quite clean. I didn’t do much. I’ll just go and get him a bedgown.”

  “You should have had it ready, Nurse, before you prepared to bath him.”

  “Yes, Matron. I—”

  “Well, get it now.”

  “Yes, Matron.”

  “That will be all right for the moment,” Hilary said. “I shall want him stripped to go over his reflexes.” Seeing the Sister bearing down urgently upon them she added, thankfully, “Don’t let me keep you if you’re busy, Matron; I’ll come and talk him over with you when I’ve had a look.”

  Nurse Jones had set down her bowl. Eager to restore her status with a display of zeal, she darted ahead of Hilary into the room, and flung back the bath blanket which lay loosely on the bed. Hilary, following her, noted with speechless exasperation the open window, and the long motionless form of the patient lying in its draft, exposed down to the loins.

  With slow, careful control Hilary said, “I meant undressed Nurse, not stark naked. Shall we have that window shut? And then perhaps you’ll bring a couple of hot-water bottles.”

  Nurse Jones flushed and hurried away. Hilary stood for a moment tapping one foot on the floor, filled with irrational and conflicting sensations of satisfaction and guilt. They coalesced into a general irritation. She turned sharply toward the bed; took hold of the blanket to twitch it upward; and stood still, its fold suspended in her hand.

  Lying flat and straight on the sheet, in a marmoreal peace, was the young rider of the larch wood. A narrow first-aid bandage, covering a cut on his forehead, bound his dark hair like a fillet; his head was turned a little to the left, as if in sleep. As if in sleep, one arm lay on his breast, the other slackly at his side. His body was as strictly cut and as faultless as his face. The black iron bed on which he lay seemed incongruous; he looked like the flower of Sparta brought back from Thermopylae on a shield.

  For a few moments, the normal processes of professional routine in Hilary’s mind were wholly arrested. Her reaction was purely human and esthetic. She felt, not compassion, for there was no suffering to awake it, but a kind of awe. Drawing up the blanket, she looked again at the quiet face. On one of the cheekbones the skin had been grazed, and picric dabbed on the place; it jolted her mental mechanisms; the wheels began to go round again. She felt the skin temperature, and noted signs of a fractured collarbone. On the same side, the right, the palm of his hand was scraped. She took his pulse.

  It was slow, but not to the point of danger; and the wound on his head proved to be superficial and without sign of deeper injury below. Naturally, there would have to be an X-ray; a portable, he had better not be moved. She proceeded to pick up a fold of chest muscle, and, twisting it expertly, noted in relief a faint flinching indicative of some response to pain. The leg and foot reflexes were normal. Just as she had ascertained this, Nurse Jones reappeared with two hot-water bottles. To her own surprise Hilary smiled at her, and explained the salient points of the case in simple terms. In her haste to be off before the weather took a turn for the worse, Nurse Jones nearly upset the screen.

  The Matron presented a problem. She was a competent and practical person; but her notions on the treatment of head injuries were archaic, and the powder of instruction would have to be mixed with liberal coatings of jam. It proved unexpectedly easy, for other preoccupations were keeping her dignity in check.

  “That’s very interesting, Dr. Mansell. I’m afraid my nurses get a bit behind with some of the new methods; it will be good experience for them. Now with regard to his condition; you think his relatives ought to be here?”

  Hilary considered. The question was a strictly technical one. “I don’t see any need, if you can get at them easily. These cases do queer things, but we ought to get some warning of any deterioration. They’ll only be a nuisance to you, camping about; and if he starts recovering consciousness, that’s just when we’ll have to keep them away. I should leave it, provided they know his condition and can get here in reasonable time if they’re sent for.”

  “That’s just what I thought you’d say, Dr. Mansell. I was wondering, if he’s a stranger about here, how soon the police would be able to trace them.”

  “Do you mean,” said Hilary, startled, “that you don’t know who he is?”

  “Only the surname. That was on his underwear. Of course, when he comes round—”

  “He may come round with complete aphasia; probably will. Or, of course, just possibly never.” She listened to her own voice, hard and incisive, and thought, Do I always talk like this?

  “Where was he picked up?” she asked.

  “He was found by some people motoring from Birmingham. Of all the silly things, they didn’t phone for the ambulance, just bundled him into their car and brought him here because they’d noticed the sign driving by. You’d think, with a head injury, anyone would have more sense.”

  Hilary had no such expectations of the lay intelligence. She further suspected that these rash Samaritans had been responsible for the accident, which would explain their leaning to informality. She said, absently, “What about his horse?”

  The Matron was impressed. />
  “Why, Dr. Mansell, you’re quite a detective, aren’t you? I did mean to have told you he was picked up in riding-things, but it quite slipped my memory.”

  “Oh, well,” said Hilary casually, “the injuries were typical. You’ve been through his pockets, of course?”

  “Yes; I’ve got everything on my desk, but really it doesn’t tell you much. Do come in, doctor, and take a cup of tea with me, and then perhaps you can do some more of your detecting.”

  On the Matron’s desk, a heap of oddments strewed the speckless sheet of the blotter. Hilary turned them over. Seventeen shillings odd in loose silver; a key ring without a name tag; a crushed postage stamp; part of an electric plug; a twist of fuse. Wire; matches; a silver cigarette case, empty, with the initials J.R.F. in one corner; an ancient square of wrapped toffee; and a dirty scrap of paper. The little handful suddenly struck her as rather moving. She said, curtly, “Not much help,” and un-folded the paper, which had been used as a spill and burned at one end. Through the creases and rubbings she managed to decipher: Dear Julian, I shan’t be in Hall tonight, so if by any chance—The other side of the paper was blank, and there was no date; but she knew the College crest, having been at Oxford herself.

  “That ought to do,” she said. “It’s the vac, but someone will be there. A first-year man, I should think; he can’t be more than twenty.” The Matron, to whom the crest conveyed nothing, waited aloofly. “There can’t be two J.R.F.’s in one college, I suppose.”

  With some self-satisfaction the Matron said, “If you remember, doctor, we have the surname. It was at the top of his chart but perhaps you overlooked it. Fleming was the name.”