Life and Death of Harriett Frean | Page 9

people, not even to
Prissie.
Her father smiled at him. "You must give us time."
He would never give it or take it. You could see him tearing at things in
his impatience, to know them, to make them give themselves up to him
at once. He came rushing to give himself up, all in a minute, to make
himself known.
"It isn't fair," he said. "I know you so much better than you know me.
Priscilla's always talking about you. But you don't know anything about
me."
"No. We've got all the excitement."
"And the risk, sir."
"And, of course, the risk." He liked him.
She could talk to Robin Lethbridge as she couldn't talk to Connie
Hancock's young men. She wasn't afraid of what he was thinking. She
was safe with him, he belonged to Priscilla Heaven. He liked her
because he loved Priscilla; but he wanted her to like him, not because

of Priscilla, but for himself.
She talked about Priscilla: "I never saw anybody so loving. It used to
frighten me; because you can hurt her so easily."
"Yes. Poor little Prissie, she's very vulnerable," he said.
When Priscilla came to stay it was almost painful. Her eyes clung to
him, and wouldn't let him go. If he left the room she was restless,
unhappy till he came back. She went out for long walks with him and
returned silent, with a tired, beaten look. She would lie on the sofa, and
he would hang over her, gazing at her with strained, unhappy eyes.
After she had gone he kept on coming more than ever, and he stayed
overnight. Harriett had to walk with him now. He wanted to talk, to talk
about himself, endlessly.
When she looked in the glass she saw a face she didn't know:
bright-eyed, flushed, pretty. The little arrogant lift had gone. As if it
had been somebody else's face she asked herself, in wonder, without
rancor, why nobody had ever cared for it. Why? Why? She could see
her father looking at her, intent, as if he wondered. And one day her
mother said, "Do you think you ought to see so much of Robin? Do you
think it's quite fair to Prissie?"
"Oh--_Mamma!_ ... I wouldn't. I haven't----"
"I know. You couldn't if you would, Hatty. You would always behave
beautifully. But are you so sure about Robin?"
"Oh, he _couldn't_ care for anybody but Prissie. It's only because he's
so safe with me, because he knows I don't and he doesn't----."
The wedding day was fixed for July. After all, they were going to risk it.
By the middle of June the wedding presents began to come in.
Harriett and Robin Lethbridge were walking up Black's Lane. The
hedges were a white bridal froth of cow's parsley. Every now and then
she swerved aside to pick the red campion.
He spoke suddenly. "Do you know what a dear little face you have,
Hatty? It's so clear and still and it behaves so beautifully."
"Does it?"
She thought of Prissie's face, dark and restless, never clear, never still.
"You're not a bit like what I expected. Prissie doesn't know what you
are. You don't know yourself."
"I know what she is."
His mouth's uneven quiver beat in and out like a pulse.

"Don't talk to me about Prissie!"
Then he got it out. He tore it out of himself. He loved her.
"Oh, Robin----" Her fingers loosened in her dismay; she went dropping
red campion.
It was no use, he said, to think about Prissie. He couldn't marry her. He
couldn't marry anybody but Hatty; Hatty must marry him.
"You can't say you don't love me, Hatty."
No. She couldn't say it; for it wouldn't be true.
"Well, then----"
"I can't. I'd be doing wrong, Robin. I feel all the time as if she belonged
to you; as if she were married to you."
"But she isn't. It isn't the same thing."
"To me it is. You can't undo it. It would be too dishonorable."
"Not half so dishonorable as marrying her when I don't love her."
"Yes. As long as she loves you. She hasn't anybody but you. She was
so happy. So happy. Think of the cruelty of it. Think what we should
send her back to."
"You think of Prissie. You don't think of me."
"Because it would kill her."
"How about you?"
"It can't kill us, because we know we love each other. Nothing can take
that from us."
"But I couldn't be happy with her, Hatty. She wears me out. She's so
restless."
"We couldn't be happy, Robin. We should always be thinking of what
we did to her. How could we be happy?"
"You know how."
"Well, even if we were, we've no right to