Living Alone | Page 9

little gathering of friends on the other side of the river, and I thought I
would call here on my way home. I had noted your address----"
She started as she came in and saw Sarah Brown, and added in her
committee voice: "I had noted your address, because I never mind how
much trouble I take in following up a promising case."
Sarah Brown, on first hearing that trenchant voice, had lost her head
and begun to hide under the counter. But the biscuit-tins refused to
make room, so she drew herself up and smiled politely.
"How good of you to go to a little gathering of friends," said the witch,
obviously trying to behave like a real human person. "I never do,
except now and then by mistake. And even then I only stay when there
are grassy sandwiches to eat. Once there were grassy sandwiches mixed
with bits of hard-boiled egg, and then I stayed to supper. You didn't
have such luck, I see, or you would look happier."
"I don't go to my friends for their food, but for their ideas," said Miss
Ford.
Sarah Brown was gliding towards the door.
"Oh, don't go," said the witch, who did not recognise tact when she met
it. "I have sent Harold the Broomstick for your Dog David and your
Suit-case Humphrey. He is an excellent packer and very clean in his
person and work. Please, please, don't go. Do you know, I live in
constant dread of being left alone with a clever person."
"I must apologise for my intrusion, in that case," said Miss Ford, with

dignity. "I repeat, I only came because I saw yours was an exceptional
case."
There was a very long silence in the growing dusk. The moon could
already be seen through the glass door, rising, pushing vigorously aside
the thickets of the crowded sky. A crack across the corner of the glass
was lighted up, and looked like a little sprig of lightning, plucked from
a passing storm and preserved in the glass.
Miss Ford suddenly began to talk in a very quick and confused way.
Any sane hearer would have known that she was talking by mistake,
that she was possessed by some distressingly Anti-Ford spirit, and that
nothing she might say in parenthesis like this ought to be remembered
against her.
"Oh, God," said Miss Ford, "I have come because I am hungry, hungry
for what you spoke of last night, in the dark.... You spoke of an April
sea--clashing of cymbals was the expression you used, wasn't it? You
spoke of a shore of brown diamonds flat to the ruffled sea ... and white
sandhills under a thin veil of grass ... and tamarisks all blown one
way...."
"Well?" said the witch.
"Well," faltered Miss Ford. "I think I came to ask you ... whether you
knew of nice lodgings there ... plain wholesome bath ... respectable
cooking, hot and cold ..."
Her voice faded away pathetically.
There was a sudden shattering, as the door burst open, and a dog and a
suit-case were swept in by a brisk broomstick.
"I am so sorry, Miss Watkins," said Miss Ford stiffly. Her face was
scarlet--neat and formal again now, but scarlet.--"I am so sorry if I have
talked nonsense. I am rather run down, I think, too much work, four
important meetings yesterday. I sometimes think I shall break down. I
have such alarming nerve-storms."

She looked nervously at Sarah Brown. It is always tiresome to meet
fellow-members of committees in private life, especially if one is in a
mood for having nerve-storms. People may be excellent in a
philanthropic way, of course, and yet impossible socially.
But Sarah Brown had heard very little. She always found Miss Ford's
voice difficult. She was on her knees asking her dog David what it had
felt like, coming. But David was still too much dazed to say much.
"You must not think," said Miss Ford, "that because I am a practical
worker I have no understanding of Inner Meanings. On the contrary, I
have perhaps wasted too much of my time on spiritual matters. That is
why I take quite a personal and special interest in your case. I had a
great friend, now in the trenches, alas, who possessed Power. He used
to come to my Wednesdays--at least I used to invite him to come, but
he was dreamy like you and constantly mistook the date. He helped me
enormously, and I miss him.... Well, the truest charity should be
anything but formal, I think, and I saw at a glance that your case was
exceptional, and that you also were Occult----"
"How d'you mean--occult?" asked the witch. "Do you mean just
knowing magic?"
"A strange mixture," mused Miss Ford self-consciously.