The Upas Tree | Page 3

the man who crawled out first was not the man who had sent for her! He turned up just too late. Now, do you see?"
"I see," said Helen. "Thirteen is always apt to be an unlucky number."
"Oh, don't joke!" cried Ronald. "I haven't time to tell you, now, how it all works out. But it's quite the strongest thing I've thought of yet. And do you see what it means to me? Think of the weird, mysterious atmosphere of Central Africa, as a setting for a really strong love-interest. Imagine three quite modern, present-day people, learning to know their own hearts and each other's, fighting out the crisis of their lives according to the accepted rules and standards of twentieth century civilisation--yet all amongst the wild primitive savagery of uncivilised tribes, and the extraordinary primeval growths of the unexplored jungles, where plants ape animals, and animals ape men, and all nature rears its head with a loose rein, as if defying method, law, order and construction! Why, merely to walk through some of the tropical houses at Kew gives one a sort of lawless feeling! If I stay long among the queer gnarled plants--all spiky and speckled and hairy; squatting, plump and ungainly on the ground, or spreading huge knotted arms far overhead, as if reaching out for things they never visibly attain--I always emerge into the ordinary English atmosphere outside, feeling altogether unconventional. As I walk across the well-kept lawns, I find it almost difficult to behave with decorum. It takes me quite a long time to become really common-place and conventional once more."
Helen smiled. "Darling," she said, "I think you must have visited the tropical plants in Kew Gardens more frequently than I realised! I shall have to forbid Kew, when certain important County functions are pending."
"Oh, bother the County!" cried Ronnie. "I never went in for a French dancing-master to bid me mind my P's and Q's! But, seriously, Helen, don't you understand how much this means to me? Both my last novels have had tame English settings. I can't go on forever letting my people make love in well-kept gardens!"
"Dear Ronnie, you have a good precedent. The first couple on record made love in a garden."
"Nonsense, darling! Eden was a quite fascinating jungle, in which all the wild animals conversed with intelligence and affability. You don't suppose Eve would have stood there alone, calmly listening while the serpent talked theology, unless conversations with animals had been an every-day occurrence. Think how you'd flee to me, if an old cow in the park suddenly asked you a question. But do let's keep to the point. I've got a new plot, and I must have a new setting."
"Why not be content to do as you have done before, Ronnie; go on writing, simply and sincerely, of the life you live and know?"
"Because, my dear girl, in common with the Athenians, people are always wanting either to tell or to hear some new thing. I've got hold of a jolly new thing, and I'm going to run it for all it's worth."
Helen considered this in silence.
Ronald walked over to the window, and beat a tattoo upon the In hoc vince pane.
"Do you see?" he asked.
"Yes," she answered, slowly. "I see your point, but I also see danger ahead. I am so anxious that, in your work, you should keep the object and motive at the highest; not putting success or popularity in their wrong place. Let success be the result of good work well done--conscientiously done. Let popularity follow unsought, simply from the fact that you have been true to yourself, and to your instinctive inspiration; that you have seen life at its best, and tried to portray it at its highest. To go rushing off to Central Africa in order to find a startling setting, is an angling after originality, which will by no means ensure doing really better work. Oh, Ronnie, my advice is: be content to stay at home, and to write truly and sincerely of the things you know."
Ronald came back to his chair; sat down, his elbows on his knees, his chin in his hands, and looked earnestly into the troubled eyes of his wife.
"But, Helen," he said, "that really is not the point. Can't you see that I am completely possessed by this new plot? Also, that Central Africa is its only possible setting? It is merely a satisfactory side-issue, that it varies my _mise-en-scène_."
"Must you go off there, Ronnie, in order to write it? Why not get all the newest and best books on African travel, and read up facts----"
"Never!" cried Ronald, on his feet again, and walking up and down the room. "I must be steeped in the wonderful African atmosphere, before I can sub-consciously work it into my book. No