‘Is that all?’
‘A particular friend. You are what I need most: a companion.’
‘But only that? Nothing more?’ He leant towards her and, moved by his looks, his ardent expectations, she felt the air charged between them. Her lips parted; she turned her head away and said: ‘If it were possible …’
‘You mean it is impossible?’
‘You know it is. I have to think of Guy.’
He took that to be no more than conventional resistance. Catching her hand, he glanced towards the wide carpeted stair-way that led from the foyer to the upper floors, and said: ‘We can’t talk here. Come up to my room.’
The impulse to please him almost drew her from her seat, but as she turned towards the stairs she saw faces that were familiar to her: Dobson’s woman friend was present; there were girls who went to the School or used the School library. Knowing how easily she could become a centre of gossip, she was chilled and drew her hand away. Laughing uneasily, she said: ‘What would these people think if they saw me going upstairs with you?’
‘Does it matter what they think?’
‘That’s a stupid question. I live here. Guy works here.’ While she spoke the waiter brought their tea-tray and she hid her confusion by pouring the tea. She imagined he would be sulking, probably blaming her for an ungenerous caution, but when she turned to hand him his cup, she found his gaze fixed on her with an expression of hurt entreaty that was more compelling than ardour. She was surprised and moved, but everything that came into her head seemed to her trite, heartless and flirtatious, so she said nothing. They took their tea in silence.
Several days passed before he made any reference to this incident. They were walking in the gardens and coming on the pergola where the wisteria was putting out a lace of leaves, he said:
‘Tà kaïména tà neiáto
Ti grígorá pou pernoun …’
She looked inquiringly at him.
‘You must have heard that song,’ he said. ‘“Poor youth, how quickly it passes: like a love song, like a shooting-star, and when it is gone, it never comes again.”’
Knowing he was blaming her for a waste of passion and misuse of time, she said: ‘It would be better if we did not meet again.’
‘Do you mean that?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You must know.’
‘I only know this is an impossible situation.’
‘If you want me to go, I won’t trouble you again.’
‘If you want to go, I can’t stop you.’
‘But I don’t want to go.’
It was an argument carried on in the fatuity of emotional intoxication and they both knew that it would lead to nothing.
24
Guy had stopped singing the ‘fun and frolic’ chorus about the house. In the mornings, while bathing, shaving, dressing and preparing for the imponderables of the day, he sang in an energetic, swinging tune that stood up to his lack of tone:
‘Oh, what a surprise for the Duce, the Duce!
He can’t put it over the Greeks.’
The words amused her at first but they soon reached a point of unendurable familiarity.
‘Is that the only song in the revue now?’ Harriet asked, speaking grudgingly, for she resented the revue and hardly ever mentioned it. Guy always had had, and always would have, some preoccupation or other, but she had persuaded herself that were it not for the revue she would not have turned to other company. Delighted by her interest, Guy did not give her the chance to add that if there were another song, she would prefer it, but rushed in to say how much the revue had improved since she had seen it in the Tatoi hangar. Then it had been no more than a parish hall show; but since the arrival of the troops the British residents, seeing the war in Greece as their own war, had taken up the revue in a remarkable way. The chorus was twice the size and made twice as much noise and the troops joining in singing the songs. Greek songs like ‘Oh what a surprise for the Duce’ had been translated into English, and special songs had been composed by an English businessman in honour of Greco-British unity. All the camps were clamouring for the revue. Everyone wanted to see it. It was a stupendous success.
‘What about Pinkrose?’
‘Not a squeak out of him. He knows he’s defeated.’
‘I can see you’re having the time of your life.’
‘You’d enjoy it. Come and see it tonight. We’re going to Kifissia for a special show and the Naafi are supplying refreshments for the cast. Do come.’
Harriet had her own plans for that evening. ‘I don’t think I can,’ she said, but Guy bent over her and, catching her by the shoulders, looked down on her with an urgent and questioning intentness, saying: ‘I would like you to come.’
‘Then of course I will.’
‘Fine.’ He was away at once, hurrying round, looking for this and that. The military lorries were picking up the cast and visitors in Kolonaki Square. ‘I suppose you can get out of the office early?’
‘I suppose so. I was seeing Charles. Do you mind if I bring him?’
‘Bring anyone you like, but make sure you come yourself.’
He was gone. Harriet watched him through the large window as he slammed the front door behind him and sped up the lane past the villa, impelled by all the activities he had planned for the day.
Yakimov said of Guy: ‘He’s a dear, sweet fellow, but he doesn’t understand how you feel.’ She had thought Yakimov was right. Now she thought Guy saw more than he would admit to seeing, understood more than he appeared to understand; but he would not let observation or understanding impede him. He was a generous man, anyway in material matters. He loved her, but his love must be taken for granted. If she put it to the proof according to her needs, she found herself sacrificed to what he saw as a more important need: his need to be free to do what he wanted to do. Challenged, he never lacked justification. He did not recognize emotional responsibility and, unlike emotional people, he was not governed by it. She suffered compunction; he did not. It was compunction – a quite uncalled-for compunction – that caused her to disappoint Charles, who had booked a table at Babayannis’, and demanded that he go to Kifissia instead. She knew that he enjoyed being fêted at Babayannis’, but they could go there any night. She was surprised, shocked, even, when he refused to go to Kifissia.
The office had been stirred by the news that Yugoslavia had been presented with a German ultimatum. The fate of Yugoslavia presaged the fate of Greece; yet, in the face of this new crisis, Charles and Harriet could do no more than bicker over their evening’s entertainment.
They went into the Zappion Gardens where everything was bright with spring, but nothing was bright for them. Each looked inward on a private injury, determined not to yield a point to the other.
Charles kept his face turned from her but he spoke in an agreeable tone that was as cruel as a threat: ‘Don’t worry about me. There are other things I can do. I’ve been neglecting my friends lately. I ought to write some letters. In fact, I shall be glad to have a free evening.’
‘We have to think of Guy,’ Harriet said. ‘I promised him …’
‘And you promised me; you promised me first. Still, it doesn’t matter. Please don’t worry. I shall be quite happy on my own.’
‘Guy does not object to my seeing you. He’s not mean or demanding; we owe him one evening. I think we ought to go …’
‘You ought to go, certainly.’
‘We will have other evenings …’
‘Perhaps; and perhaps not.’
‘What do you mean by that?’
Pale and inflexible, he stared down at the path and shrugged his shoulders. ‘This Yugoslavia business. If they reject the ultimatum, every available man will be rushed to the frontier.’