Caught by Henry Green

Author:Henry Green
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-68137-013-2
Publisher: New York Review Books
Published: 2016-11-01T16:00:00+00:00

THREE weeks later Richard asked Hilly out for a night. He took her to a small place in Soho, and was glad to see no one he recognised also having dinner. Halfway through a bottle of claret she began to tease him that he did not hear a fraction of what went on at the substation. He was thinking of Pye’s sister when he replied that he was willing to bet he knew more than she did.

“All right,” she said, “what?”

But he did not mean to tell the story of Christopher’s abduction. He did not want to bring Hilly into family secrets. He must not, he repeated to himself, realising that he would when he had had enough to drink. It would be too intimate. He knew she would only plague him asking after Christopher, as his relations had. It was over now, there was no sign that the boy had suffered in any way. He could do without her enquiries in the substation at odd times just when his aunts and cousins, after so many months, had begun to forget.

“Isn’t there something up between old man Piper and Mary?” he asked, to head her off.

“Don’t be so silly.”

“There could be, you know.”

“Anything’s possible, and all the more so now, but not between those two, please.”

“Then you do feel, as well, that anything is possible between people now?” said he, with a purpose.

“But, Richard, of course. This war’s been a tremendous release for most.”

“Not for me.”

“Really and truly?”

“No, it hasn’t. What were you before the war?”

“Didn’t I ever tell you? I was a sort of superior filing clerk, that’s all, in my uncle’s business. I hated it. They sold umbrellas and walking sticks.”

“Well you understand Dy, that is we, decided Christopher, that’s my son,” and as always, he felt pompous when he brought out that he was a parent, “we made up our minds he ought not to stay in London in case there were air raids, so we hoicked the old chap down to the country, and Dy felt she ought to stay there with him. He doesn’t cost any more, in fact it’s an economy. But I can’t get rid of our house and it’s not the same when she does come up, I can’t thank why. So there you are,” he ended lamely. He had shied away again. It was too intimate. He knew well enough the only change must be in himself, that the alteration in his circumstances, by which he was more alone every evening on leave, had made him restless. He imagined, as has been described, a great deal going on all round between girls and men. What he might be missing haunted him. “And I enjoyed my job,” he went on, getting back to firm ground, “I still look in there on the days I’m off, to keep them sweet. They make up my salary. I’m going sick for a few days to help get out the dividend warrants.”

“When?”

The moment she asked Hilly told herself she was a fool.

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