Sinister Street, vol. 1

rd with a recurrence of the slight jealousy he had always felt of Stella that, though she was not yet eleven years old, she was going to Germany to live in a German family and stud

by pointing out that in Germany her piano-playing would be laughed at and by warning her that her so evident inclination to show off would prejudice against her the bulk of Teutonic opinion. However, Michael's well-meant discouragement did not at all abash Stella, who under his most lugubrious prophecies trilled exasperatingly cheerful scales or ostentatiously folded unimportant articles of clothing with an exaggerated carefulness, the while she fussed with her hair and threw conceited glances over her shoulder into the mirror. Then, one day, the bonnet of a pink and yellow Fraul

"For the whole of the hols

rtheless, in the course of the term, the friendship had grown, and once or twice Michael and Merivale had sat beneath the hawthorn trees, between them a stained bag of cherries in the long cool grass, while intermittently they clapped the boundary hits of a school match that was clicking drowsily its progress through the summer afternoon. Tentative confidences had been exchanged, and by reason of its slower advance towards intimacy the friendship of Michael and Merivale seemed built on a firmer basis than most of the sudden affinities of school life. Now, as Michael recalled the personality of Merivale with his vivid blue eyes and dull gold hair and his laugh and freckled nose and curiously attractive walk, he had a great desire for his company during the holidays. Miss Carthew was asked to write to Mrs. Merivale in order to give the matter the weight of authority; but Michael and Miss Carthew went off to Eastbourne before the answer arrived. The sea sparkled, a cool wind blew down fro

Captain Ross's hotel. During the few days of Captain Ross's stay, he and Michael and Merivale and Miss Carthew went sailing and climbed up Beachy Head and watched a cricket match in Devonshire Park and generally behaved like all the other summer visitors to Eastbourne. Michael noticed that Captain Ross was very polite to Miss Carthew and heard with interest that they both had many friends in common-soldiers and sailors and Royal Marines. Michael listened to a great deal of talk about

Miss Carthew, when on the last evening of Captain Ross's stay

in Ross, banging his nephew on

, that loaf hurts most aw

e Captain as he twirled his little

rnest invitation accompanied the boys to see him off, and, as th

y uncle's rather go

s don't get gone on--" Michael was going to add 'chaps' sisters' governesses,' but

d reading books on the beach, so that Michael and Merivale were left free to do

in arm, were examining the credentials of the front on a shimmerin

ften does," re

ng I call you Alan and you call me Michael-only

mind," Al

t be two chaps more friends than

n I do any other cha

rather decent just to have one great fr

band of minstrels had secured their joint devotion. They greatly preferred the Pierrots to the Niggers, and very soon by a week's unbroken attendance at the three daily sessions, Mich

of barmy chaps,

in our tiles, perha

, lunatics, ev

fellows gone wro

pair of Ma

Michael and Alan avowed openly their fondness for the more serious songs sung by the Pierrettes. The wor

e girls in

le girls

sters, we we

t to love

tle girl in

our fathe

other: I marr

have drif

in life. This lyric expressed for the two boys the incommunicable aspirations of their most sacred moments. As they leaned over the rail of the promenade and gazed down upon the p

decent, isn't it?"

. "I wish I could give

hael. "It's beastly b

nd Alan looked solemnly up at the stars, they became blurred. They could not bear The Dandy Coloured Coon on such a night, and, seeing no chance of luri

o to bed at a quarter pas

in our room,"

rots," said Michael, affection

we do too,"

ther along the South Coast. Michael and Alan were dismayed, and in their disgust forsook the beach for th

n," said Michael. "I'd know her anywhere. If

linker," Ala

ever see a girl half as

se there is a girl anywhere in the world a quarter

irls in blue dresses. Michael and Alan found the coincidence so extraordinary that they stared hard, even whe

laughing at us?"

us first," said the f

nt Michael f

ed Alan. "They'll fo

chael. "Because if you do, I vote we talk to t

e we know saw us

s adventure and, lest Alan should still hold back, he took from his pocket a f

ld you like

l whom he admired dipped her hand into the bag. As all the Satin Pralines were stuck together, she br

l. "I can get some more. These are bea

ntrigue of Dora and Winn

ile in experience they were a generation ahead of either. The possession of this did not prevent them from giggling foolishly and from time to time looking at each other with an expression compounded of interrogation and shyness. Michael objected to this look, inasmuch as it implied

golden hair. He admired immensely her large shady hat trimmed with cornflowers and the string of bangles on her wrist and her general effect of being almost grown up and at the same time still obviously a little girl. As for Dora's face, Michael found it beautiful with the long-lashe

m the beginning, and he would lie awake planning how the feat was to be accomplished. He was afraid that if sudden

r kissed Winnie?" he

arkness came

t. I say,

el added defiantly, "But

't let you,

could marry-a lady. I'm tremendously gone on Dora and so are you on Winnie. But I don't think they're ladies, because Dora's got a sister who's in a pantomime and wears tights, so you see I couldn't propose to her. Besides, I should feel a most frightful fool going down on my k

ation by Alan in the darknes

clinker, Alan. Tha

down to sleep, praying for the good lu

. He expounded to Dora the ranks of the British Army; he gave her tips on birds'-nesting; he told her of his ambition to join the Bengal Lancers and he boasted of the exploits of the St. James' Football Fifteen. Dora giggled the minutes away, and at five minutes to twelve they were on a seat, screened against humanity's intrusion. Michael listened with quickening pulses to the thump of tennis balls in the distance.

cheek!" s

ips, coldly though they w

citement crimsoning his cheeks and rattling his heart

" murmur

D

gling herself free. "You have go

ffirmed Michael, choking with the emot

ll right," Do

iss me. You migh

is. He spent a long time trying to persuade her to give way, but Dora prot

otested. "Or else everybod

in herself and the colder she stayed, the more Michael felt inclined to hurt her, to shake her roughly, almost to draw blood from those soft lifeless lips. Once she murmured to him that he was hurting her, and Michael was in a quandary between an overwhelming softness of pity and an exultant desire to make h

f their passionate adventure until the blackness of night and se

ora this morning,"

Winnie,"

iss me, though,

echoed in surprize,

t!" exclai

han I kissed her. I felt an awful fool. I nearl

not understand the reason; but he supposed that Dora, being so obviously the prettier, was deservedly the more difficult to win. However, Michael felt disinclined to pursue the subjec

a certain pleasure in denying to her the attraction of Alan's company. Winnie was not very anxious for the walk, but Dora seemed highly pleased, and Dora, being the leader of the pair, Winnie had to give way. While they strolled up and down the promenade in a row, Dora pointed out to Michael and Alan in how many respects they both faile

crescent of whalebone. They bought made-up white silk knotted ties sown with crimson fleurs-de-lys and impaled with a permanent brass horseshoe. They spent a long time in the morning plastering back their hair with soap and wate

a coat as it went by and envied the pockets of the youths they met; they envied, too, the collars that surrounded the adolescent neck, and wished the time had come for them to wear 'choke

arthew had succumbed again to her headache, Michael and Alan were free to swagger up and down on the melting asphalt of the promenade. Miss Carthew grew no better, and one day she told the boys that Nancy was coming down to look after them. Michael did not know whether he were really glad or not, because, fond as he was of Nancy, he was deeply in love with Dora and he had a feeling that Nancy would inter

who are your young fri

ey were friends of Alan, but Alan w

uously. "No, and I don't admire your get-up," she went

" said Michael,

ike a thorough young bounder. Don't you come to Cobble Place with that button on your hat. Well, don't let me di

Michael, looking down at his boots, very red and biting

gger minstrels. Where did you get that tie? No wonder my sister feels bad. That belt of yours, Michael, would give a Sou

id look rather common, and he wished they would not stand, almost within earshot, giggling and prod

again, "let's bung these sticks i

his finger very slightly on a barnacled rock, he bandaged it up with his silk tie. Very soon he discovered the cut was not at all serious, but he announced the tie was spoilt and dipped it casually into a rock pool, where it floated b

, so that she could get into a hockey skirt and thick shoes. They had fine blowy days with Nancy up on Beachy Head above the sparkling blue water.

ant at the time, repelled him in the recollection of them. Moreover, he had experienced a sense of inequality in his passion for Dora. He gave all: she returned nothing. Looking back at her now under the sailing clouds, he thought her nose was ugly, her mouth flabby, her voice odious and her hair beastly. He blushed at the memory of the ridiculous names he had called her, at the contemplation of his enthusiastic praise of her beauty to Alan. He was glad that Alan had been involved, however unwillingly. Otherwise he was almost afraid he would have avoided Alan in future, unable to bear the injury to his pride. This sad sensation promoted by the wind in the grasses, by the movement of the clouds and the companionship of Alan and Nancy, was more thrilling than the Pierrette's tremolo in the lantern light. Mic

t back to school, Michael was in the Middle Fourth, and Alan just misse