Stories of the Strange and Sinister (Valancourt 20th Century Classics) Read Online Free PDF

could be no two opinions as to that. She knew it herself. A pink and very wrinkled face, a mass of thin grey hair, a small, stout body, and abnormally large flat feet (which her father had ignored, for he had always refused to bring his professional skill to the service of his family – a defect in an otherwise excellent man) these were presented to the world in clothes which looked as though they were the spoils of a succession of jumble-sales. Moreover, she never seemed to be able to dress for the time of year. In summer she might suddenly dig out an old grey fox fur and a check tweed overcoat hanging like a sack round her lumpy figure; in winter she might venture to the park wearing a flowered cotton frock and a floppy straw hat.
    ‘Really, Miss Ponsonby, you take the giddy biscuit,’ Barley said one evening, sipping her Ovaltine on her return from the theatre. ‘Who but you would think of sporting white silk gloves on the foulest December day?’
    Polly smiled. When she smiled her eyes – small and dark brown – seemed to disappear. Barley often wondered how one knew that Miss Ponsonby was smiling. But there couldn’t be any mistake about it.
    ‘It’s the artist in me.’ Polly spoke with quiet modesty. ‘Mr Ponsonby was just the same. I really don’t notice trivial things like weather, dear. I think clothes are there to serve our impulses. When I got up this morning, goody-goody! I said, white silk gloves today, my lady. Surely you, Miss Merton, being such an artist yourself, understand the call ?’
    Barley, whose impulses led to an excessive number of honey-coloured curls, and who had a way of pirouetting through puddles in very high heels, nodded thoughtfully. ‘Of course, people of a certain class can do what they like and it’s always right. Dad, for example, eats peas with a spoon – just to show that he hasn’t any use for all this gentility humbug. You and me are much of a muchness, Miss Ponsonby.’
    ‘Except, my dear, in the matter of looks,’ Polly murmured sadly.
    ‘Oh, what are looks? Of course, in my profession, they do count, you can’t get away from that. But in your case – ’ Barley stopped suddenly, feeling she might hurt Miss Ponsonby.
    ‘What were you going to say, dear?’
    ‘Well, to tell you God’s truth, I was thinking of that performance of Hiawatha by the Sydenham Choral Society you gave me a ticket for. Funny pack of guys, aren’t they? But mind you, they can sing, that’s what matters.’
    ‘I think, dear Miss Merton, that musicians, developing as they do so acutely the sense of sound, often possess a very vague sense of sight. I expect that is why I look so garish myself – and I do, of course, I know I do. But there we are. You are meant to be seen – and I am meant to be heard.’
    ‘Well, I shouldn’t get far if they couldn’t hear me.’
    ‘Of course, my dear. But a pretty face and a pleasing figure is what chiefly matters on the stage. And you do not go to a musical performance to look at the performers; you go to listen.’
    ‘Well, it takes all sorts, as they say. Human beings are funnier than apes. If I didn’t think so, I’d go crackers. If it weren’t for my brother Rye sending me nylons every so often, and some decent chocolates, and you looking after me as you do here, I think I’d chuck everything up.’
    ‘Oh, but why, dear, why? You’re so brilliant.’
    ‘Not me. A lousy actress, stuck in a bloody rep in this backwater.’
    ‘I have never regarded Sydenham as a backwater.’
    ‘Oh well, you were born and bred here. And music’s different somehow. You float away on it and forget yourself. Same with me when I’m actually on. Every time I get my call I feel as though I’m sprouting a pair of wings.’
    Miss Ponsonby was suddenly silent. Barley thought that a rich blush had suffused her wrinkled features.
    ‘If you know what I mean,’ she continued. ‘You know that thing you sing sometimes – “O for the wings of a dove?”