From force of contrast the everyday business of transport was turned into a temporary rapture. Railway travel was no longer an infliction, only to be endured by the aid of such palliatives as reservations, flowers, fruit, chocolates, light literature, and a group of friends to shriek encouragement.
As she sat, jammed in an uncomfortable carriage, in train which was not too clean, with little prospect of securing a wagon-lit at Trieste, she felt the thrill of a first journey.
The scenery preserved its barbarous character in rugged magnificence. The train threaded its way past piled-up chunks of disrupted landscape, like a Doré steel-engraving of Dante’s Inferno. Waterfalls slashed the walls of granite precipices with silver-veining. Sometimes they passed arid patches, where dark pools, fringed with black-feathered rushes, lay in desolate hollows.
Iris gazed at it through the screen of the window – glad of the protective pane of glass. This grandeur was the wreckage a world shattered by elemental-force, and reminded her it she had just been bruised by her first contact with reality.
She still shrank from the memory of first facts, even although the nightmare railway station was the thick of the mountain away. Now that it was slipping farther behind the coils of the rails with every passing minute, she could dare to estimate the narrow margin by which she had escaped disaster.
Amid the crowd at the station there must have been a percentage of dishonest characters, ready to take advantage of the providential combination of an unconscious foreigner – who did not count – and an expensive handbag which promised a rich loot. Yet the little gnome-like porter chanced to the man on the spot.
“Things always do turn out for me,” she thought. “But – it must be appalling for some of the others.”
It was the first time she had realised the fate of those unfortunates who had no squares in their palms. If there were railway accident, she knew that she would be in the un-wrecked middle portion of the train, just as inevitably as certain other passengers were doomed to be in the telescoped coaches.
As she shuddered at the thought, she glanced idly at the woman who sat opposite to her. She was a negative type in every respect – middle-aged, with a huddle of small indefinite features, and vague colouring. Someone drew a face and then rubbed it nearly out again. Her curly hair was faded and her skin was bleached to oatmeal.
She was not sufficiently a caricature to suggest a stage spinster. Even her tweed suit and matching hat were not too dowdy, although lacking any distinctive note.
In ordinary circumstances, Iris would not have spared her second glance or thought. Today, however, she gazed at her with compassion.
“If she were in a jam, no one would help her out,” she thought.
It was discomforting to reflect that the population of the globe must include a percentage of persons without friends, money, or influence; nonentities who would never be missed, and who would sink without leaving a bubble.
To distract her thoughts, Iris tried to look at the scenery again. But the window was now blocked by passengers, who were unable to find seats, so stood in the corridor. For the first time, therefore, she made a deliberate survey of the other occupants of her compartment.
They were six in number – the proper quota – which she had increased to an illegal seven. Her side was occupied by a family party – two large parents and one small daughter of about twelve.
The father had a shaven head, a little waxed moustache, and several chins. His horn-rimmed glasses and comfortable air gave him the appearance of a prosperous citizen. His wife had an oiled straight black fringe, and bushy eyebrows which looked as though they had been corked. The child wore babyish socks, which did not match her adult expression. Her hair had apparently been set, after a permanent wave, for it was still secured with clips.
They all wore new and fashionable suits, which might have been inspired by a shorthand manual. The father wore stripe – the mother, spots – and the daughter, checks. Iris reflected idly that if they were broken up, and reassembled, in the general scramble, they might convey a message to the world in shorthand.
On the evidence, it would be a motto for the home, for they displayed a united spirit, as they shared a newspaper. The mother scanned the fashions; the little girl read the children’s page; and from the closely-printed columns Iris guessed that the head of the family studied finance.
She looked away from them to the opposite side of the carriage. Sitting beside the tweed spinster was a fair pretty girl, who appeared to have modelled herself from the photograph of any blonde film actress. There were the same sleek waves of hair, the large blue eyes – with supplemented lashes, and the butterfly brows. Her cheeks were tinted and her lips painted to geranium bows.
In spite of the delicacy of her features, her beauty was lifeless and standardised. She wore a tight white suit, with high black satin blouse, while her cap, gauntlet-gloves and bag were also black. She sat erect and motionless, holding a rigid pose, as though she were being photographed for a “still.”
Although her figure was reduced almost to starvation-point, she encroached on the tweed spinster’s corner, in order to leave a respectful gap between herself and the personage had opposed Iris’ entrance.
There was no doubt that this majestic lady belonged to the ruling classes. Her bagged eyes were fierce with pride, and her nose was an arrogant beak. Dressed and semi-veiled in heavy black, her enormous bulk occupied nearly half the seat.
To Iris’ astonishment, she was regarding her with a fixed stare of hostility. It made her feel both guilty and self-conscious.
“I know I crashed the carriage,” she thought. “But she’s got plenty of room. Wish I could explain, for my own satisfaction.”
Leaning forward, she spoke impulsively to the personage.
“Do you speak English?”
Apparently the question was an insult, for the lady closed heavy lids with studied insolence, as though she could not endure a plebeian spectacle.
Iris bit her lip as she glanced at the other passengers. The family party kept their eyes fixed on their paper – the tweed spinster smoothed her skirt, the blonde beauty stared into space. Somehow, Iris received an impression that this well-bred unconsciousness was a tribute of respect to the personage.
“Is she the local equivalent to the sacred black bull?” she wondered angrily. “Can’t any one speak until she does?…Well, to me, she’s nothing but a fat woman with horrible kid gloves.”
She tried to hold on to her critical attitude, but in vain. An overpowering atmosphere of authority seemed to filtrate from the towering black figure.
Now that her excitement was wearing off, she began to feel the after-effects of her slight sunstroke. Her head ached and back of her neck felt as stiff as though it had been reinforced by an iron rod. The symptoms warned her to be careful. With the threat of illness still hanging over her, she knew she should store up every scrap of nervous force, and not waste her reserves in fanciful dislikes.
Her resolution did not save her from increasing discomfort. The carriage seemed not only stuffy, but oppressive with black widow’s personality. Iris felt positive that she was a clotted mass of prejudices – an obstruction in the healthy life-stream of the community. Her type was always a clog on progress.
As her face grew damp, she looked toward the closed windows of the compartment. The corridor-end, where she sat, was too crowded to admit any of the outer air, so she struggled to her feet and caught the other strap.