He was mentally examining the possibilities of a makeshift
racket court against a corner of the stable and barn.
“Eh, what in the kitchen, dear?”
“That about High Jinks and Low Jinks.”
“Mabel, I swear we could fix up a topping sort
of squash rackets in that corner. Those cobbles
are worn absolutely smooth—”
“I wish you’d listen to me, Mark.”
He caught his arm around her and gave her a playful
squeeze. “Sorry, old girl, what was it?
About High Jinks and Low Jinks? Ha! Dashed
funny that, don’t you think?”
“No, I don’t. I don’t think
it’s a bit funny.”
Her tone was such that, relaxing his arm, he turned
and gazed at her. “Don’t you?
Don’t you really?”
“No, I don’t. Far from funny.”
Some instinct told him he ought not to laugh, but
he could not help it. The idea appealed to him
as distinctly and clearly comic. “Well,
but it is funny. Don’t you see?
High Jinks alone is such a funny expression—sort
of—well, you know what I mean. Apart
altogether from Low Jinks,” and he laughed again.
Mabel compressed her lips. “I simply don’t.
Rebecca is not a bit like High Jinks.”
He burst out laughing. “No, I’m dashed
if she is. That’s just it!”
“I really do not see it.”
“Oh, go on, Mabel! Of course you do.
You make it funnier. High Jinks and Low Jinks!
I shall call them that.”
“Mark.” She spoke the word severely
and paused severely. “Mark. I do most
earnestly hope you’ll do nothing of the kind.”
He stared, puzzled. He had tried to explain the
absurd thing, and she simply could not see it.
“I simply don’t.”
And again that vague and transient discomfort shot
through him.
Sabre awoke in the course of that night and lay awake.
The absurd incident came immediately into his mind
and remained in his mind. High Jinks and Low
Jinks was comic. No getting over it.
Incontestably comic. Stupid, of course, but just
the kind of stupid thing that tickled him irresistibly.
And she couldn’t see it. Absolutely could
not see it. But if she were never going to see
any of these stupid little things that appealed to
him—? And then he wrinkled his brows.
“You remember how he used to wrinkle up his
old nut,” as the garrulous Hapgood had said.
A night-light, her wish, dimly illumined the room.
He raised himself and looked at her fondly, sleeping
beside him. He thought, “Dash it, the thing’s
been just the same from her point of view. That
den business. She likes den, and I can’t
stick den. Just the same for her as for me that
High Jinks and Low Jinks tickles me and doesn’t
tickle her.”
He very gently moved with his finger a tress of her
hair that had fallen upon her face.... Mabel!...
His wife!... How gently beneath her filmy bedgown
her bosom rose and fell!... How utterly calm her
face was. How at peace, how secure, she lay there.
He thought, “Three weeks ago she was sleeping
in the terrific privacy of her own room, and here she
is come to me in mine. Cut off from everything
and everybody and come here to me.”
