“No?” queried young Jolyon; “I should have thought you’d be glad to get a long job like that off your hands; but I suppose you feel it much as I do when I part with a picture – a sort of child?”
He looked kindly at Bosinney.
“Yes,” said the latter more cordially, “it goes out from you and there’s an end of it. I didn’t know you painted.”
“Only water-colours; I can’t say I believe in my work.”
“Don’t believe in it? There – how can you do it? Work’s no use unless you believe in it!”
“Good,” said young Jolyon; “it’s exactly what I’ve always said. By-the-bye, have you noticed that whenever one says ‘Good,’ one always adds ‘it’s exactly what I’ve always said’! But if you ask me how I do it, I answer, because I’m a Forsyte.”
“A Forsyte! I never thought of you as one!”
“A Forsyte,” replied young Jolyon, “is not an uncommon animal. There are hundreds among the members of this Club. Hundreds out there in the streets; you meet them wherever you go!”
“And how do you tell them, may I ask?” said Bosinney.
“By their sense of property. A Forsyte takes a practical – one might say a commonsense – view of things, and a practical view of things is based fundamentally on a sense of property. A Forsyte, you will notice, never gives himself away.”
“Joking?”
Young Jolyon’s eye twinkled.
“Not much. As a Forsyte myself, I have no business to talk. But I’m a kind of thoroughbred mongrel; now, there’s no mistaking you: you’re as different from me as I am from my Uncle James, who is the perfect specimen of a Forsyte. His sense of property is extreme, while you have practically none. Without me in between, you would seem like a different species. I’m the missing link. We are, of course, all of us the slaves of property, and I admit that it’s a question of degree, but what I call a ‘Forsyte’ is a man who is decidedly more than less a slave of property. He knows a good thing, he knows a safe thing, and his grip on property – it doesn’t matter whether it be wives, houses, money, or reputation – is his hall-mark.”
“Ah!” murmured Bosinney. “You should patent the word.”
“I should like,” said young Jolyon, “to lecture on it:
“Properties and quality of a Forsyte: This little animal, disturbed by the ridicule of his own sort, is unaffected in his motions by the laughter of strange creatures (you or I). Hereditarily disposed to myopia, he recognises only the persons of his own species, amongst which he passes an existence of competitive tranquillity.”
“You talk of them,” said Bosinney, “as if they were half England.”
“They are,” repeated young Jolyon, “half England, and the better half, too, the safe half, the three per cent. half, the half that counts. It’s their wealth and security that makes everything possible; makes your art possible, makes literature, science, even religion, possible. Without Forsytes, who believe in none of these things, and habitats but turn them all to use, where should we be? My dear sir, the Forsytes are the middlemen, the commercials, the pillars of society, the cornerstones of convention; everything that is admirable!”
“I don’t know whether I catch your drift,” said Bosinney, “but I fancy there are plenty of Forsytes, as you call them, in my profession.”
“Certainly,” replied young Jolyon. “The great majority of architects, painters, or writers have no principles, like any other Forsytes. Art, literature, religion, survive by virtue of the few cranks who really believe in such things, and the many Forsytes who make a commercial use of them. At a low estimate, three-fourths of our Royal Academicians are Forsytes, seven-eighths of our novelists, a large proportion of the press. Of science I can’t speak; they are magnificently represented in religion; in the House of Commons perhaps more numerous than anywhere; the aristocracy speaks for itself. But I’m not laughing. It is dangerous to go against the majority and what a majority!” He fixed his eyes on Bosinney: “It’s dangerous to let anything carry you away – a house, a picture, a – woman!”
They looked at each other. – And, as though he had done that which no Forsyte did – given himself away, young Jolyon drew into his shell. Bosinney broke the silence.
“Why do you take your own people as the type?” said he.
“My people,” replied young Jolyon, “are not very extreme, and they have their own private peculiarities, like every other family, but they possess in a remarkable degree those two qualities which are the real tests of a Forsyte – the power of never being able to give yourself up to anything soul and body, and the ‘sense of property’.”
Bosinney smiled: “How about the big one, for instance?”
“Do you mean Swithin?” asked young Jolyon. “Ah! in Swithin there’s something primeval still. The town and middle-class life haven’t digested him yet. All the old centuries of farm work and brute force have settled in him, and there they’ve stuck, for all he’s so distinguished.”
Bosinney seemed to ponder. “Well, you’ve hit your cousin Soames off to the life,” he said suddenly. “He’ll never blow his brains out.”
Young Jolyon shot at him a penetrating glance.
“No,” he said; “he won’t. That’s why he’s to be reckoned with. Look out for their grip! It’s easy to laugh, but don’t mistake me. It doesn’t do to despise a Forsyte; it doesn’t do to disregard them!”
“Yet you’ve done it yourself!”
Young Jolyon acknowledged the hit by losing his smile.
“You forget,” he said with a queer pride, “I can hold on, too – I’m a Forsyte myself. We’re all in the path of great forces. The man who leaves the shelter of the wall – well – you know what I mean. I don’t,” he ended very low, as though uttering a threat, “recommend every man to-go-my-way. It depends.”
The colour rushed into Bosinney’s face, but soon receded, leaving it sallow-brown as before. He gave a short laugh, that left his lips fixed in a queer, fierce smile; his eyes mocked young Jolyon.
“Thanks,” he said. “It’s deuced kind of you. But you’re not the only chaps that can hold on.” He rose.
Young Jolyon looked after him as he walked away, and, resting his head on his hand, sighed.
In the drowsy, almost empty room the only sounds were the rustle of newspapers, the scraping of matches being struck. He stayed a long time without moving, living over again those days when he, too, had sat long hours watching the clock, waiting for the minutes to pass – long hours full of the torments of uncertainty, and of a fierce, sweet aching; and the slow, delicious agony of that season came back to him with its old poignancy. The sight of Bosinney, with his haggard face, and his restless eyes always wandering to the clock, had roused in him a pity, with which was mingled strange, irresistible envy.
He knew the signs so well. Whither was he going – to what sort of fate? What kind of woman was it who was drawing him to her by that magnetic force which no consideration of honour, no principle, no interest could withstand; from which the only escape was flight.
Flight! But why should Bosinney fly? A man fled when he was in danger of destroying hearth and home, when there were children, when he felt himself trampling down ideals, breaking something. But here, so he had heard, it was all broken to his hand.
He himself had not fled, nor would he fly if it were all to come over again. Yet he had gone further than Bosinney, had broken up his own unhappy home, not someone else’s: And the old saying came back to him: ‘A man’s fate lies in his own heart.’
In his own heart! The proof of the pudding was in the eating – Bosinney had still to eat his pudding.
His thoughts passed to the woman, the woman whom he did not know, but the outline of whose story he had heard.
An unhappy marriage! No ill-treatment – only that indefinable malaise, that terrible blight which killed all sweetness under Heaven; and so from day to day, from night to night, from week to week, from year to year, till death should end it.
But young Jolyon, the bitterness of whose own feelings time had assuaged, saw Soames’ side of the question too. Whence should a man like his cousin, saturated with all the prejudices and beliefs of his class, draw the insight or inspiration necessary to break up this life? It was a question of imagination, of projecting himself into the future beyond the unpleasant gossip, sneers, and tattle that followed on such separations, beyond the passing pangs that the lack of the sight of her would cause, beyond the grave disapproval of the worthy. But few men, and especially few men of Soames’ class, had imagination enough for that. A deal of mortals in this world, and not enough imagination to go round! And sweet Heaven, what a difference between theory and practice; many a man, perhaps even Soames, held chivalrous views on such matters, who when the shoe pinched[39] found a distinguishing factor that made of himself an exception.
Then, too, he distrusted his judgment. He had been through the experience himself, had tasted too the dregs the bitterness of an unhappy marriage, and how could he take the wide and dispassionate view of those who had never been within sound of the battle? His evidence was too first-hand – like the evidence on military matters of a soldier who has been through much active service, against that of civilians who have not suffered the disadvantage of seeing things too close. Most people would consider such a marriage as that of Soames and Irene quite fairly successful; he had money, she had beauty; it was a case for compromise. There was no reason why they should not jog along, even if they hated each other. It would not matter if they went their own ways a little so long as the decencies were observed – the sanctity of the marriage tie, of the common home, respected. Half the marriages of the upper classes were conducted on these lines: Do not offend the susceptibilities of Society; do not offend the susceptibilities of the Church. To avoid offending these is worth the sacrifice of any private feelings. The advantages of the stable home are visible, tangible, so many pieces of property; there is no risk in the statu quo. To break up a home is at the best a dangerous experiment, and selfish into the bargain.
This was the case for the defence, and young Jolyon sighed.
‘The core of it all,’ he thought, ‘is property, but there are many people who would not like it put that way. To them it is “the sanctity of the marriage tie”; but the sanctity of the marriage tie is dependent on the sanctity of the family, and the sanctity of the family is dependent on the sanctity of property. And yet I imagine all these people are followers of One who never owned anything. It is curious!
And again young Jolyon sighed.
‘Am I going on my way home to ask any poor devils I meet to share my dinner, which will then be too little for myself, or, at all events, for my wife, who is necessary to my health and happiness? It may be that after all Soames does well to exercise his rights and support by his practice the sacred principle of property which benefits us all, with the exception of those who suffer by the process.’
And so he left his chair, threaded his way through the maze of seats, took his hat, and languidly up the hot streets crowded with carriages, reeking with dusty odours, wended his way home.
Before reaching Wistaria Avenue he removed old Jolyon’s letter from his pocket, and tearing it carefully into tiny pieces, scattered them in the dust of the road.
He let himself in with his key, and called his wife’s name. But she had gone out, taking Jolly and Holly, and the house was empty; alone in the garden the dog Balthasar lay in the shade snapping at flies.
Young Jolyon took his seat there, too, under the pear-tree that bore no fruit.
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
He looked kindly at Bosinney.
“Yes,” said the latter more cordially, “it goes out from you and there’s an end of it. I didn’t know you painted.”
“Only water-colours; I can’t say I believe in my work.”
“Don’t believe in it? There – how can you do it? Work’s no use unless you believe in it!”
“Good,” said young Jolyon; “it’s exactly what I’ve always said. By-the-bye, have you noticed that whenever one says ‘Good,’ one always adds ‘it’s exactly what I’ve always said’! But if you ask me how I do it, I answer, because I’m a Forsyte.”
“A Forsyte! I never thought of you as one!”
“A Forsyte,” replied young Jolyon, “is not an uncommon animal. There are hundreds among the members of this Club. Hundreds out there in the streets; you meet them wherever you go!”
“And how do you tell them, may I ask?” said Bosinney.
“By their sense of property. A Forsyte takes a practical – one might say a commonsense – view of things, and a practical view of things is based fundamentally on a sense of property. A Forsyte, you will notice, never gives himself away.”
“Joking?”
Young Jolyon’s eye twinkled.
“Not much. As a Forsyte myself, I have no business to talk. But I’m a kind of thoroughbred mongrel; now, there’s no mistaking you: you’re as different from me as I am from my Uncle James, who is the perfect specimen of a Forsyte. His sense of property is extreme, while you have practically none. Without me in between, you would seem like a different species. I’m the missing link. We are, of course, all of us the slaves of property, and I admit that it’s a question of degree, but what I call a ‘Forsyte’ is a man who is decidedly more than less a slave of property. He knows a good thing, he knows a safe thing, and his grip on property – it doesn’t matter whether it be wives, houses, money, or reputation – is his hall-mark.”
“Ah!” murmured Bosinney. “You should patent the word.”
“I should like,” said young Jolyon, “to lecture on it:
“Properties and quality of a Forsyte: This little animal, disturbed by the ridicule of his own sort, is unaffected in his motions by the laughter of strange creatures (you or I). Hereditarily disposed to myopia, he recognises only the persons of his own species, amongst which he passes an existence of competitive tranquillity.”
“You talk of them,” said Bosinney, “as if they were half England.”
“They are,” repeated young Jolyon, “half England, and the better half, too, the safe half, the three per cent. half, the half that counts. It’s their wealth and security that makes everything possible; makes your art possible, makes literature, science, even religion, possible. Without Forsytes, who believe in none of these things, and habitats but turn them all to use, where should we be? My dear sir, the Forsytes are the middlemen, the commercials, the pillars of society, the cornerstones of convention; everything that is admirable!”
“I don’t know whether I catch your drift,” said Bosinney, “but I fancy there are plenty of Forsytes, as you call them, in my profession.”
“Certainly,” replied young Jolyon. “The great majority of architects, painters, or writers have no principles, like any other Forsytes. Art, literature, religion, survive by virtue of the few cranks who really believe in such things, and the many Forsytes who make a commercial use of them. At a low estimate, three-fourths of our Royal Academicians are Forsytes, seven-eighths of our novelists, a large proportion of the press. Of science I can’t speak; they are magnificently represented in religion; in the House of Commons perhaps more numerous than anywhere; the aristocracy speaks for itself. But I’m not laughing. It is dangerous to go against the majority and what a majority!” He fixed his eyes on Bosinney: “It’s dangerous to let anything carry you away – a house, a picture, a – woman!”
They looked at each other. – And, as though he had done that which no Forsyte did – given himself away, young Jolyon drew into his shell. Bosinney broke the silence.
“Why do you take your own people as the type?” said he.
“My people,” replied young Jolyon, “are not very extreme, and they have their own private peculiarities, like every other family, but they possess in a remarkable degree those two qualities which are the real tests of a Forsyte – the power of never being able to give yourself up to anything soul and body, and the ‘sense of property’.”
Bosinney smiled: “How about the big one, for instance?”
“Do you mean Swithin?” asked young Jolyon. “Ah! in Swithin there’s something primeval still. The town and middle-class life haven’t digested him yet. All the old centuries of farm work and brute force have settled in him, and there they’ve stuck, for all he’s so distinguished.”
Bosinney seemed to ponder. “Well, you’ve hit your cousin Soames off to the life,” he said suddenly. “He’ll never blow his brains out.”
Young Jolyon shot at him a penetrating glance.
“No,” he said; “he won’t. That’s why he’s to be reckoned with. Look out for their grip! It’s easy to laugh, but don’t mistake me. It doesn’t do to despise a Forsyte; it doesn’t do to disregard them!”
“Yet you’ve done it yourself!”
Young Jolyon acknowledged the hit by losing his smile.
“You forget,” he said with a queer pride, “I can hold on, too – I’m a Forsyte myself. We’re all in the path of great forces. The man who leaves the shelter of the wall – well – you know what I mean. I don’t,” he ended very low, as though uttering a threat, “recommend every man to-go-my-way. It depends.”
The colour rushed into Bosinney’s face, but soon receded, leaving it sallow-brown as before. He gave a short laugh, that left his lips fixed in a queer, fierce smile; his eyes mocked young Jolyon.
“Thanks,” he said. “It’s deuced kind of you. But you’re not the only chaps that can hold on.” He rose.
Young Jolyon looked after him as he walked away, and, resting his head on his hand, sighed.
In the drowsy, almost empty room the only sounds were the rustle of newspapers, the scraping of matches being struck. He stayed a long time without moving, living over again those days when he, too, had sat long hours watching the clock, waiting for the minutes to pass – long hours full of the torments of uncertainty, and of a fierce, sweet aching; and the slow, delicious agony of that season came back to him with its old poignancy. The sight of Bosinney, with his haggard face, and his restless eyes always wandering to the clock, had roused in him a pity, with which was mingled strange, irresistible envy.
He knew the signs so well. Whither was he going – to what sort of fate? What kind of woman was it who was drawing him to her by that magnetic force which no consideration of honour, no principle, no interest could withstand; from which the only escape was flight.
Flight! But why should Bosinney fly? A man fled when he was in danger of destroying hearth and home, when there were children, when he felt himself trampling down ideals, breaking something. But here, so he had heard, it was all broken to his hand.
He himself had not fled, nor would he fly if it were all to come over again. Yet he had gone further than Bosinney, had broken up his own unhappy home, not someone else’s: And the old saying came back to him: ‘A man’s fate lies in his own heart.’
In his own heart! The proof of the pudding was in the eating – Bosinney had still to eat his pudding.
His thoughts passed to the woman, the woman whom he did not know, but the outline of whose story he had heard.
An unhappy marriage! No ill-treatment – only that indefinable malaise, that terrible blight which killed all sweetness under Heaven; and so from day to day, from night to night, from week to week, from year to year, till death should end it.
But young Jolyon, the bitterness of whose own feelings time had assuaged, saw Soames’ side of the question too. Whence should a man like his cousin, saturated with all the prejudices and beliefs of his class, draw the insight or inspiration necessary to break up this life? It was a question of imagination, of projecting himself into the future beyond the unpleasant gossip, sneers, and tattle that followed on such separations, beyond the passing pangs that the lack of the sight of her would cause, beyond the grave disapproval of the worthy. But few men, and especially few men of Soames’ class, had imagination enough for that. A deal of mortals in this world, and not enough imagination to go round! And sweet Heaven, what a difference between theory and practice; many a man, perhaps even Soames, held chivalrous views on such matters, who when the shoe pinched[39] found a distinguishing factor that made of himself an exception.
Then, too, he distrusted his judgment. He had been through the experience himself, had tasted too the dregs the bitterness of an unhappy marriage, and how could he take the wide and dispassionate view of those who had never been within sound of the battle? His evidence was too first-hand – like the evidence on military matters of a soldier who has been through much active service, against that of civilians who have not suffered the disadvantage of seeing things too close. Most people would consider such a marriage as that of Soames and Irene quite fairly successful; he had money, she had beauty; it was a case for compromise. There was no reason why they should not jog along, even if they hated each other. It would not matter if they went their own ways a little so long as the decencies were observed – the sanctity of the marriage tie, of the common home, respected. Half the marriages of the upper classes were conducted on these lines: Do not offend the susceptibilities of Society; do not offend the susceptibilities of the Church. To avoid offending these is worth the sacrifice of any private feelings. The advantages of the stable home are visible, tangible, so many pieces of property; there is no risk in the statu quo. To break up a home is at the best a dangerous experiment, and selfish into the bargain.
This was the case for the defence, and young Jolyon sighed.
‘The core of it all,’ he thought, ‘is property, but there are many people who would not like it put that way. To them it is “the sanctity of the marriage tie”; but the sanctity of the marriage tie is dependent on the sanctity of the family, and the sanctity of the family is dependent on the sanctity of property. And yet I imagine all these people are followers of One who never owned anything. It is curious!
And again young Jolyon sighed.
‘Am I going on my way home to ask any poor devils I meet to share my dinner, which will then be too little for myself, or, at all events, for my wife, who is necessary to my health and happiness? It may be that after all Soames does well to exercise his rights and support by his practice the sacred principle of property which benefits us all, with the exception of those who suffer by the process.’
And so he left his chair, threaded his way through the maze of seats, took his hat, and languidly up the hot streets crowded with carriages, reeking with dusty odours, wended his way home.
Before reaching Wistaria Avenue he removed old Jolyon’s letter from his pocket, and tearing it carefully into tiny pieces, scattered them in the dust of the road.
He let himself in with his key, and called his wife’s name. But she had gone out, taking Jolly and Holly, and the house was empty; alone in the garden the dog Balthasar lay in the shade snapping at flies.
Young Jolyon took his seat there, too, under the pear-tree that bore no fruit.
Chapter XI
Bosinney on Parole
The day after the evening at Richmond Soames returned from Henley by a morning train. Not constitutionally interested in amphibious sports, his visit had been one of business rather than pleasure, a client of some importance having asked him down.
He went straight to the City, but finding things slack, he left at three o’clock, glad of this chance to get home quietly. Irene did not expect him. Not that he had any desire to spy on her actions, but there was no harm in thus unexpectedly surveying the scene.
After changing to Park clothes he went into the drawing-room. She was sitting idly in the corner of the sofa, her favourite seat; and there were circles under her eyes, as though she had not slept.
He asked: “How is it you’re in? Are you expecting somebody?”
“Yes that is, not particularly.”
“Who?”
“Mr. Bosinney said he might come.”
“Bosinney. He ought to be at work.”
To this she made no answer.
“Well,” said Soames, “I want you to come out to the Stores with me, and after that we’ll go to the Park.”
“I don’t want to go out; I have a headache.”
Soames replied: “If ever I want you to do anything, you’ve always got a headache. It’ll do you good to come and sit under the trees.”
She did not answer.
Soames was silent for some minutes; at last he said: “I don’t know what your idea of a wife’s duty is. I never have known!”
He had not expected her to reply, but she did.
“I have tried to do what you want; it’s not my fault that I haven’t been able to put my heart into it.”
“Whose fault is it, then?” He watched her askance.
“Before we were married you promised to let me go if our marriage was not a success. Is it a success?”
Soames frowned.
“Success,” he stammered – “it would be a success if you behaved yourself properly!”
“I have tried,” said Irene. “Will you let me go?”
Soames turned away. Secretly alarmed, he took refuge in bluster.
“Let you go? You don’t know what you’re talking about. Let you go? How can I let you go? We’re married, aren’t we? Then, what are you talking about? For God’s sake, don’t let’s have any of this sort of nonsense! Get your hat on, and come and sit in the Park.”
“Then, you won’t let me go?”
He felt her eyes resting on him with a strange, touching look.
“Let you go!” he said; “and what on earth would you do with yourself if I did? You’ve got no money!”
“I could manage somehow.”
He took a swift turn up and down the room; then came and stood before her.
“Understand,” he said, “once and for all, I won’t have you say this sort of thing. Go and get your hat on!”
She did not move.
“I suppose,” said Soames, “you don’t want to miss Bosinney if he comes!”
Irene got up slowly and left the room. She came down with her hat on.
They went out.
In the Park, the motley hour of mid-afternoon, when foreigners and other pathetic folk drive, thinking themselves to be in fashion, had passed; the right, the proper, hour had come, was nearly gone, before Soames and Irene seated themselves under the Achilles statue.
It was some time since he had enjoyed her company in the Park. That was one of the past delights of the first two seasons of his married life, when to feel himself the possessor of this gracious creature before all London had been his greatest, though secret, pride. How many afternoons had he not sat beside her, extremely neat, with light grey gloves and faint, supercilious smile, nodding to acquaintances, and now and again removing his hat.
His light grey gloves were still on his hands, and on his lips his smile sardonic, but where the feeling in his heart?
The seats were emptying fast, but still he kept her there, silent and pale, as though to work out a secret punishment. Once or twice he made some comment, and she bent her head, or answered “Yes” with a tired smile.
Along the rails a man was walking so fast that people stared after him when he passed.
“Look at that ass!” said Soames; “he must be mad to walk like that in this heat!”
He turned; Irene had made a rapid movement.
“Hallo!” he said: “it’s our friend the Buccaneer!”
And he sat still, with his sneering smile, conscious that Irene was sitting still, and smiling too.
“Will she bow to him?” he thought.
But she made no sign.
Bosinney reached the end of the rails, and came walking back amongst the chairs, quartering his ground like a pointer. When he saw them he stopped dead, and raised his hat.
The smile never left Soames’ face; he also took off his hat.
Bosinney came up, looking exhausted, like a man after hard physical exercise; the sweat stood in drops on his brow, and Soames’ smile seemed to say: “You’ve had a trying time, my friend…. What are you doing in the Park?” he asked. “We thought you despised such frivolity!”
Bosinney did not seem to hear; he made his answer to Irene: “I’ve been round to your place; I hoped I should find you in.”
Somebody tapped Soames on the back, and spoke to him; and in the exchange of those platitudes over his shoulder, he missed her answer, and took a resolution.
“We’re just going in,” he said to Bosinney; “you’d better come back to dinner with us.” Into that invitation he put a strange bravado, a stranger pathos: “You can’t deceive me,” his look and voice seemed saying, “but see – I trust you – I’m not afraid of you!”
They started back to Montpellier Square together, Irene between them. In the crowded streets Soames went on in front. He did not listen to their conversation; the strange resolution of trustfulness he had taken seemed to animate even his secret conduct. Like a gambler, he said to himself: ‘It’s a card I dare not throw away – I must play it for what it’s worth. I have not too many chances.’
He dressed slowly, heard her leave her room and go downstairs, and, for full five minutes after, dawdled about in his dressing-room. Then he went down, purposely shutting the door loudly to show that he was coming. He found them standing by the hearth, perhaps talking, perhaps not; he could not say.
He played his part out in the farce, the long evening through – his manner to his guest more friendly than it had ever been before; and when at last Bosinney went, he said: “You must come again soon; Irene likes to have you to talk about the house!” Again his voice had the strange bravado and the stranger pathos; but his hand was cold as ice.
Loyal to his resolution, he turned away from their parting, turned away from his wife as she stood under the hanging lamp to say good-night – away from the sight of her golden head shining so under the light, of her smiling mournful lips; away from the sight of Bosinney’s eyes looking at her, so like a dog’s looking at its master.
And he went to bed with the certainty that Bosinney was in love with his wife.
The summer night was hot, so hot and still that through every opened window came in but hotter air. For long hours he lay listening to her breathing.
She could sleep, but he must lie awake. And, lying awake, he hardened himself to play the part of the serene and trusting husband.
In the small hours he slipped out of bed, and passing into his dressing-room, leaned by the open window.
He could hardly breathe.
A night four years ago came back to him – the night but one before his marriage; as hot and stifling as this.
He remembered how he had lain in a long cane chair in the window of his sitting-room off Victoria Street. Down below in a side street a man had banged at a door, a woman had cried out; he remembered, as though it were now, the sound of the scuffle, the slam of the door, the dead silence that followed. And then the early water-cart, cleansing the reek of the streets, had approached through the strange-seeming, useless lamp-light; he seemed to hear again its rumble, nearer and nearer, till it passed and slowly died away.
He leaned far out of the dressing-room window over the little court below, and saw the first light spread. The outlines of dark walls and roofs were blurred for a moment, then came out sharper than before.
He remembered how that other night he had watched the lamps paling all the length of Victoria Street; how he had hurried on his clothes and gone down into the street, down past houses and squares, to the street where she was staying, and there had stood and looked at the front of the little house, as still and grey as the face of a dead man.
And suddenly it shot through his mind; like a sick man’s fancy: What’s he doing? – that fellow who haunts me, who was here this evening, who’s in love with my wife – prowling out there, perhaps, looking for her as I know he was looking for her this afternoon; watching my house now, for all I can tell!
He stole across the landing to the front of the house, stealthily drew aside a blind, and raised a window.
The grey light clung about the trees of the square, as though Night, like a great downy moth, had brushed them with her wings. The lamps were still alight, all pale, but not a soul stirred – no living thing in sight.
Yet suddenly, very faint, far off in the deathly stillness, he heard a cry writhing, like the voice of some wandering soul barred out of heaven, and crying for its happiness. There it was again – again! Soames shut the window, shuddering.
Then he thought: ‘Ah! it’s only the peacocks, across the water.’
He went straight to the City, but finding things slack, he left at three o’clock, glad of this chance to get home quietly. Irene did not expect him. Not that he had any desire to spy on her actions, but there was no harm in thus unexpectedly surveying the scene.
After changing to Park clothes he went into the drawing-room. She was sitting idly in the corner of the sofa, her favourite seat; and there were circles under her eyes, as though she had not slept.
He asked: “How is it you’re in? Are you expecting somebody?”
“Yes that is, not particularly.”
“Who?”
“Mr. Bosinney said he might come.”
“Bosinney. He ought to be at work.”
To this she made no answer.
“Well,” said Soames, “I want you to come out to the Stores with me, and after that we’ll go to the Park.”
“I don’t want to go out; I have a headache.”
Soames replied: “If ever I want you to do anything, you’ve always got a headache. It’ll do you good to come and sit under the trees.”
She did not answer.
Soames was silent for some minutes; at last he said: “I don’t know what your idea of a wife’s duty is. I never have known!”
He had not expected her to reply, but she did.
“I have tried to do what you want; it’s not my fault that I haven’t been able to put my heart into it.”
“Whose fault is it, then?” He watched her askance.
“Before we were married you promised to let me go if our marriage was not a success. Is it a success?”
Soames frowned.
“Success,” he stammered – “it would be a success if you behaved yourself properly!”
“I have tried,” said Irene. “Will you let me go?”
Soames turned away. Secretly alarmed, he took refuge in bluster.
“Let you go? You don’t know what you’re talking about. Let you go? How can I let you go? We’re married, aren’t we? Then, what are you talking about? For God’s sake, don’t let’s have any of this sort of nonsense! Get your hat on, and come and sit in the Park.”
“Then, you won’t let me go?”
He felt her eyes resting on him with a strange, touching look.
“Let you go!” he said; “and what on earth would you do with yourself if I did? You’ve got no money!”
“I could manage somehow.”
He took a swift turn up and down the room; then came and stood before her.
“Understand,” he said, “once and for all, I won’t have you say this sort of thing. Go and get your hat on!”
She did not move.
“I suppose,” said Soames, “you don’t want to miss Bosinney if he comes!”
Irene got up slowly and left the room. She came down with her hat on.
They went out.
In the Park, the motley hour of mid-afternoon, when foreigners and other pathetic folk drive, thinking themselves to be in fashion, had passed; the right, the proper, hour had come, was nearly gone, before Soames and Irene seated themselves under the Achilles statue.
It was some time since he had enjoyed her company in the Park. That was one of the past delights of the first two seasons of his married life, when to feel himself the possessor of this gracious creature before all London had been his greatest, though secret, pride. How many afternoons had he not sat beside her, extremely neat, with light grey gloves and faint, supercilious smile, nodding to acquaintances, and now and again removing his hat.
His light grey gloves were still on his hands, and on his lips his smile sardonic, but where the feeling in his heart?
The seats were emptying fast, but still he kept her there, silent and pale, as though to work out a secret punishment. Once or twice he made some comment, and she bent her head, or answered “Yes” with a tired smile.
Along the rails a man was walking so fast that people stared after him when he passed.
“Look at that ass!” said Soames; “he must be mad to walk like that in this heat!”
He turned; Irene had made a rapid movement.
“Hallo!” he said: “it’s our friend the Buccaneer!”
And he sat still, with his sneering smile, conscious that Irene was sitting still, and smiling too.
“Will she bow to him?” he thought.
But she made no sign.
Bosinney reached the end of the rails, and came walking back amongst the chairs, quartering his ground like a pointer. When he saw them he stopped dead, and raised his hat.
The smile never left Soames’ face; he also took off his hat.
Bosinney came up, looking exhausted, like a man after hard physical exercise; the sweat stood in drops on his brow, and Soames’ smile seemed to say: “You’ve had a trying time, my friend…. What are you doing in the Park?” he asked. “We thought you despised such frivolity!”
Bosinney did not seem to hear; he made his answer to Irene: “I’ve been round to your place; I hoped I should find you in.”
Somebody tapped Soames on the back, and spoke to him; and in the exchange of those platitudes over his shoulder, he missed her answer, and took a resolution.
“We’re just going in,” he said to Bosinney; “you’d better come back to dinner with us.” Into that invitation he put a strange bravado, a stranger pathos: “You can’t deceive me,” his look and voice seemed saying, “but see – I trust you – I’m not afraid of you!”
They started back to Montpellier Square together, Irene between them. In the crowded streets Soames went on in front. He did not listen to their conversation; the strange resolution of trustfulness he had taken seemed to animate even his secret conduct. Like a gambler, he said to himself: ‘It’s a card I dare not throw away – I must play it for what it’s worth. I have not too many chances.’
He dressed slowly, heard her leave her room and go downstairs, and, for full five minutes after, dawdled about in his dressing-room. Then he went down, purposely shutting the door loudly to show that he was coming. He found them standing by the hearth, perhaps talking, perhaps not; he could not say.
He played his part out in the farce, the long evening through – his manner to his guest more friendly than it had ever been before; and when at last Bosinney went, he said: “You must come again soon; Irene likes to have you to talk about the house!” Again his voice had the strange bravado and the stranger pathos; but his hand was cold as ice.
Loyal to his resolution, he turned away from their parting, turned away from his wife as she stood under the hanging lamp to say good-night – away from the sight of her golden head shining so under the light, of her smiling mournful lips; away from the sight of Bosinney’s eyes looking at her, so like a dog’s looking at its master.
And he went to bed with the certainty that Bosinney was in love with his wife.
The summer night was hot, so hot and still that through every opened window came in but hotter air. For long hours he lay listening to her breathing.
She could sleep, but he must lie awake. And, lying awake, he hardened himself to play the part of the serene and trusting husband.
In the small hours he slipped out of bed, and passing into his dressing-room, leaned by the open window.
He could hardly breathe.
A night four years ago came back to him – the night but one before his marriage; as hot and stifling as this.
He remembered how he had lain in a long cane chair in the window of his sitting-room off Victoria Street. Down below in a side street a man had banged at a door, a woman had cried out; he remembered, as though it were now, the sound of the scuffle, the slam of the door, the dead silence that followed. And then the early water-cart, cleansing the reek of the streets, had approached through the strange-seeming, useless lamp-light; he seemed to hear again its rumble, nearer and nearer, till it passed and slowly died away.
He leaned far out of the dressing-room window over the little court below, and saw the first light spread. The outlines of dark walls and roofs were blurred for a moment, then came out sharper than before.
He remembered how that other night he had watched the lamps paling all the length of Victoria Street; how he had hurried on his clothes and gone down into the street, down past houses and squares, to the street where she was staying, and there had stood and looked at the front of the little house, as still and grey as the face of a dead man.
And suddenly it shot through his mind; like a sick man’s fancy: What’s he doing? – that fellow who haunts me, who was here this evening, who’s in love with my wife – prowling out there, perhaps, looking for her as I know he was looking for her this afternoon; watching my house now, for all I can tell!
He stole across the landing to the front of the house, stealthily drew aside a blind, and raised a window.
The grey light clung about the trees of the square, as though Night, like a great downy moth, had brushed them with her wings. The lamps were still alight, all pale, but not a soul stirred – no living thing in sight.
Yet suddenly, very faint, far off in the deathly stillness, he heard a cry writhing, like the voice of some wandering soul barred out of heaven, and crying for its happiness. There it was again – again! Soames shut the window, shuddering.
Then he thought: ‘Ah! it’s only the peacocks, across the water.’
Chapter XII
June Pays Some Calls
Jolyon stood in the narrow hall at Broadstairs, inhaling that odour of oilcloth and herrings which permeates all respectable seaside lodging-houses. On a chair – a shiny leather chair, displaying its horsehair through a hole in the top left-hand corner – stood a black despatch case. This he was filling with papers, with the Times, and a bottle of Eau-de Cologne. He had meetings that day of the ‘Globular Gold Concessions’ and the ‘New Colliery Company, Limited,’ to which he was going up, for he never missed a Board; to ‘miss a Board’ would be one more piece of evidence that he was growing old, and this his jealous Forsyte spirit could not bear.
His eyes, as he filled that black despatch case, looked as if at any moment they might blaze up with anger. So gleams the eye of a schoolboy, baited by a ring of his companions; but he controls himself, deterred by the fearful odds against him. And old Jolyon controlled himself, keeping down, with his masterful restraint now slowly wearing out, the irritation fostered in him by the conditions of his life.
He had received from his son an unpractical letter, in which by rambling generalities the boy seemed trying to get out of answering a plain question. ‘I’ve seen Bosinney,’ he said; ‘he is not a criminal. The more I see of people the more I am convinced that they are never good or bad – merely comic, or pathetic. You probably don’t agree with me!’
Old Jolyon did not; he considered it cynical to so express oneself; he had not yet reached that point of old age when even Forsytes, bereft of those illusions and principles which they have cherished carefully for practical purposes but never believed in, bereft of all corporeal enjoyment, stricken to the very heart by having nothing left to hope for – break through the barriers of reserve and say things they would never have believed themselves capable of saying.
Perhaps he did not believe in ‘goodness’ and ‘badness’ any more than his son; but as he would have said: He didn’t know – couldn’t tell; there might be something in it; and why, by an unnecessary expression of disbelief, deprive yourself of possible advantage?
Accustomed to spend his holidays among the mountains, though (like a true Forsyte) he had never attempted anything too adventurous or too foolhardy, he had been passionately fond of them. And when the wonderful view (mentioned in Baedeker[40] – ‘fatiguing but repaying’) – was disclosed to him after the effort of the climb, he had doubtless felt the existence of some great, dignified principle crowning the chaotic strivings, the petty precipices, and ironic little dark chasms of life. This was as near to religion, perhaps, as his practical spirit had ever gone.
But it was many years since he had been to the mountains. He had taken June there two seasons running, after his wife died, and had realized bitterly that his walking days were over.
To that old mountain – given confidence in a supreme order of things he had long been a stranger.
He knew himself to be old, yet he felt young; and this troubled him. It troubled and puzzled him, too, to think that he, who had always been so careful, should be father and grandfather to such as seemed born to disaster. He had nothing to say against Jo – who could say anything against the boy, an amiable chap? – but his position was deplorable, and this business of June’s nearly as bad. It seemed like a fatality, and a fatality was one of those things no man of his character could either understand or put up with.
In writing to his son he did not really hope that anything would come of it. Since the ball at Roger’s he had seen too clearly how the land lay – he could put two and two together quicker than most men – and, with the example of his own son before his eyes, knew better than any Forsyte of them all that the pale flame singes men’s wings whether they will or no.
In the days before June’s engagement, when she and Mrs. Soames were always together, he had seen enough of Irene to feel the spell she cast over men. She was not a flirt, not even a coquette – words dear to the heart of his generation, which loved to define things by a good, broad, inadequate word – but she was dangerous. He could not say why. Tell him of a quality innate in some women – a seductive power beyond their own control! He would but answer: ‘Humbug!’ She was dangerous, and there was an end of it. He wanted to close his eyes to that affair. If it was, it was; he did not want to hear any more about it – he only wanted to save June’s position and her peace of mind. He still hoped she might once more become a comfort to himself.
And so he had written. He got little enough out of the answer. As to what young Jolyon had made of the interview, there was practically only the queer sentence: ‘I gather that he’s in the stream.’ The stream! What stream? What was this new-fangled way of talking?
He sighed, and folded the last of the papers under the flap of the bag; he knew well enough what was meant.
June came out of the dining-room, and helped him on with his summer coat. From her costume, and the expression of her little resolute face, he saw at once what was coming.
“I’m going with you,” she said.
“Nonsense, my dear; I go straight into the City. I can’t have you racketting about!”
“I must see old Mrs. Smeech.”
“Oh, your precious ‘lame ducks’!” grumbled out old Jolyon. He did not believe her excuse, but ceased his opposition. There was no doing anything with that pertinacity of hers.
At Victoria he put her into the carriage which had been ordered for himself – a characteristic action, for he had no petty selfishnesses.
“Now, don’t you go tiring yourself, my darling,” he said, and took a cab on into the city.
June went first to a back-street in Paddington, where Mrs. Smeech, her ‘lame duck,’ lived – an aged person, connected with the charring interest; but after half an hour spent in hearing her habitually lamentable recital, and dragooning her into temporary comfort, she went on to Stanhope Gate. The great house was closed and dark.
She had decided to learn something at all costs. It was better to face the worst, and have it over. And this was her plan: To go first to Phil’s aunt, Mrs. Baynes, and, failing information there, to Irene herself. She had no clear notion of what she would gain by these visits.
At three o’clock she was in Lowndes Square. With a woman’s instinct when trouble is to be faced, she had put on her best frock, and went to the battle with a glance as courageous as old Jolyon’s itself. Her tremors had passed into eagerness.
Mrs. Baynes, Bosinney’s aunt (Louisa was her name), was in her kitchen when June was announced, organizing the cook, for she was an excellent housewife, and, as Baynes always said, there was ‘a lot in a good dinner.’ He did his best work after dinner. It was Baynes who built that remarkably fine row of tall crimson houses in Kensington which compete with so many others for the title of ‘the ugliest in London.’
On hearing June’s name, she went hurriedly to her bedroom, and, taking two large bracelets from a red morocco case in a locked drawer, put them on her white wrists – for she possessed in a remarkable degree that ‘sense of property,’ which, as we know, is the touchstone of Forsyteism, and the foundation of good morality.
Her figure, of medium height and broad build, with a tendency to embonpoint, was reflected by the mirror of her whitewood wardrobe, in a gown made under her own organization, of one of those half-tints, reminiscent of the distempered walls of corridors in large hotels. She raised her hands to her hair, which she wore a la Princesse de Galles, and touched it here and there, settling it more firmly on her head, and her eyes were full of an unconscious realism, as though she were looking in the face one of life’s sordid facts, and making the best of it. In youth her cheeks had been of cream and roses, but they were mottled now by middle-age, and again that hard, ugly directness came into her eyes as she dabbed a powder-puff across her forehead. Putting the puff down, she stood quite still before the glass, arranging a smile over her high, important nose, her chin, (never large, and now growing smaller with the increase of her neck), her thin-lipped, down-drooping mouth. Quickly, not to lose the effect, she grasped her skirts strongly in both hands, and went downstairs.
She had been hoping for this visit for some time past. Whispers had reached her that things were not all right between her nephew and his fiancee. Neither of them had been near her for weeks. She had asked Phil to dinner many times; his invariable answer had been ‘Too busy.’
Her instinct was alarmed, and the instinct in such matters of this excellent woman was keen. She ought to have been a Forsyte; in young Jolyon’s sense of the word, she certainly had that privilege, and merits description as such.
She had married off her three daughters in a way that people said was beyond their deserts, for they had the professional plainness only to be found, as a rule, among the female kind of the more legal callings. Her name was upon the committees of numberless charities connected with the Church-dances, theatricals, or bazaars – and she never lent her name unless sure beforehand that everything had been thoroughly organized.
She believed, as she often said, in putting things on a commercial basis; the proper function of the Church, of charity, indeed, of everything, was to strengthen the fabric of ‘Society.’ Individual action, therefore, she considered immoral. Organization was the only thing, for by organization alone could you feel sure that you were getting a return for your money. Organization – and again, organization! And there is no doubt that she was what old Jolyon called her – “a ‘dab’ at that” – he went further, he called her “a humbug.”
The enterprises to which she lent her name were organized so admirably that by the time the takings were handed over, they were indeed skim milk divested of all cream of human kindness. But as she often justly remarked, sentiment was to be deprecated. She was, in fact, a little academic.
This great and good woman, so highly thought of in ecclesiastical circles, was one of the principal priestesses in the temple of Forsyteism, keeping alive day and night a sacred flame to the God of Property, whose altar is inscribed with those inspiring words: ‘Nothing for nothing, and really remarkably little for sixpence.’
When she entered a room it was felt that something substantial had come in, which was probably the reason of her popularity as a patroness. People liked something substantial when they had paid money for it; and they would look at her – surrounded by her staff in charity ballrooms, with her high nose and her broad, square figure, attired in an uniform covered with sequins – as though she were a general.
The only thing against her was that she had not a double name. She was a power in upper middle-class society, with its hundred sets and circles, all intersecting on the common battlefield of charity functions, and on that battlefield brushing skirts so pleasantly with the skirts of Society with the capital ‘S.’ She was a power in society with the smaller ‘s,’ that larger, more significant, and more powerful body, where the commercially Christian institutions, maxims, and ‘principle,’ which Mrs. Baynes embodied, were real life-blood, circulating freely, real business currency, not merely the sterilized imitation that flowed in the veins of smaller Society with the larger ‘S.’ People who knew her felt her to be sound – a sound woman, who never gave herself away, nor anything else, if she could possibly help it.
She had been on the worst sort of terms with Bosinney’s father, who had not infrequently made her the object of an unpardonable ridicule. She alluded to him now that he was gone as her ‘poor, dear, irreverend brother.’
She greeted June with the careful effusion of which she was a mistress, a little afraid of her as far as a woman of her eminence in the commercial and Christian world could be afraid – for so slight a girl June had a great dignity, the fearlessness of her eyes gave her that. And Mrs. Baynes, too, shrewdly recognized that behind the uncompromising frankness of June’s manner there was much of the Forsyte. If the girl had been merely frank and courageous, Mrs. Baynes would have thought her ‘cranky,’ and despised her; if she had been merely a Forsyte, like Francie – let us say – she would have patronized her from sheer weight of metal; but June, small though she was – Mrs. Baynes habitually admired quantity – gave her an uneasy feeling; and she placed her in a chair opposite the light.
There was another reason for her respect which Mrs. Baynes, too good a churchwoman to be worldly, would have been the last to admit – she often heard her husband describe old Jolyon as extremely well off, and was biassed towards his granddaughter for the soundest of all reasons. To-day she felt the emotion with which we read a novel describing a hero and an inheritance, nervously anxious lest, by some frightful lapse of the novelist, the young man should be left without it at the end.
Her manner was warm; she had never seen so clearly before how distinguished and desirable a girl this was. She asked after old Jolyon’s health. A wonderful man for his age; so upright, and young looking, and how old was he? Eighty-one! She would never have thought it! They were at the sea! Very nice for them; she supposed June heard from Phil every day? Her light grey eyes became more prominent as she asked this question; but the girl met the glance without flinching.
“No,” she said, “he never writes!”
Mrs. Baynes’s eyes dropped; they had no intention of doing so, but they did. They recovered immediately.
“Of course not. That’s Phil all over – he was always like that!”
“Was he?” said June.
The brevity of the answer caused Mrs. Baynes’s bright smile a moment’s hesitation; she disguised it by a quick movement, and spreading her skirts afresh, said: “Why, my dear – he’s quite the most harum-scarum person; one never pays the slightest attention to what he does!”
The conviction came suddenly to June that she was wasting her time; even were she to put a question point-blank, she would never get anything out of this woman.
‘Do you see him?’ she asked, her face crimsoning.
The perspiration broke out on Mrs. Baynes’ forehead beneath the powder.
“Oh, yes! I don’t remember when he was here last – indeed, we haven’t seen much of him lately. He’s so busy with your cousin’s house; I’m told it’ll be finished directly. We must organize a little dinner to celebrate the event; do come and stay the night with us!”
“Thank you,” said June. Again she thought: ‘I’m only wasting my time. This woman will tell me nothing.’
She got up to go. A change came over Mrs. Baynes. She rose too; her lips twitched, she fidgeted her hands. Something was evidently very wrong, and she did not dare to ask this girl, who stood there, a slim, straight little figure, with her decided face, her set jaw, and resentful eyes. She was not accustomed to be afraid of asking questions – all organization was based on the asking of questions!
But the issue was so grave that her nerve, normally strong, was fairly shaken; only that morning her husband had said: “Old Mr. Forsyte must be worth well over a hundred thousand pounds!”
And this girl stood there, holding out her hand – holding out her hand!
The chance might be slipping away – she couldn’t tell – the chance of keeping her in the family, and yet she dared not speak.
Her eyes followed June to the door.
It closed.
Then with an exclamation Mrs. Baynes ran forward, wobbling her bulky frame from side to side, and opened it again.
Too late! She heard the front door click, and stood still, an expression of real anger and mortification on her face.
June went along the Square with her bird-like quickness. She detested that woman now whom in happier days she had been accustomed to think so kind. Was she always to be put off thus, and forced to undergo this torturing suspense?
She would go to Phil himself, and ask him what he meant. She had the right to know. She hurried on down Sloane Street till she came to Bosinney’s number. Passing the swing-door at the bottom, she ran up the stairs, her heart thumping painfully.
At the top of the third flight she paused for breath, and holding on to the bannisters, stood listening. No sound came from above.
With a very white face she mounted the last flight. She saw the door, with his name on the plate. And the resolution that had brought her so far evaporated.
The full meaning of her conduct came to her. She felt hot all over; the palms of her hands were moist beneath the thin silk covering of her gloves.
She drew back to the stairs, but did not descend. Leaning against the rail she tried to get rid of a feeling of being choked; and she gazed at the door with a sort of dreadful courage. No! she refused to go down. Did it matter what people thought of her? They would never know! No one would help her if she did not help herself! She would go through with it.
Forcing herself, therefore, to leave the support of the wall, she rang the bell. The door did not open, and all her shame and fear suddenly abandoned her; she rang again and again, as though in spite of its emptiness she could drag some response out of that closed room, some recompense for the shame and fear that visit had cost her. It did not open; she left off ringing, and, sitting down at the top of the stairs, buried her face in her hands.
Presently she stole down, out into the air. She felt as though she had passed through a bad illness, and had no desire now but to get home as quickly as she could. The people she met seemed to know where she had been, what she had been doing; and suddenly – over on the opposite side, going towards his rooms from the direction of Montpellier Square – she saw Bosinney himself.
She made a movement to cross into the traffic. Their eyes met, and he raised his hat. An omnibus passed, obscuring her view; then, from the edge of the pavement, through a gap in the traffic, she saw him walking on.
And June stood motionless, looking after him.
His eyes, as he filled that black despatch case, looked as if at any moment they might blaze up with anger. So gleams the eye of a schoolboy, baited by a ring of his companions; but he controls himself, deterred by the fearful odds against him. And old Jolyon controlled himself, keeping down, with his masterful restraint now slowly wearing out, the irritation fostered in him by the conditions of his life.
He had received from his son an unpractical letter, in which by rambling generalities the boy seemed trying to get out of answering a plain question. ‘I’ve seen Bosinney,’ he said; ‘he is not a criminal. The more I see of people the more I am convinced that they are never good or bad – merely comic, or pathetic. You probably don’t agree with me!’
Old Jolyon did not; he considered it cynical to so express oneself; he had not yet reached that point of old age when even Forsytes, bereft of those illusions and principles which they have cherished carefully for practical purposes but never believed in, bereft of all corporeal enjoyment, stricken to the very heart by having nothing left to hope for – break through the barriers of reserve and say things they would never have believed themselves capable of saying.
Perhaps he did not believe in ‘goodness’ and ‘badness’ any more than his son; but as he would have said: He didn’t know – couldn’t tell; there might be something in it; and why, by an unnecessary expression of disbelief, deprive yourself of possible advantage?
Accustomed to spend his holidays among the mountains, though (like a true Forsyte) he had never attempted anything too adventurous or too foolhardy, he had been passionately fond of them. And when the wonderful view (mentioned in Baedeker[40] – ‘fatiguing but repaying’) – was disclosed to him after the effort of the climb, he had doubtless felt the existence of some great, dignified principle crowning the chaotic strivings, the petty precipices, and ironic little dark chasms of life. This was as near to religion, perhaps, as his practical spirit had ever gone.
But it was many years since he had been to the mountains. He had taken June there two seasons running, after his wife died, and had realized bitterly that his walking days were over.
To that old mountain – given confidence in a supreme order of things he had long been a stranger.
He knew himself to be old, yet he felt young; and this troubled him. It troubled and puzzled him, too, to think that he, who had always been so careful, should be father and grandfather to such as seemed born to disaster. He had nothing to say against Jo – who could say anything against the boy, an amiable chap? – but his position was deplorable, and this business of June’s nearly as bad. It seemed like a fatality, and a fatality was one of those things no man of his character could either understand or put up with.
In writing to his son he did not really hope that anything would come of it. Since the ball at Roger’s he had seen too clearly how the land lay – he could put two and two together quicker than most men – and, with the example of his own son before his eyes, knew better than any Forsyte of them all that the pale flame singes men’s wings whether they will or no.
In the days before June’s engagement, when she and Mrs. Soames were always together, he had seen enough of Irene to feel the spell she cast over men. She was not a flirt, not even a coquette – words dear to the heart of his generation, which loved to define things by a good, broad, inadequate word – but she was dangerous. He could not say why. Tell him of a quality innate in some women – a seductive power beyond their own control! He would but answer: ‘Humbug!’ She was dangerous, and there was an end of it. He wanted to close his eyes to that affair. If it was, it was; he did not want to hear any more about it – he only wanted to save June’s position and her peace of mind. He still hoped she might once more become a comfort to himself.
And so he had written. He got little enough out of the answer. As to what young Jolyon had made of the interview, there was practically only the queer sentence: ‘I gather that he’s in the stream.’ The stream! What stream? What was this new-fangled way of talking?
He sighed, and folded the last of the papers under the flap of the bag; he knew well enough what was meant.
June came out of the dining-room, and helped him on with his summer coat. From her costume, and the expression of her little resolute face, he saw at once what was coming.
“I’m going with you,” she said.
“Nonsense, my dear; I go straight into the City. I can’t have you racketting about!”
“I must see old Mrs. Smeech.”
“Oh, your precious ‘lame ducks’!” grumbled out old Jolyon. He did not believe her excuse, but ceased his opposition. There was no doing anything with that pertinacity of hers.
At Victoria he put her into the carriage which had been ordered for himself – a characteristic action, for he had no petty selfishnesses.
“Now, don’t you go tiring yourself, my darling,” he said, and took a cab on into the city.
June went first to a back-street in Paddington, where Mrs. Smeech, her ‘lame duck,’ lived – an aged person, connected with the charring interest; but after half an hour spent in hearing her habitually lamentable recital, and dragooning her into temporary comfort, she went on to Stanhope Gate. The great house was closed and dark.
She had decided to learn something at all costs. It was better to face the worst, and have it over. And this was her plan: To go first to Phil’s aunt, Mrs. Baynes, and, failing information there, to Irene herself. She had no clear notion of what she would gain by these visits.
At three o’clock she was in Lowndes Square. With a woman’s instinct when trouble is to be faced, she had put on her best frock, and went to the battle with a glance as courageous as old Jolyon’s itself. Her tremors had passed into eagerness.
Mrs. Baynes, Bosinney’s aunt (Louisa was her name), was in her kitchen when June was announced, organizing the cook, for she was an excellent housewife, and, as Baynes always said, there was ‘a lot in a good dinner.’ He did his best work after dinner. It was Baynes who built that remarkably fine row of tall crimson houses in Kensington which compete with so many others for the title of ‘the ugliest in London.’
On hearing June’s name, she went hurriedly to her bedroom, and, taking two large bracelets from a red morocco case in a locked drawer, put them on her white wrists – for she possessed in a remarkable degree that ‘sense of property,’ which, as we know, is the touchstone of Forsyteism, and the foundation of good morality.
Her figure, of medium height and broad build, with a tendency to embonpoint, was reflected by the mirror of her whitewood wardrobe, in a gown made under her own organization, of one of those half-tints, reminiscent of the distempered walls of corridors in large hotels. She raised her hands to her hair, which she wore a la Princesse de Galles, and touched it here and there, settling it more firmly on her head, and her eyes were full of an unconscious realism, as though she were looking in the face one of life’s sordid facts, and making the best of it. In youth her cheeks had been of cream and roses, but they were mottled now by middle-age, and again that hard, ugly directness came into her eyes as she dabbed a powder-puff across her forehead. Putting the puff down, she stood quite still before the glass, arranging a smile over her high, important nose, her chin, (never large, and now growing smaller with the increase of her neck), her thin-lipped, down-drooping mouth. Quickly, not to lose the effect, she grasped her skirts strongly in both hands, and went downstairs.
She had been hoping for this visit for some time past. Whispers had reached her that things were not all right between her nephew and his fiancee. Neither of them had been near her for weeks. She had asked Phil to dinner many times; his invariable answer had been ‘Too busy.’
Her instinct was alarmed, and the instinct in such matters of this excellent woman was keen. She ought to have been a Forsyte; in young Jolyon’s sense of the word, she certainly had that privilege, and merits description as such.
She had married off her three daughters in a way that people said was beyond their deserts, for they had the professional plainness only to be found, as a rule, among the female kind of the more legal callings. Her name was upon the committees of numberless charities connected with the Church-dances, theatricals, or bazaars – and she never lent her name unless sure beforehand that everything had been thoroughly organized.
She believed, as she often said, in putting things on a commercial basis; the proper function of the Church, of charity, indeed, of everything, was to strengthen the fabric of ‘Society.’ Individual action, therefore, she considered immoral. Organization was the only thing, for by organization alone could you feel sure that you were getting a return for your money. Organization – and again, organization! And there is no doubt that she was what old Jolyon called her – “a ‘dab’ at that” – he went further, he called her “a humbug.”
The enterprises to which she lent her name were organized so admirably that by the time the takings were handed over, they were indeed skim milk divested of all cream of human kindness. But as she often justly remarked, sentiment was to be deprecated. She was, in fact, a little academic.
This great and good woman, so highly thought of in ecclesiastical circles, was one of the principal priestesses in the temple of Forsyteism, keeping alive day and night a sacred flame to the God of Property, whose altar is inscribed with those inspiring words: ‘Nothing for nothing, and really remarkably little for sixpence.’
When she entered a room it was felt that something substantial had come in, which was probably the reason of her popularity as a patroness. People liked something substantial when they had paid money for it; and they would look at her – surrounded by her staff in charity ballrooms, with her high nose and her broad, square figure, attired in an uniform covered with sequins – as though she were a general.
The only thing against her was that she had not a double name. She was a power in upper middle-class society, with its hundred sets and circles, all intersecting on the common battlefield of charity functions, and on that battlefield brushing skirts so pleasantly with the skirts of Society with the capital ‘S.’ She was a power in society with the smaller ‘s,’ that larger, more significant, and more powerful body, where the commercially Christian institutions, maxims, and ‘principle,’ which Mrs. Baynes embodied, were real life-blood, circulating freely, real business currency, not merely the sterilized imitation that flowed in the veins of smaller Society with the larger ‘S.’ People who knew her felt her to be sound – a sound woman, who never gave herself away, nor anything else, if she could possibly help it.
She had been on the worst sort of terms with Bosinney’s father, who had not infrequently made her the object of an unpardonable ridicule. She alluded to him now that he was gone as her ‘poor, dear, irreverend brother.’
She greeted June with the careful effusion of which she was a mistress, a little afraid of her as far as a woman of her eminence in the commercial and Christian world could be afraid – for so slight a girl June had a great dignity, the fearlessness of her eyes gave her that. And Mrs. Baynes, too, shrewdly recognized that behind the uncompromising frankness of June’s manner there was much of the Forsyte. If the girl had been merely frank and courageous, Mrs. Baynes would have thought her ‘cranky,’ and despised her; if she had been merely a Forsyte, like Francie – let us say – she would have patronized her from sheer weight of metal; but June, small though she was – Mrs. Baynes habitually admired quantity – gave her an uneasy feeling; and she placed her in a chair opposite the light.
There was another reason for her respect which Mrs. Baynes, too good a churchwoman to be worldly, would have been the last to admit – she often heard her husband describe old Jolyon as extremely well off, and was biassed towards his granddaughter for the soundest of all reasons. To-day she felt the emotion with which we read a novel describing a hero and an inheritance, nervously anxious lest, by some frightful lapse of the novelist, the young man should be left without it at the end.
Her manner was warm; she had never seen so clearly before how distinguished and desirable a girl this was. She asked after old Jolyon’s health. A wonderful man for his age; so upright, and young looking, and how old was he? Eighty-one! She would never have thought it! They were at the sea! Very nice for them; she supposed June heard from Phil every day? Her light grey eyes became more prominent as she asked this question; but the girl met the glance without flinching.
“No,” she said, “he never writes!”
Mrs. Baynes’s eyes dropped; they had no intention of doing so, but they did. They recovered immediately.
“Of course not. That’s Phil all over – he was always like that!”
“Was he?” said June.
The brevity of the answer caused Mrs. Baynes’s bright smile a moment’s hesitation; she disguised it by a quick movement, and spreading her skirts afresh, said: “Why, my dear – he’s quite the most harum-scarum person; one never pays the slightest attention to what he does!”
The conviction came suddenly to June that she was wasting her time; even were she to put a question point-blank, she would never get anything out of this woman.
‘Do you see him?’ she asked, her face crimsoning.
The perspiration broke out on Mrs. Baynes’ forehead beneath the powder.
“Oh, yes! I don’t remember when he was here last – indeed, we haven’t seen much of him lately. He’s so busy with your cousin’s house; I’m told it’ll be finished directly. We must organize a little dinner to celebrate the event; do come and stay the night with us!”
“Thank you,” said June. Again she thought: ‘I’m only wasting my time. This woman will tell me nothing.’
She got up to go. A change came over Mrs. Baynes. She rose too; her lips twitched, she fidgeted her hands. Something was evidently very wrong, and she did not dare to ask this girl, who stood there, a slim, straight little figure, with her decided face, her set jaw, and resentful eyes. She was not accustomed to be afraid of asking questions – all organization was based on the asking of questions!
But the issue was so grave that her nerve, normally strong, was fairly shaken; only that morning her husband had said: “Old Mr. Forsyte must be worth well over a hundred thousand pounds!”
And this girl stood there, holding out her hand – holding out her hand!
The chance might be slipping away – she couldn’t tell – the chance of keeping her in the family, and yet she dared not speak.
Her eyes followed June to the door.
It closed.
Then with an exclamation Mrs. Baynes ran forward, wobbling her bulky frame from side to side, and opened it again.
Too late! She heard the front door click, and stood still, an expression of real anger and mortification on her face.
June went along the Square with her bird-like quickness. She detested that woman now whom in happier days she had been accustomed to think so kind. Was she always to be put off thus, and forced to undergo this torturing suspense?
She would go to Phil himself, and ask him what he meant. She had the right to know. She hurried on down Sloane Street till she came to Bosinney’s number. Passing the swing-door at the bottom, she ran up the stairs, her heart thumping painfully.
At the top of the third flight she paused for breath, and holding on to the bannisters, stood listening. No sound came from above.
With a very white face she mounted the last flight. She saw the door, with his name on the plate. And the resolution that had brought her so far evaporated.
The full meaning of her conduct came to her. She felt hot all over; the palms of her hands were moist beneath the thin silk covering of her gloves.
She drew back to the stairs, but did not descend. Leaning against the rail she tried to get rid of a feeling of being choked; and she gazed at the door with a sort of dreadful courage. No! she refused to go down. Did it matter what people thought of her? They would never know! No one would help her if she did not help herself! She would go through with it.
Forcing herself, therefore, to leave the support of the wall, she rang the bell. The door did not open, and all her shame and fear suddenly abandoned her; she rang again and again, as though in spite of its emptiness she could drag some response out of that closed room, some recompense for the shame and fear that visit had cost her. It did not open; she left off ringing, and, sitting down at the top of the stairs, buried her face in her hands.
Presently she stole down, out into the air. She felt as though she had passed through a bad illness, and had no desire now but to get home as quickly as she could. The people she met seemed to know where she had been, what she had been doing; and suddenly – over on the opposite side, going towards his rooms from the direction of Montpellier Square – she saw Bosinney himself.
She made a movement to cross into the traffic. Their eyes met, and he raised his hat. An omnibus passed, obscuring her view; then, from the edge of the pavement, through a gap in the traffic, she saw him walking on.
And June stood motionless, looking after him.
Chapter XIII
Perfection of the House
‘One mockturtle, clear; one oxtail; two glasses of port.’
In the upper room at French’s, where a Forsyte could still get heavy English food, James and his son were sitting down to lunch.
Of all eating-places James liked best to come here; there was something unpretentious, well-flavoured, and filling about it, and though he had been to a certain extent corrupted by the necessity for being fashionable, and the trend of habits keeping pace with an income that would increase, he still hankered in quiet City moments after the tasty fleshpots of his earlier days. Here you were served by hairy English waiters in aprons; there was sawdust on the floor, and three round gilt looking-glasses hung just above the line of sight. They had only recently done away with the cubicles, too, in which you could have your chop, prime chump, with a floury-potato, without seeing your neighbours, like a gentleman.
He tucked the top corner of his napkin behind the third button of his waistcoat, a practice he had been obliged to abandon years ago in the West End. He felt that he should relish his soup – the entire morning had been given to winding up the estate of an old friend.
After filling his mouth with household bread, stale, he at once began: “How are you going down to Robin Hill? You going to take Irene? You’d better take her. I should think there’ll be a lot that’ll want seeing to.”
Without looking up, Soames answered: “She won’t go.”
“Won’t go? What’s the meaning of that? She’s going to live in the house, isn’t she?”
Soames made no reply.
“I don’t know what’s coming to women nowadays,” mumbled James; “I never used to have any trouble with them. She’s had too much liberty. She’s spoiled….”
Soames lifted his eyes: “I won’t have anything said against her,” he said unexpectedly.
The silence was only broken now by the supping of James’s soup.
The waiter brought the two glasses of port, but Soames stopped him.
“That’s not the way to serve port,” he said; “take them away, and bring the bottle.”
Rousing himself from his reverie over the soup, James took one of his rapid shifting surveys of surrounding facts.
“Your mother’s in bed,” he said; “you can have the carriage to take you down. I should think Irene’d like the drive. This young Bosinney’ll be there, I suppose, to show you over.”
Soames nodded.
“I should like to go and see for myself what sort of a job he’s made finishing off,” pursued James. “I’ll just drive round and pick you both up.”
“I am going down by train,” replied Soames. “If you like to drive round and see, Irene might go with you, I can’t tell.”
He signed to the waiter to bring the bill, which James paid.
They parted at St. Paul’s, Soames branching off to the station, James taking his omnibus westwards.
He had secured the corner seat next the conductor, where his long legs made it difficult for anyone to get in, and at all who passed him he looked resentfully, as if they had no business to be using up his air.
He intended to take an opportunity this afternoon of speaking to Irene. A word in time saved nine; and now that she was going to live in the country there was a chance for her to turn over a new leaf! He could see that Soames wouldn’t stand very much more of her goings on!
It did not occur to him to define what he meant by her ‘goings on’; the expression was wide, vague, and suited to a Forsyte. And James had more than his common share of courage after lunch.
On reaching home, he ordered out the barouche, with special instructions that the groom was to go too. He wished to be kind to her, and to give her every chance.
When the door of No.62 was opened he could distinctly hear her singing, and said so at once, to prevent any chance of being denied entrance.
Yes, Mrs. Soames was in, but the maid did not know if she was seeing people.
James, moving with the rapidity that ever astonished the observers of his long figure and absorbed expression, went forthwith into the drawing-room without permitting this to be ascertained. He found Irene seated at the piano with her hands arrested on the keys, evidently listening to the voices in the hall. She greeted him without smiling.
“Your mother-in-law’s in bed,” he began, hoping at once to enlist her sympathy. “I’ve got the carriage here. Now, be a good girl, and put on your hat and come with me for a drive. It’ll do you good!”
Irene looked at him as though about to refuse, but, seeming to change her mind, went upstairs, and came down again with her hat on.
“Where are you going to take me?” she asked.
“We’ll just go down to Robin Hill,” said James, spluttering out his words very quick; “the horses want exercise, and I should like to see what they’ve been doing down there.”
Irene hung back, but again changed her mind, and went out to the carriage, James brooding over her closely, to make quite sure.
It was not before he had got her more than half way that he began: “Soames is very fond of you – he won’t have anything said against you; why don’t you show him more affection?”
Irene flushed, and said in a low voice: “I can’t show what I haven’t got.”
James looked at her sharply; he felt that now he had her in his own carriage, with his own horses and servants, he was really in command of the situation. She could not put him off; nor would she make a scene in public.
“I can’t think what you’re about,” he said. “He’s a very good husband!”
Irene’s answer was so low as to be almost inaudible among the sounds of traffic. He caught the words: “You are not married to him!”
“What’s that got to do with it? He’s given you everything you want. He’s always ready to take you anywhere, and now he’s built you this house in the country. It’s not as if you had anything of your own.”
“No.”
Again James looked at her; he could not make out the expression on her face. She looked almost as if she were going to cry, and yet….
“I’m sure,” he muttered hastily, “we’ve all tried to be kind to you.”
Irene’s lips quivered; to his dismay James saw a tear steal down her cheek. He felt a choke rise in his own throat.
“We’re all fond of you,” he said, “if you’d only” – he was going to say, “behave yourself,” but changed it to – “if you’d only be more of a wife to him.”
Irene did not answer, and James, too, ceased speaking. There was something in her silence which disconcerted him; it was not the silence of obstinacy, rather that of acquiescence in all that he could find to say. And yet he felt as if he had not had the last word. He could not understand this.
He was unable, however, to long keep silence.
“I suppose that young Bosinney,” he said, “will be getting married to June now?”
Irene’s face changed. “I don’t know,” she said; “you should ask her.”
“Does she write to you?”
“No.”
“How’s that?” said James. “I thought you and she were such great friends.”
Irene turned on him. “Again,” she said, “you should ask her!”
“Well,” flustered James, frightened by her look, “it’s very odd that I can’t get a plain answer to a plain question, but there it is.”
He sat ruminating over his rebuff, and burst out at last:
“Well, I’ve warned you. You won’t look ahead. Soames he doesn’t say much, but I can see he won’t stand a great deal more of this sort of thing. You’ll have nobody but yourself to blame, and, what’s more, you’ll get no sympathy from anybody.”
Irene bent her head with a little smiling bow. “I am very much obliged to you.”
James did not know what on earth to answer.
The bright hot morning had changed slowly to a grey, oppressive afternoon; a heavy bank of clouds, with the yellow tinge of coming thunder, had risen in the south, and was creeping up.
The branches of the trees dropped motionless across the road without the smallest stir of foliage. A faint odour of glue from the heated horses clung in the thick air; the coachman and groom, rigid and unbending, exchanged stealthy murmurs on the box, without ever turning their heads.
In the upper room at French’s, where a Forsyte could still get heavy English food, James and his son were sitting down to lunch.
Of all eating-places James liked best to come here; there was something unpretentious, well-flavoured, and filling about it, and though he had been to a certain extent corrupted by the necessity for being fashionable, and the trend of habits keeping pace with an income that would increase, he still hankered in quiet City moments after the tasty fleshpots of his earlier days. Here you were served by hairy English waiters in aprons; there was sawdust on the floor, and three round gilt looking-glasses hung just above the line of sight. They had only recently done away with the cubicles, too, in which you could have your chop, prime chump, with a floury-potato, without seeing your neighbours, like a gentleman.
He tucked the top corner of his napkin behind the third button of his waistcoat, a practice he had been obliged to abandon years ago in the West End. He felt that he should relish his soup – the entire morning had been given to winding up the estate of an old friend.
After filling his mouth with household bread, stale, he at once began: “How are you going down to Robin Hill? You going to take Irene? You’d better take her. I should think there’ll be a lot that’ll want seeing to.”
Without looking up, Soames answered: “She won’t go.”
“Won’t go? What’s the meaning of that? She’s going to live in the house, isn’t she?”
Soames made no reply.
“I don’t know what’s coming to women nowadays,” mumbled James; “I never used to have any trouble with them. She’s had too much liberty. She’s spoiled….”
Soames lifted his eyes: “I won’t have anything said against her,” he said unexpectedly.
The silence was only broken now by the supping of James’s soup.
The waiter brought the two glasses of port, but Soames stopped him.
“That’s not the way to serve port,” he said; “take them away, and bring the bottle.”
Rousing himself from his reverie over the soup, James took one of his rapid shifting surveys of surrounding facts.
“Your mother’s in bed,” he said; “you can have the carriage to take you down. I should think Irene’d like the drive. This young Bosinney’ll be there, I suppose, to show you over.”
Soames nodded.
“I should like to go and see for myself what sort of a job he’s made finishing off,” pursued James. “I’ll just drive round and pick you both up.”
“I am going down by train,” replied Soames. “If you like to drive round and see, Irene might go with you, I can’t tell.”
He signed to the waiter to bring the bill, which James paid.
They parted at St. Paul’s, Soames branching off to the station, James taking his omnibus westwards.
He had secured the corner seat next the conductor, where his long legs made it difficult for anyone to get in, and at all who passed him he looked resentfully, as if they had no business to be using up his air.
He intended to take an opportunity this afternoon of speaking to Irene. A word in time saved nine; and now that she was going to live in the country there was a chance for her to turn over a new leaf! He could see that Soames wouldn’t stand very much more of her goings on!
It did not occur to him to define what he meant by her ‘goings on’; the expression was wide, vague, and suited to a Forsyte. And James had more than his common share of courage after lunch.
On reaching home, he ordered out the barouche, with special instructions that the groom was to go too. He wished to be kind to her, and to give her every chance.
When the door of No.62 was opened he could distinctly hear her singing, and said so at once, to prevent any chance of being denied entrance.
Yes, Mrs. Soames was in, but the maid did not know if she was seeing people.
James, moving with the rapidity that ever astonished the observers of his long figure and absorbed expression, went forthwith into the drawing-room without permitting this to be ascertained. He found Irene seated at the piano with her hands arrested on the keys, evidently listening to the voices in the hall. She greeted him without smiling.
“Your mother-in-law’s in bed,” he began, hoping at once to enlist her sympathy. “I’ve got the carriage here. Now, be a good girl, and put on your hat and come with me for a drive. It’ll do you good!”
Irene looked at him as though about to refuse, but, seeming to change her mind, went upstairs, and came down again with her hat on.
“Where are you going to take me?” she asked.
“We’ll just go down to Robin Hill,” said James, spluttering out his words very quick; “the horses want exercise, and I should like to see what they’ve been doing down there.”
Irene hung back, but again changed her mind, and went out to the carriage, James brooding over her closely, to make quite sure.
It was not before he had got her more than half way that he began: “Soames is very fond of you – he won’t have anything said against you; why don’t you show him more affection?”
Irene flushed, and said in a low voice: “I can’t show what I haven’t got.”
James looked at her sharply; he felt that now he had her in his own carriage, with his own horses and servants, he was really in command of the situation. She could not put him off; nor would she make a scene in public.
“I can’t think what you’re about,” he said. “He’s a very good husband!”
Irene’s answer was so low as to be almost inaudible among the sounds of traffic. He caught the words: “You are not married to him!”
“What’s that got to do with it? He’s given you everything you want. He’s always ready to take you anywhere, and now he’s built you this house in the country. It’s not as if you had anything of your own.”
“No.”
Again James looked at her; he could not make out the expression on her face. She looked almost as if she were going to cry, and yet….
“I’m sure,” he muttered hastily, “we’ve all tried to be kind to you.”
Irene’s lips quivered; to his dismay James saw a tear steal down her cheek. He felt a choke rise in his own throat.
“We’re all fond of you,” he said, “if you’d only” – he was going to say, “behave yourself,” but changed it to – “if you’d only be more of a wife to him.”
Irene did not answer, and James, too, ceased speaking. There was something in her silence which disconcerted him; it was not the silence of obstinacy, rather that of acquiescence in all that he could find to say. And yet he felt as if he had not had the last word. He could not understand this.
He was unable, however, to long keep silence.
“I suppose that young Bosinney,” he said, “will be getting married to June now?”
Irene’s face changed. “I don’t know,” she said; “you should ask her.”
“Does she write to you?”
“No.”
“How’s that?” said James. “I thought you and she were such great friends.”
Irene turned on him. “Again,” she said, “you should ask her!”
“Well,” flustered James, frightened by her look, “it’s very odd that I can’t get a plain answer to a plain question, but there it is.”
He sat ruminating over his rebuff, and burst out at last:
“Well, I’ve warned you. You won’t look ahead. Soames he doesn’t say much, but I can see he won’t stand a great deal more of this sort of thing. You’ll have nobody but yourself to blame, and, what’s more, you’ll get no sympathy from anybody.”
Irene bent her head with a little smiling bow. “I am very much obliged to you.”
James did not know what on earth to answer.
The bright hot morning had changed slowly to a grey, oppressive afternoon; a heavy bank of clouds, with the yellow tinge of coming thunder, had risen in the south, and was creeping up.
The branches of the trees dropped motionless across the road without the smallest stir of foliage. A faint odour of glue from the heated horses clung in the thick air; the coachman and groom, rigid and unbending, exchanged stealthy murmurs on the box, without ever turning their heads.
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