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diff --git a/3817-h/3817-h.htm b/3817-h/3817-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c43b42c --- /dev/null +++ b/3817-h/3817-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,16244 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<HTML> +<HEAD> + +<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> + +<TITLE> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of To Let, by John Galsworthy +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of To Let, by John Galsworthy + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: To Let + +Author: John Galsworthy + +Posting Date: May 28, 2009 [EBook #3817] +Release Date: March, 2003 +First Posted: September 23, 2001 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TO LET *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Franks, Robert Rowe and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team. HTML version by Al Haines. + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +TO LET +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +John Galsworthy +</H2> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4> +AUTHOR'S NOTE +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +With this volume, The Forsyte Saga—that series comprising "The Man of +Property," "Indian Summer of a Forsyte" (from the volume "Five Tales"), +"In Chancery," and "Awakening"—comes to an end. J. G. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H2> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PART I +</H3> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="15%">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="85%"> +<A HREF="#chap0101">ENCOUNTER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0102">FINE FLEUR FORSYTE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0103">AT ROBIN HILL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0104">THE MAUSOLEUM</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0105">THE NATIVE HEATH</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0106">JON</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0107">FLEUR</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0108">IDYLL ON GRASS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0109">GOYA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0110">TRIO</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0111">DUET</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0112">CAPRICE</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PART II +</H3> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="15%">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="85%"> +<A HREF="#chap0201">MOTHER AND SON</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0202">FATHERS AND DAUGHTERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0203">MEETINGS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0204">IN GREEN STREET</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0205">PURELY FORSYTE AFFAIRS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0206">SOAMES' PRIVATE LIFE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0207">JUNE TAKES A HAND</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0208">THE BIT BETWEEN THE TEETH</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0209">FAT IN THE FIRE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0210">DECISION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0211">TIMOTHY PROPHESIES</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PART III +</H3> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="15%">I. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" WIDTH="85%"> +<A HREF="#chap0301">OLD JOLYON WALKS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0302">CONFESSION</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0303">IRENE!</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0304">SOAMES COGITATES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0305">THE FIXED IDEA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0306">DESPERATE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0307">EMBASSY</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0308">THE DARK TUNE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0309">UNDER THE OAK-TREE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0310">FLEUR'S WEDDING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI. </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap0311">THE LAST OF THE FORSYTES</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0101"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +PART I +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +ENCOUNTER +</H3> + +<P> +Soames Forsyte emerged from the Knightsbridge Hotel, where he was +staying, in the afternoon of the 12th of May, 1920, with the intention +of visiting a collection of pictures in a Gallery off Cork Street, and +looking into the Future. He walked. Since the War he never took a cab +if he could help it. Their drivers were, in his view, an uncivil lot, +though, now that the War was over and supply beginning to exceed demand +again, getting more civil in accordance with the custom of human +nature. Still, he had not forgiven them, deeply identifying them with +gloomy memories and, now dimly, like all members of their class, with +revolution. The considerable anxiety he had passed through during the +War, and the more considerable anxiety he had since undergone in the +Peace, had produced psychological consequences in a tenacious nature. +He had, mentally, so frequently experienced ruin, that he had ceased to +believe in its material probability. Paying away four thousand a year +in income and super-tax, one could not very well be worse off! A +fortune of a quarter of a million, encumbered only by a wife and one +daughter, and very diversely invested, afforded substantial guarantee +even against that "wildcat notion"—a levy on capital. And as to +confiscation of war profits, he was entirely in favor of it, for he had +none, and "serve the beggars right!" The price of pictures, moreover, +had, if anything, gone up, and he had done better with his collection +since the War began than ever before. Air-raids, also, had acted +beneficially on a spirit congenitally cautious, and hardened a +character already dogged. To be in danger of being entirely dispersed +inclined one to be less apprehensive of the more partial dispersions +involved in levies and taxation, while the habit of condemning the +impudence of the Germans had led naturally to condemning that of Labor, +if not openly at least in the sanctuary of his soul. +</P> + +<P> +He walked. There was, moreover, time to spare, for Fleur was to meet +him at the Gallery at four o'clock, and it was as yet but half past +two. It was good for him to walk—his liver was a little constricted +and his nerves rather on edge. His wife was always out when she was in +Town, and his daughter WOULD flibberty-gibbet all over the place like +most young women since the War. Still, he must be thankful that she had +been too young to do anything in that War itself. Not, of course, that +he had not supported the War from its inception, with all his soul, but +between that and supporting it with the bodies of his wife and +daughter, there had been a gap fixed by something old-fashioned within +him which abhorred emotional extravagance. He had, for instance, +strongly objected to Annette, so attractive, and in 1914 only +thirty-five, going to her native France, her "chere patrie" as, under +the stimulus of war, she had begun to call it, to nurse her "braves +poilus," forsooth! Ruining her health and her looks! As if she were +really a nurse! He had put a stopper on it. Let her do needlework for +them at home, or knit! She had not gone, therefore, and had never been +quite the same woman since. A bad tendency of hers to mock at him, not +openly, but in continual little ways, had grown. As for Fleur, the War +had resolved the vexed problem whether or not she should go to school. +She was better away from her mother in her war mood, from the chance of +air-raids, and the impetus to do extravagant things; so he had placed +her in a seminary as far West as had seemed to him compatible with +excellence, and had missed her horribly. Fleur! He had never regretted +the somewhat outlandish name by which at her birth he had decided so +suddenly to call her—marked concession though it had been to the +French. Fleur! A pretty name—a pretty child! But restless—too +restless; and wilful! Knowing her power too over her father! Soames +often reflected on the mistake it was to dote on his daughter. To get +old and dote! Sixty-five! He was getting on; but he didn't feel it, +for, fortunately perhaps, considering Annette's youth and good looks, +his second marriage had turned out a cool affair. He had known but one +real passion in his life—for that first wife of his—Irene. Yes, and +that fellow, his Cousin Jolyon, who had gone off with her, was looking +very shaky, they said. No wonder, at seventy-two, after twenty years of +a third marriage! +</P> + +<P> +Soames paused a moment in his march to lean over the railings of the +Row. A suitable spot for reminiscence, half-way between that house in +Park Lane which had seen his birth and his parents' deaths, and the +little house in Montpellier Square where thirty-five years ago he had +enjoyed his first edition of matrimony. Now, after twenty years of his +second edition, that old tragedy seemed to him like a previous +existence—which had ended when Fleur was born in place of the son he +had hoped for. For many years he had ceased regretting, even vaguely, +the son who had not been born; Fleur filled the bill in his heart. +After all, she bore his name; and he was not looking forward at all to +the time when she would change it. Indeed, if he ever thought of such a +calamity, it was seasoned by the vague feeling that he could make her +rich enough to purchase perhaps and extinguish the name of the fellow +who married her—why not, since, as it seemed, women were equal to men +nowadays? And Soames, secretly convinced that they were not, passed his +curved hand over his face vigorously, till it reached the comfort of +his chin. Thanks to abstemious habits, he had not grown fat and flabby; +his nose was pale and thin, his grey moustache close-clipped, his +eyesight unimpaired. A slight stoop closened and corrected the +expansion given to his face by the heightening of his forehead in the +recession of his grey hair. Little change had Time wrought in the +"warmest" of the young Forsytes, as the last of the old +Forsytes—Timothy—now in his hundred and first year, would have +phrased it. +</P> + +<P> +The shade from the plane-trees fell on his neat Homburg hat; he had +given up top hats—it was no use attracting attention to wealth in days +like these. Plane-trees! His thoughts travelled sharply to Madrid—the +Easter before the War, when, having to make up his mind about that Goya +picture, he had taken a voyage of discovery to study the painter on his +spot. The fellow had impressed him—great range, real genius! Highly as +the chap ranked, he would rank even higher before they had finished +with him. The second Goya craze would be greater even than the first; +oh, yes! And he had bought. On that visit he had—as never +before—commissioned a copy of a fresco painting called "La Vendimia," +wherein was the figure of a girl with an arm akimbo, who had reminded +him of his daughter. He had it now in the Gallery at Mapledurham, and +rather poor it was—you couldn't copy Goya. He would still look at it, +however, if his daughter were not there, for the sake of something +irresistibly reminiscent in the light, erect balance of the figure, the +width between the arching eyebrows, the eager dreaming of the dark +eyes. Curious that Fleur should have dark eyes, when his own were +grey—no pure Forsyte had brown eyes—and her mother's blue! But of +course her grandmother Lamotte's eyes were dark as treacle! +</P> + +<P> +He began to walk on again towards Hyde Park Corner. No greater change +in all England than in the Row! Born almost within hail of it, he could +remember it from 1860 on. Brought there as a child between the +crinolines to stare at tight-trousered dandies in whiskers, riding with +a cavalry seat; to watch the doffing of curly-brimmed and white top +hats; the leisurely air of it all, and the little bow-legged man in a +long red waistcoat who used to come among the fashion with dogs on +several strings, and try to sell one to his mother: King Charles +spaniels, Italian greyhounds, affectionate to her crinoline—you never +saw them now. You saw no quality of any sort, indeed, just working +people sitting in dull rows with nothing to stare at but a few young +bouncing females in pot hats, riding astride, or desultory Colonials +charging up and down on dismal-looking hacks; with, here and there, +little girls on ponies, or old gentlemen jogging their livers, or an +orderly trying a great galumphing cavalry horse; no thoroughbreds, no +grooms, no bowing, no scraping, no gossip—nothing; only the trees the +same—the trees indifferent to the generations and declensions of +mankind. A democratic England—dishevelled, hurried, noisy, and +seemingly without an apex. And that something fastidious in the soul of +Soames turned over within him. Gone for ever, the close borough of rank +and polish! Wealth there was—oh, yes! wealth—he himself was a richer +man than his father had ever been; but manners, flavour, quality, all +gone, engulfed in one vast, ugly, shoulder-rubbing, petrol-smelling +Cheerio. Little half-beaten pockets of gentility and caste lurking here +and there, dispersed and chetif, as Annette would say; but nothing ever +again firm and coherent to look up to. And into this new hurly-burly of +bad manners and loose morals his daughter—flower of his life—was +flung! And when those Labour chaps got power—if they ever did—the +worst was yet to come! +</P> + +<P> +He passed out under the archway, at last no longer—thank +goodness!—disfigured by the gun-grey of its search-light. 'They'd +better put a search-light on to where they're all going,' he thought, +'and light up their precious democracy!' And he directed his steps +along the Club fronts of Piccadilly. George Forsyte, of course, would +be sitting in the bay window of the Iseeum. The chap was so big now +that he was there nearly all his time, like some immovable, sardonic, +humorous eye noting the decline of men and things. And Soames hurried, +ever constitutionally uneasy beneath his cousin's glance. George, who, +as he had heard, had written a letter signed "Patriot" in the middle of +the War, complaining of the Government's hysteria in docking the oats +of race-horses. Yes, there he was, tall, ponderous, neat, clean-shaven, +with his smooth hair, hardly thinned, smelling, no doubt, of the best +hair-wash, and a pink paper in his hand. Well, he didn't change! And +for perhaps the first time in his life Soames felt a kind of sympathy +tapping in his waistcoat for that sardonic kinsman. With his weight, +his perfectly parted hair, and bull-like gaze, he was a guarantee that +the old order would take some shifting yet. He saw George move the pink +paper as if inviting him to ascend—the chap must want to ask something +about his property. It was still under Soames's control; for in the +adoption of a sleeping partnership at that painful period twenty years +back when he had divorced Irene, Soames had found himself almost +insensibly retaining control of all purely Forsyte affairs. +</P> + +<P> +Hesitating for just a moment, he nodded and went in. Since the death of +his brother-in-law Montague Dartie, in Paris, which no one had quite +known what to make of, except that it was certainly not suicide—the +Iseeum Club had seemed more respectable to Soames. George, too, he +knew, had sown the last of his wild oats, and was committed definitely +to the joys of the table, eating only of the very best so as to keep +his weight down, and owning, as he said, "just one or two old screws to +give me an interest in life." He joined his cousin, therefore, in the +bay window without the embarrassing sense of indiscretion he had been +used to feel up there. George put out a well-kept hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Haven't seen you since the War," he said. "How's your wife?" +</P> + +<P> +"Thanks," said Soames coldly, "well enough." +</P> + +<P> +Some hidden jest curved, for a moment, George's fleshy face, and +gloated from his eye. +</P> + +<P> +"That Belgian chap, Profond," he said, "is a member here now. He's a +rum customer." +</P> + +<P> +"Quite!" muttered Soames. "What did you want to see me about?" +</P> + +<P> +"Old Timothy; he might go off the hooks at any moment. I suppose he's +made his Will." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, you or somebody ought to give him a look up—last of the old +lot; he's a hundred, you know. They say he's like a mummy. Where are +you goin' to put him? He ought to have a pyramid by rights." +</P> + +<P> +Soames shook his head. "Highgate, the family vault." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I suppose the old girls would miss him, if he was anywhere else. +They say he still takes an interest in food. He might last on, you +know. Don't we GET anything for the old Forsytes? Ten of them—average +age eighty-eight—I worked it out. That ought to be equal to triplets." +</P> + +<P> +"Is that all?" said Soames. "I must be getting on." +</P> + +<P> +'You unsociable devil,' George's eyes seemed to answer. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, that's all: Look him up in his mausoleum—the old chap might want +to prophesy." The grin died on the rich curves of his face, and he +added: "Haven't you attorneys invented a way yet of dodging this damned +income tax? It hits the fixed inherited income like the very deuce. I +used to have two thousand five hundred a year; now I've got a beggarly +fifteen hundred, and the price of living doubled." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" murmured Soames, "the turf's in danger." +</P> + +<P> +Over George's face moved a gleam of sardonic self-defence. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he said, "they brought me up to do nothing, and here I am in +the sere and yellow, getting poorer every day. These Labour chaps mean +to have the lot before they've done. What are you going to do for a +living when it comes? I shall work a six-hour day teaching politicians +how to see a joke. Take my tip, Soames; go into Parliament, make sure +of your four hundred—and employ me." +</P> + +<P> +And, as Soames retired, he resumed his seat in the bay window. +</P> + +<P> +Soames moved along Piccadilly deep in reflections excited by his +cousin's words. He himself had always been a worker and a saver, George +always a drone and a spender; and yet, if confiscation once began, it +was he—the worker and the saver—who would be looted! That was the +negation of all virtue, the overturning of all Forsyte principles. +Could civilisation be built on any other? He did not think so. Well, +they wouldn't confiscate his pictures, for they wouldn't know their +worth. But what would they be worth, if these maniacs once began to +milk capital? A drug on the market. 'I don't care about myself,' he +thought; 'I could live on five hundred a year, and never know the +difference, at my age.' But Fleur! This fortune, so wisely invested, +these treasures so carefully chosen and amassed, were all for her. And +if it should turn out that he couldn't give or leave them to her—well, +life had no meaning, and what was the use of going in to look at this +crazy, futuristic stuff with the view of seeing whether it had any +future? +</P> + +<P> +Arriving at the Gallery off Cork Street, however, he paid his shilling, +picked up a catalogue, and entered. Some ten persons were prowling +round. Soames took steps and came on what looked to him like a +lamp-post bent by collision with a motor omnibus. It was advanced some +three paces from the wall, and was described in his catalogue as +"Jupiter." He examined it with curiosity, having recently turned some +of his attention to sculpture. 'If that's Jupiter,' he thought, 'I +wonder what Juno's like.' And suddenly he saw her, opposite. She +appeared to him like nothing so much as a pump with two handles, +lightly clad in snow. He was still gazing at her, when two of the +prowlers halted on his left. "Epatant!" he heard one say. +</P> + +<P> +"Jargon!" growled Soames to himself. +</P> + +<P> +The other's boyish voice replied: +</P> + +<P> +"Missed it, old bean; he's pulling your leg. When Jove and Juno created +he them, he was saying: 'I'll see how much these fools will swallow.' +And they've lapped up the lot." +</P> + +<P> +"You young duffer! Vospovitch is an innovator. Don't you see that he's +brought satire into sculpture? The future of plastic art, of music, +painting, and even architecture, has set in satiric. It was bound to. +People are tired—the bottom's tumbled out of sentiment." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I'm quite equal to taking a little interest in beauty. I was +through the War. You've dropped your handkerchief, sir." +</P> + +<P> +Soames saw a handkerchief held out in front of him. He took it with +some natural suspicion, and approached it to his nose. It had the right +scent—of distant Eau de Cologne—and his initials in a corner. +Slightly reassured, he raised his eyes to the young man's face. It had +rather fawn-like ears, a laughing mouth, with half a toothbrush growing +out of it on each side, and small lively eyes, above a normally dressed +appearance. +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you," he said; and moved by a sort of irritation, added: "Glad +to hear you like beauty; that's rare, nowadays." +</P> + +<P> +"I dote on it," said the young man; "but you and I are the last of the +old guard, sir." +</P> + +<P> +Soames smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"If you really care for pictures," he said, "here's my card. I can show +you some quite good ones any Sunday, if you're down the river and care +to look in." +</P> + +<P> +"Awfully nice of you, sir. I'll drop in like a bird. My name's +Mont-Michael." And he took off his hat. +</P> + +<P> +Soames, already regretting his impulse, raised his own slightly in +response, with a downward look at the young man's companion, who had a +purple tie, dreadful little slug-like whiskers, and a scornful look—as +if he were a poet! +</P> + +<P> +It was the first indiscretion he had committed for so long that he went +and sat down in an alcove. What had possessed him to give his card to a +rackety young fellow, who went about with a thing like that? And Fleur, +always at the back of his thoughts, started out like a filagree figure +from a clock when the hour strikes. On the screen opposite the alcove +was a large canvas with a great many square tomato-colored blobs on it, +and nothing else, so far as Soames could see from where he sat. He +looked at his catalogue: "No. 32—'The Future Town'—Paul Post." 'I +suppose that's satiric too,' he thought. 'What a thing!' But his second +impulse was more cautious. It did not do to condemn hurriedly. There +had been those stripey, streaky creations of Monet's, which had turned +out such trumps; and then the stippled school; and Gauguin. Why, even +since the Post-Impressionists there had been one or two painters not to +be sneezed at. During the thirty-eight years of his connoisseur's life, +indeed, he had marked so many "movements," seen the tides of taste and +technique so ebb and flow, that there was really no telling anything +except that there was money to be made out of every change of fashion. +This too might quite well be a case where one must subdue primordial +instinct, or lose the market. He got up and stood before the picture, +trying hard to see it with the eyes of other people. Above the tomato +blobs was what he took to be a sunset, till some one passing said: +"He's got the airplanes wonderfully, don't you think!" Below the tomato +blobs was a band of white with vertical black stripes, to which he +could assign no meaning whatever, till some one else came by, +murmuring: "What expression he gets with his foreground!" Expression? +Of what? Soames went back to his seat. The thing was "rich," as his +father would have said, and he wouldn't give a damn for it. Expression! +Ah! they were all Expressionists now, he had heard, on the Continent. +So it was coming here too, was it? He remembered the first wave of +influenza in 1887—or 8—hatched in China, so they said. He wondered +where this—this Expressionism—had been hatched. The thing was a +regular disease! +</P> + +<P> +He had become conscious of a woman and a youth standing between him and +the "Future Town." Their backs were turned; but very suddenly Soames +put his catalogue before his face, and drawing his hat forward, gazed +through the slit between. No mistaking that back, elegant as ever +though the hair above had gone grey. Irene! His divorced wife—Irene! +And this, no doubt, was her son—by that fellow Jolyon Forsyte—their +boy, six months older than his own girl! And mumbling over in his mind +the bitter days of his divorce, he rose to get out of sight, but +quickly sat down again. She had turned her head to speak to her boy; +her profile was still so youthful that it made her grey hair seem +powdery, as if fancy-dressed; and her lips were smiling as Soames, +first possessor of them, had never seen them smile. Grudgingly he +admitted her still beautiful, and in figure almost as young as ever. +And how that boy smiled back at her! Emotion squeezed Soames' heart. +The sight infringed his sense of justice. He grudged her that boy's +smile—it went beyond what Fleur gave him, and it was undeserved. Their +son might have been his son; Fleur might have been her daughter, if she +had kept straight! He lowered his catalogue. If she saw him, all the +better! A reminder of her conduct in the presence of her son, who +probably knew nothing of it, would be a salutary touch from the finger +of that Nemesis which surely must soon or late visit her! Then, +half-conscious that such a thought was extravagant for a Forsyte of his +age, Soames took out his watch. Past four! Fleur was late. She had gone +to his niece Imogen Cardigan's, and there they would keep her smoking +cigarettes and gossiping, and that. He heard the boy laugh, and say +eagerly: "I say, Mum, is this one of Auntie June's lame ducks?" +</P> + +<P> +"Paul Post—I believe it is, darling." +</P> + +<P> +The word produced a little shock in Soames; he had never heard her use +it. And then she saw him. His eyes must have had in them something of +George Forsyte's sardonic look; for her gloved hand crisped the folds +of her frock, her eyebrows rose, her face went stony. She moved on. +</P> + +<P> +"It IS a caution," said the boy, catching her arm again. +</P> + +<P> +Soames stared after them. That boy was good-looking, with a Forsyte +chin, and eyes deep-grey, deep in; but with something sunny, like a +glass of old sherry spilled over him; his smile perhaps, his hair. +Better than they deserved—those two! They passed from his view into +the next room, and Soames continued to regard the Future Town, but saw +it not. A little smile snarled up his lips. He was despising the +vehemence of his own feelings after all these years. Ghosts! And yet as +one grew old—was there anything but what was ghost-like left? Yes, +there was Fleur! He fixed his eyes on the entrance. She was due; but +she would keep him waiting, of course! And suddenly he became aware of +a sort of human breeze—a short, slight form clad in a sea-green +djibbah with a metal belt and a fillet binding unruly red-gold hair all +streaked with grey. She was talking to the Gallery attendants, and +something familiar riveted his gaze—in her eyes, her chin, her hair, +her spirit—something which suggested a thin Skye terrier just before +its dinner. Surely June Forsyte! His cousin June—and coming straight +to his recess! She sat down beside him, deep in thought, took out a +tablet, and made a pencil note. Soames sat unmoving. A confounded thing +cousinship! "Disgusting!" he heard her murmur; then, as if resenting +the presence of an overhearing stranger, she looked at him. The worst +had happened. +</P> + +<P> +"Soames!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames turned his head a very little. +</P> + +<P> +"How are YOU?" he said. "Haven't seen you for twenty years." +</P> + +<P> +"No. Whatever made YOU come here?" +</P> + +<P> +"My sins," said Soames. "What stuff!" +</P> + +<P> +"Stuff? Oh, yes—of course; it hasn't ARRIVED yet." +</P> + +<P> +"It never will," said Soames; "it must be making a dead loss." +</P> + +<P> +"Of course it is." +</P> + +<P> +"How d'you know?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's my Gallery." +</P> + +<P> +Soames sniffed from sheer surprise. +</P> + +<P> +"Yours? What on earth makes you run a show like this?" +</P> + +<P> +"<I>I</I> don't treat Art as if it were grocery." +</P> + +<P> +Soames pointed to the Future Town. "Look at that! Who's going to live +in a town like that, or with it on his walls?" +</P> + +<P> +June contemplated the picture for a moment. "It's a vision," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"The deuce!" +</P> + +<P> +There was silence, then June rose. 'Crazy-looking creature!' he thought. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he said, "you'll find your young stepbrother here with a woman +I used to know. If you take my advice, you'll close this exhibition." +</P> + +<P> +June looked back at him. "Oh! You Forsyte!" she said, and moved on. +About her light, fly-away figure, passing so suddenly away, was a look +of dangerous decisions. Forsyte! Of course, he was a Forsyte! And so +was she! But from the time when, as a mere girl, she brought Bosinney +into his life to wreck it, he had never hit it off with June—and never +would! And here she was, unmarried to this day, owning a Gallery!... +And suddenly it came to Soames how little he knew now of his own +family. The old aunts at Timothy's had been dead so many years; there +was no clearing-house for news. What had they all done in the War? +Young Roger's boy had been wounded, St. John Hayman's second son +killed; young Nicholas' eldest had got an O. B. E., or whatever they +gave them. They had all joined up somehow, he believed. That boy of +Jolyon's and Irene's, he supposed, had been too young; his own +generation, of course, too old, though Giles Hayman had driven a car +for the Red Cross—and Jesse Hayman been a special constable—those +"Dromios" had always been of a sporting type! As for himself, he had +given a motor ambulance, read the papers till he was sick of them, +passed through much anxiety, invested in War Bonds, bought no clothes, +lost seven pounds in weight; he didn't know what more he could have +done at his age. Indeed, it struck him that he and his family had taken +this war very differently to that affair with the Boers, which had been +supposed to tax all the resources of the Empire. In that old war, of +course, his nephew Val Dartie had been wounded, that fellow Jolyon's +first son had died of enteric, "the Dromios" had gone out on horses, +and June had been a nurse; but all that had seemed in the nature of a +portent, while in THIS war everybody had done "their bit," so far as he +could make out, as a matter of course. It seemed to show the growth of +something or other—or perhaps the decline of something else. Had the +Forsytes become less individual, or more Imperial, or less provincial? +Or was it simply that one hated Germans?... Why didn't Fleur come, so +that he could get away? He saw those three return together from the +other room and pass back along the far side of the screen. The boy was +standing before the Juno now. And, suddenly, on the other side of her, +Soames saw—his daughter with eyebrows raised, as well they might be. +He could see her eyes glint sideways at the boy, and the boy look back +at her. Then Irene slipped her hand through his arm, and drew him on. +Soames saw him glancing round, and Fleur looking after them as the +three went out. +</P> + +<P> +A voice said cheerfully: "Bit thick, isn't it, sir?" +</P> + +<P> +The young man who had handed him his handkerchief was again passing. +Soames nodded. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know what we're coming to." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! That's all right, sir," answered the young man cheerfully; "they +don't either." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur's voice said, precisely as if he had been keeping her waiting: +</P> + +<P> +"Hallo, Father! There you are!" +</P> + +<P> +The young man, snatching off his hat, passed on. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Soames, looking her up and down, "you're a punctual sort +of young woman!" +</P> + +<P> +This treasured possession of his life was of medium height and color, +with short, dark-chestnut hair; her wide-apart brown eyes were set in +whites so clear that they glinted when they moved, and yet in repose +were almost dreamy under very white, black-lashed lids, held over them +in a sort of suspense. She had a charming profile, and nothing of her +father in her face save a decided chin. Aware that his expression was +softening as he looked at her, Soames frowned to preserve the +unemotionalism proper to a Forsyte. He knew she was only too inclined +to take advantage of his weakness. +</P> + +<P> +Slipping her hand under his arm, she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Who was that?" +</P> + +<P> +"He picked up my handkerchief. We talked about the pictures." +</P> + +<P> +"You're not going to buy THAT, Father?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Soames grimly; "nor that Juno you've been looking at." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur dragged at his arm. "Oh! Let's go! It's a ghastly show." +</P> + +<P> +In the doorway they passed the young man called Mont and his partner. +But Soames had hung out a board marked "Trespassers will be +prosecuted," and he barely acknowledged the young fellow's salute. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he said in the street, "whom did you meet at Imogen's?" +</P> + +<P> +"Aunt Winifred, and that Monsieur Profond." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" muttered Soames; "that chap! What does your aunt see in him?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know. He looks pretty deep—mother says she likes him." +</P> + +<P> +Soames grunted. +</P> + +<P> +"Cousin Val and his wife were there, too." +</P> + +<P> +"What!" said Soames. "I thought they were back in South Africa." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no! They've sold their farm. Cousin Val is going to train +race-horses on the Sussex Downs. They've got a jolly old manor-house; +they asked me down there." +</P> + +<P> +Soames coughed: the news was distasteful to him. "What's his wife like +now?" +</P> + +<P> +"Very quiet, but nice, I think." +</P> + +<P> +Soames coughed again. "He's a rackety chap, your cousin Val." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! no, Father; they're awfully devoted. I promised to go—Saturday to +Wednesday next." +</P> + +<P> +"Training race-horses!" said Soames. It was bad enough, but not the +reason for his distaste. Why the deuce couldn't his nephew have stayed +out in South Africa? His own divorce had been bad enough, without his +nephew's marriage to the daughter of the co-respondent; a half-sister +too of June, and of that boy whom Fleur had just been looking at from +under the pump-handle. If he didn't look out, Fleur would come to know +all about that old disgrace! Unpleasant things! They were round him +this afternoon like a swarm of bees! +</P> + +<P> +"I don't like it!" he said. +</P> + +<P> +"I want to see the race-horses," murmured Fleur; "and they've promised +I shall ride. Cousin Val can't walk much, you know; but he can ride +perfectly. He's going to show me their gallops." +</P> + +<P> +"Racing!" said Soames. "It's a pity the War didn't knock that on the +head. He's taking after his father, I'm afraid." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know anything about his father." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Soames grimly. "He took an interest in horses and broke his +neck in Paris, walking down-stairs. Good riddance for your aunt." He +frowned, recollecting the inquiry into those stairs which he had +attended in Paris six years ago, because Montague Dartie could not +attend it himself—perfectly normal stairs in a house where they played +baccarat. Either his winnings or the way he had celebrated them had +gone to his brother-in-law's head. The French procedure had been very +loose; he had had a lot of trouble with it. +</P> + +<P> +A sound from Fleur distracted his attention. "Look! The people who were +in the Gallery with us." +</P> + +<P> +"What people?" muttered Soames, who knew perfectly well. +</P> + +<P> +"I think that woman's beautiful." +</P> + +<P> +"Come into this pastry-cook's," said Soames abruptly, and tightening +his grip on her arm, he turned into a confectioner's. It was—for +him—a surprising thing to do, and he said rather anxiously: "What will +you have?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! I don't want anything. I had a cocktail and a tremendous lunch." +</P> + +<P> +"We MUST have something now we're here," muttered Soames, keeping hold +of her arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Two teas," he said; "and two of those nougat things." +</P> + +<P> +But no sooner was his body seated than his soul sprang up. Those +three—those three were coming in! He heard Irene say something to her +boy, and his answer: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! no, Mum; this place is all right. My stunt." And the three sat +down. +</P> + +<P> +At that moment, most awkward of his existence, crowded with ghosts and +shadows from his past, in presence of the only two women he had ever +loved—his divorced wife and his daughter by her successor—Soames was +not so much afraid of THEM as of his cousin June. She might make a +scene—she might introduce those two children—she was capable of +anything. He bit too hastily at the nougat, and it stuck to his plate. +Working at it with his finger, he glanced at Fleur. She was masticating +dreamily, but her eyes were on the boy. The Forsyte in him said: +"Think, feel, and you're done for!" And he wiggled his finger +desperately. Plate! Did Jolyon wear a plate? Did that woman wear a +plate? Time had been when he had seen her wearing nothing! That was +something, anyway, which had never been stolen from him. And she knew +it, though she might sit there calm and self-possessed, as if she had +never been his wife. An acid humor stirred in his Forsyte blood; a +subtle pain divided by hair's-breadth from pleasure. If only June did +not suddenly bring her hornets about his ears! The boy was talking. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, Auntie June,"—so he called his half-sister "Auntie," did +he?—well, she must be fifty, if she was a day!—"it's jolly good of +you to encourage them. Only—hang it all!" Soames stole a glance. +Irene's startled eyes were bent watchfully on her boy. She—she had +these devotions—for Bosinney—for that boy's father—for this boy! He +touched Fleur's arm, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, have you had enough?" +</P> + +<P> +"One more, Father, please." +</P> + +<P> +She would be sick! He went to the counter to pay. When he turned round +again he saw Fleur standing near the door, holding a handkerchief which +the boy had evidently just handed to her. +</P> + +<P> +"F.F.," he heard her say. "Fleur Forsyte—it's mine all right. Thank +you ever so." +</P> + +<P> +Good God! She had caught the trick from what he'd told her in the +Gallery—monkey! +</P> + +<P> +"Forsyte? Why—that's my name too. Perhaps we're cousins." +</P> + +<P> +"Really! We must be. There aren't any others. I live at Mapledurham; +where do you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Robin Hill." +</P> + +<P> +Question and answer had been so rapid that all was over before he could +lift a finger. He saw Irene's face alive with startled feeling, gave +the slightest shake of his head, and slipped his arm through Fleur's. +</P> + +<P> +"Come along!" he said. +</P> + +<P> +She did not move. +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't you hear, Father? Isn't it queer—our name's the same. Are we +cousins?" +</P> + +<P> +"What's that?" he said. "Forsyte? Distant, perhaps." +</P> + +<P> +"My name's Jolyon, sir. Jon, for short." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! Ah!" said Soames. "Yes. Distant. How are you? Very good of you. +Good-bye!" +</P> + +<P> +He moved on. +</P> + +<P> +"Thanks awfully," Fleur was saying. "Au revoir!" +</P> + +<P> +"Au revoir!" he heard the boy reply. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0102"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FINE FLEUR FORSYTE +</H3> + +<P> +Emerging from the "pastry-cook's," Soames' first impulse was to vent +his nerves by saying to his daughter: "Dropping your handkerchief!" to +which her reply might well be: "I picked that up from you!" His second +impulse therefore was to let sleeping dogs lie. But she would surely +question him. He gave her a sidelong look, and found she was giving him +the same. She said softly: +</P> + +<P> +"Why don't you like those cousins, Father?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames lifted the corner of his lip. +</P> + +<P> +"What made you think that?" +</P> + +<P> +"Cela se voit." +</P> + +<P> +'That sees itself!' What a way of putting it! +</P> + +<P> +After twenty years of a French wife Soames had still little sympathy +with her language; a theatrical affair and connected in his mind with +all the refinements of domestic irony. +</P> + +<P> +"How?" he asked. +</P> + +<P> +"You MUST know them; and you didn't make a sign. I saw them looking at +you." +</P> + +<P> +"I've never seen the boy in my life," replied Soames with perfect truth. +</P> + +<P> +"No; but you've seen the others, dear." +</P> + +<P> +Soames gave her another look. What had she picked up? Had her Aunt +Winifred, or Imogen, or Val Dartie and his wife, been talking? Every +breath of the old scandal had been carefully kept from her at home, and +Winifred warned many times that he wouldn't have a whisper of it reach +her for the world. So far as she ought to know, he had never been +married before. But her dark eyes, whose southern glint and clearness +often almost frightened him, met his with perfect innocence. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he said, "your grandfather and his brother had a quarrel. The +two families don't know each other." +</P> + +<P> +"How romantic!" +</P> + +<P> +'Now, what does she mean by that?' he thought. The word was to him +extravagant and dangerous—it was as if she had said: "How jolly!" +</P> + +<P> +"And they'll continue not to know each other," he added, but instantly +regretted the challenge in those words. Fleur was smiling. In this age, +when young people prided themselves on going their own ways and paying +no attention to any sort of decent prejudice, he had said the very +thing to excite her wilfulness. Then, recollecting the expression on +Irene's face, he breathed again. +</P> + +<P> +"What sort of a quarrel?" he heard Fleur say. +</P> + +<P> +"About a house. It's ancient history for you. Your grandfather died the +day you were born. He was ninety." +</P> + +<P> +"Ninety? Are there many Forsytes besides those in the Red Book?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know," said Soames. "They're all dispersed now. The old ones +are dead, except Timothy." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur clasped her hands. +</P> + +<P> +"Timothy? Isn't that delicious?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not at all," said Soames. It offended him that she should think +"Timothy" delicious—a kind of insult to his breed. This new generation +mocked at anything solid and tenacious. "You go and see the old boy. He +might want to prophesy." Ah! If Timothy could see the disquiet England +of his greatnephews and greatnieces, he would certainly give tongue. +And involuntarily he glanced up at the Iseeum; yes—George was still in +the window, with the same pink paper in his hand. +</P> + +<P> +"Where is Robin Hill, Father?" +</P> + +<P> +Robin Hill! Robin Hill, round which all that tragedy had centred! What +did she want to know for? +</P> + +<P> +"In Surrey," he muttered; "not far from Richmond, Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"Is the house there?" +</P> + +<P> +"What house?" +</P> + +<P> +"That they quarrelled about." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. But what's all that to do with you? We're going home +to-morrow—you'd better be thinking about your frocks." +</P> + +<P> +"Bless you! They're all thought about. A family feud? It's like the +Bible, or Mark Twain—awfully exciting. What did YOU do in the feud, +Father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Never you mind." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! But if I'm to keep it up?" +</P> + +<P> +"Who said you were to keep it up?" +</P> + +<P> +"You, darling." +</P> + +<P> +"I? I said it had nothing to do with you." +</P> + +<P> +"Just what <I>I</I> think, you know; so that's all right." +</P> + +<P> +She was too sharp for him; FINE, as Annette sometimes called her. +Nothing for it but to distract her attention. +</P> + +<P> +"There's a bit of rosaline point in here," he said, stopping before a +shop, "that I thought you might like." +</P> + +<P> +When he had paid for it and they had resumed their progress, Fleur said: +</P> + +<P> +"Don't you think that boy's mother is the most beautiful woman of her +age you've ever seen?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames shivered. Uncanny, the way she stuck to it! +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know that I noticed her." +</P> + +<P> +"Dear, I saw the corner of your eye." +</P> + +<P> +"You see everything—and a great deal more, it seems to me!" +</P> + +<P> +"What's her husband like? He must be your first cousin, if your fathers +were brothers." +</P> + +<P> +"Dead, for all I know," said Soames, with sudden vehemence. "I haven't +seen him for twenty years." +</P> + +<P> +"What was he?" +</P> + +<P> +"A painter." +</P> + +<P> +"That's quite jolly." +</P> + +<P> +The words: "If you want to please me you'll put those people out of +your head," sprang to Soames's lips, but he choked them back—he must +NOT let her see his feelings. +</P> + +<P> +"He once insulted me," he said. +</P> + +<P> +Her quick eyes rested on his face. +</P> + +<P> +"I see! You didn't avenge it, and it rankles. Poor Father! You let me +have a go!" +</P> + +<P> +It was really like lying in the dark with a mosquito hovering above his +face. Such pertinacity in Fleur was new to him, and, as they reached +the hotel, he said grimly: +</P> + +<P> +"I did my best. And that's enough about these people. I'm going up till +dinner." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall sit here." +</P> + +<P> +With a parting look at her extended in a chair—a look half-resentful, +half-adoring—Soames moved into the lift and was transported to their +suite on the fourth floor. He stood by the window of the sitting-room +which gave view over Hyde Park, and drummed a finger on its pane. His +feelings were confused, tetchy, troubled. The throb of that old wound, +scarred over by Time and new interests, was mingled with displeasure +and anxiety, and a slight pain in his chest where that nougat stuff had +disagreed. Had Annette come in? Not that she was any good to him in +such a difficulty. Whenever she had questioned him about his first +marriage, he had always shut her up; she knew nothing of it, save that +it had been the great passion of his life, and his marriage with +herself but domestic makeshift. She had always kept the grudge of that +up her sleeve, as it were, and used it commercially. He listened. A +sound—the vague murmur of a woman's movements—was coming through the +door. She was in. He tapped. +</P> + +<P> +"Who?" +</P> + +<P> +"I," said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +She had been changing her frock, and was still imperfectly clothed; a +striking figure before her glass. There was a certain magnificence +about her arms, shoulders, hair, which had darkened since he first knew +her, about the turn of her neck, the silkiness of her garments, her +dark-lashed, grey-blue eyes—she was certainly as handsome at forty as +she had ever been. A fine possession, an excellent housekeeper, a +sensible and affectionate enough mother. If only she weren't always so +frankly cynical about the relations between them! Soames, who had no +more real affection for her than she had for him, suffered from a kind +of English grievance, in that she had never dropped even the thinnest +veil of sentiment over their partnership. Like most of his countrymen +and women, he held the view that marriage should be based on mutual +love, but that when from a marriage love had disappeared, or been found +never to have really existed—so that it was manifestly not based on +love—you must not admit it. There it was, and the love was not—but +there you were, and must continue to be! Thus you had it both ways, and +were not tarred with cynicism, realism, and immorality, like the +French. Moreover, it was necessary in the interests of propriety. He +knew that she knew that they both knew there was no love between them, +but he still expected her not to admit in words or conduct such a +thing, and he could never understand what she meant when she talked of +the hypocrisy of the English. He said: +</P> + +<P> +"Whom have you got at 'The Shelter' next week?" +</P> + +<P> +Annette went on touching her lips delicately with salve—he always +wished she wouldn't do that. +</P> + +<P> +"Your sister Winifred, and the Car-r-digans"—she took up a tiny stick +of black—"and Prosper Profond." +</P> + +<P> +"That Belgian chap? Why him?" +</P> + +<P> +Annette turned her neck lazily, touched one eyelash, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"He amuses Winifred." +</P> + +<P> +"I want some one to amuse Fleur; she's restive." +</P> + +<P> +"R-restive?" repeated Annette. "Is it the first time you see that, my +friend? She was born r-restive, as you call it." +</P> + +<P> +Would she never get that affected roll out of her r's? +</P> + +<P> +He touched the dress she had taken off, and asked: +</P> + +<P> +"What have you been doing?" +</P> + +<P> +Annette looked at him, reflected in her glass. Her just-brightened lips +smiled, rather full, rather ironical. +</P> + +<P> +"Enjoying myself," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" answered Soames glumly. "Ribbandry, I suppose." +</P> + +<P> +It was his word for all that incomprehensible running in and out of +shops that women went in for. "Has Fleur got her summer dresses?" +</P> + +<P> +"You don't ask if I have mine." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't care whether I do or not." +</P> + +<P> +"Quite right. Well, she has; and I have mine—terribly expensive." +</P> + +<P> +"H'm!" said Soames. "What does that chap Profond do in England?" +</P> + +<P> +Annette raised the eyebrows she had just finished. +</P> + +<P> +"He yachts." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" said Soames; "he's a sleepy chap." +</P> + +<P> +"Sometimes," answered Annette, and her face had a sort of quiet +enjoyment. "But sometimes very amusing." +</P> + +<P> +"He's got a touch of the tar-brush about him." +</P> + +<P> +Annette stretched herself. +</P> + +<P> +"Tar-brush?" she said; "what is that? His mother was Armenienne." +</P> + +<P> +"That's it, then," muttered Soames. "Does he know anything about +pictures?" +</P> + +<P> +"He knows about everything—a man of the world." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, get some one for Fleur. I want to distract her. She's going off +on Saturday to Val Dartie and his wife; I don't like it." +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" +</P> + +<P> +Since the reason could not be explained without going into family +history, Soames merely answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Racketing about. There's too much of it." +</P> + +<P> +"I like that little Mrs. Val; she is very quiet and clever." +</P> + +<P> +"I know nothing of her except—This thing's new." And Soames took up a +creation from the bed. +</P> + +<P> +Annette received it from him. +</P> + +<P> +"Would you hook me?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +Soames hooked. Glancing once over her shoulder into the glass, he saw +the expression on her face, faintly amused, faintly contemptuous, as +much as to say: 'Thanks! You will never learn!' No, thank God, he +wasn't a Frenchman! He finished with a jerk, and the words: +</P> + +<P> +"It's too low here." And he went to the door, with the wish to get away +from her and go down to Fleur again. +</P> + +<P> +Annette stayed a powder-puff, and said with startling suddenness: +</P> + +<P> +"Que tu es grossier!" +</P> + +<P> +He knew the expression—he had reason to. The first time she had used +it he had thought it meant "What a grocer you are!" and had not known +whether to be relieved or not when better informed. He resented the +word—he was NOT coarse! If he was coarse, what was that chap in the +room beyond his, who made those horrible noises in the morning when he +cleared his throat, or those people in the Lounge who thought it +well-bred to say nothing but what the whole world could hear at the top +of their voices—quacking inanity! Coarse, because he had said her +dress was low! Well, so it was! He went out without reply. +</P> + +<P> +Coming into the Lounge from the far end, he at once saw Fleur where he +had left her. She sat with crossed knees, slowly balancing a foot in +silk stocking and grey shoe, sure sign that she was dreaming. Her eyes +showed it too—they went off like that sometimes. And then, in a +moment, she would come to life, and be as quick and restless as a +monkey. And she knew so much, so self-assured, and not yet nineteen. +What was that odious word? Flapper! Dreadful young creatures—squealing +and squawking and showing their legs! The worst of them bad dreams, the +best of them powdered angels! Fleur was NOT a flapper, NOT one of those +slangy, ill-bred young females. And yet she was frighteningly +self-willed, and full of life, and determined to enjoy it. Enjoy! The +word brought no puritan terror to Soames; but it brought the terror +suited to his temperament. He had always been afraid to enjoy to-day +for fear he might not enjoy to-morrow so much. And it was terrifying to +feel that his daughter was divested of that safeguard. The very way she +sat in that chair showed it—lost in her dream. He had never been lost +in a dream himself—there was nothing to be had out of it; and where +she got it from he did not know! Certainly not from Annette! And yet +Annette, as a young girl, when he was hanging about her, had once had a +flowery look. Well, she had lost it now! +</P> + +<P> +Fleur rose from her chair—swiftly, restlessly, and flung herself down +at a writing-table. Seizing ink and writing-paper, she began to write +as if she had not time to breathe before she got her letter written. +And suddenly she saw him. The air of desperate absorption vanished, she +smiled, waved a kiss, made a pretty face as if she were a little +puzzled and a little bored. +</P> + +<P> +Ah! She was "fine"—"fine!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0103"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +AT ROBIN HILL +</H3> + +<P> +Jolyon Forsyte had spent his boy's nineteenth birthday at Robin Hill, +quietly going into his affairs. He did everything quietly now, because +his heart was in a poor way, and, like all his family, he disliked the +idea of dying. He had never realised how much till one day, two years +ago, he had gone to his doctor about certain symptoms, and been told: +</P> + +<P> +"At any moment, on any overstrain." +</P> + +<P> +He had taken it with a smile—the natural Forsyte reaction against an +unpleasant truth. But with an increase of symptoms in the train on the +way home, he had realised to the full the sentence hanging over him. To +leave Irene, his boy, his home, his work—though he did little enough +work now! To leave them for unknown darkness, for the unimaginable +state, for such nothingness that he would not even be conscious of wind +stirring leaves above his grave, nor of the scent of earth and grass. +Of such nothingness that, however hard he might try to conceive it, he +never could, and must still hover on the hope that he might see again +those he loved! To realise this was to endure very poignant spiritual +anguish. Before he reached home that day, he had determined to keep it +from Irene. He would have to be more careful than man had ever been, +for the least thing would give it away and make her as wretched as +himself, almost. His doctor had passed him sound in other respects, and +seventy was nothing of an age—he would last a long time yet, IF HE +COULD! +</P> + +<P> +Such a conclusion, followed out for nearly two years, develops to the +full the subtler side of character. Naturally not abrupt, except when +nervously excited, Jolyon had become control incarnate. The sad +patience of old people who cannot exert themselves was masked by a +smile which his lips preserved even in private. He devised continually +all manner of cover to conceal his enforced lack of exertion. Mocking +himself for so doing, he counterfeited conversion to the Simple Life; +gave up wine and cigars, drank a special kind of coffee with no coffee +in it. In short, he made himself as safe as a Forsyte in his condition +could, under the rose of his mild irony. Secure from discovery, since +his wife and son had gone up to Town, he had spent the fine May day +quietly arranging his papers, that he might die to-morrow without +inconveniencing any one, giving in fact a final polish to his +terrestrial state. Having docketed and enclosed it in his father's old +Chinese cabinet, he put the key into an envelope, wrote the words +outside: "Key of the Chinese cabinet, wherein will be found the exact +state of me. J.F.," and put it in his breast-pocket, where it would be, +always about him, in case of accident. Then, ringing for tea, he went +out to have it under the old oak-tree. +</P> + +<P> +All are under sentence of death; Jolyon, whose sentence was but a +little more precise and pressing, had become so used to it, that he +thought habitually, like other people, of other things. He thought of +his son now. +</P> + +<P> +Jon was nineteen that day, and Jon had come of late to a decision. +Educated neither at Eton like his father, nor at Harrow, like his dead +half-brother, but at one of those establishments which, designed to +avoid the evil and contain the good of the Public School system, may or +may not contain the evil and avoid the good, Jon had left in April +perfectly ignorant of what he wanted to become. The War, which had +promised to go on for ever, had ended just as he was about to join the +army, six months before his time. It had taken him ever since to get +used to the idea that he could now choose for himself. He had held with +his father several discussions, from which, under a cheery show of +being ready for anything—except, of course, the Church, Army, Law, +Stage, Stock Exchange, Medicine, Business, and Engineering—Jolyon had +gathered rather clearly that Jon wanted to go in for nothing. He +himself had felt exactly like that at the same age. With him that +pleasant vacuity had soon been ended by an early marriage, and its +unhappy consequences. Forced to become an underwriter at Lloyd's he had +regained prosperity before his artistic talent had outcropped. But +having—as the simple say—"learned" his boy to draw pigs and other +animals, he knew that Jon would never be a painter, and inclined to the +conclusion that his aversion from everything else meant that he was +going to be a writer. Holding, however, the view that experience was +necessary even for that profession, there seemed to Jolyon nothing in +the meantime, for Jon, but University, travel, and perhaps the eating +of dinners for the Bar. After that one would see, or more probably one +would not. In face of these proffered allurements, however, Jon had +remained undecided. +</P> + +<P> +Such discussions with his son had confirmed in Jolyon a doubt whether +the world had really changed. People said that it was a new age. With +the profundity of one not too long for any age, Jolyon perceived that +under slightly different surfaces, the era was precisely what it had +been. Mankind was still divided into two species: The few who had +"speculation" in their souls, and the many who had none, with a belt of +hybrids like himself in the middle. Jon appeared to have speculation; +it seemed to his father a bad lookout. +</P> + +<P> +With something deeper, therefore, than his usual smile, he had heard +the boy say, a fortnight ago: "I should like to try farming, Dad; if it +won't cost you too much. It seems to be about the only sort of life +that doesn't hurt anybody; except art, and of course that's out of the +question for me." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon subdued his smile, and answered: +</P> + +<P> +"All right; you shall skip back to where we were under the first Jolyon +in 1760. It'll prove the cycle theory, and incidentally, no doubt, you +may grow a better turnip than he did." +</P> + +<P> +A little dashed, Jon had answered: +</P> + +<P> +"But don't you think it's a good scheme, Dad?" +</P> + +<P> +"Twill serve, my dear; and if you should really take to it, you'll do +more good than most men, which is little enough." +</P> + +<P> +To himself, however, he had said: "But he won't take to it. I give him +four years. Still, it's healthy, and harmless." +</P> + +<P> +After turning the matter over and consulting with Irene, he wrote to +his daughter Mrs. Val Dortie, asking if they knew of a farmer near them +on the Downs who would take Jon as an apprentice. Holly's answer had +been enthusiastic. There was an excellent man quite close; she and Val +would love Jon to live with them. +</P> + +<P> +The boy was due to go to-morrow. +</P> + +<P> +Sipping weak tea with lemon in it, Jolyon gazed through the leaves of +the old oak-tree at that view which had appeared to him desirable for +thirty-two years. The tree beneath which he sat seemed not a day older! +So young, the little leaves of brownish gold; so old, the +whitey-grey-green of its thick rough trunk, A tree of memories, which +would live on hundreds of years yet, unless some barbarian cut it +down—would see old England out at the pace things were going! He +remembered a night three years before, when, looking from his window, +with his arm close round Irene, he had watched a German aeroplane +hovering, it seemed, right over the old tree. Next day they had found a +bomb hole in a field on Gage's farm. That was before he knew that he +was under sentence of death. He could almost have wished the bomb had +finished him. It would have saved a lot of hanging about, many hours of +cold fear in the pit of his stomach. He had counted on living to the +normal Forsyte age of eighty-five or more, when Irene would be seventy. +As it was, she would miss him. Still there was Jon, more important in +her life than himself; Jon, who adored his mother. +</P> + +<P> +Under that tree, where old Jolyon—waiting for Irene to come to him +across the lawn—had breathed his last, Jolyon wondered, whimsically, +whether, having put everything in such perfect order, he had not better +close his own eyes and drift away. There was something undignified in +parasitically clinging on to the effortless close of a life wherein he +regretted two things only—the long division between his father and +himself when he was young, and the lateness of his union with Irene. +</P> + +<P> +From where he sat he could see a cluster of apple-trees in blossom. +Nothing in Nature moved him so much as fruit-trees in blossom; and his +heart ached suddenly because he might never see them flower again. +Spring! Decidedly no man ought to have to die while his heart was still +young enough to love beauty! Blackbirds sang recklessly in the +shrubbery, swallows were flying high, the leaves above him glistened; +and over the fields was every imaginable tint of early foliage, +burnished by the level sunlight, away to where the distant 'smoke-bush' +blue was trailed along the horizon. Irene's flowers in their narrow +beds had startling individuality that evening, little deep assertions +of gay life. Only Chinese and Japanese painters, and perhaps Leonardo, +had known how to get that startling little ego into each painted +flower, and bird, and beast—the ego, yet the sense of species, the +universality of life as well. They were the fellows! 'I've made nothing +that will live!' thought Jolyon; 'I've been an amateur—a mere lover, +not a creator. Still, I shall leave Jon behind me when I go.' What luck +that the boy had not been caught by that ghastly war! He might so +easily have been killed, like poor Jolly twenty years ago out in the +Transvaal. Jon would do something some day—if the Age didn't spoil +him—an imaginative chap! His whim to take up farming was but a bit of +sentiment, and about as likely to last. And just then he saw them +coming up the field: Irene and the boy, walking from the station, with +their arms linked. And, getting up, he strolled down through the new +rose garden to meet them.... +</P> + +<P> +Irene came into his room that night and sat down by the window. She sat +there without speaking till he said: +</P> + +<P> +"What is it, my love?" +</P> + +<P> +"We had an encounter to-day." +</P> + +<P> +"With whom?" +</P> + +<P> +"Soames." +</P> + +<P> +Soames! He had kept that name out of his thoughts these last two years; +conscious that it was bad for him. And, now, his heart moved in a +disconcerting manner, as if it had side-slipped within his chest. +</P> + +<P> +Irene went on quietly: +</P> + +<P> +"He and his daughter were in the Gallery, and afterwards at the +confectioner's where we had tea." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon went over and put his hand on her shoulder. +</P> + +<P> +"How did he look?" +</P> + +<P> +"Grey; but otherwise much the same." +</P> + +<P> +"And the daughter?" +</P> + +<P> +"Pretty. At least, Jon thought so." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon's heart side-slipped again. His wife's face had a strained and +puzzled look. +</P> + +<P> +"You didn't—?" he began. +</P> + +<P> +"No; but Jon knows their name. The girl dropped her handkerchief and he +picked it up." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon sat down on his bed. An evil chance! +</P> + +<P> +"June was with you. Did she put her foot into it?" +</P> + +<P> +"No; but it was all very queer and strained, and Jon could see it was." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon drew a long breath, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"I've often wondered whether we've been right to keep it from him. +He'll find out some day." +</P> + +<P> +"The later the better, Jolyon; the young have such cheap, hard +judgment. When you were nineteen what would you have thought of YOUR +mother if she had done what I have?" Yes! There it was! Jon worshipped +his mother; and knew nothing of the tragedies, the inexorable +necessities of life, nothing of the prisoned grief in an unhappy +marriage, nothing of jealousy, or passion—knew nothing at all, as yet! +</P> + +<P> +"What have you told him?" he said at last. +</P> + +<P> +"That they were relations, but we didn't know them; that you had never +cared much for your family, or they for you. I expect he will be asking +YOU." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon smiled. "This promises to take the place of air-raids," he said. +"After all, one misses them." +</P> + +<P> +Irene looked up at him. +</P> + +<P> +"We've known it would come some day." +</P> + +<P> +He answered her with sudden energy: +</P> + +<P> +"I could never stand seeing Jon blame you. He shan't do that, even in +thought. He has imagination; and he'll understand if it's put to him +properly. I think I had better tell him before he gets to know +otherwise." +</P> + +<P> +"Not yet, Jolyon." +</P> + +<P> +That was like her—she had no foresight, and never went to meet +trouble. Still—who knew?—she might be right. It was ill going against +a mother's instinct. It might be well to let the boy go on, if +possible, till experience had given him some touchstone by which he +could judge the values of that old tragedy; till love, jealousy, +longing, had deepened his charity. All the same, one must take +precautions—every precaution possible! And, long after Irene had left +him, he lay awake turning over those precautions. He must write to +Holly, telling her that Jon knew nothing as yet of family history. +Holly was discreet, she would make sure of her husband, she would see +to it! Jon could take the letter with him when he went to-morrow. +</P> + +<P> +And so the day on which he had put the polish on his material estate +died out with the chiming of the stable clock; and another began for +Jolyon in the shadow of a spiritual disorder which could not be so +rounded off and polished.... +</P> + +<P> +But Jon, whose room had once been his day nursery, lay awake too, the +prey of a sensation disputed by those who have never known it, "love at +first sight!" He had felt it beginning in him with the glint of those +dark eyes gazing into his athwart the Juno—a conviction that this was +his 'dream'; so that what followed had seemed to him at once natural +and miraculous. Fleur! Her name alone was almost enough for one who was +terribly susceptible to the charm of words. In a homoeopathic age, when +boys and girls were coeducated, and mixed up in early life till sex was +almost abolished, Jon was singularly old-fashioned. His modern school +took boys only, and his holidays had been spent at Robin Hill with boy +friends, or his parents alone. He had never, therefore, been inoculated +against the germs of love by small doses of the poison. And now in the +dark his temperature was mounting fast. He lay awake, featuring +Fleur—as they called it—recalling her words, especially that "Au +revoir!" so soft and sprightly. +</P> + +<P> +He was still so wide-awake at dawn that he got up, slipped on tennis +shoes, trousers, and a sweater, and in silence crept down-stairs and +out through the study window. It was just light; there was a smell of +grass. 'Fleur!' he thought; 'Fleur!' It was mysteriously white +out-of-doors, with nothing awake except the birds just beginning to +chirp. 'I'll go down into the coppice,' he thought. He ran down through +the fields, reached the pond just as the sun rose, and passed into the +coppice. Bluebells carpeted the ground there; among the larch-trees +there was mystery—the air, as it were, composed of that romantic +quality. Jon sniffed its freshness, and stared at the bluebells in the +sharpening light. Fleur! It rhymed with her! And she lived at +Mapledurham—a jolly name, too, on the river somewhere. He could find +it in the atlas presently. He would write to her. But would she answer? +Oh! She must. She had said "Au revoir!" Not good-bye! What luck that +she had dropped her handkerchief. He would never have known her but for +that. And the more he thought of that handkerchief, the more amazing +his luck seemed. Fleur! It certainly rhymed with her! Rhythm thronged +his head; words jostled to be joined together; he was on the verge of a +poem. +</P> + +<P> +Jon remained in this condition for more than half an hour, then +returned to the house, and getting a ladder, climbed in at his bedroom +window out of sheer exhilaration. Then, remembering that the study +window was open, he went down and shut it, first removing the ladder, +so as to obliterate all traces of his feeling. The thing was too deep +to be revealed to mortal soul—even to his mother. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0104"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE MAUSOLEUM +</H3> + +<P> +There are houses whose souls have passed into the limbo of Time, +leaving their bodies in the limbo of London. Such was not quite the +condition of "Timothy's" on the Bayswater Road, for Timothy's soul +still had one foot in Timothy Forsyte's body, and Smither kept the +atmosphere unchanging, of camphor and port wine and house whose windows +are only opened to air it twice a day. +</P> + +<P> +To Forsyte imagination that house was now a sort of Chinese pill-box, a +series of layers in the last of which was Timothy. One did not reach +him, or so it was reported by members of the family who, out of +old-time habit or absent-mindedness, would drive up once in a blue moon +and ask after their surviving uncle. Such were Francie, now quite +emancipated from God (she frankly avowed atheism), Euphemia, +emancipated from old Nicholas, and Winifred Dartie from her "man of the +world." But, after all, everybody was emancipated now, or said they +were—perhaps not quite the same thing! +</P> + +<P> +When Soames, therefore, took it on his way to Paddington station on the +morning after that encounter, it was hardly with the expectation of +seeing Timothy in the flesh. His heart made a faint demonstration +within him while he stood in full south sunlight on the newly whitened +doorstep of that little house where four Forsytes had once lived, and +now but one dwelt on like a winter fly; the house into which Soames had +come and out of which he had gone times without number, divested of, or +burdened with, fardels of family gossip; the house of the "old people" +of another century, another age. +</P> + +<P> +The sight of Smither—still corseted up to the armpits because the new +fashion which came in as they were going out about 1903 had never been +considered "nice" by Aunts Juley and Hester—brought a pale +friendliness to Soames's lips; Smither, still faithfully arranged to +old pattern in every detail, an invaluable servant—none such +left—smiling back at him, with the words: "Why! it's Mr. Soames, after +all this time! And how are YOU, sir? Mr. Timothy will be so pleased to +know you've been." +</P> + +<P> +"How is he?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! he keeps fairly bobbish for his age, sir; but of course he's a +wonderful man. As I said to Mrs. Dartie when she was here last: It +WOULD please Miss Forsyte and Mrs. Juley and Miss Hester to see how he +relishes a baked apple still. But he's quite deaf. And a mercy, I +always think. For what we should have done with him in the air-raids, I +don't know." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" said Soames. "What DID you do with him?" +</P> + +<P> +"We just left him in his bed, and had the bell run down into the +cellar, so that Cook and I could hear him if he rang. It would never +have done to let him know there was a war on. As I said to Cook, 'If +Mr. Timothy rings, they may do what they like—I'm going up. My dear +mistresses would have a fit if they could see him ringing and nobody +going to him.' But he slept through them all beautiful. And the one in +the daytime he was having his bath. It WAS a mercy, because he might +have noticed the people in the street all looking up—he often looks +out of the window." +</P> + +<P> +"Quite!" murmured Soames. Smither was getting garrulous! "I just want +to look round and see if there's anything to be done." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir. I don't think there's anything except a smell of mice in the +dining-room that we don't know how to get rid of. It's funny they +should be there, and not a crumb, since Mr. Timothy took to not coming +down, just before the war. But they're nasty little things; you never +know where they'll take you next." +</P> + +<P> +"Does he leave his bed?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, sir; he takes nice exercise between his bed and the window in +the morning, not to risk a change of air. And he's quite comfortable in +himself; has his Will out every day regular. It's a great consolation +to him—that." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Smither, I want to see him, if I can; in case he has anything to +say to me." +</P> + +<P> +Smither coloured up above her corsets. +</P> + +<P> +"It WILL be an occasion!" she said. "Shall I take you round the house, +sir, while I send Cook to break it to him?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, you go to him," said Soames. "I can go round the house by myself." +</P> + +<P> +One could not confess to sentiment before another, and Soames felt that +he was going to be sentimental nosing round those rooms so saturated +with the past. When Smither, creaking with excitement, had left him, +Soames entered the dining-room and sniffed. In his opinion it wasn't +mice, but incipient wood-rot, and he examined the panelling. Whether it +was worth a coat of paint, at Timothy's age, he was not sure. The room +had always been the most modern in the house; and only a faint smile +curled Soames's lips and nostrils. Walls of a rich green surmounted the +oak dado; a heavy metal chandelier hung by a chain from a ceiling +divided by imitation beams. The pictures had been bought by Timothy, a +bargain, one day at Jobson's sixty years ago—three Snyder "still +lifes," two faintly coloured drawings of a boy and a girl, rather +charming, which bore the initials "J.R."—Timothy had always believed +they might turn out to be Joshua Reynolds, but Soames, who admired +them, had discovered that they were only John Robinson; and a doubtful +Morland of a white pony being shod. Deep-red plush curtains, ten +high-backed dark mahogany chairs with deep-red plush seats, a Turkey +carpet, and a mahogany dining-table as large as the room was small, +such was an apartment which Soames could remember unchanged in soul or +body since he was four years old. He looked especially at the two +drawings, and thought: 'I shall buy those at the sale.' +</P> + +<P> +From the dining-room he passed into Timothy's study. He did not +remember ever having been in that room. It was lined from floor to +ceiling with volumes, and he looked at them with curiosity. One wall +seemed devoted to educational books, which Timothy's firm had published +two generations back—sometimes as many as twenty copies of one book. +Soames read their titles and shuddered. The middle wall had precisely +the same books as used to be in the library at his own father's in Park +Lane, from which he deduced the fancy that James and his youngest +brother had gone out together one day and bought a brace of small +libraries. The third wall he approached with more excitement. Here, +surely, Timothy's own taste would be found. It was. The books were +dummies. The fourth wall was all heavily curtained window. And turned +towards it was a large chair with a mahogany reading-stand attached, on +which a yellowish and folded copy of The Times, dated July 6, 1914, the +day Timothy first failed to come down, as if in preparation for the +war, seemed waiting for him still. In a corner stood a large globe of +that world never visited by Timothy, deeply convinced of the unreality +of everything but England, and permanently upset by the sea, on which +he had been very sick one Sunday afternoon in 1836, out of a pleasure +boat off the pier at Brighton, with Juley and Hester, Swithin and Hatty +Chessman; all due to Swithin, who was always taking things into his +head, and who, thank goodness, had been sick too. Soames knew all about +it, having heard the tale fifty times at least from one or other of +them. He went up to the globe, and gave it a spin; it emitted a faint +creak and moved about an inch, bringing into his purview a +daddy-long-legs which had died on it in latitude 44. +</P> + +<P> +'Mausoleum!' he thought. 'George was right!' And he went out and up the +stairs. On the half landing he stopped before the case of stuffed +humming-birds which had delighted his childhood. They looked not a day +older, suspended on wires above pampas-grass. If the case were opened +the birds would not begin to hum, but the whole thing would crumble, he +suspected. It wouldn't be worth putting that into the sale! And +suddenly he was caught by a memory of Aunt Ann—dear old Aunt +Ann—holding him by the hand in front of that case and saying: "Look, +Soamey! Aren't they bright and pretty, dear little humming-birds!" +Soames remembered his own answer: "They don't hum, Auntie." He must +have been six, in a black velveteen suit with a light-blue collar—he +remembered that suit well! Aunt Ann with her ringlets, and her spidery +kind hands, and her grave old aquiline smile—a fine old lady, Aunt +Ann! He moved on up to the drawing-room door. There on each side of it +were the groups of miniatures. Those he would certainly buy in! The +miniatures of his four aunts, one of his uncle Swithin adolescent, and +one of his uncle Nicholas as a boy. They had all been painted by a +young lady friend of the family at a time, 1830, about, when miniatures +were considered very genteel, and lasting too, painted as they were on +ivory. Many a time had he heard the tale of that young lady: "Very +talented, my dear; she had quite a weakness for Swithin, and very soon +after she went into a consumption and died: so like Keats—we often +spoke of it." +</P> + +<P> +Well, there they were! Ann, Juley, Hester, Susan—quite a small child; +Swithin, with sky-blue eyes, pink cheeks, yellow curls, white +waistcoat—large as life; and Nicholas, like Cupid with an eye on +heaven. Now he came to think of it, Uncle Nick had always been rather +like that—a wonderful man to the last. Yes, she must have had talent, +and miniatures had a certain back-watered cachet of their own, little +subject to the currents of competition on aesthetic Change. Soames +opened the drawing-room door. The room was dusted, the furniture +uncovered, the curtains drawn back, precisely as if his aunts still +dwelt there patiently waiting. And a thought came to him: When Timothy +died—why not? Would it not be almost a duty to preserve this +house—like Carlyle's—and put up a tablet, and show it? "Specimen of +mid-Victorian abode—entrance, one shilling, with catalogue." After +all, it was the completest thing, and perhaps the deadest in the London +of to-day. Perfect in its special taste and culture, if, that is, he +took down and carried over to his own collection the four Barbizon +pictures he had given them. The still sky-blue walls, the green +curtains patterned with red flowers and ferns; the crewel-worked +fire-screen before the cast-iron grate; the mahogany cupboard with +glass windows, full of little knick-knacks; the beaded footstools; +Keats, Shelley, Southey, Cowper, Coleridge, Byron's "Corsair" (but +nothing else), and the Victorian poets in a bookshelf row; the +marqueterie cabinet lined with dim red plush, full of family relics; +Hester's first fan; the buckles of their mother's father's shoes; three +bottled scorpions; and one very yellow elephant's tusk, sent home from +India by Great-uncle Edgar Forsyte, who had been in jute; a yellow bit +of paper propped up, with spidery writing on it, recording God knew +what! And the pictures crowding on the walls—all water-colours save +those four Barbizons looking like the foreigners they were, and +doubtful customers at that—pictures bright and illustrative, "Telling +the Bees," "Hey for the Ferry!" and two in the style of Frith, all +thimblerig and crinolines, given them by Swithin. Oh! many, many +pictures at which Soames had gazed a thousand times in supercilious +fascination; a marvellous collection of bright, smooth gilt frames. +</P> + +<P> +And the boudoir-grand piano, beautifully dusted, hermetically sealed as +ever; and Aunt Juley's album of pressed seaweed on it. And the +gilt-legged chairs, stronger than they looked. And on one side of the +fireplace the sofa of crimson silk, where Aunt Ann, and after her Aunt +Juley, had been wont to sit, facing the light and bolt upright. And on +the other side of the fire the one really easy chair, back to the +light, for Aunt Hester. Soames screwed up his eyes; he seemed to see +them sitting there. Ah! and the atmosphere—even now, of too many +stuffs and washed lace curtains, lavender in bags, and dried bee's +wings. 'No,' he thought, 'there's nothing like it left; it ought to be +preserved.' And, by George, they might laugh at it, but for a standard +of gentle life never departed from, for fastidiousness of skin and eye +and nose and feeling, it beat to-day hollow—to-day with its Tubes and +cars, its perpetual smoking, its cross-legged, bare-necked girls +visible up to the knees and down to the waist if you took the trouble +(agreeable to the satyr within each Forsyte but hardly his idea of a +lady), with their feet, too, screwed round the legs of their chairs +while they ate, and their "So longs," and their "Old Beans," and their +laughter—girls who gave him the shudders whenever he thought of Fleur +in contact with them; and the hard-eyed, capable, older women who +managed life and gave him the shudders too. No! his old aunts, if they +never opened their minds, their eyes, or very much their windows, at +least had manners, and a standard, and reverence for past and future. +</P> + +<P> +With rather a choky feeling he closed the door and went tiptoeing +up-stairs. He looked in at a place on the way: H'm! in perfect order of +the eighties, with a sort of yellow oilskin paper on the walls. At the +top of the stairs he hesitated between four doors. Which of them was +Timothy's? And he listened. A sound as of a child slowly dragging a +hobby-horse about, came to his ears. That must be Timothy! He tapped, +and a door was opened by Smither very red in the face. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Timothy was taking his walk, and she had not been able to get him +to attend. If Mr. Soames would come into the back room, he could see +him through the door. +</P> + +<P> +Soames went into the back room and stood watching. +</P> + +<P> +The last of the old Forsytes was on his feet, moving with the most +impressive slowness, and an air of perfect concentration on his own +affairs, backward and forward between the foot of his bed and the +window, a distance of some twelve feet. The lower part of his square +face, no longer clean-shaven, was covered with snowy beard clipped as +short as it could be, and his chin looked as broad as his brow where +the hair was also quite white, while nose and cheeks and brow were a +good yellow. One hand held a stout stick, and the other grasped the +skirt of his Jaeger dressing-gown, from under which could be seen his +bed-socked ankles and feet thrust into Jaeger slippers. The expression +on his face was that of a crossed child, intent on something that he +has not got. Each time he turned he stumped the stick, and then dragged +it, as if to show that he could do without it. +</P> + +<P> +"He still looks strong," said Soames under his breath. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, sir. You should see him take his bath—it's wonderful; he +does enjoy it so." +</P> + +<P> +Those quite loud words gave Soames an insight. Timothy had resumed his +babyhood. +</P> + +<P> +"Does he take any interest in things generally?" he said, also aloud. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, sir; his food and his Will. It's quite a sight to see him +turn it over and over, not to read it, of course; and every now and +then he asks the price of Consols, and I write it on a slate for +him—very large. Of course, I always write the same, what they were +when he last took notice, in 1914. We got the doctor to forbid him to +read the paper when the war broke out. Oh! he did take on about that at +first. But he soon came round, because he knew it tired him; and he's a +wonder to conserve energy as he used to call it when my dear mistresses +were alive, bless their hearts! How he did go on at them about that; +they were always so active, if you remember, Mr. Soames." +</P> + +<P> +"What would happen if I were to go in?" asked Soames. "Would he +remember me? I made his Will, you know, after Miss Hester died in 1907." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! that, sir," replied Smither doubtfully, "I couldn't take on me to +say. I think he might; he really is a wonderful man for his age." +</P> + +<P> +Soames moved into the doorway, and, waiting for Timothy to turn, said +in a loud voice: "Uncle Timothy!" +</P> + +<P> +Timothy trailed back half-way, and halted. +</P> + +<P> +"Eh?" he said. +</P> + +<P> +"Soames," cried Soames at the top of his voice, holding out his hand, +"Soames Forsyte!" +</P> + +<P> +"No!" said Timothy, and stumping his stick loudly on the floor, he +continued his walk. +</P> + +<P> +"It doesn't seem to work," said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +"No, sir," replied Smither, rather crestfallen; "you see, he hasn't +finished his walk. It always was one thing at a time with him. I expect +he'll ask me this afternoon if you came about the gas, and a pretty job +I shall have to make him understand." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you think he ought to have a man about him?" +</P> + +<P> +Smither held up her hands. "A man! Oh! no. Cook and me can manage +perfectly. A strange man about would send him crazy in no time. And my +mistresses wouldn't like the idea of a man in the house. Besides, we're +so proud of him." +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose the doctor comes?" +</P> + +<P> +"Every morning. He makes special terms for such a quantity, and Mr. +Timothy's so used, he doesn't take a bit of notice, except to put out +his tongue." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Soames, turning away, "it's rather sad and painful to me." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! sir," returned Smither anxiously, "you mustn't think that. Now +that he can't worry about things, he quite enjoys his life, really he +does. As I say to Cook, Mr. Timothy is more of a man than he ever was. +You see, when he's not walkin', or takin' his bath, he's eatin', and +when he's not eatin', he's sleeping and there it is. There isn't an +ache or a care about him anywhere." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Soames, "there's something in that. I'll go down. By the +way, let me see his Will." +</P> + +<P> +"I should have to take my time about that, sir; he keeps it under his +pillow, and he'd see me, while he's active." +</P> + +<P> +"I only want to know if it's the one I made," said Soames; "you take a +look at its date some time, and let me know." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir; but I'm sure it's the same, because me and Cook witnessed, +you remember, and there's our names on it still, and we've only done it +once." +</P> + +<P> +"Quite!" said Soames. He did remember. Smither and Jane had been proper +witnesses, having been left nothing in the Will that they might have no +interest in Timothy's death. It had been—he fully admitted—an almost +improper precaution, but Timothy had wished it, and, after all, Aunt +Hester had provided for them amply. +</P> + +<P> +"Very well," he said; "good-bye, Smither. Look after him, and if he +should say anything at any time, put it down, and let me know." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, Mr. Soames; I'll be sure to do that. It's been such a +pleasant change to see you. Cook will be quite excited when I tell her." +</P> + +<P> +Soames shook her hand and went down-stairs. He stood for fully two +minutes by the hat-stand whereon he had hung his hat so many times. 'So +it all passes,' he was thinking; 'passes and begins again. Poor old +chap!' And he listened, if perchance the sound of Timothy trailing his +hobby-horse might come down the well of the stairs; or some ghost of an +old face show over the banisters, and an old voice say: "Why, it's dear +Soames, and we were only saying that we hadn't seen him for a week!" +</P> + +<P> +Nothing—nothing! Just the scent of camphor, and dust-motes in a +sunbeam through the fanlight over the door. The little old house! A +mausoleum! And, turning on his heel, he went out, and caught his train. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0105"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE NATIVE HEATH +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "His foot's upon his native heath,<BR> + His name's—Val Dartie."<BR> +</P> + +<P> +With some such feeling did Val Dartie, in the fortieth year of his age, +set out that same Thursday morning very early from the old manor-house +he had taken on the north side of the Sussex Downs. His destination was +Newmarket, and he had not been there since the autumn of 1899, when he +stole over from Oxford for the Cambridgeshire. He paused at the door to +give his wife a kiss, and put a flask of port into his pocket. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't overtire your leg, Val, and don't bet too much." +</P> + +<P> +With the pressure of her chest against his own, and her eyes looking +into his, Val felt both leg and pocket safe. He should be moderate; +Holly was always right—she had a natural aptitude. It did not seem so +remarkable to him, perhaps, as it might to others, that—half Dartie as +he was—he should have been perfectly faithful to his young first +cousin during the twenty years since he married her romantically out in +the Boer War; and faithful without any feeling of sacrifice or +boredom—she was so quick, so slyly always a little in front of his +mood. Being first cousins they had decided, or rather Holly had, to +have no children; and, though a little sallower, she had kept her +looks, her slimness, and the colour of her dark hair. Val particularly +admired the life of her own she carried on, besides carrying on his, +and riding better every year. She kept up her music, she read an awful +lot—novels, poetry, all sorts of stuff. Out on their farm in Cape +Colony she had looked after all the "nigger" babies and women in a +miraculous manner. She was, in fact,—clever; yet made no fuss about +it, and had no "side." Though not remarkable for humility, Val had come +to have the feeling that she was his superior, and he did not grudge +it—a great tribute. It might be noted that he never looked at Holly +without her knowing of it, but that she looked at him sometimes +unawares. +</P> + +<P> +He has kissed her in the porch because he should not be doing so on the +platform, though she was going to the station with him, to drive the +car back. Tanned and wrinkled by Colonial weather and the wiles +inseparable from horses, and handicapped by the leg which, weakened in +the Boer War, had probably saved his life in the war just past, Val was +still much as he had been in the days of his courtship; his smile as +wide and charming, his eyelashes, if anything, thicker and darker, his +eyes screwed up under them, as bright a grey, his freckles rather +deeper, his hair a little grizzled at the sides. He gave the impression +of one who has lived actively WITH HORSES in a sunny climate. +</P> + +<P> +Twisting the car sharp round at the gate, he said: +</P> + +<P> +"When is young Jon coming?" +</P> + +<P> +"To-day." +</P> + +<P> +"Is there anything you want for him? I could bring it down on Saturday." +</P> + +<P> +"No; but you might come by the same train as Fleur—one forty." +</P> + +<P> +Val gave the Ford full rein; he still drove like a man in a new country +on bad roads, who refuses to compromise, and expects heaven at every +hole. +</P> + +<P> +"That's a young woman who knows her way about," he said. "I say, has it +struck you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Holly. +</P> + +<P> +"Uncle Soames and your dad—bit awkward, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"She won't know, and he won't know, and nothing must be said, of +course. It's only for five days, Val." +</P> + +<P> +"Stable secret! Righto!" If Holly thought it safe, it was. Glancing +slyly round at him, she said: "Did you notice how beautifully she asked +herself?" +</P> + +<P> +"No!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, she did. What do you think of her, Val?" +</P> + +<P> +"Pretty, and clever; but she might run out at any corner if she got her +monkey up, I should say." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm wondering," Holly murmured, "whether she is the modern young +woman. One feels at sea coming home into all this." +</P> + +<P> +"You? You get the hang of things so quick." +</P> + +<P> +Holly slid her hand into his coat-pocket. +</P> + +<P> +"You keep one in the know," said Val, encouraged. "What do you think of +that Belgian fellow, Profond?" +</P> + +<P> +"I think he's rather 'a good devil.'" +</P> + +<P> +Val grinned. +</P> + +<P> +"He seems to me a queer fish for a friend of our family. In fact, our +family is in pretty queer waters, with Uncle Soames marrying a +Frenchwoman, and your dad marrying Soames's first. Our grandfathers +would have had fits!" +</P> + +<P> +"So would anybody's, my dear." +</P> + +<P> +"This car," said Val suddenly, "wants rousing; she doesn't get her hind +legs under her up-hill. I shall have to give her her head on the slope +if I'm to catch that train." +</P> + +<P> +There was that about horses which had prevented him from ever really +sympathising with a car, and the running of the Ford under his +guidance, compared with its running under that of Holly, was always +noticeable. He caught the train. +</P> + +<P> +"Take care going home; she'll throw you down if she can. Good-bye, +darling." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye," called Holly, and kissed her hand. +</P> + +<P> +In the train, after quarter of an hour's indecision between thoughts of +Holly, his morning paper, the look of the bright day, and his dim +memory of Newmarket, Val plunged into the recesses of a small square +book, all names, pedigrees, tap-roots, and notes about the make and +shape of horses. The Forsyte in him was bent on the acquisition of a +certain strain of blood, and he was subduing resolutely as yet the +Dartie hankering for a flutter. On getting back to England, after the +profitable sale of his South African farm and stud, and observing that +the sun seldom shone, Val had said to himself: "I've absolutely got to +have an interest in life, or this country will give me the blues. +Hunting's not enough, I'll breed and I'll train." With just that extra +pinch of shrewdness and decision imparted by long residence in a new +country, Val had seen the weak point of modern breeding. They were all +hypnotised by fashion and high price. He should buy for looks, and let +names go hang! And, here he was already, hypnotised by the prestige of +a certain strain of blood! Half consciously, he thought: 'There's +something in this damned climate which makes one go round in a ring. +All the same, I must have a strain of Mayfly blood.' +</P> + +<P> +In this mood he reached the Mecca of his hopes. It was one of those +quiet meetings favorable to such as wish to look into horses, rather +than into the mouths of bookmakers; and Val clung to the paddock. His +twenty years of Colonial life, divesting him of the dandyism in which +he had been bred, had left him the essential neatness of the horseman, +and given him a queer and rather blighting eye over what he called "the +silly haw-haw" of some Englishmen, the 'flapping cockatoory' of some +Englishwomen—Holly had none of that and Holly was his model. +Observant, quick, resourceful, Val went straight to the heart of a +transaction, a horse, a drink; and he was on his way to the heart of a +Mayfly filly, when a slow voice said at his elbow: +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Val Dartie? How's Mrs. Val Dartie? She's well, I hope." And he saw +beside him the Belgian he had met at his sister Imogen's. +</P> + +<P> +"Prosper Profond—I met you at lunch," added the voice. "How are you?" +murmured Val. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm very well," replied Monsieur Profond, smiling with a certain +inimitable slowness. "A good devil" Holly had called him. Well! He +looked a little like a devil, with his dark, clipped, pointed beard; a +sleepy one though, and good-humoured, with fine eyes, unexpectedly +intelligent. +</P> + +<P> +"Here's a gentleman wants to know you—cousin of yours—Mr. George +Forsyde." +</P> + +<P> +Val saw a large form, and a face clean-shaven, bull-like, a little +lowering, with sardonic humour bubbling behind a full grey eye; he +remembered it dimly from old days when he used to dine with his father +at the Iseeum Club. +</P> + +<P> +"I was a racing pal of your father's," George was saying. "How's the +stud? Like to buy one of my screws?" +</P> + +<P> +Val grinned, to hide the sudden feeling that the bottom had fallen out +of breeding. They believed in nothing over here, not even in horses. +George Forsyte, Prosper Profond! The devil himself was not more +disillusioned than those two. +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't know you were a racing man," he said to Monsieur Profond. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not. I don' care for it. I'm a yachtin' man. I don' care for +yachtin' either, but I like to see my friends. I've got some lunch, Mr. +Val Dartie, just a small lunch, if you'd like to 'ave some; not +much—just a small one—in my car." +</P> + +<P> +"Thanks," said Val; "very good of you. I'll come along in about quarter +of an hour." +</P> + +<P> +"Over there. Mr. Forsyde's comin'," and Monsieur Profond "poinded" with +a yellow-gloved finger; "small car, with a small lunch"; he moved on, +groomed, sleepy, and remote, George Forsyte following, neat, huge, and +with his jesting air. +</P> + +<P> +Val remained gazing at the Mayfly filly. George Forsyte, of course, was +an old chap, but this Profond might be about his own age; Val felt +extremely young, as if the Mayfly filly were a toy at which those two +had laughed. The animal had lost reality. +</P> + +<P> +"That 'small' mare"—he seemed to hear the voice of Monsieur +Profond—"what do you see in her—we must all die!" +</P> + +<P> +And George Forsyte, crony of his father, racing still! The Mayfly +strain—was it any better than any other? He might just as well have a +flutter with his money instead. +</P> + +<P> +"No, by gum!" he muttered suddenly, "if it's no good breeding horses, +it's no good doing anything. What did I come for? I'll buy her." +</P> + +<P> +He stood back and watched the ebb of the paddock visitors towards the +stand. Natty old chips, shrewd portly fellows, Jews, trainers looking +as if they had never been guilty of seeing a horse in their lives; +tall, flapping, languid women, or brisk, loud-voiced women; young men +with an air as if trying to take it seriously—two or three of them +with only one arm! +</P> + +<P> +'Life over here's a game!' thought Val. 'Muffin bell rings, horses run, +money changes hands; ring again, run again, money changes back.' +</P> + +<P> +But, alarmed at his own philosophy, he went to the paddock gate to +watch the Mayfly filly canter down. She moved well; and he made his way +over to the "small" car. The "small" lunch was the sort a man dreams of +but seldom gets; and when it was concluded Monsieur Profond walked back +with him to the paddock. +</P> + +<P> +"Your wife's a nice woman," was his surprising remark. +</P> + +<P> +"Nicest woman I know," returned Val dryly. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Monsieur Profond; "she has a nice face. I admire nice +women." +</P> + +<P> +Val looked at him suspiciously, but something kindly and direct in the +heavy diabolism of his companion disarmed him for the moment. +</P> + +<P> +"Any time you like to come on my yacht, I'll give her a small cruise." +</P> + +<P> +"Thanks," said Val, in arms again, "she hates the sea." +</P> + +<P> +"So do I," said Monsieur Profond. +</P> + +<P> +"Then why do you yacht?" +</P> + +<P> +The Belgian's eyes smiled. "Oh! I don' know. I've done everything; it's +the last thing I'm doin'." +</P> + +<P> +"It must be d—d expensive. I should want more reason than that." +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Prosper Profond raised his eyebrows, and puffed out a heavy +lower lip. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm an easy-goin' man," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"Were you in the war?" asked Val. +</P> + +<P> +"Ye-es. I've done that too. I was gassed; it was a small bit +unpleasant." He smiled with a deep and sleepy air of prosperity, as if +he had caught it from his name. Whether his saying "small" when he +ought to have said "little" was genuine mistake or affectation, Val +could not decide; the fellow was evidently capable of anything. Among +the ring of buyers round the Mayfly filly who had won her race, +Monsieur Profond said: "You goin' to bid?" +</P> + +<P> +Val nodded. With this sleepy Satan at his elbow, he felt in need of +faith. Though placed above the ultimate blows of Providence by the +forethought of a grandfather who had tied him up a thousand a year to +which was added the thousand a year tied up for Holly by HER +grand-father, Val was not flush of capital that he could touch, having +spent most of what he had realised from his South African farm on his +establishment in Sussex. And very soon he was thinking: 'Dash it! she's +going beyond me!' His limit—six hundred—exceeded, he dropped out of +the bidding. The Mayfly filly passed under the hammer at seven hundred +and fifty guineas. He was turning away vexed when the slow voice of +Monsieur Profond said in his ear: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I've bought that small filly, but I don't want her; you take her +and give her to your wife." +</P> + +<P> +Val looked at the fellow with renewed suspicion, but the good humour in +his eyes was such that he really could not take offence. +</P> + +<P> +"I made a small lot of money in the war," began Monsieur Profond in +answer to that look. "I 'ad armament shares. I like to give it away. +I'm always makin' money. I want very small lot myself. I like my +friends to 'ave it." +</P> + +<P> +"I'll buy her of you at the price you gave," said Val with sudden +resolution. +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Monsieur Profond. "You take her. I don' want her." +</P> + +<P> +"Hang it! One doesn't—" +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" smiled Monsieur Profond. "I'm a friend of your family." +</P> + +<P> +"Seven hundred and fifty guineas is not a box of cigars," said Val +impatiently. +</P> + +<P> +"All right; you keep her for me till I want her, and do what you like +with her." +</P> + +<P> +"So long as she's yours," said Val, "I don't mind that." "That's all +right," murmured Monsieur Profond, and moved away. +</P> + +<P> +Val watched; he might be "a good devil," but then again he might not. +He saw him rejoin George Forsyte, and thereafter saw him no more. +</P> + +<P> +He spent those nights after racing at his mother's house in Green +Street. +</P> + +<P> +Winifred Dartie at sixty-two was marvellously preserved, considering +the three-and-thirty years during which she had put up with Montague +Dartie, till almost happily released by a French staircase. It was to +her a vehement satisfaction to have her favourite son back from South +Africa after all this time, to feel him so little changed, and to have +taken a fancy to his wife. Winifred, who in the late seventies, before +her marriage, had been in the vanguard of freedom, pleasure, and +fashion, confessed her youth outclassed by the donzellas of the day. +They seemed, for instance, to regard marriage as an incident, and +Winifred sometimes regretted that she had not done the same; a second, +third, fourth incident might have secured her a partner of less +dazzling inebriety; though, after all, he had left her Val, Imogen, +Maud, Benedict (almost a colonel and unharmed by the war)—none of whom +had been divorced as yet. The steadiness of her children often amazed +one who remembered their father; but, as she was fond of believing, +they were really all Forsytes, favouring herself, with the exception +perhaps of Imogen. Her brother's "little girl" Fleur frankly puzzled +Winifred. The child was as restless as any of these modern young +women—"She's a small flame in a draught," Prosper Profond had said one +day after dinner—but she did not flop, or talk at the top of her +voice. The steady Forsyteism in Winifred's own character instinctively +resented the feeling in the air, the modern girl's habits and her +motto: "All's much of a muchness! Spend! To-morrow we shall be poor!" +She found it a saving grace in Fleur that having set her heart on a +thing, she had no change of heart until she got it—though what +happened after, Fleur was, of course, too young to have made evident. +The child was a "very pretty little thing," too, and quite a credit to +take about, with her mother's French taste and gift for wearing +clothes; everybody turned to look at Fleur—great consideration to +Winifred, a lover of the style and distinction which had so cruelly +deceived her in the case of Montague Dartie. +</P> + +<P> +In discussing her with Val, at breakfast on Saturday morning, Winifred +dwelt on the family skeleton. +</P> + +<P> +"That little affair of your father-in-law and your Aunt Irene, +Val—it's old as the hills, of course, Fleur need know nothing about +it—making a fuss. Your Uncle Soames is very particular about that. So +you'll be careful." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes! But it's dashed awkward—Holly's young half-brother is coming to +live with us while he learns farming. He's there already." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Winifred. "That is a gaff! What is he like?" +</P> + +<P> +"Only saw him once—at Robin Hill, when we were home in 1909; he was +naked and painted blue and yellow in stripes—a jolly little chap." +</P> + +<P> +Winifred thought that "rather nice," and added comfortably: "Well, +Holly's sensible; she'll know how to deal with it. I shan't tell your +uncle. It'll only bother him. It's a great comfort to have you back, my +dear boy, now that I'm getting on." +</P> + +<P> +"Getting on! Why! you're as young as ever. By the way, that chap +Profond, Mother, is he all right?" +</P> + +<P> +"Prosper Profond! Oh! the most amusing man I know." +</P> + +<P> +Val grunted, and recounted the story of the Mayfly filly. +</P> + +<P> +"That's SO like him," murmured Winifred. "He does all sorts of things." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Val shrewdly, "our family haven't been too lucky with that +kind of cattle; they're too light-hearted for us." +</P> + +<P> +It was true, and Winifred's blue study lasted a full minute before she +answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! well! He's a foreigner, Val; one must make allowances." +</P> + +<P> +"All right, I'll use his filly and make it up to him, somehow." +</P> + +<P> +And soon after he gave her his blessing, received a kiss, and left her +for his bookmaker's, the Iseeum Club, and Victoria station. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0106"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +JON +</H3> + +<P> +Mrs. Val Dartie, after twenty years of South Africa, had fallen deeply +in love, fortunately with something of her own, for the object of her +passion was the prospect in front of her windows, the cool clear light +on the green Downs. It was England again, at last! England more +beautiful than she had dreamed. Chance had, in fact, guided the Val +Darties to a spot where the South Downs had real charm when the sun +shone. Holly had enough of her father's eye to apprehend the rare +quality of their outlines and chalky radiance; to go up there by the +ravine-like lane and wander along towards Chanctonbury or Amberley, was +still a delight which she hardly attempted to share with Val, whose +admiration of Nature was confused by a Forsyte's instinct for getting +something out of it, such as the condition of the turf for his horses' +exercise. +</P> + +<P> +Driving the Ford home with a certain humouring smoothness, she promised +herself that the first use she would make of Jon would be to take him +up there, and show him "the view" under this May-day sky. +</P> + +<P> +She was looking forward to her young half-brother with a motherliness +not exhausted by Val. A three-day visit to Robin Hill, soon after their +arrival home, had yielded no sight of him—he was still at school; so +that her recollection, like Val's, was of a little sunny-haired boy +striped blue and yellow, down by the pond. +</P> + +<P> +Those three days at Robin Hill had been exciting, sad, embarrassing. +Memories of her dead brother, memories of Val's courtship; the aging of +her father, not seen for twenty years, something funereal in his ironic +gentleness which did not escape one who had much subtle instinct; above +all, the presence of her stepmother, whom she could still vaguely +remember as the "lady in grey" of days when she was little and +grandfather alive and Mademoiselle Beauce so cross because that +intruder gave her music lessons—all these confused and tantalised a +spirit which had longed to find Robin Hill untroubled. But Holly was +adept at keeping things to herself, and all had seemed to go quite well. +</P> + +<P> +Her father had kissed her when she left him, with lips which she was +sure had trembled. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, my dear," he said, "the war hasn't changed Robin Hill, has it? +If only you could have brought Jolly back with you! I say, can you +stand this spiritualistic racket? When the oak-tree dies, it dies, I'm +afraid." +</P> + +<P> +From the warmth of her embrace he probably divined that he had let the +cat out of his bag, for he rode off at once on irony. +</P> + +<P> +"Spiritualism—queer word, when the more they manifest the more they +prove that they've got hold of matter." +</P> + +<P> +"How?" said Holly. +</P> + +<P> +"Why! Look at their photographs of auric presences. You must have +something material for light and shade to fall on before you can take a +photograph. No, it'll end in our calling all matter spirit, or all +spirit matter—I don't know which." +</P> + +<P> +"But don't you believe in survival, Dad?" +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon had looked at her, and the sad whimsicality of his face +impressed her deeply. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, my dear, I should like to get something out of death. I've been +looking into it a bit. But for the life of me I can't find anything +that telepathy, subconsciousness, and emanation from the storehouse of +this world can't account for just as well. Wish I could! Wishes father +thoughts but they don't breed evidence." +</P> + +<P> +Holly had pressed her lips again to his forehead with a feeling that it +confirmed his theory that all matter was becoming spirit—his brow felt +somehow so insubstantial. +</P> + +<P> +But the most poignant memory of that little visit had been watching, +unobserved, her stepmother reading to herself a letter from Jon. It +was—she decided—the prettiest sight she had ever seen. Irene, lost as +it were in the letter of her boy, stood at a window where the light +fell on her face and her fine grey hair; her lips were moving, smiling, +her dark eyes laughing, dancing, and the hand which did not hold the +letter was pressed against her breast. Holly withdrew as from a vision +of perfect love, convinced that Jon must be nice. +</P> + +<P> +When she saw him coming out of the station with a kit-bag in either +hand, she was confirmed in her predisposition. He was a little like +Jolly, that long-lost idol of her childhood, but eager-looking and less +formal, with deeper eyes and brighter-coloured hair, for he wore no +hat; altogether a very interesting "little" brother! +</P> + +<P> +His tentative politeness charmed one who was accustomed to assurance in +the youthful manner; he was disturbed because she was to drive him +home, instead of his driving her. Shouldn't he have a shot? They hadn't +a car at Robin Hill since the war, of course, and he had only driven +once, and landed up a bank, so she oughtn't to mind his trying. His +laugh, soft and infectious, was very attractive, though that word, she +had heard, was now quite old-fashioned. When they reached the house he +pulled out a crumpled letter which she read while he was washing—a +quite short letter, which must have cost her father many a pang to +write. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"MY DEAR, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"You and Val will not forget, I trust, that Jon knows nothing of family +history. His mother and I think he is too young at present. The boy is +very dear, and the apple of her eye. Verbum sapientibus. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Your loving father, J. F." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +That was all; but it renewed in Holly an uneasy regret that Fleur was +coming. +</P> + +<P> +After tea she fulfilled that promise to herself and took Jon up the +hill. They had a long talk, sitting above an old chalk-pit grown over +with brambles and goosepenny. Milkwort and liverwort starred the green +slope, the larks sang, and thrushes in the brake, and now and then a +gull flighting inland would wheel very white against the paling sky, +where the vague moon was coming up. Delicious fragrance came to them, +as if little invisible creatures were running and treading scent out of +the blades of grass. +</P> + +<P> +Jon, who had fallen silent, said rather suddenly: "I say, this is +wonderful! There's no fat on it at all. Gull's flight and sheep-bells—" +</P> + +<P> +"Gull's flight and sheep-bells! You're a poet, my dear!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon sighed. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Golly! No go!" +</P> + +<P> +"Try! I used to at your age." +</P> + +<P> +"Did you? Mother says 'try' too; but I'm so rotten. Have you any of +yours for me to see?" +</P> + +<P> +"My dear," Holly murmured, "I've been married nineteen years. I only +wrote verses when I wanted to be." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Jon, and turned over on to his face: the one cheek she could +see was a charming colour. Was Jon "touched in the wind," then, as Val +would have called it? Already? But, if so, all the better, he would +take no notice of young Fleur. Besides, on Monday he would begin his +farming. And she smiled. Was it Burns who followed the plough, or only +Piers Plowman? Nearly every young man and most young women seemed to be +poets nowadays, from the number of their books she had read out in +South Africa, importing them from Hatchus and Bumphards; and quite +good—oh! quite; much better than she had been herself! But then poetry +had only really come in since her day—with motor-cars. Another long +talk after dinner over a wood fire in the low hall, and there seemed +little left to know about Jon except anything of real importance. Holly +parted from him at his bedroom door, having seen twice over that he had +everything, with the conviction that she would love him, and Val would +like him. He was eager, but did not gush; he was a splendid listener, +sympathetic, reticent about himself. He evidently loved their father, +and adored his mother. He liked riding, rowing, and fencing, better +than games. He saved moths from candles, and couldn't bear spiders, but +put them out of doors in screws of paper sooner than kill them. In a +word, he was amiable. She went to sleep, thinking that he would suffer +horribly if anybody hurt him; but who would hurt him? +</P> + +<P> +Jon, on the other hand, sat awake at his window with a bit of paper and +a pencil, writing his first "real poem" by the light of a candle +because there was not enough moon to see by, only enough to make the +night seem fluttery and as if engraved on silver. Just the night for +Fleur to walk, and turn her eyes, and lead on—over the hills and far +away. And Jon, deeply furrowed in his ingenuous brow, made marks on the +paper and rubbed them out and wrote them in again, and did all that was +necessary for the completion of a work of art; and he had a feeling +such as the winds of Spring must have, trying their first songs among +the coming blossom. Jon was one of those boys (not many) in whom a +home-trained love of beauty had survived school life. He had had to +keep it to himself, of course, so that not even the drawing-master knew +of it; but it was there, fastidious and clear within him. And his poem +seemed to him as lame and stilted as the night was winged. But he kept +it all the same. It was a "beast," but better than nothing as an +expression of the inexpressible. And he thought with a sort of +discomfiture: 'I shan't be able to show it to Mother.' He slept +terribly well, when he did sleep, overwhelmed by novelty. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0107"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FLEUR +</H3> + +<P> +To avoid the awkwardness of questions which could not be answered, all +that had been told Jon was: "There's a girl coming down with Val for +the week-end." +</P> + +<P> +For the same reason, all that had been told Fleur was: "We've got a +youngster staying with us." +</P> + +<P> +The two yearlings, as Val called them in his thoughts, met therefore in +a manner which for unpreparedness left nothing to be desired. They were +thus introduced by Holly: +</P> + +<P> +"This is Jon, my little brother; Fleur's a cousin of ours, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +Jon, who was coming in through a French window out of strong sunlight, +was so confounded by the providential nature of this miracle, that he +had time to hear Fleur say calmly: "Oh, how do you do?" as if he had +never seen her, and to understand dimly from the quickest imaginable +little movement of her head that he never HAD seen her. He bowed +therefore over her hand in an intoxicated manner, and became more +silent than the grave. He knew better than to speak. Once in his early +life, surprised reading by a night-light, he had said fatuously "I was +just turning over the leaves, Mum," and his mother had replied: "Jon, +never tell stories, because of your face—nobody will ever believe +them." +</P> + +<P> +The saying had permanently undermined the confidence necessary to the +success of spoken untruth. He listened therefore to Fleur's swift and +rapt allusions to the jolliness of everything, plied her with scones +and jam, and got away as soon as might be. They say that in delirium +tremens you see a fixed object, preferably dark, which suddenly changes +shape and position. Jon saw the fixed object; it had dark eyes and +passably dark hair, and changed its position, but never its shape. The +knowledge that between him and that object there was already a secret +understanding (however impossible to understand) thrilled him so that +he waited feverishly, and began to copy out his poem—which of course +he would never dare to show her—till the sound of horses' hoofs roused +him, and, leaning from his window, he saw her riding forth with Val. It +was clear that she wasted no time; but the sight filled him with grief. +He wasted his. If he had not bolted, in his fearful ecstasy, he might +have been asked to go too. From his window he watched them disappear, +appear again in the chine of the road, vanish, and emerge once more for +a minute clear on the outline of the Down. 'Silly brute!' he thought; +'I always miss my chances.' +</P> + +<P> +Why couldn't he be self-confident and ready? And, leaning his chin on +his hands, he imagined the ride he might have had with her. A week-end +was but a week-end, and he had missed three hours of it. Did he know +any one except himself who would have been such a flat? He did not. +</P> + +<P> +He dressed for dinner early, and was first down. He would miss no more. +But he missed Fleur, who came down last. He sat opposite her at dinner, +and it was terrible—impossible to say anything for fear of saying the +wrong thing, impossible to keep his eyes fixed on her in the only +natural way; in sum, impossible to treat normally one with whom in +fancy he had already been over the hills and far away; conscious, too, +all the time, that he must seem to her, to all of them, a dumb gawk. +Yes, it was terrible! And she was talking so well—swooping with swift +wing this way and that. Wonderful how she had learned an art which he +found so disgustingly difficult. She must think him hopeless indeed! +</P> + +<P> +His sister's eyes fixed on him with a certain astonishment, obliged him +at last to look at Fleur; but instantly her eyes, very wide and eager, +seeming to say: "Oh! for goodness' sake!" obliged him to look at Val; +where a grin obliged him to look at his cutlet—that, at least, had no +eyes, and no grin, and he ate it hastily. +</P> + +<P> +"Jon is going to be a farmer," he heard Holly say; "a farmer and a +poet." +</P> + +<P> +He glanced up reproachfully, caught the comic lift of her eyebrow just +like their father's, laughed, and felt better. +</P> + +<P> +Val recounted the incident of Monsieur Prosper Profond; nothing could +have been more favourable, for, in relating it, he regarded Holly, who +in turn regarded him, while Fleur seemed to be regarding with a slight +frown some thought of her own, and Jon was really free to look at her +at last. She had on a white frock, very simple and well made; her arms +were bare, and her hair had a white rose in it. In just that swift +moment of free vision, after such intense discomfort, Jon saw her +sublimated, as one sees in the dark a slender white fruit-tree; caught +her like a verse of poetry flashed before the eyes of the mind, or a +tune which floats out in the distance and dies. +</P> + +<P> +He wondered giddily how old she was—she seemed so much more +self-possessed and experienced than himself. Why mustn't he say they +had met? He remembered suddenly his mother's face; puzzled, +hurt-looking, when she answered: "Yes, they're relations, but we don't +know them." Impossible that his mother, who loved beauty, should not +admire Fleur if she did know her! +</P> + +<P> +Alone with Val after dinner, he sipped port deferentially and answered +the advances of this new-found brother-in-law. As to riding (always the +first consideration with Val) he could have the young chestnut, saddle +and unsaddle it himself, and generally look after it when he brought it +in. Jon said he was accustomed to all that at home, and saw that he had +gone up one in his host's estimation. +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur," said Val, "can't ride much yet, but she's keen. Of course, her +father doesn't know a horse from a cartwheel. Does your dad ride?" +</P> + +<P> +"He used to; but now he's—you know, he's—" He stopped, so hating the +word old. His father was old, and yet not old; no—never! +</P> + +<P> +"Quite!" muttered Val. "I used to know your brother up at Oxford, ages +ago, the one who died in the Boer War. We had a fight in New College +Gardens. That was a queer business," he added, musing; "a good deal +came out of it." +</P> + +<P> +Jon's eyes opened wide; all was pushing him towards historical +research, when his sister's voice said gently from the doorway: +</P> + +<P> +"Come along, you two," and he rose, his heart pushing him towards +something far more modern. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur having declared that it was "simply too wonderful to stay +indoors," they all went out. Moonlight was frosting the dew, and an old +sun-dial threw a long shadow. Two box hedges at right angles, dark and +square, barred off the orchard. Fleur turned through that angled +opening. +</P> + +<P> +"Come on!" she called. Jon glanced at the others, and followed. She was +running among the trees like a ghost. All was lovely and foamlike above +her, and there was a scent of old trunks, and of nettles. She vanished. +He thought he had lost her, then almost ran into her standing quite +still. +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't it jolly?" she cried, and Jon answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Rather!" +</P> + +<P> +She reached up, twisted off a blossom, and, twirling it in her fingers, +said: +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose I can call you Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +"I should think so just." +</P> + +<P> +"All right! But you know there's a feud between our families?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon stammered: "Feud? Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's ever so romantic and silly? That's why I pretended we hadn't met. +Shall we get up early to-morrow morning and go for a walk before +breakfast and have it out? I hate being slow about things, don't you?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon murmured a rapturous assent. +</P> + +<P> +"Six o'clock, then. I think your mother's beautiful." +</P> + +<P> +Jon said fervently: "Yes, she is." +</P> + +<P> +"I love all kinds of beauty," went on Fleur, "when it's exciting. I +don't like Greek things a bit." +</P> + +<P> +"What! Not Euripides?" +</P> + +<P> +"Euripides? Oh! no, I can't bear Greek plays; they're so long. I think +beauty's always swift. I like to look at ONE picture, for instance, and +then run off. I can't bear a lot of things together. Look!" She held up +her blossom in the moonlight. "That's better than all the orchard, I +think." +</P> + +<P> +And, suddenly, with her other hand she caught Jon's. "Of all things in +the world, don't you think caution's the most awful? Smell the +moonlight!" +</P> + +<P> +She thrust the blossom against his face; Jon agreed giddily that of all +things in the world caution was the worst, and bending over, kissed the +hand which held his. +</P> + +<P> +"That's nice and old-fashioned," said Fleur calmly. "You're frightfully +silent, Jon. Still I like silence when it's swift." She let go his +hand. "Did you think I dropped my handkerchief on purpose?" +</P> + +<P> +"No!" cried Jon, intensely shocked. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I did, of course. Let's get back, or they'll think we're doing +this on purpose too." And again she ran like a ghost among the trees. +Jon followed, with love in his heart, Spring in his heart, and over all +the moonlit white unearthly blossom. They came out where they had gone +in, Fleur walking demurely. +</P> + +<P> +"It's quite wonderful in there," she said dreamily to Holly. +</P> + +<P> +Jon preserved silence, hoping against hope that she might be thinking +it swift. +</P> + +<P> +She bade him a casual and demure good-night, which made him think he +had been dreaming.... +</P> + +<P> +In her bedroom Fleur had flung off her gown, and, wrapped in a +shapeless garment, with the white flower still in her hair, she looked +like a mousme, sitting cross-legged on her bed, writing by candlelight. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"DEAREST CHERRY: +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"I believe I'm in love. I've got it in the neck, only the feeling is +really lower down. He's a second cousin—such a child, about six months +older and ten years younger than I am. Boys always fall in love with +their seniors, and girls with their juniors or with old men of forty. +Don't laugh, but his eyes are the truest things I ever saw; and he's +quite divinely silent! We had a most romantic first meeting in London +under the Vospovitch 'Juno.' And now he's sleeping in the next room and +the moonlight's on the blossom; and to-morrow morning, before anybody's +awake, we're going to walk off into Down fairyland. There's a feud +between our families, which makes it really exciting. Yes! and I may +have to use subterfuge and come on you for invitations—if so, you'll +know why! My father doesn't want us to know each other, but I can't +help that. Life's too short. He's got the most beautiful mother, with +lovely silvery hair and a young face with dark eyes. I'm staying with +his sister—who married my cousin; it's all mixed up, but I mean to +pump her to-morrow. We've often talked about love being a spoil-sport; +well, that's all tosh, it's the beginning of sport, and the sooner you +feel it, my dear, the better for you. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"Jon (not simplified spelling, but short for Jolyon, which is a name in +my family, they say) is the sort that lights up and goes out; about +five feet ten, still growing, and I believe he's going to be a poet. If +you laugh at me I've done with you for ever. I perceive all sorts of +difficulties, but you know when I really want a thing I get it. One of +the chief effects of love is that you see the air sort of inhabited, +like seeing a face in the moon; and you feel—you feel dancey and soft +at the same time, with a funny sensation—like a continual first sniff +of orange blossom—just above your stays. This is my first, and I feel +as if it were going to be my last, which is absurd, of course, by all +the laws of Nature and morality. If you mock me I will smite you, and +if you tell anybody I will never forgive you. So much so, that I almost +don't think I'll send this letter. Anyway, I'll sleep over it. So +good-night, my Cherry—oh! +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Your FLEUR." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0108"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IDYLL ON GRASS +</H3> + +<P> +When those two young Forsytes emerged from the chine lane, and set +their faces East towards the sun, there was not a cloud in heaven, and +the Downs were dewy. They had come at a good bat up the slope and were +a little out of breath; if they had anything to say they did not say +it, but marched in the early awkwardness of unbreakfasted morning under +the songs of the larks. The stealing out had been fun, but with the +freedom of the tops the sense of conspiracy ceased, and gave place to +dumbness. +</P> + +<P> +"We've made one blooming error," said Fleur, when they had gone half a +mile. "I'm hungry." +</P> + +<P> +Jon produced a stick of chocolate. They shared it and their tongues +were loosened. They discussed the nature of their homes and previous +existences, which had a kind of fascinating unreality up on that lonely +height. There remained but one thing solid in Jon's past—his mother; +but one thing solid in Fleur's—her father; and of these figures, as +though seen in the distance with disapproving faces, they spoke little. +</P> + +<P> +The Down dipped and rose again towards Chanctonbury Ring; a sparkle of +far sea came into view, a sparrowhawk hovered in the sun's eye so that +the blood-nourished brown of his wings gleamed nearly red. Jon had a +passion for birds, and an aptitude for sitting very still to watch +them; keen-sighted, and with a memory for what interested him, on birds +he was almost worth listening to. But in Chanctonbury Ring there were +none—its great beech temple was empty of life, and almost chilly at +this early hour; they came out willingly again into the sun on the far +side. It was Fleur's turn now. She spoke of dogs, and the way people +treated them. It was wicked to keep them on chains! She would like to +flog people who did that. Jon was astonished to find her so +humanitarian. She knew a dog, it seemed, which some farmer near her +home kept chained up at the end of his chicken run, in all weathers +till it had almost lost its voice from barking! +</P> + +<P> +"And the misery is," she said vehemently, "that if the poor thing +didn't bark at every one who passes it wouldn't be kept there. I do +think men are cunning brutes. I've let it go twice, on the sly; it's +nearly bitten me both times, and then it goes simply mad with joy; but +it always runs back home at last, and they chain it up again. If I had +my way, I'd chain that man up." +</P> + +<P> +Jon saw her teeth and her eyes gleam. "I'd brand him on his forehead +with the word 'Brute'; that would teach him!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon agreed that it would be a good remedy. "It's their sense of +property," he said, "which makes people chain things. The last +generation thought of nothing but property; and that's why there was +the war." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Fleur, "I never thought of that. Your people and mine +quarrelled about property. And anyway we've all got it—at least, I +suppose your people have." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, luckily; I don't suppose I shall be any good at making money." +</P> + +<P> +"If you were, I don't believe I should like you." +</P> + +<P> +Jon slipped his hand tremulously under her arm. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur looked straight before her, and chanted: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Jon, Jon, the farmer's son,<BR> + Stole a pig, and away he run!"<BR> +</P> + +<P> +Jon's arm crept round her waist. +</P> + +<P> +"This is rather sudden," said Fleur calmly; "do you often do it?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon dropped his arm. But when she laughed, his arm stole back again; +and Fleur began to sing: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "O who will o'er the downs so free,<BR> + O who will with me ride?<BR> + O who will up and follow me—"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +"Sing, Jon!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon sang. The larks joined in, sheep-bells, and an early morning church +far away over in Steyning. They went on from tune to tune, till Fleur +said: +</P> + +<P> +"My God! I am hungry now!" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! I AM sorry!" +</P> + +<P> +She looked round into his face. +</P> + +<P> +"Jon, you're rather a darling." +</P> + +<P> +And she pressed his hand against her waist. Jon almost reeled with +happiness. A yellow-and-white dog coursing a hare startled them apart. +They watched the two vanish down the slope, till Fleur said with a +sigh: "He'll never catch it, thank goodness! What's the time? Mine's +stopped. I never wound it." +</P> + +<P> +Jon looked at his watch. "By Jove!" he said, "mine's stopped, too." +</P> + +<P> +They walked on again, but only hand in hand. +</P> + +<P> +"If the grass is dry," said Fleur, "let's sit down for half a minute." +</P> + +<P> +Jon took off his coat, and they shared it. +</P> + +<P> +"Smell! Actually wild thyme!" +</P> + +<P> +With his arm round her waist again, they sat some minutes in silence. +</P> + +<P> +"We are goats!" cried Fleur, jumping up; "we shall be most fearfully +late, and look so silly, and put them on their guard. Look here, Jon! +We only came out to get an appetite for breakfast, and lost our way. +See?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Jon. +</P> + +<P> +"It's serious; there'll be a stopper put on us. Are you a good liar?" +</P> + +<P> +"I believe not very; but I can try." Fleur frowned. +</P> + +<P> +"You know," she said, "I realise that they don't mean us to be friends." +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" +</P> + +<P> +"I told you why." +</P> + +<P> +"But that's silly." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes; but you don't know my father!" +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose he's fearfully fond of you." +</P> + +<P> +"You see, I'm an only child. And so are you—of your mother. Isn't it a +bore? There's so much expected of one. By the time they've done +expecting, one's as good as dead." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," muttered Jon, "life's beastly short. One wants to live for ever, +and know everything." +</P> + +<P> +"And love everybody?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," cried Jon; "I only want to love once—you." +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed! You're coming on! Oh! Look! There's the chalk-pit; we can't be +very far now. Let's run." +</P> + +<P> +Jon followed, wondering fearfully if he had offended her. +</P> + +<P> +The chalk-pit was full of sunshine and the murmuration of bees. Fleur +flung back her hair. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," she said, "in case of accidents, you may give me one kiss, +Jon," and she pushed her cheek forward. With ecstasy he kissed that hot +soft cheek. +</P> + +<P> +"Now, remember! We lost our way; and leave it to me as much as you can. +I'm going to be rather beastly to you; it's safer; try and be beastly +to me!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon shook his head. "That's impossible." +</P> + +<P> +"Just to please me; till five o'clock, at all events." +</P> + +<P> +"Anybody will be able to see through it," said Jon gloomily. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, do your best. Look! There they are! Wave your hat! Oh! you +haven't got one. Well, I'll cooee! Get a little away from me, and look +sulky." +</P> + +<P> +Five minutes later, entering the house and, doing his utmost to look +sulky, Jon heard her clear voice in the dining-room: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! I'm simply RAVENOUS! He's going to be a farmer—and he loses his +way! The boy's an idiot!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0109"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +GOYA +</H3> + +<P> +Lunch was over and Soames mounted to the picture-gallery in his house +near Mapledurham. He had what Annette called "a grief." Fleur was not +yet home. She had been expected on Wednesday; had wired that it would +be Friday; and again on Friday that it would be Sunday afternoon; and +here were her aunt, and her cousins the Cardigans, and this fellow +Profond, and everything flat as a pancake for the want of her. He stood +before his Gauguin—sorest point of his collection. He had bought the +ugly great thing with two early Matisses before the war, because there +was such a fuss about those Post-Impressionist chaps. He was wondering +whether Profond would take them off his hands—the fellow seemed not to +know what to do with his money—when he heard his sister's voice say: +"I think that's a horrid thing, Soames." and saw that Winifred had +followed him up. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! you DO?" he said dryly; "I gave five hundred for it." +</P> + +<P> +"Fancy! Women aren't made like that even if they are black." +</P> + +<P> +Soames uttered a glum laugh. "You didn't come up to tell me that." +</P> + +<P> +"No. Do you know that Jolyon's boy is staying with Val and his wife?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames spun round. +</P> + +<P> +"What?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," drawled Winifred; "he's gone to live with them there while he +learns farming." +</P> + +<P> +Soames had turned away, but her voice pursued him as he walked up and +down. "I warned Val that neither of them was to be spoken to about old +matters." +</P> + +<P> +"Why didn't you tell me before?" +</P> + +<P> +Winifred shrugged her substantial shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur does what she likes. You've always spoiled her. Besides, my dear +boy, what's the harm?" +</P> + +<P> +"The harm!" muttered Soames. "Why, she—" he checked himself. The Juno, +the handkerchief, Fleur's eyes, her questions, and now this delay in +her return—the symptoms seemed to him so sinister that, faithful to +his nature, he could not part with them. +</P> + +<P> +"I think you take too much care," said Winifred; "if I were you, I +should tell her of that old matter. It's no good thinking that girls in +these days are as they used to be. Where they pick up their knowledge I +can't tell, but they seem to know everything." +</P> + +<P> +Over Soames's face, closely composed, passed a sort of spasm, and +Winifred added hastily: +</P> + +<P> +"If you don't like to speak of it, I could for you." Soames shook his +head. Unless there was absolute necessity the thought that his adored +daughter should learn of that old scandal hurt his pride too much. +</P> + +<P> +"No," he said, "not yet. Never if I can help it." +</P> + +<P> +"Nonsense, my dear. Think what people are!" +</P> + +<P> +"Twenty years is a long time," muttered Soames, "outside our family, +who's likely to remember?" +</P> + +<P> +Winifred was silenced. She inclined more and more to that peace and +quietness of which Montague Dartie had deprived her in her youth. And, +since pictures always depressed her, she soon went down again. +</P> + +<P> +Soames passed into the corner where, side by side, hung his real Goya, +and the copy of the fresco "La Vendimia." His acquisition of the real +Goya rather beautifully illustrated the cobweb of vested interests and +passions, which mesh the bright-winged fly of human life. The real +Goya's noble owner's ancestor had come into possession of it during +some Spanish war—it was in a word loot. The noble owner had remained +in ignorance of its value until in the nineties an enterprising critic +discovered that a Spanish painter named Goya was a genius. It was only +a fair Goya, but almost unique in England, and the noble owner became a +marked man. Having many possessions and that aristocratic culture +which, independent of mere sensuous enjoyment, is founded on the +sounder principle that one must know everything and be fearfully +interested in life, he had fully intended to keep an article which +contributed to his reputation while he was alive, and to leave it to +the nation after he was dead. Fortunately for Soames, the House of +Lords was violently attacked in 1909, and the noble owner became +alarmed and angry. "If," he said to himself, "they think they can have +it both ways they are very much mistaken. So long as they leave me in +quiet enjoyment the nation can have some of my pictures at my death. +But if the nation is going to bait me, and rob me like this, I'm damned +if I won't sell the—lot. They can't have my private property and my +public spirit—both." He brooded in this fashion for several months +till one morning, after reading the speech of a certain statesman, he +telegraphed to his agent to come down and bring Bodkin. On going over +the collection Bodkin, than whose opinion on market values none was +more sought, pronounced that with a free hand to sell to America, +Germany, and other places where there was an interest in art, a lot +more money could be made than by selling in England. The noble owner's +public spirit—he said—was well known but the pictures were unique. +The noble owner put this opinion in his pipe and smoked it for a year. +At the end of that time he read another speech by the same statesman, +and telegraphed to his agents: "Give Bodkin a free hand." It was at +this juncture that Bodkin conceived the idea which salved the Goya and +two other unique pictures for the native country of the noble owner. +With one hand Bodkin proffered the pictures to the foreign market, with +the other he formed a list of private British collectors. Having +obtained what he considered the highest possible bids from across the +seas, he submitted pictures and bids to the private British collectors, +and invited them, of their public spirit, to outbid. In three instances +(including the Goya) out of twenty-one he was successful. And why? One +of the private collectors made buttons—he had made so many that he +desired that his wife should be called Lady "Buttons." He therefore +bought an unique picture at great cost, and gave it to the nation. It +was "part," his friends said, "of his general game." The second of the +private collectors was an Americo-phobe, and bought a unique picture to +"spite the damned Yanks." The third of the private collectors was +Soames, who—more sober than either of the others—bought after a visit +to Madrid, because he was certain that Goya was still on the up grade. +Goya was not booming at the moment, but he would come again; and, +looking at that portrait, Hogarthian, Manetesque in its directness, but +with its own queer sharp beauty of paint, he was perfectly satisfied +still that he had made no error, heavy though the price had +been—heaviest he had ever paid. And next to it was hanging the copy of +"La Vendimia." There she was—the little wretch—looking back at him in +her dreamy mood, the mood he loved best because he felt so much safer +when she looked like that. +</P> + +<P> +He was still gazing when the scent of a cigar impinged on his nostrils, +and a voice said: "Well, Mr. Forsyde, what you goin' to do with this +small lot?" +</P> + +<P> +That Belgian chap, whose mother—as if Flemish blood were not +enough—had been Armenian! Subduing a natural irritation, he said: "Are +you a judge of pictures?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I've got a few myself." +</P> + +<P> +"Any Post-Impressionists?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ye-es, I rather like them." +</P> + +<P> +"What do you think of this?" said Soames, pointing to the Gauguin. +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond protruded his lower lip and short pointed beard. +"Rather fine, I think," he said; "do you want to sell it?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames checked his instinctive "Not particularly"—he would not chaffer +with this alien. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"What do you want for it?" +</P> + +<P> +"What I gave." +</P> + +<P> +"All right," said Monsieur Profond. "I'll be glad to take that small +picture. Post-Impressionists—they're awful dead, but they're amusin'. +I don' care for pictures much, but I've got some, just a small lot." +</P> + +<P> +"What DO you care for?" +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond shrugged his shoulders. "Life's awful like a lot of +monkeys scramblin' for empty nuts." +</P> + +<P> +"You're young," said Soames. If the fellow must make a generalisation, +he needn't suggest that the forms of property lacked solidity! +</P> + +<P> +"I don' worry," replied Monsieur Profond smiling; "we're born, and we +die. Half the world's starvin'. I feed a small lot of babies out in my +mother's country; but what's the use? Might as well throw my money in +the river." +</P> + +<P> +Soames looked at him, and turned back towards his Goya. He didn't know +what the fellow wanted. +</P> + +<P> +"What shall I make my cheque for?" pursued Monsieur Profond. +</P> + +<P> +"Five hundred," said Soames shortly; "but I don't want you to take it +if you don't care for it more than that." +</P> + +<P> +"That's all right," said Monsieur Profond; "I'll be 'appy to 'ave that +picture." +</P> + +<P> +He wrote a cheque with a fountain-pen heavily chased with gold. Soames +watched the process uneasily. How on earth had the fellow known that he +wanted to sell that picture? Monsieur Profond held out the cheque. +</P> + +<P> +"The English are awful funny about pictures," he said. "So are the +French, so are my people. They're all awful funny." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't understand you," said Soames stiffly. +</P> + +<P> +"It's like hats," said Monsieur Profond enigmatically, "small or large, +turnin' up or down—just the fashion. Awful funny." And, smiling, he +drifted out of the gallery again, blue and solid like the smoke of his +excellent cigar. +</P> + +<P> +Soames had taken the cheque, feeling as if the intrinsic value of +ownership had been called in question. 'He's a cosmopolitan,' he +thought, watching Profond emerge from under the verandah with Annette, +and saunter down the lawn towards the river. What his wife saw in the +fellow he didn't know, unless it was that he could speak her language; +and there passed in Soames what Monsieur Profond would have called a +"small doubt" whether Annette was not too handsome to be walking with +any one so "cosmopolitan." Even at that distance he could see the blue +fumes from Profond's cigar wreathe out in the quiet sunlight; and his +grey buckskin shoes, and his grey hat—the fellow was a dandy! And he +could see the quick turn of his wife's head, so very straight on her +desirable neck and shoulders. That turn of her neck always seemed to +him a little too showy, and in the "Queen of all I survey" manner—not +quite distinguished. He watched them walk along the path at the bottom +of the garden. A young man in flannels joined them down there—a Sunday +caller no doubt, from up the river. Soames went back to his Goya. He +was still staring at that replica of Fleur, and worrying over +Winifred's news, when his wife's voice said: +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Michael Mont, Soames. You invited him to see your pictures." +</P> + +<P> +There was the cheerful young man of the Gallery off Cork Street! +</P> + +<P> +"Turned up, you see, sir; I live only four miles from Pangbourne. Jolly +day, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +Confronted with the results of his expansiveness, Soames scrutinised +his visitor. The young man's mouth was excessively large and curly—he +seemed always grinning. Why didn't he grow the rest of those idiotic +little moustaches, which made him look like a music-hall buffoon? What +on earth were young men about, deliberately lowering their class with +these tooth-brushes, or little slug whiskers? Ugh! Affected young +idiots! In other respects he was presentable, and his flannels very +clean. +</P> + +<P> +"Happy to see you!" he said. +</P> + +<P> +The young man, who had been turning his head from side to side, became +transfixed. "I say!" he said, "'some' picture!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames saw, with mixed sensations, that he had addressed the remark to +the Goya copy. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," he said dryly, "that's not a Goya. It's a copy. I had it painted +because it reminded me of my daughter." +</P> + +<P> +"By Jove! I thought I knew the face, sir. Is she here?" +</P> + +<P> +The frankness of his interest almost disarmed Soames. +</P> + +<P> +"She'll be in after tea," he said. "Shall we go round the gallery?" +</P> + +<P> +And Soames began that round which never tired him. He had not +anticipated much intelligence from one who had mistaken a copy for an +original, but as they passed from section to section, period to period, +he was startled by the young man's frank and relevant remarks. Natively +shrewd himself, and even sensuous beneath his mask, Soames had not +spent thirty-eight years over his one hobby without knowing something +more about pictures than their market values. He was, as it were, the +missing link between the artist and the commercial public. Art for +art's sake and all that, of course, was cant. But aesthetics and good +taste were necessary. The appreciation of enough persons of good taste +was what gave a work of art its permanent market value, or in other +words made it "a work of art." There was no real cleavage. And he was +sufficiently accustomed to sheep-like and unseeing visitors, to be +intrigued by one who did not hesitate to say of Mauve: "Good old +haystacks!" or of James Maris: "Didn't he just paint and paper 'em! +Mathew was the real swell, sir; you could dig into his surfaces!" It +was after the young man had whistled before a Whistler, with the words: +"D'you think he ever really saw a naked woman, sir?" that Soames +remarked: +</P> + +<P> +"What ARE you, Mr. Mont, if I may ask?" +</P> + +<P> +"I, sir? I WAS going to be a painter, but the War knocked that. Then in +the trenches, you know, I used to dream of the Stock Exchange, snug and +warm and just noisy enough. But the Peace knocked that; shares seem +off, don't they? I've only been demobbed about a year. What do you +recommend, sir?" +</P> + +<P> +"Have you got money?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well," answered the young man; "I've got a father, I kept him alive +during the War, so he's bound to keep me alive now. Though, of course, +there's the question whether he ought to be allowed to hang on to his +property. What do you think about that, sir?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames, pale and defensive, smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"The old man has fits when I tell him he may have to work yet. He's got +land, you know; it's a fatal disease." +</P> + +<P> +"This is my real Goya," said Soames dryly. +</P> + +<P> +"By George! He WAS a swell. I saw a Goya in Munich once that bowled me +middle stump. A most evil-looking old woman in the most gorgeous lace. +HE made no compromise with the public taste. That old boy was 'some' +explosive; he must have smashed up a lot of convention in his day. +Couldn't he just paint! He makes Velasquez stiff, don't you think?" +</P> + +<P> +"I have no Velasquez," said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +The young man stared. "No," he said; "only nations or profiteers can +afford him, I suppose. I say, why shouldn't all the bankrupt nations +sell their Velasquezes and Titians and other swells to the profiteers +by force, and then pass a law that any one who holds a picture by an +Old Master—see schedule—must hang it in a public gallery? There seems +something in that." +</P> + +<P> +"Shall we go down to tea?" said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +The young man's ears seemed to droop on his skull. 'He's not dense,' +thought Soames, following him off the premises. +</P> + +<P> +Goya, with his satiric and surpassing precision, his original "line," +and the daring of his light and shade, could have reproduced to +admiration the group assembled round Annette's tea-tray in the +ingle-nook below. He alone, perhaps, of painters would have done +justice to the sunlight filtering through a screen of creeper, to the +lovely pallor of brass, the old cut glasses, the thin slices of lemon +in pale amber tea; justice to Annette in her black lacey dress; there +was something of the fair Spaniard in her beauty, though it lacked the +spirituality of that rare type; to Winifred's grey-haired, corseted +solidity; to Soames, of a certain grey and flat-cheeked distinction; to +the vivacious Michael Mont, pointed in ear and eye; to Imogen, dark, +luscious of glance, growing a little stout; to Prosper Profond, with +his expression as who should say: "Well, Mr. Goya, what's the use of +paintin' this small party?" finally, to Jack Cardigan, with his shining +stare and tanned sanguinity betraying the moving principle: "I'm +English, and I live to be fit." +</P> + +<P> +Curious, by the way, that Imogen, who as a girl had declared solemnly +one day at Timothy's that she would never marry a good man—they were +so dull—should have married Jack Cardigan, in whom health had so +destroyed all traces of original sin, that she might have retired to +rest with ten thousand other Englishmen without knowing the difference +from the one she had chosen to repose beside. "Oh!" she would say of +him, in her "amusing" way; "Jack keeps himself so fearfully fit; he's +never had a day's illness in his life. He went right through the war +without a finger-ache. You really can't imagine how fit he is!" Indeed, +he was so "fit" that he couldn't see when she was flirting, which was +such a comfort in a way. All the same she was quite fond of him, so far +as one could be of a sports-machine, and of the two little Cardigans +made after his pattern. Her eyes just then were comparing him +maliciously with Prosper Profond. There was no "small" sport or game +which Monsieur Profond had not played at too, it seemed, from skittles +to harpon-fishing, and worn out every one. Imogen would sometimes wish +that they had worn out Jack, who continued to play at them and talk of +them with the simple zeal of a schoolgirl learning hockey; at the age +of Great-uncle Timothy she well knew that Jack would be playing carpet +golf in her bedroom, and "wiping somebody's eye." +</P> + +<P> +He was telling them now how he had "pipped the pro—a charmin' fellow, +playin' a very good game," at the last hole this morning; and how he +had pulled down to Caversham since lunch, and trying to incite Prosper +Profond to play him a set of tennis after tea—do him good—"keep him +fit." +</P> + +<P> +"But what's the use of keepin' fit?" said Monsieur Profond. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir," murmured Michael Mont, "what do you keep fit for?" +</P> + +<P> +"Jack," cried Imogen, enchanted, "what do you keep fit for?" +</P> + +<P> +Jack Cardigan stared with all his health. The questions were like the +buzz of a mosquito, and he put up his hand to wipe them away. During +the War, of course, he had kept fit to kill Germans; now that it was +over he either did not know, or shrank in delicacy from explanation of +his moving principle. +</P> + +<P> +"But he's right," said Monsieur Profond unexpectedly, "there's nothin' +left but keepin' fit." +</P> + +<P> +The saying, too deep for Sunday afternoon, would have passed +unanswered, but for the mercurial nature of young Mont. +</P> + +<P> +"Good!" he cried. "That's the great discovery of the war. We all +thought we were progressing—now we know we're only changing." +</P> + +<P> +"For the worse," said Monsieur Profond genially. +</P> + +<P> +"How you are cheerful, Prosper!" murmured Annette. +</P> + +<P> +"You come and play tennis!" said Jack Cardigan; "you've got the hump. +We'll soon take that down. D'you play, Mr. Mont?" +</P> + +<P> +"I hit the ball about, sir." +</P> + +<P> +At this juncture Soames rose, ruffled in that deep instinct of +preparation for the future which guided his existence. +</P> + +<P> +"When Fleur comes—" he heard Jack Cardigan say. +</P> + +<P> +Ah! and why didn't she come? He passed through drawing-room, hall, and +porch out onto the drive, and stood there listening for the car. All +was still and Sunday-fied; the lilacs in full flower scented the air. +There were white clouds, like the feathers of ducks gilded by the +sunlight. Memory of the day when Fleur was born, and he had waited in +such agony with her life and her mother's balanced in his hands, came +to him sharply. He had saved her then, to be the flower of his life. +And now! Was she going to give him trouble—pain—give him trouble? He +did not like the look of things! A blackbird broke in on his reverie +with an evening song—a great big fellow up in that acacia-tree. Soames +had taken quite an interest in his birds of late years; he and Fleur +would walk round and watch them; her eyes were sharp as needles, and +she knew every nest. He saw her dog, a retriever, lying on the drive in +a patch of sunlight, and called to him, "Hallo, old fellow—waiting for +her too!" The dog came slowly with a grudging tail, and Soames +mechanically laid a pat on his head. The dog, the bird, the lilac all +were part of Fleur for him; no more, no less. 'Too fond of her!' he +thought, 'too fond!' He was like a man uninsured, with his ships at +sea. Uninsured again—as in that other time, so long ago, when he would +wander dumb and jealous in the wilderness of London, longing for that +woman—his first wife—he mother of this infernal boy. Ah! There was +the car at last! It drew up, it had luggage, but no Fleur. +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Fleur is walking up, sir, by the towing-path" +</P> + +<P> +Walking all those miles? Soames stared. The man's face had the +beginning of a smile on it. What was he grinning at? And very quickly +he turned, saying: "All right, Sims!" and went into the house. He +mounted to the picture-gallery once more. He had from there a view of +the river bank, and stood with his eyes fixed on it, oblivious of the +fact that it would be an hour at least before her figure showed there. +Walking up! And that fellow's grin! The boy—! He turned abruptly from +the window. He couldn't spy on her. If she wanted to keep things from +him—she must; he could not spy on her. His heart felt empty; and +bitterness mounted from it into his very mouth. The staccato shouts of +Jack Cardigan pursuing the ball, the laugh of young Mont rose in the +stillness and came in. He hoped they were making that chap Profond run. +And the girl in "La Vendimia" stood with her arm akimbo and her dreamy +eyes looking past him. 'I've done all I could for you,' he thought, +'since you were no higher than my knee. You aren't going to—to—hurt +me, are you?' +</P> + +<P> +But the Goya copy answered not, brilliant in colour just beginning to +tone down. 'There's no real life in it,' thought Soames. 'Why doesn't +she come?' +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0110"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TRIO +</H3> + +<P> +Among those four Forsytes of the third, and, as one might say, fourth +generation, at Wansdon under the Downs, a week-end prolonged unto the +ninth day had stretched the crossing threads of tenacity almost to +snapping-point. Never had Fleur been so "FINE," Holly so watchful, Val +so stable-secretive, Jon so silent and disturbed. What he learned of +farming in that week might have been balanced on the point of a +pen-knife and puffed off. He, whose nature was essentially averse to +intrigue, and whose adoration of Fleur disposed him to think that any +need for concealing it was "skittles," chafed and fretted, yet obeyed, +taking what relief he could in the few moments when they were alone. On +Thursday, while they were standing in the bay window of the +drawing-room, dressed for dinner, she said to him: +</P> + +<P> +"Jon, I'm going home on Sunday by the 3.40 from Paddington; if you were +to go home on SATURDAY you could come up on Sunday and take me down, +and just get back here by the last train, after. You WERE going home +anyway, weren't you?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon nodded. +</P> + +<P> +"Anything to be with you," he said; "only why need I pretend—" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur slipped her little finger into his palm: +</P> + +<P> +"You have no instinct, Jon; you MUST leave things to me. It's serious +about our people. We've simply got to be secret at present, if we want +to be together." The door was opened, and she added loudly: "You ARE a +duffer, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +Something turned over within Jon; he could not bear this subterfuge +about a feeling so natural, so overwhelming, and so sweet. +</P> + +<P> +On Friday night about eleven he had packed his bag, and was leaning out +of his window, half miserable and half lost in a dream of Paddington +station, when he heard a tiny sound, as of a finger-nail tapping on his +door. He rushed to it and listened. Again the sound. It WAS a nail. He +opened. Oh! What a lovely thing came in! +</P> + +<P> +"I wanted to show you my fancy dress," it said, and struck an attitude +at the foot of his bed. Jon drew a long breath and leaned against the +door. The apparition wore white muslin on its head, a fichu round its +bare neck over a wine-coloured dress, fulled out below its slender +waist. It held one arm akimbo, and the other raised right-angled +holding a fan which touched its head. +</P> + +<P> +"This ought to be a basket of grapes," it whispered, "but I haven't got +it here. It's my Goya dress. And this is the attitude in the picture. +Do you like it?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's a dream." +</P> + +<P> +The apparition pirouetted. "Touch it, and see." +</P> + +<P> +Jon knelt down and took the skirt reverently. +</P> + +<P> +"Grape colour," came the whisper, "all grapes—La Vendimia—the +vintage." +</P> + +<P> +Jon's fingers scarcely touched each side of the waist; he looked up, +with adoring eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! Jon," it whispered; bent, kissed his forehead, pirouetted again, +and,—gliding out, was gone. +</P> + +<P> +Jon stayed on his knees, and his head fell forward against the bed. How +long he stayed like that he did not know. The little noises of the +tapping nail, the feet, the skirts rustling—as in a dream—went on +about him; and before his closed eyes the figure stood and smiled and +whispered, a faint perfume of narcissus lingering in the air. And his +forehead where it had been kissed had a little cool place between the +brows, like the imprint of a flower. Love filled his soul, that love of +boy for girl which knows so little, hopes so much, would not brush the +down off for the world, and must become in time a fragrant memory—a +searing passion—a humdrum mateship—or, once in many times, vintage +full and sweet with sunset colour on the grapes. +</P> + +<P> +Enough has been said about Jon Forsyte here and in another place to +show what long marches lay between him and his great-great-grandfather, +the first Jolyon, in Dorset down by the sea. Jon was sensitive as a +girl, more sensitive than nine out of ten girls of the day; imaginative +as one of his half-sister June's "lame duck" painters; affectionate as +a son of his father and his mother naturally would be. And yet, in his +inner tissue, there was something of the old founder of his family, a +secret tenacity of soul, a dread of showing his feelings, a +determination not to know when he was beaten. Sensitive, imaginative, +affectionate boys get a bad time at school, but Jon had instinctively +kept his nature dark, and been but normally unhappy there. Only with +his mother had he, up till then, been absolutely frank and natural; and +when he went home to Robin Hill that Saturday his heart was heavy +because Fleur had said that he must not be frank and natural with her +from whom he had never yet kept anything, must not even tell her that +they had met again, unless he found that she knew already. So +intolerable did this seem to him that he was very near to telegraphing +an excuse and staying up in London. And the first thing his mother said +to him was: +</P> + +<P> +"So you've had our little friend of the confectioner's there, Jon. What +is she like on second thoughts?" +</P> + +<P> +With relief, and a high colour, Jon answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! awfully jolly, Mum." +</P> + +<P> +Her arm pressed his. +</P> + +<P> +Jon had never loved her so much as in that minute which seemed to +falsify Fleur's fears and to release his soul. He turned to look at +her, but something in her smiling face—something which only he perhaps +would have caught—stopped the words bubbling up in him. Could fear go +with a smile? If so, there was fear in her face. And out of Jon tumbled +quite other words, about farming, Holly, and the Downs. Talking fast, +he waited for her to come back to Fleur. But she did not. Nor did his +father mention her, though of course he, too, must know. What +deprivation, and killing of reality was in this silence about +Fleur—when he was so full of her, when his mother was so full of Jon, +and his father so full of his mother! And so the trio spent the evening +of that Saturday. +</P> + +<P> +After dinner his mother played; she seemed to play all the things he +liked best, and he sat with one knee clasped, and his hair standing up +where his fingers had run through it. He gazed at his mother while she +played, but he saw Fleur—Fleur in the moonlit orchard, Fleur in the +sunlit gravel-pit, Fleur in that fancy dress, swaying, whispering, +stooping, kissing his forehead. Once, while he listened, he forgot +himself and glanced at his father in that other easy chair. What was +Dad looking like that for? The expression on his face was so sad and +puzzling. It filled him with a sort of remorse, so that he got up and +went and sat on the arm of his father's chair. From there he could not +see his face; and again he saw Fleur—in his mother's hands, slim and +white on the keys, in the profile of her face and her powdery hair; and +down the long room in the open window where the May night walked +outside. +</P> + +<P> +When he went up to bed his mother came into his room. She stood at the +window, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Those cypresses your grandfather planted down there have done +wonderfully. I always think they look beautiful under a dropping moon. +I wish you had known your grandfather, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +"Were you married to Father, when he was alive?" asked Jon suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"No, dear; he died in '92—very old—eighty-five, I think." +</P> + +<P> +"Is Father like him?" +</P> + +<P> +"A little, but more subtle, and not quite so solid." +</P> + +<P> +"I know, from Grandfather's portrait; who painted that?" +</P> + +<P> +"One of June's 'lame ducks.' But it's quite good." +</P> + +<P> +Jon slipped his hand through his Mother's arm. "Tell me about the +family quarrel, Mum." +</P> + +<P> +He felt her arm quivering. "No, dear; that's for your father some day, +if he thinks fit." +</P> + +<P> +"Then it WAS serious," said Jon, with a catch in his breath. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." And there was a silence, during which neither knew whether the +arm or the hand within it were quivering most. +</P> + +<P> +"Some people," said Irene softly, "think the moon on her back is evil; +to me she's always lovely. Look at those cypress shadows! Jon, Father +says we may go to Italy, you and I, for two months. Would you like?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon took his hand from under her arm; his sensation was so sharp and so +confused. Italy with his Mother! A fortnight ago it would have been +perfection; now it filled him with dismay; he felt that the sudden +suggestion had to do with Fleur. He stammered out: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes; only—I don't know. Ought I—now I've just begun? I'd like to +think it over." +</P> + +<P> +Her voice answered, cool and gentle: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, dear; think it over. But better now than when you've begun +farming seriously. Italy with you—! It would be nice!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon put his arm round her waist, still slim and firm as a girl's. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you think you ought to leave Father?" he said feebly, feeling very +mean. +</P> + +<P> +"Father suggested it; he thinks you ought to see Italy at least before +you settle down to anything." +</P> + +<P> +The sense of meanness died in Jon; he knew, yes—he knew—that his +father and his mother were not speaking frankly, no more than he +himself. They wanted to keep him from Fleur! His heart hardened. And, +as if she felt that process going on, his mother said: +</P> + +<P> +"Good-night, darling. Have a good sleep and think it over. But it would +be lovely!" +</P> + +<P> +She pressed him to her so quickly that he did not see her face. Jon +stood feeling exactly as he used to when he was a naughty little boy; +sore because he was not loving, and because he was justified in his own +eyes. +</P> + +<P> +But Irene, after she had stood a moment in her own room, passed through +the dressing-room between it and her husband's. +</P> + +<P> +"Well?" +</P> + +<P> +"He will think it over, Jolyon." +</P> + +<P> +Watching her lips that wore a little drawn smile, Jolyon said quietly: +</P> + +<P> +"You had better let me tell him, and have done with it. After all, Jon +has the instincts of a gentleman. He has only to understand—" +</P> + +<P> +"Only! He can't understand; that's impossible." +</P> + +<P> +"I believe I could have at his age." +</P> + +<P> +Irene caught his hand. "You were always more of a realist than Jon; and +never so innocent." +</P> + +<P> +"That's true," said Jolyon. "It's queer, isn't it? You and I would tell +our stories to the world without a particle of shame; but our own boy +stumps us." +</P> + +<P> +"We've never cared whether the world approves or not." +</P> + +<P> +"Jon would not disapprove of US!" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! Jolyon, yes. He's in love, I feel he's in love. And he'd say: 'My +mother once married WITHOUT LOVE! How could she have!' It'll seem to +him a crime! And so it was!" +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon took her hand, and said with a wry smile: +</P> + +<P> +"Ah! why on earth are we born young? Now, if only we were born old and +grew younger year by year we should understand how things happen, and +drop all our cursed intolerance. But you know if the boy is really in +love, he won't forget, even if he goes to Italy. We're a tenacious +breed; and he'll know by instinct why he's being sent. Nothing will +really cure him but the shock of being told." +</P> + +<P> +"Let me try, anyway." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon stood a moment without speaking. Between this devil and this +deep sea—the pain of a dreaded disclosure and the grief of losing his +wife for two months—he secretly hoped for the devil; yet if she wished +for the deep sea he must put up with it. After all, it would be +training for that departure from which there would be no return. And, +taking her in his arms, he kissed her eyes, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"As you will, my love." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0111"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DUET +</H3> + +<P> +That "small" emotion, love, grows amazingly when threatened with +extinction. Jon reached Paddington station half an hour before his time +and a full week after, as it seemed to him. He stood at the appointed +book-stall amid a crowd of Sunday travellers, in a Harris tweed suit +exhaling, as it were, the emotion of his thumping heart. He read the +names of the novels on the bookstall, and bought one at last, to avoid +being regarded with suspicion by the book-stall clerk. It was called +"The Heart of the Trail" which must mean something, though it did not +seem to. He also bought "The Lady's Mirror" and "The Landsman." Every +minute was an hour long, and full of horrid imaginings. After nineteen +had passed, he saw her with a bag and a porter wheeling her luggage. +She came swiftly; she came cool. She greeted him as if he were a +brother. +</P> + +<P> +"First class," she said to the porter, "corner seats; opposite." +</P> + +<P> +Jon admired her frightful self-possession. +</P> + +<P> +"Can't we get a carriage to ourselves?" he whispered. +</P> + +<P> +"No good; it's a stopping train. After Maidenhead perhaps. Look +natural, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +Jon screwed his features into a scowl. They got in—with two other +beasts!—oh! heaven! He tipped the porter unnaturally, in his +confusion. The brute deserved nothing for putting them in there, and +looking as if he knew all about it into the bargain. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur hid herself behind "The Lady's Mirror." Jon imitated her behind +"The Landsman." The train started. Fleur let "The Lady's Mirror" fall +and leaned forward. "Well?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +"It's seemed about fifteen days." +</P> + +<P> +She nodded, and Jon's face lighted up at once. +</P> + +<P> +"Look natural," murmured Fleur, and went off into a bubble of laughter. +It hurt him. How could he look natural with Italy hanging over him? He +had meant to break it to her gently, but now he blurted it out. +</P> + +<P> +"They want me to go to Italy with Mother for two months." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur drooped her eyelids; turned a little pale, and bit her lips. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" she said. It was all, but it was much. +</P> + +<P> +That "Oh!" was like the quick drawback of the wrist in fencing ready +for riposte. It came. +</P> + +<P> +"You must go!" +</P> + +<P> +"Go?" said Jon in a strangled voice. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course." +</P> + +<P> +"But—two months—it's ghastly." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Fleur, "six weeks. You'll have forgotten me by then. We'll +meet in the National Gallery the day after you get back." +</P> + +<P> +Jon laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"But suppose you've forgotten ME," he muttered into the noise of the +train. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"Some other beast—" murmured Jon. +</P> + +<P> +Her foot touched his. +</P> + +<P> +"No other beast," she said, lifting the "Lady's Mirror." +</P> + +<P> +The train stopped; two passengers got out, and one got in. +</P> + +<P> +'I shall die,' thought Jon, 'if we're not alone at all.' +</P> + +<P> +The train went on; and again Fleur leaned forward. +</P> + +<P> +"I never let go," she said; "do you?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon shook his head vehemently. +</P> + +<P> +"Never!" he said. "Will you write to me?" +</P> + +<P> +"No; but YOU can—to my club." +</P> + +<P> +She had a Club; she was wonderful! +</P> + +<P> +"Did you pump Holly?" he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, but got nothing. I didn't dare pump hard." +</P> + +<P> +"What can it be?" cried Jon. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall find out all right." +</P> + +<P> +A long silence followed till Fleur said: "This is Maidenhead, stand by, +Jon!" +</P> + +<P> +The train stopped. The remaining passenger got out. Fleur drew down her +blind. +</P> + +<P> +"Quick!" she cried. "Hang out! Look as much of a beast as you can." +</P> + +<P> +Jon blew his nose, and scowled; never in all his life had he scowled +like that! An old lady recoiled, a young one tried the handle. It +turned, but the lock would not open. The train moved, the young lady +darted to another carriage. +</P> + +<P> +"What luck!" cried Jon. "It jammed." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Fleur; "I was holding it." +</P> + +<P> +The train moved out, and Jon fell on his knees. +</P> + +<P> +"Look out for the corridor," she whispered; "and—quick!" +</P> + +<P> +Her lips met his. And though their kiss only lasted perhaps ten seconds +Jon's soul left his body and went so far beyond that, when he was again +sitting opposite that demure figure, he was pale as death. He heard her +sigh, and the sound seemed to him the most precious he had ever +heard—an exquisite declaration that he meant something to her. +</P> + +<P> +"Six weeks isn't really long," she said; "and you can easily make it +six if you keep your head out there, and never seem to think of me." +</P> + +<P> +Jon gasped. +</P> + +<P> +"This is just what's really wanted, Jon, to convince them, don't you +see? If we're just as bad when you come back they'll stop being +ridiculous about it. Only, I'm sorry it's not Spain; there's a girl in +a Goya picture at Madrid who's like me, Father says. Only she +isn't—we've got a copy of her." +</P> + +<P> +It was to Jon like a ray of sunshine piercing through a fog. "I'll make +it Spain," he said, "Mother won't mind; she's never been there. And my +father thinks a lot of Goya." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, he's a painter—isn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"Only water-colour," said Jon, with honesty. +</P> + +<P> +"When we come to Reading, Jon, get out first and go down to Caversham +lock and wait for me. I'll send the car home and we'll walk by the +towing-path." +</P> + +<P> +Jon seized her hand in gratitude, and they sat silent, with the world +well lost, and one eye on the corridor. But the train seemed to run +twice as fast now, and its sound was almost lost in that of Jon's +sighing. +</P> + +<P> +"We're getting near," said Fleur; "the towing-path's awfully exposed. +One more! Oh! Jon, don't forget me." +</P> + +<P> +Jon answered with his kiss. And very soon, a flushed, +distracted-looking youth could have been seen—as they say—leaping +from the train and hurrying along the platform, searching his pockets +for his ticket. +</P> + +<P> +When at last she rejoined him on the towing-path a little beyond +Caversham lock he had made an effort, and regained some measure of +equanimity. If they had to part, he would not make a scene! A breeze by +the bright river threw the white side of the willow leaves up into the +sunlight, and followed those two with its faint rustle. +</P> + +<P> +"I told our chauffeur that I was train-giddy," said Fleur. "Did you +look pretty natural as you went out?" "I don't know. What is natural?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's natural to you to look seriously happy. When I first saw you I +thought you weren't a bit like other people." +</P> + +<P> +"Exactly what I thought when I saw you. I knew at once I should never +love anybody else." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"We're absurdly young. And love's young dream is out of date, Jon. +Besides, it's awfully wasteful. Think of all the fun you might have. +You haven't begun, even; it's a shame, really. And there's me. I +wonder!" +</P> + +<P> +Confusion came on Jon's spirit. How could she say such things just as +they were going to part? +</P> + +<P> +"If you feel like that," he said, "I can't go. I shall tell Mother that +I ought to try and work. There's always the condition of the world!" +</P> + +<P> +"The condition of the world!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon thrust his hands deep into his pockets. +</P> + +<P> +"But there is," he said; "think of the people starving!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur shook her head. "No, no, I never, never will make myself +miserable for nothing." +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing! But there's an awful state of things, and of course one ought +to help." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, I know all that. But you can't help people, Jon; they're +hopeless. When you pull them out of a hole they only get into another. +Look at them, still fighting and plotting and struggling, though +they're dying in heaps all the time. Idiots!" +</P> + +<P> +"Aren't you sorry for them?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! sorry—yes, but I'm not going to make myself unhappy about it; +that's no good." +</P> + +<P> +And they were silent, disturbed by this first glimpse of each other's +natures. +</P> + +<P> +"I think people are brutes and idiots," said Fleur stubbornly. +</P> + +<P> +"I think they're poor wretches," said Jon. It was as if they had +quarrelled—and at this supreme and awful moment, with parting visible +out there in that last gap of the willows! +</P> + +<P> +"Well, go and help your poor wretches, and don't think of me." +</P> + +<P> +Jon stood still. Sweat broke out on his forehead, and his limbs +trembled. Fleur too had stopped, and was frowning at the river. +</P> + +<P> +"I MUST believe in things," said Jon with a sort of agony; "we're all +meant to enjoy life." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur laughed: "Yes; and that's what you won't do, if you don't take +care. But perhaps your idea of enjoyment is to make yourself wretched. +There are lots of people like that, of course." +</P> + +<P> +She was pale, her eyes had darkened, her lips had thinned. Was it Fleur +thus staring at the water? Jon had an unreal feeling as if he were +passing through the scene in a book where the lover has to choose +between love and duty. But just then she looked round at him. Never was +anything so intoxicating as that vivacious look. It acted on him +exactly as the tug of a chain acts on a dog—brought him up to her with +his tail wagging and his tongue out. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't let's be silly," she said, "time's too short. Look, Jon, you can +just see where I've got to cross the river. There, round the bend, +where the woods begin." +</P> + +<P> +Jon saw a gable, a chimney or two, a patch of wall through the +trees—and felt his heart sink. +</P> + +<P> +"I mustn't dawdle any more. It's no good going beyond the next hedge, +it gets all open. Let's get on to it and say good-bye." +</P> + +<P> +They went side by side, hand in hand, silently towards the hedge, where +the mayflower, both pink and white, was in full bloom. +</P> + +<P> +"My Club's the 'Talisman,' Stratton Street, Piccadilly. Letters there +will be quite safe, and I'm almost always up once a week." +</P> + +<P> +Jon nodded. His face had become extremely set, his eyes stared straight +before him. +</P> + +<P> +"To-day's the twenty-third of May," said Fleur; "on the ninth of July I +shall be in front of the 'Bacchus and Ariadne' at three o'clock; will +you?" +</P> + +<P> +"I will." +</P> + +<P> +"If you feel as bad as I it's all right. Let those people pass!" +</P> + +<P> +A man and woman airing their children went by strung out in Sunday +fashion. +</P> + +<P> +The last of them passed the wicket gate. +</P> + +<P> +"Domesticity!" said Fleur, and blotted herself against the hawthorn +hedge. The blossom sprayed out above her head, and one pink cluster +brushed her cheek. Jon put up his hand jealously to keep it off. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye, Jon!" For a second they stood with hands hard clasped. Then +their lips met for the third time, and when they parted Fleur broke +away and fled through the wicket gate. Jon stood where she had left +him, with his forehead against that pink cluster. Gone! For an +eternity—for seven weeks all but two days! And here he was, wasting +the last sight of her! He rushed to the gate. She was walking swiftly +on the heels of the straggling children. She turned her head, he saw +her hand make a little flitting gesture; then she sped on, and the +trailing family blotted her out from his view. +</P> + +<P> +The words of a comic song— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Paddington groan—worst ever known—<BR> + He gave a sepulchral Paddington groan—"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +came into his head, and he sped incontinently back to Reading station. +All the way up to London and down to Wansdon he sat with "The Heart of +the Trail" open on his knee, knitting in his head a poem so full of +feeling that it would not rhyme. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0112"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CAPRICE +</H3> + +<P> +Fleur sped on. She had need of rapid motion; she was late, and wanted +all her wits about her when she got in. She passed the islands, the +station, and hotel, and was about to take the ferry, when she saw a +skiff with a young man standing up in it, and holding to the bushes. +</P> + +<P> +"Miss Forsyte," he said; "let me put you across. I've come on purpose." +</P> + +<P> +She looked at him in blank amazement. +</P> + +<P> +"It's all right, I've been having tea with your people. I thought I'd +save you the last bit. It's on my way, I'm just off back to Pangbourne. +My name's Mont. I saw you at the picture-gallery—you remember—when +your father invited me to see his pictures." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Fleur; "yes—the handkerchief." +</P> + +<P> +To this young man she owed Jon; and, taking his hand, she stepped down +into the skiff. Still emotional, and a little out of breath, she sat +silent; not so the young man. She had never heard any one say so much +in so short a time. He told her his age, twenty-four, his weight, ten +stone eleven; his place of residence, not far away; described his +sensations under fire, and what it felt like to be gassed; criticised +the Juno, mentioned his own conception of that goddess; commented on +the Goya copy, said Fleur was not too awfully like it; sketched in +rapidly the condition of England; spoke of Monsieur Profond—or +whatever his name was—as "an awful sport"; thought her father had some +ripping pictures and some rather "dug-up"; hoped he might row down +again and take her on the river because he was quite trustworthy; +inquired her opinion of Tchekov, gave her his own; wished they could go +to the Russian ballet together some time—considered the name Fleur +Forsyte simply topping; cursed his people for giving him the name of +Michael on the top of Mont; outlined his father, and said that if she +wanted a good book she should read "Job"; his father was rather like +Job while Job still had land. +</P> + +<P> +"But Job didn't have land," Fleur murmured; "he only had flocks and +herds and moved on." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" answered Michael Mont, "I wish my gov'nor would move on. Not that +I want his land. Land's an awful bore in these days, don't you think?" +</P> + +<P> +"We never have it in my family," said Fleur. "We have everything else. +I believe one of my great-uncles once had a sentimental farm in Dorset, +because we came from there originally, but it cost him more than it +made him happy." +</P> + +<P> +"Did he sell it?" +</P> + +<P> +"No; he kept it." +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"Because nobody would buy it." +</P> + +<P> +"Good for the old boy!" +</P> + +<P> +"No, it wasn't good for him. Father says it soured him. His name was +Swithin." +</P> + +<P> +"What a corking name!" +</P> + +<P> +"Do you know," said Fleur, "that we're getting farther off, not nearer? +This river flows." +</P> + +<P> +"Splendid!" cried Mont, dipping his sculls vaguely; "it's good to meet +a girl who's got wit." +</P> + +<P> +"But better to meet a young man who's got it in the plural." +</P> + +<P> +Young Mont raised a hand to tear his hair. +</P> + +<P> +"Look out!" cried Fleur. "Your scull!" +</P> + +<P> +"All right! It's thick enough to bear a scratch." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you mind sculling?" said Fleur severely, "I want to get in." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah! but when you get in, you see, I shan't see you any more to-day. +Fini, as the French girl said when she jumped on her bed after saying +her prayers. Don't you bless the day that gave you a French mother, and +a name like yours?" +</P> + +<P> +"I like my name, but Father gave it me. Mother wanted me called +Marguerite." +</P> + +<P> +"Which is absurd. Do you mind calling me M. M. and letting me call you +F. F.? It's in the spirit of the age." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't mind anything, so long as I get in." Mont caught a little +crab, and answered: "That was a nasty one!" +</P> + +<P> +"Please row." +</P> + +<P> +"I am." And he did for several strokes, looking at her with rueful +eagerness. "Of course, you know," he ejaculated, pausing, "that I came +to see you, not your father's pictures." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur rose. +</P> + +<P> +"If you don't row, I shall get out and swim." +</P> + +<P> +"Really and truly? Then I could come in after you." +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Mont, I'm late and tired; please put me on shore at once." +</P> + +<P> +When she stepped out on to the garden landing-stage he rose, and +grasping his hair with both hands, looked at her. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't!" cried the irrepressible Mont. "I know you're going to say: +'Out, damned hair!'" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur whisked round, threw him a wave of her hand. "Good-bye, Mr. M. +M.!" she called, and was gone among the rose-trees. She looked at her +wrist-watch and the windows of the house. It struck her as curiously +uninhabited. Past six! The pigeons were just gathering to roost, and +sunlight slanted on the dove-cot, on their snowy feathers, and beyond +in a shower on the top boughs of the woods. The click of billiard-balls +came from the ingle-nook—Jack Cardigan, no doubt; a faint rustling, +too, from an eucalyptus-tree, startling Southerner in this old English +garden. She reached the verandah, and was passing in, but stopped at +the sound of voices from the drawing-room to her left. Mother! Profond! +From behind the verandah screen which fenced the ingle-nook she heard +these words! +</P> + +<P> +"I don't, Annette." +</P> + +<P> +Did Father know that he called her mother "Annette"? Always on the side +of her father—as children are ever on one side or the other in houses +where relations are a little strained—she stood, uncertain. Her mother +was speaking in her low, pleasing, slightly metallic voice—one word +she caught: "Demain." And Profond's answer: "All right." Fleur frowned. +A little sound came out into the stillness. Then Profond's voice: "I'm +takin' a small stroll." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur darted through the window into the morning room. There he +came—from the drawing-room, crossing the verandah, down the lawn; and +the click of billiard-balls which, in listening for other sounds, she +had ceased to hear, began again. She shook herself, passed into the +hall, and opened the drawing-room door. Her mother was sitting on the +sofa between the windows, her knees crossed, her head resting on a +cushion, her lips half parted, her eyes half closed. She looked +extraordinarily handsome. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah! Here you are, Fleur! Your father is beginning to fuss." +</P> + +<P> +"Where is he?" +</P> + +<P> +"In the picture-gallery. Go up!" +</P> + +<P> +"What are you going to do to-morrow, Mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"To-morrow? I go up to London with your aunt. Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"I thought you might be. Will you get me a quite plain parasol?" +</P> + +<P> +"What color?" +</P> + +<P> +"Green. They're all going back, I suppose." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, all; you will console your father. Kiss me, then." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur crossed the room, stooped, received a kiss on her forehead, and +went out past the impress of a form on the sofa-cushions in the other +corner. She ran up-stairs. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur was by no means the old-fashioned daughter who demands the +regulation of her parents' lives in accordance with the standard +imposed on herself. She claimed to regulate her own life, not those of +others; besides, an unerring instinct for what was likely to advantage +her own case was already at work. In a disturbed domestic atmosphere +the heart she had set on Jon would have a better chance. None the less +was she offended, as a flower by a crisping wind. If that man had +really been kissing her mother it was—serious, and her father ought to +know. +</P> + +<P> +"Demain!" "All right!" And her mother going up to Town! She turned in +to her bedroom and hung out of the window to cool her face, which had +suddenly grown very hot. Jon must be at the station by now! What did +her father know about Jon! Probably everything—pretty nearly! +</P> + +<P> +She changed her dress, so as to look as if she had been in some time, +and ran up to the gallery. +</P> + +<P> +Soames was standing stubbornly still before his Alfred Stevens—the +picture he loved best. He did not turn at the sound of the door, but +she knew he had heard, and she knew he was hurt. She came up softly +behind him, put her arms round his neck, and poked her face over his +shoulder, till her cheek lay against his. It was an advance which had +never yet failed, but it failed her now, and she augured the worst. +</P> + +<P> +"Well," he said stonily, "so you've come!" +</P> + +<P> +"Is that all," murmured Fleur, "from a bad parent?" and rubbed her +cheek against his. +</P> + +<P> +Soames shook his head so far as that was possible. +</P> + +<P> +"Why do you keep me on tenterhooks like this, putting me off and off?" +</P> + +<P> +"Darling, it was very harmless." +</P> + +<P> +"Harmless! Much you know what's harmless and what isn't." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur dropped her arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, then, dear, suppose you tell me; and be quite frank about it." +</P> + +<P> +And she went over to the window-seat. +</P> + +<P> +Her father had turned from his picture, and was staring at his feet. He +looked very grey. 'He has nice small feet,' she thought, catching his +eye, at once averted from her. +</P> + +<P> +"You're my only comfort," said Soames suddenly, "and you go on like +this." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur's heart began to beat. +</P> + +<P> +"Like what, dear?" +</P> + +<P> +Again Soames gave her a look which, but for the affection in it, might +have been called furtive. +</P> + +<P> +"You know what I told you," he said. "I don't choose to have anything +to do with that branch of our family." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, ducky, but I don't know why <I>I</I> shouldn't." +</P> + +<P> +Soames turned on his heel. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not going into the reasons," he said; "you ought to trust me, +Fleur!" +</P> + +<P> +The way he spoke those words affected Fleur, but she thought of Jon, +and was silent, tapping her foot against the wainscot. Unconsciously +she had assumed a modern attitude, with one leg twisted in and out of +the other, with her chin on one bent wrist, her other arm across her +chest, and its hand hugging her elbow; there was not a line of her that +was not involuted, and yet—in spite of all—she retained a certain +grace. +</P> + +<P> +"You knew my wishes," Soames went on, "and yet you stayed on there four +days. And I suppose that boy came with you to-day." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur kept her eyes on him. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't ask you anything," said Soames; "I make no inquisition where +you're concerned." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur suddenly stood up, leaning out at the window with her chin on her +hands. The sun had sunk behind trees, the pigeons were perched, quite +still, on the edge of the dove-cot; the click of the billiard-balls +mounted, and a faint radiance shone out below where Jack Cardigan had +turned the light up. +</P> + +<P> +"Will it make you any happier," she said suddenly, "if I promise you +not to see him for say—the next six weeks?" She was not prepared for a +sort of tremble in the blankness of his voice. +</P> + +<P> +"Six weeks? Six years—sixty years more like. Don't delude yourself, +Fleur; don't delude yourself!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur turned in alarm. +</P> + +<P> +"Father, what is it?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames came close enough to see her face. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't tell me," he said, "that you're foolish enough to have any +feeling beyond caprice. That would be too much!" And he laughed. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur, who had never heard him laugh like that, thought: 'Then it IS +deep! Oh! what is it?' And putting her hand through his arm she said +lightly: +</P> + +<P> +"No, of course; caprice. Only, I like my caprices and I don't like +yours, dear." +</P> + +<P> +"Mine!" said Soames bitterly, and turned away. +</P> + +<P> +The light outside had chilled, and threw a chalky whiteness on the +river. The trees had lost all gaiety of colour. She felt a sudden +hunger for Jon's face, for his hands, and the feel of his lips again on +hers. And pressing her arms tight across her breast she forced out a +little light laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"O la! la! What a small fuss! as Profond would say. Father, I don't +like that man." +</P> + +<P> +She saw him stop, and take something out of his breast pocket. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't?" he said. "Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing," murmured Fleur; "just caprice!" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Soames; "not caprice!" And he tore what was in his hands +across. "You're right. <I>I</I> don't like him either!" +</P> + +<P> +"Look!" said Fleur softly. "There he goes! I hate his shoes; they don't +make any noise." +</P> + +<P> +Down in the failing light Prosper Profond moved, his hands in his side +pockets, whistling softly in his beard; he stopped, and glanced up at +the sky, as if saying: "I don't think much of that small moon." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur drew back. "Isn't he a great cat?" she whispered; and the sharp +click of the billiard-balls rose, as if Jack Cardigan had capped the +cat, the moon, caprice, and tragedy with: "In off the red!" +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond had resumed his strolling, to a teasing little tune in +his beard. What was it? Oh! yes, from "Rigoletto": "Donna e mobile." +Just what he would think! She squeezed her father's arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Prowling!" she muttered, as he turned the corner of the house. It was +past that disillusioned moment which divides the day and night—still +and lingering and warm, with hawthorn scent and lilac scent clinging on +the riverside air. A blackbird suddenly burst out. Jon would be in +London by now; in the Park perhaps, crossing the Serpentine, thinking +of her! A little sound beside her made her turn her eyes; her father +was again tearing the paper in his hands. Fleur saw it was a cheque. +</P> + +<P> +"I shan't sell him my Gauguin," he said. "I don't know what your aunt +and Imogen see in him." +</P> + +<P> +"Or Mother." +</P> + +<P> +"Your mother!" said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +'Poor Father!' she thought. 'He never looks happy—not really happy. I +don't want to make him worse, but of course I shall have to, when Jon +comes back. Oh! well, sufficient unto the night!' +</P> + +<P> +"I'm going to dress," she said. +</P> + +<P> +In her room she had a fancy to put on her "freak" dress. It was of gold +tissue with little trousers of the same, tightly drawn in at the +ankles, a page's cape slung from the shoulders, little gold shoes, and +a gold-winged Mercury helmet; and all over her were tiny gold bells, +especially on the helmet; so that if she shook her head she pealed. +When she was dressed she felt quite sick because Jon could not see her; +it even seemed a pity that the sprightly young man Michael Mont would +not have a view. But the gong had sounded, and she went down. +</P> + +<P> +She made a sensation in the drawing-room. Winifred thought it "Most +amusing." Imogen was enraptured. Jack Cardigan called it "stunning," +"ripping," "topping," and "corking." Monsieur Profond, smiling with his +eyes, said: "That's a nice small dress!" Her mother, very handsome in +black, sat looking at her, and said nothing. It remained for her father +to apply the test of common sense. "What did you put on that thing for? +You're not going to dance." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur spun round, and the bells pealed. +</P> + +<P> +"Caprice!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames stared at her, and, turning away, gave his arm to Winifred. Jack +Cardigan took her mother. Prosper Profond took Imogen. Fleur went in by +herself, with her bells jingling.... +</P> + +<P> +The "small" moon had soon dropped down, and May night had fallen soft +and warm, enwrapping with its grape-bloom colour and its scents the +billion caprices, intrigues, passions, longings, and regrets of men and +women. Happy was Jack Cardigan who snored into Imogen's white shoulder, +fit as a flea; or Timothy in his "mausoleum," too old for anything but +baby's slumber. For so many lay awake, or dreamed, teased by the +crisscross of the world. +</P> + +<P> +The dew fell and the flowers closed; cattle grazed on in the river +meadows, feeling with their tongues for the grass they could not see; +and the sheep on the Downs lay quiet as stones. Pheasants in the tall +trees of the Pangbourne woods, larks on their grassy nests above the +gravel-pit at Wansdon, swallows in the eaves at Robin Hill, and the +sparrows of Mayfair, all made a dreamless night of it, soothed by the +lack of wind. The Mayfly filly, hardly accustomed to her new quarters, +scraped at her straw a little; and the few night-flitting things—bats, +moths, owls—were vigorous in the warm darkness; but the peace of night +lay in the brain of all day-time Nature, colourless and still. Men and +women, alone, riding the hobbyhorses of anxiety or love, burned their +wavering tapers of dream and thought into the lonely hours. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur, leaning out of her window, heard the hall clock's muffled chime +of twelve, the tiny splash of a fish, the sudden shaking of an aspen's +leaves in the puffs of breeze that rose along the river, the distant +rumble of a night train, and time and again the sounds which none can +put a name to in the darkness, soft obscure expressions of uncatalogued +emotions from man and beast, bird and machine, or, maybe, from departed +Forsytes, Darties, Cardigans, taking night strolls back into a world +which had once suited their embodied spirits. But Fleur heeded not +these sounds, her spirit, far from disembodied, fled with swift wing +from railway-carriage to flowery hedge, straining after Jon, tenacious +of his forbidden image, and the sound of his voice which was taboo. And +she crinkled her nose, retrieving from the perfume of the riverside +night that moment when his hand slipped between the mayflowers and her +cheek. Long she leaned out in her freak dress, keen to burn her wings +at life's candle; while the moths brushed her cheeks on their +pilgrimage to the lamp on her dressing-table, ignorant that in a +Forsyte's house there is no open flame. But at last even she felt +sleepy, and, forgetting her bells, drew quickly in. +</P> + +<P> +Through the open window of his room, alongside Annette's, Soames, +wakeful too, heard their thin faint tinkle, as it might be shaken from +stars, or the dewdrops falling from a flower, if one could hear such +sounds. +</P> + +<P> +'Caprice!' he thought. 'I can't tell. She's wilful. What shall I do? +Fleur!' +</P> + +<P> +And long into the "small" night he brooded. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0201"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +PART II +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +MOTHER AND SON +</H3> + +<P> +To say that Jon Forsyte accompanied his mother to Spain unwillingly +would scarcely have been adequate. He went as a well-natured dog goes +for a walk with its mistress, leaving a choice mutton-bone on the lawn. +He went looking back at it. Forsytes deprived of their mutton-bones are +wont to sulk. But Jon had little sulkiness in his composition. He +adored his mother, and it was his first travel. Spain had become Italy +by his simply saying: "I'd rather go to Spain, Mum; you've been to +Italy so many times; I'd like it new to both of us." +</P> + +<P> +The fellow was subtle besides being naif. He never forgot that he was +going to shorten the proposed two months into six weeks, and must +therefore show no sign of wishing to do so. For one with so enticing a +mutton-bone and so fixed an idea, he made a good enough travelling +companion, indifferent to where or when he arrived, superior to food, +and thoroughly appreciative of a country strange to the most travelled +Englishman. Fleur's wisdom in refusing to write to him was profound, +for he reached each new place entirely without hope or fever, and could +concentrate immediate attention on the donkeys and tumbling bells, the +priests, patios, beggars, children, crowing cocks, sombreros, cactus +hedges, old high white villages, goats, olive-trees, greening plains, +singing birds in tiny cages, water-sellers, sunsets, melons, mules, +great churches, pictures, and swimming grey-brown mountains of a +fascinating land. +</P> + +<P> +It was already hot, and they enjoyed an absence of their compatriots. +Jon, who, so far as he knew, had blood in him which was not English, +was often innately unhappy in the presence of his own countrymen. He +felt they had no nonsense about them, and took a more practical view of +things than himself. He confided to his mother that he must be an +unsociable beast—it was jolly to be away from everybody who could talk +about the things people did talk about. To which Irene had replied +simply: "Yes, Jon, I know." +</P> + +<P> +In this isolation he had unparalleled opportunities of appreciating +what few sons can apprehend, the whole-heartedness of a mother's love. +Knowledge of something kept from her made him, no doubt, unduly +sensitive; and a Southern people stimulated his admiration for her type +of beauty, which he had been accustomed to hear called Spanish, but +which he now perceived to be no such thing. Her beauty was neither +English, French, Spanish, nor Italian—it was special! He appreciated, +too, as never before, his mother's subtlety of instinct. He could not +tell, for instance, whether she had noticed his absorption in that Goya +picture, "La Vendimia," or whether she knew that he had slipped back +there after lunch and again next morning, to stand before it full half +an hour, a second and third time. It was not Fleur, of course, but like +enough to give him heartache—so dear to lovers—remembering her +standing at the foot of his bed with her hand held above her head. To +keep a postcard reproduction of this picture in his pocket and slip it +out to look at became for Jon one of those bad habits which soon or +late disclose themselves to eyes sharpened by love, fear, or jealousy. +And his mother's were sharpened by all three. In Granada he was fairly +caught, sitting on a sun-warmed stone bench in a little battlemented +garden on the Alhambra hill, whence he ought to have been looking at +the view. His mother, he had thought, was examining the potted stocks +between the polled acacias, when her voice said: +</P> + +<P> +"Is that your favourite Goya, Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +He checked, too late, a movement such as he might have made at school +to conceal some surreptitious document, and answered: "Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"It certainly is most charming; but I think I prefer the 'Quitasol.' +Your father would go crazy about Goya; I don't believe he saw them when +he was in Spain in '92." +</P> + +<P> +In '92—nine years before he had been born! What had been the previous +existences of his father and his mother? If they had a right to share +in his future, surely he had a right to share in their pasts. He looked +up at her. But something in her face—a look of life hard-lived, the +mysterious impress of emotions, experience, and suffering—seemed with +its incalculable depth, its purchased sanctity, to make curiosity +impertinent. His mother must have had a wonderfully interesting life; +she was so beautiful, and so—so—but he could not frame what he felt +about her. He got up, and stood gazing down at the town, at the plain +all green with crops, and the ring of mountains glamorous in sinking +sunlight. Her life was like the past of this old Moorish city, full, +deep, remote—his own life as yet such a baby of a thing, hopelessly +ignorant and innocent! They said that in those mountains to the west, +which rose sheer from the blue-green plain, as if out of a sea, +Phoenicians had dwelt—a dark, strange, secret race, above the land! +His mother's life was as unknown to him, as secret, as that Phoenician +past was to the town down there, whose cocks crowed and whose children +played and clamoured so gaily, day in, day out. He felt aggrieved that +she should know all about him and he nothing about her except that she +loved him and his father, and was beautiful. His callow ignorance—he +had not even had the advantage of the war, like nearly everybody +else!—made him small in his own eyes. +</P> + +<P> +That night, from the balcony of his bedroom, he gazed down on the roof +of the town—as if inlaid with honey-comb of jet, ivory, and gold; and, +long after, he lay awake, listening to the cry of the sentry as the +hours struck, and forming in his head these lines: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "Voice in the night crying, down in the old sleeping<BR> + Spanish city darkened under her white stars!<BR> + What says the voice—its clear—lingering anguish?<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + Just the watchman, telling his dateless tale of safety?<BR> + Just a roadman, flinging to the moon his song?<BR> + No! 'Tis one deprived, whose lover's heart is weeping.<BR> + Just his cry: 'How long?'"<BR> +</P> + +<P> +The word "deprived" seemed to him cold and unsatisfactory, but bereaved +was too final, and no other word of two syllables short-long came to +him, which would enable him to keep "whose lover's heart is weeping." +It was past two by the time he had finished it, and past three before +he went to sleep, having said it over to himself at least twenty-four +times. Next day he wrote it out and enclosed it in one of those letters +to Fleur, which he always finished before he went down, so as to have +his mind free and companionable. +</P> + +<P> +About noon that same day, on the tiled terrace of their hotel, he felt +a sudden dull pain in the back of his head, a queer sensation in the +eyes, and sickness. The sun had touched him too affectionately. The +next three days were passed in semi-darkness, and a dulled, aching +indifference to all except the feel of ice on his forehead and his +mother's smile. She never moved from his room, never relaxed her +noiseless vigilance, which seemed to Jon angelic. But there were +moments when he was extremely sorry for himself, and wished terribly +that Fleur could see him. Several times he took a poignant imaginary +leave of her and of the earth, tears oozing out of his eyes. He even +prepared the message he would send to her by his mother—who would +regret to her dying day that she had ever sought to separate them—his +poor mother! He was not slow, however, in perceiving that he had now +his excuse for going home. +</P> + +<P> +Towards half past six each evening came a "gasgacha" of bells—a +cascade of tumbling chimes, mounting from the city below and falling +back chime on chime. After listening to them on the fourth day he said +suddenly: +</P> + +<P> +"I'd like to be back in England, Mum, the sun's too hot." +</P> + +<P> +"Very well, darling. As soon as you're fit to travel." And at once he +felt better, and—meaner. +</P> + +<P> +They had been out five weeks when they turned towards home. Jon's head +was restored to its pristine clarity, but he was confined to a hat +lined by his mother with many layers of orange and green silk, and he +still walked from choice in the shade. As the long struggle of +discretion between them drew to its close, he wondered more and more +whether she could see his eagerness to get back to that which she had +brought him away from. Condemned by Spanish Providence to spend a day +in Madrid between their trains, it was but natural to go again to the +Prado. Jon was elaborately casual this time before his Goya girl. Now +that he was going back to her, he could afford a lesser scrutiny. It +was his mother who lingered before the picture, saying: +</P> + +<P> +"The face and figure of the girl are exquisite." +</P> + +<P> +Jon heard her uneasily. Did she understand? But he felt once more that +he was no match for her in self-control and subtlety. She could, in +some supersensitive way, of which he had not the secret, feel the pulse +of his thoughts; she knew by instinct what he hoped and feared and +wished. It made him terribly uncomfortable and guilty, having, beyond +most boys, a conscience. He wished she would be frank with him; he +almost hoped for an open struggle. But none came, and steadily, +silently, they travelled north. Thus did he first learn how much better +than men women play a waiting game. In Paris they had again to pause +for a day. Jon was grieved because it lasted two, owing to certain +matters in connection with a dressmaker; as if his mother, who looked +beautiful in anything, had any need of dresses! The happiest moment of +his travel was that when he stepped on to the Folkestone boat. +</P> + +<P> +Standing by the bulwark rail, with her arm in his, she said: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm afraid you haven't enjoyed it much, Jon. But you've been very +sweet to me." +</P> + +<P> +Jon squeezed her arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes, I've enjoyed it awfully—except for my head lately." +</P> + +<P> +And now that the end had come, he really had, feeling a sort of glamour +over the past weeks—a kind of painful pleasure, such as he had tried +to screw into those lines about the voice in the night crying; a +feeling such as he had known as a small boy listening avidly to Chopin, +yet wanting to cry. And he wondered why it was that he couldn't say to +her quite simply what she had said to him: +</P> + +<P> +"You were very sweet to me." Odd—one never could be nice and natural +like that! He substituted the words: "I expect we shall be sick." +</P> + +<P> +They were, and reached London somewhat attenuated, having been away six +weeks and two days, without a single allusion to the subject which had +hardly ever ceased to occupy their minds. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0202"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FATHERS AND DAUGHTERS +</H3> + +<P> +Deprived of his wife and son by the Spanish adventure, Jolyon found the +solitude at Robin Hill intolerable. A philosopher when he has all that +he wants is different from a philosopher when he has not. Accustomed, +however, to the idea, if not to the reality of resignation, he would +perhaps have faced it out but for his daughter June. He was a "lame +duck" now, and on her conscience. Having achieved—momentarily—the +rescue of an etcher in low circumstances, which she happened to have in +hand, she appeared at Robin Hill a fortnight after Irene and Jon had +gone. The little lady was living now in a tiny house with a big studio +at Chiswick. A Forsyte of the best period, so far as the lack of +responsibility was concerned, she had overcome the difficulty of a +reduced income in a manner satisfactory to herself and her father. The +rent of the Gallery off Cork Street which he had bought for her, and +her increased income tax happening to balance, it had been quite +simple—she no longer paid him the rent. The Gallery might be expected +now at any time, after eighteen years of barren usufruct, to pay its +way, so that she was sure her father would not feel it. Through this +device she still had twelve hundred a year, and by reducing what she +ate, and, in place of two Belgians in a poor way, employing one +Austrian in a poorer, practically the same surplus for the relief of +genius. After three days at Robin Hill she carried her father back with +her to Town. In those three days she had stumbled on the secret he had +kept for two years, and had instantly decided to cure him. She knew, in +fact, the very man. He had done wonders with Paul Post—that painter a +little in advance of Futurism; and she was impatient with her father +because his eyebrows would go up, and because he had heard of neither. +Of course, if he hadn't "faith" he would never get well! It was absurd +not to have faith in the man who had healed Paul Post so that he had +only just relapsed, from having overworked, or overlived, himself +again. The great thing about this healer was that he relied on Nature. +He had made a special study of the symptoms of Nature—when his patient +failed in any natural symptom he supplied the poison which caused +it—and there you were! She was extremely hopeful. Her father had +clearly not been living a natural life at Robin Hill, and she intended +to provide the symptoms. He was—she felt—out of touch with the times, +which was not natural; his heart wanted stimulating. In the little +Chiswick house she and the Austrian—a grateful soul, so devoted to +June for rescuing her that she was in danger of decease from +overwork—stimulated Jolyon in all sorts of ways, preparing him for his +cure. But they could not keep his eyebrows down; as—for example—when +the Austrian woke him at eight o'clock just as he was going to sleep or +June took The Times away from him, because it was unnatural to read +"that stuff" when he ought to be taking an interest in "life." He never +failed, indeed, to be astonished at her resource, especially in the +evenings. For his benefit, as she declared, though he suspected that +she also got something out of it, she assembled the Age so far as it +was satellite to genius; and with some solemnity it would move up and +down the studio before him in the Fox-trot, and that more mental form +of dancing—the One-step—which so pulled against the music, that +Jolyon's eyebrows would be almost lost in his hair from wonder at the +strain it must impose on the dancers' will-power. Aware that, hung on +the line in the Water Colour Society, he was a back number to those +with any pretension to be called artists, he would sit in the darkest +corner he could find, and wonder about rhythm, on which so long ago he +had been raised. And when June brought some girl or young man up to +him, he would rise humbly to their level so far as that was possible, +and think: 'Dear me! This is very dull for them!' Having his father's +perennial sympathy with Youth, he used to get very tired from entering +into their points of view. But it was all stimulating, and he never +failed in admiration of his daughter's indomitable spirit. Even genius +itself attended these gatherings now and then, with its nose on one +side; and June always introduced it to her father. This, she felt, was +exceptionally good for him, for genius was a natural symptom he had +never had—fond as she was of him. +</P> + +<P> +Certain as a man can be that she was his own daughter, he often +wondered whence she got herself—her red-gold hair, now greyed into a +special colour; her direct, spirited face, so different from his own +rather folded and subtilised countenance, her little light figure, when +he and most of the Forsytes were tall. And he would dwell on the origin +of species, and debate whether she might be Danish or Celtic. Celtic, +he thought, from her pugnacity, and her taste in fillets and djibbahs. +It was not too much to say that he preferred her to the Age with which +she was surrounded, youthful though, for the greater part, it was. She +took, however, too much interest in his teeth, for he still had some of +those natural symptoms. Her dentist at once found "staphylococcus +aureus present in pure culture" (which might cause boils, of course) +and wanted to take out all the teeth he had and supply him with two +complete sets of unnatural symptoms. Jolyon's native tenacity was +roused, and in the studio that evening he developed his objections. He +had never had any boils, and his own teeth would last his time. Of +course—June admitted—they would last his time if he didn't have them +out! But if he had more teeth he would have a better heart and his time +would be longer. His recalcitrance—she said—was a symptom of his +whole attitude; he was taking it lying down. He ought to be fighting. +When was he going to see the man who had cured Paul Post? Jolyon was +very sorry, but the fact was he was not going to see him. June chafed. +Pondridge—she said—the healer, was such a fine man, and he had such +difficulty in making two ends meet and getting his theories recognised. +It was just such indifference and prejudice as her father manifested +which was keeping him back. It would be so splendid for both of them! +</P> + +<P> +"I perceive," said Jolyon, "that you are trying to kill two birds with +one stone." +</P> + +<P> +"To cure, you mean!" cried June. +</P> + +<P> +"My dear, it's the same thing." +</P> + +<P> +June protested. It was unfair to say that without a trial. +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon thought he might not have the chance of saying it after. +</P> + +<P> +"Dad!" cried June, "you're hopeless." +</P> + +<P> +"That," said Jolyon, "is a fact, but I wish to remain hopeless as long +as possible. I shall let sleeping dogs lie, my child. They are quiet at +present." +</P> + +<P> +"That's not giving science a chance," cried June. "You've no idea how +devoted Pondridge is. He puts his science before everything." +</P> + +<P> +"Just," replied Jolyon, puffing the mild cigarette to which he was +reduced, "as Mr. Paul Post puts his art, eh? Art for Art's +sake—Science for the sake of Science. I know those enthusiastic +egomaniac gentry. They vivisect you without blinking. I'm enough of a +Forsyte to give them the go-by, June." +</P> + +<P> +"Dad," said June, "if you only knew how old-fashioned that sounds! +Nobody can afford to be half-hearted nowadays." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm afraid," murmured Jolyon, with his smile, "that's the only natural +symptom with which Mr. Pondridge need not supply me. We are born to be +extreme or to be moderate, my dear; though if you'll forgive my saying +so, half the people nowadays who believe they're extreme are really +very moderate. I'm getting on as well as I can expect, and I must leave +it at that." +</P> + +<P> +June was silent, having experienced in her time the inexorable +character of her father's amiable obstinacy so far as his own freedom +of action was concerned. +</P> + +<P> +How he came to let her know why Irene had taken Jon to Spain puzzled +Jolyon, for he had little confidence in her discretion. After she had +brooded on the news, it brought a rather sharp discussion, during which +he perceived to the full the fundamental opposition between her active +temperament and his wife's passivity. He even gathered that a little +soreness still remained from that generation-old struggle between them +over the body of Philip Bosinney, in which the passive had so signally +triumphed over the active principle. +</P> + +<P> +According to June, it was foolish and even cowardly to hide the past +from Jon. Sheer opportunism, she called it. +</P> + +<P> +"Which," Jolyon put in mildly, "is the working principle of real life, +my dear." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" cried June, "YOU don't really defend her for not telling Jon, +Dad. If it were left to you, you would." +</P> + +<P> +"I might, but simply because I know he must find out, which will be +worse than if we told him." +</P> + +<P> +"Then why DON'T you tell him? It's just sleeping dogs again." +</P> + +<P> +"My dear," said Jolyon, "I wouldn't for the world go against Irene's +instinct. He's her boy." +</P> + +<P> +"Yours too," cried June. +</P> + +<P> +"What is a man's instinct compared with a mother's?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I think it's very weak of you." +</P> + +<P> +"I dare say," said Jolyon, "I dare say." +</P> + +<P> +And that was all she got from him; but the matter rankled in her brain. +She could not bear sleeping dogs. And there stirred in her a tortuous +impulse to push the matter towards decision. Jon ought to be told, so +that either his feeling might be nipped in the bud, or, flowering in +spite of the past, come to fruition. And she determined to see Fleur, +and judge for herself. When June determined on anything, delicacy +became a somewhat minor consideration. After all, she was Soames' +cousin, and they were both interested in pictures. She would go and +tell him that he ought to buy a Paul Post, or perhaps a piece of +sculpture by Boris Strumolowski, and of course she would say nothing to +her father. She went on the following Sunday, looking so determined +that she had some difficulty in getting a cab at Reading station. The +river country was lovely in those days of her own month, and June ached +at its loveliness. She who had passed through this life without knowing +what union was had a love of natural beauty which was almost madness. +And when she came to that choice spot where Soames had pitched his +tent, she dismissed her cab, because, business over, she wanted to +revel in the bright water and the woods. She appeared at his front +door, therefore, as a mere pedestrian, and sent in her card. It was in +June's character to know that when her nerves were fluttering she was +doing something worth while. If one's nerves did not flutter, she was +taking the line of least resistance, and knew that nobleness was not +obliging her. She was conducted to a drawing-room, which, though not in +her style, showed every mark of fastidious elegance. Thinking: 'Too +much taste—too many knick-knacks,' she saw in an old lacquer-framed +mirror the figure of a girl coming in from the verandah. Clothed in +white, and holding some white roses in her hand, she had, reflected in +that silvery-grey pool of glass, a vision-like appearance, as if a +pretty ghost had come out of the green garden. +</P> + +<P> +"How do you do?" said June, turning round. "I'm a cousin of your +father's." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes; I saw you in that confectioner's." +</P> + +<P> +"With my young stepbrother. Is your father in?" +</P> + +<P> +"He will be directly. He's only gone for a little walk." +</P> + +<P> +June slightly narrowed her blue eyes, and lifted her decided chin. +</P> + +<P> +"Your name's Fleur, isn't it? I've heard of you from Holly. What do you +think of Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +The girl lifted the roses in her hand, looked at them, and answered +calmly: +</P> + +<P> +"He's quite a nice boy." +</P> + +<P> +"Not a bit like Holly or me, is he?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not a bit." +</P> + +<P> +'She's cool,' thought June. +</P> + +<P> +And suddenly the girl said: "I wish you'd tell me why our families +don't get on?" +</P> + +<P> +Confronted with the question she had advised her father to answer, June +was silent; either because this girl was trying to get something out of +her, or simply because what one would do theoretically is not always +what one will do when it comes to the point. +</P> + +<P> +"You know," said the girl, "the surest way to make people find out the +worst is to keep them ignorant. My father's told me it was a quarrel +about property. But I don't believe it; we've both got heaps. They +wouldn't have been so bourgeois as all that." +</P> + +<P> +June flushed. The word applied to her grandfather and father offended +her. +</P> + +<P> +"My grandfather," she said, "was very generous, and my father is, too; +neither of them was in the least bourgeois." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, what was it then?" repeated the girl. Conscious that this young +Forsyte meant having what she wanted, June at once determined to +prevent her, and to get something for herself instead. +</P> + +<P> +"Why do you want to know?" +</P> + +<P> +The girl smelled at her roses. "I only want to know because they won't +tell me." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, it WAS about property, but there's more than one kind." +</P> + +<P> +"That makes it worse. Now I really MUST know." +</P> + +<P> +June's small and resolute face quivered. She was wearing a round cap, +and her hair had fluffed out under it. She looked quite young at that +moment, rejuvenated by encounter. +</P> + +<P> +"You know," she said, "I saw you drop your handkerchief. Is there +anything between you and Jon? Because, if so, you'd better drop that +too." +</P> + +<P> +The girl grew paler, but she smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"If there were, that isn't the way to make me." +</P> + +<P> +At the gallantry of that reply June held out her hand. +</P> + +<P> +"I like you; but I don't like your father; I never have. We may as well +be frank." +</P> + +<P> +"Did you come down to tell him that?" +</P> + +<P> +June laughed. "No; I came down to see YOU." +</P> + +<P> +"How delightful of you!" +</P> + +<P> +This girl could fence. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm two-and-a-half times your age," said June, "but I quite +sympathise. It's horrid not to have one's own way." +</P> + +<P> +The girl smiled again. "I really think you MIGHT tell me." +</P> + +<P> +How the child stuck to her point! +</P> + +<P> +"It's not my secret. But I'll see what I can do, because I think both +you and Jon OUGHT to be told. And now I'll say good-bye." +</P> + +<P> +"Won't you wait and see Father?" +</P> + +<P> +June shook her head. "How can I get over to the other side?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'll row you across." +</P> + +<P> +"Look!" said June impulsively, "next time you're in London, come and +see me. This is where I live. I generally have young people in the +evening. But I shouldn't tell your father that you're coming." +</P> + +<P> +The girl nodded. +</P> + +<P> +Watching her scull the skiff across, June thought: 'She's awfully +pretty and well made. I never thought Soames would have a daughter as +pretty as this. She and Jon would make a lovely couple.' +</P> + +<P> +The instinct to couple, starved within herself, was always at work in +June. She stood watching Fleur row back; the girl took her hand off a +scull to wave farewell; and June walked languidly on between the +meadows and the river, with an ache in her heart. Youth to youth, like +the dragon-flies chasing each other, and love like the sun warming them +through and through. Her youth! So long ago—when Phil and she—! And +since? Nothing—no one had been quite what she had wanted. And so she +had missed it all. But what a coil was round those two young things, if +they really were in love, as Holly would have it—as her father, and +Irene, and Soames himself seemed to dread. What a coil, and what a +barrier! And the itch for the future, the contempt, as it were, for +what was overpast, which forms the active principle, moved in the heart +of one who ever believed that what one wanted was more important than +what other people did not want. From the bank, awhile, in the warm +summer stillness, she watched the water-lily plants and willow leaves, +the fishes rising; sniffed the scent of grass and meadow-sweet, +wondering how she could force everybody to be happy. Jon and Fleur! Two +little lame ducks—charming callow yellow little ducks! A great pity! +Surely something could be done! One must not take such situations lying +down. She walked on, and reached a station, hot and cross. +</P> + +<P> +That evening, faithful to the impulse towards direct action, which made +many people avoid her, she said to her father: +</P> + +<P> +"Dad, I've been down to see young Fleur. I think she's very attractive. +It's no good hiding our heads under our wings, is it?" +</P> + +<P> +The startled Jolyon set down his barley water, and began crumbling his +bread. +</P> + +<P> +"It's what you appear to be doing," he said: "Do you realise whose +daughter she is?" +</P> + +<P> +"Can't the dead past bury its dead?" +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon rose. +</P> + +<P> +"Certain things can never be buried." +</P> + +<P> +"I disagree," said June. "It's that which stands in the way of all +happiness and progress. You don't understand the Age, Dad. It's got no +use for outgrown things. Why do you think it matters so terribly that +Jon should know about his mother? Who pays any attention to that sort +of thing now? The marriage laws are just as they were when Soames and +Irene couldn't get a divorce, and you had to come in. We've moved, and +they haven't. So nobody cares. Marriage without a decent chance of +relief is only a sort of slave-owning; people oughtn't to own each +other. Everybody sees that now. If Irene broke such laws, what does it +matter?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's not for me to disagree there," said Jolyon; "but that's all quite +beside the mark. This is a matter of human feeling." +</P> + +<P> +"Of course, it is," cried June, "the human feeling of those two young +things." +</P> + +<P> +"My dear," said Jolyon with gentle exasperation, "you're talking +nonsense." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not. If they prove to be really fond of each other, why should +they be made unhappy because of the past?" +</P> + +<P> +"YOU haven't lived that past. I have—through the feelings of my wife; +through my own nerves and my imagination, as only one who is devoted +can." +</P> + +<P> +June, too, rose, and began to wander restlessly. +</P> + +<P> +"If," she said suddenly, "she were the daughter of Phil Bosinney, I +could understand you better. Irene loved him, she never loved Soames." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon uttered a deep sound—the sort of noise an Italian peasant woman +utters to her mule. His heart had begun beating furiously, but he paid +no attention to it, quite carried away by his feelings. +</P> + +<P> +"That shows how little you understand. Neither I nor Jon, if I know +him, would mind a love-past. It's the brutality of a union without +love. This girl is the daughter of the man who once owned Jon's mother +as a negro-slave was owned. You can't lay that ghost; don't try to, +June! It's asking us to see Jon joined to the flesh and blood of the +man who possessed Jon's mother against her will. It's no good mincing +words; I want it clear once for all. And now I mustn't talk any more, +or I shall have to sit up with this all night." And, putting his hand +over his heart, Jolyon turned his back on his daughter and stood +looking at the river Thames. +</P> + +<P> +June, who by nature never saw a hornets' nest until she had put her +head into it, was seriously alarmed. She came and slipped her arm +through his. Not convinced that he was right, and she herself wrong, +because that was not natural to her, she was yet profoundly impressed +by the obvious fact that the subject was very bad for him. She rubbed +her cheek against his shoulder, and said nothing. +</P> + +<P> +After taking her elderly cousin across, Fleur did not land at once, but +pulled in among the reeds, into the sunshine. The peaceful beauty of +the afternoon seduced for a little one not much given to the vague and +poetic. In the field beyond the bank where her skiff lay up, a machine +drawn by a grey horse was turning an early field of hay. She watched +the grass cascading over and behind the light wheels with +fascination—it looked so green and fresh. The click and swish blended +with the rustle of the willows and the poplars, and the cooing of a +wood-pigeon, in a true river song. Alongside, in the grey-green water, +weeds like yellow snakes were writhing and nosing with the current; +pied cattle on the farther side stood in the shade lazily swishing +their tails. It was an afternoon to dream. And she took out Jon's +letters—not flowery effusions, but haunted in their recital of things +seen and done by a longing very agreeable to her, and all ending "Your +devoted J." Fleur was not sentimental, her desires were ever concrete +and concentrated, but what poetry there was in the daughter of Soames +and Annette had certainly in those weeks of waiting gathered round her +memories of Jon. They all belonged to grass and blossom, flowers and +running water. She enjoyed him in the scents absorbed by her crinkling +nose. The stars could persuade her that she was standing beside him in +the centre of the map of Spain; and of an early morning the dewy +cobwebs, the hazy sparkle and promise of the day down in the garden, +were Jon personified to her. +</P> + +<P> +Two white swans came majestically by, while she was reading his +letters, followed by their brood of six young swans in a line, with +just so much space between each tail and head, a flotilla of grey +destroyers. Fleur thrust her letters back, got out her sculls, and +pulled up to the landing-stage. Crossing the lawn, she wondered whether +she should tell her father of June's visit. If he learned of it from +the butler, he might think it odd if she did not. It gave her, too, +another chance to startle out of him the reason of the feud. She went, +therefore, up the road to meet him. +</P> + +<P> +Soames had gone to look at a patch of ground on which the Local +Authorities were proposing to erect a Sanatorium for people with weak +lungs. Faithful to his native individualism, he took no part in local +affairs, content to pay the rates which were always going up. He could +not, however, remain indifferent to this new and dangerous scheme. The +site was not half a mile from his own house. He was quite of opinion +that the country should stamp out tuberculosis; but this was not the +place. It should be done farther away. He took, indeed, an attitude +common to all true Forsytes, that disability of any sort in other +people was not his affair, and the State should do its business without +prejudicing in any way the natural advantages which he had acquired or +inherited. Francie, the most free-spirited Forsyte of his generation +(except perhaps that fellow Jolyon) had once asked him in her malicious +way: "Did you ever see the name Forsyte in a subscription list, +Soames?" That was as it might be, but a Sanatorium would depreciate the +neighbourhood, and he should certainly sign the petition which was +being got up against it. Returning with this decision fresh within him, +he saw Fleur coming. +</P> + +<P> +She was showing him more affection of late, and the quiet time down +here with her in this summer weather had been making him feel quite +young; Annette was always running up to Town for one thing or another, +so that he had Fleur to himself almost as much as he could wish. To be +sure, young Mont had formed a habit of appearing on his motor-cycle +almost every other day. Thank goodness, the young fellow had shaved off +his half-toothbrushes, and no longer looked like a mountebank! With a +girl friend of Fleur's who was staying in the house, and a neighbouring +youth or so, they made two couples after dinner, in the hall, to the +music of the electric pianola which performed Fox-trots unassisted, +with a surprised shine on its expressive surface. Annette, even, now +and then passed gracefully up and down in the arms of one or other of +the young men. And Soames, coming to the drawing-room door, would lift +his nose a little sideways, and watch them, waiting to catch a smile +from Fleur; then move back to his chair by the drawing-room hearth, to +peruse The Times or some other collector's price-list. To his +ever-anxious eyes Fleur showed no sign of remembering that caprice of +hers. +</P> + +<P> +When she reached him on the dusty road, he slipped his hand within her +arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Who, do you think, has been to see you, Dad? She couldn't wait! Guess!" +</P> + +<P> +"I never guess," said Soames uneasily. "Who?" +</P> + +<P> +"Your cousin, June Forsyte." +</P> + +<P> +Quite unconsciously Soames gripped her arm. "What did SHE want?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know. But it was rather breaking through the feud, wasn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Feud? What feud?" +</P> + +<P> +"The one that exists in your imagination, dear." +</P> + +<P> +Soames dropped her arm. Was she mocking, or trying to draw him on? +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose she wanted me to buy a picture," he said at last. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't think so. Perhaps it was just family affection." +</P> + +<P> +"She's only a first cousin once removed," muttered Soames. +</P> + +<P> +"And the daughter of your enemy." +</P> + +<P> +"What d'you mean by that?" +</P> + +<P> +"I beg your pardon, dear; I thought he was." +</P> + +<P> +"Enemy!" repeated Soames. "It's ancient history. I don't know where you +get your notions." +</P> + +<P> +"From June Forsyte." +</P> + +<P> +It had come to her as an inspiration that if he thought she knew, or +were on the edge of knowledge, he would tell her. +</P> + +<P> +Soames was startled, but she had underrated his caution and tenacity. +</P> + +<P> +"If you know," he said coldly, "why do you plague me?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur saw that she had overreached herself. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want to plague you, darling. As you say, why want to know +more? Why want to know anything of that 'small' mystery—Je m'en fiche, +as Profond says." +</P> + +<P> +"That chap!" said Soames profoundly. +</P> + +<P> +That chap, indeed, played a considerable, if invisible, part this +summer—for he had not turned up again. Ever since the Sunday when +Fleur had drawn attention to him prowling on the lawn, Soames had +thought of him a good deal, and always in connection with Annette, for +no reason, except that she was looking handsomer than for some time +past. His possessive instinct, subtler, less formal, more elastic since +the war, kept all misgiving underground. As one looks on some American +river, quiet and pleasant, knowing that an alligator perhaps is lying +in the mud with his snout just raised and indistinguishable from a snag +of wood—so Soames looked on the river of his own existence, +subconscious of Monsieur Profond, refusing to see more than the +suspicion of his snout. He had at this epoch in his life practically +all he wanted, and was as nearly happy as his nature would permit. His +senses were at rest; his affections found all the vent they needed in +his daughter; his collection was well known, his money well invested; +his health excellent, save for a touch of liver now and again; he had +not yet begun to worry seriously about what would happen after death, +inclining to think that nothing would happen. He resembled one of his +own gilt-edged securities, and to knock the gilt off by seeing anything +he could avoid seeing, would be, he felt instinctively, perverse and +retrogressive. Those two crumpled rose-leaves, Fleur's caprice and +Monsieur Profond's snout, would level away if he lay on them +industriously. +</P> + +<P> +That evening Chance, which visits the lives of even the best-invested +Forsytes, put a clue into Fleur's hands. Her father came down to dinner +without a handkerchief, and had occasion to blow his nose. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll get you one, dear," she had said, and run upstairs. In the sachet +where she sought for it—an old sachet of very faded silk—there were +two compartments: one held handkerchiefs; the other was buttoned, and +contained something flat and hard. By some childish impulse Fleur +unbuttoned it. There was a frame and in it a photograph of herself as a +little girl. She gazed at it, fascinated, as one is by one's own +presentment. It slipped under her fidgeting thumb, and she saw that +another photograph was behind. She pressed her own down further, and +perceived a face, which she seemed to know, of a young woman, very +good-looking, in a very old style of evening dress. Slipping her own +photograph up over it again, she took out a handkerchief and went down. +Only on the stairs did she identify that face. Surely—surely Jon's +mother! The conviction came as a shock. And she stood still in a flurry +of thought. Why, of course! Jon's father had married the woman her +father had wanted to marry, had cheated him out of her, perhaps. Then, +afraid of showing by her manner that she had lighted on his secret, she +refused to think further, and, shaking out the silk handkerchief, +entered the dining-room. +</P> + +<P> +"I chose the softest, Father." +</P> + +<P> +"H'm!" said Soames; "I only use those after a cold. Never mind!" +</P> + +<P> +That evening passed for Fleur in putting two and two together; +recalling the look on her father's face in the confectioner's shop—a +look strange, and coldly intimate, a queer look. He must have loved +that woman very much to have kept her photograph all this time, in +spite of having lost her. Unsparing and matter-of-fact, her mind darted +to his relations with her own mother. Had he ever really loved HER? She +thought not. Jon was the son of the woman he had really loved. Surely, +then, he ought not to mind his daughter loving him; it only wanted +getting used to. And a sigh of sheer relief was caught in the folds of +her nightgown slipping over her head. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0203"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +MEETINGS +</H3> + +<P> +Youth only recognises Age by fits and starts. Jon, for one, had never +really seen his father's age till he came back from Spain. The face of +the fourth Jolyon, worn by waiting, gave him quite a shock—it looked +so wan and old. His father's mask had been forced awry by the emotion +of the meeting, so that the boy suddenly realised how much he must have +felt their absence. He summoned to his aid the thought: 'Well, I didn't +want to go!' It was out of date for Youth to defer to Age. But Jon was +by no means typically modern. His father had always been "so jolly" to +him, and to feel that one meant to begin again at once the conduct +which his father had suffered six weeks' loneliness to cure, was not +agreeable. +</P> + +<P> +At the question, "Well, old man, how did the great Goya strike you?" +his conscience pricked him badly. The great Goya only existed because +he had created a face which resembled Fleur's. +</P> + +<P> +On the night of their return he went to bed full of compunction; but +awoke full of anticipation. It was only the fifth of July, and no +meeting was fixed with Fleur until the ninth. He was to have three days +at home before going back to farm. Somehow he must contrive to see her! +</P> + +<P> +In the lives of men an inexorable rhythm, caused by the need for +trousers, not even the fondest parents can deny. On the second day, +therefore, Jon went to Town, and having satisfied his conscience by +ordering what was indispensable in Conduit Street, turned his face +towards Piccadilly. Stratton Street, where her Club was, adjoined +Devonshire House. It would be the merest chance that she should be at +her Club. But he dawdled down Bond Street with a beating heart, +noticing the superiority of all other young men to himself. They wore +their clothes with such an air; they had assurance; they were OLD. He +was suddenly overwhelmed by the conviction that Fleur must have +forgotten him. Absorbed in his own feeling for her all these weeks, he +had mislaid that possibility. The corners of his mouth drooped, his +hands felt clammy. Fleur with the pick of youth at the beck of her +smile—Fleur incomparable! It was an evil moment. Jon, however, had a +great idea that one must be able to face anything. And he braced +himself with that dour reflection in front of a bric-a-brac shop. At +this high-water mark of what was once the London season, there was +nothing to mark it out from any other except a grey top hat or two, and +the sun. Jon moved on, and turning the corner into Piccadilly, ran into +Val Dartie moving towards the Iseeum Club, to which he had just been +elected. +</P> + +<P> +"Hallo! young man! Where are you off to?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon flushed. "I've just been to my tailor's." +</P> + +<P> +Val looked him up and down. "That's good! I'm going in here to order +some cigarettes, then come and have some lunch." +</P> + +<P> +Jon thanked him. He might get news of HER from Val. The condition of +England, that nightmare of its Press and Public men, was seen in +different perspective within the tobacconist's which they now entered. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir; precisely the cigarette I used to supply your father with. +Bless me! Mr. Montague Dartie was a customer here from—let me see—the +year Melton won the Derby. One of my very best customers he was." And a +faint smile illumined the tobacconist's face. "Many's the tip he's +given me, to be sure! I suppose he took a couple of hundred of these +every week, year in, year out, and never changed his cigarette. Very +affable gentleman, brought me a lot of custom. I was sorry he met with +that accident. One misses an old customer like him." +</P> + +<P> +Val smiled. His father's decease had closed an account which had been +running longer, probably, than any other; and in a ring of smoke puffed +out from that time-honoured cigarette he seemed to see again his +father's face, dark, good-looking, moustachioed, a little puffy, in the +only halo it had earned. His father had his fame here, anyway—a man +who smoked two hundred cigarettes a week, who could give tips, and run +accounts for ever! To his tobacconist a hero! Even that was some +distinction to inherit! +</P> + +<P> +"I pay cash," he said; "how much?" +</P> + +<P> +"To HIS son, sir, and cash—ten and six. I shall never forget Mr. +Montague Dartie. I've known him stand talkin' to me half an hour. We +don't get many like him now, with everybody in such a hurry. The war +was bad for manners, sir—it was bad for manners. You were in it, I +see." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Val, tapping his knee, "I got this in the war before. Saved +my life, I expect. Do you want any cigarettes, Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +Rather ashamed, Jon murmured: "I don't smoke, you know," and saw the +tobacconist's lips twisted, as if uncertain whether to say "Good God!" +or "Now's your chance, sir!" +</P> + +<P> +"That's right," said Val; "keep off it while you can. You'll want it +when you take a knock. This is really the same tobacco, then?" +</P> + +<P> +"Identical, sir; a little dearer, that's all. Wonderful staying +power—the British Empire, I always say." +</P> + +<P> +"Send me down a hundred a week to this address, and invoice it monthly. +Come on, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +Jon entered the Iseeum with curiosity. Except to lunch now and then at +the Hotch-potch with his father, he had never been in a London Club. +The Iseeum, comfortable and unpretentious, did not move, could not, so +long as George Forsyte sat on its Committee, where his culinary acumen +was almost the controlling force. The Club had made a stand against the +newly rich, and it had taken all George Forsyte's prestige, and praise +of him as a "good sportsman," to bring in Prosper Profond. +</P> + +<P> +The two were lunching together when the half-brothers-in-law entered +the dining-room, and attracted by George's forefinger, sat down at +their table, Val with his shrewd eyes and charming smile, Jon with +solemn lips and an attractive shyness in his glance. There was an air +of privilege around that corner table, as though past masters were +eating there. Jon was fascinated by the hypnotic atmosphere. The +waiter, lean in the chaps, pervaded with such freemasonical deference. +He seemed to hang on George Forsyte's lips, to watch the gloat in his +eye with a kind of sympathy, to follow the movements of the heavy +club-marked silver fondly. His liveried arm and confidential voice +alarmed Jon, they came so secretly over one's shoulder. +</P> + +<P> +Except for George's: "Your grandfather tipped me once; he was a deuced +good judge of a cigar!" neither he nor the other past master took any +notice of him, and he was grateful for this. The talk was all about the +breeding, points, and prices of horses, and he listened to it vaguely +at first, wondering how it was possible to retain so much knowledge in +a head. He could not take his eyes off the dark past master—what he +said was so deliberate and discouraging—such heavy, queer, smiled-out +words. Jon was thinking of butterflies, when he heard him say: +</P> + +<P> +"I want to see Mr. Soames Forsyde take an interest in 'orses." +</P> + +<P> +"Old Soames! He's too dry a file!" +</P> + +<P> +With all his might Jon tried not to grow red, while the dark past +master went on. +</P> + +<P> +"His daughter's an attractive small girl. Mr. Soames Forsyde is a bit +old-fashioned. I want to see him have a pleasure some day." +</P> + +<P> +George Forsyte grinned. "Don't you worry; he's not so miserable as he +looks. He'll never show he's enjoying anything—they might try and take +it from him. Old Soames! Once bit, twice shy!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Jon," said Val hastily, "if you've finished, we'll go and have +coffee." +</P> + +<P> +"Who were those?" Jon asked on the stairs: "I didn't quite—" +</P> + +<P> +"Old George Forsyte is a first cousin of your father's, and of my uncle +Soames. He's always been here. The other chap, Profond, is a queer +fish. I think he's hanging round Soames' wife, if you ask me!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon looked at him, startled. "But that's awful," he said: "I mean—for +Fleur." +</P> + +<P> +"Don't suppose Fleur cares very much; she's very up-to-date." +</P> + +<P> +"Her mother!" +</P> + +<P> +"You're very green, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +Jon grew red. "Mothers," he stammered angrily, "are different." +</P> + +<P> +"You're right," said Val suddenly; "but things aren't what they were +when I was your age. There's a 'Tomorrow we die' feeling. That's what +old George meant about my uncle Soames. HE doesn't mean to die +tomorrow." +</P> + +<P> +Jon said quickly: "What's the matter between him and my father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Stable secret, Jon. Take my advice, and bottle up. You'll do no good +by knowing. Have a liqueur?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"I hate the way people keep things from one," he muttered, "and then +sneer at one for being green." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, you can ask Holly. If SHE won't tell you, you'll believe it's +for your own good, I suppose." +</P> + +<P> +Jon got up. "I must go now; thanks awfully for the lunch." +</P> + +<P> +Val smiled up at him, half-sorry and yet amused. The boy looked so +upset. +</P> + +<P> +"All right! See you on Friday." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know," murmured Jon. +</P> + +<P> +And he did not. This conspiracy of silence made him desperate. It was +humiliating to be treated like a child. He retraced his moody steps to +Stratton Street. But he would go to her Club now, and find out the +worst. To his inquiry the reply was that Miss Forsyte was not in the +Club. She might be in perhaps later. She was often in on Monday—they +could not say. Jon said he would call again, and, crossing into the +Green Park, flung himself down under a tree. The sun was bright, and a +breeze fluttered the leaves of the young lime-tree beneath which he +lay; but his heart ached. Such darkness seemed gathered round his +happiness. He heard Big Ben chime "Three" above the traffic. The sound +moved something in him, and taking out a piece of paper, he began to +scribble on it with a pencil. He had jotted a stanza, and was searching +the grass for another verse, when something hard touched his +shoulder—a green parasol. There above him stood Fleur! +</P> + +<P> +"They told me you'd been, and were coming back. So I thought you might +be out here; and you are—it's rather wonderful!" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Fleur! I thought you'd have forgotten me." +</P> + +<P> +"When I told you that I shouldn't!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon seized her arm. +</P> + +<P> +"It's too much luck! Let's get away from this side." +</P> + +<P> +He almost dragged her on through that too thoughtfully regulated Park, +to find some cover where they could sit and hold each other's hands. +</P> + +<P> +"Hasn't anybody cut in?" he said, gazing round at her lashes, in +suspense above her cheeks. +</P> + +<P> +"There IS a young idiot, but he doesn't count." +</P> + +<P> +Jon felt a twitch of compassion for the—young idiot. +</P> + +<P> +"You know I've had sunstroke, I didn't tell you." +</P> + +<P> +"Really! Was it interesting?" +</P> + +<P> +"No. Mother was an angel. Has anything happened to YOU?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing. Except that I think I've found out what's wrong between our +families, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +His heart began beating very fast. +</P> + +<P> +"I believe my father wanted to marry your mother, and your father got +her instead." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" +</P> + +<P> +"I came on a photo of her; it was in a frame behind a photo of me. Of +course, if he was very fond of her, that would have made him pretty +mad, wouldn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon thought for a minute. "Not if she loved my father best." +</P> + +<P> +"But suppose they were engaged?" +</P> + +<P> +"If we were engaged, and you found you loved somebody better, I might +go cracked, but I shouldn't grudge it you." +</P> + +<P> +"I should. You mustn't ever do that with me, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +"My God! Not much!" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't believe that he's ever really cared for my mother." +</P> + +<P> +Jon was silent. Val's words, the two past masters in the Club! +</P> + +<P> +"You see, we don't know," went on Fleur; "it may have been a great +shock. She may have behaved badly to him. People do." +</P> + +<P> +"My mother wouldn't." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur shrugged her shoulders. "I don't think we know much about our +fathers and mothers. We just see them in the light of the way they +treat US; but they've treated other people, you know, before we were +born—plenty, I expect. You see, they're both old. Look at your father, +with three separate families!" +</P> + +<P> +"Isn't there any place," cried Jon, "in all this beastly London where +we can be alone?" +</P> + +<P> +"Only a taxi." +</P> + +<P> +"Let's get one, then." +</P> + +<P> +When they were installed, Fleur asked suddenly: "Are you going back to +Robin Hill? I should like to see where you live, Jon. I'm staying with +my aunt for the night, but I could get back in time for dinner. I +wouldn't come to the house, of course." +</P> + +<P> +Jon gazed at her enraptured. +</P> + +<P> +"Splendid! I can show it you from the copse, we shan't meet anybody. +There's a train at four." +</P> + +<P> +The god of property and his Forsytes great and small, leisured, +official, commercial, or professional, unlike the working classes, +still worked their seven hours a day, so that those two of the fourth +generation travelled down to Robin Hill in an empty first-class +carriage, dusty and sun-warmed, of that too early train. They travelled +in blissful silence, holding each other's hands. +</P> + +<P> +At the station they saw no one except porters, and a villager or two +unknown to Jon, and walked out up the lane, which smelled of dust and +honeysuckle. +</P> + +<P> +For Jon—sure of her now, and without separation before him—it was a +miraculous dawdle, more wonderful than those on the Downs, or along the +river Thames. It was love-in-a-mist—one of those illumined pages of +Life, where every word and smile, and every light touch they gave each +other were as little gold and red and blue butterflies and flowers and +birds scrolled in among the text—a happy communing, without +afterthought, which lasted twenty-seven minutes. They reached the +coppice at the milking-hour. Jon would not take her as far as the +farmyard; only to where she could see the field leading up to the +gardens, and the house beyond. They turned in among the larches, and +suddenly, at the winding of the path, came on Irene, sitting on an old +log seat. +</P> + +<P> +There are various kinds of shocks: to the vertebrae; to the nerves; to +moral sensibility; and, more potent and permanent, to personal dignity. +This last was the shock Jon received, coming thus on his mother. He +became suddenly conscious that he was doing an indelicate thing. To +have brought Fleur down openly—yes! But to sneak her in like this! +Consumed with shame, he put on a front as brazen as his nature would +permit. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur was smiling a little defiantly; his mother's startled face was +changing quickly to the impersonal and gracious. It was she who uttered +the first words: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm very glad to see you. It was nice of Jon to think of bringing you +down to us." +</P> + +<P> +"We weren't coming to the house," Jon blurted out. "I just wanted Fleur +to see where I lived." +</P> + +<P> +His mother said quietly: "Won't you come up and have tea?" +</P> + +<P> +Feeling that he had but aggravated his breach of breeding, he heard +Fleur answer: "Thanks very much; I have to get back to dinner. I met +Jon by accident, and we thought it would be rather jolly just to see +his home." +</P> + +<P> +How self-possessed she was! +</P> + +<P> +"Of course; but you MUST have tea. We'll send you down to the station. +My husband will enjoy seeing you." +</P> + +<P> +The expression of his mother's eyes, resting on him for a moment, cast +Jon down level with the ground—a true worm. Then she led on, and Fleur +followed her. He felt like a child, trailing after those two, who were +talking so easily about Spain and Wansdon, and the house up there +beyond the trees and the grassy slope. He watched the fencing of their +eyes, taking each other in—the two beings he loved most in the world. +</P> + +<P> +He could see his father sitting under the oak-tree; and suffered in +advance all the loss of caste he must go through in the eyes of that +tranquil figure, with his knees crossed, thin, old, and elegant; +already he could feel the faint irony which would come into his voice +and smile. +</P> + +<P> +"This is Fleur Forsyte, Jolyon; Jon brought her down to see the house. +Let's have tea at once—she has to catch a train. Jon, tell them, dear, +and telephone to the Dragon for a car." +</P> + +<P> +To leave her alone with them was strange, and yet, as no doubt his +mother had foreseen, the least of evils at the moment; so he ran up +into the house. Now he would not see Fleur alone again—not for a +minute, and they had arranged no further meeting! When he returned +under cover of the maids and teapots, there was not a trace of +awkwardness beneath the tree; it was all within himself, but not the +less for that. They were talking of the Gallery off Cork Street. +</P> + +<P> +"We back-numbers," his father was saying, "are awfully anxious to find +out why we can't appreciate the new stuff; you and Jon must tell us." +</P> + +<P> +"It's supposed to be satiric, isn't it?" said Fleur. +</P> + +<P> +He saw his father's smile. +</P> + +<P> +"Satiric? Oh! I think it's more than that. What do you say, Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know at all," stammered Jon. His father's face had a sudden +grimness. +</P> + +<P> +"The young are tired of us, our gods and our ideals. Off with their +heads, they say—smash their idols! And let's get back to—nothing! +And, by Jove, they've done it! Jon's a poet. He'll be going in, too, +and stamping on what's left of us. Property, beauty, sentiment—all +smoke. We mustn't own anything nowadays, not even our feelings. They +stand in the way of—Nothing." +</P> + +<P> +Jon listened, bewildered, almost outraged by his father's words, behind +which he felt a meaning that he could not reach. He didn't want to +stamp on anything! +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing's the god of to-day," continued Jolyon; "we're back where the +Russians were sixty years ago, when they started Nihilism." +</P> + +<P> +"No, Dad," cried Jon suddenly; "we only want to LIVE, and we don't know +how, because of the Past—that's all!" +</P> + +<P> +"By George!" said Jolyon, "that's profound, Jon. Is it your own? The +Past! Old ownerships, old passions, and their aftermath. Let's have +cigarettes." +</P> + +<P> +Conscious that his mother had lifted her hand to her lips, quickly, as +if to hush something, Jon handed the cigarettes. He lighted his +father's and Fleur's, then one for himself. Had he taken the knock that +Val had spoken of? The smoke was blue when he had not puffed, grey when +he had; he liked the sensation in his nose, and the sense of equality +it gave him. He was glad no one said: "So you've begun!" He felt less +young. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur looked at her watch, and rose. His mother went with her into the +house. Jon stayed with his father, puffing at the cigarette. +</P> + +<P> +"See her into the car, old man," said Jolyon; "and when she's gone, ask +your mother to come back to me." +</P> + +<P> +Jon went. He waited in the hall. He saw her into the car. There was no +chance for any word; hardly for a pressure of the hand. He waited all +that evening for something to be said to him. Nothing was said. Nothing +might have happened. He went up to bed; and in the mirror on his +dressing-table met himself. He did not speak, nor did the image; but +both looked as if they thought the more. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0204"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IN GREEN STREET +</H3> + +<P> +Uncertain, whether the impression that Prosper Profond was dangerous +should be traced to his attempt to give Val the Mayfly filly; to the +remark of Fleur's: "Isn't he a great cat? Prowling!" to his +preposterous inquiry of Jack Cardigan: "What's the use of keepin' fit?" +or, more simply, to the fact that he was a foreigner, or alien as it +was now called. Certain that Annette was looking particularly handsome, +and that Soames had sold him a Gauguin and then torn up the cheque, so +that Monsieur Profond himself had said: "I didn't get that small +picture I bought from Mr. Forsyde." +</P> + +<P> +However suspiciously regarded, he still frequented Winifred's evergreen +little house in Green Street, with a good-natured obtuseness which no +one mistook for naivete; a word hardly applicable to Monsieur Prosper +Profond. Winifred still found him "amusing," and would write him little +notes saying: "Come and have a 'jolly' with us"—it was breath of life +to her to keep up with the phrases of the day. +</P> + +<P> +The mystery, with which all felt him to be surrounded, was due to his +having done, seen, heard, and known everything, and found nothing in +it—which was unnatural. The English type of disillusionment was +familiar enough to Winifred, who had always moved in fashionable +circles. It gave a certain cachet or distinction, so that one got +something out of it. But to see nothing in anything, not as a pose, but +because there WAS nothing in anything, was not English; and that which +was not English one could not help secretly feeling dangerous, if not +precisely bad form. It was like having the mood which the war had left, +seated—dark, heavy, smiling, indifferent—in your Empire chair; it was +like listening to that mood talking through thick pink lips above a +little diabolic beard. It was, as Jack Cardigan expressed it—for the +English character at large—"a bit too thick"—for if nothing was +really worth getting excited about, there were always games, and one +could make it so! Even Winifred, ever a Forsyte at heart, felt that +there was nothing to be had out of a mood of disillusionment; it really +ought not to be there. Monsieur Profond, in fact, made the mood too +plain, in a country which decently veiled such realities. +</P> + +<P> +When Fleur, after her hurried return from Robin Hill, came down to +dinner that evening, the mood was standing at the window of Winifred's +little drawing-room, looking out into Green Street, with an air of +seeing nothing in it. And Fleur gazed promptly into the fireplace with +an air of seeing a fire which was not there. +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond came from the window. He was in full fig, with a white +waistcoat and a white flower in his buttonhole. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Miss Forsyde," he said, "I'm awful pleased to see you. Mr. +Forsyde well? I was sayin' to-day I want to see him have some pleasure. +He worries." +</P> + +<P> +"You think so?" said Fleur shortly. +</P> + +<P> +"Worries," repeated Monsieur Profond, burring the r's. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur spun round. "Shall I tell you," she said, "what would give him +pleasure?" But the words: "To hear that you had cleared out" died at +the expression on his face. All his fine white teeth were showing. +</P> + +<P> +"I was hearin' at the Club to-day, about his old trouble." +</P> + +<P> +"What do you mean?" +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond moved his sleek head as if to minimise his statement. +</P> + +<P> +"Before you were born," he said; "that small business." +</P> + +<P> +Though conscious that he had cleverly diverted her from his own share +in her father's worry, Fleur could not withstand a rush of nervous +curiosity. "What did you hear?" +</P> + +<P> +"Why!" murmured Monsieur Profond, "you know all that." +</P> + +<P> +"I expect I do. But I should like to know that you haven't heard it all +wrong." +</P> + +<P> +"His first wife," murmured Monsieur Profond. +</P> + +<P> +Choking back the words: "He was never married before"; she said: "Well, +what about her?" +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. George Forsyde was tellin' me about your father's first wife +marryin' his cousin Jolyon afterwards. It was a small bit unpleasant, I +should think. I saw their boy—nice boy!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur looked up. Monsieur Profond was swimming, heavily diabolical, +before her. That—the reason! With the most heroic effort of her life +so far, she managed to arrest that swimming figure. She could not tell +whether he had noticed. And just then Winifred came in. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! here you both are already! Imogen and I have had the most amusing +afternoon at the Babies' bazaar." +</P> + +<P> +"What babies?" said Fleur mechanically. +</P> + +<P> +"The 'Save the Babies.' I got such a bargain, my dear. A piece of old +Armenian work—from before the flood. I want your opinion on it, +Prosper." +</P> + +<P> +"Auntie," whispered Fleur suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +At the tone in the girl's voice Winifred closed in on her. +</P> + +<P> +"What's the matter? Aren't you well?" +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond had withdrawn into the window, where he was +practically out of hearing. +</P> + +<P> +"Auntie, he told me that father has been married before. Is it true +that he divorced her, and she married Jon Forsyte's father?" +</P> + +<P> +Never in all the life of the mother of four little Darties had Winifred +felt more seriously embarrassed. Her niece's face was so pale, her eyes +so dark, her voice so whispery and strained. +</P> + +<P> +"Your Father didn't wish you to hear," she said, with all the aplomb +she could muster. "These things will happen. I've often told him he +ought to let you know." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Fleur, and that was all, but it made Winifred pat her +shoulder—a firm little shoulder, nice and white! She never could help +an appraising eye and touch in the matter of her niece, who would have +to be married, of course—though not to that boy Jon. +</P> + +<P> +"We've forgotten all about it years and years ago," she said +comfortably. "Come and have dinner!" +</P> + +<P> +"No, Auntie. I don't feel very well. May I go upstairs?" +</P> + +<P> +"My dear!" murmured Winifred, concerned; "you're not taking this to +heart? Why, you haven't properly come out yet! That boy's a child!" +</P> + +<P> +"What boy? I've only got a headache. But I can't stand that man +to-night." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, well," said Winifred; "go and lie down. I'll send you some +bromide, and I shall talk to Prosper Profond. What business had he to +gossip? Though I must say I think it's much better you should know." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur smiled. "Yes," she said, and slipped from the room. +</P> + +<P> +She went up with her head whirling, a dry sensation in her throat, a +fluttered, frightened feeling in her breast. Never in her life as yet +had she suffered from even momentary fear that she would not get what +she had set her heart on. The sensations of the afternoon had been +full, and poignant, and this gruesome discovery coming on the top of +them had really made her head ache. No wonder her father had hidden +that photograph so secretly behind her own—ashamed of having kept it! +But could he hate Jon's mother and yet keep her photograph? She pressed +her hands over her forehead, trying to see things clearly. Had they +told Jon—had her visit to Robin Hill forced them to tell him? +Everything now turned on that! She knew, they all knew, +except—perhaps—Jon! +</P> + +<P> +She walked up and down, biting her lip and thinking desperately hard. +Jon loved his mother. If they had told him, what would he do? She could +not tell. But if they had not told him, should she not—could she not +get him for herself—get married to him, before he knew? She searched +her memories of Robin Hill. His mother's face so passive—with its dark +eyes and as if powdered hair, its reserve, its smile—baffled her; and +his father's—kindly, sunken, ironic. Instinctively she felt they would +shrink from telling Jon, even now, shrink from hurting him—for of +course it would hurt him awfully to know! +</P> + +<P> +Her aunt must be made not to tell her father that she knew. So long as +neither she herself nor Jon were supposed to know, there was still a +chance—freedom to cover one's tracks, and get what her heart was set +on. But she was almost overwhelmed by her isolation. Every one's hand +was against her—every one's! It was as Jon had said—he and she just +wanted to live and the past was in their way, a past they hadn't shared +in, and didn't understand! Oh! What a shame! And suddenly she thought +of June. Would she help them? For somehow June had left on her the +impression that she would be sympathetic with their love, impatient of +obstacle. Then, instinctively, she thought: 'I won't give anything +away, though, even to her. I daren't! I mean to have Jon; in spite of +them all.' +</P> + +<P> +Soup was brought up to her, and one of Winifred's pet headache cachets. +She swallowed both. Then Winifred herself appeared. Fleur opened her +campaign with the words: +</P> + +<P> +"You know, Auntie, I do wish people wouldn't think I'm in love with +that boy. Why, I've hardly seen him!" +</P> + +<P> +Winifred, though experienced, was not 'fine'. She accepted the remark +with considerable relief. Of course, it was not pleasant for the girl +to hear of the family scandal, and she set herself to minimise the +matter, a task for which she was eminently qualified, raised +fashionably under a comfortable mother and a father whose nerves might +not be shaken, and for many years the wife of Montague Dartie. Her +description was a masterpiece of understatement. Fleur's father's first +wife had been very foolish. There had been a young man who had got run +over, and she had left Fleur's father. Then, years after, when it might +all have come right again, she had taken up with their cousin Jolyon; +and, of course, her father had been obliged to have a divorce. Nobody +remembered anything of it now, except just the family. And, perhaps, it +had all turned out for the best; her father had Fleur; and Jolyon and +Irene had been quite happy, they said, and their boy was a nice boy. +"Val having Holly, too, is a sort of plaster, don't you know?" With +these soothing words, Winifred patted her niece's shoulder, thought: +"She's a nice, plump little thing!" and went back to Prosper Profond, +who, in spite of his indiscretion, was very "amusing" this evening. +</P> + +<P> +For some minutes after her aunt had gone Fleur remained under influence +of bromide material and spiritual. But then reality came back. Her aunt +had left out all that mattered—all the feeling, the hate, the love, +the unforgivingness of passionate hearts. She, who knew so little of +life, and had touched only the fringe of love, was yet aware by +instinct that words have as little relation to fact and feeling as coin +to the bread it buys. 'Poor Father!' she thought. 'Poor me! Poor Jon! +But I don't care, I mean to have him!' From the window of her darkened +room she saw "that man" issue from the door below and "prowl" away. If +he and her mother—how would that affect her chance? Surely it must +make her father cling to her more closely, so that he would consent in +the end to anything she wanted, or become reconciled the sooner to what +she did without his knowledge. +</P> + +<P> +She took some earth from the flower-box in the window, and with all her +might flung it after that disappearing figure. It fell short, but the +action did her good. +</P> + +<P> +And a little puff of air came up from Green Street, smelling of petrol, +not sweet. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0205"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PURELY FORSYTE AFFAIRS +</H3> + +<P> +Soames, coming up to the City, with the intention of calling in at +Green Street at the end of his day and taking Fleur back home with him, +suffered from rumination. Sleeping partner that he was, he seldom +visited the City now, but he still had a room of his own at Cuthcott +Kingson & Forsyte's, and one special clerk and a half assigned to the +management of purely Forsyte affairs. They were somewhat in flux just +now—an auspicious moment for the disposal of house property. And +Soames was unloading the estates of his father and uncle Roger, and to +some extent of his uncle Nicholas. His shrewd and matter-of-course +probity in all money concerns had made him something of an autocrat in +connection with these trusts. If Soames thought this or thought that, +one had better save oneself the bother of thinking too. He guaranteed, +as it were, irresponsibility to numerous Forsytes of the third and +fourth generations. His fellow trustees, such as his cousins Roger or +Nicholas, his cousins-in-law Tweetyman and Spender, or his sister +Cicely's husband all trusted him; he signed first, and where he signed +first they signed after, and nobody was a penny the worse. Just now +they were all a good many pennies the better, and Soames was beginning +to see the close of certain trusts, except for distribution of the +income from securities as gilt-edged as was compatible with the period. +</P> + +<P> +Passing the more feverish parts of the City towards the most perfect +backwater in London, he ruminated. Money was extraordinarily tight; and +morality extraordinarily loose! The War had done it. Banks were not +lending; people breaking contracts all over the place. There was a +feeling in the air and a look on faces that he did not like. The +country seemed in for a spell of gambling and bankruptcies. There was +satisfaction in the thought that neither he nor his trusts had an +investment which could be affected by anything less maniacal than +national repudiation or a levy on capital. If Soames had faith, it was +in what he called "English common sense"—or the power to have things, +if not one way then another. He might—like his father James before +him—say he didn't know what things were coming to, but he never in his +heart believed they were. If it rested with him, they wouldn't—and, +after all, he was only an Englishman like any other, so quietly +tenacious of what he had that he knew he would never really part with +it without something more or less equivalent in exchange. Take his own +case, for example! He was well off. Did that do anybody harm? He did +not eat ten meals a day; he ate no more than, perhaps not so much as, a +poor man. He spent no money on vice; breathed no more air, used no more +water to speak of than the mechanic or the porter. He certainly had +pretty things about him, but they had given employment in the making, +and somebody must use them. He bought pictures, but Art must be +encouraged. He was, in fact, an accidental channel through which money +flowed, employing labour. What was there objectionable in that? In his +charge money was in quicker and more useful flux than it would be in +charge of the State and a lot of slow-fly money-sucking officials. And +as to what he saved each year—it was just as much in flux as what he +didn't save, going into Water Board or Council Stocks, or something +sound and useful. The State paid him no salary for being trustee of his +own or other people's money—HE DID ALL THAT FOR NOTHING. Therein lay +the whole case against nationalisation—owners of private property were +unpaid, and yet had every incentive to quicken up the flux. Under +nationalisation—just the opposite! In a country smarting from +officialism he felt that he had a strong case. +</P> + +<P> +It particularly annoyed him, entering that backwater of perfect peace, +to think that a lot of unscrupulous Trusts and Combinations had been +cornering the market in goods of all kinds, and keeping prices at an +artificial height. Such abusers of the individualistic system were the +ruffians who caused all the trouble, and it was some satisfaction to +see them getting into a stew at last lest the whole thing might come +down with a run-and land in the soup. +</P> + +<P> +The offices of Cuthcott Kingson & Forsyte occupied the ground and first +floors of a house on the right-hand side; and, ascending to his room, +Soames thought: 'Time we had a coat of paint.' +</P> + +<P> +His old clerk Gradman was seated, where he always was, at a huge bureau +with countless pigeonholes. Half-the-clerk stood beside him, with a +broker's note recording investment of the proceeds from sale of the +Bryanston Square house, in Roger Forsyte's estate. Soames took it, and +said: +</P> + +<P> +"Vancouver City Stock. H'm! It's down to-day!" +</P> + +<P> +With a sort of grating ingratiation old Gradman answered him: +</P> + +<P> +"Ye-es; but everything's down, Mr. Soames." And half-the-clerk withdrew. +</P> + +<P> +Soames skewered the document onto a number of other papers and hung up +his hat. +</P> + +<P> +"I want to look at my Will and Marriage Settlement, Gradman." +</P> + +<P> +Old Gradman, moving to the limit of his swivel chair, drew out two +drafts from the bottom left-hand drawer. Recovering his body, he raised +his grizzle-haired face, very red from stooping. +</P> + +<P> +"Copies, sir." +</P> + +<P> +Soames took them. It struck him suddenly how like Gradman was to the +stout brindled yard dog they had been wont to keep on his chain at 'The +Shelter,' till one day Fleur had come and insisted it should be let +loose, so that it had at once bitten the cook and been destroyed. If +you let Gradman off his chair, would he bite the cook? +</P> + +<P> +Checking this frivolous fancy, Soames unfolded his Marriage Settlement. +He had not looked at it for over eighteen years, not since he remade +his Will when his father died and Fleur was born. He wanted to see +whether the words "during coverture" were in. Yes, they were—odd +expression, when you thought of it, and derived perhaps from +horse-breeding! Interest on fifteen thousand pounds (which he paid her +without deducting income tax) so long as she remained his wife, and +afterwards during widowhood "dum casta"—old-fashioned and rather +pointed words, put in to insure the conduct of Fleur's mother. His Will +made it up to an annuity of a thousand under the same conditions. All +right! He returned the copies to Gradman, who took them without looking +up, swung the chair, restored the papers to their drawer, and went on +casting up. +</P> + +<P> +"Gradman! I don't like the condition of the country; there are a lot of +people about without any common sense. I want to find a way by which I +can safeguard Miss Fleur against anything which might arise." +</P> + +<P> +Gradman wrote the figure "2" on his blotting-paper. +</P> + +<P> +"Ye-es," he said; "there's a nahsty spirit." +</P> + +<P> +"The ordinary restraint against anticipation doesn't meet the case." +</P> + +<P> +"Nao," said Gradman. +</P> + +<P> +"Suppose those Labour fellows come in, or worse! It's these people with +fixed ideas who are the danger. Look at Ireland!" +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!" said Gradman. +</P> + +<P> +"Suppose I were to make a settlement on her at once with myself as +beneficiary for life, they couldn't take anything but the interest from +me, unless of course they alter the law." +</P> + +<P> +Gradman moved his head and smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"Aoh!" he said, "they wouldn't do tha-at!" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know," muttered Soames; "I don't trust them." +</P> + +<P> +"It'll take two years, sir, to be valid against death duties." +</P> + +<P> +Soames sniffed. Two years! He was only sixty-five! +</P> + +<P> +"That's not the point. Draw a form of settlement that passes all my +property to Miss Fleur's children in equal shares, with antecedent +life-interests first to myself and then to her without power of +anticipation, and add a clause that in the event of anything happening +to divert her life-interest, that interest passes to the trustees, to +apply for her benefit, in their absolute discretion." +</P> + +<P> +Gradman grated: "Rather extreme at your age, sir; you lose control." +</P> + +<P> +"That's my business," said Soames sharply. +</P> + +<P> +Gradman wrote on a piece of paper. "Life-interest—anticipation—divert +interest—absolute discretion..." and said: +</P> + +<P> +"What trustees? There's young Mr. Kingson, he's a nice steady young +fellow." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, he might do for one. I must have three. There isn't a Forsyte now +who appeals to me." +</P> + +<P> +"Not young Mr. Nicholas? He's at the Bar. We've given 'im briefs." +</P> + +<P> +"He'll never set the Thames on fire," said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +A smile oozed out on Gradman's face, greasy with countless +mutton-chops, the smile of a man who sits all day. +</P> + +<P> +"You can't expect it, at his age, Mr. Soames." +</P> + +<P> +"Why? What is he? Forty?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ye-es, quite a young fellow." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, put him in; but I want somebody who'll take a personal interest. +There's no one that I can see." +</P> + +<P> +"What about Mr. Valerius, now he's come home?" +</P> + +<P> +"Val Dartie? With that father?" +</P> + +<P> +"We-ell," murmured Gradman, "he's been dead seven years—the Statute +runs against him." +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Soames. "I don't like the connection." +</P> + +<P> +He rose. Gradman said suddenly: +</P> + +<P> +"If they were makin' a levy on capital, they could come on the +trustees, sir. So there you'd be just the same. I'd think it over, if I +were you." +</P> + +<P> +"That's true," said Soames, "I will. What have you done about that +dilapidation notice in Vere Street?" +</P> + +<P> +"I 'aven't served it yet. The party's very old. She won't want to go +out at her age." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know. This spirit of unrest touches every one." +</P> + +<P> +"Still, I'm lookin' at things broadly, sir. She's eighty-one." +</P> + +<P> +"Better serve it," said Soames, "and see what she says. Oh! and Mr. +Timothy? Is everything in order in case of accidents." +</P> + +<P> +"I've got the inventory of his estate all ready; had the furniture and +pictures valued so that we know what reserves to put on. I shall be +sorry when he goes, though. Dear me! It is a time since I first saw Mr. +Timothy!" +</P> + +<P> +"We can't live for ever," said Soames, taking down his hat. +</P> + +<P> +"Nao," said Gradman; "but it'll be a pity—the last of the old family! +Shall I take up the matter of that nuisance in Old Compton Street? +Those organs—they're nahsty things." +</P> + +<P> +"Do. I must call for Miss Fleur and catch the four o'clock. Good-day, +Gradman." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-day, Mr. Soames. I hope Miss Fleur—" +</P> + +<P> +"Well enough, but gads about too much." +</P> + +<P> +"Ye-es," grated Gradman; "she's young." +</P> + +<P> +Soames went out, musing: "Old Gradman! If he were younger I'd put him +in the trust. There's nobody I can depend on to take a real interest." +</P> + +<P> +Leaving the bilious and mathematical exactitude, the preposterous peace +of that backwater, he thought suddenly: 'During coverture! Why can't +they exclude fellows like Profond, instead of a lot of hard-working +Germans?' and was surprised at the depth of uneasiness which could +provoke so unpatriotic a thought. But there it was! One never got a +moment of real peace. Always something at the back of everything! And +he made his way towards Green Street. +</P> + +<P> +Two hours later by his watch, Thomas Gradman, stirring in his swivel +chair, closed the last drawer of his bureau, and putting into his +waistcoat pocket a bunch of keys so fat that they gave him a +protuberance on the liver side, brushed his old top hat round with his +sleeve, took his umbrella, and descended. Thick, short, and buttoned +closely into his old frock coat, he walked towards Covent Garden +market. He never missed that daily promenade to the Tube for Highgate, +and seldom some critical transaction on the way in connection with +vegetables and fruit. Generations might be born, and hats might change, +wars be fought, and Forsytes fade away, but Thomas Gradman, faithful +and grey, would take his daily walk and buy his daily vegetable. Times +were not what they were, and his son had lost a leg, and they never +gave him those nice little plaited baskets to carry the stuff in now, +and these Tubes were convenient things—still he mustn't complain; his +health was good considering his time of life, and after fifty-four +years in the Law he was getting a round eight hundred a year and a +little worried of late, because it was mostly collector's commission on +the rents, and with all this conversion of Forsyte property going on, +it looked like drying up, and the price of living still so high; but it +was no good worrying—"The good God made us all"—as he was in the +habit of saying; still, house property in London—he didn't know what +Mr. Roger or Mr. James would say if they could see it being sold like +this—seemed to show a lack of faith; but Mr. Soames—he worried. Life +and lives in being and twenty-one years after—beyond that you couldn't +go; still, he kept his health wonderfully—and Miss Fleur was a pretty +little thing—she was; she'd marry; but lots of people had no children +nowadays—he had had his first child at twenty-two; and Mr. Jolyon, +married while he was at Cambridge, had his child the same +year—gracious Peter! That was back in '70, a long time before old Mr. +Jolyon—fine judge of property—had taken his Will away from Mr. +James—dear, yes! Those were the days when they were buyin' property +right and left, and none of this khaki and fallin' over one another to +get out of things; and cucumbers at twopence; and a melon—the old +melons, that made your mouth water! Fifty years since he went into Mr. +James' office, and Mr. James had said to him: "Now, Gradman, you're +only a shaver—you pay attention, and you'll make your five hundred a +year before you've done." And he had, and feared God, and served the +Forsytes, and kept a vegetable diet at night. And, buying a copy of +John Bull—not that he approved of it, an extravagant affair—he +entered the Tube elevator with his mere brown-paper parcel, and was +borne down into the bowels of the earth. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0206"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SOAMES' PRIVATE LIFE +</H3> + +<P> +On his way to Green Street it occurred to Soames that he ought to go +into Dumetrius' in Suffolk Street about the possibility of the Bolderby +Old Crome. Almost worth while to have fought the War to have the +Bolderby Old Crome, as it were, in flux! Old Bolderby had died, his son +and grandson had been killed—a cousin was coming into the estate, who +meant to sell it, some said because of the condition of England, others +said because he had asthma. +</P> + +<P> +If Dumetrius once got hold of it the price would become prohibitive; it +was necessary for Soames to find out whether Dumetrius had got it, +before he tried to get it himself. He therefore confined himself to +discussing with Dumetrius whether Monticellis would come again now that +it was the fashion for a picture to be anything except a picture; and +the future of Johns, with a side-slip into Buxton Knights. It was only +when leaving that he added: "So they're not selling the Bolderby Old +Crome, after all?" In sheer pride of racial superiority, as he had +calculated would be the case, Dumetrius replied: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! I shall get it, Mr. Forsyte, sir." +</P> + +<P> +The flutter of his eyelid fortified Soames in a resolution to write +direct to the new Bolderby, suggesting that the only dignified way of +dealing with an Old Crome was to avoid dealers. He therefore said: +"Well, good-day!" and went, leaving Dumetrius the wiser. +</P> + +<P> +At Green Street he found that Fleur was out and would be all the +evening; she was staying one more night in London. He cabbed on +dejectedly, and caught his train. +</P> + +<P> +He reached his house about six o'clock. The air was heavy, midges +biting, thunder about. Taking his letters he went up to his +dressing-room to cleanse himself of London. +</P> + +<P> +An uninteresting post. A receipt, a bill for purchases on behalf of +Fleur. A circular about an exhibition of etchings. A letter beginning: +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"SIR, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"I feel it my duty—" +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +That would be an appeal or something unpleasant. He looked at once for +the signature. There was none! Incredulously he turned the page over +and examined each corner. Not being a public man, Soames had never yet +had an anonymous letter, and his first impulse was to tear it up, as a +dangerous thing; his second to read it, as a thing still more dangerous. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"SIR, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"I feel it my duty to inform you that having no interest in the matter +your lady is carrying on with a foreigner—" +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Reaching that word Soames stopped mechanically and examined the +post-mark. So far as he could pierce the impenetrable disguise in which +the Post Office had wrapped it, there was something with a "sea" at the +end and a "t" in it. Chelsea? No! Battersea? Perhaps! He read on. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"These foreigners are all the same. Sack the lot! This one meets your +lady twice a week. I know it of my own knowledge—and to see an +Englishman put on goes against the grain. You watch it and see if what +I say isn't true. I shouldn't meddle if it wasn't a dirty foreigner +that's in it. Yours obedient." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The sensation with which Soames dropped the letter was similar to that +he would have had entering his bedroom and finding it full of +black-beetles. The meanness of anonymity gave a shuddering obscenity to +the moment. And the worst of it was that this shadow had been at the +back of his mind ever since the Sunday evening when Fleur had pointed +down at Prosper Profond strolling on the lawn, and said: "Prowling +cat!" Had he not in connection therewith, this very day, perused his +Will and Marriage Settlement? And now this anonymous ruffian, with +nothing to gain, apparently, save the venting of his spite against +foreigners, had wrenched it out of the obscurity in which he had hoped +and wished it would remain. To have such knowledge forced on him, at +his time of life, about Fleur's mother! He picked the letter up from +the carpet, tore it across, and then, when it hung together by just the +fold at the back, stopped tearing, and re-read it. He was taking at +that moment one of the decisive resolutions of his life. He would NOT +be forced into another scandal. No! However he decided to deal with +this matter—and it required the most far-sighted and careful +consideration—he would do nothing that might injure Fleur. That +resolution taken, his mind answered the helm again, and he made his +ablutions. His hands trembled as he dried them. Scandal he would not +have, but something must be done to stop this sort of thing! He went +into his wife's room and stood looking round him. The idea of searching +for anything which would incriminate, and entitle him to hold a menace +over her, did not even come to him. There would be nothing—she was +much too practical. The idea of having her watched had been dismissed +before it came—too well he remembered his previous experience of that. +No! He had nothing but this torn-up letter from some anonymous ruffian, +whose impudent intrusion into his private life he so violently +resented. It was repugnant to him to make use of it, but he might have +to. What a mercy Fleur was not at home to-night! A tap on the door +broke up his painful cogitations. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Michael Mont, sir, is in the drawing-room. Will you see him?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Soames; "yes. I'll come down." +</P> + +<P> +Anything that would take his mind off for a few minutes! +</P> + +<P> +Michael Mont in flannels stood on the verandah, smoking a cigarette. He +threw it away as Soames came up, and ran his hand through his hair. +</P> + +<P> +Soames' feeling towards this young man was singular. He was no doubt a +rackety, irresponsible young fellow according to old standards, yet +somehow likeable, with his extraordinarily cheerful way of blurting out +his opinions. +</P> + +<P> +"Come in," he said; "have you had tea?" +</P> + +<P> +Mont came in. +</P> + +<P> +"I thought Fleur would have been back, sir; but I'm glad she isn't. The +fact is, I—I'm fearfully gone on her; so fearfully gone that I thought +you'd better know. It's old-fashioned, of course, coming to fathers +first, but I thought you'd forgive that. I went to my own dad, and he +says if I settle down he'll see me through. He rather cottons to the +idea, in fact. I told him about your Goya." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Soames, inexpressibly dry. "He rather cottons?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir; do you?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames smiled faintly. "You see," resumed Mont, twiddling his straw +hat, while his hair, ears, eyebrows, all seemed to stand up from +excitement, "when you've been through the War you can't help being in a +hurry." +</P> + +<P> +"To get married; and unmarried afterwards," said Soames slowly. +</P> + +<P> +"Not from Fleur, sir. Imagine, if you were me!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames cleared his throat. That way of putting it was forcible enough. +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur's too young," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! no, sir. We're awfully old nowadays. My dad seems to me a perfect +babe; his thinking apparatus hasn't turned a hair. But he's a +Baronight, of course; that keeps him back." +</P> + +<P> +"Baronight," repeated Soames; "what may that be?" +</P> + +<P> +"Bart, sir. I shall be a Bart some day. But I shall live it down, you +know." +</P> + +<P> +"Go away and live this down," said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +Young Mont said imploringly: "Oh! no, sir. I simply must hang round, or +I shouldn't have a dog's chance. You'll let Fleur do what she likes, I +suppose, anyway. Madame passes me." +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed!" said Soames frigidly. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't really bar me, do you?" and the young man looked so doleful +that Soames smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"You may think you're very old," he said; "but you strike me as +extremely young. To rattle ahead of everything is not a proof of +maturity." +</P> + +<P> +"All right, sir; I give you our age. But to show you I mean +business—I've got a job." +</P> + +<P> +"Glad to hear it." +</P> + +<P> +"Joined a publisher; my governor is putting up the stakes." +</P> + +<P> +Soames put his hand over his mouth—he had so very nearly said: "God +help the publisher." His grey eyes scrutinised the agitated young man. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't dislike you, Mr. Mont, but Fleur is everything to me. +Everything—do you understand?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, sir, I know; but so she is to me." +</P> + +<P> +"That's as may be. I'm glad you've told me, however. And now I think +there's nothing more to be said." +</P> + +<P> +"I know it rests with her, sir." +</P> + +<P> +"It will rest with her a long time, I hope." +</P> + +<P> +"You aren't cheering," said Mont suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Soames; "my experience of life has not made me anxious to +couple people in a hurry. Good-night, Mr. Mont. I shan't tell Fleur +what you've said." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" murmured Mont blankly; "I really could knock my brains out for +want of her. She knows that perfectly well." +</P> + +<P> +"I dare say," and Soames held out his hand. A distracted squeeze, a +heavy sigh, and, soon after, sounds from the young man's motor-cycle +called up visions of flying dust and broken bones. +</P> + +<P> +'The younger generation!' he thought heavily, and went out on to the +lawn. The gardeners had been mowing, and there was still the smell of +fresh-cut grass—the thundery air kept all scents close to earth. The +sky was of a purplish hue—the poplars black. Two or three boats passed +on the river, scuttling, as it were, for shelter before the storm. +'Three days fine weather,' thought Soames, 'and then a storm!' Where +was Annette? With that chap, for all he knew—she was a young woman! +Impressed with the queer charity of that thought, he entered the +summer-house and sat down. The fact was—and he admitted it—Fleur was +so much to him that his wife was very little—very little; French—had +hardly been more than a mistress, and he was getting indifferent to +that side of things! It was odd how, with all his ingrained care for +moderation and secure investment, Soames ever put his emotional eggs +into one basket. First Irene—now Fleur. He was just conscious of it, +sitting there, conscious of its odd dangerousness. It had brought him +to wreck and scandal once, but now—now it should save him! He cared so +much for Fleur that he would have no further scandal. If only he could +get at that anonymous letter writer, he would teach the fellow not to +meddle and stir up mud at the bottom of water which he wished should +remain stagnant!... A distant flash, a low rumble, and large drops of +rain spattered on the thatch above him. He remained indifferent, +tracing a pattern with his finger on the dusty surface of a little +rustic table. Fleur's future! 'I want fair sailing for her,' he +thought. 'Nothing else matters at my time of life.' A lonely +business—life! What you had you never could keep to yourself! As you +warned one off, you let another in. One could make sure of nothing! He +reached up and pulled a red rambler rose from a cluster which blocked +the window. Flowers grew and dropped—you couldn't keep them! The +thunder rumbled and crashed, travelling east along the river, the +paling flashes flicked his eyes; the poplar tops showed sharp and dense +against the sky, a heavy shower rustled and rattled and veiled in the +little house wherein he sat, indifferent, thinking. +</P> + +<P> +When the storm was over, he left his retreat and went down the wet path +to the river bank. +</P> + +<P> +Two swans had come, sheltering in among the reeds. He knew the birds +well, and stood watching the dignity in the curve of those white necks +and formidable snake-like heads. 'Not dignified—what I have to do!' he +thought. And yet it must be tackled, lest worse befell. Annette must be +back by now from wherever she had gone, for it was nearly dinner-time, +and as the moment for seeing her approached, the difficulty of knowing +what to say and how to say it had increased. A new and scaring thought +occurred to him. Suppose she wanted her liberty to marry this fellow! +Well, if she did, she couldn't have it. He had not married her for +that. The image of Prosper Profond dawdled before him reassuringly. Not +a marrying man! No, no! Anger replaced that momentary scare. 'He had +better not come my way,' he thought. The mongrel represented—! Ah! +what did Prosper Profond represent? Nothing that mattered surely. And +yet something real enough in the world—unmorality let off its chain, +disillusionment on the prowl! That expression Annette had caught from +him: "Je m'en fiche!" A fatalistic chap! A Continental—a +cosmopolitan—a product of the age! If there were condemnation more +complete, Soames felt that he did not know it. +</P> + +<P> +The swans had turned their heads, and were looking past him into some +distance of their own. One of them uttered a little hiss, wagged its +tail, turned as if answering to a rudder, and swam away. The other +followed. Their white bodies, their stately necks, passed out of his +sight, and he went towards the house. +</P> + +<P> +Annette was in the drawing-room, dressed for dinner, and he thought as +he went up-stairs: 'Handsome is as handsome does.' Handsome! Except for +remarks about the curtains in the drawing-room, and the storm, there +was practically no conversation during a meal distinguished by +exactitude of quantity and perfection of quality. Soames drank nothing. +He followed her into the drawing-room afterwards, and found her smoking +a cigarette on the sofa between the two French windows. She was leaning +back, almost upright, in a low black frock, with her knees crossed and +her blue eyes half closed; grey-blue smoke issued from her red, rather +full lips, a fillet bound her chestnut hair, she wore the thinnest silk +stockings, and shoes with very high heels showing off her instep. A +fine piece in any room! Soames, who held that torn letter in a hand +thrust deep into the side-pocket of his dinner-jacket, said: +</P> + +<P> +"I'm going to shut the window; the damp's lifting in." +</P> + +<P> +He did so, and stood looking at a David Cox adorning the cream-panelled +wall close by. +</P> + +<P> +What was she thinking of? He had never understood a woman in his +life—except Fleur—and Fleur not always! His heart beat fast. But if +he meant to do it, now was the moment. Turning from the David Cox, he +took out the torn letter. +</P> + +<P> +"I've had this." +</P> + +<P> +Her eyes widened, stared at him, and hardened. +</P> + +<P> +Soames handed her the letter. +</P> + +<P> +"It's torn, but you can read it." And he turned back to the David +Cox—a seapiece, of good tone but without movement enough. 'I wonder +what that chap's doing at this moment?' he thought. 'I'll astonish him +yet.' Out of the corner of his eye he saw Annette holding the letter +rigidly; her eyes moved from side to side under her darkened lashes and +frowning darkened eyebrows. She dropped the letter, gave a little +shiver, smiled, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Dirrty!" +</P> + +<P> +"I quite agree," said Soames; "degrading. Is it true?" +</P> + +<P> +A tooth fastened on her red lower lip. "And what if it were?" +</P> + +<P> +She was brazen! +</P> + +<P> +"Is that all you have to say?" +</P> + +<P> +"No." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, speak out!" +</P> + +<P> +"What is the good of talking?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames said icily: "So you admit it?" +</P> + +<P> +"I admit nothing. You are a fool to ask. A man like you should not ask. +It is dangerous." +</P> + +<P> +Soames made a tour of the room, to subdue his rising anger. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you remember," he said, halting in front of her, "what you were +when I married you? Working at accounts in a restaurant." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you remember that I was not half your age?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames broke off the hard encounter of their eyes, and went back to the +David Cox. +</P> + +<P> +"I am not going to bandy words. I require you to give up +this—friendship. I think of the matter entirely as it affects Fleur." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah!—Fleur!" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Soames stubbornly; "Fleur. She is your child as well as +mine." +</P> + +<P> +"It is kind to admit that!" +</P> + +<P> +"Are you going to do what I say?" +</P> + +<P> +"I refuse to tell you." +</P> + +<P> +"Then I must make you." +</P> + +<P> +Annette smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"No, Soames," she said. "You are helpless. Do not say things that you +will regret." +</P> + +<P> +Anger swelled the veins on his forehead. He opened his mouth to vent +that emotion, and—could not. Annette went on: +</P> + +<P> +"There shall be no more such letters, I promise you. That is enough." +</P> + +<P> +Soames writhed. He had a sense of being treated like a child by this +woman who had deserved he did not know what. +</P> + +<P> +"When two people have married, and lived like us, Soames, they had +better be quiet about each other. There are things one does not drag up +into the light for people to laugh at. You will be quiet, then; not for +my sake—for your own. You are getting old; I am not, yet. You have +made me ver-ry practical." Soames, who had passed through all the +sensations of being choked, repeated dully: +</P> + +<P> +"I require you to give up this friendship." +</P> + +<P> +"And if I do not?" +</P> + +<P> +"Then—then I will cut you out of my Will." +</P> + +<P> +Somehow it did not seem to meet the case. Annette laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"You will live a long time, Soames." +</P> + +<P> +"You—you are a bad woman," said Soames suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +Annette shrugged her shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +"I do not think so. Living with you has killed things in me, it is +true; but I am not a bad woman. I am sensible—that is all. And so will +you be when you have thought it over." +</P> + +<P> +"I shall see this man," said Soames sullenly, "and warn him off." +</P> + +<P> +"Mon cher, you are funny. You do not want me, you have as much of me as +you want; and you wish the rest of me to be dead. I admit nothing, but +I am not going to be dead, Soames, at my age; so you had better be +quiet, I tell you. I myself will make no scandal; none. Now, I am not +saying any more, whatever you do." +</P> + +<P> +She reached out, took a French novel off a little table, and opened it. +Soames watched her, silenced by the tumult of his feelings. The thought +of that man was almost making him want her, and this was a revelation +of their relationship, startling to one little given to introspective +philosophy. Without saying another word he went out and up to the +picture-gallery. This came of marrying a Frenchwoman! And yet, without +her there would have been no Fleur! She had served her purpose. +</P> + +<P> +'She's right,' he thought; 'I can do nothing. I don't even KNOW that +there's anything in it.' The instinct of self-preservation warned him +to batten down his hatches, to smother the fire with want of air. +Unless one believed there was something in a thing, there wasn't. +</P> + +<P> +That night he went into her room. She received him in the most +matter-of-fact way, as if there had been no scene between them. And he +returned to his own room with a curious sense of peace. If one didn't +choose to see, one needn't. And he did not choose—in future he did not +choose. There was nothing to be gained by it—nothing! Opening the +drawer he took from the sachet a handkerchief, and the framed +photograph of Fleur. When he had looked at it a little he slipped it +down, and there was that other one—that old one of Irene. An owl +hooted while he stood in his window gazing at it. The owl hooted, the +red climbing roses seemed to deepen in colour, there came a scent of +lime-blossom. God! That had been a different thing! Passion—Memory! +Dust! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0207"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +JUNE TAKES A HAND +</H3> + +<P> +One who was a sculptor, a Slav, a sometime resident in New York, an +egoist, and impecunious, was to be found of an evening in June +Forsyte's studio on the bank of the Thames at Chiswick. On the evening +of July 6, Boris Strumolowski—several of whose works were on show +there because they were as yet too advanced to be on show anywhere +else—had begun well, with that aloof and rather Christlike silence +which admirably suited his youthful, round, broad-cheekboned +countenance framed in bright hair banged like a girl's. June had known +him three weeks, and he still seemed to her the principal embodiment of +genius, and hope of the future; a sort of Star of the East which had +strayed into an unappreciative West. Until that evening he had +conversationally confined himself to recording his impressions of the +United States, whose dust he had just shaken from off his feet—a +country, in his opinion, so barbarous in every way that he had sold +practically nothing there, and become an object of suspicion to the +police; a country, as he said, without a race of its own, without +liberty, equality, or fraternity, without principles, traditions, +taste, without—in a word—a soul. He had left it for his own good, and +come to the only other country where he could live well. June had dwelt +unhappily on him in her lonely moments, standing before his +creations—frightening, but powerful and symbolic once they had been +explained! That he, haloed by bright hair like an early Italian +painting, and absorbed in his genius to the exclusion of all else—the +only sign of course by which real genius could be told—should still be +a "lame duck" agitated her warm heart almost to the exclusion of Paul +Post. And she had begun to take steps to clear her Gallery, in order to +fill it with Strumolowski masterpieces. She had at once encountered +trouble. Paul Post had kicked; Vospovitch had stung. With all the +emphasis of a genius which she did not as yet deny them, they had +demanded another six weeks at least of her Gallery. The American +stream, still flowing in, would soon be flowing out. The American +stream was their right, their only hope, their salvation—since nobody +in this "beastly" country cared for Art. June had yielded to the +demonstration. After all Boris would not mind their having the full +benefit of an American stream, which he himself so violently despised. +</P> + +<P> +This evening she had put that to Boris with nobody else present, except +Hannah Hobdey, the mediaeval black-and-whitist, and Jimmy Portugal, +editor of the Neo-Artist. She had put it to him with that sudden +confidence which continual contact with the neo-artistic world had +never been able to dry up in her warm and generous nature. He had not +broken his Christlike silence, however, for more than two minutes +before she began to move her blue eyes from side to side, as a cat +moves its tail. This—he said—was characteristic of England, the most +selfish country in the world; the country which sucked the blood of +other countries; destroyed the brains and hearts of Irishmen, Hindus, +Egyptians, Boers, and Burmese, all the finest races in the world; +bullying, hypocritical England! This was what he had expected, coming +to such a country, where the climate was all fog, and the people all +tradesmen perfectly blind to Art, and sunk in profiteering and the +grossest materialism. Conscious that Hannah Hobdey was murmuring: +"Hear, hear!" and Jimmy Portugal sniggering, June grew crimson, and +suddenly rapped out: +</P> + +<P> +"Then why did you ever come? We didn't ask you." The remark was so +singularly at variance with all that she had led him to expect from +her, that Strumolowski stretched out his hand and took a cigarette. +</P> + +<P> +"England never wants an idealist," he said. +</P> + +<P> +But in June something primitively English was thoroughly upset; old +Jolyon's sense of justice had risen, as it were, from bed. "You come +and sponge on us," she said, "and then abuse us. If you think that's +playing the game, I don't." +</P> + +<P> +She now discovered that which others had discovered before her—the +thickness of hide beneath which the sensibility of genius is sometimes +veiled. Strumolowski's young and ingenuous face became the incarnation +of a sneer. +</P> + +<P> +"Sponge, one does not sponge, one takes what is owing—a tenth part of +what is owing. You will repent to say that, Miss Forsyte." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no," said June, "I shan't." +</P> + +<P> +"Ah! We know very well, we artists—you take us to get what you can out +of us. I want nothing from you"—and he blew out a cloud of June's +smoke. +</P> + +<P> +Decision rose in an icy puff from the turmoil of insulted shame within +her. "Very well, then, you can take your things away." +</P> + +<P> +And, almost in the same moment, she thought: 'Poor boy! He's only got a +garret, and probably not a taxi fare. In front of these people, too; +it's positively disgusting!' +</P> + +<P> +Young Strumolowski shook his head violently; his hair, thick, smooth, +close as a golden plate, did not fall off. +</P> + +<P> +"I can live on nothing," he said shrilly; "I have often had to for the +sake of my Art. It is you bourgeois who force us to spend money." +</P> + +<P> +The words hit June like a pebble, in the ribs. After all she had done +for Art, all her identification with its troubles and lame ducks. She +was struggling for adequate words when the door was opened, and her +Austrian murmured: +</P> + +<P> +"A young lady, gnadiges fraulein." +</P> + +<P> +"Where?" +</P> + +<P> +"In the little meal-room." +</P> + +<P> +With a glance at Boris Strumolowski, at Hannah Hobdey, at Jimmy +Portugal, June said nothing, and went out, devoid of equanimity. +Entering the "little meal-room," she perceived the young lady to be +Fleur—looking very pretty, if pale. At this disenchanted moment a lame +duck of her own breed was welcome to June, so homoeopathic by instinct. +</P> + +<P> +The girl must have come, of course, because of Jon; or, if not, at +least to get something out of her. And June felt just then that to +assist somebody was the only bearable thing. +</P> + +<P> +"So you've remembered to come," she said. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. What a jolly little duck of a house! But please don't let me +bother you, if you've got people." +</P> + +<P> +"Not at all," said June. "I want to let them stew in their own juice +for a bit. Have you come about Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +"You said you thought we ought to be told. Well, I've found out." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said June blankly. "Not nice, is it?" +</P> + +<P> +They were standing one on each side of the little bare table at which +June took her meals. A vase on it was full of Iceland poppies; the girl +raised her hand and touched them with a gloved finger. To her +new-fangled dress, frilly about the hips and tight below the knees, +June took a sudden liking—a charming colour, flax-blue. +</P> + +<P> +'She makes a picture,' thought June. Her little room, with its +whitewashed walls, its floor and hearth of old pink brick, its black +paint, and latticed window athwart which the last of the sunlight was +shining, had never looked so charming, set off by this young figure, +with the creamy, slightly frowning face. She remembered with sudden +vividness how nice she herself had looked in those old days when HER +heart was set on Philip Bosinney, that dead lover, who had broken from +her to destroy for ever Irene's allegiance to this girl's father. Did +Fleur know of that, too? +</P> + +<P> +"Well," she said, "what are you going to do?" +</P> + +<P> +It was some seconds before Fleur answered. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want Jon to suffer. I must see him once more to put an end to +it." +</P> + +<P> +"You're going to put an end to it!" +</P> + +<P> +"What else is there to do?" +</P> + +<P> +The girl seemed to June, suddenly, intolerably spiritless. +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you're right," she muttered. "I know my father thinks so; +but—I should never have done it myself. I can't take things lying +down." +</P> + +<P> +How poised and watchful that girl looked; how unemotional her voice +sounded! +</P> + +<P> +"People WILL assume that I'm in love." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, aren't you?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur shrugged her shoulders. 'I might have known it,' thought June; +'she's Soames' daughter—fish! And yet—he!' +</P> + +<P> +"Well, what do you want ME to do?" she said with a sort of disgust. +</P> + +<P> +"Could I see Jon here to-morrow on his way down to Holly's? He'd come +if you sent him a line to-night, and perhaps afterwards you'd let them +know quietly at Robin Hill that it's all over, and that they needn't +tell Jon about his mother." +</P> + +<P> +"All right!" said June abruptly. "I'll write now, and you can post it. +Half-past two to-morrow. I shan't be in, myself." +</P> + +<P> +She sat down at the tiny bureau which filled one corner. When she +looked round with the finished note Fleur was still touching the +poppies with her gloved finger. +</P> + +<P> +June licked a stamp. "Well, here it is. If you're not in love, of +course, there's no more to be said. Jon's lucky." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur took the note. "Thanks awfully!" +</P> + +<P> +'Cold-blooded little baggage!' thought June. Jon, son of her father, to +love, and not to be loved by the daughter of—Soames! It was +humiliating! +</P> + +<P> +"Is that all?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur nodded; her frills shook and trembled as she swayed towards the +door. +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye!" +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye! ... Little piece of fashion!" muttered June, closing the +door. "That family!" And she marched back towards her studio. Boris +Strumolowski had regained his Christlike silence, and Jimmy Portugal +was damning everybody, except the group in whose behalf he ran the +Neo-Artist. Among the condemned were Eric Cobbley, and several other +"lame-duck" genii who at one time or another had held first place in +the repertoire of June's aid and adoration. She experienced a sense of +futility and disgust, and went to the window to let the river-wind blow +those squeaky words away. +</P> + +<P> +But when at length Jimmy Portugal had finished, and gone with Hannah +Hobdey, she sat down and mothered young Strumolowski for half an hour, +promising him a month, at least, of the American stream; so that he +went away with his halo in perfect order. 'In spite of all,' June +thought, 'Boris IS wonderful.' +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0208"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE BIT BETWEEN THE TEETH +</H3> + +<P> +To know that your hand is against every one's is—for some natures—to +experience a sense of moral release. Fleur felt no remorse when she +left June's house. Reading condemnatory resentment in her little +kinswoman's blue eyes—she was glad that she had fooled her, despising +June because that elderly idealist had not seen what she was after. +</P> + +<P> +End it, forsooth! She would soon show them all that she was only just +beginning. And she smiled to herself on the top of the 'bus which +carried her back to Mayfair. But the smile died, squeezed out by spasms +of anticipation and anxiety. Would she be able to manage Jon? She had +taken the bit between her teeth, but could she make him take it too? +She knew the truth and the real danger of delay—he knew neither; +therein lay all the difference in the world. +</P> + +<P> +'Suppose I tell him,' she thought; 'wouldn't it really be safer?' This +hideous luck had no right to spoil their love; he must see that! They +could not let it! People always accepted an accomplished fact, in time! +From that piece of philosophy—profound enough at her age—she passed +to another consideration less philosophic. If she persuaded Jon to a +quick and secret marriage, and he found out afterwards that she had +known the truth! What then? Jon hated subterfuge. Again, then, would it +not be better to tell him? But the memory of his mother's face kept +intruding on that impulse. Fleur was afraid. His mother had power over +him; more power perhaps than she herself. Who could tell? It was too +great a risk. Deep-sunk in these instinctive calculations she was +carried on past Green Street as far as the Ritz Hotel. She got down +there, and walked back on the Green Park side. The storm had washed +every tree; they still dripped. Heavy drops fell on to her frills, and +to avoid them she crossed over under the eyes of the Iseeum Club. +Chancing to look up she saw Monsieur Profond with a tall stout man in +the bay window. Turning into Green Street she heard her name called, +and saw "that prowler" coming up. He took off his hat—a glossy +"bowler" such as she particularly detested: +</P> + +<P> +"Good-evenin'! Miss Forsyde. Isn't there a small thing I can do for +you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, pass by on the other side." +</P> + +<P> +"I say! Why do you dislike me?" +</P> + +<P> +"It looks like it." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, then, because you make me feel life isn't worth living." +</P> + +<P> +Monsieur Profond smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"Look here, Miss Forsyde, don't worry. It'll be all right. Nothing +lasts." +</P> + +<P> +"Things do last," cried Fleur; "with me anyhow—especially likes and +dislikes." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, that makes me a bit un'appy." +</P> + +<P> +"I should have thought nothing could ever make you happy or unhappy." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't like to annoy other people. I'm goin' on my yacht." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur looked at him, startled. +</P> + +<P> +"Where?" +</P> + +<P> +"Small voyage to the South Seas or somewhere," said Monsieur Profond. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur suffered relief and a sense of insult. Clearly he meant to convey +that he was breaking with her mother. How dared he have anything to +break, and yet how dared he break it? +</P> + +<P> +"Good-night, Miss Forsyde! Remember me to Mrs. Dartie. I'm not so bad, +really. Good-night!" Fleur left him standing there with his hat raised. +Stealing a look round, she saw him stroll—immaculate and heavy—back +towards his Club. +</P> + +<P> +'He can't even love with conviction,' she thought. 'What will Mother +do?' +</P> + +<P> +Her dreams that night were endless and uneasy; she rose heavy and +unrested, and went at once to the study of Whitaker's Almanac. A +Forsyte is instinctively aware that facts are the real crux of any +situation. She might conquer Jon's prejudice, but without exact +machinery to complete their desperate resolve, nothing would happen. +From the invaluable tome she learned that they must each be twenty-one; +or some one's consent would be necessary, which of course was +unobtainable; then she became lost in directions concerning licenses, +certificates, notices, districts, coming finally to the word "perjury." +But that was nonsense! Who would really mind their giving wrong ages in +order to be married for love! She ate hardly any breakfast, and went +back to Whitaker. The more she studied the less sure she became; till, +idly turning the pages, she came to Scotland. People could be married +there without any of this nonsense. She had only to go and stay there +twenty-one days, then Jon could come, and in front of two people they +could declare themselves married. And what was more—they would be! It +was far the best way; and at once she ran over her school-fellows. +There was Mary Lambe who lived in Edinburgh and was "quite a sport!" +She had a brother too. She could stay with Mary Lambe, who with her +brother would serve for witnesses. She well knew that some girls would +think all this unnecessary, and that all she and Jon need do was to go +away together for a week-end and then say to their people: "We are +married by Nature, we must now be married by Law." But Fleur was +Forsyte enough to feel such a proceeding dubious, and to dread her +father's face when he heard of it. Besides, she did not believe that +Jon would do it; he had an opinion of her such as she could not bear to +diminish. No! Mary Lambe was preferable, and it was just the time of +year to go to Scotland. More at ease now, she packed, avoided her aunt, +and took a 'bus to Chiswick. She was too early and went on to Kew +Gardens. She found no peace among its flower-beds, labelled trees, and +broad green spaces, and having lunched off anchovy-paste sandwiches and +coffee, returned to Chiswick and rang June's bell. The Austrian +admitted her to the "little meal-room." Now that she knew what she and +Jon were up against, her longing for him had increased tenfold, as if +he were a toy with sharp edges or dangerous paint such as they had +tried to take from her as a child. If she could not have her way, and +get Jon for good and all, she felt like dying of privation. By hook or +crook she must and would get him! A round dim mirror of very old glass +hung over the pink brick hearth. She stood looking at herself reflected +in it, pale, and rather dark under the eyes; little shudders kept +passing through her nerves. Then she heard the bell ring, and, stealing +to the window, saw him standing on, the doorstep smoothing his hair and +lips, as if he too were trying to subdue the fluttering of his nerves. +</P> + +<P> +She was sitting on one of the two rush-seated chairs, with her back to +the door, when he came in, and she said at once: +</P> + +<P> +"Sit down, Jon, I want to talk seriously." +</P> + +<P> +Jon sat on the table by her side, and without looking at him she went +on: +</P> + +<P> +"If you don't want to lose me, we must get married." +</P> + +<P> +Jon gasped. +</P> + +<P> +"Why? Is there anything new?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, but I felt it at Robin Hill, and among my people." +</P> + +<P> +"But—" stammered Jon, "at Robin Hill—it was all smooth—and they've +said nothing to me." +</P> + +<P> +"But they mean to stop us. Your mother's face was enough. And my +father's." +</P> + +<P> +"Have you seen him since?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur nodded. What mattered a few supplementary lies? +</P> + +<P> +"But," said Jon eagerly, "I can't see how they can feel like that after +all these years." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur looked up at him. +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps you don't love me enough." +</P> + +<P> +"Not love you enough! Why-I—" +</P> + +<P> +"Then make sure of me" +</P> + +<P> +"Without telling them?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not till after." +</P> + +<P> +Jon was silent. How much older he looked than on that day, barely two +months ago, when she first saw him—quite two years older! +</P> + +<P> +"It would hurt Mother awfully," he said. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur drew her hand away. +</P> + +<P> +"You've got to choose." +</P> + +<P> +Jon slid off the table onto his knees. +</P> + +<P> +"But why not tell them? They can't really stop us, Fleur!" +</P> + +<P> +"They can! I tell you, they can." +</P> + +<P> +"How?" +</P> + +<P> +"We're utterly dependent—by putting money pressure, and all sorts of +other pressure. I'm not patient, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +"But it's deceiving them." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur got up. +</P> + +<P> +"You can't really love me, or you wouldn't hesitate. 'He either fears +his fate too much—!'" +</P> + +<P> +Lifting his hands to her waist, Jon forced her to sit down again. She +hurried on: +</P> + +<P> +"I've planned it all out. We've only to go to Scotland. When we're +married they'll soon come round. People always come round to facts. +Don't you SEE, Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +"But to hurt them so awfully!" +</P> + +<P> +So he would rather hurt her than those people of his! +</P> + +<P> +"All right, then; let me go!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon got up and put his back against the door. "I expect you're right," +he said slowly; "but I want to think it over." +</P> + +<P> +She could see that he was seething with feelings he wanted to express; +but she did not mean to help him. She hated herself at this moment, and +almost hated him. +</P> + +<P> +Why had she to do all the work to secure their love? It wasn't fair. +And then she saw his eyes, adoring and distressed. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't look like that! I only don't want to lose you, Jon." +</P> + +<P> +"You can't lose me so long as you want me." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, yes, I can." +</P> + +<P> +Jon put his hands on her shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur, do you know anything you haven't told me?" +</P> + +<P> +It was the point-blank question she had dreaded. She looked straight at +him, and answered: "No." She had burnt her boats; but what did it +matter, if she got him? He would forgive her. And throwing her arms +round his neck, she kissed him on the lips. She was winning! She felt +it in the beating of his heart against her, in the closing of his eyes. +"I want to make sure! I want to make sure!" she whispered. "Promise!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon did not answer. His face had the stillness of extreme trouble. At +last he said: +</P> + +<P> +"It's like hitting them. I must think a little, Fleur. I really must." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur slipped out of his arms. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! Very well!" And suddenly she burst into tears of disappointment, +shame, and overstrain. Followed five minutes of acute misery. Jon's +remorse and tenderness knew no bounds; but he did not promise. Despite +her will to cry: "Very well, then, if you don't love me +enough—good-bye!" she dared not. From birth accustomed to her own way, +this check from one so young, so tender, so devoted, baffled and +surprised her. She wanted to push him away from her, to try what anger +and coldness would do, and again she dared not. The knowledge that she +was scheming to rush him blindfold into the irrevocable weakened +everything—weakened the sincerity of pique, and the sincerity of +passion; even her kisses had not the lure she wished for them. That +stormy little meeting ended inconclusively. +</P> + +<P> +"Will you some tea, gnadiges Fraulein?" +</P> + +<P> +Pushing Jon from her, she cried out: +</P> + +<P> +"No—no, thank you! I'm just going." +</P> + +<P> +And before he could prevent her she was gone. +</P> + +<P> +She went stealthily, mopping her flushed, stained cheeks, frightened, +angry, very miserable. She had stirred Jon up so fearfully, yet nothing +definite was promised or arranged! But the more uncertain and hazardous +the future, the more "the will to have" worked its tentacles into the +flesh of her heart—like some burrowing tick! +</P> + +<P> +No one was at Green Street. Winifred had gone with Imogen to see a play +which some said was allegorical, and others "very exciting, don't you +know?" It was because of what others said that Winifred and Imogen had +gone. Fleur went on to Paddington. Through the carriage the air from +the brick-kilns of West Drayton and the late hay-fields fanned her +still-flushed cheeks. Flowers had seemed to be had for the picking; now +they were all thorned and prickled. But the golden flower within the +crown of spikes seemed to her tenacious spirit all the fairer and more +desirable. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0209"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FAT IN THE FIRE +</H3> + +<P> +On reaching home Fleur found an atmosphere so peculiar that it +penetrated even the perplexed aura of her own private life. Her mother +was in blue stockingette and a brown study; her father in a white felt +hat and the vinery. Neither of them had a word to throw to a dog. 'Is +it because of me?' thought Fleur. 'Or because of Profond?' To her +mother she said: +</P> + +<P> +"What's the matter with Father?" +</P> + +<P> +Her mother answered with a shrug of her shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +To her father: +</P> + +<P> +"What's the matter with Mother?" +</P> + +<P> +Her father answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Matter? What should be the matter?" and gave her a sharp look. +</P> + +<P> +"By the way," murmured Fleur, "Monsieur Profond is going a 'small' +voyage on his yacht, to the South Seas." +</P> + +<P> +Soames examined a branch on which no grapes were growing. +</P> + +<P> +"This vine's a failure," he said. "I've had young Mont here. He asked +me something about you." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! How do you like him, Father?" +</P> + +<P> +"He—he's a product—like all these young people." +</P> + +<P> +"What were you at his age, dear?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames smiled grimly. +</P> + +<P> +"We went to work, and didn't play about—flying and motoring, and +making love." +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't you ever make love?" +</P> + +<P> +She avoided looking at him while she said that, but she saw him well +enough. His pale face had reddened, his eyebrows, where darkness was +still mingled with the grey, had come close together. +</P> + +<P> +"I had no time or inclination to philander." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps you had a grand passion." +</P> + +<P> +Soames looked at her intently. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes—if you want to know—and much good it did me." He moved away, +along by the hot-water pipes. Fleur tiptoed silently after him. +</P> + +<P> +"Tell me about it, Father!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames became very still. +</P> + +<P> +"What should you want to know about such things, at your age?" +</P> + +<P> +"Is she alive?" +</P> + +<P> +He nodded. +</P> + +<P> +"And married?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"It's Jon Forsyte's mother, isn't it? And she was your wife first." +</P> + +<P> +It was said in a flash of intuition. Surely his opposition came from +his anxiety that she should not know of that old wound to his pride. +But she was startled. To see some one so old and calm wince as if +struck, to hear so sharp a note of pain in his voice! +</P> + +<P> +"Who told you that? If your aunt—! I can't bear the affair talked of." +</P> + +<P> +"But, darling," said Fleur, softly, "it's so long ago." +</P> + +<P> +"Long ago or not, I—" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur stood stroking his arm. +</P> + +<P> +"I've tried to forget," he said suddenly; "I don't wish to be +reminded." And then, as if venting some long and secret irritation, he +added: "In these days people don't understand. Grand passion, indeed! +No one knows what it is." +</P> + +<P> +"I do," said Fleur, almost in a whisper. +</P> + +<P> +Soames, who had turned his back on her, spun round. +</P> + +<P> +"What are you talking of—a child like you!" +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps I've inherited it, Father." +</P> + +<P> +"What?" +</P> + +<P> +"For her son, you see." +</P> + +<P> +He was pale as a sheet, and she knew that she was as bad. They stood +staring at each other in the steamy heat, redolent of the mushy scent +of earth, of potted geranium, and of vines coming along fast. +</P> + +<P> +"This is crazy," said Soames at last, between dry lips. +</P> + +<P> +Scarcely moving her own, she murmured: +</P> + +<P> +"Don't be angry, Father. I can't help it." +</P> + +<P> +But she could see he wasn't angry; only scared, deeply scared. +</P> + +<P> +"I thought that foolishness," he stammered, "was all forgotten." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no! It's ten times what it was." +</P> + +<P> +Soames kicked at the hot-water pipe. The hapless movement touched her, +who had no fear of her father—none. +</P> + +<P> +"Dearest!" she said: "What must be, must, you know." +</P> + +<P> +"Must!" repeated Soames. "You don't know what you're talking of. Has +that boy been told?" +</P> + +<P> +The blood rushed into her cheeks. +</P> + +<P> +"Not yet." +</P> + +<P> +He had turned from her again, and, with one shoulder a little raised, +stood staring fixedly at a joint in the pipes. +</P> + +<P> +"It's most distasteful to me," he said suddenly; "nothing could be more +so. Son of that fellow—It's—it's—perverse!" +</P> + +<P> +She had noted, almost unconsciously, that he did not say "son of that +woman," and again her intuition began working. +</P> + +<P> +Did the ghost of that grand passion linger in some corner of his heart? +</P> + +<P> +She slipped her hand under his arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Jon's father is quite ill and old; I saw him." +</P> + +<P> +"You—?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I went there with Jon; I saw them both." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, and what did they say to you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nothing. They were very polite." +</P> + +<P> +"They would be." He resumed his contemplation of the pipe-joint, and +then said suddenly: "I must think this over—I'll speak to you again +to-night." +</P> + +<P> +She knew this was final for the moment, and stole away, leaving him +still looking at the pipe-joint. She wandered into the fruit-garden, +among the raspberry and currant bushes, without impetus to pick and +eat. Two months ago—she was light-hearted! Even two days +ago—light-hearted, before Prosper Profond told her. Now she felt +tangled in a web—of passions, vested rights, oppressions and revolts, +the ties of love and hate. At this dark moment of discouragement there +seemed, even to her hold-fast nature, no way out. How deal with it—how +sway and bend things to her will, and get her heart's desire? And, +suddenly, round the corner of the high box hedge, she came plump on her +mother, walking swiftly, with an open letter in her hand. Her bosom was +heaving, her eyes dilated, her cheeks flushed. Instantly Fleur thought: +"The yacht! Poor Mother!" +</P> + +<P> +Annette gave her a wide startled look, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"J'ai la migraine." +</P> + +<P> +"I'm awfully sorry, Mother." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh; yes! you and your father—sorry!" +</P> + +<P> +"But, Mother—I am. I know what it feels like." +</P> + +<P> +Annette's startled eyes grew wide, till the whites showed above them. +"You innocent!" she said. +</P> + +<P> +Her mother—so self-possessed, and commonsensical—to look and speak +like this! It was all frightening! Her father, her mother, herself! And +only two months back they had seemed to have everything they wanted in +this world. +</P> + +<P> +Annette crumpled the letter in her hand. Fleur knew that she must +ignore the sight. +</P> + +<P> +"Can't I do anything for your head, Mother?" +</P> + +<P> +Annette shook that head and walked on, swaying her hips. +</P> + +<P> +'It's cruel,' thought Fleur, 'and I was glad! That man! What do men +come prowling for, disturbing everything! I suppose he's tired of her. +What business has he to be tired of my mother? What business!' And at +that thought, so natural and so peculiar, she uttered a little choked +laugh. +</P> + +<P> +She ought, of course, to be delighted, but what was there to be +delighted at? Her father didn't really care! Her mother did, perhaps? +She entered the orchard, and sat down under a cherry-tree. A breeze +sighed in the higher boughs; the sky seen through their green was very +blue and very white in cloud—those heavy white clouds almost always +present in river landscape. Bees, sheltering out of the wind, hummed +softly, and over the lush grass fell the thick shade from those +fruit-trees planted by her father five-and-twenty years ago. Birds were +almost silent, the cuckoos had ceased to sing, but wood-pigeons were +cooing. The breath and drone and cooing of high summer were not for +long a sedative to her excited nerves. Crouched over her knees she +began to scheme. Her father must be made to back her up. Why should he +mind so long as she was happy? She had not lived for nearly nineteen +years without knowing that her future was all he really cared about. +She had, then, only to convince him that her future could not be happy +without Jon. He thought it a mad fancy. How foolish the old were, +thinking they could tell what the young felt! Had not he confessed that +he—when young—had loved with a grand passion! He ought to understand. +'He piles up his money for me,' she thought; 'but what's the use, if +I'm not going to be happy?' Money, and all it bought, did not bring +happiness. Love only brought that. The ox-eyed daisies in this orchard, +which gave it such a moony look sometimes, grew wild and happy, and had +their hour. 'They oughtn't to have called me Fleur,' she mused, 'if +they didn't mean me to have my hour, and be happy while it lasts.' +Nothing real stood in the way, like poverty, or disease—sentiment +only, a ghost from the unhappy past! Jon was right. They wouldn't let +you live, these old people! They made mistakes, committed crimes, and +wanted their children to go on paying! The breeze died away; midges +began to bite. She got up, plucked a piece of honeysuckle, and went in. +</P> + +<P> +It was hot that night. Both she and her mother had put on thin, pale +low frocks. The dinner flowers were pale. Fleur was struck with the +pale look of everything: her father's face, her mother's shoulders; the +pale panelled walls, the pale-grey velvety carpet, the lamp-shade, even +the soup was pale. There was not one spot of colour in the room, not +even wine in the pale glasses, for no one drank it. What was not pale +was black—her father's clothes, the butler's clothes, her retriever +stretched out exhausted in the window, the curtains black with a cream +pattern. A moth came in, and that was pale. And silent was that +half-mourning dinner in the heat. +</P> + +<P> +Her father called her back as she was following her mother out. +</P> + +<P> +She sat down beside him at the table, and, unpinning the pale +honeysuckle, put it to her nose. +</P> + +<P> +"I've been thinking," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, dear?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's extremely painful for me to talk, but there's no help for it. I +don't know if you understand how much you are to me—I've never spoken +of it, I didn't think it necessary; but—but you're everything. Your +mother—" he paused, staring at his finger-bowl of Venetian glass. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes?" +</P> + +<P> +"I've only you to look to. I've never had—never wanted anything else, +since you were born." +</P> + +<P> +"I know," Fleur murmured. +</P> + +<P> +Soames moistened his lips. +</P> + +<P> +"You may think this a matter I can smooth over and arrange for you. +You're mistaken. I—I'm helpless." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur did not speak. +</P> + +<P> +"Quite apart from my own feelings," went on Soames with more +resolution, "those two are not amenable to anything I can say. +They—they hate me, as people always hate those whom they have injured." +</P> + +<P> +"But he—Jon—" +</P> + +<P> +"He's their flesh and blood, her only child. Probably he means to her +what you mean to me. It's a deadlock." +</P> + +<P> +"No," cried Fleur, "no, Father!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames leaned back, the image of pale patience, as if resolved on the +betrayal of no emotion. +</P> + +<P> +"Listen!" he said. "You're putting the feelings of two months—two +months—against the feelings of thirty-five years! What chance do you +think you have? Two months—your very first love-affair, a matter of +half a dozen meetings, a few walks and talks, a few kisses—against, +against what you can't imagine, what no one could who hasn't been +through it. Come, be reasonable, Fleur! It's midsummer madness!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur tore the honeysuckle into little, slow bits. "The madness is in +letting the past spoil it all. What do we care about the past? It's our +lives, not yours." +</P> + +<P> +Soames raised his hand to his forehead, where suddenly she saw moisture +shining. +</P> + +<P> +"Whose child are you?" he said. "Whose child is he? The present is +linked with the past, the future with both. There's no getting away +from that." +</P> + +<P> +She had never heard philosophy pass those lips before. Impressed even +in her agitation, she leaned her elbows on the table, her chin on her +hands. +</P> + +<P> +"But, Father, consider it practically. We want each other. There's ever +so much money, and nothing whatever in the way but sentiment. Let's +bury the past, Father." +</P> + +<P> +Soames shook his head. "Impossible!" +</P> + +<P> +"Besides," said Fleur gently, "you can't prevent us." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't suppose," said Soames, "that if left to myself I should try to +prevent you; I must put up with things, I know, to keep your affection. +But it's not I who control this matter. That's what I want you to +realise before it's too late. If you go on thinking you can get your +way, and encourage this feeling, the blow will be much heavier when you +find you can't." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" cried Fleur, "help me, Father; you CAN help me, you know." +</P> + +<P> +Soames made a startled movement of negation. +</P> + +<P> +"I?" he said bitterly. "Help? I am the impediment—the just cause and +impediment—isn't that the jargon? You have my blood in your veins." +</P> + +<P> +He rose. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, the fat's in the fire. If you persist in your wilfulness you'll +have yourself to blame. Come! Don't be foolish, my child—my only +child!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur laid her forehead against his shoulder. +</P> + +<P> +All was in such turmoil within her. But no good to show it! No good at +all! She broke away from him, and went out into the twilight, +distraught, but unconvinced. All was indeterminate and vague within +her, like the shapes and shadows in the garden, except—her will to +have. A poplar pierced up into the dark-blue sky and touched a white +star there. The dew wetted her shoes, and chilled her bare shoulders. +She went down to the river bank, and stood gazing at a moonstreak on +the darkening water. Suddenly she smelled tobacco smoke, and a white +figure emerged as if created by the moon. It was young Mont in +flannels, standing in his boat. She heard the tiny hiss of his +cigarette extinguished in the water. +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur," came his voice, "don't be hard on a poor devil! I've been +waiting hours." +</P> + +<P> +"For what?" +</P> + +<P> +"Come in my boat!" +</P> + +<P> +"Not I." +</P> + +<P> +"Why not?" +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not a water-nymph." +</P> + +<P> +"Haven't you ANY romance in you? Don't be modern, Fleur!" +</P> + +<P> +He appeared on the path within a yard of her. +</P> + +<P> +"Go away!" +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur, I love you. Fleur!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur uttered a short laugh. +</P> + +<P> +"Come again," she said, "when I haven't got my wish." +</P> + +<P> +"What is your wish?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ask another." +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur," said Mont, and his voice sounded strange, "don't mock me! Even +vivisected dogs are worth decent treatment before they're cut up for +good." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur shook her head; but her lips were trembling. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, you shouldn't make me jump. Give me a cigarette." +</P> + +<P> +Mont gave her one, lighted it, and another for himself. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't want to talk rot," he said, "but please imagine all the rot +that all the lovers that ever were have talked, and all my special rot +thrown in." +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you, I have imagined it. Good-night!" +</P> + +<P> +They stood for a moment facing each other in the shadow of an +acacia-tree with very moonlit blossoms, and the smoke from their +cigarettes mingled in the air between them. +</P> + +<P> +"Also ran: 'Michael Mont'?" he said. Fleur turned abruptly towards the +house. On the lawn she stopped to look back. Michael Mont was whirling +his arms above him; she could see them dashing at his head, then waving +at the moonlit blossoms of the acacia. His voice just reached her. +"Jolly—jolly!" Fleur shook herself. She couldn't help him, she had too +much trouble of her own! On the verandah she stopped very suddenly +again. Her mother was sitting in the drawing-room at her writing +bureau, quite alone. There was nothing remarkable in the expression of +her face except its utter immobility. But she looked desolate! Fleur +went up-stairs. At the door of her room she paused. She could hear her +father walking up and down, up and down the picture-gallery. +</P> + +<P> +'Yes,' she thought, jolly! Oh, Jon!' +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0210"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DECISION +</H3> + +<P> +When Fleur left him Jon stared at the Austrian. She was a thin woman +with a dark face and the concerned expression of one who has watched +every little good that life once had slip from her, one by one. +</P> + +<P> +"No tea?" she said. +</P> + +<P> +Susceptible to the disappointment in her voice, Jon murmured: +</P> + +<P> +"No, really; thanks." +</P> + +<P> +"A lil cup—it ready. A lil cup and cigarette." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur was gone! Hours of remorse and indecision lay before him! And +with a heavy sense of disproportion he smiled, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Well—thank you!" +</P> + +<P> +She brought in a little pot of tea with two cups, and a silver box of +cigarettes on a little tray. +</P> + +<P> +"Sugar? Miss Forsyte has much sugar—she buy my sugar, my friend's +sugar also. Miss Forsyte is a veree kind lady. I am happy to serve her. +You her brother?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Jon, beginning to puff the second cigarette of his life. +</P> + +<P> +"Very young brother," said the Austrian, with a little anxious smile, +which reminded him of the wag of a dog's tail. +</P> + +<P> +"May I give you some?" he said. "And won't you sit down?" +</P> + +<P> +The Austrian shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"Your father a very nice man—the most nice old man I ever see. Miss +Forsyte tell me all about him. Is he better?" +</P> + +<P> +Her words fell on Jon like a reproach. "Oh! I think he's all right." +</P> + +<P> +"I like to see him again," said the Austrian, putting a hand on her +heart; "he have veree kind heart." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Jon. And again her words seemed to him a reproach. +</P> + +<P> +"He never give no trouble to no one, and smile so gentle." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes! doesn't he?" +</P> + +<P> +"He look at Miss Forsyte so funny sometimes. I tell him all my story; +he so sympatisch. Your mother—she nice and well?" +</P> + +<P> +"Very." +</P> + +<P> +"He have her photograph on his dressing-table. Veree beautiful." +</P> + +<P> +Jon gulped down his tea. This woman, with her concerned face and her +reminding words, was like the first and second murderers. +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you," he said; "I must go now. May—may I leave this with you?" +</P> + +<P> +He put a ten-shilling note on the tray with a doubting hand and gained +the door. He heard the Austrian gasp, and hurried out. He had just time +to catch his train, and all the way to Victoria looked at every face +that passed, as lovers will, hoping against hope. On reaching Worthing +he put his luggage into the local train, and set out across the Downs +for Wansdon, trying to walk off his aching irresolution. So long as he +went full bat, he could enjoy the beauty of those green slopes, +stopping now and again to sprawl on the grass, admire the perfection of +a wild rose, or listen to a lark's song. But the war of motives within +him was but postponed—the longing for Fleur, and the hatred of +deception. He came to the old chalk-pit above Wansdon with his mind no +more made up than when he started. To see both sides of a question +vigorously was at once Jon's strength and weakness. He tramped in, just +as the first dinner-bell rang. His things had already been brought up. +He had a hurried bath and came down to find Holly alone—Val had gone +to Town and would not be back till the last train. +</P> + +<P> +Since Val's advice to him to ask his sister what was the matter between +the two families, so much had happened—Fleur's disclosure in the Green +Park, her visit to Robin Hill, to-day's meeting—that there seemed +nothing to ask. He talked of Spain, his sunstroke, Val's horses, their +father's health. Holly startled him by saying that she thought their +father not at all well. She had been twice to Robin Hill for the +week-end. He had seemed fearfully languid, sometimes even in pain, but +had always refused to talk about himself. +</P> + +<P> +"He's awfully dear and unselfish—don't you think, Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +Feeling far from dear and unselfish himself, Jon answered: "Rather!" +</P> + +<P> +"I think, he's been a simply perfect father, so long as I can remember." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," answered Jon, very subdued. +</P> + +<P> +"He's never interfered, and he's always seemed to understand. I've not +forgotten how he let me go out to South Africa in the Boer War when I +was in love with Val." +</P> + +<P> +"That was before he married Mother, wasn't it?" said Jon suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes. Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! nothing. Only, wasn't she engaged to Fleur's father first?" +</P> + +<P> +Holly put down the spoon she was using, and raised her eyes. Her stare +was circumspect. What did the boy know? Enough to make it better to +tell him? She could not decide. He looked strained and worried, +altogether older, but that might be the sunstroke. +</P> + +<P> +"There WAS something," she said. "Of course we were out there, and got +no news of anything." She could not take the risk. It was not her +secret. Besides, she was in the dark about his feelings now. Before +Spain she had made sure he was in love; but boys were boys; that was +seven weeks ago, and all Spain between. +</P> + +<P> +She saw that he knew she was putting him off, and added: +</P> + +<P> +"Have you heard anything of Fleur?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +His face told her more than the most elaborate explanations. He had not +forgotten! +</P> + +<P> +She said very quietly: "Fleur is awfully attractive, Jon, but you +know—Val and I don't really like her very much." +</P> + +<P> +"Why?" +</P> + +<P> +"We think she's got rather a 'having' nature." +</P> + +<P> +"'Having?' I don't know what you mean. She—she—" he pushed his +dessert plate away, got up, and went to the window. +</P> + +<P> +Holly, too, got up, and put her arm round his waist. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't be angry, Jon dear. We can't all see people in the same light, +can we? I believe each of us only has about one or two people who can +see the best that's in us, and bring it out. For you I think it's your +mother. I once saw her looking at a letter of yours; it was wonderful +to see her face. I think she's the most beautiful woman I ever saw—Age +doesn't seem to touch her." +</P> + +<P> +Jon's face softened, then again became tense. He recognised the +intention of those words. Everybody was against him and Fleur! It all +strengthened her appeal: +</P> + +<P> +"Make sure of me—marry me, Jon!" +</P> + +<P> +Here, where he had passed that wonderful week with her—the tug of her +enchantment, the ache in his heart increased with every minute that she +was not there to make the room, the garden, the very air magical. Would +he ever be able to live down here, not seeing her? And he closed up +utterly, going early to bed. It would not make him healthy, wealthy, +and wise, but it closeted him with memory of Fleur in her fancy frock. +He heard Val's arrival—the Ford discharging cargo, then the stillness +of the summer night stole back—with only the bleating of very distant +sheep, and a night-jar's harsh purring. He leaned far out. Cold +moon—warm air—the Downs like silver! Small wings, a stream bubbling, +the rambler roses! God-how empty all of it without her! In the Bible it +was written: Thou shalt leave father and mother and cleave to—Fleur! +</P> + +<P> +Let him have pluck, and go and tell them! They couldn't stop him +marrying her—they wouldn't want to stop him when they knew how he +felt. Yes! He would go! Bold and open—Fleur was wrong! +</P> + +<P> +The night-jar ceased, the sheep were silent; the only sound in the +darkness was the bubbling of the stream. And Jon in his bed slept, +freed from the worst of life's evils—indecision. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0211"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TIMOTHY PROPHESIES +</H3> + +<P> +On the day of the cancelled meeting at the National Gallery, began the +second anniversary of the resurrection of England's pride and +glory—or, more shortly, the top hat. "Lord's"—that festival which the +war had driven from the field—raised its light and dark blue flags for +the second time, displaying almost every feature of a glorious past. +Here, in the luncheon interval, were all species of female and one +species of male hat, protecting the multiple types of face associated +with "the classes" The observing Forsyte might discern in the free or +unconsidered seats a certain number of the squash-hatted, but they +hardly ventured on the grass; the old school—or schools—could still +rejoice that the proletariat was not yet paying the necessary +half-crown. Here was still a close borough, the only one left on a +large scale—for the papers were about to estimate the attendance at +ten thousand. And the ten thousand, all animated by one hope, were +asking each other one question: "Where are you lunching?" Something +wonderfully uplifting and reassuring in that query and the sight of so +many people like themselves voicing it! What reserve power in the +British realm—enough pigeons, lobsters, lamb, salmon mayonnaise, +strawberries, and bottles of champagne, to feed the lot! No miracle in +prospect—no case of seven loaves and a few fishes—faith rested on +surer foundations. Six thousand top hats, four thousand parasols would +be doffed and furled, ten thousand mouths all speaking the same English +would be filled. There was life in the old dog yet! Tradition! And +again Tradition! How strong and how elastic! Wars might rage, taxation +prey, Trades Unions take toll, and Europe perish of starvation; but the +ten thousand would be fed; and, within their ring fence, stroll upon +green turf, wear their top hats, and meet—themselves. The heart was +sound, the pulse still regular. E-ton! E-ton! Har-r-o-o-o-w! +</P> + +<P> +Among the many Forsytes present, on a hunting-ground theirs, by +personal prescriptive right, or proxy, was Soames, with his wife and +daughter. He had not been at either school, he took no interest in +cricket, but he wanted Fleur to show her frock, and he wanted to wear +his top hat—parade it again in peace and plenty among his peers. He +walked sedately with Fleur between him and Annette. No women equalled +them, so far as he could see. They could walk, and hold themselves up; +there was substance in their good looks; the modern woman had no build, +no chest, no anything! He remembered suddenly with what intoxication of +pride he had walked round with Irene in the first years of his first +marriage. And how they used to lunch on the drag which his mother WOULD +make his father have, because it was so "chic"—all drags and carriages +in those days, not these lumbering great Stands! And how consistently +Montague Dartie had drunk too much. He supposed that people drank too +much still, but there was not the scope for it there used to be. He +remembered George Forsyte—whose brothers Roger and Eustace had been at +Harrow and Eton—towering up on the top of the drag waving a light-blue +flag with one hand and a dark-blue flag with the other, and shouting: +"Etroow—Harrton!" just when everybody was silent, like the buffoon he +had always been; and Eustace got up to the nines below, too dandified +to wear any colour or take any notice. H'm! Old days, and Irene in grey +silk shot with palest green. He looked, sideways, at Fleur's face. +Rather colourless—no light, no eagerness! That love affair was preying +on her—a bad business! He looked beyond, at his wife's face, rather +more touched up than usual, a little disdainful—not that she had any +business to disdain, so far as he could see. She was taking Profond's +defection with curious quietude; or was his "small" voyage just a +blind? If so, he should refuse to see it! After promenading round the +pitch and in front of the pavilion, they sought Winifred's table in the +Bedouin Club tent. This Club—a new "cock and hen"—had been founded in +the interests of travel, and of a gentleman with an old Scottish name, +whose father had somewhat strangely been called Levi. Winifred had +joined, not because she had travelled, but because instinct told her +that a Club with such a name and such a founder was bound to go far; if +one didn't join at once one might never have the chance. Its tent, with +a text from the Koran on an orange ground, and a small green camel +embroidered over the entrance, was the most striking on the ground. +Outside it they found Jack Cardigan in a dark-blue tie (he had once +played for Harrow), batting with a Malacca cane to show how that fellow +ought to have hit that ball. He piloted them in. Assembled in +Winifred's corner were Imogen, Benedict with his young wife, Val Dartie +without Holly, Maud and her husband, and, after Soames and his two were +seated, one empty place. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm expecting Prosper," said Winifred, "but he's so busy with his +yacht." +</P> + +<P> +Soames stole a glance. No movement in his wife's face! Whether that +fellow were coming or not, she evidently knew all about it. It did not +escape him that Fleur, too, looked at her mother. If Annette didn't +respect his feelings, she might think of Fleur! The conversation, very +desultory, was syncopated by Jack Cardigan talking about "mid-off." He +cited all the "great mid-offs" from the beginning of time, as if they +had been a definite racial entity in the composition of the British +people. Soames had finished his lobster, and was beginning on +pigeon-pie, when he heard the words: "I'm a small bit late, Mrs. +Dartie," and saw that there was no longer any empty place. THAT FELLOW +was sitting between Annette and Imogen. Soames ate steadily on, with an +occasional word to Maud and Winifred. Conversation buzzed around him. +He heard the voice of Profond say: +</P> + +<P> +"I think you're mistaken, Mrs. Forsyde I'll—I'll bet Miss Forsyde +agrees with me." +</P> + +<P> +"In what?" came Fleur's clear tones across the table. +</P> + +<P> +"I was sayin', young gurls are much the same as they always +were—there's very small difference." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you know so much about them?" +</P> + +<P> +That sharp reply caught the ears of all, and Soames moved uneasily on +his thin green chair. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I don't know, I think they want their own small way, and I think +they always did." +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed!" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, but—Prosper," Winifred interjected comfortably, "the girls in the +streets—the girls who've been in munitions, the little flappers in the +shops; their manners now really quite hit you in the eye." +</P> + +<P> +At the word "hit" Jack Cardigan stopped his disquisition; and in the +silence Monsieur Profond said: +</P> + +<P> +"It was inside before, now it's outside; that's all." +</P> + +<P> +"But their morals!" cried Imogen. +</P> + +<P> +"Just as moral as they ever were, Mrs. Cardigan, but they've got more +opportunity." +</P> + +<P> +The saying, so cryptically cynical, received a little laugh from +Imogen, a slight opening of Jack Cardigan's mouth, and another creak +from Soames' chair. +</P> + +<P> +Winifred said: "That's too bad, Prosper." +</P> + +<P> +"What do you say, Mrs. Forsyde; don't you think human nature's always +the same?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames subdued a sudden longing to get up and kick the fellow. He heard +his wife reply: +</P> + +<P> +"Human nature is not the same in England as anywhere else." That was +her confounded mockery! +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I don't know much about this small country"—'No, thank God!' +thought Soames—"but I should say the pot was boilin' under the lid +everywhere. We all want pleasure, and we always did." +</P> + +<P> +Damn the fellow! His cynicism was outrageous! +</P> + +<P> +When lunch was over they broke up into couples for the digestive +promenade. Too proud to notice, Soames knew perfectly that Annette and +that fellow had gone prowling round together. Fleur was with Val; she +had chosen him, no doubt, because he knew that boy. He himself had +Winifred for partner. They walked in the bright, circling stream, a +little flushed and sated, till Winifred sighed: +</P> + +<P> +"I wish we were back forty years, old boy!" +</P> + +<P> +Before the eyes of her spirit an interminable procession of her own +"Lord's" frocks was passing, paid for with the money of her father, to +save a recurrent crisis. "It's been very amusing, after all. Sometimes +I even wish Monty was back. What do you think of people nowadays, +Soames?" +</P> + +<P> +"Precious little style. The thing began to go to pieces with bicycles +and motor-cars; the war has finished it." +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder what's coming?" said Winifred in a voice dreamy from +pigeon-pie. "I'm not at all sure we shan't go back to crinolines and +pegtops. Look at that dress!" Soames shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"There's money, but no faith in things. We don't lay by for the future. +These youngsters—it's all a short life and a merry one with them." +</P> + +<P> +"There's a hat!" said Winifred. "I don't know—when you come to think +of the people killed and all that in the war, it's rather wonderful, I +think. There's no other country—Prosper says the rest are all +bankrupt, except America; and of course her men always took their style +in dress from us." +</P> + +<P> +"Is that chap," said Soames, "really going to the South Seas?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, one never knows where Prosper's going!" +</P> + +<P> +"HE'S a sign of the times," muttered Soames, "if you like." +</P> + +<P> +Winifred's hand gripped his arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't turn your head," she said in a low voice, "but look to your +right in the front row of the Stand." +</P> + +<P> +Soames looked as best he could under that limitation. A man in a grey +top hat, grey-bearded, with thin brown, folded cheeks, and a certain +elegance of posture, sat there with a woman in a lawn-coloured frock, +whose dark eyes were fixed on himself. Soames looked quickly at his +feet. How funnily feet moved, one after the other like that! Winifred's +voice said in his ear: +</P> + +<P> +"Jolyon looks very ill, but he always had style. SHE doesn't +change—except her hair." +</P> + +<P> +"Why did you tell Fleur about that business?" +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't; she picked it up. I always knew she would." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, it's a mess. She's set her heart upon their boy." +</P> + +<P> +"The little wretch," murmured Winifred. "She tried to take me in about +that. What shall you do, Soames?" +</P> + +<P> +"Be guided by events." +</P> + +<P> +They moved on, silent, in the almost solid crowd. +</P> + +<P> +"Really," said Winifred suddenly; "it almost seems like Fate. Only +that's so old-fashioned. Look! There are George and Eustace!" +</P> + +<P> +George Forsyte's lofty bulk had halted before them. +</P> + +<P> +"Hallo, Soames!" he said. "Just met Profond and your wife. You'll catch +'em if you put on steam. Did you ever go to see old Timothy?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames nodded, and the streams forced them apart. +</P> + +<P> +"I always liked old George," said Winifred. "He's so droll." +</P> + +<P> +"I never did," said Soames. "Where's your seat? I shall go to mine. +Fleur may be back there." +</P> + +<P> +Having seen Winifred to her seat, he regained his own, conscious of +small, white, distant figures running, the click of the bat, the cheers +and counter-cheers. No Fleur, and no Annette! You could expect nothing +of women nowadays! They had the vote. They were "emancipated," and much +good it was doing them. So Winifred would go back, would she, and put +up with Dartie all over again? To have the past once more—to be +sitting here as he had sat in '83 and '84, before he was certain that +his marriage with Irene had gone all wrong, before her antagonism had +become so glaring that with the best will in the world he could not +overlook it. The sight of her with that fellow had brought all memory +back. Even now he could not understand why she had been so +impracticable. She could love other men; she had it in her! To himself, +the one person she ought to have loved, she had chosen to refuse her +heart. It seemed to him, fantastically, as he looked back, that all +this modern relaxation of marriage—though its forms and laws were the +same as when he married her—that all this modern looseness had come +out of her revolt; it seemed to him, fantastically, that she had +started it, till all decent ownership of anything had gone, or was on +the point of going. All came from her! And now—a pretty state of +things! Homes! How could you have them without mutual ownership? Not +that he had ever had a real home! But had that been his fault? He had +done his best. And his reward—those two sitting in that Stand! And +this affair of Fleur's! +</P> + +<P> +And overcome by loneliness he thought: 'Shan't wait any longer! They +must find their own way back to the hotel—if they mean to come!' +Hailing a cab outside the ground, he said: +</P> + +<P> +"Drive me to the Bayswater Road." His old aunts had never failed him. +To them he had meant an everwelcome visitor. Though they were gone, +there, still, was Timothy! +</P> + +<P> +Smither was standing in the open doorway. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Soames! I was just taking the air. Cook will be so pleased." +</P> + +<P> +"How is Mr. Timothy?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not himself at all these last few days, sir; he's been talking a great +deal. Only this morning he was saying: 'My brother James, he's getting +old.' His mind wanders, Mr. Soames, and then he will talk of them. He +troubles about their investments. The other day he said: 'There's my +brother Jolyon won't look at Consols'—he seemed quite down about it. +Come in, Mr. Soames, come in! It's such a pleasant change!" +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Soames, "just for a few minutes." +</P> + +<P> +"No," murmured Smither in the hall, where the air had the singular +freshness of the outside day, "we haven't been very satisfied with him, +not all this week. He's always been one to leave a titbit to the end; +but ever since Monday he's been eating it first. If you notice a dog, +Mr. Soames, at its dinner, it eats the meat first. We've always thought +it such a good sign of Mr. Timothy at his age to leave it to the last, +but now he seems to have lost all his self-control; and, of course, it +makes him leave the rest. The doctor doesn't make anything of it, +but"—Smither shook her head—"he seems to think he's got to eat it +first, in case he shouldn't get to it. That and his talking makes us +anxious." +</P> + +<P> +"Has he said anything important?" +</P> + +<P> +"I shouldn't like to say that, Mr. Soames; but he's turned against his +Will. He gets quite pettish—and after having had it out every morning +for years, it does seem funny. He said the other day: 'They want my +money.' It gave me such a turn, because, as I said to him, nobody wants +his money, I'm sure. And it does seem a pity he should be thinking +about money at his time of life. I took my courage in my 'ands. 'You +know, Mr. Timothy,' I said, 'my dear mistress'—that's Miss Forsyte, +Mr. Soames, Miss Ann that trained me—'SHE never thought about money,' +I said, 'it was all CHARACTER with her.' He looked at me, I can't tell +you how funny, and he said quite dry: 'Nobody wants my character.' +Think of his saying a thing like that! But sometimes he'll say +something as sharp and sensible as anything." +</P> + +<P> +Soames, who had been staring at an old print by the hat-rack, thinking, +'That's got value!' murmured: "I'll go up and see him, Smither." +</P> + +<P> +"Cook's with him," answered Smither above her corsets; "she will be +pleased to see you." +</P> + +<P> +He mounted slowly, with the thought: 'Shan't care to live to be that +age.' +</P> + +<P> +On the second floor, he paused, and tapped. The door was opened, and he +saw the round homely face of a woman about sixty. +</P> + +<P> +"Mr. Soames!" she said: "Why! Mr. Soames!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames nodded. "All right, Cook!" and entered. +</P> + +<P> +Timothy was propped up in bed, with his hands joined before his chest, +and his eyes fixed on the ceiling, where a fly was standing upside +down. Soames stood at the foot of the bed, facing him. +</P> + +<P> +"Uncle Timothy," he said, raising his voice; "Uncle Timothy!" +</P> + +<P> +Timothy's eyes left the fly, and levelled themselves on his visitor. +Soames could see his pale tongue passing over his darkish lips. +</P> + +<P> +"Uncle Timothy," he said again, "is there anything I can do for you? Is +there anything you'd like to say?" +</P> + +<P> +"Ha!" said Timothy. +</P> + +<P> +"I've come to look you up and see that everything's all right." +</P> + +<P> +Timothy nodded. He seemed trying to get used to the apparition before +him. +</P> + +<P> +"Have you got everything you want?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Timothy. +</P> + +<P> +"Can I get you anything?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," said Timothy. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm Soames, you know; your nephew, Soames Forsyte. Your brother James' +son." +</P> + +<P> +Timothy nodded. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall be delighted to do anything I can for you." +</P> + +<P> +Timothy beckoned. Soames went close to him. +</P> + +<P> +"You—" said Timothy in a voice which seemed to have outlived tone, +"you tell them all from me—you tell them all—" and his finger tapped +on Soames' arm, "to hold on—hold on—Consols are goin' up," and he +nodded thrice. +</P> + +<P> +"All right!" said Soames; "I will." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Timothy, and, fixing his eyes again on the ceiling, he +added: "That fly!" +</P> + +<P> +Strangely moved, Soames looked at the Cook's pleasant fattish face, all +little puckers from staring at fires. +</P> + +<P> +"That'll do him a world of good, sir," she said. +</P> + +<P> +A mutter came from Timothy, but he was clearly speaking to himself, and +Soames went out with the cook. +</P> + +<P> +"I wish I could make you a pink cream, Mr. Soames, like in old days; +you did so relish them. Good-bye, sir; it HAS been a pleasure." +</P> + +<P> +"Take care of him, Cook, he is old." +</P> + +<P> +And, shaking her crumpled hand, he went down-stairs. Smither was still +taking the air in the doorway. +</P> + +<P> +"What do you think of him, Mr. Soames?" +</P> + +<P> +"H'm!" Soames murmured: "He's lost touch." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Smither, "I was afraid you'd think that, coming fresh out +of the world to see him like." +</P> + +<P> +"Smither," said Soames, "we're all indebted to you." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, no, Mr. Soames, don't say that! It's a pleasure—he's such a +wonderful man." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, good-bye!" said Soames, and got into his taxi. +</P> + +<P> +'Going up!' he thought; 'going up!' +</P> + +<P> +Reaching the hotel at Knightsbridge he went to their sitting-room, and +rang for tea. Neither of them were in. And again that sense of +loneliness came over him. These hotels! What monstrous great places +they were now! He could remember when there was nothing bigger than +Long's or Brown's, Morley's or the Tavistock, and the heads that were +shaken over the Langham and the Grand. Hotels and Clubs—Clubs and +Hotels; no end to them now! And Soames, who had just been watching at +Lord's a miracle of tradition and continuity, fell into reverie over +the changes in that London where he had been born five-and-sixty years +before. Whether Consols were going up or not, London had become a +terrific property. No such property in the world, unless it were New +York! There was a lot of hysteria in the papers nowadays; but any one +who, like himself, could remember London sixty years ago, and see it +now, realised the fecundity and elasticity of wealth. They had only to +keep their heads, and go at it steadily. Why! he remembered +cobble-stones, and stinking straw on the floor of your cab. And old +Timothy—what could HE not tell them, if he had kept his memory! Things +were unsettled, people in a funk or in a hurry, but here were London +and the Thames, and out there the British Empire, and the ends of the +earth. "Consols are goin' up!" He shouldn't be a bit surprised. It was +the breed that counted. And all that was bull-dogged in Soames stared +for a moment out of his grey eyes, till diverted by the print of a +Victorian picture on the walls. The hotel had bought three dozen of +that little lot! The old hunting or "Rake's Progress" prints in the old +inns were worth looking at—but this sentimental stuff—well, +Victorianism had gone! "Tell them to hold on!" old Timothy had said. +But to what were they to hold on in this modern welter of the +"democratic principle"? Why, even privacy was threatened! And at the +thought that privacy might perish, Soames pushed back his teacup and +went to the window. Fancy owning no more of Nature than the crowd out +there owned of the flowers and trees and waters of Hyde Park! No, no! +Private possession underlay everything worth having. The world had +slipped its sanity a bit, as dogs now and again at full moon slipped +theirs and went off for a night's rabbiting; but the world, like the +dog, knew where its bread was buttered and its bed warm, and would come +back sure enough to the only home worth having—to private ownership. +The world was in its second childhood for the moment, like old +Timothy—eating its titbit first! +</P> + +<P> +He heard a sound behind him, and saw that his wife and daughter had +come in. +</P> + +<P> +"So you're back!" he said. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur did not answer; she stood for a moment looking at him and her +mother, then passed into her bedroom. Annette poured herself out a cup +of tea. +</P> + +<P> +"I am going to Paris, to my mother, Soames." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! To your mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"For how long?" +</P> + +<P> +"I do not know." +</P> + +<P> +"And when are you going?" +</P> + +<P> +"On Monday." +</P> + +<P> +Was she really going to her mother? Odd, how indifferent he felt! Odd, +how clearly she had perceived the indifference he would feel so long as +there was no scandal. And suddenly between her and himself he saw +distinctly the face he had seen that afternoon—Irene's. +</P> + +<P> +"Will you want money?" +</P> + +<P> +"Thank you; I have enough." +</P> + +<P> +"Very well. Let us know when you are coming back." +</P> + +<P> +Annette put down the cake she was fingering, and, looking up through +darkened lashes, said: +</P> + +<P> +"Shall I give Maman any message?" +</P> + +<P> +"My regards." +</P> + +<P> +Annette stretched herself, her hands on her waist, and said in French: +</P> + +<P> +"What luck that you have never loved me, Soames!" Then rising, she too +left the room. Soames was glad she had spoken it in French—it seemed +to require no dealing with. Again that other face—pale, dark-eyed, +beautiful still! And there stirred far down within him the ghost of +warmth, as from sparks lingering beneath a mound of flaky ash. And +Fleur infatuated with her boy! Queer chance! Yet, was there such a +thing as chance? A man went down a street, a brick fell on his head. +Ah! that was chance, no doubt. But this! "Inherited," his girl had +said. She—she was "holding on!" +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0301"></A> +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +PART III +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +OLD JOLYON WALKS +</H3> + +<P> +Twofold impulse had made Jolyon say to his wife at breakfast: "Let's go +up to Lord's!" +</P> + +<P> +"Wanted"—something to abate the anxiety in which those two had lived +during the sixty hours since Jon had brought Fleur down. "Wanted"—too, +that which might assuage the pangs of memory in one who knew he might +lose them any day! +</P> + +<P> +Fifty-eight years ago Jolyon had become an Eton boy, for old Jolyon's +whim had been that he should be canonised at the greatest possible +expense. Year after year he had gone to Lord's from Stanhope Gate with +a father whose youth in the eighteen-twenties had been passed without +polish in the game of cricket. Old Jolyon would speak quite openly of +swipes, full tosses, half and three-quarter balls; and young Jolyon +with the guileless snobbery of youth had trembled lest his sire should +be overheard. Only in this supreme matter of cricket he had been +nervous, for his father—in Crimean whiskers then—had ever impressed +him as the beau ideal. Though never canonised himself, old Jolyon's +natural fastidiousness and balance had saved him from the errors of the +vulgar. How delicious, after howling in a top hat and a sweltering +heat, to go home with his father in a hansom cab, bathe, dress, and +forth to the "Disunion" Club, to dine off whitebait, cutlets, and a +tart, and go—two "swells," old and young, in lavender kid gloves—to +the opera or play. And on Sunday, when the match was over, and his top +hat duly broken, down with his father in a special hansom to the "Crown +and Sceptre," and the terrace above the river—the golden sixties when +the world was simple, dandies glamorous, Democracy not born, and the +books of Whyte Melville coming thick and fast. +</P> + +<P> +A generation later, with his own boy, Jolly, Harrow—buttonholed with +cornflowers—by old Jolyon's whim his grandson had been canonised at a +trifle less expense—again Jolyon had experienced the heat and +counter-passions of the day, and come back to the cool and the +strawberry beds of Robin Hill, and billiards after dinner, his boy +making the most heart-breaking flukes and trying to seem languid and +grown-up. Those two days each year he and his son had been alone +together in the world, one on each side—and Democracy just born! +</P> + +<P> +And so, he had unearthed a grey top hat, borrowed a tiny bit of +light-blue ribbon from Irene, and gingerly, keeping cool, by car and +train and taxi, had reached Lord's Ground. There, beside her in a +lawn-coloured frock with narrow black edges, he had watched the game, +and felt the old thrill stir within him. +</P> + +<P> +When Soames passed, the day was spoiled, and Irene's face distorted by +compression of the lips. No good to go on sitting here with Soames or +perhaps his daughter recurring in front of them, like decimals. And he +said: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, dear, if you've had enough—let's go!" +</P> + +<P> +That evening Jolyon felt exhausted. Not wanting her to see him thus, he +waited till she had begun to play, and stole off to the little study. +He opened the long window for air, and the door, that he might still +hear her music drifting in; and, settled in his father's old armchair, +closed his eyes, with his head against the worn brown leather. Like +that passage of the Cesar Franck Sonata—so had been his life with her, +a divine third movement. And now this business of Jon's—this bad +business! Drifted to the edge of consciousness, he hardly knew if it +were in sleep that he smelled the scent of a cigar, and seemed to see a +shape in the blackness before his closed eyes. That shape formed, went, +and formed again; as if in the very chair where he himself was sitting, +he saw his father, black-coated, with knees crossed, glasses balanced +between thumb and finger; saw the big white moustaches, and the deep +eyes looking up below a dome of forehead, seeming to search his own; +seeming to speak. "Are you facing it, Jo? It's for you to decide. She's +only a woman!" How well he knew his father in that phrase; how all the +Victorian Age came up with it!—And his answer "No, I've funked +it—funked hurting her and Jon and myself. I've got a heart; I've +funked it." But the old eyes, so much older, so much younger than his +own, kept at it: "It's your wife, your son, your past. Tackle it, my +boy!" Was it a message from walking spirit; or but the instinct of his +sire living on within him? And again came that scent of cigar +smoke—from the old saturated leather. Well! he would tackle it, write +to Jon, and put the whole thing down in black and white! And suddenly +he breathed with difficulty, with a sense of suffocation, as if his +heart were swollen. He got up and went out into the air. Orion's Belt +was very bright. He passed along the terrace round the corner of the +house, till, through the window of the music-room, he could see Irene +at the piano, with lamplight falling on her powdery hair; withdrawn +into herself she seemed, her dark eyes staring straight before her, her +hands idle. Jolyon saw her raise those hands and clasp them over her +breast. 'It's Jon, with her,' he thought; 'all Jon! I'm dying out of +her—it's natural!' +</P> + +<P> +And, careful not to be seen, he stole back. +</P> + +<P> +Next day, after a bad night, he sat down to his task. He wrote with +difficulty and many erasures. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"MY DEAREST BOY, +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"You are old enough to understand how very difficult it is for elders +to give themselves away to their young. Especially when—like your +mother and myself, though I shall never think of her as anything but +young—their hearts are altogether set on him to whom they must +confess. I cannot say we are conscious of having sinned exactly—people +in real life very seldom are, I believe, but most persons would say we +had, and at all events our conduct, righteous or not, has found us out. +The truth is, my dear, we both have pasts, which it is now my task to +make known to you, because they so grievously and deeply affect your +future. Many, very many years ago, as far back indeed as 1883, when she +was only twenty, your mother had the great and lasting misfortune to +make an unhappy marriage—no, not with me, Jon. Without money of her +own, and with only a stepmother—closely related to Jezebel—she was +very unhappy in her home life. IT WAS FLEUR'S FATHER THAT SHE MARRIED, +my cousin Soames Forsyte. He had pursued her very tenaciously and to do +him justice was deeply in love with her. Within a week she knew the +fearful mistake she had made. It was not his fault; it was her error of +judgment—her misfortune." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +So far Jolyon had kept some semblance of irony, but now his subject +carried him away. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +"Jon, I want to explain to you if I can—and it's very hard—how it is +that an unhappy marriage such as this can so easily come about. You +will of course say: 'If she didn't really love him how could she ever +have married him?' You would be quite right if it were not for one or +two rather terrible considerations. From this initial mistake of hers +all the subsequent trouble, sorrow, and tragedy have come, and so I +must make it clear to you if I can. You see, Jon, in those days and +even to this day—indeed, I don't see, for all the talk of +enlightenment, how it can well be otherwise—most girls are married +ignorant of the sexual side of life. Even if they know what it means +they have not EXPERIENCED it. That's the crux. It is this actual lack +of experience, whatever verbal knowledge they have, which makes all the +difference and all the trouble. In a vast number of marriages—and your +mother's was one—girls are not and CANNOT be certain whether they love +the man they marry or not; they do not know until after that act of +union which makes the reality of marriage. Now, in many, perhaps in +most doubtful cases, this act cements and strengthens the attachment, +but in other cases, and your mother's was one, it is a revelation of +mistake, a destruction of such attraction as there was. There is +nothing more tragic in a woman's life than such a revelation, growing +daily, nightly clearer. Coarse-grained and unthinking people are apt to +laugh at such a mistake, and say 'what a fuss about nothing!' Narrow +and self-righteous people, only capable of judging the lives of others +by their own, are apt to condemn those who make this tragic error, to +condemn them for life to the dungeons they have made for themselves. +You know the expression: 'She has made her bed, she must lie on it!' It +is a hard-mouthed saying, quite unworthy of a gentleman or lady in the +best sense of those words; and I can use no stronger condemnation. I +have not been what is called a moral man, but I wish to use no words to +you, my dear, which will make you think lightly of ties or contracts +into which you enter. Heaven forbid! But with the experience of a life +behind me I do say that those who condemn the victims of these tragic +mistakes, condemn them and hold out no hands to help them, are inhuman +or rather they would be if they had the understanding to know what they +are doing. But they haven't! Let them go! They are as much anathema to +me as I, no doubt, am to them. I have had to say all this, because I am +going to put you into a position to judge your mother, and you are very +young, without experience of what life is. To go on with the story. +After three years of effort to subdue her shrinking—I was going to say +her loathing and it's not too strong a word, for shrinking soon becomes +loathing under such circumstances—three years of what to a sensitive, +beauty-loving nature like your mother's, Jon, was torment, she met a +young man who fell in love with her. He was the architect of this very +house that we live in now, he was building it for her and Fleur's +father to live in, a new prison to hold her, in place of the one she +inhabited with him in London. Perhaps that fact played some part in +what came of it. But in any case she, too, fell in love with him. I +know it's not necessary to explain to you that one does not precisely +choose with whom one will fall in love. It comes. Very well! It came. I +can imagine—though she never said much to me about it—the struggle +that then took place in her, because, Jon, she was brought up strictly +and was not light in her ideas—not at all. However, this was an +overwhelming feeling, and it came to pass that they loved in deed as +well as in thought. Then came a fearful tragedy. I must tell you of it +because if I don't you will never understand the real situation that +you have now to face. The man whom she had married—Soames Forsyte, the +father of Fleur—one night, at the height of her passion for this young +man, forcibly reasserted his rights over her. The next day she met her +lover and told him of it. Whether he committed suicide or whether he +was accidentally run over in his distraction, we never knew; but so it +was. Think of your mother as she was that evening when she heard of his +death. I happened to see her. Your grand-father sent me to help her if +I could. I only just saw her, before the door was shut against me by +her husband. But I have never forgotten her face, I can see it now. I +was not in love with her then, nor for twelve years after, but I have +never forgotten. My dear boy—it is not easy to write like this. But +you see, I must. Your mother is wrapped up in you, utterly, devotedly. +I don't wish to write harshly of Soames Forsyte. I don't think harshly +of him. I have long been sorry for him; perhaps I was sorry even then. +As the world judges she was in error, he was within his rights. He +loved her—in his way. SHE WAS HIS PROPERTY. That is the view he holds +of life—of human feelings and hearts—property. It's not his fault—so +was he born! To me it is a view that has always been abhorrent—so was +I born! Knowing you as I do, I feel it cannot be otherwise than +abhorrent to you. Let me go on with the story. Your mother fled from +his house that night; for twelve years she lived quietly alone without +companionship of any sort, until, in 1899 her husband—you see, he was +still her husband, for he did not attempt to divorce her, and she of +course had no right to divorce him, became conscious, it seems, of the +want of children, and commenced a long attempt to induce her to go back +to him and give him a child. I was her trustee then, under your +grandfather's Will, and I watched this going on. While watching, I +became devotedly attached to her. His pressure increased, till one day +she came to me here and practically put herself under my protection. +Her husband, who was kept informed of all her movements, attempted to +force us apart by bringing a divorce suit, or at all events by +threatening one; anyway our names were publicly joined. That decided +us, and we became united in fact. She was divorced, married me, and you +were born. We have lived in perfect happiness, at least I have, and I +believe your mother also. Soames, soon after the divorce, married +Fleur's mother, and she was born. That is the story, Jon. I have told +it you, because by the affection which we see you have formed for this +man's daughter you are blindly moving towards what must utterly destroy +your mother's happiness, if not your own. I don't wish to speak of +myself, because at my age there's no use supposing I shall cumber the +ground much longer, besides, what I should suffer would be mainly on +her account, and on yours. But what I want you to realise is that +feelings of horror and aversion such as those can never be buried or +forgotten. They are alive in her to-day. Only yesterday at Lord's we +happened to see Soames Forsyte. Her face, if you had seen it, would +have convinced you. The idea that you should marry his daughter is a +nightmare to her, Jon. I have nothing to say against Fleur save that +she IS his daughter. But your children, if you married her, would be +the grandchildren of Soames, as much as of your mother, of a man who +once owned your mother as a man might own a slave. Think what that +would mean. By such a marriage you enter the camp which held your +mother prisoner and wherein she ate her heart out. You are just on the +threshold of life, you have only known this girl two months, and +however deeply you think you love her, I appeal to you to break it off +at once. Don't give your mother this rankling pain and humiliation +during the rest of her life. Young though she will always seem to me, +she is fifty-seven. Except for us two she has no one in the world. She +will soon have only you. Pluck up your spirit, Jon, and break away. +Don't put this cloud and barrier between you. Don't break her heart! +Bless you, my dear boy, and again forgive me for all the pain this +letter must bring you—we tried to spare it you, but Spain—it +seems—was no good. +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +Ever your devoted father +</P> + +<P CLASS="letter"> +JOLYON FORSYTE." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Having finished his confession, Jolyon sat with a thin cheek on his +hand, re-reading. There were things in it which hurt him so much, when +he thought of Jon reading them—that he nearly tore the letter up. To +speak of such things at all to a boy—his own boy—to speak of them in +relation to his own wife and the boy's own mother, seemed dreadful to +the reticence of his Forsyte soul. And yet without speaking of them how +make Jon understand the reality, the deep cleavage, the ineffaceable +scar? Without them, how justify this stifling of the boy's love? He +might just as well not write at all! +</P> + +<P> +He folded the confession, and put it in his pocket. It was—thank +heaven!—Saturday; he had till Sunday evening to think it over; for +even if posted now it could not reach Jon till Monday. He felt a +curious relief at this delay, and at the fact that, whether sent or +not, it was written. +</P> + +<P> +In the rose garden, which had taken the place of the old fernery, he +could see Irene snipping and pruning, with a little basket on her arm. +She was never idle, it seemed to him, and he envied her now that he +himself was idle nearly all his time. He went down to her. She held up +a stained glove and smiled. A piece of lace tied under her chin +concealed her hair, and her oval face with its still dark brows looked +very young. +</P> + +<P> +"The green fly are awful this year, and yet it's cold. You look tired, +Jolyon." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon took the confession from his pocket. "I've been writing this. I +think you ought to see it." +</P> + +<P> +"To Jon?" Her whole face had changed, in that instant, becoming almost +haggard. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes; the murder's out." +</P> + +<P> +He gave it her, and walked away among the roses. Presently, seeing that +she had finished reading and was standing quite still with the sheets +of the letter against her skirt, he came back to her. +</P> + +<P> +"Well?" +</P> + +<P> +"It's wonderfully put. I don't see how it could be put better. Thank +you, dear." +</P> + +<P> +"Is there anything you would like left out?" +</P> + +<P> +She shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"No; he must know all, if he's to understand." +</P> + +<P> +"That's what I thought, but I hate it like the devil!" +</P> + +<P> +He had the feeling that he hated it more than she—to him sex was so +much easier to mention between man and woman than between man and man; +and she had always been more natural and frank, not deeply secretive +like his Forsyte self. +</P> + +<P> +"I wonder if he will understand, even now, Jolyon? He's so young; and +he shrinks from the physical." +</P> + +<P> +"He gets that shrinking from my father, he was as fastidious as a girl +in all such matters. Would it be better to rewrite the whole thing, and +just say you hated Soames?" +</P> + +<P> +Irene shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"Hate's only a word. It conveys nothing. No, better as it is." +</P> + +<P> +"Very well. It shall go to-morrow." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0302"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CONFESSION +</H3> + +<P> +Late that same afternoon, Jolyon had a nap in the old armchair. Face +down on his knee was La Rotisserie de la Reine Pedaugue, and just +before he fell asleep he had been thinking: 'As a people shall we ever +really like the French? Will they ever really like us?' He himself had +always liked the French, feeling at home with their wit, their taste, +their cooking. Irene and he had paid many visits to France before the +war, when Jon had been at his private school. His romance with her had +begun in Paris—his last and most enduring romance. But the French—no +Englishman could like them who could not see them in some sort with the +detached aesthetic eye! And with that melancholy conclusion he had +nodded off. +</P> + +<P> +When he woke he saw Jon standing between him and the window. The boy +had evidently come in from the garden and was waiting for him to wake. +Jolyon smiled, still half asleep. How nice the chap looked-sensitive, +affectionate, straight! Then his heart gave a nasty jump; and a quaking +sensation overcame him. That confession! He controlled himself with an +effort. "Why, Jon, where did you spring from?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon bent over and kissed his forehead. +</P> + +<P> +Only then he noticed the look on the boy's face. +</P> + +<P> +"I came home to tell you something, Dad." +</P> + +<P> +With all his might Jolyon tried to get the better of the jumping, +gurgling sensations within his chest. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, sit down, old man. Have you seen your mother?" +</P> + +<P> +"No." The boy's flushed look gave place to pallor; he sat down on the +arm of the old chair, as, in old days, Jolyon himself used to sit +beside his own father, installed in its recesses. Right up to the time +of the rupture in their relations he had been wont to perch there—had +he now reached such a moment with his own son? All his life he had +hated scenes like poison, avoided rows, gone on his own way quietly and +let others go on theirs. But now—it seemed—at the very end of things, +he had a scene before him more painful than any he had avoided. He drew +a visor down over his emotion, and waited for his son to speak. +</P> + +<P> +"Father," said Jon slowly, "Fleur and I are engaged." +</P> + +<P> +'Exactly!' thought Jolyon, breathing with difficulty. +</P> + +<P> +"I know that you and Mother don't like the idea. Fleur says that Mother +was engaged to her father before you married her. Of course I don't +know what happened, but it must be ages ago. I'm devoted to her, Dad, +and she says she is to me." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon uttered a queer sound, half laugh, half groan. +</P> + +<P> +"You are nineteen, Jon, and I am seventy-two. How are we to understand +each other in a matter like this, eh?" +</P> + +<P> +"You love Mother, Dad; you must know what we feel. It isn't fair to us +to let old things spoil our happiness, is it?" +</P> + +<P> +Brought face to face with his confession, Jolyon resolved to do without +it if by any means he could. He laid his hand on the boy's arm. +</P> + +<P> +"Look, Jon! I might put you off with talk about your both being too +young and not knowing your own minds, and all that, but you wouldn't +listen; besides, it doesn't meet the case—Youth, unfortunately, cures +itself. You talk lightly about 'old things like that,' knowing +nothing—as you say truly—of what happened. Now, have I ever given you +reason to doubt my love for you, or my word?" +</P> + +<P> +At a less anxious moment he might have been amused by the conflict his +words aroused—the boy's eager clasp, to reassure him on these points, +the dread on his face of what that reassurance would bring forth; but +he could only feel grateful for the squeeze. +</P> + +<P> +"Very well, you can believe what I tell you. If you don't give up this +love affair, you will make Mother wretched to the end of her days. +Believe me, my dear, the past, whatever it was, can't be buried—it +can't indeed." +</P> + +<P> +Jon got off the arm of the chair. +</P> + +<P> +'The girl—' thought Jolyon—'there she goes—starting up before +him—life itself—eager, pretty, loving!' +</P> + +<P> +"I can't, Father; how can I—just because you say that? Of course I +can't!" +</P> + +<P> +"Jon, if you knew the story you would give this up without hesitation; +you would have to! Can't you believe me?" +</P> + +<P> +"How can you tell what I should think? Why, I love her better than +anything in the world." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon's face twitched, and he said with painful slowness: +</P> + +<P> +"Better than your mother, Jon?" +</P> + +<P> +From the boy's face, and his clenched fists Jolyon realised the stress +and struggle he was going through. +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know," he burst out, "I don't know! But to give Fleur up for +nothing—for something I don't understand, for something that I don't +believe can really matter half so much, will make me—make me—" +</P> + +<P> +"Make you feel us unjust, put a barrier—yes. But that's better than +going on with this." +</P> + +<P> +"I can't. Fleur loves me, and I love her. You want me to trust you; why +don't you trust me, Father? We wouldn't want to know anything—we +wouldn't let it make any difference. It'll only make us both love you +and Mother all the more." +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon put his hand into his breast pocket, but brought it out again +empty, and sat, clucking his tongue against his teeth. +</P> + +<P> +"Think what your mother's been to you, Jon! She has nothing but you; I +shan't last much longer." +</P> + +<P> +"Why not? It isn't fair to—Why not?" +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Jolyon, rather coldly, "because the doctors tell me I +shan't; that's all." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! Dad!" cried Jon, and burst into tears. +</P> + +<P> +This downbreak of his son, whom he had not seen cry since he was ten, +moved Jolyon terribly. He recognised to the full how fearfully soft the +boy's heart was, how much he would suffer in this business, and in life +generally. And he reached out his hand helplessly—not wishing, indeed +not daring to get up. +</P> + +<P> +"Dear man," he said, "don't—or you'll make me!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon smothered down his paroxysm, and stood with face averted, very +still. +</P> + +<P> +'What now?' thought Jolyon; 'what can I say to move him?' +</P> + +<P> +"By the way, don't speak of that to Mother," he said; "she has enough +to scare her with this affair of yours. I know how you feel. But, Jon, +you know her and me well enough to be sure we wouldn't wish to spoil +your happiness lightly. Why, my dear boy, we don't care for anything +but your happiness—at least, with me it's just yours and Mother's and +with her just yours. It's all the future for you both that's at stake." +</P> + +<P> +Jon turned. His face was deadly pale; his eyes, deep in his head, +seemed to burn. +</P> + +<P> +"What is it? What is it? Don't keep me like this!" +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon, who knew that he was beaten, thrust his hand again into his +breast pocket, and sat for a full minute, breathing with difficulty, +his eyes closed. The thought passed through his mind: 'I've had a good +long innings—some pretty bitter moments—this is the worst!' Then he +brought his hand out with the letter, and said with a sort of fatigue: +"Well, Jon, if you hadn't come to-day, I was going to send you this. I +wanted to spare you—I wanted to spare your mother and myself, but I +see it's no good. Read it, and I think I'll go into the garden." He +reached forward to get up. +</P> + +<P> +Jon, who had taken the letter, said quickly: "No, I'll go"; and was +gone. +</P> + +<P> +Jolyon sank back in his chair. A blue-bottle chose that moment to come +buzzing round him with a sort of fury; the sound was homely, better +than nothing.... Where had the boy gone to read his letter? The +wretched letter—the wretched story! A cruel business—cruel to her—to +Soames—to those two children—to himself!... His heart thumped and +pained him. Life—its loves—its work—its beauty—its aching, and—its +end! A good time; a fine time in spite of all; until—you regretted +that you had ever been born. Life—it wore you down, yet did not make +you want to die—that was the cunning evil! Mistake to have a heart! +Again the blue-bottle came buzzing—bringing in all the heat and hum +and scent of summer—yes, even the scent—as of ripe fruits, dried +grasses, sappy shrubs, and the vanilla breath of cows. And out there +somewhere in the fragrance Jon would be reading that letter, turning +and twisting its pages in his trouble, his bewilderment and +trouble-breaking his heart about it! The thought made Jolyon acutely +miserable. Jon was such a tender-hearted chap, affectionate to his +bones, and conscientious, too—it was so damned unfair! He remembered +Irene saying to him once: "Never was any one born more loving and +lovable than Jon." Poor little Jon! His world gone up the spout, all of +a summer afternoon! Youth took things so hard! And stirred, tormented +by that vision of Youth taking things hard, Jolyon got out of his +chair, and went to the window. The boy was nowhere visible. And he +passed out. If one could take any help to him now—one must! +</P> + +<P> +He traversed the shrubbery, glanced into the walled garden—no Jon! Nor +where the peaches and the apricots were beginning to swell and colour. +He passed the Cupressus-trees, dark and spiral, into the meadow. Where +had the boy got to? Had he rushed down to the coppice—his old +hunting-ground? Jolyon crossed the rows of hay. They would cock it on +Monday and be carrying the day after, if rain held off. Often they had +crossed this field together—hand in hand, when Jon was a little chap. +Dash it! The golden age was over by the time one was ten! He came to +the pond, where flies and gnats were dancing over a bright reedy +surface; and on into the coppice. It was cool there, fragrant of +larches. Still no Jon! He called. No answer! On the log seat he sat +down, nervous, anxious, forgetting his own physical sensations. He had +been wrong to let the boy get away with that letter; he ought to have +kept him under his eye from the start! Greatly troubled, he got up to +retrace his steps. At the farm-buildings he called again, and looked +into the dark cow-house. There in the cool, and the scent of vanilla +and ammonia, away from flies, the three Alderneys were chewing the +quiet cud; just milked, waiting for evening, to be turned out again +into the lower field. One turned a lazy head, a lustrous eye; Jolyon +could see the slobber on its grey lower lip. He saw everything with +passionate clearness, in the agitation of his nerves—all that in his +time he had adored and tried to paint—wonder of light and shade and +colour. No wonder the legend put Christ into a manger—what more +devotional than the eyes and moon-white horns of a chewing cow in the +warm dusk! He called again. No answer! And he hurried away out of the +coppice, past the pond, up the hill. Oddly ironical—now he came to +think of it—if Jon had taken the gruel of his discovery down in the +coppice where his mother and Bosinney in those old days had made the +plunge of acknowledging their love. Where he himself, on the log seat +the Sunday morning he came back from Paris, had realised to the full +that Irene had become the world to him. That would have been the place +for Irony to tear the veil from before the eyes of Irene's boy! But he +was not here! Where had he got to? One must find the poor chap! +</P> + +<P> +A gleam of sun had come, sharpening to his hurrying senses all the +beauty of the afternoon, of the tall trees and lengthening shadows, of +the blue, and the white clouds, the scent of the hay, and the cooing of +the pigeons; and the flower shapes standing tall. He came to the +rosary, and the beauty of the roses in that sudden sunlight seemed to +him unearthly. "Rose, you Spaniard!" Wonderful three words! There she +had stood by that bush of dark red roses; had stood to read and decide +that Jon must know it all! He knew all now! Had she chosen wrong? He +bent and sniffed a rose, its petals brushed his nose and trembling +lips; nothing so soft as a rose-leaf's velvet, except her neck—Irene! +On across the lawn he went, up the slope, to the oak-tree. Its top +alone was glistening, for the sudden sun was away over the house; the +lower shade was thick, blessedly cool—he was greatly overheated. He +paused a minute with his hand on the rope of the swing—Jolly, +Holly—Jon! The old swing! And, suddenly, he felt horribly—deadly ill. +'I've overdone it!' he thought: 'by Jove. I've overdone it—after all!' +He staggered up towards the terrace, dragged himself up the steps, and +fell against the wall of the house. He leaned there gasping, his face +buried in the honeysuckle that he and she had taken such trouble with +that it might sweeten the air which drifted in. Its fragrance mingled +with awful pain. 'My Love!' he thought; 'the boy!' And with a great +effort he tottered in through the long window, and sank into old +Jolyon's chair. The book was there, a pencil in it; he caught it up, +scribbled a word on the open page.... His hand dropped.... So it was +like this—was it?... +</P> + +<P> +There was a great wrench; and darkness.... +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0303"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IRENE! +</H3> + +<P> +When Jon rushed away with the letter in his hand, he ran along the +terrace and round the corner of the house, in fear and confusion. +Leaning against the creepered wall he tore open the letter. It was +long—very long! This added to his fear, and he began reading. When he +came to the underlined words: "It was Fleur's father that she married," +everything swam before him. He was close to a window, and entering by +it, he passed, through music-room and hall, up to his bedroom. Dipping +his face in cold water, he sat on his bed, and went on reading, +dropping each finished page on the bed beside him. His father's writing +was easy to read—he knew it so well, though he had never had a letter +from him one quarter so long. He read with a dull feeling—imagination +only half at work. He best grasped, on that first reading, the pain his +father must have had in writing such a letter. He let the last sheet +fall, and in a sort of mental, moral helplessness he began to read the +first again. It all seemed to him disgusting—dead and disgusting. +Then, suddenly, a hot wave of horrified emotion tingled through him. He +buried his face in his hands. His mother! Fleur's father! He took up +the letter again, and read on mechanically. And again came the feeling +that it was all dead and disgusting; his own love so different! This +letter said his mother—and her father! An awful letter! +</P> + +<P> +Property! Could there be men who looked on women as their property? +Faces seen in street and countryside came thronging up before him—red, +stock-fish faces; hard, dull faces; prim, dry faces; violent faces; +hundreds, thousands of them! How could he know what men who had such +faces thought and did? He held his head in his hands and groaned. His +mother! He caught up the letter and read on again: "horror and +aversion—alive in her to-day ... your children ... grandchildren ... +of a man who once owned your mother as a man might own a slave...." He +got up from his bed. This cruel shadowy past, lurking there to murder +his love and Fleur's, was true, or his father could never have written +it. 'Why didn't they tell me the first thing,' he thought, 'the day I +first saw Fleur? They knew I'd seen her. They were afraid, +and—now—I've—got it!' Overcome by misery too acute for thought or +reason, he crept into a dusky corner of the room and sat down on the +floor. He sat there, like some unhappy little animal. There was comfort +in dusk, and in the floor—as if he were back in those days when he +played his battles sprawling all over it. He sat there huddled, his +hair ruffled, his hands clasped round his knees, for how long he did +not know. He was wrenched from his blank wretchedness by the sound of +the door opening from his mother's room. The blinds were down over the +windows of his room, shut up in his absence, and from where he sat he +could only hear a rustle, her footsteps crossing, till beyond the bed +he saw her standing before his dressing-table. She had something in her +hand. He hardly breathed, hoping she would not see him, and go away. He +saw her touch things on the table as if they had some virtue in them, +then face the window—grey from head to foot like a ghost. The least +turn of her head, and she must see him! Her lips moved: "Oh! Jon!" She +was speaking to herself; the tone of her voice troubled Jon's heart. He +saw in her hand a little photograph. She held it towards the light, +looking at it—very small. He knew it—one of himself as a tiny boy, +which she always kept in her bag. His heart beat fast. And, suddenly, +as if she had heard it, she turned her eyes and saw him. At the gasp +she gave, and the movement of her hands pressing the photograph against +her breast, he said: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, it's me." +</P> + +<P> +She moved over to the bed, and sat down on it, quite close to him, her +hands still clasping her breast, her feet among the sheets of the +letter which had slipped to the floor. She saw them, and her hands +grasped the edge of the bed. She sat very upright, her dark eyes fixed +on him. At last she spoke. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Jon, you know, I see." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"You've seen Father?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +There was a long silence, till she said: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! my darling!" +</P> + +<P> +"It's all right." The emotions in him were so violent and so mixed that +he dared not move—resentment, despair, and yet a strange yearning for +the comfort of her hand on his forehead. +</P> + +<P> +"What are you going to do?" +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know." +</P> + +<P> +There was another long silence, then she got up. She stood a moment, +very still, made a little movement with her hand, and said: "My darling +boy, my most darling boy, don't think of me—think of yourself." And, +passing round the foot of the bed, went back into her room. +</P> + +<P> +Jon turned—curled into a sort of ball, as might a hedgehog—into the +corner made by the two walls. +</P> + +<P> +He must have been twenty minutes there before a cry roused him. It came +from the terrace below. He got up, scared. Again came the cry: "Jon!" +His mother was calling! He ran out and down the stairs, through the +empty dining-room into the study. She was kneeling before the old +armchair, and his father was lying back quite white, his head on his +breast, one of his hands resting on an open book, with a pencil +clutched in it—more strangely still than anything he had ever seen. +She looked round wildly, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! Jon—he's dead—he's dead!" +</P> + +<P> +Jon flung himself down, and reaching over the arm of the chair, where +he had lately been sitting, put his lips to the forehead. Icy cold! How +could—how could Dad be dead, when only an hour ago—His mother's arms +were round the knees; pressing her breast against them. "Why—why +wasn't I with him?" he heard her whisper. Then he saw the tottering +word "Irene" pencilled on the open page, and broke down himself. It was +his first sight of human death, and its unutterable stillness blotted +from him all other emotion; all else, then, was but preliminary to +this! All love and life, and joy, anxiety, and sorrow, all movement, +light and beauty, but a beginning to this terrible white stillness. It +made a dreadful mark on him; all seemed suddenly little, futile, short. +He mastered himself at last, got up, and raised her. +</P> + +<P> +"Mother! don't cry—Mother!" +</P> + +<P> +Some hours later, when all was done that had to be, and his mother was +lying down, he saw his father alone, on the bed, covered with a white +sheet. He stood for a long time gazing at that face which had never +looked angry—always whimsical, and kind. "To be kind and keep your end +up—there's nothing else in it," he had once heard his father say. How +wonderfully Dad had acted up to that philosophy! He understood now that +his father had known for a long time past that this would come +suddenly—known, and not said a word. He gazed with an awed and +passionate reverence. The loneliness of it—just to spare his mother +and himself! His own trouble seemed small while he was looking at that +face. The word scribbled on the page! The farewell word! Now his mother +had no one but himself! He went up close to the dead face—not changed +at all, and yet completely changed. He had heard his father say once +that he did not believe in consciousness surviving death, or that if it +did it might be just survival till the natural age-limit of the body +had been reached—the natural term of its inherent vitality; so that if +the body were broken by accident, excess, violent disease, +consciousness might still persist till, in the course of Nature +uninterfered with, it would naturally have faded out. The whimsical +conceit had struck him. When the heart failed like this—surely it was +not quite natural! Perhaps his father's consciousness was in the room +with him. Above the bed hung a picture of his father's father. Perhaps +HIS consciousness, too, was still alive; and his brother's—his +half-brother, who had died in the Transvaal. Were they all gathered +round this bed? Jon kissed the forehead, and stole back to his own +room. The door between it and his mother's was ajar; she had evidently +been in—everything was ready for him, even some biscuits and hot milk, +and the letter no longer on the floor. He ate and drank, watching the +last light fade. He did not try to see into the future—just stared at +the dark branches of the oak-tree, level with his window, and felt as +if life had stopped. Once in the night, turning in his heavy sleep, he +was conscious of something white and still, beside his bed, and started +up. His mother's voice said: +</P> + +<P> +"It's only I, Jon dear!" Her hand pressed his forehead gently back; her +white figure disappeared. +</P> + +<P> +Alone! He fell heavily asleep again, and dreamed he saw his mother's +name crawling on his bed. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0304"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IV +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +SOAMES COGITATES +</H3> + +<P> +The announcement in THE TIMES of his cousin Jolyon's death affected +Soames quite simply. So that chap was gone! There had never been a time +in their two lives when love had not been lost between them. That +quick-blooded sentiment hatred had run its course long since in Soames' +heart, and he had refused to allow any recrudescence, but he considered +this early decease a piece of poetic justice. For twenty years the +fellow had enjoyed the reversion of his wife and house, and—he was +dead! The obituary notice, which appeared a little later, paid +Jolyon—he thought—too much attention. It spoke of that "diligent and +agreeable painter whose work we have come to look on as typical of the +best late-Victorian water-colour art." Soames, who had almost +mechanically preferred Mole, Morpin, and Caswell Baye, and had always +sniffed quite audibly when he came to one of his cousin's on the line, +turned THE TIMES with a crackle. +</P> + +<P> +He had to go up to Town that morning on Forsyte affairs, and was fully +conscious of Gradman's glance sidelong over his spectacles. The old +clerk had about him an aura of regretful congratulation. He smelled, as +it were, of old days. One could almost hear him thinking: "Mr. Jolyon, +ye-es—just my age, and gone—dear, dear! I dare say she feels it. She +was a naice-lookin' woman. Flesh is flesh! They've given 'im a notice +in the papers. Fancy!" His atmosphere in fact caused Soames to handle +certain leases and conversions with exceptional swiftness. +</P> + +<P> +"About that settlement on Miss Fleur, Mr. Soames?" +</P> + +<P> +"I've thought better of that," answered Soames shortly. +</P> + +<P> +"Aoh! I'm glad of that. I thought you were a little hasty. The times do +change." +</P> + +<P> +How this death would affect Fleur had begun to trouble Soames. He was +not certain that she knew of it—she seldom looked at the paper, never +at the births, marriages, and deaths. +</P> + +<P> +He pressed matters on, and made his way to Green Street for lunch. +Winifred was almost doleful. Jack Cardigan had broken a splashboard, so +far as one could make out, and would not be "fit" for some time. She +could not get used to the idea. +</P> + +<P> +"Did Profond ever get off?" he said suddenly. +</P> + +<P> +"He got off," replied Winifred, "but where—I don't know." +</P> + +<P> +Yes, there it was—impossible to tell anything! Not that he wanted to +know. Letters from Annette were coming from Dieppe, where she and her +mother were staying. +</P> + +<P> +"You saw that fellow's death, I suppose?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Winifred. "I'm sorry for his children. He was very amiable." +</P> + +<P> +Soames uttered a rather queer sound. A suspicion of the old deep +truth—that men were judged in this world rather by what they were than +by what they did—crept and knocked resentfully at the back door of his +mind. +</P> + +<P> +"I know there was a superstition to that effect," he muttered. +</P> + +<P> +"One must do him justice now he's dead." +</P> + +<P> +"I should like to have done him justice before," said Soames; "but I +never had the chance. Have you got a 'Baronetage' here?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes; in that bottom row." +</P> + +<P> +Soames took out a fat red book, and ran over the leaves. +</P> + +<P> +"Mont—Sir Lawrence, 9th Bt. cr. 1620. e.s. of Geoffrey 8th Bt. and +Lavinia daur. of Sir Charles Muskham Bt. of Muskham Hall, Shrops: marr. +1890 Emily, daur. of Conway Charwell Esq. of Condaford Grange, co. +Oxon; 1 son, heir Michael Conway, b. 1895, 2 daurs. Residence: +Lippinghall Manor, Folwell, Bucks: Clubs: Snooks: Coffee House: +Aeroplane. See Bidlicott." +</P> + +<P> +"H'm!" he said: "Did you ever know a publisher?" +</P> + +<P> +"Uncle Timothy." +</P> + +<P> +"Alive, I mean." +</P> + +<P> +"Monty knew one at his Club. He brought him here to dinner once. Monty +was always thinking of writing a book, you know, about how to make +money on the turf. He tried to interest that man." +</P> + +<P> +"Well?" +</P> + +<P> +"He put him on to a horse—for the Two Thousand. We didn't see him +again. He was rather smart, if I remember." +</P> + +<P> +"Did it win?" +</P> + +<P> +"No; it ran last, I think. You know Monty really was quite clever in +his way.". +</P> + +<P> +"Was he?" said Soames. "Can you see any connection between a sucking +baronet and publishing?" +</P> + +<P> +"People do all sorts of things nowadays," replied Winifred. "The great +stunt seems not to be idle—so different from our time. To do nothing +was the thing then. But I suppose it'll come again." +</P> + +<P> +"This young Mont that I'm speaking of is very sweet on Fleur. If it +would put an end to that other affair I might encourage it." +</P> + +<P> +"Has he got style?" asked Winifred. +</P> + +<P> +"He's no beauty; pleasant enough, with some scattered brains. There's a +good deal of land, I believe. He seems genuinely attached. But I don't +know." +</P> + +<P> +"No," murmured Winifred; "it's very difficult. I always found it best +to do nothing. It IS such a bore about Jack; now we shan't get away +till after Bank holiday. Well, the people are always amusing, I shall +go into the Park and watch them." +</P> + +<P> +"If I were you," said Soames, "I should have a country cottage, and be +out of the way of holidays and strikes when you want." +</P> + +<P> +"The country bores me," answered Winifred, "and I found the railway +strike quite exciting." +</P> + +<P> +Winifred had always been noted for sang-froid. +</P> + +<P> +Soames took his leave. All the way down to Reading he debated whether +he should tell Fleur of that boy's father's death. It did not alter the +situation except that he would be independent now, and only have his +mother's opposition to encounter. He would come into a lot of money, no +doubt, and perhaps the house—the house built for Irene and +himself—the house whose architect had wrought his domestic ruin. His +daughter—mistress of that house! That would be poetic justice! Soames +uttered a little mirthless laugh. He had designed that house to +re-establish his failing union, meant it for the seat of his +descendants, if he could have induced Irene to give him one! Her son +and Fleur! Their children would be, in some sort, offspring of the +union between himself and her! +</P> + +<P> +The theatricality in that thought was repulsive to his sober sense. And +yet—it would be the easiest and wealthiest way out of the impasse, now +that Jolyon was gone. The juncture of two Forsyte fortunes had a kind +of conservative charm. And she—Irene—would be linked to him once +more. Nonsense! Absurd! He put the notion from his head. +</P> + +<P> +On reaching home he heard the click of billiard-balls; and through the +window saw young Mont sprawling over the table. Fleur, with her cue +akimbo, was watching with a smile. How pretty she looked! No wonder +that young fellow was out of his mind about her. A title—land! There +was little enough in land, these days; perhaps less in a title. The old +Forsytes had always had a kind of contempt for titles, rather remote +and artificial things—not worth the money they cost, and having to do +with the Court. They had all had that feeling in differing +measure—Soames remembered. Swithin, indeed, in his most expansive days +had once attended a Levee. He had come away saying he shouldn't go +again—"All that small fry!" It was suspected that he had looked too +big in knee-breeches. Soames remembered how his own mother had wished +to be presented because of the fashionable nature of the performance, +and how his father had put his foot down with unwonted decision. What +did she want with such peacocking—wasting time and money; there was +nothing in it! +</P> + +<P> +The instinct which had made and kept the British Commons the chief +power in the State, a feeling that their own world was good enough and +a little better than any other because it was THEIR world, had kept the +old Forsytes singularly free of "flummery," as Nicholas had been wont +to call it when he had the gout. Soames' generation, more +self-conscious and ironical, had been saved by a sense of Swithin in +knee-breeches. While the third and the fourth generation, as it seemed +to him, laughed at everything. +</P> + +<P> +However, there was no harm in the young fellow's being heir to a title +and estate—a thing one couldn't help. He entered quietly, as Mont +missed his shot. He noted the young man's eyes, fixed on Fleur bending +over in her turn; and the adoration in them almost touched him. +</P> + +<P> +She paused with the cue poised on the bridge of her slim hand, and +shook her crop of short dark chestnut hair. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall never do it." +</P> + +<P> +"'Nothing venture!'" +</P> + +<P> +"All right!" The cue struck, the ball rolled. "There!" +</P> + +<P> +"Bad luck! Never mind!" +</P> + +<P> +Then they saw him, and Soames said: "I'll mark for you." +</P> + +<P> +He sat down on the raised seat beneath the marker, trim and tired, +furtively studying those two young faces. When the game was over Mont +came up to him. "I've started in, sir. Rum game, business, isn't it? I +suppose you saw a lot of human nature as a solicitor." +</P> + +<P> +"I did." +</P> + +<P> +"Shall I tell you what I've noticed: People are quite on the wrong +track in offering less than they can afford to give; they ought to +offer more, and work backward." +</P> + +<P> +Soames raised his eyebrows. "Suppose the more is accepted?" +</P> + +<P> +"That doesn't matter a little bit," said Mont; "it's much more paying +to abate a price than to increase it. For instance, say we offer an +author good terms—he naturally takes them. Then we go into it, find we +can't publish at a decent profit and tell him so. He's got confidence +in us because we've been generous to him, and he comes down like a +lamb, and bears us no malice. But if we offer him poor terms at the +start, he doesn't take them, so we have to advance them to get him, and +he thinks us damned screws into the bargain." +</P> + +<P> +"Try buying pictures on that system"; said Soames, "an offer accepted +is a contract—haven't you learned that?" +</P> + +<P> +Young Mont turned his head to where Fleur was standing in the window. +</P> + +<P> +"No," he said, "I wish I had. Then there's another thing. Always let a +man off a bargain if he wants to be let off." +</P> + +<P> +"As advertisement?" said Soames dryly. +</P> + +<P> +"Of course it IS; but I meant on principle." +</P> + +<P> +"Does your firm work on those lines?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not yet," said Mont, "but it'll come." +</P> + +<P> +"And they will go." +</P> + +<P> +"No, really, sir. I'm making any number of observations, and they all +confirm my theory. Human nature is consistently underrated in business, +people do themselves out of an awful lot of pleasure and profit by +that. Of course, you must be perfectly genuine and open, but that's +easy if you feel it. The more human and generous you are the better +chance you've got in business." +</P> + +<P> +Soames rose. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you a partner?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not for six months, yet." +</P> + +<P> +"The rest of the firm had better make haste and retire." +</P> + +<P> +Mont laughed. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll see," he said. "There's going to be a big change. The +possessive principle has got its shutters up." +</P> + +<P> +"What?" said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +"The house is to let! Good-bye, sir; I'm off now." +</P> + +<P> +Soames watched his daughter give her hand, saw her wince at the squeeze +it received, and distinctly heard the young man's sigh as he passed +out. Then she came from the window, trailing her finger along the +mahogany edge of the billiard-table. Watching her, Soames knew that she +was going to ask him something. Her finger felt round the last pocket, +and she looked up. +</P> + +<P> +"Have you done anything to stop Jon writing to me, Father?" +</P> + +<P> +Soames shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"You haven't seen, then?" he said. "His father died just a week ago +to-day." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" +</P> + +<P> +In her startled, frowning face, he saw the instant struggle to +apprehend what this would mean. +</P> + +<P> +"Poor Jon! Why didn't you tell me, Father?" +</P> + +<P> +"I never know!" said Soames slowly; "you don't confide in me." +</P> + +<P> +"I would, if you'd help me, dear." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps I shall." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur clasped her hands. "Oh! darling—when one wants a thing +fearfully, one doesn't think of other people. Don't be angry with me." +</P> + +<P> +Soames put out his hand, as if pushing away an aspersion. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm cogitating," he said. What on earth had made him use a word like +that! "Has young Mont been bothering you again?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur smiled. "Oh! Michael! He's always bothering; but he's such a good +sort—I don't mind him." +</P> + +<P> +"Well," said Soames, "I'm tired; I shall go and have a nap before +dinner." +</P> + +<P> +He went up to his picture-gallery, lay down on the couch there, and +closed his eyes. A terrible responsibility this girl of his—whose +mother was—ah! what was she? A terrible responsibility! Help her—how +could he help her? He could not alter the fact that he was her father. +Or that Irene—! What was it young Mont had said—some nonsense about +the possessive instinct—shutters up—To let? Silly! +</P> + +<P> +The sultry air, charged with a scent of meadow-sweet, of river and +roses, closed on his senses, drowsing them. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0305"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +V +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE FIXED IDEA +</H3> + +<P> +"The fixed idea," which has outrun more constables than any other form +of human disorder, has never more speed and stamina than when it takes +the avid guise of love. To hedges and ditches, and doors, to humans +without ideas fixed or otherwise, to perambulators and the contents +sucking their fixed ideas, even to the other sufferers from this fast +malady—the fixed idea of love pays no attention. It runs with eyes +turned inward to its own light, oblivious of all other stars. Those +with the fixed ideas that human happiness depends on their art, on +vivisecting dogs, on hating foreigners, on paying supertax, on +remaining Ministers, on making wheels go round, on preventing their +neighbours from being divorced, on conscientious objection, Greek +roots, Church dogma, paradox and superiority to everybody else, with +other forms of ego-mania—all are unstable compared with him or her +whose fixed idea is the possession of some her or him. And though +Fleur, those chilly summer days, pursued the scattered life of a little +Forsyte whose frocks are paid for, and whose business is pleasure, she +was—as Winifred would have said in the latest fashion of +speech—'honest-to-God' indifferent to it all. She wished and wished +for the moon, which sailed in cold skies above the river or the Green +Park when she went to Town. She even kept Jon's letters covered with +pink silk, on her heart, than which in days when corsets were so low, +sentiment so despised, and chests so out of fashion, there could, +perhaps, have been no greater proof of the fixity of her idea. +</P> + +<P> +After hearing of his father's death, she had written to Jon, and +received his answer three days later on her return from a river picnic. +It was his first letter since their meeting at June's. She opened it +with misgiving, and read it with dismay. +</P> + +<P> +"Since I saw you I've heard everything about the past. I won't tell it +you—I think you knew when we met at June's. She says you did. If you +did, Fleur, you ought to have told me. I expect you only heard your +father's side of it. I have heard my mother's. It's dreadful. Now that +she's so sad I can't do anything to hurt her more. Of course, I long +for you all day, but I don't believe now that we shall ever come +together—there's something too strong pulling us apart." +</P> + +<P> +Her deception had found her out. But Jon—she felt—had forgiven that. +It was what he said of his mother which caused the fluttering in her +heart and the weak sensation in her legs. +</P> + +<P> +Her first impulse was to reply—her second, not to reply. These +impulses were constantly renewed in the days which followed, while +desperation grew within her. She was not her father's child for +nothing. The tenacity, which had at once made and undone Soames, was +her backbone, too, frilled and embroidered by French grace and +quickness. Instinctively she conjugated the verb "to have" always with +the pronoun "I." She concealed, however, all signs of her growing +desperation, and pursued such river pleasures as the winds and rain of +a disagreeable July permitted, as if she had no care in the world; nor +did any "sucking baronet" ever neglect the business of a publisher more +consistently than her attendant spirit, Michael Mont. +</P> + +<P> +To Soames she was a puzzle. He was almost deceived by this careless +gaiety. Almost—because he did not fail to mark her eyes often fixed on +nothing, and the film of light shining from her bedroom window late at +night. What was she thinking and brooding over into small hours when +she ought to have been asleep? But he dared not ask what was in her +mind; and, since that one little talk in the billiard-room, she said +nothing to him. +</P> + +<P> +In this taciturn condition of affairs it chanced that Winifred invited +them to lunch and to go afterwards to "a most amusing little play, 'The +Beggar's Opera,'" and would they bring a man to make four? Soames, +whose attitude towards theatres was to go to nothing, accepted, because +Fleur's attitude was to go to everything. They motored up, taking +Michael Mont, who, being in his seventh heaven, was found by Winifred +"very amusing." "The Beggar's Opera" puzzled Soames. The people were +unpleasant, the whole thing cynical. Winifred was "intrigued"—by the +dresses. The music too did not displease her. At the Opera, the night +before, she had arrived too early for the Russian Ballet, and found the +stage occupied by singers, for a whole hour pale or apoplectic from +terror lest by some dreadful inadvertence they might drop into a tune. +Michael Mont was enraptured with the whole thing. And all three +wondered what Fleur was thinking of it. But Fleur was not thinking of +it. Her fixed idea stood on the stage and sang with Polly Peachum, +mimed with Filch, danced with Jenny Diver, postured with Lucy Lockit, +kissed, trolled, and cuddled with Macheath. Her lips might smile, her +hands applaud, but the comic old masterpiece made no more impression on +her than if it had been pathetic, like a modern "Revue." When they +embarked in the car to return, she ached because Jon was not sitting +next her instead of Michael Mont. When, at some jolt, the young man's +arm touched hers as if by accident, she only thought: 'If that were +Jon's arm!' When his cheerful voice, tempered by her proximity, +murmured above the sound of the car's progress, she smiled and +answered, thinking: 'If that were Jon's voice!' and when once he said: +"Fleur, you look a perfect angel in that dress!" she answered: "Oh, do +you like it?" thinking: 'If only Jon could see it!' +</P> + +<P> +During this drive she took a resolution. She would go to Robin Hill and +see him—alone; she would take the car, without word beforehand to him +or to her father. It was nine days since his letter, and she could wait +no longer. On Monday she would go! The decision made her well disposed +towards young Mont. With something to look forward to she could afford +to tolerate and respond. He might stay to dinner; propose to her as +usual; dance with her, press her hand, sigh—do what he liked. He was +only a nuisance when he interfered with her fixed idea. She was even +sorry for him so far as it was possible to be sorry for anybody but +herself just now. At dinner he seemed to talk more wildly than usual +about what he called 'the death of the close borough'—she paid little +attention, but her father seemed paying a good deal, with a smile on +his face which meant opposition, if not anger. +</P> + +<P> +"The younger generation doesn't think as you do, sir; does it, Fleur?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur shrugged her shoulders—the younger generation was just Jon, and +she did not know what he was thinking. +</P> + +<P> +"Young people will think as I do when they're my age, Mr. Mont. Human +nature doesn't change." +</P> + +<P> +"I admit that, sir; but the forms of thought change with the times. The +pursuit of self-interest is a form of thought that's going out." +</P> + +<P> +"Indeed! To mind one's own business is not a form of thought, Mr. Mont, +it's an instinct." +</P> + +<P> +Yes, when Jon was the business! +</P> + +<P> +"But what is one's business, sir? That's the point, EVERYBODY'S +business is going to be one's business. Isn't it, Fleur?" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur only smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"If not," added young Mont, "there'll be blood." +</P> + +<P> +"People have talked like that from time immemorial." +</P> + +<P> +"But you'll admit, sir, that the sense of property is dying out?" +</P> + +<P> +"I should say increasing among those who have none." +</P> + +<P> +"Well, look at me! I'm heir to an entailed estate. I don't want the +thing; I'd cut the entail to-morrow." +</P> + +<P> +"You're not married, and you don't know what you're talking about." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur saw the young man's eyes turn rather piteously upon her. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you really mean that marriage—?" he began. +</P> + +<P> +"Society is built on marriage," came from between her father's close +lips; "marriage and its consequences. Do you want to do away with it?" +</P> + +<P> +Young Mont made a distracted gesture. Silence brooded over the +dinner-table, covered with spoons bearing the Forsyte crest—a pheasant +proper—under the electric light in an alabaster globe. And outside, +the river evening darkened, charged with heavy moisture and sweet +scents. +</P> + +<P> +'Monday,' thought Fleur; 'Monday!' +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0306"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +DESPERATE +</H3> + +<P> +The weeks which followed the death of his father were sad and empty to +the only Jolyon Forsyte left. The necessary forms and ceremonies—the +reading of the Will, valuation of the estate, distribution of the +legacies—were enacted over the head, as it were, of one not yet of +age. Jolyon was cremated. By his special wish no one attended that +ceremony, or wore black for him. The succession of his property, +controlled to some extent by old Jolyon's Will, left his widow in +possession of Robin Hill, with two thousand five hundred pounds a year +for life. Apart from this the two Wills worked together in some +complicated way to insure that each of Jolyon's three children should +have an equal share in their grandfather's and father's property in the +future as in the present, save only that Jon, by virtue of his sex, +would have control of his capital when he was twenty-one, while June +and Holly would only have the spirit of theirs, in order that their +children might have the body after them. If they had no children, it +would all come to Jon if he outlived them; and since June was fifty, +and Holly nearly forty, it was considered in Lincoln's Inn Fields that +but for the cruelty of income tax, young Jon would be as warm a man as +his grandfather when he died. All this was nothing to Jon, and little +enough to his mother. It was June who did everything needful for one +who had left his affairs in perfect order. When she had gone, and those +two were alone again in the great house, alone with death drawing them +together, and love driving them apart, Jon passed very painful days +secretly disgusted and disappointed with himself. His mother would look +at him with a patient sadness which yet had in it an instinctive pride, +as if she were reserving her defence. If she smiled he was angry that +his answering smile should be so grudging and unnatural. He did not +judge or condemn her; that was all too remote—indeed, the idea of +doing so had never come to him. No! he was grudging and unnatural +because he couldn't have what he wanted because of her. There was one +alleviation—much to do in connection with his father's career, which +could not be safely intrusted to June, though she had offered to +undertake it. Both Jon and his mother had felt that if she took his +portfolios, unexhibited drawings and unfinished matter, away with her, +the work would encounter such icy blasts from Paul Post and other +frequenters of her studio, that it would soon be frozen out even of her +warm heart. On its old-fashioned plane and of its kind the work was +good, and they could not bear the thought of its subjection to +ridicule. A one-man exhibition of his work was the least testimony they +could pay to one they had loved; and on preparation for this they spent +many hours together. Jon came to have a curiously increased respect for +his father. The quiet tenacity with which he had converted a mediocre +talent into something really individual was disclosed by these +researches. There was a great mass of work with a rare continuity of +growth in depth and reach of vision. Nothing certainly went very deep, +or reached very high—but such as the work was, it was thorough, +conscientious, and complete. And, remembering his father's utter +absence of "side" or self-assertion, the chaffing humility with which +he had always spoken of his own efforts, ever calling himself "an +amateur," Jon could not help feeling that he had never really known his +father. To take himself seriously, yet never bore others by letting +them know that he did so, seemed to have been his ruling principle. +There was something in this which appealed to the boy, and made him +heartily indorse his mother's comment: "He had true refinement; he +couldn't help thinking of others, whatever he did. And when he took a +resolution which went counter, he did it with the minimum of +defiance—not like the Age, is it? Twice in his life he had to go +against everything; and yet it never made him bitter." Jon saw tears +running down her face, which she at once turned away from him. She was +so quiet about her loss that sometimes he had thought she didn't feel +it much. Now, as he looked at her, he felt how far he fell short of the +reserve power and dignity in both his father and his mother. And, +stealing up to her, he put his arm round her waist. She kissed him +swiftly, but with a sort of passion, and went out of the room. +</P> + +<P> +The studio, where they had been sorting and labelling, had once been +Holly's schoolroom, devoted to her silk-worms, dried lavender, music, +and other forms of instruction. Now, at the end of July, despite its +northern and eastern aspects, a warm and slumberous air came in between +the long-faded lilac linen curtains. To redeem a little the departed +glory, as of a field that is golden and gone, clinging to a room which +its master has left, Irene had placed on the paint-stained table a bowl +of red roses. This, and Jolyon's favourite cat, who still clung to the +deserted habitat, were the pleasant spots in that dishevelled, sad +workroom. Jon, at the north window, sniffing air mysteriously scented +with warm strawberries, heard a car drive up. The lawyers again about +some nonsense! Why did that scent so make one ache? And where did it +come from—there were no strawberry beds on this side of the house. +Instinctively he took a crumpled sheet of paper from his pocket, and +wrote down some broken words. A warmth began spreading in his chest; he +rubbed the palms of his hands together. Presently he had jotted this: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> + "If I could make a little song—<BR> + A little song to soothe my heart!<BR> + I'd make it all of little things—<BR> + The plash of water, rub of wings,<BR> + The puffing-off of dandie's crown,<BR> + The hiss of raindrop spilling down,<BR> + The purr of cat, the trill of bird,<BR> + And ev'ry whispering I've heard<BR> + From willy wind in leaves and grass,<BR> + And all the distant drones that pass.<BR> + A song, as tender and as light<BR> + As flower, or butterfly in flight;<BR> + And when I saw it opening<BR> + I'd let it fly, and sing!"<BR> +</P> + +<P> +He was still muttering it over to himself at the window, when he heard +his name called, and, turning round, saw Fleur. At that amazing +apparition, he made at first no movement and no sound, while her clear +vivid glance ravished his heart. Then he went forward to the table, +saying: "How nice of you to come!" and saw her flinch as if he had +thrown something at her. +</P> + +<P> +"I asked for you," she said, "and they showed me up here. But I can go +away again." +</P> + +<P> +Jon clutched the paint-stained table. Her face and figure in its frilly +frock, photographed itself with such startling vividness upon his eyes, +that if she had sunk through the floor he must still have seen her. +</P> + +<P> +"I know I told you a lie, Jon. But I told it out of love." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! yes! That's nothing!" +</P> + +<P> +"I didn't answer your letter. What was the use—there wasn't anything +to answer. I wanted to see you instead." She held out both her hands, +and Jon grasped them across the table. He tried to say something, but +all his attention was given to trying not to hurt her hands. His own +felt so hard and hers so soft. She said almost defiantly: +</P> + +<P> +"That old story—was it so very dreadful?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." In his voice, too, there was a note of defiance. +</P> + +<P> +She dragged her hands away. "I didn't think in these days boys were +tied to their mothers' apron-strings." +</P> + +<P> +Jon's chin went up as if he had been struck. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! I didn't mean it, Jon. What a horrible thing to say!" Swiftly she +came close to him. "Jon, dear; I didn't mean it." +</P> + +<P> +"All right." +</P> + +<P> +She had put her two hands on his shoulder, and her forehead down on +them; the brim of her hat touched his neck, and he felt it quivering. +But, in a sort of paralysis, he made no response. She let go of his +shoulder and drew away. +</P> + +<P> +"Well, I'll go, if you don't want me. But I never thought you'd have +given me up." +</P> + +<P> +"I HAVEN'T," cried Jon, coming suddenly to life. "I can't. I'll try +again." +</P> + +<P> +She swayed towards him. "Jon—I love you! Don't give me up! If you do, +I don't know what I shall do—I feel so desperate. What does it +matter—all that past—compared with THIS?" +</P> + +<P> +She clung to him. He kissed her eyes, her cheeks, her lips. But while +he kissed her he saw the sheets of that letter fallen down on the floor +of his bedroom—his father's white dead face—his mother kneeling +before it. Fleur's whisper: "Make her! Promise! Oh! Jon, try!" seemed +childish in his ear. He felt curiously old. +</P> + +<P> +"I promise!" he muttered. "Only, you don't understand." +</P> + +<P> +"She wants to spoil our lives, just because—" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, of what?" +</P> + +<P> +Again that challenge in his voice, and she did not answer. Her arms +tightened round him, and he returned her kisses; but even while he +yielded, the poison worked in him, the poison of the letter. Fleur did +not know, she did not understand—she misjudged his mother; she came +from the enemy's camp! So lovely, and he loved her so—yet, even in her +embrace, he could not help the memory of Holly's words: "I think she +has a 'having' nature," and his mother's: "My darling boy; don't think +of me—think of yourself." +</P> + +<P> +When she was gone like a passionate dream, leaving her image on his +eyes, her kisses on his lips, such an ache in his heart, Jon leaned in +the window, listening to the car bearing her away. Still the scent as +of warm strawberries, still the little summer sounds that should make +his song; still all the promise of youth and happiness in sighing, +floating, fluttering July—and his heart torn; yearning strong in him; +hope high in him, yet with its eyes cast down, as if ashamed. The +miserable task before him! If Fleur was desperate, so was he—watching +the poplars swaying, the white clouds passing, the sunlight on the +grass. +</P> + +<P> +He waited till evening, till after their almost silent dinner, till his +mother had played to him—and still he waited, feeling that she knew +what he was waiting to say. She kissed him and went up-stairs, and +still he lingered, watching the moonlight and the moths, and that +unreality of colouring which steals along and stains a summer night. +And he would have given anything to be back in the past—barely three +months back; or away forward, years, in the future. The present with +this stark cruelty of a decision, one way or the other, seemed +impossible. He realised now so much more keenly what his mother felt +than he had at first; as if the story in that letter had been a +poisonous germ producing a kind of fever of partisanship, so that he +really felt there were two camps, his mother's and his—Fleur's and her +father's. It might be a dead thing, that old tragic ownership and +enmity, but dead things were poisonous till Time had cleaned them away. +Even his love felt tainted, less illusioned, more of the earth, and +with a treacherous lurking doubt lest Fleur, like her father, might +want to OWN; not articulate, just a stealing haunt, horribly unworthy, +which crept in and about the ardour of his memories, touched with its +tarnishing breath the vividness and grace of that charmed face and +figure—a doubt, not real enough to convince him of its presence, just +real enough to deflower a perfect faith. And perfect faith, to Jon, not +yet twenty, was essential. He still had Youth's eagerness to give with +both hands, to take with neither—to give lovingly to one who had his +own impulsive generosity. Surely she had! He got up from the +window-seat and roamed in the big grey ghostly room, whose walls were +hung with silvered canvas. This house—his father said in that +death-bed letter—had been built for his mother to live in—with +Fleur's father! He put out his hand in the half-dark, as if to grasp +the shadowy hand of the dead. He clenched, trying to feel the thin +vanished fingers of his father; to squeeze them, and reassure him that +he—he was on his father's side. Tears, prisoned within him, made his +eyes feel dry and hot. He went back to the window. It was warmer, not +so eerie, more comforting outside, where the moon hung golden, three +days off full; the freedom of the night was comforting. If only Fleur +and he had met on some desert island without a past—and Nature for +their house! Jon had still his high regard for desert islands, where +breadfruit grew, and the water was blue above the coral. The night was +deep, was free—there was enticement in it; a lure, a promise, a refuge +from entanglement, and love! Milksop tied to his mother's—! His cheeks +burned. He shut the window, drew curtains over it, switched off the +lighted sconce, and went up-stairs. +</P> + +<P> +The door of his room was open, the light turned up; his mother, still +in her evening gown, was standing at the window. She turned, and said: +</P> + +<P> +"Sit down, Jon; let's talk." She sat down on the window-seat, Jon on +his bed. She had her profile turned to him, and the beauty and grace of +her figure, the delicate line of the brow, the nose, the neck, the +strange and as it were remote refinement of her, moved him. His mother +never belonged to her surroundings. She came into them from +somewhere—as it were! What was she going to say to him, who had in his +heart such things to say to her? +</P> + +<P> +"I know Fleur came to-day. I'm not surprised." It was as though she had +added: "She is her father's daughter!" And Jon's heart hardened. Irene +went on quietly: +</P> + +<P> +"I have Father's letter. I picked it up that night and kept it. Would +you like it back, dear?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon shook his head. +</P> + +<P> +"I had read it, of course, before he gave it to you. It didn't quite do +justice to my criminality." +</P> + +<P> +"Mother!" burst from Jon's lips. +</P> + +<P> +"He put it very sweetly, but I know that in marrying Fleur's father +without love I did a dreadful thing. An unhappy marriage, Jon, can play +such havoc with other lives besides one's own. You are fearfully young, +my darling, and fearfully loving. Do you think you can possibly be +happy with this girl?" +</P> + +<P> +Staring at her dark eyes, darker now from pain, Jon answered: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes; oh! yes—if YOU could be." +</P> + +<P> +Irene smiled. +</P> + +<P> +"Admiration of beauty, and longing for possession are not love. If +yours were another case like mine, Jon—where the deepest things are +stifled; the flesh joined, and the spirit at war!" +</P> + +<P> +"Why should it, Mother? You think she must be like her father, but +she's not. I've seen him." +</P> + +<P> +Again the smile came on Irene's lips, and in Jon something wavered; +there was such irony and experience in that smile. +</P> + +<P> +"You are a giver, Jon; she is a taker." +</P> + +<P> +That unworthy doubt, that haunting uncertainty again! He said with +vehemence: +</P> + +<P> +"She isn't—she isn't. It's only because I can't bear to make you +unhappy, Mother, now that Father—" He thrust his fists against his +forehead. +</P> + +<P> +Irene got up. +</P> + +<P> +"I told you that night, dear, not to mind me. I meant it. Think of +yourself and your own happiness! I can stand what's left—I've brought +it on myself." +</P> + +<P> +Again the word: "Mother!" burst from Jon's lips. +</P> + +<P> +She came over to him and put her hands over his. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you feel your head, darling?" +</P> + +<P> +Jon shook it. What he felt was in his chest—a sort of tearing asunder +of the tissue there, by the two loves. +</P> + +<P> +"I shall always love you the same, Jon, whatever you do. You won't lose +anything." She smoothed his hair gently, and walked away. +</P> + +<P> +He heard the door shut; and, rolling over on the bed, lay, stifling his +breath, with an awful held-up feeling within him. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0307"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +EMBASSY +</H3> + +<P> +Enquiring for her at tea time Soames learned that Fleur had been out in +the car since two. Three hours! Where had she gone? Up to London +without a word to him? He had never become quite reconciled with cars. +He had embraced them in principle—like the born empiricist, or +Forsyte, that he was—adopting each symptom of progress as it came +along with: "Well, we couldn't do without them now." But in fact he +found them tearing, great, smelly things. Obliged by Annette to have +one—a Rollhard with pearl-grey cushions, electric light, little +mirrors, trays for the ashes of cigarettes, flower vases—all smelling +of petrol and stephanotis—he regarded it much as he used to regard his +brother-in-law, Montague Dartie. The thing typified all that was fast, +insecure, and subcutaneously oily in modern life. As modern life became +faster, looser, younger, Soames was becoming older, slower, tighter, +more and more in thought and language like his father James before him. +He was almost aware of it himself. Pace and progress pleased him less +and less; there was an ostentation, too, about a car which he +considered provocative in the prevailing mood of Labour. On one +occasion that fellow Sims had driven over the only vested interest of a +working man. Soames had not forgotten the behaviour of its master, when +not many people would have stopped to put up with it. He had been sorry +for the dog, and quite prepared to take its part against the car, if +that ruffian hadn't been so outrageous. With four hours fast becoming +five, and still no Fleur, all the old car-wise feelings he had +experienced in person and by proxy balled within him, and sinking +sensations troubled the pit of his stomach. At seven he telephoned to +Winifred by trunk call. No! Fleur had not been to Green Street. Then +where was she? Visions of his beloved daughter rolled up in her pretty +frills, all blood-and-dust-stained, in some hideous catastrophe, began +to haunt him. He went to her room and spied among her things. She had +taken nothing—no dressing-case, no jewellery. And this, a relief in +one sense, increased his fears of an accident. Terrible to be helpless +when his loved one was missing, especially when he couldn't bear fuss +or publicity of any kind! What should he do, if she were not back by +nightfall? +</P> + +<P> +At a quarter to eight he heard the car. A great weight lifted from off +his heart; he hurried down. She was getting out—pale and +tired-looking, but nothing wrong. He met her in the hall. +</P> + +<P> +"You've frightened me. Where have you been?" +</P> + +<P> +"To Robin Hill. I'm sorry, dear. I had to go; I'll tell you +afterwards." And, with a flying kiss, she ran up-stairs. +</P> + +<P> +Soames waited in the drawing-room. To Robin Hill! What did that portend? +</P> + +<P> +It was not a subject they could discuss at dinner—consecrated to the +susceptibilities of the butler. The agony of nerves Soames had been +through, the relief he felt at her safety, softened his power to +condemn what she had done, or resist what she was going to do; he +waited in a relaxed stupor for her revelation. Life was a queer +business. There he was at sixty-five and no more in command of things +than if he had not spent forty years in building up security—always +something one couldn't get on terms with! In the pocket of his +dinner-jacket was a letter from Annette. She was coming back in a +fortnight. He knew nothing of what she had been doing out there. And he +was glad that he did not. Her absence had been a relief. Out of sight +was out of mind! And now she was coming back. Another worry! And the +Bolderby Old Crome was gone—Dumetrius had got it—all because that +anonymous letter had put it out of his thoughts. He furtively remarked +the strained look on his daughter's face, as if she too were gazing at +a picture that she couldn't buy. He almost wished the war back. Worries +didn't seem, then, quite so worrying. From the caress in her voice, the +look on her face, he became certain that she wanted something from him, +uncertain whether it would be wise of him to give it her. He pushed his +savoury away uneaten, and even joined her in a cigarette. +</P> + +<P> +After dinner she set the electric piano-player going. And he augured +the worst when she sat down on a cushion footstool at his knee, and put +her hand on his. +</P> + +<P> +"Darling, be nice to me. I had to see Jon—he wrote to me. He's going +to try what he can do with his mother. But I've been thinking. But it's +really in YOUR hands, Father. If you'd persuade her that it doesn't +mean renewing the past in any way! That I shall stay yours, and Jon +will stay hers; that you need never see him or her, and she need never +see you or me! Only you could persuade her, dear, because only you +could promise. One can't promise for other people. Surely it wouldn't +be too awkward for you to see her just this once—now that Jon's father +is dead?" +</P> + +<P> +"Too awkward?" Soames repeated. "The whole thing's preposterous." +</P> + +<P> +"You know," said Fleur, without looking up, "you wouldn't mind seeing +her, really." +</P> + +<P> +Soames was silent. Her words had expressed a truth too deep for him to +admit. She slipped her fingers between his own—hot, slim, eager, they +clung there. This child of his would corkscrew her way into a brick +wall! +</P> + +<P> +"What am I to do, if you won't, Father?" she said very softly. +</P> + +<P> +"I'll do anything for your happiness," said Soames; "but this isn't for +your happiness." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! it is; it is!" +</P> + +<P> +"It'll only stir things up," he said grimly. +</P> + +<P> +"But they are stirred up. The thing is to quiet them. To make her feel +that this is just OUR lives, and has nothing to do with yours or hers. +You can do it, Father, I know you can." +</P> + +<P> +"You know a great deal, then," was Soames' glum answer. +</P> + +<P> +"If you will, Jon and I will wait a year—two years if you like." +</P> + +<P> +"It seems to me," murmured Soames, "that you care nothing about what I +feel." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur pressed his hand against her cheek. +</P> + +<P> +"I do, darling. But you wouldn't like me to be awfully miserable." How +she wheedled to get her ends! And trying with all his might to think +she really cared for him—he was not sure—not sure. All she cared for +was this boy! Why should he help her to get this boy, who was killing +her affection for himself? Why should he? By the laws of the Forsytes +it was foolish! There was nothing to be had out of it—nothing! To give +her to that boy! To pass her into the enemy's camp, under the influence +of the woman who had injured him so deeply! Slowly—inevitably—he +would lose this flower of his life! And suddenly he was conscious that +his hand was wet. His heart gave a little painful jump. He couldn't +bear her to cry. He put his other hand quickly over hers, and a tear +dropped on that, too. He couldn't go on like this! "Well, well," he +said, "I'll think it over, and do what I can. Come, come!" If she must +have it for her happiness—she must; he couldn't refuse to help her. +And lest she should begin to thank him he got out of his chair and went +up to the piano-player—making that noise! It ran down, as he reached +it, with a faint buzz. That musical box of his nursery days: "The +Harmonious Blacksmith," "Glorious Port"—the thing had always made him +miserable when his mother set it going on Sunday afternoons. Here it +was again—the same thing, only larger, more expensive, and now it +played: "The Wild Wild Women" and "The Policeman's Holiday," and he was +no longer in black velvet with a sky-blue collar. 'Profond's right,' he +thought, 'there's nothing in it! We're all progressing to the grave!' +And with that surprising mental comment he walked out. +</P> + +<P> +He did not see Fleur again that night. But, at breakfast, her eyes +followed him about with an appeal he could not escape—not that he +intended to try. No! He had made up his mind to the nerve-racking +business. He would go to Robin Hill—to that house of memories. A +pleasant memory—the last! Of going down to keep that boy's father and +Irene apart by threatening divorce. He had often thought, since, that +it had clenched their union. And, now, he was going to clench the union +of that boy with his girl. 'I don't know what I've done,' he thought, +'to have such things thrust on me!' He went up by train and down by +train, and from the station walked by the long rising lane, still very +much as he remembered it over thirty years ago. Funny—so near London! +Some one evidently was holding on to the land there. This speculation +soothed him, moving between the high hedges slowly, so as not to get +overheated, though the day was chill enough. After all was said and +done there was something real about land, it didn't shift. Land, and +good pictures! The values might fluctuate a bit, but on the whole they +were always going up—worth holding on to, in a world where there was +such a lot of unreality, cheap building, changing fashions, such a +"Here to-day and gone to-morrow" spirit. The French were right, +perhaps, with their peasant proprietorship, though he had no opinion of +the French. One's bit of land! Something solid in it! He had heard +peasant-proprietors described as a pig-headed lot; had heard young Mont +call his father a pig-headed Morning Poster—disrespectful young devil. +Well, there were worse things than being pig-headed or reading The +Morning Post. There was Profond and his tribe, and all these Labour +chaps, and loud-mouthed politicians, and "wild, wild women"! A lot of +worse things! And, suddenly, Soames became conscious of feeling weak, +and hot, and shaky. Sheer nerves at the meeting before him! As Aunt +Juley might have said—quoting "Superior Dosset"—his nerves were "in a +proper fantigue." He could see the house now among its trees, the house +he had watched being built, intending it for himself and this woman, +who, by such strange fate, had lived in it with another after all! He +began to think of Dumetrius, Local Loans, and other forms of +investment. He could not afford to meet her with his nerves all +shaking; he who represented the Day of Judgment for her on earth as it +was in heaven; he, legal ownership, personified, meeting lawless +beauty, incarnate. His dignity demanded impassivity during this embassy +designed to link their offspring, who, if she had behaved herself, +would have been brother and sister. That wretched tune: "The Wild Wild +Women" kept running in his head, perversely, for tunes did not run +there as a rule. Passing the poplars in front of the house, he thought: +'How they've grown; I had them planted!' +</P> + +<P> +A maid answered his ring. +</P> + +<P> +"Will you say—Mr. Forsyte, on a very special matter." +</P> + +<P> +If she realised who he was, quite probably she would not see him. 'By +George!' he thought, hardening as the tug came: 'It's a topsyturvy +affair!' +</P> + +<P> +The maid came back. Would the gentleman state his business, please? +</P> + +<P> +"Say it concerns Mr. Jon," said Soames. +</P> + +<P> +And once more he was alone in that hall with the pool of grey-white +marble designed by her first lover. Ah! she had been a bad lot—had +loved two men, and not himself! He must remember that when he came face +to face with her once more. And suddenly he saw her in the opening +chink between the long heavy purple curtains, swaying, as if in +hesitation; the old perfect poise and line, the old startled dark-eyed +gravity; the old calm defensive voice: "Will you come in, please?" +</P> + +<P> +He passed through that opening. As in the picture-gallery and the +confectioner's shop, she seemed to him still beautiful. And this was +the first time—the very first—since he married her five and thirty +years ago, that he was speaking to her without the legal right to call +her his. She was not wearing black—one of that fellow's radical +notions, he supposed. +</P> + +<P> +"I apologise for coming," he said glumly; "but this business must be +settled one way or the other." +</P> + +<P> +"Won't you sit down?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, thank you." +</P> + +<P> +Anger at his false position, impatience of ceremony between them, +mastered him, and words came tumbling out: +</P> + +<P> +"It's an infernal mischance; I've done my best to discourage it. I +consider my daughter crazy, but I've got into the habit of indulging +her; that's why I'm here. I suppose you're fond of your son." +</P> + +<P> +"Devotedly." +</P> + +<P> +"Well?" +</P> + +<P> +"It rests with him." +</P> + +<P> +He had a sense of being met and baffled. Always—always she had baffled +him, even in those old first married days. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a mad notion," he said. +</P> + +<P> +"It is." +</P> + +<P> +"If you had only—! Well—they might have been—" he did not finish +that sentence "brother and sister and all this saved," but he saw her +shudder as if he had, and stung by the sight, he crossed over to the +window. Out THERE the trees had not grown—they couldn't, they were old! +</P> + +<P> +"So far as I'm concerned," he said, "you may make your mind easy. I +desire to see neither you nor your son if this marriage comes about. +Young people in these days are—are unaccountable. But I can't bear to +see my daughter unhappy. What am I to say to her when I go back?" +</P> + +<P> +"Please say to her, as I said to you, that it rests with Jon." +</P> + +<P> +"You don't oppose it?" +</P> + +<P> +"With all my heart; not with my lips." +</P> + +<P> +Soames stood, biting his finger. +</P> + +<P> +"I remember an evening—" he said suddenly; and was silent. What was +there—what was there in this woman that would not fit into the four +comers of his hate or condemnation? "Where is he—your son?" +</P> + +<P> +"Up in his father's studio, I think." +</P> + +<P> +"Perhaps you'd have him down." +</P> + +<P> +He watched her ring the bell, he watched the maid come in. +</P> + +<P> +"Please tell Mr. Jon that I want him." +</P> + +<P> +"If it rests with him," said Soames hurriedly, when the maid was gone, +"I suppose I may take it for granted that this unnatural marriage will +take place: in that case there'll be formalities. Whom do I deal +with—Herring's?" Irene nodded. +</P> + +<P> +"You don't propose to live with them?" +</P> + +<P> +Irene shook her head. +</P> + +<P> +"What happens to this house?" +</P> + +<P> +"It will be as Jon wishes." +</P> + +<P> +"This house," said Soames suddenly: "I had hopes when I began it. If +THEY live in it—their children! They say there's such a thing as +Nemesis. Do you believe in it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! You do!" He had come back from the window, and was standing close +to her, who, in the curve of her grand piano, was, as it were, embayed. +</P> + +<P> +"I'm not likely to see you again," he said slowly: "Will you shake +hands," his lip quivered, the words came out jerkily, "and let the past +die?" He held out his hand. Her pale face grew paler, her eyes so dark, +rested immovably on his, but her hands remained clasped in front of +her. He heard a sound and turned. That boy was standing in the opening +of the curtains. Very queer he looked, hardly recognisable as the young +fellow he had seen in the Gallery off Cork Street—very queer; much +older, no youth in the face at all—haggard, rigid, his hair ruffled, +his eyes deep in his head. Soames made an effort, and said with a lift +of his lip, not quite a smile nor quite a sneer: +</P> + +<P> +"Well, young man! I'm here for my daughter; it rests with you, it +seems—this matter. Your mother leaves it in your hands." +</P> + +<P> +The boy continued staring at his mother's face, and made no answer. +</P> + +<P> +"For my daughter's sake I've brought myself to come," said Soames. +"What am I to say to her when I go back?" +</P> + +<P> +Still looking at his mother, the boy said, quietly: +</P> + +<P> +"Tell Fleur that it's no good, please; I must do as my father wished +before he died." +</P> + +<P> +"Jon!" +</P> + +<P> +"It's all right, Mother." +</P> + +<P> +In a kind of stupefaction Soames looked from one to the other; then, +taking up hat and umbrella, which he had put down on a chair, he walked +towards the curtains. The boy stood aside for him to go by. He passed +through and heard the grate of the rings as the curtains were drawn +behind him. The sound liberated something in his chest. +</P> + +<P> +'So that's that!' he thought, and passed out of the front door. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0308"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +VIII +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE DARK TUNE +</H3> + +<P> +As Soames walked away from the house at Robin Hill the sun broke +through the grey of that chill afternoon, in smoky radiance. So +absorbed in landscape-painting that he seldom looked seriously for +effects of Nature out-of-doors, he was struck by that moody +effulgence—it mourned with a triumph suited to his own feeling. +Victory in defeat! His embassy had come to naught. But he was rid of +those people, had regained his daughter at the expense of—her +happiness. What would Fleur say to him? Would she believe he had done +his best? And under that sunlight flaring on the elms, hazels, hollies +of the lane and those unexploited fields, Soames felt dread. She would +be terribly upset! He must appeal to her pride. That boy had given her +up, declared part and lot with the woman who so long ago had given her +father up! Soames clenched his hands. Given him up, and why? What had +been wrong with him? And once more he felt the malaise of one who +contemplates himself as seen by another—like a dog who chances on his +reflection in a mirror, and is intrigued and anxious at the unseizable +thing. +</P> + +<P> +Not in a hurry to get home, he dined in town at the Connoisseurs. While +eating a pear it suddenly occurred to him that, if he had not gone down +to Robin Hill, the boy might not have so decided. He remembered the +expression on his face while his mother was refusing the hand he had +held out. A strange, an awkward thought! Had Fleur cooked her own goose +by trying to make too sure? +</P> + +<P> +He reached home at half-past nine. While the car was passing in at one +drive gate he heard the grinding sputter of a motor-cycle passing out +by the other. Young Mont, no doubt, so Fleur had not been lonely. But +he went in with a sinking heart. In the cream-panelled drawing-room she +was sitting with her elbows on her knees, and her chin on her clasped +hands, in front of a white camellia plant which filled the fireplace. +That glance at her before she saw him renewed his dread. What was she +seeing among those white camellias? +</P> + +<P> +"Well, Father!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames shook his head. His tongue failed him. This was murderous work! +He saw her eyes dilate, her lips quivering. +</P> + +<P> +"What? What? Quick, Father!" +</P> + +<P> +"My dear," said Soames, "I—I did my best, but—" And again he shook +his head. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur ran to him and put a hand on each of his shoulders. +</P> + +<P> +"She?" +</P> + +<P> +"No," muttered Soames; "he. I was to tell you that it was no use; he +must do what his father wished before he died." He caught her by the +waist. "Come, child, don't let them hurt you. They're not worth your +little finger." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur tore herself from his grasp. +</P> + +<P> +"You didn't—you couldn't have tried. You—you betrayed me, Father!" +</P> + +<P> +Bitterly wounded, Soames gazed at her passionate figure writhing there +in front of him. +</P> + +<P> +"You didn't try—you didn't—I was a fool—I won't believe he could—he +ever could! Only yesterday he—! Oh! why did I ask you?" +</P> + +<P> +"Yes," said Soames quietly, "why did you? I swallowed my feelings; I +did my best for you, against my judgment—and this is my reward. +Good-night!" +</P> + +<P> +With every nerve in his body twitching he went towards the door. +</P> + +<P> +Fleur darted after him. +</P> + +<P> +"He gives me up? You mean that? Father!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames turned and forced himself to answer: +</P> + +<P> +"Yes." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" cried Fleur. "What did you—what could you have done in those old +days?" +</P> + +<P> +The breathless sense of really monstrous injustice cut the power of +speech in Soames' throat. What had HE done! What had they done to him! +And with quite unconscious dignity he put his hand on his breast, and +looked at her. +</P> + +<P> +"It's a shame!" cried Fleur passionately. +</P> + +<P> +Soames went out. He mounted, slow and icy, to his picture-gallery, and +paced among his treasures. Outrageous! Oh! Outrageous! She was spoiled! +Ah! and who had spoiled her? He stood still before the Goya copy. +Accustomed to her own way in everything—Flower of his life! And now +that she couldn't have it. He turned to the window for some air. +Daylight was dying, the moon rising, gold behind the poplars! What +sound was that? Why! That piano thing! A dark tune, with a thrum and a +throb! She had set it going—what comfort could she get from that? His +eyes caught movement down there beyond the lawn, under the trellis of +rambler roses and young acacia-trees, where the moonlight fell. There +she was, roaming up and down. His heart gave a little sickening jump. +What would she do under this blow? How could he tell? What did he know +of her—he had only loved her all his life—looked on her as the apple +of his eye! He knew nothing—had no notion. There she was—and that +dark tune—and the river gleaming in the moonlight! +</P> + +<P> +'I must go out,' he thought. He hastened down to the drawing-room, +lighted just as he had left it, with the piano thrumming out that +waltz, or fox-trot, or whatever they called it in these days, and +passed through on to the verandah. Where could he watch, without her +seeing him? And he stole down through the fruit garden to the +boat-house. He was between her and the river now, and his heart felt +lighter. She was his daughter, and Annette's—she wouldn't do anything +foolish; but there it was—he didn't know! From the boat-house window +he could see the last acacia and the spin of her skirt when she turned +in her restless march. That tune had run down at last—thank goodness! +He crossed the floor and looked through the farther window at the water +slow-flowing past the lilies. It made little bubbles against them, +bright where a moon-streak fell. He remembered suddenly that early +morning when he had slept in this boat-house after his father died, and +she had just been born—nearly nineteen years ago! Even now he recalled +the unaccustomed world when he woke up, the strange feeling it had +given him. That day the second passion of his life began—for this girl +of his, roaming under the acacias. What a comfort she had been to him! +And all the soreness and sense of outrage left him. If he could make +her happy again, he didn't care! An owl flew, queeking, queeking; a bat +flitted by; the moonlight brightened and broadened on the water. How +long was she going to roam about like this! He went back to the window, +and suddenly saw her coming down to the bank. She stood quite close, on +the landing-stage. And Soames watched, clenching his hands. Should he +speak to her? His excitement was intense. The stillness of her figure, +its youth, its absorption in despair, in longing, in—itself. He would +always remember it, moonlit like that; and the faint sweet reek of the +river and the shivering of the willow leaves. She had everything in the +world that he could give her, except the one thing that she could not +have because of him! The perversity of things hurt him at that moment, +as might a fish-bone in his throat. Then, with an infinite relief, he +saw her turn back towards the house. What could he give her to make +amends? Pearls, travel, horses, other young men—anything she +wanted—that he might lose the memory of her young figure lonely by the +water! There! She had set that tune going again! Why—it was a mania! +Dark, thrumming, faint, travelling from the house. It was as though she +had said: "If I can't have something to keep me going, I shall die of +this!" Soames dimly understood. Well, if it helped her, let her keep it +thrumming on all night! And, mousing back through the fruit garden, he +regained the verandah. Though he meant to go in and speak to her now, +he still hesitated, not knowing what to say, trying hard to recall how +it felt to be thwarted in love. He ought to know, ought to +remember—and he could not! Gone—all real recollection; except that it +had hurt him horribly. In this blankness he stood passing his +handkerchief over hands and lips, which were very dry. By craning his +head he could just see Fleur, standing with her back to that piano +still grinding out its tune, her arms tight crossed on her breast, a +lighted cigarette between her lips, whose smoke half veiled her face. +The expression on it was strange to Soames, the eyes shone and stared, +and every feature was alive with a sort of wretched scorn and anger. +Once or twice he had seen Annette look like that—the face was too +vivid, too naked, not HIS daughter's at that moment. And he dared not +go in, realising the futility of any attempt at consolation. He sat +down in the shadow of the ingle-nook. Monstrous trick, that Fate had +played him! Nemesis! That old unhappy marriage! And in God's name—why? +How was he to know, when he wanted Irene so violently, and she +consented to be his, that she would never love him? The tune died and +was renewed, and died again, and still Soames sat in the shadow, +waiting for he knew not what. The fag of Fleur's cigarette, flung +through the window, fell on the grass; he watched it glowing, burning +itself out. The moon had freed herself above the poplars, and poured +her unreality on the garden. Comfortless light, mysterious, +withdrawn—like the beauty of that woman who had never loved +him—dappling the nemesias and the stocks with a vesture not of earth. +Flowers! And his flower so unhappy! Ah, why could one not put happiness +into Local Loans, gild its edges, insure it against going down? Light +had ceased to flow out now from the drawing-room window. All was silent +and dark in there. Had she gone up? He rose, and, tiptoeing, peered in. +It seemed so! He entered. The verandah kept the moonlight out; and at +first he could see nothing but the outlines of furniture blacker than +the darkness. He groped towards the farther window to shut it. His foot +struck a chair, and he heard a gasp. There she was, curled and crushed +into the corner of the sofa! His hand hovered. Did she want his +consolation? He stood, gazing at that ball of crushed frills and hair +and graceful youth, trying to burrow its way out of sorrow. How leave +her there? At last he touched her hair, and said: "Come, darling, +better go to bed. I'll make it up to you, somehow." How fatuous! But +what could he have said? +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0309"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +IX +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +UNDER THE OAK-TREE +</H3> + +<P> +When their visitor had disappeared Jon and his mother stood without +speaking, till he said suddenly: "I ought to have seen him out." But +Soames was already walking down the drive, and Jon went up-stairs to +his father's studio, not trusting himself to go back. The expression on +his mother's face confronting the man she had once been married to, had +sealed a resolution growing within him ever since she left him the +night before. It had put the finishing touch of reality. To marry Fleur +would be to hit his mother in the face; to betray his dead father! It +was no good! Jon had the least resentful of natures. He bore his +parents no grudge in this hour of his distress. For one so young there +was a rather strange power in him of seeing things in some sort of +proportion. It was worse for Fleur, worse for his mother even, than it +was for him. Harder than to give up was to be given up, or to be the +cause of some one you loved giving up for you. He must not, would not +behave grudgingly! While he stood watching the tardy sunlight, he had +again that sudden vision of the world which had come to him the night +before. Sea on sea, country on country, millions on millions of people, +all with their own lives, energies, joys, griefs, and suffering—all +with things they had to give up, and separate struggles for existence. +Even though he might be willing to give up all else for the one thing +he couldn't have, he would be a fool to think his feelings mattered +much in so vast a world, and to behave like a cry-baby or a cad. He +pictured the people who had nothing—the millions who had given up life +in the war, the millions whom the war had left with life and little +else; the hungry children he had read of, the shattered men; people in +prison, every kind of unfortunate. And—they did not help him much. If +one had to miss a meal, what comfort in the knowledge that many others +had to miss it too? There was more distraction in the thought of +getting away out into this vast world of which he knew nothing yet. He +could not go on staying here, walled in and sheltered, with everything +so slick and comfortable, and nothing to do but brood and think what +might have been. He could not go back to Wansdon, and the memories of +Fleur. If he saw her again he could not trust himself; and if he stayed +here or went back there, he would surely see her. While they were +within reach of each other that must happen. To go far away and +quickly, was the only thing to do. But, however much he loved his +mother, he did not want to go away with her. Then feeling that was +brutal, he made up his mind desperately to propose that they should go +to Italy. For two hours in that melancholy room he tried to master +himself; then dressed solemnly for dinner. +</P> + +<P> +His mother had done the same. They ate little, at some length, and +talked of his father's catalogue. The Show was arranged for October, +and beyond clerical detail there was nothing more to do. +</P> + +<P> +After dinner she put on a cloak and they went out; walked a little, +talked a little, till they were standing silent at last beneath the +oak-tree. Ruled by the thought: 'If I show anything, I show all,' Jon +put his arm through hers and said quite casually: +</P> + +<P> +"Mother, let's go to Italy." +</P> + +<P> +Irene pressed his arm, and said as casually: +</P> + +<P> +"It would be very nice; but I've been thinking you ought to see and do +more than you would if I were with you." +</P> + +<P> +"But then you'd be alone." +</P> + +<P> +"I was once alone for more than twelve years. Besides, I should like to +be here for the opening of Father's show." +</P> + +<P> +Jon's grip tightened round her arm; he was not deceived. +</P> + +<P> +"You couldn't stay here all by yourself; it's too big." +</P> + +<P> +"Not here, perhaps. In London, and I might go to Paris, after the show +opens. You ought to have a year at least, Jon, and see the world." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, I'd like to see the world and rough it. But I don't want to leave +you all alone." +</P> + +<P> +"My dear, I owe you that at least. If it's for your good, it'll be for +mine. Why not start to-morrow? You've got your passport." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes; if I'm going it had better be at once. Only—Mother—if—if I +wanted to stay out somewhere—America or anywhere, would you mind +coming presently?" +</P> + +<P> +"Wherever and whenever you send for me. But don't send until you really +want me." +</P> + +<P> +Jon drew a deep breath. +</P> + +<P> +"I feel England's choky." +</P> + +<P> +They stood a few minutes longer under the oak-tree—looking out to +where the grand stand at Epsom was veiled in evening. The branches kept +the moonlight from them, so that it only fell everywhere else—over the +fields and far away, and on the windows of the creepered house behind, +which soon would be to let. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0310"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +X +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +FLEUR'S WEDDING +</H3> + +<P> +The October paragraphs describing the wedding of Fleur Forsyte to +Michael Mont hardly conveyed the symbolic significance of this event. +In the union of the great-granddaughter of "Superior Dosset" with the +heir of a ninth baronet was the outward and visible sign of that merger +of class in class which buttresses the political stability of a realm. +The time had come when the Forsytes might resign their natural +resentment against a "flummery" not theirs by birth, and accept it as +the still more natural due of their possessive instincts. Besides, they +really had to mount to make room for all those so much more newly rich. +In that quiet but tasteful ceremony in Hanover Square, and afterwards +among the furniture in Green Street, it had been impossible for those +not in the know to distinguish the Forsyte troop from the Mont +contingent—so far away was "Superior Dosset" now. Was there, in the +crease of his trousers, the expression of his moustache, his accent, or +the shine on his top hat, a pin to choose between Soames and the ninth +baronet himself? Was not Fleur as self-possessed, quick, glancing, +pretty, and hard as the likeliest Muskham, Mont, or Charwell filly +present? If anything, the Forsytes had it in dress and looks and +manners. They had become "upper class" and now their name would be +formally recorded in the Stud Book, their money joined to land. Whether +this was a little late in the day, and those rewards of the possessive +instinct, lands and money destined for the melting-pot—was still a +question so moot that it was not mooted. After all, Timothy had said +Consols were goin' up. Timothy, the last, the missing link; Timothy in +extremis on the Bayswater Road—so Francie had reported. It was +whispered, too, that this young Mont was a sort of socialist—strangely +wise of him, and in the nature of insurance, considering the days they +lived in. There was no uneasiness on that score. The landed classes +produced that sort of amiable foolishness at times, turned to safe uses +and confined to theory. As George remarked to his sister Francie: +"They'll soon be having puppies—that'll give him pause." +</P> + +<P> +The church with white flowers and something blue in the middle of the +East window, looked extremely chaste, as though endeavouring to +counteract the somewhat lurid phraseology of a Service calculated to +keep the thoughts of all on puppies. Forsytes, Haymans, Tweetymans, sat +in the left aisle; Monts, Charwells, Muskhams in the right; while a +sprinkling of Fleur's fellow-sufferers at school, and of Mont's +fellow-sufferers in the war, gaped indiscriminately from either side, +and three maiden ladies, who had dropped in on their way from +Skyward's, brought up the rear, together with two Mont retainers and +Fleur's old nurse. In the unsettled state of the country as full a +house as could be expected. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Val Dartie, who sat with her husband in the third row, squeezed +his hand more than once during the performance. To her, who knew the +plot of this tragi-comedy, its most dramatic moment was well-nigh +painful. 'I wonder if Jon knows by instinct,' she thought—Jon, out in +British Columbia. She had received a letter from him only that morning +which had made her smile and say: +</P> + +<P> +"Jon's in British Columbia, Val, because he wants to be in California. +He thinks it's too nice there." +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" said Val, "so he's beginning to see a joke again." +</P> + +<P> +"He's bought some land and sent for his mother." +</P> + +<P> +"What on earth will she do out there?" +</P> + +<P> +"All she cares about is Jon. Do you still think it a happy release?" +</P> + +<P> +Val's shrewd eyes narrowed to grey pin-points between their dark lashes. +</P> + +<P> +"Fleur wouldn't have suited him a bit. She's not bred right." +</P> + +<P> +"Poor little Fleur!" sighed Holly. Ah! it was strange—this marriage! +The young man, Mont, had caught her on the rebound, of course, in the +reckless mood of one whose ship has just gone down. Such a plunge could +not but be—as Val put it—an outside chance. There was little to be +told from the back view of her young cousin's veil, and Holly's eyes +reviewed the general aspect of this Christian wedding. She who had made +a love-match which had been successful, had a horror of unhappy +marriages. This might not be one in the end—but it was clearly a +toss-up; and to consecrate a toss-up in this fashion with manufactured +unction before a crowd of fashionable free-thinkers—for who thought +otherwise than freely, or not at all, when they were 'dolled' +up—seemed to her as near a sin as one could find in an age which had +abolished them. Her eyes wandered from the prelate in his robes (a +Charwell—the Forsytes had not as yet produced a prelate) to Val, +beside her, thinking—she was certain of—the Mayfly filly at fifteen +to one for the Cambridgeshire. They passed on and caught the profile of +the ninth baronet, in counterfeitment of the kneeling process. She +could just see the neat ruck above his knees where he had pulled his +trousers up, and thought: 'Val's forgotten to pull up his!' Her eyes +passed to the pew in front of her, where Winifred's substantial form +was gowned with passion, and on again to Soames and Annette kneeling +side by side. A little smile came on her lips—Prosper Profond, back +from the South Seas of the Channel, would be kneeling too, about six +rows behind. Yes! This was a funny "small" business, however it turned +out; still it was in a proper church and would be in the proper papers +to-morrow morning. +</P> + +<P> +They had begun a hymn; she could hear the ninth baronet across the +aisle, singing of the hosts of Midian. Her little finger touched Val's +thumb—they were holding the same hymn-book—and a tiny thrill passed +through her, preserved from twenty years ago. He stooped and whispered: +</P> + +<P> +"I say, d'you remember the rat?" The rat at their wedding in Cape +Colony, which had cleaned its whiskers behind the table at the +Registrar's! And between her little and third finger she squeezed his +thumb hard. +</P> + +<P> +The hymn was over, the prelate had begun to deliver his discourse. He +told them of the dangerous times they lived in, and the awful conduct +of the House of Lords in connection with divorce. They were all +soldiers—he said—in the trenches under the poisonous gas of the +Prince of Darkness, and must be manful. The purpose of marriage was +children, not mere sinful happiness. +</P> + +<P> +An imp danced in Holly's eyes—Val's eyelashes were meeting. Whatever +happened, he must NOT snore. Her finger and thumb closed on his thigh; +till he stirred uneasily. +</P> + +<P> +The discourse was over, the danger past. They were signing in the +vestry; and general relaxation had set in. +</P> + +<P> +A voice behind her said: +</P> + +<P> +"Will she stay the course?" +</P> + +<P> +"Who's that?" she whispered. +</P> + +<P> +"Old George Forsyte!" +</P> + +<P> +Holly demurely scrutinised one of whom she had often heard. Fresh from +South Africa, and ignorant of her kith and kin, she never saw one +without an almost childish curiosity. He was very big, and very dapper; +his eyes gave her a funny feeling of having no particular clothes. +</P> + +<P> +"They're off!" she heard him say. +</P> + +<P> +They came, stepping from the chancel. Holly looked first in young +Mont's face. His lips and ears were twitching, his eyes, shifting from +his feet to the hand within his arm, stared suddenly before them as if +to face a firing party. He gave Holly the feeling that he was +spiritually intoxicated. But Fleur! Ah! That was different. The girl +was perfectly composed, prettier than ever, in her white robes and veil +over her banged dark chestnut hair; her eyelids hovered demure over her +dark hazel eyes. Outwardly, she seemed all there. But, inwardly, where +was she? As those two passed, Fleur raised her eyelids—the restless +glint of those clear whites remained on Holly's vision as might the +flutter of a caged bird's wings. +</P> + +<P> +In Green Street Winifred stood to receive, just a little less composed +than usual. Soames' request for the use of her house had come on her at +a deeply psychological moment. Under the influence of a remark of +Prosper Profond, she had begun to exchange her Empire for +Expressionistic furniture. There were the most amusing arrangements, +with violet, green, and orange blobs and scriggles, to be had at +Mealard's. Another month and the change would have been complete. Just +now, the very "intriguing" recruits she had enlisted did not march too +well with the old guard. It was as if her regiment were half in khaki, +half in scarlet and bearskins. But her strong and comfortable character +made the best of it in a drawing-room which typified, perhaps, more +perfectly than she imagined, the semi-bolshevised imperialism of her +country. After all, this was a day of merger, and you couldn't have too +much of it! Her eyes travelled indulgently among her guests. Soames had +gripped the back of a buhl chair; young Mont was behind that "awfully +amusing" screen, which no one as yet had been able to explain to her. +The ninth baronet had shied violently at a round scarlet table, inlaid +tinder glass with blue Australian butterflies' wings, and was clinging +to her Louis-Quinze cabinet; Francie Forsyte had seized the new +mantel-board, finely carved with little purple grotesques on an ebony +ground; George, over by the old spinet, was holding a little sky-blue +book as if about to enter bets; Prosper Profond was twiddling the knob +of the open door, black with peacock-blue panels; and Annette's hands, +close by, were grasping her own waist; two Muskhams clung to the +balcony among the plants, as if feeling ill; Lady Mont, thin and +brave-looking, had taken up her long-handled glasses and was gazing at +the central light shade, of ivory and orange dashed with deep magenta, +as if the heavens had opened. Everybody, in fact, seemed holding on to +something. Only Fleur, still in her bridal dress, was detached from all +support, flinging her words and glances to left and right. +</P> + +<P> +The room was full of the bubble and the squeak of conversation. Nobody +could hear anything that anybody said; which seemed of little +consequence, since no one waited for anything so slow as an answer. +Modern conversation seemed to Winifred so different from the days of +her prime, when a drawl was all the vogue. Still it was diverting, +which, of course, was all that mattered. Even the Forsytes were talking +with extreme rapidity—Fleur and Christopher, and Imogen, and young +Nicholas's youngest, Patrick. Soames, of course, was silent; but +George, by the spinet, kept up a running commentary, and Francie, by +her mantel-shelf. Winifred drew nearer to the ninth baronet. He seemed +to promise a certain repose; his nose was fine and drooped a little, +his grey moustaches too; and she said, drawling through her smile; +</P> + +<P> +"It's rather nice, isn't it?" +</P> + +<P> +His reply shot out of his smile like a snipped bread pellet: +</P> + +<P> +"D'you remember, in Frazer, the tribe that buries the bride up to the +waist?" +</P> + +<P> +He spoke as fast as anybody! He had dark, lively little eyes, too, all +crinkled round like a Catholic priest's. Winifred felt suddenly he +might say things she would regret. +</P> + +<P> +"They're always so diverting—weddings," she murmured, and moved on to +Soames. He was curiously still, and Winifred saw at once what was +dictating his immobility. To his right was George Forsyte, to his left +Annette and Prosper Profond. He could not move without either seeing +those two together, or the reflection of them in George Forsyte's +japing eyes. He was quite right not to be taking notice. +</P> + +<P> +"They say Timothy's sinking," he said glumly. +</P> + +<P> +"Where will you put him, Soames?" +</P> + +<P> +"Highgate." And counted on his fingers. "It'll make twelve of them +there, including wives. How do you think Fleur looks?" +</P> + +<P> +"Remarkably well." +</P> + +<P> +Soames nodded. He had never seen her look prettier, yet he could not +rid himself of the impression that this business was +unnatural—remembering still that crushed figure burrowing into the +corner of the sofa. From that night to this day he had received from +her no confidences. He knew from his chauffeur that she had made one +more attempt on Robin Hill and drawn blank—an empty house, no one at +home. He knew that she had received a letter, but not what was in it, +except that it had made her hide herself and cry. He had remarked that +she looked at him sometimes when she thought he wasn't noticing, as if +she were wondering still what he had done—forsooth—to make those +people hate him so. Well, there it was! Annette had come back, and +things had worn on through the summer—very miserable, till suddenly +Fleur had said she was going to marry young Mont. She had shown him a +little more affection when she told Soames that. And he had +yielded—what was the good of opposing it? God knew that he had never +wished to thwart her in anything! And the young man seemed quite +delirious about her. No doubt she was in a reckless mood, and she was +young, absurdly young. But if he opposed her, he didn't know what she +would do; for all he could tell she might want to take up a profession, +become a doctor or solicitor, some nonsense. She had no aptitude for +painting, writing, music, in his view the legitimate occupations of +unmarried women, if they must do something in these days. On the whole, +she was safer married, for he could see too well how feverish and +restless she was at home. Annette, too, had been in favour of +it—Annette, from behind the veil of his refusal to know what she was +about, if she was about anything. Annette had said: "Let her marry this +young man. He is a nice boy—not so highty-flighty as he seems." Where +she got her expressions, he didn't know—but her opinion soothed his +doubts. His wife, whatever her conduct, had clear eyes and an almost +depressing amount of common sense. He had settled fifty thousand on +Fleur, taking care that there was no cross settlement in case it didn't +turn out well. Could it turn out well? She had not got over that other +boy—he knew. They were to go to Spain for the honeymoon. He would be +even lonelier when she was gone. But later, perhaps, she would forget, +and turn to him again! +</P> + +<P> +Winifred's voice broke on his reverie. +</P> + +<P> +"Why! Of all wonders—June!" +</P> + +<P> +There, in a djibbah—what things she wore!—with her hair straying from +under a fillet, Soames saw his cousin, and Fleur going forward to greet +her. The two passed from their view out on to the stairway. +</P> + +<P> +"Really," said Winifred, "she does the most impossible things! Fancy +HER coming!" +</P> + +<P> +"What made you ask her?" muttered Soames. +</P> + +<P> +"Because I thought she wouldn't accept, of course." +</P> + +<P> +Winifred had forgotten that behind conduct lies the main trend of +character; or, in other words, omitted to remember that Fleur was now a +"lame duck." +</P> + +<P> +On receiving her invitation, June had first thought: 'I wouldn't go +near them for the world!' and then, one morning, had awakened from a +dream of Fleur waving to her from a boat with a wild unhappy gesture. +And she had changed her mind. +</P> + +<P> +When Fleur came forward and said to her: +</P> + +<P> +"Do come up while I'm changing my dress"; she had followed up the +stairs. The girl led the way into Imogen's old bedroom, set ready for +her toilet. +</P> + +<P> +June sat down on the bed, thin and upright, like a little spirit in the +sere and yellow. Fleur locked the door. +</P> + +<P> +The girl stood before her divested of her wedding-dress. What a pretty +thing she was! +</P> + +<P> +"I suppose you think me a fool," she said, with quivering lips, "when +it was to have been Jon. But what does it matter? Michael wants me, and +I don't care. It'll get me away from home." Diving her hand into the +frills on her breast, she brought out a letter. "Jon wrote me this." +</P> + +<P> +June read: "Lake Okanagen, British Columbia. I'm not coming back to +England. Bless you always. Jon." +</P> + +<P> +"She's made safe, you see," said Fleur. +</P> + +<P> +June handed back the letter. +</P> + +<P> +"That's not fair to Irene; she always told Jon he could do as he +wished." +</P> + +<P> +Fleur smiled bitterly. "Didn't she spoil your life too?" +</P> + +<P> +"Nobody can spoil a life, my dear. That's nonsense. Things happen, but +we bob up." +</P> + +<P> +Then with a sort of terror she saw the girl sink on her knees and bury +her face in the djibbah, with a strangled sob. +</P> + +<P> +"It's all right—all right," June murmured: "Don't! There, there!" +</P> + +<P> +But the point of the girl's chin was pressed ever closer into her +thigh, and the sound was dreadful of her sobbing. Well, well! It had to +come. She would feel better afterwards! June stroked the short hair of +that shapely head and all the scattered mother-sense in her focussed +itself and passed through the tips of her fingers into the girl's brain. +</P> + +<P> +"Don't sit down under it, my dear," she said at last. "We can't control +life, but we can fight it. Make the best of things. I've had to. I held +on, like you; and I cried, as you're crying now. And look at me!" +</P> + +<P> +Fleur raised her head; a sob merged suddenly into a little choked +laugh. In truth it was a thin and rather wild and wasted spirit she was +looking at, but it had brave eyes. +</P> + +<P> +"All right!" she said. "I'm sorry. I shall forget him, I suppose, if I +fly fast and far enough." +</P> + +<P> +And, scrambling to her feet, she went over to the washstand. +</P> + +<P> +June watched her removing with cold water the traces of emotion. Save +for a little becoming pinkness there was nothing left when she stood +before the mirror. June got off the bed and took a pin-cushion in her +hand. To put two pins into the wrong places was all the vent she found +for sympathy. +</P> + +<P> +"Give me a kiss," she said when Fleur was ready, and dug her chin into +the girl's warm cheek. +</P> + +<P> +"I want a whiff," said Fleur; "don't wait." +</P> + +<P> +June left her, sitting on the bed with a cigarette between her lips and +her eyes half closed, and went down-stairs. In the doorway of the +drawing-room stood Soames as if unquiet at his daughter's tardiness. +June tossed her head and passed down on to the half landing. Her cousin +Francie was standing there. +</P> + +<P> +"Look!" said June, pointing with her chin at Soames. "That man's fatal!" +</P> + +<P> +"How do you mean," said Francie, "fatal?" +</P> + +<P> +June did not answer her. "I shan't wait to see them off," she said. +"Good-bye!" +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye!" And Francie's eyes, of a Celtic grey, goggled. That old +feud! Really, it was quite romantic! +</P> + +<P> +Soames, moving to the well of the staircase, saw June go, and drew a +breath of satisfaction. But why didn't Fleur come? They would miss +their train. That train would bear her away from him, yet he could not +help fidgeting at the thought that they would lose it. And then she did +come, running down in her tan-coloured frock and black velvet cap, and +passed him into the drawing-room. He saw her kiss her mother, her aunt, +Val's wife, Imogen, and then come forth, quick and pretty as ever. How +would she treat him at this last moment of her girlhood? He couldn't +hope for much! +</P> + +<P> +Her lips pressed the middle of his cheek. +</P> + +<P> +"Daddy!" she said, and was past and gone. Daddy! She hadn't called him +that for years. He drew a long breath and followed slowly down. There +was all the folly with that confetti stuff and the rest of it to go +through with, yet. But he would like just to catch her smile, if she +leaned out, though they would hit her in the eye with the shoe, if they +didn't take care. Young Mont's voice said fervently in his ear: +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye, sir; and thank you! I'm so fearfully bucked." +</P> + +<P> +"Good-bye," he said; "don't miss your train." +</P> + +<P> +He stood on the bottom step but three, whence he could see above the +heads—the silly hats and heads. They were in the car now; and there +was that stuff, showering, and there went the shoe. A flood of +something welled up in Soames, and—he didn't know—he couldn't see! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap0311"></A> +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +XI +</H3> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +THE LAST OF THE FORSYTES +</H3> + +<P> +When they came to prepare that terrific symbol Timothy Forsyte—the one +pure individualist left, the only man who hadn't heard of the Great +War—they found him wonderful—not even death had undermined his +soundness. +</P> + +<P> +To Smither and Cook that preparation came like final evidence of what +they had never believed possible—the end of the old Forsyte family on +earth. Poor Mr. Timothy must now take a harp and sing in the company of +Miss Forsyte, Mrs. Julia, Miss Hester; with Mr. Jolyon, Mr. Swithin, +Mr. James, Mr. Roger, and Mr. Nicholas of the party. Whether Mrs. +Hayman would be there was more doubtful, seeing that she had been +cremated. Secretly Cook thought that Mr. Timothy would be upset—he had +always been so set against barrel organs. How many times had she not +said: "Drat the thing! There it is again! Smither, you'd better run up +and see what you can do." And in her heart she would so have enjoyed +the tunes, if she hadn't known that Mr. Timothy would ring the bell in +a minute and say: "Here, take him a halfpenny and tell him to move on." +Often they had been obliged to add threepence of their own before the +man would go—Timothy had ever underrated the value of emotion. Luckily +he had taken the organs for blue-bottles in his last years, which had +been a comfort, and they had been able to enjoy the tunes. But a harp! +Cook wondered. It WAS a change! And Mr. Timothy had never liked change. +But she did not speak of this to Smither, who did so take a line of her +own in regard to heaven that it quite put one about sometimes. +</P> + +<P> +She cried while Timothy was being prepared, and they all had sherry +afterwards out of the yearly Christmas bottle, which would not be +needed now. Ah! dear! She had been there five-and-forty years and +Smither nine-and-thirty! And now they would be going to a tiny house in +Tooting, to live on their savings and what Miss Hester had so kindly +left them—for to take fresh service after the glorious past—No! But +they WOULD like just to see Mr. Soames again, and Mrs. Dartie, and Miss +Francie, and Miss Euphemia. And even if they had to take their own cab, +they felt they must go to the funeral. For six years Mr. Timothy had +been their baby, getting younger and younger every day, till at last he +had been too young to live. +</P> + +<P> +They spent the regulation hours of waiting in polishing and dusting, in +catching the one mouse left, and asphyxiating the last beetle, so as to +leave it nice, discussing with each other what they would buy at the +sale. Miss Ann's work-box; Miss Juley's (that is Mrs. Julia's) seaweed +album; the fire-screen Miss Hester had crewelled; and Mr. Timothy's +hair—little golden curls, glued into a black frame. Oh! they must have +those—only the price of things had gone up so! +</P> + +<P> +It fell to Soames to issue invitations for the funeral. He had them +drawn up by Gradman in his office—only blood relations, and no +flowers. Six carriages were ordered. The Will would be read afterwards +at the house. +</P> + +<P> +He arrived at eleven o'clock to see that all was ready. At a quarter +past old Gradman came in black gloves and crape on his hat. He and +Soames stood in the drawing-room waiting. At half-past eleven the +carriages drew up in a long row. But no one else appeared. Gradman said: +</P> + +<P> +"It surprises me, Mr. Soames. I posted them myself." +</P> + +<P> +"I don't know," said Soames; "he'd lost touch with the family." +</P> + +<P> +Soames had often noticed in old days how much more neighbourly his +family were to the dead than to the living. But, now, the way they had +flocked to Fleur's wedding and abstained from Timothy's funeral, seemed +to show some vital change. There might, of course, be another reason; +for Soames felt that if he had not known the contents of Timothy's +Will, he might have stayed away himself through delicacy. Timothy had +left a lot of money, with nobody in particular to leave it to. They +mightn't like to seem to expect something. +</P> + +<P> +At twelve o'clock the procession left the door; Timothy alone in the +first carriage under glass. Then Soames alone; then Gradman alone; then +Cook and Smither together. They started at a walk, but were soon +trotting under a bright sky. At the entrance to Highgate Cemetery they +were delayed by service in the Chapel. Soames would have liked to stay +outside in the sunshine. He didn't believe a word of it; on the other +hand, it was a form of insurance which could not safely be neglected, +in case there might be something in it after all. +</P> + +<P> +They walked up two and two—he and Gradman, Cook and Smither—to the +family vault. It was not very distinguished for the funeral of the last +old Forsyte. +</P> + +<P> +He took Gradman into his carriage on the way back to the Bayswater Road +with a certain glow in his heart. He had a surprise in pickle for the +old chap who had served the Forsytes four-and-fifty years—a treat that +was entirely his doing. How well he remembered saying to Timothy the +day after Aunt Hester's funeral: "Well, Uncle Timothy, there's Gradman. +He's taken a lot of trouble for the family. What do you say to leaving +him five thousand?" and his surprise, seeing the difficulty there had +been in getting Timothy to leave anything, when Timothy had nodded. And +now the old chap would be as pleased as Punch, for Mrs. Gradman, he +knew, had a weak heart, and their son had lost a leg in the war. It was +extraordinarily gratifying to Soames to have left him five thousand +pounds of Timothy's money. They sat down together in the little +drawing-room, whose walls—like a vision of heaven—were sky-blue and +gold, with every picture-frame unnaturally bright, and every speck of +dust removed from every piece of furniture, to read that little +masterpiece,—the Will of Timothy. With his back to the light in Aunt +Hester's chair, Soames faced Gradman with his face to the light on Aunt +Ann's sofa; and, crossing his legs, began: +</P> + +<P> +"This is the last Will and Testament of me Timothy Forsyte of The Bower +Bayswater Road London I appoint my nephew Soames Forsyte of The Shelter +Mapledurham and Thomas Gradman of 159 Folly Road Highgate (hereinafter +called my Trustees) to be the trustees and executors of this my Will. +To the said Soames Forsyte I leave the sum of one thousand pounds free +of legacy duty and to the said Thomas Gradman I leave the sum of five +thousand pounds free of legacy duty." +</P> + +<P> +Soames paused. Old Gradman was leaning forward, convulsively gripping a +stout black knee with each of his thick hands; his mouth had fallen +open so that the gold fillings of three teeth gleamed; his eyes were +blinking; two tears rolled slowly out of them. Soames read hastily on. +</P> + +<P> +"All the rest of my property of whatsoever description I bequeath to my +Trustees upon Trust to convert and hold the same upon the following +trusts namely. To pay thereout all my debts funeral expenses and +outgoings of any kind in connection with my Will and to hold the +residue thereof in trust for that male lineal descendant of my father +Jolyon Forsyte by his marriage with Ann Pierce who after the decease of +all lineal descendants whether male or female of my said father by his +said marriage in being at the time of my death shall last attain the +age of twenty-one years absolutely it being my desire that my property +shall be nursed to the extreme limit permitted by the laws of England +for the benefit of such male lineal descendant as aforesaid." +</P> + +<P> +Soames read the investment and attestation clauses, and, ceasing, +looked at Gradman. The old fellow was wiping his brow with a large +handkerchief, whose brilliant colour supplied a sudden festive tinge to +the proceedings. +</P> + +<P> +"My word, Mr. Soames!" he said, and it was clear that the lawyer in him +had utterly wiped out the man: "My word! Why, there are two babies now, +and some quite young children—if one of them lives to be eighty—it's +not a great age—and add twenty-one—that's a hundred years; and Mr. +Timothy worth a hundred and fifty thousand pound if he's worth a penny. +Compound interest at five per cent doubles you in fourteen years. In +fourteen years three hundred thousand—six hundred thousand in +twenty-eight—twelve hundred thousand in forty-two—twenty-four hundred +thousand in fifty-six—four million eight hundred thousand in +seventy—nine million six hundred thousand in eighty-four—Why, in a +hundred years it'll be twenty million! And we shan't live to see it! It +IS a Will!" +</P> + +<P> +Soames said dryly: "Anything may happen. The State might take the lot; +they're capable of anything in these days." +</P> + +<P> +"And carry five," said Gradman to himself. "I forgot—Mr. Timothy's in +Consols; we shan't get more than two per cent with this income tax. To +be on the safe side, say seven million. Still, that's a pretty penny." +</P> + +<P> +Soames rose and handed him the Will. "You're going into the City. Take +care of that, and do what's necessary. Advertise; but there are no +debts. When's the sale?" +</P> + +<P> +"Tuesday week," said Gradman. "Life or lives in bein' and twenty-one +years afterwards—it's a long way off. But I'm glad he's left it in the +family." ... +</P> + +<P> +The sale—not at Jobson's, in view of the Victorian nature of the +effects—was far more freely attended than the funeral, though not by +Cook and Smither, for Soames had taken it on himself to give them their +hearts' desires. Winifred was present, Euphemia, and Francie, and +Eustace had come in his car. The miniatures, Barbizons, and J. R. +drawings had been bought in by Soames; and relics of no marketable +value were set aside in an off-room for members of the family who cared +to have mementos. These were the only restrictions upon bidding +characterised by an almost tragic langour. Not one piece of furniture, +no picture or porcelain figure appealed to modern taste. The +humming-birds had fallen like autumn leaves when taken from where they +had not hummed for sixty years. It was painful to Soames to see the +chairs his aunts had sat on, the little grand piano they had +practically never played, the books whose outsides they had gazed at, +the china they had dusted, the curtains they had drawn, the hearth-rug +which had warmed their feet; above all, the beds they had lain and died +in—sold to little dealers, and the housewives of Fulham. And yet—what +could one do? Buy them and stick them in a lumber-room? No; they had to +go the way of all flesh and furniture, and be worn out. But when they +put up Aunt Ann's sofa and were going to knock it down for thirty +shillings, he cried out, suddenly: "Five pounds!" The sensation was +considerable, and the sofa his. +</P> + +<P> +When that little sale was over in the fusty saleroom, and those +Victorian ashes scattered, he went out into the misty October sunshine +feeling as if cosiness had died out of the world, and the board "To +Let" was up, indeed. Revolutions on the horizon; Fleur in Spain; no +comfort in Annette; no Timothy's on the Bayswater Road. In the +irritable desolation of his soul he went into the Goupenor Gallery. +That chap Jolyon's water-colours were on view there. He went in to look +down his nose at them—it might give him some faint satisfaction. The +news had trickled through from June to Val's wife, from her to Val, +from Val to his mother, from her to Soames, that the house—the fatal +house at Robin Hill—was for sale, and Irene going to join her boy out +in British Columbia, or some such place. For one wild moment the +thought had come to Soames: 'Why shouldn't I buy it back? I meant it +for my—!' No sooner come than gone. Too lugubrious a triumph; with two +many humiliating memories for himself and Fleur. She would never live +there after what had happened. No, the place must go its way to some +peer or profiteer. It had been a bone of contention from the first, the +shell of the feud and with the woman gone, it was an empty shell. "For +Sale or To Let." With his mind's eye he could see that board raised +high above the ivied wall which he had built. +</P> + +<P> +He passed through the first of the two rooms in the Gallery. There was +certainly a body of work! And now that the fellow was dead it did not +seem so trivial. The drawings were pleasing enough, with quite a sense +of atmosphere, and something individual in the brush work. 'His father +and my father; he and I; his child and mine!' thought Soames. So it had +gone on! And all about that woman! Softened by the events of the past +week, affected by the melancholy beauty of the autumn day, Soames came +nearer than he had ever been to realisation of that truth—passing the +understanding of a Forsyte pure—that the body of Beauty has a +spiritual essence, uncapturable save by a devotion which thinks not of +self. After all, he was near that truth in his devotion to his +daughter; perhaps that made him understand a little how he had missed +the prize. And there, among the drawings of his kinsman, who had +attained to that which he had found beyond his reach, he thought of him +and her with a tolerance which surprised him. But he did not buy a +drawing. +</P> + +<P> +Just as he passed the seat of custom on his return to the outer air he +met with a contingency which had not been entirely absent from his mind +when he went into the Gallery—Irene, herself, coming in. So she had +not gone yet, and was still paying farewell visits to that fellow's +remains! He subdued the little involuntary leap of his +subconsciousness, the mechanical reaction of his senses to the charm of +this once-owned woman, and passed her with averted eyes. But when he +had gone by he could not for the life of him help looking back. This, +then, was finality—the heat and stress of his life, the madness and +the longing thereof, the long, the only defeat he had known, would be +over when she faded from his view this time; even such memories had +their own queer aching value. She, too, was looking back. Suddenly she +lifted her gloved hand, her lips smiled faintly, her dark eyes seemed +to speak. It was the turn of Soames to make no answer to that smile and +that little farewell wave; he went out into the fashionable street +quivering from head to foot. He knew what she had meant to say: "Now +that I am going for ever out of the reach of you and yours—forgive me; +I wish you well." That was the meaning; last sign of that terrible +reality—passing morality, duty, common sense—her aversion from him +who had owned her body but had never touched her spirit or her heart. +It hurt; yes—more than if she had kept her mask unmoved, her hand +unlifted. +</P> + +<P> +Three days later, in that fast-yellowing October, Soames took a +taxi-cab to Highgate Cemetery and mounted through its white forest to +the Forsyte vault. Close to the cedar, above catacombs and columbaria, +tall, ugly, and individual, it looked like an apex of the competitive +system. He could remember a discussion wherein Swithin had advocated +the addition to its face of the pheasant proper. The proposal had been +rejected in favour of a wreath in stone, above the stark words: "The +family vault of Jolyon Forsyte: 1850." It was in good order. All trace +of the recent interment had been removed, and its sober grey gloomed +reposefully in the sunshine. The whole family lay there now, except old +Jolyon's wife, who had gone back under a contract to her own family +vault in Suffolk; old Jolyon himself lying at Robin Hill; and Susan +Hayman, cremated so that none knew where she might be. Soames gazed at +it with satisfaction—massive, needing little attention; and this was +important, for he was well aware that no one would attend to it when he +himself was gone, and he would have to be looking out for lodgings +soon. He might have twenty years before him, but one never knew. Twenty +years without an aunt or uncle, with a wife of whom one had better not +know anything, with a daughter gone from home. His mood inclined to +melancholy and retrospection. This cemetery was quite full now—of +people with extraordinary names, buried in extraordinary taste. Still, +they had a fine view up here, right over London. Annette had once given +him a story to read by that Frenchman, Maupassant—a most lugubrious +concern, where all the skeletons emerged from their graves one night, +and all the pious inscriptions on the stones were altered to +descriptions of their sins. Not a true story at all. He didn't know +about the French, but there was not much real harm in English people +except their teeth and their taste, which were certainly deplorable. +"The family vault of Jolyon Forsyte, 1850." A lot of people had been +buried here since then—a lot of English life crumbled to mould and +dust! The boom of an airplane passing under the gold-tinted clouds +caused him to lift his eyes. The deuce of a lot of expansion had gone +on. But it all came back to a cemetery—to a name and a date on a tomb. +And he thought with a curious pride that he and his family had done +little or nothing to help this feverish expansion. Good solid +middlemen, they had gone to work with dignity to manage and possess. +"Superior Dosset," indeed, had built, in a dreadful, and Jolyon +painted, in a doubtful period, but so far as he remembered not another +of them all had soiled his hands by creating anything—unless you +counted Val Dartie and his horse-breeding. Collectors, solicitors, +barristers, merchants, publishers, accountants, directors, land agents, +even soldiers—there they had been! The country had expanded, as it +were, in spite of them. They had checked, controlled, defended, and +taken advantage of the process—and when you considered how "Superior +Dosset" had begun life with next to nothing, and his lineal descendants +already owned what old Gradman estimated at between a million and a +million and a half, it was not so bad! And yet he sometimes felt as if +the family bolt was shot, their possessive instinct dying out. They +seemed unable to make money—this fourth generation; they were going +into art, literature, farming, or the army; or just living on what was +left them—they had no push and no tenacity. They would die out if they +didn't take care. +</P> + +<P> +Soames turned from the vault and faced towards the breeze. The air up +here would be delicious if only he could rid his nerves of the feeling +that mortality was in it. He gazed restlessly at the crosses and the +urns, the angels, the "immortelles," the flowers, gaudy or withering; +and suddenly he noticed a spot which seemed so different from anything +else up there that he was obliged to walk the few necessary yards and +look at it. A sober corner, with a massive queer-shaped cross of grey +rough-hewn granite, guarded by four dark yew-trees. The spot was free +from the pressure of the other graves, having a little box-hedged +garden on the far side, arid in front a goldening birch-tree. This +oasis in the desert of conventional graves appealed to the aesthetic +sense of Soames, and he sat down there in the sunshine. Through those +trembling gold birch leaves he gazed out at London, and yielded to the +waves of memory. He thought of Irene in Montpellier Square, when her +hair was rusty-golden and her white shoulders his—Irene, the prize of +his love—passion, resistant to his ownership. He saw Bosinney's body +lying in that white mortuary, and Irene sitting on the sofa looking at +her picture with the eyes of a dying bird. Again he thought of her by +the little green Niobe in the Bois de Boulogne, once more rejecting +him. His fancy took him on beside his drifting river on the November +day when Fleur was to be born, took him to the dead leaves floating on +the green-tinged water and the snake-headed weed for ever swaying and +nosing, sinuous, blind, tethered. And on again to the window opened to +the cold starry night above Hyde Park, with his father lying dead. His +fancy darted to that picture of "The Future Town," to that boy's and +Fleur's first meeting; to the blueish trail of Prosper Profond's cigar, +and Fleur in the window pointing down to where the fellow prowled. To +the sight of Irene and that dead fellow sitting side by side in the +Stand at Lord's. To her and that boy at Robin Hill. To the sofa, where +Fleur lay crushed up in the corner; to her lips pressed into his cheek, +and her farewell "Daddy." And suddenly he saw again Irene's grey-gloved +hand waving its last gesture of release. +</P> + +<P> +He sat there a long time dreaming his career, faithful to the scut of +his possessive instinct, warming himself even with its failures. +</P> + +<P> +"To Let"—the Forsyte age and way of life, when a man owned his soul, +his investments, and his woman, without check or question. And now the +State had, or would have, his investments, his woman had herself, and +God knew who had his soul. "To Let"—that sane and simple creed! +</P> + +<P> +The waters of change were foaming in, carrying the promise of new forms +only when their destructive flood should have passed its full. He sat +there, subconscious of them, but with his thoughts resolutely set on +the past—as a man might ride into a wild night with his face to the +tail of his galloping horse. Athwart the Victorian dykes the waters +were rolling on property, manners, and morals, on melody and the old +forms of art—waters bringing to his mouth a salt taste as of blood, +lapping to the foot of this Highgate Hill where Victorianism lay +buried. And sitting there, high up on its most individual spot, +Soames—like a figure of Investment—refused their restless sounds. +Instinctively he would not fight them—there was in him too much +primeval wisdom, of Man the possessive animal. They would quiet down +when they had fulfilled their tidal fever of dispossessing and +destroying; when the creations and the properties of others were +sufficiently broken and dejected—they would lapse and ebb, and fresh +forms would rise based on an instinct older than the fever of +change—the instinct of Home. +</P> + +<P> +"Je m'en fiche," said Prosper Profond. Soames did not say "Je m'en +fiche"—it was French, and the fellow was a thorn in his side—but deep +down he knew that change was only the interval of death between two +forms of life, destruction necessary to make room for fresher property. +What though the board was up, and cosiness to let?—some one would come +along and take it again some day. +</P> + +<P> +And only one thing really troubled him, sitting there—the melancholy +craving in his heart—because the sun was like enchantment on his face +and on the clouds and on the golden birch leaves, and the wind's rustle +was so gentle, and the yew-tree green so dark, and the sickle of a moon +pale in the sky. +</P> + +<P> +Ah! He might wish and wish and never get it—the beauty and the loving +in the world! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="finis"> +THE END +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of To Let, by John Galsworthy + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TO LET *** + +***** This file should be named 3817-h.htm or 3817-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/8/1/3817/ + +Produced by Charles Franks, Robert Rowe and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team. HTML version by Al Haines. + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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