diff options
| author | www-data <www-data@mail.pglaf.org> | 2026-05-22 11:01:01 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | www-data <www-data@mail.pglaf.org> | 2026-05-22 11:01:01 -0700 |
| commit | 28a682c6e1fc1767a6e3de682697dc5eab9e44fd (patch) | |
| tree | 3276bfe6965f45e4ea24ea0dd904ec7712b0d7c8 /78723-h | |
Diffstat (limited to '78723-h')
| -rw-r--r-- | 78723-h/78723-h.htm | 9363 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 78723-h/images/cover.jpg | bin | 0 -> 36522 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 78723-h/images/font-Jacques+Francois+Shadow.ttf | bin | 0 -> 75160 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 78723-h/images/title.jpg | bin | 0 -> 1413 bytes |
4 files changed, 9363 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/78723-h/78723-h.htm b/78723-h/78723-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b494821 --- /dev/null +++ b/78723-h/78723-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,9363 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /> + <title>The Project Gutenberg eBook of Cakes and Ale by W. Somerset Maugham</title> + + <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg"/> + + <style type="text/css"> + body { margin-left:8%;margin-right:10%; } + .it { font-style:italic; } + .bold { font-weight:bold; } + .sc { font-variant:small-caps; } + .gesp { letter-spacing:0.2em; } + p { text-indent:0; margin-top:0.5em; margin-bottom:0.5em; + text-align: justify; } + div.lgc { } + div.lgl { } + div.lgc p { text-align:center; text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } + div.lgl p { text-indent: -17px; margin-left:17px; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } + div.lgp { + display:inline-block; + text-align: left; + } + + div.lgp p { + text-align:left; + margin-top:0; + margin-bottom:0; + } + + .poetry-container { + text-align:center; + } + + h1 { + text-align:center; + font-weight:normal; + page-break-before: always; + font-size:1.2em; margin:2em auto 1em auto + } + + hr.tbk100{ border:none; border-bottom:2px solid black; width:50%; margin-top:4em; margin-bottom:0.5em; text-align:center; margin-left:25%; margin-right:25% } + hr.tbk101{ border:none; border-bottom:2px solid black; width:50%; margin-top:0.5em; margin-bottom:0.5em; text-align:center; margin-left:25%; margin-right:25% } + hr.pbk { border:none; border-bottom:1px solid silver; width:100%; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:2em } + .figcenter { + text-align:center; + margin:1em auto; + page-break-inside: avoid; + } + + div.blockquote { margin:1em 2em; text-align:justify; } + div.blockquote-right90percent { margin:1em 0em 1em auto; text-align:right; width:90%; } + div.blockquote100percent { margin:1em auto; width:100%; } + div.blockquote-right90percent p { text-align:left; } + div.blockquote100percent p { text-align:left; } + p.line { text-indent:0; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; } + div.lgp p.line0 { text-indent:-3em; margin:0 auto 0 3em; } + .pindent { margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; text-indent:1.5em; } + .noindent { margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0; text-indent:0; } + .hang { padding-left:1.5em; text-indent:-1.5em; } + + + </style> + <style type="text/css"> + h1 {font-size:2em; text-align:center; font-weight:bold; padding-bottom:6em;} + .poetry-container {font-size:1em; + margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em; + margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;} + .literal-container {margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em} + div.lgc {margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em} + p {margin-top: 0em; margin-bottom: 0em;} + div.blockquote {margin-top:.5em; margin-bottom:.5em;} + </style> + </head> + + <body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78723 ***</div> + +<p class='pindent'><span class='bold'>* A Distributed Proofreaders Canada eBook *</span></p> + +<p class='pindent'>This ebook is made available at no cost and with very few +restrictions. These restrictions apply only if (1) you make +a change in the ebook (other than alteration for different +display devices), or (2) you are making commercial use of +the ebook. If either of these conditions applies, please +contact a FP administrator before proceeding.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>This work is in the Canadian public domain, but may be under +copyright in some countries. If you live outside Canada, check your +country's copyright laws. IF THE BOOK IS UNDER COPYRIGHT +IN YOUR COUNTRY, DO NOT DOWNLOAD OR REDISTRIBUTE THIS FILE.</p> + +<div class='lgl' style=''> <!-- rend=';' --> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Title:</span> Cakes and Ale</p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Date of first publication:</span> 1930</p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Author:</span> W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965)</p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Date first posted:</span> July 31, 2017</p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Date last updated:</span> July 31, 2017</p> +<p class='line0'>Faded Page eBook #20170731</p> +</div> <!-- end rend --> + +<p class='pindent'>This ebook was produced by: Al Haines, Cindy Beyer +& the online Distributed Proofreaders Canada team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net</p> + +<hr class='pbk'/> + +<div class='figcenter'> +<img src='images/cover.jpg' alt='' id='iid-0000' style='width:80%;height:auto;'/> +</div> + +<hr class='pbk'/> + +<div class='lgc' style=''> <!-- rend=';' --> +<p class='line0' style='margin-top:2em;font-size:1.5em;font-weight:bold;'><span class='gesp'>CAKES AND ALE</span></p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:.8em;font-weight:bold;'>BY</p> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:1em;font-weight:bold;'>W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM</p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<div class='figcenter'> +<img src='images/title.jpg' alt='' id='iid-0001' style='width:80px;height:auto;'/> +</div> +<p class='line'> </p> +<hr class='tbk100'/> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:1em;font-weight:bold;'><span class='gesp'>TRIANGLE BOOKS</span></p> +<p class='line0' style='margin-top:.3em;margin-bottom:4em;font-weight:bold;'><span class='sc'>New York</span></p> +</div> <!-- end rend --> + +<hr class='pbk'/> + +<div class='lgc' style='margin-top:2em;'> <!-- rend=';fs:.8em;' --> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:.8em;'>COPYRIGHT, 1930, BY W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM</p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:.8em;'><span class='it'>All rights reserved</span></p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:.8em;'><span class='sc'>Triangle Books Edition Published January 1941</span></p> +<p class='line0' style='margin-top:.5em;font-size:.8em;'><span class='sc'>Reprinted January 1941</span></p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line0' style='margin-top:15em;font-size:.8em;'><span class='sc'>Triangle Books</span>, 14 West Forty-ninth Street,</p> +<p class='line0' style='font-size:.8em;'>New York, N. Y.</p> +<p class='line'> </p> +<p class='line0' style='margin-bottom:8em;font-size:.8em;'>PRINTED AND BOUND IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA</p> +</div> <!-- end rend --> + +<hr class='pbk'/> + +<div class='lgc' style=''> <!-- rend=';' --> +<p class='line0' style='margin-top:2em;font-size:1.2em;'>CAKES AND ALE</p> +<hr class='tbk101'/> +<p class='line0' style='margin-bottom:20em;font-size:1em;'><span class='gesp'>W. SOMERSET MAUGHAM</span></p> +</div> <!-- end rend --> + +<hr class='pbk'/> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">I</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I have</span> noticed that when someone asks for you on +the telephone and, finding you out, leaves a message +begging you to call him up the moment you come in, +and it’s important, the matter is more often important +to him than to you. When it comes to making +you a present or doing you a favour most people are +able to hold their impatience within reasonable +bounds. So when I got back to my lodgings with just +enough time to have a drink, a cigarette, and to read +my paper before dressing for dinner, and was told +by Miss Fellows, my landlady, that Mr. Alroy Kear +wished me to ring him up at once, I felt that I could +safely ignore his request.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Is that the writer?” she asked me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It is.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She gave the telephone a friendly glance.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Shall I get him?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, thank you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What shall I say if he rings again?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Ask him to leave a message.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Very good, sir.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She pursed her lips. She took the empty siphon, +swept the room with a look to see that it was tidy, +and went out. Miss Fellows was a great novel reader. +I was sure that she had read all Roy’s books. Her +disapproval of my casualness suggested that she had +read them with admiration. When I got home again, +I found a note in her bold, legible writing on the +sideboard.</p> + +<div class='blockquote100percent'> + +<p class='pindent'><span class='it'>Mr. Kear rang up twice. Can you lunch with him to-morrow? +If not what day will suit you?</span></p> + +</div> + +<p class='pindent'>I raised my eyebrows. I had not seen Roy for +three months and then only for a few minutes at a +party; he had been very friendly, he always was, and +when we separated he had expressed his hearty regret +that we met so seldom.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“London’s awful,” he said. “One never has time +to see any of the people one wants to. Let’s lunch +together one day next week, shall we?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’d like to,” I replied.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll look at my book when I get home and ring +you up.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had not known Roy for twenty years without +learning that he always kept in the upper left-hand +pocket of his waistcoat the little book in which he +put down his engagements; I was therefore not surprised +when I heard from him no further. It was +impossible for me now to persuade myself that this +urgent desire of his to dispense hospitality was disinterested. +As I smoked a pipe before going to bed +I turned over in my mind the possible reasons for +which Roy might want me to lunch with him. It might +be that an admirer of his had pestered him to introduce +me to her or that an American editor, in +London for a few days, had desired Roy to put me +in touch with him; but I could not do my old friend +the injustice of supposing him so barren of devices as +not to be able to cope with such a situation. Besides, +he told me to choose my own day, so it could hardly +be that he wished me to meet anyone else.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Than Roy no one could show a more genuine cordiality +to a fellow novelist whose name was on everybody’s +lips, but no one could more genially turn a cold +shoulder on him when idleness, failure, or someone +else’s success had cast a shade on his notoriety. The +writer has his ups and downs, and I was but too +conscious that at the moment I was not in the public +eye. It was obvious that I might have found excuses +without affront to refuse Roy’s invitation, though he +was a determined fellow and if he was resolved for +purposes of his own to see me, I well knew that +nothing short of a downright “go to hell” would +check his persistence; but I was beset by curiosity. +I had also a considerable affection for Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had watched with admiration his rise in the +world of letters. His career might well have served +as a model for any young man entering upon the pursuit +of literature. I could think of no one among my +contemporaries who had achieved so considerable +a position on so little talent. This, like the wise man’s +daily dose of Bemax, might have gone into a heaped-up +tablespoon. He was perfectly aware of it, and it +must have seemed to him sometimes little short of a +miracle that he had been able with it to compose +already some thirty books. I cannot but think that he +saw the white light of revelation when first he read +that Charles Dickens in an after-dinner speech had +stated that genius was an infinite capacity for taking +pains. He pondered the saying. If that was all, he +must have told himself, he could be a genius like the +rest; and when the excited reviewer of a lady’s paper, +writing a notice of one of his works, used the word +(and of late the critics have been doing it with agreeable +frequency) he must have sighed with the satisfaction +of one who after long hours of toil has completed +a cross-word puzzle. No one who for years +had observed his indefatigable industry could deny +that at all events he deserved to be a genius.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy started with certain advantages. He was the +only son of a civil servant who after being Colonial +Secretary for many years in Hong-Kong ended his +career as Governor of Jamaica. When you looked +up Alroy Kear in the serried pages of <span class='it'>Who’s Who</span> +you saw <span class='it'>o. s.</span> of Sir Raymond Kear, K. C. M. G., +K.C.V.O. <span class='it'>q.v.</span> and of Emily, <span class='it'>y.d.</span> of the late Major +General Percy Camperdown, Indian Army. He was +educated at Winchester and at New College, Oxford. +He was president of the Union and but for +an unfortunate attack of measles might very well +have got his rowing blue. His academic career was +respectable rather than showy, and he left the university +without a debt in the world. Roy was even +then of a thrifty habit, without any inclination to +unprofitable expense, and he was a good son. He +knew that it had been a sacrifice to his parents to +give him so costly an education. His father, having +retired, lived in an unpretentious, but not mean, +house near Stroud in Gloucestershire, but at intervals +went to London to attend official dinners connected +with the colonies he had administered, and on these +occasions was in the habit of visiting the Athenæum, +of which he was a member. It was through an old +crony at this club that he was able to get his son, +when he came down from Oxford, appointed private +secretary to a politician who, after having made a +fool of himself as Secretary of State in two Conservative +administrations, had been rewarded with +a peerage. This gave Roy a chance to become acquainted +at an early age with the great world. He +made good use of his opportunities. You will never +find in his works any of the solecisms that disfigure +the productions of those who have studied the upper +circles of society only in the pages of the illustrated +papers. He knew exactly how dukes spoke to one +another, and the proper way they should be addressed +respectively by a member of Parliament, an +attorney, a book-maker, and a valet. There is something +captivating in the jauntiness with which in his +early novels he handles viceroys, ambassadors, prime +ministers, royalties, and great ladies. He is friendly +without being patronizing and familiar without being +impertinent. He does not let you forget their +rank, but shares with you his comfortable feeling +that they are of the same flesh as you and I. I +always think it a pity that, fashion having decided +that the doings of the aristocracy are no longer a +proper subject for serious fiction, Roy, always keenly +sensitive to the tendency of the age, should in his +later novels have confined himself to the spiritual +conflicts of solicitors, chartered accountants, and +produce brokers. He does not move in these circles +with his old assurance.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I knew him first soon after he resigned his secretaryship +to devote himself exclusively to literature, +and he was then a fine, upstanding young man, six +feet high in his stockinged feet and of an athletic +build, with broad shoulders and a confident carriage. +He was not handsome, but in a manly way agreeable +to look at, with wide blue frank eyes and curly hair +of a lightish brown; his nose was rather short and +broad, his chin square. He looked honest, clean, and +healthy. He was something of an athlete. No one +who has read in his early books the descriptions of +a run with the hounds, so vivid, and so accurate, can +doubt that he wrote from personal experience; and +until quite lately he was willing now and then to +desert his desk for a day’s hunting. He published +his first novel at the period when men of letters, to +show their virility, drank beer and played cricket, +and for some years there was seldom a literary +eleven in which his name did not figure. This particular +school, I hardly know why, has lost its bravery, +their books are neglected, and cricketers though they +have remained, they find difficulty in placing their +articles. Roy ceased playing cricket a good many +years ago and he has developed a fine taste for claret.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy was very modest about his first novel. It was +short, neatly written, and, as is everything he has +produced since, in perfect taste. He sent it with a +pleasant letter to all the leading writers of the day, +and in this he told each one how greatly he admired +his works, how much he had learned from his study +of them, and how ardently he aspired to follow, albeit +at a humble distance, the trail his correspondent had +blazed. He laid his book at the feet of a great artist +as the tribute of a young man entering upon the +profession of letters to one whom he would always +look up to as his master. Deprecatingly, fully conscious +of his audacity in asking so busy a man to +waste his time on a neophyte’s puny effort, he begged +for criticism and guidance. Few of the replies were +perfunctory. The authors he wrote to, flattered by +his praise, answered at length. They commended his +book; many of them asked him to luncheon. They +could not fail to be charmed by his frankness and +warmed by his enthusiasm. He asked for their advice +with a humility that was touching and promised +to act upon it with a sincerity that was impressive. +Here, they felt, was someone worth taking a little +trouble over.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>His novel had a considerable success. It made him +many friends in literary circles and in a very short +while you could not go to a tea party in Bloomsbury, +Campden Hill, or Westminster without finding him +handing round bread and butter or disembarrassing +an elderly lady of an empty cup. He was so young, +so bluff, so gay, he laughed so merrily at other +people’s jokes that no one could help liking him. He +joined dining clubs where in the basement of a hotel +in Victoria Street or Holborn men of letters, young +barristers, and ladies in Liberty silks and strings of +beads ate a three-and-sixpenny dinner and discussed +art and literature. It was soon discovered that he +had a pretty gift for after-dinner speaking. He was +so pleasant that his fellow writers, his rivals and +contemporaries, forgave him even the fact that he +was a gentleman. He was generous in his praise of +their fledgeling works, and when they sent him +manuscripts to criticize could never find a thing amiss. +They thought him not only a good sort, but a sound +judge.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He wrote a second novel. He took great pains +with it and he profited by the advice his elders in the +craft had given him. It was only just that more than +one should at his request write a review for a paper +with whose editor Roy had got into touch and only +natural that the review should be flattering. His +second novel was successful, but not so successful as +to arouse the umbrageous susceptibilities of his competitors. +In fact it confirmed them in their suspicions +that he would never set the Thames on fire. He was +a jolly good fellow; no side, or anything like that: +they were quite content to give a leg up to a man +who would never climb so high as to be an obstacle +to themselves. I know some who smile bitterly now +when they reflect on the mistake they made.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But when they say that he is swollen-headed they +err. Roy has never lost the modesty which in his +youth was his most engaging trait.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I know I’m not a great novelist,” he will tell you. +“When I compare myself with the giants I simply +don’t exist. I used to think that one day I should +write a really great novel, but I’ve long ceased even +to hope for that. All I want people to say is that I +do my best. I do work. I never let anything slipshod +get past me. I think I can tell a good story and I +can create characters that ring true. And after all +the proof of the pudding is in the eating: <span class='it'>The Eye +of the Needle</span> sold thirty-five thousand in England +and eighty thousand in America, and for the serial +rights of my next book I’ve got the biggest terms +I’ve ever had yet.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And what, after all, can it be other than modesty +that makes him even now write to the reviewers of +his books, thanking them for their praise, and ask +them to luncheon? Nay, more: when someone has +written a stinging criticism and Roy, especially since +his reputation became so great, has had to put up +with some very virulent abuse, he does not, like most +of us, shrug his shoulders, fling a mental insult at +the ruffian who does not like our work, and then +forget about it; he writes a long letter to his critic, +telling him that he is very sorry he thought his book +bad, but his review was so interesting in itself, and +if he might venture to say so, showed so much critical +sense and so much feeling for words, that he felt +bound to write to him. No one is more anxious to +improve himself than he and he hopes he is still +capable of learning. He does not want to be a bore, +but if the critic has nothing to do on Wednesday +or Friday will he come and lunch at the Savoy and +tell him why exactly he thought his book so bad? +No one can order a lunch better than Roy, and generally +by the time the critic has eaten half a dozen +oysters and a cut from a saddle of baby lamb, he +has eaten his words too. It is only poetic justice +that when Roy’s next novel comes out the critic +should see in the new work a very great advance.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>One of the difficulties that a man has to cope with +as he goes through life is what to do about the persons +with whom he has once been intimate and whose +interest for him has in due course subsided. If both +parties remain in a modest station the break comes +about naturally, and no ill feeling subsists, but if +one of them achieves eminence the position is awkward. +He makes a multitude of new friends, but the +old ones are inexorable; he has a thousand claims on +his time, but they feel that they have the first right +to it. Unless he is at their beck and call they sigh +and with a shrug of the shoulders say:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Ah, well, I suppose you’re like everyone else. I +must expect to be dropped now that you’re a success.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>That of course is what he would like to do if he +had the courage. For the most part he hasn’t. He +weakly accepts an invitation to supper on Sunday +evening. The cold roast beef is frozen and comes +from Australia and was over-cooked at middle day; +and the burgundy—ah, why will they call it burgundy? +Have they never been to Beaune and stayed at the +Hôtel de la Poste? Of course it is grand to talk of the +good old days when you shared a crust of bread in a +garret together, but it is a little disconcerting when +you reflect how near to a garret is the room you are +sitting in. You feel ill at ease when your friend tells +you that his books don’t sell and that he can’t place +his short stories; the managers won’t even read his +plays, and when he compares them with some of the +stuff that’s put on (here he fixes you with an accusing +eye) it really does seem a bit hard. You are embarrassed +and you look away. You exaggerate the +failures you have had in order that he may realize +that life has its hardships for you too. You refer to +your work in the most disparaging way you can and +are a trifle taken aback to find that your host’s opinion +of it is the same as yours. You speak of the fickleness +of the public so that he may comfort himself by +thinking that your popularity cannot last. He is a +friendly but severe critic.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I haven’t read your last book,” he says, “but I +read the one before. I’ve forgotten its name.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>You tell him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was rather disappointed in it. I didn’t think +it was quite so good as some of the things you’ve +done. Of course you know which my favourite is.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And you, having suffered from other hands than +his, answer at once with the name of the first book +you ever wrote; you were twenty then, and it was +crude and ingenuous, and on every page was written +your inexperience.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’ll never do anything so good as that,” he +says heartily, and you feel that your whole career +has been a long decadence from that one happy hit. +“I always think you’ve never <span class='it'>quite</span> fulfilled the promise +you showed then.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The gas fire roasts your feet, but your hands are +icy. You look at your wrist watch surreptitiously and +wonder whether your old friend would think it offensive +if you took your leave as early as ten. You have +told your car to wait round the corner so that it +should not stand outside the door and by its magnificence +affront his poverty, but at the door he says:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’ll find a bus at the bottom of the street. I’ll +just walk down with you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Panic seizes you and you confess that you have +a car. He finds it very odd that the chauffeur should +wait round the corner. You answer that this is one +of his idiosyncrasies. When you reach it your friend +looks at it with tolerant superiority. You nervously +ask him to dinner with you one day. You promise to +write to him and you drive away wondering whether +when he comes he will think you are swanking if you +ask him to Claridge’s or mean if you suggest Soho.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy Kear suffered from none of these tribulations. +It sounds a little brutal to say that when he +had got all he could out of people he dropped them; +but it would take so long to put the matter more +delicately, and would need so subtle an adjustment +of hints, half-tones, and allusions, playful or tender, +that such being at bottom the fact, I think it as well +to leave it at that. Most of us when we do a caddish +thing harbour resentment against the person we have +done it to, but Roy’s heart, always in the right place, +never permitted him such pettiness. He could use +a man very shabbily without afterward bearing him +the slightest ill-will.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Poor old Smith,” he would say. “He is a dear; +I’m so fond of him. Pity he’s growing so bitter. I +wish one could do something for him. No, I haven t +seen him for years. It’s no good trying to keep up +old friendships. It’s painful for both sides. The fact +is, one grows out of people, and the only thing is +to face it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But if he ran across Smith at some gathering like +the private view of the Royal Academy no one could +be more cordial. He wrung his hand and told him +how delighted he was to see him. His face beamed. +He shed good fellowship as the kindly sun its rays. +Smith rejoiced in the glow of this wonderful vitality +and it was damned decent of Roy to say he’d give +his eye-teeth to have written a book half as good as +Smith’s last. On the other hand, if Roy thought +Smith had not seen him, he looked the other way; +but Smith <span class='it'>had</span> seen him, and Smith resented being cut. +Smith was very acid. He said that in the old days Roy +had been glad enough to share a steak with him in a +shabby restaurant and spend a month’s holiday in a +fisherman’s cottage at St. Ives. Smith said that Roy +was a time server. He said he was a snob. He said +he was a humbug.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Smith was wrong here. The most shining characteristic +of Alroy Kear was his sincerity. No one can +be a humbug for five-and-twenty years. Hypocrisy is +the most difficult and nerve-racking vice that any +man can pursue; it needs an unceasing vigilance and +a rare detachment of spirit. It cannot, like adultery +or gluttony, be practised at spare moments; it is a +whole-time job. It needs also a cynical humour; +although Roy laughed so much I never thought he +had a very quick sense of humour, and I am quite sure +that he was incapable of cynicism. Though I have +finished few of his novels, I have begun a good many, +and to my mind his sincerity is stamped on every one +of their multitudinous pages. This is clearly the chief +ground of his stable popularity. Roy has always sincerely +believed what everyone else believed at the +moment. When he wrote novels about the aristocracy +he sincerely believed that its members were dissipated +and immoral, and yet had a certain nobility +and an innate aptitude for governing the British +Empire; when later he wrote of the middle classes +he sincerely believed that they were the backbone +of the country. His villains have always been villainous, +his heroes heroic, and his maidens chaste.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When Roy asked the author of a flattering review +to lunch it was because he was sincerely grateful to +him for his good opinion, and when he asked the +author of an unflattering one it was because he was +sincerely concerned to improve himself. When unknown +admirers from Texas or western Australia +came to London it was not only to cultivate his public +that he took them to the National Gallery, it was +because he was sincerely anxious to observe their +reactions to art. You had only to hear him lecture to +be convinced of his sincerity.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When he stood on the platform, in evening dress +admirably worn, or in a loose, much used but perfectly +cut, lounge suit if it better fitted the occasion, +and faced his audience seriously, frankly, but with +an engaging diffidence you could not but realize that +he was giving himself up to his task with complete +earnestness. Though now and then he pretended to +be at a loss for a word, it was only to make it more +effective when he uttered it. His voice was full and +manly. He told a story well. He was never dull. He +was fond of lecturing upon the younger writers of +England and America, and he explained their merits +to his audience with an enthusiasm that attested his +generosity. Perhaps he told almost too much, for +when you had heard his lecture you felt that you +really knew all you wanted to about them and it was +quite unnecessary to read their books. I suppose that +is why when Roy had lectured in some provincial +town not a single copy of the books of the authors +he had spoken of was ever asked for, but there was +always a run on his own. His energy was prodigious. +Not only did he make successful tours of the United +States, but he lectured up and down Great Britain. +No club was so small, no society for the self-improvement +of its members so insignificant, that +Roy disdained to give it an hour of his time. Now +and then he revised his lectures and issued them in +neat little books. Most people who are interested in +these things have at least looked through the works +entitled <span class='it'>Modern Novelists</span>, <span class='it'>Russian Fiction</span>, and +<span class='it'>Some Writers</span>; and few can deny that they exhibit a +real feeling for literature and a charming personality.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But this by no means exhausted his activities. He +was an active member of the organizations that have +been founded to further the interests of authors or +to alleviate their hard lot when sickness or old age +has brought them to penury. He was always willing +to give his help when matters of copyright were the +subject of legislation and he was never unprepared to +take his place in those missions to a foreign country +which are devised to establish amicable relations between +writers of different nationalities. He could +be counted on to reply for literature at a public +dinner and he was invariably on the reception committee +formed to give a proper welcome to a literary +celebrity from overseas. No bazaar lacked an autographed +copy of at least one of his books. He never +refused to grant an interview. He justly said that +no one knew better than he the hardships of the +author’s trade and if he could help a struggling journalist +to earn a few guineas by having a pleasant +chat with him he had not the inhumanity to refuse. +He generally asked his interviewer to luncheon and +seldom failed to make a good impression on him. +The only stipulation he made was that he should +see the article before it was published. He was never +impatient with the persons who call up the celebrated +on the telephone at inconvenient moments to +ask them for the information of newspaper readers +whether they believe in God or what they eat for +breakfast. He figured in every symposium and the +public knew what he thought of prohibition, vegetarianism, +jazz, garlic, exercise, marriage, politics, +and the place of women in the home.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>His views on marriage were abstract, for he had +successfully evaded the state which so many artists +have found difficult to reconcile with the arduous +pursuit of their calling. It was generally known that +he had for some years cherished a hopeless passion +for a married woman of rank, and though he never +spoke of her but with chivalrous admiration, it was +understood that she had treated him with harshness. +The novels of his middle period reflected in their unwonted +bitterness the strain to which he had been +put. The anguish of spirit he had passed through +then enabled him without offense to elude the advances +of ladies of little reputation, frayed ornaments +of a hectic circle, who were willing to exchange an +uncertain present for the security of marriage with +a successful novelist. When he saw in their bright +eyes the shadow of the registry office he told them +that the memory of his one great love would always +prevent him from forming any permanent tie. His +quixotry might exasperate, but could not affront +them. He sighed a little when he reflected that he +must be for ever denied the joys of domesticity and +the satisfaction of parenthood, but it was a sacrifice +that he was prepared to make not only to his ideal, +but also to the possible partner of his joys. He had +noticed that people really do not want to be bothered +with the wives of authors and painters. The +artist who insisted on taking his wife wherever he +went only made himself a nuisance and indeed was +in consequence often not asked to places he would +have liked to go to; and if he left his wife at home, +he was on his return exposed to recriminations that +shattered the repose so essential for him to do the +best that was in him. Alroy Kear was a bachelor and +now at fifty was likely to remain one.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He was an example of what an author can do, and +to what heights he can rise, by industry, common-sense, +honesty, and the efficient combination of means +and ends. He was a good fellow and none but a cross-grained +carper could grudge him his success. I felt +that to fall asleep with his image in my mind would +insure me a good night. I scribbled a note to Miss +Fellows, knocked the ashes out of my pipe, put out +the light in my sitting room, and went to bed.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">II</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>When</span> I rang for my letters and the papers next +morning a message was delivered to me, in answer +to my note to Miss Fellows, that Mr. Alroy Kear +expected me at one-fifteen at his club in St. James’s +Street; so a little before one I strolled round to my +own and had the cocktail, which I was pretty sure +Roy would not offer me. Then I walked down St. +James’s Street, looking idly at the shop windows, and +since I had still a few minutes to spare (I did not +want to keep my appointment too punctually) I +went into Christie’s to see if there was anything I +liked the look of. The auction had already begun +and a group of dark, small men were passing round +to one another pieces of Victorian silver, while the +auctioneer, following their gestures with bored eyes, +muttered in a drone: “Ten shillings offered, eleven, +eleven and six” . . . It was a fine day, early in June, +and the air in King Street was bright. It made the +pictures on the walls of Christie’s look very dingy. +I went out. The people in the street walked with a +kind of nonchalance, as though the ease of the day +had entered into their souls and in the midst of their +affairs they had a sudden and surprised inclination to +stop and look at the picture of life.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy’s club was sedate. In the ante-chamber were +only an ancient porter and a page; and I had a sudden +and melancholy feeling that the members were all +attending the funeral of the head waiter. The page, +when I had uttered Roy’s name, led me into an +empty passage to leave my hat and stick and then +into an empty hall hung with life-sized portraits of +Victorian statesmen. Roy got up from a leather sofa +and warmly greeted me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Shall we go straight up?” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was right in thinking that he would not offer me +a cocktail and I commended my prudence. He led me +up a noble flight of heavily carpeted stairs, and we +passed nobody on the way; we entered the strangers’ +dining room, and we were its only occupants. It was +a room of some size, very clean and white, with an +Adam window. We sat down by it and a demure +waiter handed us the bill of fare. Beef, mutton and +lamb, cold salmon, apple tart, rhubarb tart, gooseberry +tart. As my eye travelled down the inevitable +list I sighed as I thought of the restaurants round +the corner where there was French cooking, the +clatter of life, and pretty painted women in summer +frocks.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I can recommend the veal-and-ham pie,” said Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll mix the salad myself,” he told the waiter in +an off-hand and yet commanding way, and then, casting +his eye once more on the bill of fare, generously: +“And what about some asparagus to follow?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That would be very nice.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>His manner grew a trifle grander.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Asparagus for two and tell the chef to choose +them himself. Now what would you like to drink? +What do you say to a bottle of hock? We rather +fancy our hock here.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I had agreed to this he told the waiter to +call the wine steward. I could not but admire the +authoritative and yet perfectly polite manner in which +he gave his orders. You felt that thus would a well-bred +king send for one of his field marshals. The wine +steward, portly in black, with the silver chain of his +office round his neck, bustled in with the wine list +in his hand. Roy nodded to him with curt familiarity.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Hulloa, Armstrong, we want some of the Liebfraumilch, +the ’21.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Very good, sir.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How’s it holding up? Pretty well? We shan’t +be able to get any more of it, you know.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m afraid not, sir.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, it’s no good meeting trouble halfway, is it, +Armstrong?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy smiled at the steward with breezy cordiality. +The steward saw from his long experience of members +that the remark needed an answer.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, sir.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy laughed and his eye sought mine. Quite a +character, Armstrong.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, chill it, Armstrong; not too much, you +know, but just right. I want my guest to see that we +know what’s what here.” He turned to me. “Armstrong’s +been with us for eight and forty years.” +And when the wine steward had left us: “I hope you +don’t mind coming here. It’s quiet and we can have +a good talk. It’s ages since we did. You’re looking +very fit.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>This drew my attention to Roy’s appearance.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not half so fit as you,” I answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The result of an upright, sober, and godly life,” +he laughed. “Plenty of work. Plenty of exercise. +How’s the golf? We must have a game one of these +days.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I knew that Roy was scratch and that nothing +would please him less than to waste a day with so +indifferent a player as myself. But I felt I was quite +safe in accepting so vague an invitation. He looked +the picture of health. His curly hair was getting very +gray, but it suited him and made his frank, sunburned +face look younger. His eyes, which looked +upon the world with such a hearty candour, were +bright and clear. He was not so slim as in his youth +and I was not surprised that when the waiter offered +us rolls he asked for Rye-Vita. His slight corpulence +only added to his dignity. It gave weight to his observations. +Because his movements were a little more +deliberate than they had been you had a comfortable +feeling of confidence in him; he filled his chair +with so much solidity that you had almost the impression +that he sat upon a monument.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I do not know whether, as I wished, I have indicated +by my report of his dialogue with the waiter +that his conversation was not as a rule brilliant or +witty, but it was easy and he laughed so much that +you sometimes had the illusion that what he said +was funny. He was never at a loss for a remark +and he could discourse on the topics of the day with +an ease that prevented his hearers from experiencing +any sense of strain.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Many authors from their preoccupation with words +have the bad habit of choosing those they use in conversation +too carefully. They form their sentences +with unconscious care and say neither more nor less +than they mean. It makes intercourse with them somewhat +formidable to persons in the upper ranks of +society whose vocabulary is limited by their simple +spiritual needs, and their company consequently is +sought only with hesitation. No constraint of this sort +was ever felt with Roy. He could talk with a dancing +guardee in terms that were perfectly comprehensible +to him and with a racing countess in the language of +her stable boys. They said of him with enthusiasm +and relief that he was not a bit like an author. No +compliment pleased him better. The wise always use +a number of ready-made phrases (at the moment I +write “nobody’s business” is the most common), popular +adjectives (like “divine” or “shy-making”), +verbs that you only know the meaning of if you live +in the right set (like “dunch”), which give ease and +a homely sparkle to small talk and avoid the necessity +of thought. The Americans, who are the most efficient +people on the earth, have carried this device +to such a height of perfection and have invented +so wide a range of pithy and hackneyed phrases +that they can carry on an amusing and animated conversation +without giving a moment’s reflection to +what they are saying and so leave their minds free +to consider the more important matters of big business +and fornication. Roy’s repertory was extensive +and his scent for the word of the minute unerring; it +peppered his speech, but aptly, and he used it each +time with a sort of bright eagerness, as though his +fertile brain had just minted it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Now he talked of this and that, of our common +friends and the latest books, of the opera. He was +very breezy. He was always cordial, but to-day his +cordiality took my breath away. He lamented that +we saw one another so seldom and told me with the +frankness that was one of his pleasantest characteristics +how much he liked me and what a high opinion +he had of me. I felt I must not fail to meet this +friendliness halfway. He asked me about the book +I was writing, I asked him about the book he was +writing. We told one another that neither of us had +had the success he deserved. We ate the veal-and-ham +pie and Roy told me how he mixed a salad. We drank +the hock and smacked appreciative lips.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And I wondered when he was coming to the point.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I could not bring myself to believe that at the +height of the London season Alroy Kear would +waste an hour on a fellow writer who was not a +reviewer and had no influence in any quarter whatever +in order to talk of Matisse, the Russian Ballet +and Marcel Proust. Besides, at the back of his gaiety +I vaguely felt a slight apprehension. Had I not +known that he was in a prosperous state I should +have suspected that he was going to borrow a hundred +pounds from me. It began to look as though luncheon +would end without his finding the opportunity to say +what he had in mind. I knew he was cautious. Perhaps +he thought that this meeting, the first after so +long a separation, had better be employed in establishing +friendly relations, and was prepared to look +upon the pleasant, substantial meal merely as ground +bait.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Shall we go and have our coffee in the next +room?” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“If you like.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think it’s more comfortable.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I followed him into another room, much more +spacious, with great leather armchairs and huge +sofas; there were papers and magazines on the +tables. Two old gentlemen in a corner were talking +in undertones. They gave us a hostile glance, but this +did not deter Roy from offering them a cordial +greeting.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Hullo, General,” he cried, nodding breezily.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I stood for a moment at the window, looking at +the gaiety of the day, and wished I knew more of +the historical associations of St. James’s Street. I +was ashamed that I did not even know the name of +the club across the way and was afraid to ask Roy +lest he should despise me for not knowing what every +decent person knew. He called me back by asking +me whether I would have a brandy with my coffee, +and when I refused, insisted. The club’s brandy was +famous. We sat side by side on a sofa by the elegant +fireplace and lit cigars.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The last time Edward Driffield ever came to +London he lunched with me here,” said Roy casually. +“I made the old man try our brandy and he +was delighted with it. I was staying with his widow +over last week-end.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Were you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She sent you all sorts of messages.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s very kind of her. I shouldn’t have thought +she remembered me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, yes, she does. You lunched there about six +years ago, didn’t you? She says the old man was so +glad to see you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I didn’t think <span class='it'>she</span> was.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, you’re quite wrong. Of course she had to be +very careful. The old man was pestered with people +who wanted to see him and she had to husband his +strength. She was always afraid he’d do too much. +It’s a wonderful thing if you come to think of it that +she should have kept him alive and in possession of +all his faculties to the age of eighty-four. I’ve been +seeing a good deal of her since he died. She’s awfully +lonely. After all, she devoted herself to looking after +him for twenty-five years. Othello’s occupation, you +know. I really feel sorry for her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’s still comparatively young. I dare say she’ll +marry again.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, no, she couldn’t do that. That would be +dreadful.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>There was a slight pause while we sipped our +brandy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You must be one of the few persons still alive +who knew Driffield when he was unknown. You saw +quite a lot of him at one time, didn’t you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“A certain amount. I was almost a small boy and +he was a middle-aged man. We weren’t boon companions, +you know.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Perhaps not, but you must know a great deal +about him that other people don’t.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose I do.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Have you ever thought of writing your recollections +of him?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good heavens, no!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you think you ought to? He was one of +the greatest novelists of our day. The last of the +Victorians. He was an enormous figure. His novels +have as good a chance of surviving as any that have +been written in the last hundred years.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wonder. I’ve always thought them rather boring.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy looked at me with eyes twinkling with laughter.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How like you that is! Anyhow you must admit +that you’re in the minority. I don’t mind telling you +that I’ve read his novels not once or twice, but half +a dozen times, and every time I read them I think +they’re finer. Did you read the articles that were +written about him at his death?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Some of them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The consensus of opinion was absolutely amazing. I read every one.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“If they all said the same thing, wasn’t that rather +unnecessary?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy shrugged his massive shoulders good-humouredly, but did not answer my +question.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I thought the <span class='it'>Times Lit. Sup.</span> was splendid. It +would have done the old man good to read it. I hear +that the quarterlies are going to have articles in their +next numbers.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I still think his novels rather boring.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy smiled indulgently.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Doesn’t it make you slightly uneasy to think that +you disagree with everyone whose opinion matters?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not particularly. I’ve been writing for thirty-five +years now, and you can’t think how many geniuses +I’ve seen acclaimed, enjoy their hour or two of glory, +and vanish into obscurity. I wonder what’s happened +to them. Are they dead, are they shut up in madhouses, +are they hidden away in offices? I wonder if +they furtively lend their books to the doctor and the +maiden lady in some obscure village. I wonder if they +are still great men in some Italian pension.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, yes, they’re the flash in the pans. I’ve known +them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’ve even lectured about them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“One has to. One wants to give them a leg up if +one can and one knows they won’t amount to anything. +Hang it all, one can afford to be generous. +But after all, Driffield wasn’t anything like that. The +collected edition of his works is in thirty-seven volumes +and the last set that came up at Sotheby’s sold +for seventy-eight pounds. That speaks for itself. His +sales have increased steadily every year and last year +was the best he ever had. You can take my word for +that. Mrs. Driffield showed me his accounts last time +I was down there. Driffield has come to stay all right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Who can tell?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, you think you can,” replied Roy acidly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was not put out. I knew I was irritating him +and it gave me a pleasant sensation.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think the instinctive judgments I formed when +I was a boy were right. They told me Carlyle was a +great writer and I was ashamed that I found the +<span class='it'>French Revolution</span> and <span class='it'>Sartor Resartus</span> unreadable. +Can anyone read them now? I thought the opinions +of others must be better than mine and I persuaded +myself that I thought George Meredith magnificent. +In my heart I found him affected, verbose, and insincere. +A good many people think so too now. Because +they told me that to admire Walter Pater was +to prove myself a cultured young man, I admired +Walter Pater, but heavens how Marius bored me!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, well, I don’t suppose anyone reads Pater +now, and of course Meredith has gone all to pot +and Carlyle was a pretentious windbag.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You don’t know how secure of immortality they +all looked thirty years ago.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And have you never made mistakes?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“One or two. I didn’t think half as much of Newman +as I do now, and I thought a great deal more +of the tinkling quatrains of Fitzgerald. I could not +read Goethe’s <span class='it'>Wilhelm Meister</span>; now I think it his +masterpiece.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And what did you think much of then that you +think much of still?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, <span class='it'>Tristram Shandy</span> and <span class='it'>Amelia</span> and <span class='it'>Vanity +Fair</span>. <span class='it'>Madame Bovary</span>, <span class='it'>La Chartreuse de Parme</span>, +and <span class='it'>Anna Karenina</span>. And Wordsworth and Keats +and Verlaine.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“If you don’t mind my saying so, I don’t think +that’s particularly original.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t mind your saying so at all. I don’t think +it is. But you asked me why I believed in my own +judgment, and I was trying to explain to you that, +whatever I said out of timidity and in deference +to the cultured opinion of the day, I didn’t really +admire certain authors who were then thought admirable +and the event seems to show that I was +right. And what I honestly and instinctively liked +then has stood the test of time with me and with +critical opinion in general.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy was silent for a moment. He looked in the +bottom of his cup, but whether to see if there were +any more coffee in it or to find something to say, I +did not know. I gave the clock on the chimney-piece +a glance. In a minute it would be fitting for me to +take my leave. Perhaps I had been wrong and Roy +had invited me only that we might idly chat of +Shakespeare and the musical glasses. I chid myself +for the uncharitable thoughts I had had of him. I +looked at him with concern. If that was his only +object it must be that he was feeling tired or discouraged. +If he was disinterested it could only be +that for the moment at least the world was too much +for him. But he caught my look at the clock and +spoke.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t see how you can deny that there must be +something in a man who’s able to carry on for sixty +years, writing book after book, and who’s able to +hold an ever-increasing public. After all, at Ferne +Court there are shelves filled with the translations +of Driffield’s books into every language of civilized +people. Of course I’m willing to admit that a lot he +wrote seems a bit old-fashioned nowadays. He flourished +in a bad period and he was inclined to be long-winded. +Most of his plots are melodramatic; but +there’s one quality you must allow him: beauty.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes?” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“When all’s said and done, that’s the only thing +that counts and Driffield never wrote a page that +wasn’t instinct with beauty.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes?” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wish you’d been there when we went down to +present him with his portrait on his eightieth birthday. +It really was a memorable occasion.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I read about it in the papers.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It wasn’t only writers, you know, it was a thoroughly +representative gathering—science, politics, +business, art, the world; I think you’d have to go a +long way to find gathered together such a collection +of distinguished people as got out from that train +at Blackstable. It was awfully moving when the P.M. +presented the old man with the Order of Merit. He +made a charming speech. I don’t mind telling you +there were tears in a good many eyes that day.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did Driffield cry?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, he was singularly calm. He was like he +always was, rather shy, you know, and quiet, very +well-mannered, grateful, of course, but a little dry. +Mrs. Driffield didn’t want him to get overtired and +when we went into lunch he stayed in his study, and +she sent him something in on a tray. I slipped away +while the others were having their coffee. He was +smoking his pipe and looking at the portrait. I asked +him what he thought of it. He wouldn’t tell me, he +just smiled a little. He asked me if I thought he +could take his teeth out and I said, No, the deputation +would be coming in presently to say good-bye +to him. Then I asked him if he didn’t think it was a +wonderful moment. ‘Rum,’ he said, ‘very rum.’ The +fact is, I suppose, he was shattered. He was a messy +eater in his later days and a messy smoker—he scattered +the tobacco all over himself when he filled his +pipe; Mrs. Driffield didn’t like people to see him +when he was like that, but of course she didn’t mind +me; I tidied him up a bit and then they all came in +and shook hands with him, and we went back to +town.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I got up.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, I really must be going. It’s been awfully +nice seeing you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m just going along to the private view at the +Leicester Galleries. I know the people there. I’ll take +you in if you like.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s very kind of you, but they sent me a card. +No, I don’t think I’ll come.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We walked down the stairs and I got my hat. +When we came out into the street and I turned to +ward Piccadilly, Roy said:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll just walk up to the top with you.” He got +into step with me. “You knew his first wife, didn’t +you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Whose?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Driffield’s.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh!” I had forgotten him. “Yes.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Fairly.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose she was awful.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t recollect that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She must have been dreadfully common. She was +a barmaid, wasn’t she?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wonder why the devil he married her. I’ve +always been given to understand that she was extremely +unfaithful to him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Extremely.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Do you remember at all what she was like?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, very distinctly,” I smiled. “She was sweet.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy gave a short laugh.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s not the general impression.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not answer. We had reached Piccadilly, and +stopping I held out my hand to Roy. He shook it, +but I fancied without his usual heartiness. I had +the impression that he was disappointed with our +meeting. I could not imagine why. Whatever he had +wanted of me I had not been able to do, for the +reason that he had given me no inkling of what it +was, and as I strolled under the arcade of the Ritz +Hotel and along the park railings till I came opposite +Half Moon Street I wondered if my manner +had been more than ordinarily forbidding. It was +quite evident that Roy had felt the moment inopportune +to ask me to grant him a favour.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I walked up Half Moon Street. After the gay +tumult of Piccadilly it had a pleasant silence. It was +sedate and respectable. Most of the houses let +apartments, but this was not advertised by the vulgarity +of a card; some had a brightly polished brass +plate, like a doctor’s, to announce the fact and others +the word <span class='it'>Apartments</span> neatly painted on the fanlight. +One or two with an added discretion merely gave +the name of the proprietor, so that if you were +ignorant you might have thought it a tailor’s or a +money lender’s. There was none of the congested +traffic of Jermyn Street, where also they let rooms, +but here and there a smart car, unattended, stood +outside a door and occasionally at another a taxi +deposited a middle-aged lady. You had the feeling +that the people who lodged here were not gay and +a trifle disreputable as in Jermyn Street, racing men +who rose in the morning with headaches and asked +for a hair of the dog that bit them, but respectable +women from the country who came up for six weeks +for the London season and elderly gentlemen who +belonged to exclusive clubs. You felt that they came +year after year to the same house and perhaps had +known the proprietor when he was still in private +service. My own Miss Fellows had been cook in +some very good places, but you would never have +guessed it had you seen her walking along to do her +shopping in Shepherd’s Market. She was not stout, +red-faced, and blousy as one expects a cook to be; +she was spare and very upright, neatly but fashionably +dressed, a woman of middle age, with determined +features; her lips were rouged and she +wore an eyeglass. She was businesslike, quiet, coolly +cynical, and very expensive.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The rooms I occupied were on the ground floor. +The parlour was papered with an old marbled paper +and on the walls were water colours of romantic +scenes, cavaliers bidding good-bye to their ladies and +knights of old banqueting in stately halls; there +were large ferns in pots, and the armchairs were +covered with faded leather. There was about the +room an amusing air of the eighteen eighties, and +when I looked out of the window I expected to see +a private hansom rather than a Chrysler. The curtains +were of a heavy red rep.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">III</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I had</span> a good deal to do that afternoon, but my +conversation with Roy and the impression of the day +before yesterday, the sense of a past that still dwelt +in the minds of men not yet old, that my room, I +could not tell why, had given me even more strongly +than usual as I entered it, inveigled my thoughts to +saunter down the road of memory. It was as though +all the people who had at one time and another inhabited +my lodging pressed upon me with their old-fashioned +ways and odd clothes, men with muttonchop +whiskers in frock coats and women in bustles +and flounced skirts. The rumble of London, which I +did not know if I imagined or heard (my house was +at the top of Half Moon Street), and the beauty +of the sunny June day (<span class='it'>le vierge, le vivace et le bel +aujourd’hui</span>), gave my reverie a poignancy which +was not quite painful. The past I looked at seemed +to have lost its reality and I saw it as though it +were a scene in a play and I a spectator in the back +row of a dark gallery. But it was all very clear as +far as it went. It was not misty like life as one leads +it when the ceaseless throng of impressions seems to +rob them of outline, but sharp and definite like a +landscape painted in oils by a painstaking artist of +the middle-Victorian era.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I fancy that life is more amusing now than it was +forty years ago and I have a notion that people are +more amiable. They may have been worthier then, +possessed of more solid virtue as, I am told, they +were possessed of more substantial knowledge; I do +not know. I know they were more cantankerous; +they ate too much, many of them drank too much, +they took too little exercise. Their livers were out +of order and their digestions often impaired. They +were irritable. I do not speak of London of which +I knew nothing till I was grown up, nor of grand +people who hunted and shot, but of the countryside +and of the modest persons, gentlemen of small +means, clergymen, retired officers, and such like +who made up the local society. The dullness of their +lives was almost incredible. There were no golf +links; at a few houses was an ill-kept tennis court, +but it was only the very young who played; there was +a dance once a year in the Assembly Rooms; carriage +folk went for a drive in the afternoon; the +others went for a “constitutional!” You may say +that they did not miss amusements they had never +thought of, and that they created excitement for +themselves from the small entertainment (tea when +you were asked to bring your music and you sang +the songs of Maude Valérie White and Tosti) which +at infrequent intervals they offered one another; the +days were very long; they were bored. People who +were condemned to spend their lives within a mile of +one another quarrelled bitterly, and seeing each +other every day in the town cut one another for +twenty years. They were vain, pig-headed, and odd. +It was a life that perhaps formed queer characters; +people were not so like one another as now and they +acquired a small celebrity by their idiosyncrasies, but +they were not easy to get on with. It may be that we +are flippant and careless, but we accept one another +without the old suspicion; our manners, rough and +ready, are kindly; we are more prepared to give and +take and we are not so crabbed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I lived with an uncle and aunt on the outskirts of +a little Kentish town by the sea. It was called Blackstable +and my uncle was the vicar. My aunt was a +German. She came of a very noble but impoverished +family, and the only portion she brought her husband +was a marquetry writing desk, made for an ancestor +in the Seventeenth Century, and a set of tumblers. +Of these only a few remained when I entered upon +the scene and they were used as ornaments in the +drawing room. I liked the grand coat-of-arms with +which they were heavily engraved. There were I +don’t know how many quarterings, which my aunt +used demurely to explain to me, and the supporters +were fine and the crest emerging from a crown incredibly +romantic. She was a simple old lady, of a +meek and Christian disposition, but she had not, +though married for more than thirty years to a +modest parson with very little income beyond his +stipend, forgotten that she was <span class='it'>hochwohlgeboren</span>. +When a rich banker from London, with a name that +in these days is famous in financial circles, took a +neighbouring house for the summer holidays, though +my uncle called on him (chiefly, I surmise, to get a +subscription to the Additional Curates Society), she +refused to do so because he was in trade. No one +thought her a snob. It was accepted as perfectly +reasonable. The banker had a little boy of my own +age, and, I forget how, I became acquainted with +him. I still remember the discussion that ensued +when I asked if I might bring him to the vicarage; +permission was reluctantly given me, but I was not +allowed to go in return to his house. My aunt said +I’d be wanting to go to the coal merchant’s next, and +my uncle said:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Evil communications corrupt good manners.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The banker used to come to church every Sunday +morning, and he always put half a sovereign in the +plate, but if he thought his generosity made a good +impression he was much mistaken. All Blackstable +knew, but only thought him purse-proud.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Blackstable consisted of a long winding street that +led to the sea, with little two-story houses, many of +them residential but with a good many shops; and +from this ran a certain number of short streets, recently +built, that ended on one side in the country +and on the other in the marshes. Round about the +harbour was a congeries of narrow winding alleys. +Colliers brought coal from Newcastle to Blackstable +and the harbour was animated. When I was old +enough to be allowed out by myself I used to spend +hours wandering about there looking at the rough +grimy men in their jerseys and watching the coal +being unloaded.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was at Blackstable that I first met Edward +Driffield. I was fifteen and had just come back from +school for the summer holidays. The morning after +I got home I took a towel and bathing drawers and +went down to the beach. The sky was unclouded and +the air hot and bright, but the North Sea gave +it a pleasant tang so that it was a delight just to +live and breathe. In winter the natives of Blackstable +walked down the empty street with a hurried +gait, screwing themselves up in order to expose as +little surface as possible to the bitterness of the +east wind, but now they dawdled; they stood about +in groups in the space between the Duke of Kent and +the Bear and Key. You heard a hum of their East +Anglian speech, drawling a little with an accent that +may be ugly, but in which from old association I still +find a leisurely charm. They were fresh-complexioned, +with blue eyes and high cheek bones, and their hair +was light. They had a clean, honest, and ingenuous +look. I do not think they were very intelligent, but +they were guileless. They looked healthy, and though +not tall for the most part were strong and active. +There was little wheeled traffic in Blackstable in +those days and the groups that stood about the road +chatting seldom had to move for anything but the +doctor’s dogcart or the baker’s trap.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Passing the bank, I called in to say how-do-you-do +to the manager, who was my uncle’s churchwarden, +and when I came out met my uncle’s curate. He +stopped and shook hands with me. He was walking +with a stranger. He did not introduce me to him. He +was a smallish man with a beard and he was dressed +rather loudly in a bright brown knickerbocker suit, the +breeches very tight, with navy blue stockings, black +boots, and a billycock hat. Knickerbockers were uncommon +then, at least in Blackstable, and being young +and fresh from school I immediately set the fellow +down as a cad. But while I chatted with the curate +he looked at me in a friendly way, with a smile in his +pale blue eyes. I felt that for two pins he would have +joined in the conversation and I assumed a haughty +demeanour. I was not going to run the risk of being +spoken to by a chap who wore knickerbockers like a +gamekeeper and I resented the familiarity of his good-humoured +expression. I was myself faultlessly dressed +in white flannel trousers, a blue blazer with the arms +of my school on the breast pocket, and a black-and-white +straw hat with a very wide brim. The curate +said that he must be getting on (fortunately, for I +never knew how to break away from a meeting in the +street and would endure agonies of shyness while I +looked in vain for an opportunity), but said that he +would be coming up to the vicarage that afternoon +and would I tell my uncle. The stranger nodded and +smiled as we parted, but I gave him a stony stare. +I supposed he was a summer visitor and in Blackstable +we did not mix with the summer visitors. We +thought London people vulgar. We said it was +horrid to have all that rag-tag and bobtail down +from town every year, but of course it was all right +for the tradespeople. Even they, however, gave a +faint sigh of relief when September came to an end +and Blackstable sank back into its usual peace.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I went home to dinner, my hair insufficiently +dried and clinging lankily to my head, I remarked +that I had met the curate and he was coming up that +afternoon.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Old Mrs. Shepherd died last night,” said my +uncle in explanation.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The curate’s name was Galloway; he was a tall +thin ungainly man with untidy black hair and a small +sallow dark face. I suppose he was quite young, but +to me he seemed middle-aged. He talked very quickly +and gesticulated a great deal. This made people +think him rather queer and my uncle would not have +kept him but that he was very energetic, and my +uncle, being extremely lazy, was glad to have someone +to take so much work off his shoulders. After +he had finished the business that had brought him +to the vicarage Mr. Galloway came in to say how-do-you-do +to my aunt and she asked him to stay +to tea.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Who was that you were with this morning?” I +asked him as he sat down.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, that was Edward Driffield. I didn’t introduce +him. I wasn’t sure if your uncle would wish you to +know him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think it would be most undesirable,” said my +uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why, who is he? He’s not a Blackstable man, +is he?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He was born in the parish,” said my uncle. “His +father was old Miss Wolfe’s bailiff at Ferne Court. +But they were chapel people.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He married a Blackstable girl,” said Mr. Galloway.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“In church, I believe,” said my aunt. “Is it true +that she was a barmaid at the Railway Arms?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She looks as if she might have been something +like that,” said Mr. Galloway, with a smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Are they going to stay long?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, I think so. They’ve taken one of those houses +in that street where the Congregational chapel is,” +said the curate.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>At that time in Blackstable, though the new +streets doubtless had names, nobody knew or used +them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Is he coming to church?” asked my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I haven’t actually talked to him about it yet,” +answered Mr. Galloway. “He’s quite an educated +man, you know.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I can hardly believe that,” said my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He was at Haversham School, I understand, and +he got any number of scholarships and prizes. He +got a scholarship at Wadham, but he ran away to +sea instead.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’d heard he was rather a harum-scarum,” said +my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He doesn’t look much like a sailor,” I remarked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, he gave up the sea many years ago. He’s been +all sorts of things since then.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Jack of all trades and master of none,” said +my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Now, I understand, he’s a writer.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That won’t last long,” said my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had never known a writer before; I was interested.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What does he write?” I asked. “Books?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I believe so,” said the curate, “and articles. He +had a novel published last spring. He’s promised to +lend it me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wouldn’t waste my time on rubbish in your +place,” said my uncle, who never read anything but +the <span class='it'>Times</span> and the <span class='it'>Guardian</span>.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What’s it called?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He told me the title, but I forget it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Anyhow, it’s quite unnecessary that you should +know,” said my uncle. “I should very much object +to your reading trashy novels. During your holidays +the best thing you can do is to keep out in the open +air. And you have a holiday task, I presume?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had. It was <span class='it'>Ivanhoe</span>. I had read it when I was +ten, and the notion of reading it again and writing +an essay on it bored me to distraction.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I consider the greatness that Edward Driffield +afterward achieved I cannot but smile as I remember +the fashion in which he was discussed at my +uncle’s table. When he died a little while ago and an +agitation arose among his admirers to have him +buried in Westminster Abbey the present incumbent +at Blackstable, my uncle’s successor twice removed, +wrote to the <span class='it'>Daily Mail</span> pointing out that Driffield +was born in the parish and not only had passed long +years, especially the last twenty-five of his life, in the +neighbourhood, but had laid there the scene of some +of his most famous books; it was only becoming then +that his bones should rest in the churchyard where +under the Kentish elms his father and mother dwelt +in peace. There was relief in Blackstable when, the +Dean of Westminster having somewhat curtly refused +the Abbey, Mrs. Driffield sent a dignified letter +to the press in which she expressed her confidence +that she was carrying out the dearest wishes of her +dead husband in having him buried among the simple +people he knew and loved so well. Unless the notabilities +of Blackstable have very much changed since +my day I do not believe they very much liked that +phrase about “simple people,” but, as I afterward +learnt, they had never been able to “abide” the second +Mrs. Driffield.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">IV</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>To my</span> surprise, two or three days after I lunched +with Alroy Kear I received a letter from Edward +Driffield’s widow. It ran as follows:</p> + +<div class='blockquote100percent'> + +<p class='hang'><span class='sc'>Dear Friend</span>,<br/> +<span class='it'>I hear that you had a long talk with Roy last week +about Edward Driffield and I am so glad to know that +you spoke of him so nicely. He often talked to me of +you. He had the greatest admiration for your talent and +he was so very pleased to see you when you came to lunch +with us. I wonder if you have in your possession any +letters that he wrote to you and if so whether you would +let me have copies of them. I should be very pleased if +I could persuade you to come down for two or three +days and stay with me. I live very quietly now and have +no one here, so please choose your own time. I shall be +delighted to see you again and have a talk of old times. +I have a particular service I want you to do me and I +am sure that for the sake of my dear dead husband you +will not refuse.</span></p> + +<p class='line0' style='text-align:right;margin-right:2em;'><span class='it'>Yours ever sincerely</span>,</p> +<p class='line0' style='text-align:right;margin-right:1em;'><span class='sc'>Amy Driffield</span>.</p> + +</div> + +<p class='pindent'>I had seen Mrs. Driffield only once and she but +mildly interested me; I do not like being addressed as +“dear friend”; that alone would have been enough to +make me decline her invitation; and I was exasperated +by its general character which, however ingenious +an excuse I invented, made the reason I did not +go quite obvious, namely, that I did not want to. I +had no letters of Driffield’s. I suppose years ago he +had written to me several times, brief notes, but he +was then an obscure scribbler and even if I ever kept +letters it would never have occurred to me to keep +his. How was I to know that he was going to be +acclaimed as the greatest novelist of our day? I hesitated +only because Mrs. Driffield said she wanted me +to do something for her. It would certainly be a +nuisance, but it would be churlish not to do it if I +could, and after all her husband was a very distinguished man.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The letter came by the first post and after breakfast +I rang up Roy. As soon as I mentioned my name +I was put through to him by his secretary. If I were +writing a detective story I should immediately have +suspected that my call was awaited, and Roy’s virile +voice calling hullo would have confirmed my suspicion. +No one could naturally be quite so cheery so +early in the morning.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I hope I didn’t wake you,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good God, no.” His healthy laugh rippled along +the wires. “I’ve been up since seven. I’ve been riding +in the park. I’m just going to have breakfast. Come +along and have it with me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I have a great affection for you, Roy,” I answered, +“but I don’t think you’re the sort of person I’d care +to have breakfast with. Besides, I’ve already had +mine. Look here, I’ve just had a letter from Mrs. +Driffield asking me to go down and stay.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, she told me she was going to ask you. We +might go down together. She’s got quite a good +grass court and she does one very well. I think you’d +like it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What is it that she wants me to do?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Ah, I think she’d like to tell you that herself.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>There was a softness in Roy’s voice such as I +imagined he would use if he were telling a prospective +father that his wife was about to gratify his wishes. +It cut no ice with me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Come off it, Roy,” I said. “I’m too old a bird +to be caught with chaff. Spit it out.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>There was a moment’s pause at the other end of +the telephone. I felt that Roy did not like my expression.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Are you busy this morning?” he asked suddenly. +“I’d like to come and see you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right, come on. I shall be in till one.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll be round in about an hour.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I replaced the receiver and relit my pipe. I gave +Mrs. Driffield’s letter a second glance.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I remembered vividly the luncheon to which she +referred. I happened to be staying for a long week-end +not far from Tercanbury with a certain Lady +Hodmarsh, the clever and handsome American wife +of a sporting baronet with no intelligence and charming +manners. Perhaps to relieve the tedium of domestic +life she was in the habit of entertaining persons +connected with the arts. Her parties were mixed and +gay. Members of the nobility and gentry mingled +with astonishment and an uneasy awe with painters, +writers, and actors. Lady Hodmarsh neither read the +books nor looked at the pictures of the people to +whom she offered hospitality, but she liked their company +and enjoyed the feeling it gave her of being in the +artistic know. When on this occasion the conversation +happened to dwell for a moment on Edward Driffield, +her most celebrated neighbour, and I mentioned +that I had at one time known him very well +she proposed that we should go over and lunch with +him on Monday when a number of her guests were +going back to London. I demurred, for I had not +seen Driffield for five and thirty years and I could +not believe that he would remember me; and if he +did (though this I kept to myself) I could not believe +that it would be with pleasure. But there was +a young peer there, a certain Lord Scallion, with +literary inclinations so violent that, instead of ruling +this country as the laws of man and nature have +decreed, he devoted his energy to the composition +of detective novels. His curiosity to see Driffield was +boundless and the moment Lady Hodmarsh made her +suggestion he said it would be too divine. The star +guest of the party was a big young fat duchess and +it appeared that her admiration for the celebrated +writer was so intense that she was prepared to cut +an engagement in London and not go up till the +afternoon.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That would make four of us,” said Lady Hodmarsh. +“I don’t think they could manage more than +that. I’ll wire to Mrs. Driffield at once.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I could not see myself going to see Driffield in +that company and tried to throw cold water on the +scheme.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’ll only bore him to death,” I said. “He’ll hate +having a lot of strangers barging in on him like this. +He’s a very old man.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s why if they want to see him they’d better +see him now. He can’t last much longer. Mrs. Driffield +says he likes to meet people. They never see +anybody but the doctor and the parson and it’s a +change for them. Mrs. Driffield said I could always +bring anyone interesting. Of course she has to be +very careful. He’s pestered by all sorts of people +who want to see him just out of idle curiosity, and +interviewers and authors who want him to read their +books, and silly hysterical women. But Mrs. Driffield +is wonderful. She keeps everyone away from +him but those she thinks he ought to see. I mean, +he’d be dead in a week if he saw everyone who wants +to see him. She has to think of his strength. Naturally +we’re different.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Of course I thought I was; but as I looked at them +I perceived that the duchess and Lord Scallion +thought they were too; so it seemed best to say no +more.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We drove over in a bright yellow Rolls. Ferne +Court was three miles from Blackstable. It was a +stucco house built, I suppose, about 1840, plain and +unpretentious, but substantial; it was the same back +and front, two large bows on each side of a flat +piece in which was the front door, and there were two +large bows on the first floor. A plain parapet hid the +low roof. It stood in about an acre of garden, somewhat +overgrown with trees, but neatly tended, and +from the drawing room window you had a pleasant +view of woods and green downland. The drawing +room was furnished so exactly as you felt a drawing +room in a country house of modest size should be +furnished that it was slightly disconcerting. Clean +bright chintzes covered the comfortable chairs and +the large sofa, and the curtains were of the same +bright clean chintz. On little Chippendale tables stood +large Oriental bowls filled with pot-pourri. On the +cream-coloured walls were pleasant water colours by +painters well known at the beginning of this century. +There were great masses of flowers charmingly +arranged, and on the grand piano in silver frames +photographs of celebrated actresses, deceased authors, +and minor royalties.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was no wonder that the duchess cried out that +it was a lovely room. It was just the kind of room +in which a distinguished writer should spend the +evening of his days. Mrs. Driffield received us with +modest assurance. She was a woman of about five +and forty, I judged, with a small sallow face and +neat, sharp features. She had a black cloche hat +pressed tight down on her head and wore a gray +coat and skirt. Her figure was slight and she was +neither tall nor short, and she looked trim, competent, +and alert. She might have been the squire’s +widowed daughter, who ran the parish and had a +peculiar gift for organization. She introduced us to +a clergyman and a lady, who got up as we were +shown in. They were the Vicar of Blackstable and +his wife. Lady Hodmarsh and the duchess immediately +assumed that cringing affability that persons +of rank assume with their inferiors in order to show +them that they are not for a moment aware that +there is any difference of station between them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then Edward Driffield came in. I had seen portraits +of him from time to time in the illustrated +papers but it was with dismay that I saw him in the +flesh. He was smaller than I remembered and very +thin, his head was barely covered with fine silvery +hair, he was clean-shaven, and his skin was almost +transparent. His blue eyes were very pale and the +rims of his eyelids red. He looked an old, old man, +hanging on to mortality by a thread; he wore very +white false teeth and they made his smile seem +forced and stiff. I had never seen him but bearded +and his lips were thin and pallid. He was dressed in +a new, well-cut suit of blue serge and his low collar, +two or three sizes too large for him, showed a +wrinkled, scraggy neck. He wore a neat black tie +with a pearl in it. He looked a little like a dean in +mufti on his summer holiday in Switzerland.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield gave him a quick glance as he came +in and smiled encouragingly; she must have been satisfied +with the neatness of his appearance. He shook +hands with his guests and to each one said something +civil. When he came to me he said:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s very good of a busy and successful man like +you to come all this way to see an old fogey.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was a trifle taken aback, for he spoke as though +he had never seen me before, and I was afraid my +friends would think I had been boasting when I +claimed at one time to have known him intimately. +I wondered if he had completely forgotten me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know how many years it is since we last +met,” I said, trying to be hearty.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He looked at me for what I suppose was no more +than a few seconds, but for what seemed to me quite +a long time, and then I had a sudden shock; he gave +me a little wink. It was so quick that nobody but I +could have caught it, and so unexpected in that distinguished +old face that I could hardly believe my +eyes. In a moment his face was once more composed, +intelligently benign, and quietly observant. Luncheon +was announced and we trooped into the dining room.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>This also was in what can only be described as +the acme of good taste. On the Chippendale sideboard +were silver candlesticks. We sat on Chippendale +chairs and ate off a Chippendale table. In a +silver bowl in the middle were roses and round this +were silver dishes with chocolates in them and peppermint +creams; the silver salt cellars were brightly +polished and evidently Georgian. On the cream-coloured +walls were mezzotints of ladies painted by +Sir Peter Lely and on the chimney-piece a garniture +of blue delft. The service was conducted by two +maids in brown uniform and Mrs. Driffield in the +midst of her fluent conversation kept a wary eye on +them. I wondered how she had managed to train +these buxom Kentish girls (their healthy colour and +high cheek bones betrayed the fact that they were +“local”) to such a pitch of efficiency. The lunch was +just right for the occasion, smart but not showy, +fillets of sole rolled up and covered with a white +sauce, roast chicken, with new potatoes and green +peas, asparagus and gooseberry fool. It was the +dining room and the lunch and the manner which +you felt exactly fitted a literary gent of great celebrity +but moderate wealth.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield, like the wives of most men of letters, +was a great talker and she did not let the conversation +at her end of the table flag; so that, however +much we might have wanted to hear what her +husband was saying at the other, we had no opportunity. +She was gay and sprightly. Though Edward +Driffield’s indifferent health and great age obliged +her to live most of the year in the country, she managed +notwithstanding to run up to town often enough +to keep abreast of what was going on and she was +soon engaged with Lord Scallion in an animated +discussion of the plays in the London theatres and +the terrible crowd at the Royal Academy. It had +taken her two visits to look at all the pictures and +even then she had not had time to see the water +colours. She liked water colours so much; they were +unpretentious; she hated things to be pretentious.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>So that host and hostess should sit at the head and +foot of the table, the vicar sat next to Lord Scallion +and his wife next to the duchess. The duchess engaged +her in conversation on the subject of working-class +dwellings, a subject on which she seemed to be +much more at home than the parson’s lady, and my attention +being thus set free I watched Edward Driffield. +He was talking to Lady Hodmarsh. She was apparently +telling him how to write a novel and giving +him a list of a few that he really ought to read. He +listened to her with what looked like polite interest, +putting in now and then a remark in a voice too low +for me to catch, and when she made a jest (she made +them frequently and often good ones) he gave a +little chuckle and shot her a quick look that seemed +to say: this woman isn’t such a damned fool after all. +Remembering the past, I asked myself curiously what +he thought of this grand company, his neatly turned +out wife, so competent and discreetly managing, and +the elegant surroundings in which he lived. I wondered +if he regretted his early days of adventure. I +wondered if all this amused him or if the amiable +civility of his manner masked a hideous boredom. +Perhaps he felt my eyes upon him, for he raised his. +They rested on me for a while with a meditative look, +mild and yet oddly scrutinizing, and then suddenly, +unmistakably this time, he gave me another wink. +The frivolous gesture in that old, withered face was +more than startling, it was embarrassing; I did not +know what to do. My lips outlined a dubious smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But the duchess joining in the conversation at the +head of the table, the vicar’s wife turned to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You knew him many years ago, didn’t you?” she +asked me in a low tone.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She gave the company a glance to see that no one +was attending to us.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“His wife is anxious that you shouldn’t call up +old memories that might be painful to him. He’s very +frail, you know, and the least thing upsets him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll be very careful.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The way she looks after him is simply wonderful. +Her devotion is a lesson to all of us. She realizes +what a precious charge it is. Her unselfishness is +beyond words.” She lowered her voice a little more. +“Of course he’s a very old man and old men sometimes +are a little trying; I’ve never seen her out of +patience. In her way she’s just as wonderful as he is.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>These were the sort of remarks to which it was +difficult to find a reply, but I felt that one was expected +of me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Considering everything I think he looks very +well,” I murmured.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He owes it all to her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>At the end of luncheon we went back into the +drawing room and after we had been standing about +for two or three minutes Edward Driffield came up +to me. I was talking with the vicar and for want of +anything better to say was admiring the charming +view. I turned to my host.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was just saying how picturesque that little row +of cottages is down there.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“From here.” Driffield looked at their broken outline +and an ironic smile curled his thin lips. “I was +born in one of them. Rum, isn’t it?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But Mrs. Driffield came up to us with bustling +geniality. Her voice was brisk and melodious.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, Edward, I’m sure the duchess would like to +see your writing room. She has to go almost immediately.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m so sorry, but I must catch the three-eighteen +from Tercanbury,” said the duchess.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We filed into Driffield’s study. It was a large room +on the other side of the house, looking out on the +same view as the dining room, with a bow window. +It was the sort of room that a devoted wife would +evidently arrange for her literary husband. It was +scrupulously tidy and large bowls of flowers gave +it a feminine touch.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“This is the desk at which he’s written all his +later works,” said Mrs. Driffield, closing a book +that was open face downward on it. “It’s the frontispiece +in the third volume of the <span class='it'>edition de luxe</span>. It’s +a period piece.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We all admired the writing table and Lady Hodmarsh, +when she thought no one was looking, ran +her fingers along its under edge to see if it was +genuine. Mrs. Driffield gave us a quick, bright smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Would you like to see one of his manuscripts?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’d love to,” said the duchess, “and then I simply +must bolt.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield took from a shelf a manuscript +bound in blue morocco, and while the rest of the +party reverently examined it I had a look at the +books with which the room was lined. As authors +will, I ran my eye round quickly to see if there were +any of mine, but could not find one; I saw, however, +a complete set of Alroy Kear’s and a great +many novels in bright bindings, which looked suspiciously +unread; I guessed that they were the works +of authors who had sent them to the master in +homage to his talent and perhaps the hope of a few +words of eulogy that could be used in the publisher’s +advertisements. But all the books were so neatly +arranged, they were so clean, that I had the impression +they were very seldom read. There was the +Oxford Dictionary and there were standard editions +in grand bindings of most of the English classics, +Fielding, Boswell, Hazlitt, and so on, and there +were a great many books on the sea; I recognized +the variously coloured, untidy volumes of the sailing +directions issued by the Admiralty, and there were +a number of works on gardening. The room had the +look not of a writer’s workshop, but of a memorial +to a great name, and you could almost see already +the desultory tripper wandering in for want of something +better to do and smell the rather musty, +close smell of a museum that few visited. I had a +suspicion that nowadays if Driffield read anything +at all it was the <span class='it'>Gardener’s Chronicle</span> or the <span class='it'>Shipping +Gazette</span>, of which I saw a bundle on a table in the +corner.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When the ladies had seen all they wanted we bade +our hosts farewell. But Lady Hodmarsh was a +woman of tact and it must have occurred to her that +I, the excuse for the party, had scarcely had a word +with Edward Driffield, for at the door, enveloping +me with a friendly smile, she said to him:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was so interested to hear that you and Mr. +Ashenden had known one another years and years +ago. Was he a nice little boy?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Driffield looked at me for a moment with that +level, ironic gaze of his. I had the impression that +if there had been nobody there he would have put his +tongue out at me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Shy,” he replied. “I taught him to ride a bicycle.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We got once more into the huge yellow Rolls and +drove off.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He’s too sweet,” said the duchess. “I’m so glad +we went.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He has such nice manners, hasn’t he?” said Lady +Hodmarsh.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You didn’t really expect him to eat his peas with +a knife, did you?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wish he had,” said Scallion. “It would have +been so picturesque.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I believe it’s very difficult,” said the duchess. +“I’ve tried over and over again and I can never get +them to stay on.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You have to spear them,” said Scallion.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not at all,” retorted the duchess. “You have to +balance them on the flat, and they roll like the devil.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What did you think of Mrs. Driffield?” asked +Lady Hodmarsh.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose she serves her purpose,” said the +duchess.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He’s so old, poor darling, he must have someone +to look after him. You know she was a hospital +nurse?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, was she?” said the duchess. “I thought perhaps +she’d been his secretary or typist or something.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’s quite nice,” said Lady Hodmarsh, warmly +defending a friend.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, quite.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He had a long illness about twenty years ago, +and she was his nurse then, and after he got well he +married her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Funny how men will do that. She must have +been years younger than him. She can’t be more than—what?—forty +or forty-five.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, I shouldn’t think so. Forty-seven, say. I’m +told she’s done a great deal for him. I mean, she’s +made him quite presentable. Alroy Kear told me that +before that he was almost too bohemian.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“As a rule authors’ wives are odious.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s such a bore having to have them, isn’t it?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Crushing. I wonder they don’t see that themselves.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Poor wretches, they often suffer from the delusion +that people find them interesting,” I murmured.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We reached Tercanbury, dropped the duchess at +the station, and drove on.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">V</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>It was</span> true that Edward Driffield had taught me +to bicycle. That was indeed how I first made his +acquaintance. I do not know how long the safety +bicycle had been invented, but I know that it was +not common in the remote part of Kent in which I +lived and when you saw someone speeding along on +solid tires you turned round and looked till he was +out of sight. It was still a matter for jocularity on +the part of middle-aged gentlemen who said Shank’s +pony was good enough for them, and for trepidation +on the part of elderly ladies who made a dash for +the side of the road when they saw one coming. I +had been for some time filled with envy of the boys +whom I saw riding into the school grounds on their +bicycles, and it gave a pretty opportunity for showing +off when you entered the gateway without holding +on to the handles. I had persuaded my uncle to let +me have one at the beginning of the summer holidays, +and though my aunt was against it, since she +said I should only break my neck, he had yielded to +my pertinacity more willingly because I was of course +paying for it out of my own money. I ordered it +before school broke up and a few days later the carrier +brought it over from Tercanbury.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was determined to learn to ride it by myself and +chaps at school had told me that they had learned +in half an hour. I tried and tried and at last came +to the conclusion that I was abnormally stupid (I +am inclined now to think that I was exaggerating), +but even after my pride was sufficiently humbled for +me to allow the gardener to hold me up I seemed at +the end of the first morning no nearer to being able +to get on by myself than at the beginning. Next day, +however, thinking that the carriage drive at the +vicarage was too winding to give a fellow a proper +chance, I wheeled the bicycle to a road not far away +which I knew was perfectly flat and straight and so +solitary that no one would see me making a fool of +myself. I tried several times to mount, but fell off +each time. I barked my shins against the pedals and +got very hot and bothered. After I had been doing +this for about an hour, though I began to think that +God did not intend me to ride a bicycle, but was determined +(unable to bear the thought of the sarcasms +of my uncle, his representative at Blackstable) +to do so all the same, to my disgust I saw two people +on bicycles coming along the deserted road. I immediately +wheeled my machine to the side and sat down +on a stile, looking out to sea in a nonchalant way as +though I had been for a ride and were just sitting +there wrapped in contemplation of the vasty +ocean. I kept my eyes dreamily averted from the +two persons who were advancing toward me, but I +felt that they were coming nearer, and through the +corner of my eye I saw that they were a man and +a woman. As they passed me the woman swerved +violently to my side of the road and, crashing against +me, fell to the ground.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said. “I knew I should fall +off the moment I saw you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was impossible under the circumstances to preserve +my appearance of abstraction and, blushing +furiously, I said that it didn’t matter at all.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The man had got off as she fell.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You haven’t hurt yourself?” he asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, no.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I recognized him then as Edward Driffield, the +author I had seen walking with the curate a few +days before.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m just learning to ride,” said his companion. +“And I fall off whenever I see anything in the road.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Aren’t you the vicar’s nephew?” said Driffield. +“I saw you the other day. Galloway told me who +you were. This is my wife.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She held out her hand with an oddly frank gesture +and when I took it gave mine a warm and hearty +pressure. She smiled with her lips and with her eyes +and there was in her smile something that even then I +recognized as singularly pleasant. I was confused. +People I did not know made me dreadfully self-conscious, +and I could not take in any of the details +of her appearance. I just had an impression of a +rather large blond woman. I do not know if I noticed +then or only remembered afterward that she wore a +full skirt of blue serge, a pink shirt with a starched +front and a starched collar, and a straw hat, called in +those days, I think, a boater, perched on the top of +a lot of golden hair.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think bicycling’s lovely, don’t you?” she said, +looking at my beautiful new machine which leaned +against the stile. “It must be wonderful to be able +to ride well.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I felt that this inferred an admiration for my proficiency.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s only a matter of practice,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“This is only my third lesson. Mr. Driffield says +I’m coming on wonderful, but I feel so stupid I could +kick myself. How long did it take you before you +could ride?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I blushed to the roots of my hair. I could hardly +utter the shameful words.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I can’t ride,” I said. “I’ve only just got this bike +and this is the first time I’ve tried.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I equivocated a trifle there, but I made it all right +with my conscience by adding the mental reservation: +except yesterday at home in the garden.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll give you a lesson if you like,” said Driffield +in his good-humoured way. “Come on.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, no,” I said. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why not?” asked his wife, her blue eyes still +pleasantly smiling. “Mr. Driffield would like to and +it’ll give me a chance to rest.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Driffield took my bicycle, and I, reluctant but unable +to withstand his friendly violence, clumsily +mounted. I swayed from side to side, but he held me +with a firm hand.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Faster,” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I pedalled and he ran by me as I wobbled from +side to side. We were both very hot when, notwithstanding +his struggles, I at last fell off. It was very +hard under such circumstances to preserve the standoffishness +befitting the vicar’s nephew with the son +of Miss Wolfe’s bailiff, and when I started back +again and for thirty or forty thrilling yards actually +rode by myself and Mrs. Driffield ran into the middle +of the road with her arms akimbo shouting, “Go it, +go it, two to one on the favourite,” I was laughing +so much that I positively forgot all about my social +status. I got off of my own accord, my face no doubt +wearing an air of immodest triumph, and received +without embarrassment the Driffields’ congratulation +on my cleverness in riding a bicycle the very first +day I tried.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I want to see if I can get on by myself,” said +Mrs. Driffield, and I sat down again on the stile +while her husband and I watched her unavailing +struggles.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then, wanting to rest again, disappointed but +cheerful, she sat down beside me. Driffield lit his +pipe. We chatted. I did not of course realize it then, +but I know now that there was a disarming frankness +in her manner that put one at one’s ease. She +talked with a kind of eagerness, like a child bubbling +over with the zest of life, and her eyes were lit all +the time by her engaging smile. I did not know why +I liked it. I should say it was a little sly, if slyness +were not a displeasing quality; it was too innocent +to be sly. It was mischievous rather, like that of a +child who has done something that he thinks funny, +but is quite well aware that you will think rather +naughty; he knows all the same that you won’t be +really cross and if you don’t find out about it quickly +he’ll come and tell you himself. But of course then +I only knew that her smile made me feel at home.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Presently Driffield, looking at his watch, said that +they must be going and suggested that we should +all ride back together in style. It was just the time +that my aunt and uncle would be coming home from +their daily walk down the town and I did not like to +run the risk of being seen with people whom they +would not at all approve of; so I asked them to go +on first, as they would go more quickly than I. Mrs. +Driffield would not hear of it, but Driffield gave me +a funny, amused little look, which made me think +that he saw through my excuse so that I blushed scarlet, +and he said:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Let him go by himself, Rosie. He can manage +better alone.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right. Shall you be here to-morrow? We’re +coming.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll try to,” I answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>They rode off, and in a few minutes I followed. +Feeling very much pleased with myself, I rode all the +way to the vicarage gates without falling. I think I +boasted a good deal at dinner, but I did not say that +I had met the Driffields.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Next day at about eleven I got my bicycle out of +the coachhouse. It was so called though it held not +even a pony trap and was used by the gardener to +keep the mower and the roller, and by Mary-Ann for +her sack of meal for the chickens. I wheeled it down +to the gate and, mounting none too easily, rode along +the Tercanbury Road till I came to the old turnpike +and turned into Joy Lane.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The sky was blue and the air, warm and yet fresh, +crackled, as it were, with the heat. The light was +brilliant without harshness. The sun’s beams seemed +to hit the white road with a directed energy and +bounce back like a rubber ball.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I rode backward and forward, waiting for the +Driffields, and presently saw them come. I waved +to them and turned round (getting off to do so) +and we pedalled along together. Mrs. Driffield and +I complimented one another on our progress. We +rode anxiously, clinging like grim death to the +handle-bars, but exultant, and Driffield said that as +soon as we felt sure of ourselves we must go for +rides all over the country.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I want to get rubbings of one or two brasses in +the neighbourhood,” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not know what he meant, but he would not +explain.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Wait and I’ll show you,” he said. “Do you think +you could ride fourteen miles to-morrow, seven there +and seven back?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rather,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll bring a sheet of paper for you and some wax +and you can make a rubbing. But you’d better ask +your uncle if you can come.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I needn’t do that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think you’d better all the same.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield gave me that peculiar look of hers, +mischievous and yet friendly, and I blushed scarlet. +I knew that if I asked my uncle he would say no. +It would be much better to say nothing about it. But +as we rode along I saw coming toward us the doctor +in his dogcart. I looked straight in front of me as +he passed in the vain hope that if I did not look at +him he would not look at me. I was uneasy. If he +had seen me the fact would quickly reach the ears +of my uncle or my aunt and I considered whether it +would not be safer to disclose myself a secret that +could no longer be concealed. When we parted at +the vicarage gates (I had not been able to avoid +riding as far as this in their company) Driffield said +that if I found I could come with them next day I +had better call for them as early as I could.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know where we live, don’t you? Next door +to the Congregational Church. It’s called Lime Cottage.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I sat down to dinner I looked for an opportunity +to slip in casually the information that I +had by accident run across the Driffields; but news +travelled fast in Blackstable.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Who were those people you were bicycling with +this morning?” asked my aunt. “We met Dr. Anstey +in the town and he said he’d seen you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>My uncle, chewing his roast beef with an air of +disapproval, looked sullenly at his plate.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The Driffields,” I said with nonchalance. “You +know, the author. Mr. Galloway knows them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They’re most disreputable people,” said my +uncle. “I don’t wish you to associate with them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why not?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m not going to give you my reasons. It’s enough +that I don’t wish it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How did you ever get to know them?” asked my +aunt.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was just riding along and they were riding +along, and they asked me if I’d like to ride with +them,” I said, distorting the truth a little.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I call it very pushing,” said my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I began to sulk. And to show my indignation when +the sweet was put on the table, though it was raspberry +tart which I was extremely fond of, I refused +to have any. My aunt asked me if I was not feeling +very well.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes,” I said, as haughtily as I could, “I’m feeling +all right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Have a little bit,” said my aunt.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m not hungry,” I answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Just to please me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He must know when he’s had enough,” said my +uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I gave him a bitter look.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t mind having a small piece,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>My aunt gave me a generous helping, which I ate +with the air of one who, impelled by a stern sense of +duty, performs an act that is deeply distasteful to +him. It was a beautiful raspberry tart. Mary-Ann +made short pastry that melted in the mouth. But +when my aunt asked me whether I could not manage +a little more I refused with cold dignity. She +did not insist. My uncle said grace and I carried my +outraged feelings into the drawing room.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But when I reckoned that the servants had finished +their dinner I went into the kitchen. Emily +was cleaning the silver in the pantry. Mary-Ann was +washing up.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I say, what’s wrong with the Driffields?” I asked +her.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann had come to the vicarage when she was +eighteen. She had bathed me when I was a small boy, +given me powders in plum jam when I needed them, +packed my box when I went to school, nursed me when +I was ill, read to me when I was bored, and scolded +me when I was naughty. Emily, the housemaid, was +a flighty young thing, and Mary-Ann didn’t know +whatever would become of me if <span class='it'>she</span> had the looking +after of me. Mary-Ann was a Blackstable girl. She +had never been to London in her life and I do not +think she had been to Tercanbury more than three +or four times. She was never ill. She never had a +holiday. She was paid twelve pounds a year. One +evening a week she went down the town to see her +mother, who did the vicarage washing; and on Sunday +evenings she went to church. But Mary-Ann +knew everything that went on in Blackstable. She +knew who everybody was, who had married whom, +what anyone’s father had died of, and how many +children, and what they were called, any woman had +had.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I asked Mary-Ann my question and she slopped a +wet clout noisily into the sink.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t blame your uncle,” she said. “I wouldn’t +let you go about with them, not if you was my +nephew. Fancy their askin’ you to ride your bicycle +with them! Some people will do anything.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I saw that the conversation in the dining room +had been repeated to Mary-Ann.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m not a child,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That makes it all the worse. The impudence of +their comin’ ’ere at all!” Mary-Ann dropped her +aitches freely. “Takin’ a house and pretendin’ to be +ladies and gentlemen. Now leave that pie alone.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The raspberry tart was standing on the kitchen +table and I broke off a piece of crust with my fingers +and put it in my mouth.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We’re goin’ to eat that for our supper. If you’d +wanted a second ’elpin’ why didn’t you ’ave one when +you was ’avin’ your dinner? Ted Driffield never could +stick to anything. He ’ad a good education, too. The +one I’m sorry for is his mother. He’s been a trouble +to ’er from the day he was born. And then to go +an’ marry Rosie Gann. They tell me that when he +told his mother what he was goin’ to do she took +to ’er bed and stayed there for three weeks and +wouldn’t talk to anybody.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Was Mrs. Driffield Rosie Gann before she married? +Which Ganns were those?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Gann was one of the commonest names at Blackstable. +The churchyard was thick with their graves.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, you wouldn’t ’ave known them. Old Josiah +Gann was her father. He was a wild one, too. He +went for a soldier and when he come back he ’ad a +wooden leg. He used to go out doing painting, but +he was out of work more often than not. They lived +in the next ’ouse to us in Rye Lane. Me an’ Rosie +used to go to Sunday school together.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But she’s not as old as you are,” I said with the +bluntness of my age.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’ll never see thirty again.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann was a little woman with a snub nose +and decayed teeth, but fresh-coloured, and I do not +suppose she could have been more than thirty-five.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rosie ain’t more than four or five years younger +than me, whatever she may pretend she is. They tell +me you wouldn’t know her now all dressed up and +everything.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Is it true that she was a barmaid?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, at the Railway Arms and then at the Prince +of Wales’s Feathers at Haversham. Mrs. Reeves +’ad her to ’elp in the bar at the Railway Arms, but +it got so bad she had to get rid of her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The Railway Arms was a very modest little public +house just opposite the station of the London, Chatham +& Dover Railway. It had a sort of sinister gaiety. +On a winter’s night as you passed by you saw through +the glass doors men lounging about the bar. My uncle +very much disapproved of it, and had for years been +trying to get its license taken away. It was frequented +by the railway porters, colliers, and farm +labourers. The respectable residents of Blackstable +would have disdained to enter it and, when they +wanted a glass of bitter, went to the Bear and Key +or the Duke of Kent.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why, what did she do?” I asked, my eyes popping +out of my head.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What didn’t she do?” said Mary-Ann. “What +d’you think your uncle would say if he caught me +tellin’ you things like that? There wasn’t a man +who come in to ’ave a drink that she didn’t carry +on with. No matter who they was. She couldn’t stick +to anybody, it was just one man after another. They +tell me it was simply ’orrible. That was when it +begun with Lord George. It wasn’t the sort of place +he was likely to go to, he was too grand for that, but +they say he went in accidental like one day when his +train was late, and he saw her. And after that he +was never out of the place, mixin’ with all them +common rough people, and of course they all knew +what he was there for, and him with a wife and three +children. Oh, I was sorry for her! And the talk it +made. Well, it got so Mrs. Reeves said she wasn’t +going to put up with it another day and she gave her +her wages and told her to pack her box and go. Good +riddance to bad rubbish, that’s what I said.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I knew Lord George very well. His name was +George Kemp and the title by which he was always +known had been given him ironically owing to his +grand manner. He was our coal merchant, but he +also dabbled in house property, and he owned a share +in one or two colliers. He lived in a new brick house +that stood in its own grounds and he drove his own +trap. He was a stoutish man with a pointed beard, +florid, with a high colour and bold blue eyes. Remembering +him, I think he must have looked like +some jolly rubicund merchant in an old Dutch picture. +He was always very flashily dressed and when +you saw him driving at a smart pace down the middle +of the High Street in a fawn-coloured covert-coat +with large buttons, his brown bowler on the side of +his head and a red rose in his buttonhole, you could +not but look at him. On Sunday he used to come to +church in a lustrous topper and a frock coat. Everyone +knew that he wanted to be made churchwarden, +and it was evident that his energy would have made +him useful, but my uncle said not in his time, and +though Lord George as a protest went to chapel for +a year my uncle remained obdurate. He cut him +dead when he met him in the town. A reconciliation +was effected and Lord George came to church again, +but my uncle only yielded so far as to appoint him +sidesman. The gentry thought him extremely vulgar +and I have no doubt that he was vain and boastful. +They complained of his loud voice and his strident +laugh—when he was talking to somebody on one +side of the street you heard every word he said from +the other—and they thought his manners dreadful. +He was much too friendly; when he talked to them +it was as though he were not in trade at all; they +said he was very pushing. But if he thought his hail-fellow-well-met +air, his activity in public works, his +open purse when subscriptions were needed for the +annual regatta or for the harvest festival, his willingness +to do anyone a good turn were going to break +the barriers at Blackstable he was mistaken. His +efforts at sociability were met with blank hostility.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I remember once that the doctor’s wife was calling +on my aunt and Emily came in to tell my uncle that +Mr. George Kemp would like to see him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But I heard the front door ring, Emily,” said +my aunt.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes’m, he came to the front door.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>There was a moment’s awkwardness. Everyone +was at a loss to know how to deal with such an unusual +occurrence, and even Emily, who knew who +should come to the front door, who should go to +the side door, and who to the back, looked a trifle +flustered. My aunt, who was a gentle soul, I think +felt honestly embarrassed that anyone should put +himself in such a false position; but the doctor’s wife +gave a little sniff of contempt. At last my uncle collected +himself.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Show him into the study, Emily,” he said. “I’ll +come as soon as I’ve finished my tea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But Lord George remained exuberant, flashy, loud, +and boisterous. He said the town was dead and he +was going to wake it up. He was going to get the +company to run excursion trains. He didn’t see why +it shouldn’t become another Margate. And why +shouldn’t they have a mayor? Ferne Bay had one.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose he thinks he’d be mayor himself,” said +the people of Blackstable. They pursed their lips. +“Pride goeth before a fall,” they said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And my uncle remarked that you could take a +horse to the water but you couldn’t make him drink.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I should add that I looked upon Lord George with +the same scornful derision as everyone else. It outraged +me that he should stop me in the street and +call me by my Christian name and talk to me as +though there were no social difference between us. +He even suggested that I should play cricket with +his sons, who were of about the same age as myself. +But they went to the grammar school at Haversham +and of course I couldn’t possibly have anything to +do with them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was shocked and thrilled by what Mary-Ann told +me, but I had difficulty in believing it. I had read too +many novels and had learnt too much at school not +to know a good deal about love, but I thought it was +a matter that only concerned young people. I could +not conceive that a man with a beard, who had sons +as old as I, could have any feelings of that sort. I +thought when you married all that was finished. That +people over thirty should be in love seemed to me +rather disgusting.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You don’t mean to say they did anything?” I +asked Mary-Ann.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“From what I hear there’s very little that Rosie +Gann didn’t do. And Lord George wasn’t the only +one.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But, look here, why didn’t she have a baby?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>In the novels I had read whenever lovely woman +stooped to folly she had a baby. The cause was put +with infinite precaution, sometimes indeed suggested +only by a row of asterisks, but the result was inevitable.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“More by good luck than by good management, I +lay,” said Mary-Ann. Then she recollected herself +and stopped drying the plates she was busy with. “It +seems to me you know a lot more than you ought +to,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Of course I know,” I said importantly. “Hang it +all, I’m practically grown up, aren’t I?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All I can tell you,” said Mary-Ann, “is that when +Mrs. Reeves gave her the sack Lord George got +her a job at the Prince of Wales’s Feathers at Haversham +and he was always poppin’ over there in his +trap. You can’t tell me the ale’s any different over +there from what it is here.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then why did Ted Driffield marry her?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Ask me another,” said Mary-Ann. “It was at +the Feathers he saw her. I suppose he couldn’t get +anyone else to marry him. No respectable girl would +’ave ’ad ’im.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did he know about her?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’d better ask him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was silent. It was all very puzzling.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What does she look like now?” asked Mary-Ann. +“I never seen her since she married. I never +even speak to ’er after I ’eard what was goin’ on at +the Railway Arms.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She looks all right,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, you ask her if she remembers me and see +what she says.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">VI</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I had</span> quite made up my mind that I was going out +with the Driffields next morning, but knew that it +was no good asking my uncle if I might. If he found +out that I had been and made a row it couldn’t be +helped, and if Ted Driffield asked me whether I had +got my uncle’s permission I was quite prepared to +say I had. But I had after all no need to lie. In the +afternoon, the tide being high, I walked down to +the beach to bathe and my uncle, having something +to do in the town, walked part of the way with me. +Just as we were passing the Bear and Key, Ted +Driffield stepped out of it. He saw us and came +straight up to my uncle. I was startled at his coolness.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good afternoon, Vicar,” he said. “I wonder if +you remember me. I used to sing in the choir when +I was a boy. Ted Driffield. My old governor was Miss +Wolfe’s bailiff.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>My uncle was a very timid man, and he was taken +aback.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, yes, how do you do? I was sorry to hear +your father died.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ve made the acquaintance of your young +nephew. I was wondering if you’d let him come for +a ride with me to-morrow. It’s rather dull for him +riding alone, and I’m going to do a rubbing of one +of the brasses at Ferne Church.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s very kind of you, but——”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>My uncle was going to refuse, but Driffield interrupted +him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll see he doesn’t get up to any mischief. I +thought he might like to make a rubbing himself. It +would be an interest for him. I’ll give him some +paper and wax so that it won’t cost him anything.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>My uncle had not a consecutive mind and the +suggestion that Ted Driffield should pay for my +paper and wax offended him so much that he quite +forgot his intention to forbid me to go at all.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He can quite well get his own paper and wax,” +he said. “He has plenty of pocket money, and he’d +much better spend it on something like that than on +sweets and make himself sick.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, if he goes to Hayward, the stationer’s, and +says he wants the same paper as I got and the wax +they’ll let him have it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll go now,” I said, and to prevent any change +of mind on my uncle’s part dashed across the road.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">VII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I do</span> not know why the Driffields bothered about me +unless it was from pure kindness of heart. I was a +dull little boy, not very talkative, and if I amused +Ted Driffield at all it must have been unconsciously. +Perhaps he was tickled by my attitude of superiority. +I was under the impression that it was condescension +on my part to consort with the son of Miss Wolfe’s +bailiff, and he what my uncle called a penny-a-liner; +and when, perhaps with a trace of superciliousness, +I asked him to lend me one of his books and he said +it wouldn’t interest me I took him at his word and +did not insist. After my uncle had once consented to +my going out with the Driffields he made no further +objection to my association with them. Sometimes we +went for sails together, sometimes we went to some +picturesque spot and Driffield painted a little water +colour. I do not know if the English climate was better +in those days or if it is only an illusion of youth, +but I seem to remember that all through that summer +the sunny days followed one another in an unbroken +line. I began to feel a curious affection for the undulating, +opulent, and gracious country. We went +far afield, to one church after another, taking rubbings +of brasses, knights in armour and ladies in +stiff farthingales. Ted Driffield fired me with his own +enthusiasm for this naïve pursuit and I rubbed with +passion. I showed my uncle proudly the results of +my industry, and I suppose he thought that whatever +my company, I could not come to much harm when I +was occupied in church. Mrs. Driffield used to remain +in the churchyard while we were at work, not +reading or sewing, but just mooning about; she +seemed able to do nothing for an indefinite time without +feeling bored. Sometimes I would go out and sit +with her for a little on the grass. We chattered about +my school, my friends there and my masters, about +the people at Blackstable, and about nothing at all. +She gratified me by calling me Mr. Ashenden. I +think she was the first person who had ever done +so and it made me feel grown up. I resented it vastly +when people called me Master Willie. I thought it +a ridiculous name for anyone to have. In fact I did +not like either of my names and spent much time +inventing others that would have suited me better. +The ones I preferred were Roderic Ravensworth and +I covered sheets of paper with this signature in a +suitably dashing hand. I did not mind Ludovic Montgomery +either.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I could not get over what Mary-Ann had told me +about Mrs. Driffield. Though I knew theoretically +what people did when they were married, and was +capable of putting the facts in the bluntest language, +I did not really understand it. I thought it indeed +rather disgusting and I did not quite, quite believe +it. After all, I was aware that the earth was round, +but I <span class='it'>knew</span> it was flat. Mrs. Driffield seemed so frank, +her laugh was so open and simple, there was in her +demeanour something so young and childlike, that +I could not see her “going with” sailors and above +all anyone so gross and horrible as Lord George. +She was not at all the type of the wicked woman I +had read of in novels. Of course I knew she wasn’t +“good form” and she spoke with the Blackstable +accent, she dropped an aitch now and then, and sometimes +her grammar gave me a shock, but I couldn’t +help liking her. I came to the conclusion that what +Mary-Ann had told me was a pack of lies.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>One day I happened to tell her that Mary-Ann +was our cook.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She says she lived next door to you in Rye Lane,” +I added, quite prepared to hear Mrs. Driffield say +that she had never even heard of her.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But she smiled and her blue eyes gleamed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s right. She used to take me to Sunday +school. She used to have a rare job keeping me quiet. +I heard she’d gone to service at the vicarage. Fancy +her being there still! I haven’t seen her for donkey’s +years. I’d like to see her again and have a chat about +old days. Remember me to her, will you, and ask her +to look in on her evening out. I’ll give her a cup +of tea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was taken aback at this. After all, the Driffields +lived in a house that they were talking of buying and +they had a “general.” It wouldn’t be at all the thing +for them to have Mary-Ann to tea, and it would make +it very awkward for me. They seemed to have no +sense of the things one could do and the things one +simply couldn’t. It never ceased to embarrass me, the +way in which they talked of incidents in their past that +I should have thought they would not dream of mentioning. +I do not know that the people I lived among +were pretentious in the sense of making themselves +out to be richer or grander than they really were, but +looking back it does seem to me that they lived a life +full of pretences. They dwelt behind a mask of respectability. +You never caught them in their shirt +sleeves with their feet on the table. The ladies put on +afternoon dresses and were not visible till then; they +lived privately with rigid economy so that you could +not drop in for a casual meal, but when they entertained +their tables groaned with food. Though catastrophe +overwhelmed the family, they held their heads +high and ignored it. One of the sons might have married +an actress, but they never referred to the calamity, +and though the neighbours said it was dreadful, +they took ostentatious care not to mention the theatre +in the presence of the afflicted. We all knew that the +wife of Major Greencourt who had taken the Three +Gables was connected with trade, but neither she nor +the major ever so much as hinted at the discreditable +secret; and though we sniffed at them behind their +backs, we were too polite even to mention crockery +(the source of Mrs. Greencourt’s adequate income) +in their presence. It was still not unheard of for an +angry parent to cut off his son with a shilling or to +tell his daughter (who like my own mother had married +a solicitor) never to darken his doors again. I +was used to all this and it seemed to me perfectly +natural. What did shock me was to hear Ted Driffield +speak of being a waiter in a restaurant in Holborn +as though it were the most ordinary thing in the +world. I knew he had run away to sea, that was romantic; +I knew that boys, in books at all events, often +did this and had thrilling adventures before they +married a fortune and an earl’s daughter; but Ted +Driffield had driven a cab at Maidstone and had been +clerk in a booking office at Birmingham. Once when +we bicycled past the Railway Arms, Mrs. Driffield +mentioned quite casually, as though it were something +that anyone might have done, that she had +worked there for three years.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It was my first place,” she said. “After that I +went to the Feathers at Haversham. I only left there +to get married.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She laughed as though she enjoyed the recollection. +I did not know what to say; I did not know +which way to look; I blushed scarlet. Another time +when we were going through Ferne Bay on our way +back from a long excursion, it being a hot day and +all of us thirsty, she suggested that we should go into +the Dolphin and have a glass of beer. She began +talking to the girl behind the bar and I was horrified +to hear her remark that she had been in the business +herself for five years. The landlord joined us and +Ted Driffield offered him a drink, and Mrs. Driffield +said that the barmaid must have a glass of port, +and for some time they all chatted amiably about +trade and tied houses and how the price of everything +was going up. Meanwhile, I stood, hot and cold +all over, and not knowing what to do with myself. +As we went out Mrs. Driffield remarked:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I took quite a fancy to that girl, Ted. She ought +to do well for herself. As I said to her, it’s a hard +life but a merry one. You do see a bit of what’s going +on and if you play your cards right you ought to +marry well. I noticed she had an engagement ring +on, but she told me she just wore that because it gave +the fellows a chance to tease her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Driffield laughed. She turned to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I had a rare old time when I was a barmaid, but +of course you can’t go on for ever. You have to think +of your future.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But a greater jolt awaited me. It was halfway +through September and my holidays were drawing +to an end. I was very full of the Driffields, but my +desire to talk about them at home was snubbed by +my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We don’t want your friends pushed down our +throats all day long,” said he. “There are other +topics of conversation that are more suitable. But +I do think that, as Ted Driffield was born in the +parish and is seeing you almost every day, he might +come to church occasionally.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>One day I told Driffield: “My uncle wants you to +come to church.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right. Let’s go to church next Sunday night, +Rosie.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t mind,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I told Mary-Ann they were going. I sat in the +vicarage pew just behind the squire’s and I could +not look round, but I was conscious by the behaviour +of my neighbours on the other side of the aisle that +they were there, and as soon as I had a chance next +day I asked Mary-Ann if she had seen them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I see ’er all right,” said Mary-Ann grimly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did you speak to her afterward?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Me?” She suddenly burst into anger. “You get +out of my kitchen. What d’you want to come bothering +me all day long? How d’you expect me to do my +work with you getting in my way all the time?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right,” I said. “Don’t get in a wax.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know what your uncle’s about lettin’ you +go all over the place with the likes of them. All them +flowers in her ’at. I wonder she ain’t ashamed to +show her face. Now run along, I’m busy.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not know why Mary-Ann was so cross. I did +not mention Mrs. Driffield again. But two or three +days later I happened to go into the kitchen to get +something I wanted. There were two kitchens at the +vicarage, a small one in which the cooking was done +and a large one, built I suppose for a time when country +clergymen had large families and gave grand +dinners to the surrounding gentry, where Mary-Ann +sat and sewed when her day’s work was over. We +had cold supper at eight so that after tea she had +little to do. It was getting on for seven and the day +was drawing in. It was Emily’s evening out and I +expected to find Mary-Ann alone, but as I went +along the passage I heard voices and the sound of +laughter. I supposed Mary-Ann had someone in to +see her. The lamp was lit, but it had a thick green +shade and the kitchen was almost in darkness. I saw +a teapot and cups on the table. Mary-Ann was having +a late cup of tea with her friend. The conversation +stopped as I opened the door, then I heard a +voice.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good-evening.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>With a start I saw that Mary-Ann’s friend was +Mrs. Driffield. Mary-Ann laughed a little at my +surprise.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rosie Gann dropped in to have a cup of tea with +me,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We’ve been having a talk about old times.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann was a little shy at my finding her thus, +but not half so shy as I. Mrs. Driffield gave me that +childlike, mischievous smile of hers; she was perfectly +at her ease. For some reason I noticed her +dress. I suppose because I had never seen her so +grand before. It was of pale blue cloth, very tight +at the waist, with high sleeves and a long skirt with +a flounce at the bottom. She wore a large black straw +hat with a great quantity of roses and leaves and +bows on it. It was evidently the hat she had worn in +church on Sunday.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I thought if I went on waiting till Mary-Ann came +to see me I’d have to wait till doomsday, so I thought +the best thing I could do was to come and see her +myself.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann grinned self-consciously, but did not +look displeased. I asked for whatever it was I +wanted and as quickly as I could left them. I went +out into the garden and wandered about aimlessly. +I walked down to the road and looked over the gate. +The night had fallen. Presently I saw a man strolling +along. I paid no attention to him, but he passed backward +and forward and it looked as though he were +waiting for someone. At first I thought it might +be Ted Driffield and I was on the point of going out +when he stopped and lit a pipe; I saw it was Lord +George. I wondered what he was doing there and +at the same moment it struck me that he was waiting +for Mrs. Driffield. My heart began to beat fast, +and though I was hidden by the darkness I withdrew +into the shade of the bushes. I waited a few minutes +longer, then I saw the side door open and Mrs. Driffield +let out by Mary-Ann. I heard her footsteps on +the gravel. She came to the gate and opened it. It +opened with a little click. At the sound Lord George +stepped across the road and before she could come +out slipped in. He took her in his arms and gave her +a great hug. She gave a little laugh.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Take care of my hat,” she whispered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was not more than three feet away from them +and I was terrified lest they should notice me. I was +so ashamed for them. I was trembling with agitation. +For a minute he held her in his arms.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What about the garden?” he said, still in a +whisper.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, there’s that boy. Let’s go in the fields.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>They went out by the gate, he with his arm round +her waist, and were lost in the night. Now I felt my +heart pounding against my chest so that I could +hardly breathe. I was so astonished at what I had +seen that I could not think sensibly. I would have +given anything to be able to tell someone, but it was +a secret and I must keep it. I was thrilled with the +importance it gave me. I walked slowly up to the +house and let myself in by the side door. Mary-Ann, +hearing it open, called me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Is that you, Master Willie?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I looked in the kitchen. Mary-Ann was putting the +supper on a tray to take it into the dining room.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wouldn’t say anything to your uncle about Rosie +Gann ’avin’ been here,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, no.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It was a surprisement to me. When I ’eared a +knock at the side door and opened it and saw Rosie +standing there, you could ’ave knocked me down with +a feather. ‘Mary-Ann,’ she says, an’ before I knew +what she was up to she was kissing me all over me +face. I couldn’t but ask ’er in and when she was in I +couldn’t but ask her to ’ave a nice cup of tea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann was anxious to excuse herself. After +all she had said of Mrs. Driffield it must seem +strange to me that I should find them sitting there +together chatting away and laughing. I did not want +to crow.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’s not so bad, is she?” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann smiled. Notwithstanding her black decayed +teeth there was in her smile something sweet +and touching.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t ’ardly know what it is, but there’s somethin’ +you can’t ’elp likin’ about her. She was ’ere the +best part of an hour and I will say that for ’er, she +never once give ’erself airs. And she told me with +’er own lips the material of that dress she ’ad on cost +thirteen and eleven a yard and I believe it. She remembers +everything, how I used to brush her ’air +for her when she was a tiny tot and how I used to +make her wash her little ’ands before tea. You see, +sometimes her mother used to send ’er in to ’ave her +tea with us. She was as pretty as a picture in them +days.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mary-Ann looked back into the past and her funny +crumpled face grew wistful.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, well,” she said after a pause, “I dare say +she’s been no worse than plenty of others if the truth +was only known. She ’ad more temptation than most, +and I dare say a lot of them as blame her would ’ave +been no better than what she was if they’d ’ad the +opportunity.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">VIII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>The weather</span> broke suddenly; it grew chilly and +heavy rain fell. It put an end to our excursions. I was +not sorry, for I did not know how I could look Mrs. +Driffield in the face now that I had seen her meeting +with George Kemp. I was not so much shocked +as astonished. I could not understand how it was +possible for her to like being kissed by an old man, +and the fantastic notion passed through my mind, +filled with the novels I had read, that somehow Lord +George held her in his power and forced her by his +knowledge of some fearful secret to submit to his +loathsome embraces. My imagination played with +terrible possibilities. Bigamy, murder, and forgery. +Very few villains in books failed to hold the threat +of exposure of one of these crimes over some hapless +female. Perhaps Mrs. Driffield had backed a bill; I +never could quite understand what this meant, but I +knew that the consequences were disastrous. I toyed +with the fancy of her anguish (the long sleepless +nights when she sat at her window in her nightdress, +her long fair hair hanging to her knees, and watched +hopelessly for the dawn) and saw myself (not a boy +of fifteen with sixpence a week pocket money, but a +tall man with a waxed moustache and muscles of +steel in faultless evening dress) with a happy blend +of heroism and dexterity rescuing her from the toils +of the rascally blackmailer. On the other hand, it +had not looked as though she had yielded quite unwillingly +to Lord George’s fondling and I could not +get out of my ears the sound of her laugh. It had +a note that I had never heard before. It gave me a +queer feeling of breathlessness.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>During the rest of my holidays I only saw the +Driffields once more. I met them by chance in the +town and they stopped and spoke to me. I suddenly +felt very shy again, but when I looked at Mrs. Driffield +I could not help blushing with embarrassment, +for there was nothing in her countenance that indicated +a guilty secret. She looked at me with those +soft blue eyes of hers in which there was a child’s +playful naughtiness. She often held her mouth a little +open, as though it were just going to break into a +smile, and her lips were full and red. There was +honesty and innocence in her face and an ingenuous +frankness and though then I could not have expressed +this, I felt it quite strongly. If I had put it into words +at all I think I should have said: She looks as straight +as a die. It was impossible that she could be “carrying +on” with Lord George. There must be an explanation; +I did not believe what my eyes had seen.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then the day came when I had to go back to +school. The carter had taken my trunk and I walked +to the station by myself. I had refused to let my +aunt see me off, thinking it more manly to go alone, +but I felt rather low as I walked down the street. +It was a small branch line to Tercanbury and the +station was at the other end of the town near the +beach. I took my ticket and settled myself in the +corner of a third-class carriage. Suddenly I heard +a voice: “There he is”; and Mr. and Mrs. Driffield +bustled gaily up.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We thought we must come and see you off,” she +said. “Are you feeling miserable?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, of course not.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, well, it won’t last long. We’ll have no end +of a time when you come back for Christmas. Can +you skate?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I can. I’ll teach you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Her high spirits cheered me, and at the same time +the thought that they had come to the station to say +good-bye to me gave me a lump in my throat. I tried +hard not to let the emotion I felt appear on my face.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I expect I shall be playing a lot of football this +term,” I said. “I ought to get into the second fifteen.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She looked at me with kindly shining eyes, smiling +with her full red lips. There was something in her +smile I had always rather liked, and her voice seemed +almost to tremble with a laugh or a tear. For one +horrible moment I was afraid that she was going +to kiss me. I was scared out of my wits. She talked +on, she was mildly facetious as grown-up people are +with schoolboys, and Driffield stood there without +saying anything. He looked at me with a smile in his +eyes and pulled his beard. Then the guard blew a +cracked whistle and waved a red flag. Mrs. Driffield +took my hand and shook it. Driffield came forward.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good-bye,” he said. “Here’s something for you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He pressed a tiny packet into my hand and the +train steamed off. When I opened it I found that it +was two half-crowns wrapped in a piece of toilet +paper. I blushed to the roots of my hair. I was glad +enough to have an extra five shillings, but the thought +that Ted Driffield had dared to give me a tip filled +me with rage and humiliation. I could not possibly +accept anything from him. It was true that I had +bicycled with him and sailed with him, but he wasn’t +a sahib (I had got that from Major Greencourt) +and it was an insult to me to give me five shillings. +At first I thought of returning the money without +a word, showing by my silence how outraged I was +at the solecism he had committed, then I composed +in my head a dignified and frigid letter in which I +thanked him for his generosity, but said that he +must see how impossible it was for a gentleman to +accept a tip from someone who was practically a +stranger. I thought it over for two or three days +and every day it seemed more difficult to me to part +with the two half-crowns. I felt sure that Driffield +had meant it kindly, and of course he was very bad +form and didn’t know about things; it would be +rather hard to hurt his feelings by sending the money +back, and finally I spent it. But I assuaged my +wounded pride by not writing to thank Driffield for +his gift.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When Christmas came, however, and I went back +to Blackstable for the holidays, it was the Driffields +I was most eager to see. In that stagnant little place +they alone seemed to have a connection with the outside +world which already was beginning to touch my +daydreams with anxious curiosity. But I could not +overcome my shyness enough to go to their house +and call, and I hoped that I should meet them in the +town. But the weather was dreadful, a boisterous +wind whistled down the street, piercing you to the +bone, and the few women who had an errand were +swept along by their full skirts like fishing boats in half +a gale. The cold rain scudded in sudden squalls and +the sky, which in summer had enclosed the friendly +country so snugly, now was a great pall that pressed +upon the earth with sullen menace. There was small +hope of meeting the Driffields by chance and at last +I took my courage in both hands and one day after +tea slipped out. As far as the station the road was +pitch dark, but there the street lamps, few and dim, +made it easier to keep to the pavement. The Driffields +lived in a little two-story house in a side street; it was +of dingy yellow brick and had a bow window. I +knocked and presently a little maid opened the door; +I asked if Mrs. Driffield was in. She gave me an uncertain +look and, saying she would go and see, left +me standing in the passage. I had already heard +voices in the next room, but they were stilled as she +opened the door and, entering, shut it behind her. +I had a faint impression of mystery; in the houses of +my uncle’s friends, even if there was no fire and the +gas had to be lit as you went in, you were shown into +the drawing room when you called. But the door was +opened and Driffield came out. There was only a +speck of light in the passage and at first he could +not see who it was; but in an instant he recognized +me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, it’s you. We wondered when we were going +to see you.” Then he called out: “Rosie, it’s young +Ashenden.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>There was a cry and before you could say knife +Mrs. Driffield had come into the passage and was +shaking my hands.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Come in, come in. Take off your coat. Isn’t it +awful, the weather? You must be perishing.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She helped me with my coat and took off my +muffler and snatched my cap out of my hand and +drew me into the room. It was hot and stuffy, a tiny +room full of furniture, with a fire burning in the +grate; they had gas there, which we hadn’t at the +vicarage, and the three burners in round globes of +frosted glass filled the room with harsh light. The +air was gray with tobacco smoke. At first, dazzled +and then taken aback by my effusive welcome, I did +not see who the two men were who got up as I came +in. Then I saw they were the curate, Mr. Galloway, +and Lord George Kemp. I fancied that the curate +shook my hand with constraint.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How are you? I just came in to return some +books that Mr. Driffield had lent me and Mrs. Driffield +very kindly asked me to stay to tea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I felt rather than saw the quizzical look that Driffield +gave him. He said something about the mammon +of unrighteousness, which I recognized as a quotation, +but did not gather the sense of. Mr. Galloway +laughed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know about that,” he said. “What about +the publicans and sinners?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I thought the remark in very bad taste, but I was +immediately seized upon by Lord George. There was +no constraint about him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, young fellow, home for the holidays? My +word, what a big chap you’re growing.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I shook hands with him rather coldly. I wished I +had not come.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Let me give you a nice strong cup of tea,” said +Mrs. Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ve already had tea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Have some more,” said Lord George, speaking +as though he owned the place (that was just like +him). “A big fellow like you can always tuck away +another piece of bread and butter and jam and Mrs. +D. will cut you a slice with her own fair hands.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The tea things were still on the table and they +were sitting round it. A chair was brought up for +me and Mrs. Driffield gave me a piece of cake.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We were just trying to persuade Ted to sing us +a song,” said Lord George. “Come on, Ted.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Sing, ‘All Through Stickin’ to a Soljer,’ Ted,” +said Mrs. Driffield. “I love that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, sing ‘First We Mopped the Floor with +Him.’ ”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll sing ’em both if you’re not careful,” said +Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He took his banjo, which was lying on the top of +the cottage piano, tuned it, and began to sing. He +had a rich baritone voice. I was quite used to people +singing songs. When there was a tea party at the +vicarage, or I went to one at the major’s or the doctor’s, +people always brought their music with them. +They left it in the hall, so that it should not seem +that they wanted to be asked to play or sing; but +after tea the hostess asked them if they had brought +it. They shyly admitted that they had, and if it was +at the vicarage I was sent to fetch it. Sometimes +a young lady would say that she had quite given up +playing and hadn’t brought anything with her, and +then her mother would break in and say that <span class='it'>she</span> +had brought it. But when they sang it was not comic +songs; it was “I’ll Sing Thee Songs of Araby,” or +“Good-Night, Beloved,” or “Queen of My Heart.” +Once at the annual concert at the Assembly Rooms, +Smithson, the draper, had sung a comic song, and +though the people at the back of the hall had applauded +a great deal, the gentry had seen nothing +funny in it. Perhaps there wasn’t. Anyhow, before +the next concert he was asked to be a little more +careful about what he sang (“Remember there are +ladies present, Mr. Smithson”) and so gave “The +Death of Nelson.” The next ditty that Driffield sang +had a chorus and the curate and Lord George joined +in lustily. I heard it a good many times afterward, +but I can only remember four lines:</p> + + + <div class='poetry-container' style=''> + <div class='lgp'> <!-- rend=';' --> +<div class='stanza-outer'> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>First we mopped the floor with him;</span></p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Dragged him up and down the stairs;</span></p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Then we lugged him round the room,</span></p> +<p class='line0'><span class='it'>Under tables, over chairs.</span></p> +</div> +</div></div> <!-- end poetry block --><!-- end rend --> + +<p class='pindent'>When it was finished, assuming my best company +manners, I turned to Mrs. Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you sing?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I do, but it always turns the milk, so Ted doesn’t +encourage me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Driffield put down his banjo and lit a pipe.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, how’s the old book getting along, Ted?” +said Lord George heartily.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, all right. I’m working away, you know.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good old Ted and his books,” Lord George +laughed. “Why don’t you settle down and do something +respectable for a change? I’ll give you a job +in my office.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I’m all right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You let him be, George,” said Mrs. Driffield. +“He likes writing, and what I say is, as long as it +keeps him happy why shouldn’t he?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, I don’t pretend to know anything about +books,” began George Kemp.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then don’t talk about them,” interrupted Driffield +with a smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t think anyone need be ashamed to have +written <span class='it'>Fairhaven</span>,” said Mr. Galloway, “and I don’t +care what the critics said.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, Ted, I’ve known you since I was a boy and +<span class='it'>I</span> couldn’t read it, try as I would.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, come on, we don’t want to start talking about +books,” said Mrs. Driffield. “Sing us another song, +Ted.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I must be going,” said the curate. He turned to +me. “We might walk along together. Have you got +anything for me to read, Driffield?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Driffield pointed to a pile of new books that were +heaped up on a table in the corner.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Take your pick.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“By Jove, what a lot!” I said, looking at them +greedily.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, it’s all rubbish. They’re sent down for review.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What d’you do with them?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Take ’em into Tercanbury and sell ’em for what +they’ll fetch. It all helps to pay the butcher.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When we left, the curate and I, he with three or +four books under his arm, he asked me:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did you tell your uncle you were coming to see +the Driffields?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, I just went out for a walk and it suddenly +occurred to me that I might look in.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>This of course was some way from the truth, but +I did not care to tell Mr. Galloway that, though I +was practically grown up, my uncle realized the fact +so little that he was quite capable of trying to prevent +me from seeing people he objected to.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Unless you have to I wouldn’t say anything about +it in your place. The Driffields are perfectly all right, +but your uncle doesn’t quite approve of them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I know,” I said. “It’s such rot.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Of course they’re rather common, but he doesn’t +write half badly, and when you think what he came +from it’s wonderful that he writes at all.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was glad to know how the land lay. Mr. Galloway +did not wish my uncle to know that he was on +friendly terms with the Driffields. I could feel sure +at all events that he would not give me away.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The patronizing manner in which my uncle’s curate +spoke of one who has been now so long recognized as +one of the greatest of the later Victorian novelists +must arouse a smile; but it was the manner in which +he was generally spoken of at Blackstable. One day +we went to tea at Mrs. Greencourt’s, who had staying +with her a cousin, the wife of an Oxford don, +and we had been told that she was very cultivated. +She was a Mrs. Encombe, a little woman with an +eager wrinkled face; she surprised us very much because +she wore her gray hair short and a black serge +skirt that only just came down below the tops of her +square-toed boots. She was the first example of the +New Woman that had even been seen in Blackstable. +We were staggered and immediately on the defensive, +for she looked intellectual and it made us feel shy. +(Afterward we all scoffed at her, and my uncle said +to my aunt: “Well, my dear, I’m thankful you’re not +clever, at least I’ve been spared that”; and my aunt +in a playful mood put my uncle’s slippers which were +warming for him by the fire over her boots and said: +“Look, I’m the new woman.” And then we all said: +“Mrs. Greencourt is very funny; you never know +what she’ll do next. But of course she isn’t quite +quite.” We could hardly forget that her father made +china and that her grandfather had been a factory +hand.)</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But we all found it very interesting to hear Mrs. +Encombe talk of the people she knew. My uncle had +been at Oxford, but everyone he asked about seemed +to be dead. Mrs. Encombe knew Mrs. Humphry +Ward and admired <span class='it'>Robert Elsmere</span>. My uncle considered +it a scandalous work, and he was surprised +that Mr. Gladstone, who at least called himself a +Christian, had found a good word to say for it. They +had quite an argument about it. My uncle said he +thought it would unsettle people’s opinions and give +them all sorts of ideas that they were much better +without. Mrs. Encombe answered that he wouldn’t +think that if he knew Mrs. Humphry Ward. She was +a woman of the very highest character, a niece of +Mr. Matthew Arnold, and whatever you might think +of the book itself (and she, Mrs. Encombe, was +quite willing to admit that there were parts which +had better have been omitted) it was quite certain +that she had written it from the very highest motives. +Mrs. Encombe knew Miss Broughton too. She was +of very good family and it was strange that she +wrote the books she did.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t see any harm in them,” said Mrs. Hayforth, +the doctor’s wife. “I enjoy them, especially +<span class='it'>Red as a Rose is She</span>.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Would you like your girls to read them?” asked +Mrs. Encombe.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not just yet perhaps,” said Mrs. Hayforth. “But +when they’re married I should have no objection.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then it might interest you to know,” said Mrs. +Encombe, “that when I was in Florence last Easter +I was introduced to Ouida.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s quite another matter,” returned Mrs. +Hayforth. “I can’t believe that any lady would read +a book by Ouida.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I read one out of curiosity,” said Mrs. Encombe. +“I must say, it’s more what you’d expect from a +Frenchman than from an English gentlewoman.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, but I understand she isn’t really English. +I’ve always heard her real name is Mademoiselle +de la Ramée.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was then that Mr. Galloway mentioned Edward +Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know we have an author living here,” he +said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We’re not very proud of him,” said the major. +“He’s the son of old Miss Wolfe’s bailiff and he +married a barmaid.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Can he write?” asked Mrs. Encombe.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You can tell at once that he’s not a gentleman,” +said the curate, “but when you consider the disadvantages +he’s had to struggle against it’s rather remarkable +that he should write as well as he does.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He’s a friend of Willie’s,” said my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Everyone looked at me, and I felt very uncomfortable.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They bicycled together last summer, and after +Willie had gone back to school I got one of his +books from the library to see what it was like. I read +the first volume and then I sent it back. I wrote a +pretty stiff letter to the librarian and I was glad to +hear that he’d withdrawn it from circulation. If it +had been my own property I should have put it +promptly in the kitchen stove.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I looked through one of his books myself,” said +the doctor. “It interested me because it was set in +this neighbourhood and I recognized some of the +people. But I can’t say I liked it; I thought it unnecessarily +coarse.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I mentioned that to him,” said Mr. Galloway, +“and he said the men in the colliers that run up to +Newcastle and the fishermen and farm hands don’t +behave like ladies and gentlemen and don’t talk like +them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But why write about people of that character?” +said my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s what I say,” said Mrs. Hayforth. “We +all know that there are coarse and wicked and vicious +people in the world, but I don’t see what good it +does to write about them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m not defending him,” said Mr. Galloway. “I’m +only telling you what explanation he gives himself. +And then of course he brought up Dickens.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Dickens is quite different,” said my uncle. “I +don’t see how anyone can object to the <span class='it'>Pickwick +Papers</span>.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose it’s a matter of taste,” said my aunt. +“I always found Dickens very coarse. I don’t want +to read about people who drop their aitches. I must +say I’m very glad the weather’s so bad now and +Willie can’t take any more rides with Mr. Driffield. +I don’t think he’s quite the sort of person he +ought to associate with.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Both Mr. Galloway and I looked down our noses.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">IX</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>As often</span> as the mild Christmas gaieties of Blackstable +allowed me I went to the Driffields’ little house +next door to the Congregational chapel. I always +found Lord George and often Mr. Galloway. Our +conspiracy of silence had made us friends and when +we met at the vicarage or in the vestry after church +we looked at one another archly. We did not talk +about our secret, but we enjoyed it; I think it gave +us both a good deal of satisfaction to know that we +were making a fool of my uncle. But once it occurred +to me that George Kemp, meeting my uncle in the +street, might remark casually that he had been seeing +a lot of me at the Driffields’.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What about Lord George?” I said to Mr. Galloway.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I made that all right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We chuckled. I began to like Lord George. At first +I was very cold with him and scrupulously polite, but +he seemed so unconscious of the social difference between +us that I was forced to conclude that my +haughty courtesy failed to put him in his place. He +was always cordial, breezy, even boisterous; he +chaffed me in his common way and I answered him +back with schoolboy wit; we made the others laugh +and this disposed me kindly toward him. He was for +ever bragging about the great schemes he had in +mind, but he took in good part my jokes at the expense +of his grandiose imaginations. It amused me +to hear him tell stories about the swells of Blackstable +that made them look foolish and when he mimicked +their oddities I roared with laughter. He was +blatant and vulgar and the way he dressed was always +a shock to me (I had never been to Newmarket +nor seen a trainer, but that was my idea of how a +Newmarket trainer dressed) and his table manners +were offensive, but I found myself less and less affronted +by him. He gave me the <span class='it'>Pink ’Un</span> every week +and I took it home, carefully tucked away in my +great-coat pocket, and read it in my bedroom.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I never went to the Driffields’ till after tea at the +vicarage, but I always managed to make a second +tea when I got there. Afterward Ted Driffield sang +comic songs, accompanying himself sometimes on +the banjo and sometimes on the piano. He would sing, +peering at the music with his rather short-sighted +eyes, for an hour at a time; there was a smile on his +lips and he liked us all to join in the chorus. We +played whist. I had learned the game when I was +a child and my uncle and aunt and I used to play +at the vicarage during the long winter evenings. My +uncle always took dummy, and though of course we +played for love, when my aunt and I lost I used to +retire under the dining room table and cry. Ted +Driffield did not play cards, he said he had no head +for them, and when we started a game he would sit +down by the fire and, pencil in hand, read one of the +books that had been sent down to him from London +to review. I had never played with three people before +and of course I did not play well, but Mrs. Driffield +had a natural card sense. Her movements as a +rule were rather deliberate, but when it came to +playing cards she was quick and alert. She played the +rest of us right off our heads. Ordinarily she did not +speak very much and then slowly, but when, after a +hand was played, she took the trouble good-humouredly +to point out to me my mistakes, she was +not only lucid but voluble. Lord George chaffed her +as he chaffed everybody; she would smile at his banter, +for she very seldom laughed, and sometimes make a +neat retort. They did not behave like lovers, but like +familiar friends, and I should have quite forgotten +what I had heard about them and what I had seen +but that now and then she gave him a look that embarrassed +me. Her eyes rested on him quietly, as +though he were not a man but a chair or a table, and +in them was a mischievous, childlike smile. Then I +would notice that his face seemed suddenly to swell +and he moved uneasily in his chair. I looked quickly +at the curate, afraid that he would notice something, +but he was intent on the cards or else was lighting +his pipe.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The hour or two I spent nearly every day in that +hot, poky, smoke-laden room passed like lightning, +and as the holidays drew nearer to their end I was +seized with dismay at the thought that I must spend +the next three months dully at school.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know what we shall do without you,” +said Mrs. Driffield. “We shall have to play dummy.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was glad that my going would break up the +game. While I was doing prep I did not want to +think that they were sitting in that little room and +enjoying themselves just as if I did not exist.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How long do you get at Easter?” asked Mr. +Galloway.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“About three weeks.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We’ll have a lovely time then,” said Mrs. Driffield. +“The weather ought to be all right. We can +ride in the mornings and then after tea we’ll play +whist. You’ve improved a lot. If we play three or +four times a week during your Easter holidays you +won’t need to be afraid to play with anybody.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">X</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>But the</span> term came to an end at last. I was in high +spirits when once more I got out of the train at Blackstable. +I had grown a little and I had had a new suit +made at Tercanbury, blue serge and very smart, and +I had bought a new tie. I meant to go and see the +Driffields immediately I had swallowed my tea and +I was full of hope that the carrier would have brought +my box in time for me to put the new suit on. It +made me look quite grown up. I had already begun +putting vaseline on my upper lip every night to make +my moustache grow. On my way through the town +I looked down the street in which the Driffields lived +in the hope of seeing them. I should have liked to +go in and say how-do-you-do, but I knew that Driffield +wrote in the morning and Mrs. Driffield was not +“presentable.” I had all sorts of exciting things to +tell them. I had won the hundred-yard race in the +sports and I had been second in the hurdles. I meant +to have a shot for the history prize in the summer +and I was going to swot up my English history during +the holidays. Though there was an east wind +blowing, the sky was blue and there was a feeling of +spring in the air. The High Street, with its colours +washed clean by the wind and its lines sharp as though +drawn with a new pen, looked like a picture by Samuel +Scott, quiet and naïve and cosy: now, looking +back; then it looked like nothing but High Street, +Blackstable. When I came to the railway bridge I +noticed that two or three houses were being built.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“By Jove,” I said, “Lord George <span class='it'>is</span> going it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>In the fields beyond little white lambs were gambolling. +The elm trees were just beginning to turn +green. I let myself in by the side door. My uncle was +sitting in his armchair by the fire reading the <span class='it'>Times</span>. +I shouted to my aunt and she came downstairs, a +pink spot from the excitement of seeing me on each +of her withered cheeks, and threw her thin old arms +round my neck. She said all the right things.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How you’ve grown!” and “Good gracious me, +you’ll be getting a moustache soon!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I kissed my uncle on his bald forehead and I stood +in front of the fire, with my legs well apart and my +back to it, and was extremely grown up and rather +condescending. Then I went upstairs to say how-do-you-do +to Emily, and into the kitchen to shake hands +with Mary-Ann, and out into the garden to see the +gardener.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I sat down hungrily to dinner and my uncle +carved the leg of mutton I asked my aunt:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, what’s happened at Blackstable since I was +here?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Nothing very much. Mrs. Greencourt went down +to Mentone for six weeks, but she came back a few +days ago. The major had an attack of gout.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And your friends the Driffields have bolted,” +added my uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They’ve done what?” I cried.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Bolted. They took their luggage away one night +and just went up to London. They’ve left bills all +over the place. They hadn’t paid their rent and they +hadn’t paid for their furniture. They owed Harris +the butcher the best part of thirty pounds.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How awful,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s bad enough,” said my aunt, “but it appears +they hadn’t even paid the wages of the maid +they had for three months.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was flabbergasted. I thought I felt a little sick.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think in future,” said my uncle, “you would +be wiser not to consort with people whom your aunt +and I don’t think proper associates for you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“One can’t help feeling sorry for all those tradesmen +they cheated,” said my aunt.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It serves them right,” said my uncle. “Fancy +giving credit to people like that! I should have +thought anyone could see they were nothing but adventurers.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I always wonder why they came down here at all.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They just wanted to show off, and I suppose they +thought as people knew who they were here it would +be easier to get things on credit.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not think this quite reasonable, but was too +much crushed to argue.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>As soon as I had the chance I asked Mary-Ann +what she knew of the incident. To my surprise she +did not take it at all in the same way as my uncle and +aunt. She giggled.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They let everyone in proper,” she said. “They +was as free as you like with their money and everyone +though they ’ad plenty. It was always the best +end of the neck for them at the butcher’s and when +they wanted a steak nothing would do but the undercut. +Asparagus and grapes and I don’t know what +all. They ran up bills in every shop in the town. I +don’t know ’ow people can be such fools.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But it was evidently of the tradesmen she was +speaking and not of the Driffields.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But how did they manage to bunk without anyone +knowing?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, that’s what everybody’s askin’. They do say +it was Lord George ’elped them. How did they get +their boxes to the station, I ask you, if ’e didn’t take +them in that there trap of ’is?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What does he say about it?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He says ’e knows no more about it than the man +in the moon. There was a rare to-do all over the +town when they found out the Driffields had shot the +moon. It made me laugh. Lord George says ’e never +knew they was broke, and ’e makes out ’e was as +surprised as anybody. But I for one don’t believe a +word of it. We all knew about ’im and Rosie before +she was married, and between you and me and the +gatepost I don’t know that it ended there. They do +say they was seen walkin’ about the fields together +last summer and ’e was in and out of the ’ouse pretty +near every day.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How did people find out?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, it’s like this. They ’ad a girl there and +they told ’er she could go ’ome and spend the night +with her mother, but she wasn’t to be back later +than eight o’clock in the morning. Well, when she +come back she couldn’t get in. She knocked and she +rung but nobody answered, and so she went in next +door and asked the lady there what she’d better do, +and the lady said she’d better go to the police station. +The sergeant come back with ’er and ’e knocked +and ’e rung, but ’<span class='it'>e</span> couldn’t get no answer. Then he +asked the girl ’ad they paid ’er ’er wages, and she +said no, not for three months, and then ’e said, you +take my word for it, they’ve shot the moon, that’s +what they’ve done. An’ when they come to get inside +they found they’d took all their clothes, an’ their +books—they say as Ted Driffield ’ad a rare lot of +books—an’ every blessed thing that belonged to +them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And has nothing been heard of them since?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, not exactly, but when they’d been gone +about a week the girl got a letter from London, and +when she opened it there was no letter or anything, +but just a postal order for ’er wages. An’ if you ask +me, I call that very ’andsome not to do a poor girl +out of her wages.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was much more shocked than Mary-Ann. I was +a very respectable youth. The reader cannot have +failed to observe that I accepted the conventions of +my class as if they were the laws of Nature, and +though debts on the grand scale in books had seemed +to me romantic, and duns and money lenders were +familiar figures to my fancy, I could not but think +it mean and paltry not to pay the tradesmen’s books. +I listened with confusion when people talked in my +presence of the Driffields, and when they spoke of +them as my friends I said: “Hang it all, I just knew +them”; and when they asked: “Weren’t they fearfully +common?” I said: “Well, after all they didn’t +exactly suggest the Vere de Veres, you know.” Poor +Mr. Galloway was dreadfully upset.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Of course I didn’t think they were wealthy,” he +told me, “but I thought they had enough to get along. +The house was very nicely furnished and the piano +was new. It never struck me that they hadn’t paid for +a single thing. They never stinted themselves. What +hurts me is the deceit. I used to see quite a lot of +them and I thought they liked me. They always made +one welcome. You’d hardly believe it, but the last +time I saw them when they shook hands with me +Mrs. Driffield asked me to come next day and Driffield +said: ‘Muffins for tea to-morrow.’ And all the +time they had everything packed upstairs and that +very night they took the last train to London.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What does Lord George say about it?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“To tell you the truth I haven’t gone out of my +way to see him lately. It’s been a lesson to me. There’s +a little proverb about evil communications which I’ve +thought well to bear in mind.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I felt very much the same about Lord George, and +I was a little nervous, too. If he took it into his head +to tell people that at Christmas I had been going to +see the Driffields almost every day, and it came to +my uncle’s ears, I foresaw an unpleasant fuss. My +uncle would accuse me of deceit and prevarication +and disobedience and of not behaving like a gentleman, +and I did not at the moment see what answer +I could make. I knew him well enough to be aware +that he would not let the matter drop, and that I +should be reminded of my transgression for years. +I was just as glad not to see Lord George. But one +day I ran into him face to face in the High Street.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Hulloa, youngster,” he cried, addressing me in +a way I particularly resented. “Back for the holidays, +I suppose.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You suppose quite correctly,” I answered with +what I thought withering sarcasm.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Unfortunately he only bellowed with laughter.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’re so sharp you’ll cut yourself if you don’t +look out,” he answered heartily. “Well, it looks as +if there was no more whist for you and me just yet. +Now you see what comes of living beyond your +means. What I always say to my boys is, if you’ve +got a pound and you spend nineteen and six you’re +a rich man, but if you spend twenty shillings and sixpence +you’re a pauper. Look after the pence, young +fellow, and the pounds’ll look after themselves.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But though he spoke after this fashion there was +in his voice no note of disapproval, but a bubble of +laughter as though in his heart he were tittering at +these admirable maxims.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They say you helped them to bunk,” I remarked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Me?” His face assumed a look of extreme surprise, +but his eyes glittered with sly mirth. “Why, +when they came and told me the Driffields had shot +the moon you could have knocked me down with a +feather. They owed me four pounds seventeen and six +for coal. We’ve all been let in, even poor old Galloway +who never got his muffins for tea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had never thought Lord George more blatant. +I should have liked to say something final and crushing, +but as I could not think of anything I just said +that I must be getting along and with a curt nod left +him.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XI</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>Musing</span> thus over the past, while I waited for Alroy +Kear, I chuckled when I considered this shabby incident +of Edward Driffield’s obscurity in the light of +the immense respectability of his later years. I wondered +whether it was because, in my boyhood, he was +as a writer held in such small esteem by the people +about me that I had never been able to see in him +the astonishing merit that the best critical opinion +eventually ascribed to him. He was for long thought +to write very bad English, and indeed he gave you +the impression of writing with the stub of a blunt +pencil; his style was laboured, an uneasy mixture +of the classical and the slangy, and his dialogue +was such as could never have issued from the mouth +of a human being. Toward the end of his career, +when he dictated his books, his style, acquiring a +conversational ease, became flowing and limpid; and +then the critics, going back to the novels of his +maturity, found that their English had a nervous, +racy vigour that eminently suited the matter. His +prime belonged to a period when the purple patch +was in vogue and there are descriptive passages in +his works that have found their way into all the +anthologies of English prose. His pieces on the sea, +and spring in the Kentish woods, and sunset on the +lower reaches of the Thames are famous. It should +be a mortification to me that I cannot read them without +discomfort.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I was a young man, though his books sold +but little and one or two were banned by the libraries, +it was very much a mark of culture to admire them. +He was thought boldly realistic. He was a very good +stick to beat the Philistines with. Somebody’s lucky +inspiration discovered that his sailors and peasants +were Shakespearean, and when the advanced got together +they uttered shrill cries of ecstasy over the +dry and spicy humour of his yokels. This was a commodity +that Edward Driffield had no difficulty in supplying. +My own heart sank when he led me into the +forecastle of a sailing ship or the taproom of a public +house and I knew I was in for half a dozen pages +in dialect of facetious comment on life, ethics, and +immortality. But, I admit, I have always thought the +Shakespearean clowns tedious and their innumerable +progeny insupportable.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Driffield’s strength lay evidently in his depiction +of the class he knew best, farmers and farm labourers, +shopkeepers and bartenders, skippers of sailing +ships, mates, cooks, and able seamen. When he introduces +characters belonging to a higher station in +life even his warmest admirers, one would have +thought, must experience a certain malaise; his fine +gentlemen are so incredibly fine, his high-born ladies +are so good, so pure, so noble that you are not surprised +that they can only express themselves with +polysyllabic dignity. His women difficultly come to +life. But here again I must add that this is only my +own opinion; the world at large and the most eminent +critics have agreed that they are very winsome +types of English womanhood, spirited, gallant, high-souled, +and they have been often compared with +the heroines of Shakespeare. We know of course +that women are habitually constipated, but to represent +them in fiction as being altogether devoid +of a back passage seems to me really an excess of +chivalry. I am surprised that they care to see themselves +thus limned.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The critics can force the world to pay attention +to a very indifferent writer, and the world may lose +its head over one who has no merit at all, but the +result in neither case is lasting; and I cannot help +thinking that no writer can hold the public for as +long as Edward Driffield without considerable gifts. +The elect sneer at popularity; they are inclined +even to assert that it is a proof of mediocrity; but +they forget that posterity makes its choice not from +among the unknown writers of a period, but from +among the known. It may be that some great masterpiece +which deserves immortality has fallen still-born +from the press, but posterity will never hear of it; it +may be that posterity will scrap all the best sellers +of our day, but it is among them that it must choose. +At all events Edward Driffield is in the running. His +novels happen to bore me; I find them long; the +melodramatic incidents with which he sought to stir +the sluggish reader’s interest leave me cold; but he +certainly had sincerity. There is in his best books +the stir of life, and in none of them can you fail to +be aware of the author’s enigmatic personality. In his +earlier days he was praised or blamed for his realism; +according to the idiosyncrasy of his critics he +was extolled for his truth or censured for his coarseness. +But realism has ceased to excite remark, and +the library reader will take in his stride obstacles at +which a generation back he would have violently +shied. The cultured reader of these pages will remember +the leading article in the Literary Supplement +of the <span class='it'>Times</span> which appeared at the moment of +Driffield’s death. Taking the novels of Edward Driffield +as his text, the author wrote what was very +well described as a hymn to beauty. No one who read +it could fail to be impressed by those swelling periods, +which reminded one of the noble prose of Jeremy +Taylor, by that reverence and piety, by all those +high sentiments, in short, expressed in a style that +was ornate without excess and dulcet without effeminacy. +It was itself a thing of beauty. If some +suggested that Edward Driffield was by way of being +a humourist and that a jest would here and there +have lightened this eulogious article it must be replied +that after all it was a funeral oration. And it +is well known that Beauty does not look with a good +grace on the timid advances of Humour. Roy Kear, +when he was talking to me of Driffield, claimed that, +whatever his faults, they were redeemed by the +beauty that suffused his pages. Now I come to look +back on our conversation, I think it was this remark +that had most exasperated me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Thirty years ago in literary circles God was all +the fashion. It was good form to believe and journalists +used him to adorn a phrase or balance a sentence; +then God went out (oddly enough with cricket +and beer) and Pan came in. In a hundred novels his +cloven hoof left its imprint on the sward; poets saw +him lurking in the twilight on London commons, and +literary ladies in Surrey and New England, nymphs +of an industrial age, mysteriously surrendered their +virginity to his rough embrace. Spiritually they were +never the same again. But Pan went out and now +beauty has taken his place. People find it in a phrase, +or a turbot, a dog, a day, a picture, an action, a dress. +Young women in cohorts, each of whom has written +so promising and competent a novel, prattle of it +in every manner from allusive to arch, from intense +to charming; and the young men, more or less recently +down from Oxford, but still trailing its clouds +of glory, who tell us in the weekly papers what we +should think of art, life, and the universe, fling the +word with a pretty negligence about their close-packed +pages. It is sadly frayed. Gosh, they have +worked it hard! The ideal has many names and beauty +is but one of them. I wonder if this clamour is anything +more than the cry of distress of those who cannot +make themselves at home in our heroic world of +machines, and I wonder if their passion for beauty, +the Little Nell of this shamefaced day, is anything +more than sentimentality. It may be that another +generation, accommodating itself more adequately +to the stress of life, will look for inspiration not in a +flight from reality, but in an eager acceptance of it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I do not know if others are like myself, but I am +conscious that I cannot contemplate beauty long. For +me no poet made a falser statement than Keats when +he wrote the first line of <span class='it'>Endymion</span>. When the thing +of beauty has given me the magic of its sensation my +mind quickly wanders; I listen with incredulity to +the persons who tell me that they can look with rapture +for hours at a view or a picture. Beauty is an +ecstasy; it is as simple as hunger. There is really +nothing to be said about it. It is like the perfume of +a rose: you can smell it and that is all: that is why +the criticism of art, except in so far as it is unconcerned +with beauty and therefore with art, is tiresome. +All the critic can tell you with regard to +Titian’s Entombment of Christ, perhaps of all the +pictures in the world that which has most pure +beauty, is to go and look at it. What else he has to +say is history, or biography, or what not. But people +add other qualities to beauty—sublimity, human interest, +tenderness, love—because beauty does not +long content them. Beauty is perfect, and perfection +(such is human nature) holds our attention but for +a little while. The mathematician who after seeing +Phèdre asked: “<span class='it'>Qu’est-ce que ça prouve?</span>” was not +such a fool as he has been generally made out. No +one has ever been able to explain why the Doric +temple of Pæstum is more beautiful than a glass of +cold beer except by bringing in considerations that +have nothing to do with beauty. Beauty is a blind +alley. It is a mountain peak which once reached leads +nowhere. That is why in the end we find more to entrance +us in El Greco than in Titian, in the incomplete +achievement of Shakespeare than in the consummate +success of Racine. Too much has been +written about beauty. That is why I have written a +little more. Beauty is that which satisfies the æsthetic +instinct. But who wants to be satisfied? It is only to +the dullard that enough is as good as a feast. Let us +face it: beauty is a bit of a bore.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But of course what the critics wrote about Edward +Driffield was eye-wash. His outstanding merit was +not the realism that gave vigour to his work, nor +the beauty that informed it, nor his graphic portraits +of seafaring men, nor his poetic descriptions of salty +marshes, of storm and calm and of nestling hamlets; +it was his longevity. Reverence for old age is +one of the most admirable traits of the human race +and I think it may safely be stated that in no other +country than ours is this trait more marked. The awe +and love with which other nations regard old age is +often platonic; but ours is practical. Who but the +English would fill Covent Garden to listen to an +aged prima donna without a voice? Who but the +English would pay to see a dancer so decrepit that he +can hardly put one foot before the other and say to +one another admiringly in the intervals: “By George, +sir, d’you know he’s a long way past sixty?” But +compared with politicians and writers these are but +striplings, and I often think that a <span class='it'>jeune premier</span> must +be of a singularly amiable disposition if it does not +make him bitter to consider that when at the age of +seventy he must end his career the public man and the +author are only at their prime. A man who is a politician +at forty is a statesman at three score and ten. +It is at this age, when he would be too old to be a +clerk or a gardener or a police-court magistrate, that +he is ripe to govern a country. This is not so strange +when you reflect that from the earliest times the old +have rubbed it into the young that they are wiser than +they, and before the young had discovered what nonsense +this was they were old too, and it profited them +to carry on the imposture; and besides, no one can +have moved in the society of politicians without discovering +that (if one may judge by results) it requires +little mental ability to rule a nation. But why +writers should be more esteemed the older they grow, +has long perplexed me. At one time I thought that +the praise accorded to authors when they had ceased +for twenty years to write anything of interest was +largely due to the fact that the younger men, having +no longer to fear their competition, felt it safe to +extol their merit; and it is well known that to praise +someone whose rivalry you do not dread is often a +very good way of putting a spoke in the wheel of +someone whose rivalry you do. But this is to take a +low view of human nature and I would not for the +world lay myself open to a charge of cheap cynicism. +After mature consideration I have come to the conclusion +that the real reason for the universal applause +that comforts the declining years of the author who +exceeds the common span of man is that intelligent +people after the age of thirty read nothing at all. As +they grow older the books they read in their youth are +lit with its glamour and with every year that passes +they ascribe greater merit to the author that wrote +them. Of course he must go on; he must keep in the +public eye. It is no good his thinking that it is enough +to write one or two masterpieces; he must provide a +pedestal for them of forty or fifty works of no particular +consequence. This needs time. His production +must be such that if he cannot captivate a reader by +his charm he can stun him by his weight.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>If, as I think, longevity is genius, few in our time +have enjoyed it in a more conspicuous degree than +Edward Driffield. When he was a young fellow in +the sixties (the cultured having had their way with +him and passed him by) his position in the world of +letters was only respectable; the best judges praised +him, but with moderation; the younger men were +inclined to be frivolous at his expense. It was agreed +that he had talent, but it never occurred to anyone +that he was one of the glories of English literature. +He celebrated his seventieth birthday; an uneasiness +passed over the world of letters, like a ruffling +of the waters when on an Eastern sea a typhoon +lurks in the distance, and it grew evident that there +had lived among us all these years a great novelist +and none of us had suspected it. There was a rush +for Driffield’s book in the various libraries and a +hundred busy pens, in Bloomsbury, in Chelsea, and +in other places where men of letters congregate, +wrote appreciations, studies, essays, and works, short +and chatty or long and intense, on his novels. These +were reprinted, in complete editions, in select editions, +at a shilling and three and six and five shillings +and a guinea. His style was analyzed, his philosophy +was examined, his technique was dissected. At +seventy-five everyone agreed that Edward Driffield +had genius. At eighty he was the Grand Old Man of +English Letters. This position he held till his death.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Now we look about and think sadly that there is +no one to take his place. A few septuagenarians are +sitting up and taking notice, and they evidently feel +that they could comfortably fill the vacant niche. But +it is obvious that they lack something.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Though these recollections have taken so long to +narrate they took but a little while to pass through +my head. They came to me higgledy-piggledy, an +incident and then a scrap of conversation that belonged +to a previous time, and I have set them down +in order for the convenience of the reader and because +I have a neat mind. One thing that surprised +me was that even at that far distance I could remember +distinctly what people looked like and even +the gist of what they said, but only with vagueness +what they wore. I knew of course that the dress, +especially of women, was quite different forty years +ago from what it was now, but if I recalled it at all +it was not from life but from pictures and photographs +that I had seen much later.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was still occupied with my idle fancies when I +heard a taxi stop at the door, the bell ring, and in a +moment Alroy Kear’s booming voice telling the butler +that he had an appointment with me. He came in, +big, bluff, and hearty; his vitality shattered with a +single gesture the frail construction I had been building +out of the vanished past. He brought in with +him, like a blustering wind in March, the aggressive +and inescapable present.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was just asking myself,” I said, “who could +possibly succeed Edward Driffield as the Grand Old +Man of English Letters and you arrive to answer my +question.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He broke into a jovial laugh, but into his eyes +came a quick look of suspicion.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t think there’s anybody,” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How about yourself?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, my dear boy, I’m not fifty yet. Give me another +twenty-five years.” He laughed, but his eyes +held mine keenly. “I never know when you’re pulling +my leg.” He looked down suddenly. “Of course one +can’t help thinking about the future sometimes. All +the people who are at the top of the tree now are +anything from fifteen to twenty years older than me. +They can’t last for ever, and when they’re gone who +is there? Of course there’s Aldous; he’s a good deal +younger than me, but he’s not very strong and I don’t +believe he takes great care of himself. Barring accidents, +by which I mean barring some genius who +suddenly springs up and sweeps the board, I don’t +quite see how in another twenty or twenty-five years +I can help having the field pretty well to myself. It’s +just a question of pegging away and living on longer +than the others.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy sank his virile bulk into one of my landlady’s +armchairs and I offered him a whisky and soda.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, I never drink spirits before six o’clock,” he +said. He looked about him. “Jolly, these digs are.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I know. What have you come to see me about?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I thought I’d better have a little chat with you +about Mrs. Driffield’s invitation. It was rather difficult +to explain over the telephone. The truth of the +matter is that I’ve arranged to write Driffield’s life.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh! Why didn’t you tell me the other day?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I felt friendly disposed toward Roy. I was happy +to think that I had not misjudged him when I suspected +that it was not merely for the pleasure of my +company that he had asked me to luncheon.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I hadn’t entirely made up my mind. Mrs. Driffield +is very keen on my doing it. She’s going to help me +in every way she can. She’s giving me all the material +she has. She’s been collecting it for a good +many years. It’s not an easy thing to do and of course +I can’t afford not to do it well. But if I can make a +pretty good job of it, it can’t fail to do me a lot of +good. People have so much more respect for a novelist +if he writes something serious now and then. Those +critical works of mine were an awful sweat, and they +sold nothing, but I don’t regret them for a moment. +They’ve given me a position I could never have got +without them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think it’s a very good plan. You’ve known Driffield +more intimately than most people for the last +twenty years.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think I have. But of course he was over sixty +when I first made his acquaintance. I wrote and told +him how much I admired his books and he asked me +to go and see him. But I know nothing about the +early part of his life. Mrs. Driffield used to try to +get him to talk about those days and she made very +copious notes of all he said, and then there are diaries +that he kept now and then, and of course a lot of +the stuff in the novels is obviously autobiographical. +But there are immense lacunæ. I’ll tell you the sort +of book I want to write, a sort of intimate life, with +a lot of those little details that make people feel warm +inside, you know, and then woven in with this a +really exhaustive criticism of his literary work, not +ponderous, of course, but although sympathetic, +searching and . . . subtle. Naturally it wants doing, +but Mrs. Driffield seems to think I can do it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m sure you can,” I put in.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t see why not,” said Roy. “I am a critic, +and I’m a novelist. It’s obvious that I have certain +literary qualifications. But I can’t do anything unless +everyone who can is willing to help me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I began to see where I came in. I tried to make +my face look quite blank. Roy leaned forward.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I asked you the other day if you were going to +write anything about Driffield yourself and you said +you weren’t. Can I take that as definite?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Certainly.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then have you got any objection to giving me +your material?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“My dear boy, I haven’t got any.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, that’s nonsense,” said Roy good-humouredly, +with the tone of a doctor who is trying to persuade +a child to have its throat examined. “When he was +living at Blackstable you must have seen a lot of +him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was only a boy then.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But you must have been conscious of the unusual +experience. After all, no one could be for half an +hour in Edward Driffield’s society without being impressed +by his extraordinary personality. It must +have been obvious even to a boy of sixteen, and you +were probably more observant and sensitive than the +average boy of that age.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wonder if his personality would have seemed +extraordinary without the reputation to back it up. +Do you imagine that if you went down to a spa in +the west of England as Mr. Atkins, a chartered +accountant taking the waters for his liver, you would +impress the people you met there as a man of immense +character?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I imagine they’d soon realize that I was not quite +the common or garden chartered accountant,” said +Roy, with a smile that took from his remark any appearance +of self-esteem.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, all I can tell you is that what chiefly bothered +me about Driffield in those days was that the +knickerbocker suit he wore was dreadfully loud. We +used to bicycle a lot together and it always made me +feel a trifle uncomfortable to be seen with him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It sounds comic now. What did he talk about?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know; nothing very much. He was rather +keen on architecture, and he talked about farming, +and if a pub looked nice he generally suggested stopping +for five minutes and having a glass of bitter, +and then he would talk to the landlord about the +crops and the price of coal and things like that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I rambled on, though I could see by the look of +Roy’s face that he was disappointed with me; he +listened, but he was a trifle bored, and it struck me +that when he was bored he looked peevish. But +though I couldn’t remember that Driffield had ever +said anything significant during those long rides of +ours, I had a very acute recollection of the <span class='it'>feel</span> of +them. Blackstable was peculiar in this, that though +it was on the sea, with a long shingly beach and +marshland at the back, you had only to go about +half a mile inland to come into the most rural country +in Kent. Winding roads that ran between the great +fat green fields and clumps of huge elms, substantial +and with a homely stateliness like good old Kentish +farmers’ wives, high-coloured and robust, who had +grown portly on good butter and home-made bread +and cream and fresh eggs. And sometimes the road +was only a lane, with thick hawthorn hedges, and the +green elms overhung it on either side so that when +you looked up there was only a strip of blue sky between. +And as you rode along in the warm, keen air +you had a sensation that the world was standing still +and life would last for ever. Although you were +pedalling with such energy you had a delicious feeling +of laziness. You were quite happy when no one +spoke, and if one of the party from sheer high spirits +suddenly put on speed and shot ahead it was a joke +that everyone laughed at and for a few minutes you +pedalled as hard as you could. And we chaffed one +another innocently and giggled at our own humour. +Now and then one would pass cottages with little +gardens in front of them and in the gardens were +hollyhocks and tiger lilies; and a little way from +the road were farmhouses, with their spacious barns +and oasthouses; and one would pass through hopfields +with the ripening hops hanging in garlands. +The public houses were friendly and informal, hardly +more important than cottages, and on the porches +often honeysuckle would be growing. The names they +bore were usual and familiar: the Jolly Sailor, the +Merry Ploughman, the Crown and Anchor, the Red +Lion.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But of course all that could matter nothing to +Roy, and he interrupted me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did he never talk of literature?” he asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t think so. He wasn’t that sort of writer. I +suppose he thought about his writing, but he never +mentioned it. He used to lend the curate books. In +the winter, one Christmas holidays, I used to have +tea at his house nearly every day and sometimes the +curate and he would talk about books, but we used +to shut them up.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you remember anything he said?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Only one thing. I remember it because I hadn’t +ever read the things he was talking about and what +he said made me do so. He said that when Shakespeare +retired to Stratford-on-Avon and became respectable, +if he ever thought of his plays at all, probably +the two that he remembered with most interest +were <span class='it'>Measure for Measure</span> and <span class='it'>Troilus and Cressida</span>.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t think that’s very illuminating. Didn’t he +say anything about anyone more modern than +Shakespeare?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, not then, that I can remember; but when +I was lunching with the Driffields a few years ago I +overheard him saying that Henry James had turned +his back on one of the great events of the world’s +history, the rise of the United States, in order to +report tittle-tattle at tea parties in English country +houses. Driffield called it <span class='it'>il gran rifiuto</span>. I was surprised +at hearing the old man use an Italian phrase +and amused because a great big bouncing duchess who +was there was the only person who knew what the +devil he was talking about. He said: ‘Poor Henry, +he’s spending eternity wandering round and round +a stately park and the fence is just too high for him +to peep over and they’re having tea just too far for +him to hear what the countess is saying.’ ”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy listened to my little anecdote with attention. +He shook his head reflectively.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t think I could use that. I’d have the +Henry James gang down on me like a thousand of +bricks. . . . But what used you to do during those +evenings?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, we played whist while Driffield read books +for review, and he used to sing.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s interesting,” said Roy, leaning forward +eagerly. “Do you remember what he sang?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Perfectly. ‘All Through Stickin’ to a Soljer’ and +‘Come Where the Booze Is Cheaper’ were his favourites.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I could see that Roy was disappointed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did you expect him to sing Schumann?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know why not. It would have been rather +a good point. But I think I should have expected him +to sing sea chanteys or old English country airs, you +know, the sort of thing they used to sing at fairings—blind +fiddlers and the village swains dancing with the +girls on the threshing floor and all that sort of thing. +I might have made something rather beautiful out +of that, but I can’t <span class='it'>see</span> Edward Driffield singing +music hall songs. After all, when you’re drawing a +man’s portrait you must get the values right; you +only confuse the impression if you put in stuff that’s +all out of tone.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know that shortly after this he shot the moon. +He let everybody in.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy was silent for fully a minute and he looked +down at the carpet reflectively.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, I knew there’d been some unpleasantness. +Mrs. Driffield mentioned it. I understand everything +was paid up later before he finally bought Ferne +Court and settled down in the district. I don’t think +it’s necessary to dwell on an incident that is not really +of any importance in the history of his development. +After all, it happened nearly forty years ago. You +know, there were some very curious sides to the old +man. One would have thought that after a rather +sordid little scandal like that the neighbourhood of +Blackstable would be the last place he’d choose to +spend the rest of his life in when he’d become celebrated, +especially when it was the scene of his rather +humble origins; but he didn’t seem to mind a bit. +He seemed to think the whole thing rather a good +joke. He was quite capable of telling people who +came to lunch about it and it was very embarrassing +for Mrs. Driffield. I should like you to know Amy +better. She’s a very remarkable woman. Of course +the old man had written all his great books before +he ever set eyes on her, but I don’t think anyone can +deny that it was she who created the rather imposing +and dignified figure that the world saw for the last +twenty-five years of his life. She’s been very frank +with me. She didn’t have such an easy job of it. Old +Driffield had some very queer ways and she had to +use a good deal of tact to get him to behave decently. +He was very obstinate in some things and I think a +woman of less character would have been discouraged. +For instance, he had a habit that poor Amy +had a lot of trouble to break him of: after he’d finished +his meat and vegetables he’d take a piece of +bread and wipe the plate clean with it and eat it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Do you know what that means?” I said. “It means +that for long he had so little to eat that he couldn’t +afford to waste any food he could get.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, that may be, but it’s not a very pretty habit +for a distinguished man of letters. And then, he +didn’t exactly tipple, but he was rather fond of going +down to the Bear and Key at Blackstable and having +a few beers in the public bar. Of course there was +no harm in it, but it did make him rather conspicuous, +especially in summer when the place was full +of trippers. He didn’t mind who he talked to. He +didn’t seem able to realize that he had a position to +keep up. You can’t deny it was rather awkward after +they’d been having a lot of interesting people to +lunch—people like Edmund Gosse, for instance, and +Lord Curzon—that he should go down to a public +house and tell the plumber and the baker and the +sanitary inspector what he thought about them. But +of course that could be explained away. One could +say that he was after local colour and was interested +in types. But he had some habits that really were +rather difficult to cope with. Do you know that it +was with the greatest difficulty that Amy Driffield +could ever get him to take a bath?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He was born at a time when people thought it +unhealthy to take too many baths. I don’t suppose +he ever lived in a house that had a bathroom till he +was fifty.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, he said he never had had a bath more than +once a week and he didn’t see why he should change +his habits at his time of life. Then Amy said that he +must change his under linen every day, but he objected +to that too. He said he’d always been used +to wearing his vest and drawers for a week and it +was nonsense, it only wore them out to have them +washed so often. Mrs. Driffield did everything she +could to tempt him to have a bath every day, with +bath salts and perfumes, you know, but nothing +would induce him to, and as he grew older he wouldn’t +even have one once a week. She tells me that for +the last three years of his life he never had a bath +at all. Of course, all this is between ourselves; I’m +merely telling it to show you that in writing his life +I shall have to use a good deal of tact. I don’t see +how one can deny that he was just a wee bit unscrupulous +in money matters and he had a kink in him +that made him take a strange pleasure in the society +of his inferiors and some of his personal habits were +rather disagreeable, but I don’t think that side of +him was the most significant. I don’t want to say anything +that’s untrue, but I do think there’s a certain +amount that’s better left unsaid.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you think it would be more interesting if +you went the whole hog and drew him warts and +all?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I couldn’t. Amy Driffield would never speak +to me again. She only asked me to do the life because +she felt she could trust my discretion. I must +behave like a gentleman.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s very hard to be a gentleman and a writer.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t see why. And besides, you know what the +critics are. If you tell the truth they only say you’re +cynical and it does an author no good to get a reputation +for cynicism. Of course I don’t deny that if I +were thoroughly unscrupulous I could make a sensation. +It would be rather amusing to show the man +with his passion for beauty and his careless treatment +of his obligations, his fine style and his personal +hatred for soap and water, his idealism and his tippling +in disreputable pubs; but honestly, would it +pay? They’d only say I was imitating Lytton Strachey. +No, I think I shall do much better to be allusive +and charming and rather subtle, you know the sort +of thing, and tender. I think one ought always to +<span class='it'>see</span> a book before one starts it. Well, I see this rather +like a portrait of Van Dyck, with a good deal of +atmosphere, you know, and a certain gravity, and +with a sort of aristocratic distinction. Do you know +what I mean? About eighty thousand words.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He was absorbed for a moment in the ecstasy of +æsthetic contemplation. In his mind’s eye he saw a +book, in royal octavo, slim and light in the hand, +printed with large margins on handsome paper in +a type that was both clear and comely, and I think +he saw a binding in smooth black cloth with a decoration +in gold and gilt lettering. But being human, +Alroy Kear could not, as I suggested a few pages +back, hold the ecstasy that beauty yields for more +than a little while. He gave me a candid smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But how the devil am I to get over the first Mrs. +Driffield?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The skeleton in the cupboard,” I murmured.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She is damned awkward to deal with. She was +married to Driffield for a good many years. Amy +has very decided views on the subject, but I don’t see +how I can possibly meet them. You see, her attitude +is that Rose Driffield exerted a most pernicious influence +on her husband, and that she did everything +possible to ruin him morally, physically, and financially; +she was beneath him in every way, at least +intellectually and spiritually, and it was only because +he was a man of immense force and vitality that he +survived. It was of course a very unfortunate marriage. +It’s true that she’s been dead for ages and +it seems a pity to rake up old scandals and wash a +lot of dirty linen in public; but the fact remains that +all Driffield’s greatest books were written when he +was living with her. Much as I admire the later +books, and no one is more conscious of their genuine +beauty than I am, and they have a restraint and a +sort of classical sobriety which are admirable, I must +admit that they haven’t the tang and the vigour and +the smell and bustle of life of the early ones. It does +seem to me that you can’t altogether ignore the influence +his first wife had on his work.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What are you going to do about it?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, I can’t see why all that part of his life +shouldn’t be treated with the greatest possible reserve +and delicacy, so as not to offend the most exacting +susceptibility, and yet with a sort of manly +frankness, if you understand what I mean, that would +be rather moving.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It sounds a very tall order.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“As I see it, there’s no need to dot the i’s or to +cross the t’s. It can only be a question of getting +just the right touch. I wouldn’t state more than I +could help, but I would suggest what was essential +for the reader to realize. You know, however gross +a subject is you can soften its unpleasantness if you +treat it with dignity. But I can do nothing unless I +am in complete possession of the facts.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Obviously you can’t cook them unless you have +them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy had been expressing himself with a fluent ease +that revealed the successful lecturer. I wished (a) +that I could express myself with so much force and +aptness, never at a loss for a word, rolling off the +sentences without a moment’s hesitation; and (b) +that I did not feel so miserably incompetent with my +one small insignificant person to represent the large +and appreciative audience that Roy was instinctively +addressing. But now he paused. A genial look came +over his face, which his enthusiasm had reddened and +the heat of the day caused to perspire, and the eyes +that had held me with a dominating brilliance softened +and smiled.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“This is where you come in, old boy,” he said +pleasantly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I have always found it a very good plan in life to +say nothing when I had nothing to say and when I +do not know how to answer a remark to hold my +tongue. I remained silent and looked back at Roy +amiably.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know more about his life at Blackstable than +anybody else.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know about that. There must be a number +of people at Blackstable who saw as much of +him in the old days as I did.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That may be, but after all they’re presumably +not people of any importance, and I don’t think they +matter very much.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I see. You mean that I’m the only person +who might blow the gaff.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Roughly, that is what I do mean, if you feel that +you must put it in a facetious way.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I saw that Roy was not inclined to be amused. I +was not annoyed, for I am quite used to people not +being amused at my jokes. I often think that the +purest type of the artist is the humorist who laughs +alone at his own jests.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And you saw a good deal of him later on in London, +I believe.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That is when he had an apartment somewhere in +Lower Belgravia.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, lodgings in Pimlico.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy smiled drily.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We won’t quarrel about the exact designation +of the quarter of London in which he lived. You +were very intimate with him then.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Fairly.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How long did that last?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“About a couple of years.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How old were you then?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Twenty.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Now look here, I want you to do me a great +favour. It won’t take you very long and it will be of +quite inestimable value to me. I want you to jot down +as fully as you can all your recollections of Driffield, +and all you remember about his wife and his relations +with her and so on, both at Blackstable and in +London.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, my dear fellow, that’s asking a great deal. +I’ve got a lot of work to do just now.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It needn’t take you very long. You can write it +quite roughly, I mean. You needn’t bother about +style, you know, or anything like that. I’ll put the +style in. All I want are the facts. After all, you +know them and nobody else does. I don’t want to be +pompous or anything like that, but Driffield was a +great man and you owe it to his memory and to English +literature to tell everything you know. I shouldn’t +have asked you, but you told me the other day that +you weren’t going to write anything about him yourself. +It would be rather like a dog in a manger to +keep to yourself a whole lot of material that you +have no intention of using.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Thus Roy appealed at once to my sense of duty, my +indolence, my generosity, and my rectitude.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But why does Mrs. Driffield want me to go down +and stay at Ferne Court?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, we talked it over. It’s a very jolly house to +stay in. She does one very well, and it ought to be +divine in the country just now. She thought it would +be very nice and quiet for you if you felt inclined to +write your recollections there; of course, I said I +couldn’t promise that, but naturally being so near +Blackstable would remind you of all sorts of things +that you might otherwise forget. And then, living in +his house, among his books and things, it would make +the past seem much more real. We could all talk +about him, and you know how in the heat of conversation +things come back. Amy’s very quick and +clever. She’s been in the habit of making notes of +Driffield’s talk for years, and after all it’s quite +likely that you’ll say things on the spur of the moment +that you wouldn’t think of writing and she can +just jot them down afterward. And we can play +tennis and bathe.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m not very fond of staying with people,” I said. +“I hate getting up for a nine-o’clock breakfast to eat +things I have no mind to. I don’t like going for walks, +and I’m not interested in other people’s chickens.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’s a lonely woman now. It would be a kindness +to her and it would be a kindness to me too.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I reflected.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll tell you what I’ll do: I’ll go down to Blackstable, +but I’ll go down on my own. I’ll put up at +the Bear and Key and I’ll come over and see Mrs. +Driffield while you’re there. You can both talk your +heads off about Edward Driffield, but I shall be able +to get away when I’m fed up with you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy laughed good-naturedly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right. That’ll do. And will you jot down anything +you can remember that you think will be useful +to me?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll try.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“When will you come? I’m going down on Friday.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll come with you if you’ll promise not to talk +to me in the train.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right. The five-ten’s the best one. Shall I come +and fetch you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m capable of getting to Victoria by myself. I’ll +meet you on the platform.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I don’t know if Roy was afraid of my changing my +mind, but he got up at once, shook my hand heartily, +and left. He begged me on no account to forget my +tennis racket and bathing suit.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>My promise</span> to Roy sent my thoughts back to my +first years in London. Having nothing much to do +that afternoon, it occurred to me to stroll along and +have a cup of tea with my old landlady. Mrs. Hudson’s +name had been given to me by the secretary of +the medical school at St. Luke’s when, a callow youth +just arrived in town, I was looking for lodgings. She +had a house in Vincent Square. I lived there for five +years, in two rooms on the ground floor, and over +me on the drawing room floor lived a master at Westminster +School. I paid a pound a week for my rooms +and he paid twenty-five shillings. Mrs. Hudson was +a little, active, bustling woman, with a sallow face, +a large aquiline nose, and the brightest, the most +vivacious, black eyes that I ever saw. She had a great +deal of very dark hair, in the afternoons and all day +on Sunday arranged in a fringe on the forehead with +a bun at the nape of the neck as you may see in old +photographs of the Jersey Lily. She had a heart of +gold (though I did not know it then, for when you +are young you take the kindness people show you as +your right) and she was an excellent cook. No one +could make a better <span class='it'>omelette soufflée</span> than she. Every +morning she was up betimes to get the fire lit in her +gentlemen’s sitting room so that they needn’t eat +their breakfasts simply perishing with the cold, my +word it’s bitter this morning; and if she didn’t hear +you having your bath, a flat tin bath that slipped +under the bed, the water put in the night before to +take the chill off, she’d say: “There now, there’s my +dining room floor not up yet, ’e’ll be late for his +lecture again,” and she would come tripping upstairs +and thump on the door and you would hear her shrill +voice: “If you don’t get up at once you won’t ’ave +time to ’ave breakfast, an’ I’ve got a lovely ’addick +for you.” She worked all day long and she sang at +her work and she was gay and happy and smiling. Her +husband was much older than she. He had been a +butler in very good families, and wore side-whiskers +and a perfect manner; he was verger at a neighbouring +church, highly respected, and he waited at table +and cleaned the boots and helped with the washing-up. +Mrs. Hudson’s only relaxation was to come up +after she had served the dinners (I had mine at half-past +six and the schoolmaster at seven) and have a +little chat with her gentlemen. I wish to goodness I +had had the sense (like Amy Driffield with her celebrated +husband) to take notes of her conversation, for +Mrs. Hudson was a mistress of Cockney humour. +She had a gift of repartee that never failed her, she +had a racy style and an apt and varied vocabulary, +she was never at a loss for the comic metaphor or +the vivid phrase. She was a pattern of propriety and +she would never have women in her house, you never +knew what they were up to (“It’s men, men, men all +the time with them, and afternoon tea and thin bread +and butter, and openin’ the door and ringin’ for ’ot +water and I don’t know what all”); but in conversation +she did not hesitate to use what was called in +those days the blue bag. One could have said of her +what she said of Marie Lloyd: “What I like about ’er +is that she gives you a good laugh. She goes pretty +near the knuckle sometimes, but she never jumps +over the fence.” Mrs. Hudson enjoyed her own +humour and I think she talked more willingly to her +lodgers because her husband was a serious man (“It’s +as it should be,” she said, “ ’im bein’ a verger and +attendin’ weddings and funerals and what all”) and +wasn’t much of a one for a joke. “Wot I says to +’Udson is, laugh while you’ve got the chance, you +won’t laugh much when you’re dead and buried.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Hudson’s humour was cumulative and the +story of her feud with Miss Butcher who let lodgings +at number fourteen was a great comic saga that +went on year in and year out.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’s a disagreeable old cat, but I give you my +word I’d miss ’er if the Lord took ’er one fine day. +Though what ’e’d do with ’er when ’e got ’er I +can’t think. Many’s the good laugh she’s give me in +’er time.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Hudson had very bad teeth and the question +whether she should have them taken out and have +false ones was discussed by her for two or three years +with an unimaginable variety of comic invention.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But as I said to ’Udson on’y last night, when he +said, ‘Oh, come on, ’ave ’em out and ’ave done with +it’, I shouldn’t ’ave anythin’ to talk about.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had not seen Mrs. Hudson for two or three years. +My last visit had been in answer to a little letter in +which she asked me to come and drink a nice strong +cup of tea with her and announced: “Hudson died +three months ago next Saturday, aged seventy-nine, +and George and Hester send their respectful compliments.” +George was the issue of her marriage with +Hudson. He was now a man approaching middle age +who worked at Woolwich Arsenal, and his mother +had been repeating for twenty years that George +would be bringing a wife home one of these days. +Hester was the maid-of-all-work she had engaged +toward the end of my stay with her, and Mrs. Hudson +still spoke of her as “that dratted girl of mine.” +Though Mrs. Hudson must have been well over +thirty when I first took her rooms, and that was five +and thirty years ago, I had no feeling as I walked +leisurely through the Green Park that I should not +find her alive. She was as definitely part of the recollections +of my youth as the pelicans that stood at the +edge of the ornamental water.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I walked down the area steps and the door was +opened to me by Hester, a woman getting on for +fifty now and stoutish, but still bearing on her shyly +grinning face the irresponsibility of the dratted girl. +Mrs. Hudson was darning George’s socks when I +was shown into the front room of the basement and +she took off her spectacles to look at me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, if that isn’t Mr. Ashenden! Who ever +thought of seeing you? Is the water boiling, ’Ester? +You will ’ave a nice cup of tea, won’t you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Hudson was a little heavier than when I first +knew her and her movements were more deliberate, +but there was scarcely a white hair on her head, and +her eyes, as black and shining as buttons, sparkled +with fun. I sat down in a shabby little armchair covered +with maroon leather.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How are you getting on, Mrs. Hudson?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I’ve got nothin’ much to complain of except +that I’m not so young as I used to was,” she answered. +“I can’t do so much as I could when you was +’ere. I don’t give my gentlemen dinner now, only +breakfast.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Are all your rooms let?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, I’m thankful to say.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Owing to the rise of prices Mrs. Hudson was able +to get more for her rooms than in my day, and I +think in her modest way she was quite well off. But +of course people wanted a lot nowadays.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You wouldn’t believe it, first I ’ad to put in a +bathroom, and then I ’ad to put in the electric light, +and then nothin’ would satisfy them but I must ’ave +a telephone. What they’ll want next I can’t think.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Mr. George says it’s pretty near time Mrs. +’Udson thought of retiring,” said Hester, who was +laying the tea.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You mind your own business, my girl,” said Mrs. +Hudson tartly. “When I retire it’ll be to the cemetery. +Fancy me livin’ all alone with George and +’Ester without nobody to talk to.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Mr. George says she ought to take a little ’ouse +in the country an’ take care of ’erself,” said Hester, +unperturbed by the reproof.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t talk to me about the country. The doctor +said I was to go there for six weeks last summer. It +nearly killed me, I give you my word. The noise of +it. All them birds singin’ all the time, and the cocks +crowin’ and the cows mooin’. I couldn’t stick it. When +you’ve lived all the years I ’ave in peace and quietness +you can’t get used to all that racket goin’ on +all the time.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>A few doors away was the Vauxhall Bridge Road +and down it trams were clanging, ringing their bells +as they went, motor buses were lumbering along, +taxis were tooting their horns. If Mrs. Hudson heard +it, it was London she heard, and it soothed her as +a mother’s crooning soothes a restless child.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I looked round the cosy, shabby, homely little +parlour in which Mrs. Hudson had lived so long. I +wondered if there was anything I could do for her. +I noticed that she had a gramophone. It was the only +thing I could think of.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Is there anything you want, Mrs. Hudson?” I +asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She fixed her beady eyes on me reflectively.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know as there is, now you come to speak +of it, except me ’ealth and strength for another +twenty years so as I can go on workin’.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I do not think I am a sentimentalist, but her reply, +unexpected but so characteristic, made a sudden lump +come to my throat.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When it was time for me to go I asked if I could +see the rooms I had lived in for five years.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Run upstairs, ’Ester, and see if Mr. Graham’s +in. If he ain’t, I’m sure ’e wouldn’t mind you ’avin’ +a look at them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Hester scurried up, and in a moment, slightly +breathless, came down again to say that Mr. Graham +was out. Mrs. Hudson came with me. The bed was +the same narrow iron bed that I had slept in and +dreamed in and there was the same chest of drawers +and the same washing stand. But the sitting room +had the grim heartiness of the athlete; on the walls +were photographs of cricket elevens and rowing men +in shorts; golf clubs stood in the corner and pipes +and tobacco jars, ornamented with the arms of a +college, were littered on the chimney-piece. In my +day we believed in art for art’s sake and this I exemplified +by draping the chimney-piece with a Moorish +rug, putting up curtains of art serge and a bilious +green, and hanging on the walls autotypes of pictures +by Perugino, Van Dyck and Hobbema.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Very artistic you was, wasn’t you?” Mrs. Hudson +remarked, not without irony.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Very,” I murmured.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I could not help feeling a pang as I thought of all +the years that had passed since I inhabited that room, +and of all that had happened to me. It was at that +same table that I had eaten my hearty breakfast and +my frugal dinner, read my medical books and written +my first novel. It was in that same armchair that I +had read for the first time Wordsworth and Stendhal, +the Elizabethan dramatists and the Russian novelists, +Gibbon, Boswell, Voltaire, and Rousseau. I wondered +who had used them since. Medical students, +articled clerks, young fellows making their way in +the city, and elderly men retired from the colonies +or thrown unexpectedly upon the world by the break +up of an old home. The room made me, as Mrs. +Hudson would have put it, go queer all over. All the +hopes that had been cherished there, the bright +visions of the future, the flaming passion of youth; +the regrets, the disillusion, the weariness, the resignation; +so much had been felt in that room, by so +many, the whole gamut of human emotion, that it +seemed strangely to have acquired a troubling and +enigmatic personality of its own. I have no notion +why, but it made me think of a woman at a crossroad +with a finger on her lips, looking back and with +her other hand beckoning. What I obscurely (and +rather shamefacedly) felt, communicated itself to +Mrs. Hudson, for she gave a laugh and with a characteristic +gesture rubbed her prominent nose.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“My word, people are funny,” she said. “When I +think of all the gentlemen I’ve ’ad here, I give you +my word you wouldn’t believe it if I told you some +of the things I know about them. One of them’s +funnier than the other. Sometimes I lie abed thinkin’ +of them, and <span class='it'>laugh</span>. Well, it would be a bad world if +you didn’t get a good laugh now and then, but, lor’, +lodgers really are the limit.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XIII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I lived</span> with Mrs. Hudson for nearly two years +before I met the Driffields again. My life was very +regular. I spent all day at the hospital and about six +walked back to Vincent Square. I bought the <span class='it'>Star</span> +at Lambeth Bridge and read it till my dinner was +served. Then I read seriously for an hour or two, +works to improve my mind, for I was a strenuous, +earnest, and industrious youth, and after that wrote +novels and plays till bedtime. I do not know for what +reason it was that one day toward the end of June, +happening to leave the hospital early, I thought I +would walk down the Vauxhall Bridge Road. I liked +it for its noisy bustle. It had a sordid vivacity that +was pleasantly exciting and you felt that at any +moment an adventure might there befall you. I +strolled along in a daydream and was surprised suddenly +to hear my name. I stopped and looked, and +there to my astonishment stood Mrs. Driffield. She +was smiling at me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you know me?” she cried.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes. Mrs. Driffield.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And though I was grown up I was conscious that +I was blushing as furiously as when I was sixteen. I +was embarrassed. With my lamentably Victorian +notions of honesty I had been much shocked by the +Driffields’ behaviour in running away from Blackstable +without paying their bills. It seemed to me +very shabby. I felt deeply the shame I thought they +must feel and I was astounded that Mrs. Driffield +should speak to someone who knew of the discreditable +incident. If I had seen her coming I should +have looked away, my delicacy presuming that she +would wish to avoid the mortification of being seen +by me; but she held out her hand and shook mine +with obvious pleasure.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I am glad to see a Blackstable face,” she said. +“You know we left there in a hurry.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She laughed and I laughed too; but her laugh was +mirthful and childlike, while mine, I felt, was +strained.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I hear there <span class='it'>was</span> a to-do when they found out we’d +skipped. I thought Ted would never stop laughing +when he heard about it. What did your uncle say?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was quick to get the right tone. I wasn’t going +to let her think that I couldn’t see a joke as well as +anyone.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, you know what he is. He’s very old-fashioned.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, that’s what’s wrong with Blackstable. They +want waking up.” She gave me a friendly look. +“You’ve grown a lot since I saw you last. Why, +you’re growing a moustache.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes,” I said, giving it as much of a twirl as its +size allowed me. “I’ve had that for ages.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How time does fly, doesn’t it? You were just a +boy four years ago and now you’re a man.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I ought to be,” I replied somewhat haughtily. +“I’m nearly twenty-one.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was looking at Mrs. Driffield. She wore a very +small hat with feathers in it, and a pale gray dress +with large leg-of-mutton sleeves and a long train. I +thought she looked very smart. I had always thought +that she had a nice face, but I noticed now, for the +first time, that she was pretty. Her eyes were bluer +than I remembered and her skin was like ivory.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know we live just round the corner,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“So do I.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We live in Limpus Road. We’ve been there almost +ever since we left Blackstable.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, I’ve been in Vincent Square for nearly two +years.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I knew you were in London. George Kemp told +me so, and I often wondered where you were. Why +don’t you walk back with me now? Ted will be so +pleased to see you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t mind,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>As we walked along she told me that Driffield +was now literary editor of a weekly paper; his last +book had done much better than any of his others +and he was expecting to get quite a bit as an advance +on royalties for the next one. She seemed to know +most of the Blackstable news, and I remembered how +it had been suspected that Lord George had helped +the Driffields in their flight. I guessed that he wrote +to them now and then. I noticed as we walked along +that sometimes the men who passed us stared at Mrs. +Driffield. It occurred to me presently that they must +think her pretty too. I began to walk with a certain +swagger.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Limpus Road was a long wide straight street that +ran parallel with the Vauxhall Bridge Road. The +houses were all alike, of stucco, dingily painted, solid, +and with substantial porticos. I suppose they had +been built to be inhabited by men of standing in the +city of London, but the street had gone down in +the world or had never attracted the right sort of +tenant; and its decayed respectability had an air +at once furtive and shabbily dissipated, that made +you think of persons who had seen better days and +now, genteelly fuddled, talked of the social distinction +of their youth. The Driffields lived in a house +painted a dull red, and Mrs. Driffield letting me into +a narrow dark hall, opened a door and said:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Go in. I’ll tell Ted you’re here.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She walked down the hall and I entered the sitting +room. The Driffields had the basement and the +ground floor of the house, which they rented from +the lady who lived in the upper part. The room into +which I went looked as if it had been furnished with +the scourings of auction sales. There were heavy +velvet curtains with great fringes, all loops and festoons, +and a gilt suite, upholstered in yellow damask, +heavily buttoned; and there was a great pouffe in +the middle of the room. There were gilt cabinets in +which were masses of little articles, pieces of china, +ivory figures, wood carvings, bits of Indian brass; +and on the walls hung large oil paintings of highland +glens and stags and gillies. In a moment Mrs. Driffield +brought her husband and he greeted me warmly. +He wore a shabby alpaca coat and gray trousers; he +had shaved his beard and wore now a moustache and +a small imperial. I noticed for the first time how +short he was; but he looked more distinguished than +he used to. There was something a trifle foreign in +his appearance and I thought this was much more +what I should expect an author to look like.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, what do you think of our new abode?” he +asked. “It looks rich, doesn’t it? I think it inspires +confidence.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He looked round him with satisfaction.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And Ted’s got his den at the back where he can +write, and we’ve got a dining room in the basement,” +said Mrs. Driffield. “Miss Cowley was companion +for many years to a lady of title and when she died +she left her all her furniture. You can see everything’s +good, can’t you? You can see it came out of a gentleman’s +house.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rosie fell in love with the place the moment we +saw it,” said Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You did too, Ted.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We’ve lived in sordid circumstances so long; it’s +a change to be surrounded by luxury. Madame de +Pompadour and all that sort of thing.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I left them it was with a very cordial invitation +to come again. It appeared that they were at +home every Saturday afternoon and all sorts of +people whom I would like to meet were in the habit +of dropping in.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XIV</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I went</span>. I enjoyed myself. I went again. When the +autumn came and I returned to London for the winter +session at St. Luke’s I got into the habit of going +every Saturday. It was my introduction into the world +of art and letters; I kept it a profound secret that +in the privacy of my lodgings I was busily writing; +I was excited to meet people who were writing also +and I listened entranced to their conversation. All +sorts of persons came to these parties: at that time +week-ends were rare, golf was still a subject for +ridicule, and few had much to do on Saturday afternoons. +I do not think anyone came who was of any +great importance; at all events, of all the painters, +writers, and musicians I met at the Driffields’ I cannot +remember one whose reputation has endured; but +the effect was cultured and animated. You found +young actors who were looking for parts and middle-aged +singers who deplored the fact that the English +were not a musical race, composers who played their +compositions on the Driffields’ cottage piano and +complained in a whispered aside that they sounded +nothing except on a concert grand, poets who on +pressure consented to read a little thing that they +had just written, and painters who were looking for +commissions. Now and then a person of title added +a certain glamour; seldom, however, for in those +days the aristocracy had not yet become bohemian +and if a person of quality cultivated the society of +artists it was generally because a notorious divorce +or a little difficulty over cards had made life in his +own station (or hers) a bit awkward. We have +changed all that. One of the greatest benefits that +compulsory education has conferred upon the world +is the wide diffusion among the nobility and gentry +of the practice of writing. Horace Walpole once +wrote a <span class='it'>Catalogue of Royal and Noble Authors</span>; +such a work now would have the dimensions of an +encyclopædia. A title, even a courtesy one, can make +a well known author of almost anyone and it may +be safely asserted that there is no better passport +to the world of letters than rank.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I have indeed sometimes thought that now that +the House of Lords must inevitably in a short while +be abolished, it would be a very good plan if the +profession of literature were by law confined to its +members and their wives and children. It would be +a graceful compensation that the British people might +offer the peers in return for the surrender of their +hereditary privileges. It would be a means of support +for those (too many) whom devotion to the +public cause in keeping chorus girls and race horses +and playing <span class='it'>chemin de fer</span> has impoverished, and a +pleasant occupation for the rest who by the process +of natural selection have in the course of time become +unfit to do anything but govern the British Empire. +But this is an age of specialization and if my plan +is adopted it is obvious that it cannot but be to the +greater glory of English literature that its various +provinces should be apportioned among the various +ranks of the nobility. I would suggest, therefore, that +the humbler branches of literature should be practised +by the lower orders of the peerage and that the +barons and viscounts should devote themselves exclusively +to journalism and the drama. Fiction might +be the privileged demesne of the earls. They have +already shown their aptitude for this difficult art and +their numbers are so great that they would very +competently supply the demand. To the marquises +might safely be left the production of that part of +literature which is known (I have never quite seen +why) as <span class='it'>belles lettres</span>. It is perhaps not very profitable +from a pecuniary standpoint, but it has a distinction +that very well suits the holders of this romantic +title.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The crown of literature is poetry. It is its end +and aim. It is the sublimest activity of the human +mind. It is the achievement of beauty. The writer of +prose can only step aside when the poet passes; he +makes the best of us look like a piece of cheese. It +is evident then that the writing of poetry should be +left to the dukes, and I should like to see their rights +protected by the most severe pains and penalties, for +it is intolerable that the noblest of arts should be +practised by any but the noblest of men. And since +here, too, specialization must prevail, I foresee that +the dukes (like the successors of Alexander) will +divide the realm of poetry between them, each confining +himself to that aspect with which hereditary +influence and natural bent have rendered him +competent to deal: thus I see the dukes of Manchester +writing poems of a didactic and moral character, +the dukes of Westminster composing stirring +odes on Duty and the Responsibilities of Empire; +whereas I imagine that the dukes of Devonshire +would be more likely to write love lyrics and elegies +in the Propertian manner, while it is almost inevitable +that the dukes of Marlborough should pipe in an +idyllic strain on such subjects as domestic bliss, conscription, +and content with modest station.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But if you say that this is somewhat formidable +and remind me that the muse does not only stalk +with majestic tread, but on occasion trips on a light +fantastic toe; if, recalling the wise person who said +that he did not care who made a nation’s laws so +long as he wrote its songs, you ask me (thinking +rightly that it would ill become the dukes to do so) +who shall twang those measures on the lyre that the +diverse and inconstant soul of man occasionally +hankers after—I answer (obviously enough, I should +have thought) the duchesses. I recognize that the day +is past when the amorous peasants of the Romagna +sang to their sweethearts the verses of Torquato +Tasso and Mrs. Humphry Ward crooned over young +Arnold’s cradle the choruses of Œdipus in Colonus. +The age demands something more up-to-date. I suggest, +therefore, that the more domestic duchesses +should write our hymns and our nursery rhymes; +while the skittish ones, those who incline to mingle +vine leaves with the strawberry, should write the +lyrics for musical comedies, humorous verse for the +comic papers, and mottoes for Christmas cards and +crackers. Thus would they retain in the hearts of +the British public that place which they have held +hitherto only on account of their exalted station.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was at these parties on Saturday afternoon that +I discovered very much to my surprise that Edward +Driffield was a distinguished person. He had written +something like twenty books, and though he had +never made more than a pittance out of them his +reputation was considerable. The best judges admired +them and the friends who came to his house +were agreed that one of these days he would be recognized. +They rated the public because it would not +see that here was a great writer, and since the easiest +way to exalt one man is to kick another in the pants, +they reviled freely all the novelists whose contemporary +fame obscured his. If, indeed, I had known +as much of literary circles as I learned later I should +have guessed by the not infrequent visits of Mrs. +Barton Trafford that the time was approaching when +Edward Driffield, like a runner in a long-distance +race breaking away suddenly from the little knot of +plodding athletes, must forge ahead. I admit that +when first I was introduced to this lady her name +meant nothing to me. Driffield presented me as a +young neighbour of his in the country and told her +that I was a medical student. She gave me a mellifluous +smile, murmured in a soft voice something about +Tom Sawyer, and, accepting the bread and butter I +offered her, went on talking with her host. But I +noticed that her arrival had made an impression and +the conversation, which had been noisy and hilarious, +was hushed. When in an undertone I asked who she +was, I found that my ignorance was amazing; I was +told that she had “made” So and So and So and So. +After half an hour she rose, shook hands very graciously +with such of the people as she was acquainted +with, and with a sort of lithe sweetness sidled out +of the room. Driffield accompanied her to the door +and put her in a hansom.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Barton Trafford was then a woman of about +fifty; she was small and slight, but with rather large +features, which made her head look a little too big +for her body; she had crisp white hair which she +wore like the Venus of Milo, and she was supposed +in her youth to have been very comely. She dressed +discreetly in black silk, and wore round her neck +jangling chains of beads and shells. She was said +to have been unhappily married in early life, but now +for many years had been congenially united to +Barton Trafford, a clerk in the Home Office and a +well known authority on prehistoric man. She gave +you the curious impression of having no bones in her +body and you felt that if you pinched her shin (which +of course my respect for her sex as well as something +of quiet dignity in her appearance would have never +allowed me to do) your fingers would meet. When +you took her hand it was like taking a fillet of sole. +Her face, notwithstanding its large features, had +something fluid about it. When she sat it was as +though she had no backbone and were stuffed, like +an expensive cushion, with swansdown.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Everything was soft about her, her voice, her smile, +her laugh; her eyes, which were small and pale, had +the softness of flowers; her manner was as soft as +the summer rain. It was this extraordinary, and +charming, characteristic that made her the wonderful +friend she was. It was this that had gained her +the celebrity that she now enjoyed. The whole world +was aware of her friendship with the great novelist +whose death a few years back had come as such a +shock to the English-speaking peoples. Everyone had +read the innumerable letters which he had written to +her and which she was induced to publish shortly +after his demise. Every page revealed his admiration +for her beauty and his respect for her judgment; +he could never say often enough how much he owed +to her encouragement, her ready sympathy, her tact, +her taste; and if certain of his expressions of passion +were such as some persons might think would +not be read by Mr. Barton Trafford with unmixed +feelings, that only added to the human interest of the +work. But Mr. Barton Trafford was above the prejudices +of vulgar men (his misfortune, if such it was, +was one that the greatest personages in history have +endured with philosophy) and, abandoning his studies +of aurignacian flints and neolithic ax heads he consented +to write a Life of the deceased novelist in +which he showed quite definitely how great a part of +the writer’s genius was due to his wife’s influence.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But Mrs. Barton Trafford’s interest in literature, +her passion for art, were not dead because the friend +for whom she had done so much had become part, +with her far from negligible assistance, of posterity. +She was a great reader. Little that was noteworthy +escaped her attention and she was quick to establish +personal relations with any young writer who showed +promise. Her fame, especially since the Life, was now +such that she was sure that no one would hesitate to +accept the sympathy she was prepared to offer. It was +inevitable that Mrs. Barton Trafford’s genius for +friendship should in due course find an outlet. When +she read something that struck her, Mr. Barton Trafford, +himself no mean critic, wrote a warm letter +of appreciation to the author and asked him to luncheon. +After luncheon, having to get back to the Home +Office, he left him to have a chat with Mrs. Barton +Trafford. Many were called. They all had <span class='it'>something</span>, +but that was not enough. Mrs. Barton Trafford had +a <span class='it'>flair</span>, and she trusted her <span class='it'>flair</span>; her <span class='it'>flair</span> bade her +wait.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She was so cautious indeed that with Jasper Gibbons +she almost missed the bus. The records of the +past tell us of writers who grew famous in a night, +but in our more prudent day this is unheard of. The +critics want to see which way the cat will jump, +and the public has been sold a pup too often to +take unnecessary chances. But in the case of Jasper +Gibbons it is almost the exact truth that he did +thus jump into celebrity. Now that he is so completely +forgotten and the critics who praised him +would willingly eat their words if they were not +carefully guarded in the files of innumerable newspaper +offices, the sensation he made with his first +volume of poems is almost unbelievable. The most +important papers gave to reviews of them as much +space as they would have to the report of a prize +fight; the most influential critics fell over one another +in their eagerness to welcome him. They likened him +to Milton (for the sonority of his blank verse), to +Keats (for the opulence of his sensuous imagery), +and to Shelley (for his airy fantasy); and, using +him as a stick to beat idols of whom they were weary, +they gave in his name many a resounding whack on +the emaciated buttocks of Lord Tennyson and a few +good husky smacks on the bald pate of Robert Browning. +The public fell like the walls of Jericho. Edition +after edition was sold, and you saw Jasper Gibbons’s +handsome volume in the boudoirs of countesses in +Mayfair, in vicarage drawing rooms from Land’s +End to John o’ Groats, and in the parlours of many +an honest but cultured merchant in Glasgow, Aberdeen, +and Belfast. When it became known that Queen +Victoria had accepted a specially bound copy of the +book from the hands of the loyal publisher, and had +given him (not the poet, the publisher) a copy of +<span class='it'>Leaves from a Journal in the Highlands</span> in exchange, +the national enthusiasm knew no bounds.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>And all this happened as it were in the twinkling +of an eye. Seven cities in Greece disputed the honour +of having given birth to Homer, and though Jasper +Gibbons’s birthplace (Walsall) was well known, +twice seven critics claimed the honour of having discovered +him; eminent judges of literature who for +twenty years had written eulogies of one another’s +works in the weekly papers quarrelled so bitterly +over this matter that one cut the other dead in the +Athenæum. Nor was the great world remiss in giving +him its recognition. Jasper Gibbons was asked to +luncheon and invited to tea by dowager duchesses, the +wives of cabinet ministers, and the widows of bishops. +It is said that Harrison Ainsworth was the first English +man of letters to move in English society on terms +of equality (and I have sometimes wondered that +an enterprising publisher on this account has not +thought of bringing out a complete edition of his +works); but I believe that Jasper Gibbons was the +first poet to have his name engraved at the bottom +of an At Home card as a draw as enticing as an +opera singer or a ventriloquist.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was out of the question then for Mrs. Barton +Trafford to get in on the ground floor. She could +only buy in the open market. I do not know what +prodigious strategy she employed, what miracles of +tact, what tenderness, what exquisite sympathy, what +demure blandishments; I can only surmise and admire; +she nobbled Jasper Gibbons. In a little while +he was eating out of her soft hand. She was admirable. +She had him to lunch to meet the right +people; she gave At Homes where he recited his +poems before the most distinguished persons in England; +she introduced him to eminent actors who gave +him commissions to write plays; she saw that his +poems should only appear in the proper places; she +dealt with the publishers and made contracts for +him that would have staggered even a cabinet minister; +she took care that he should accept only the +invitations of which she approved; she even went +so far as to separate him from the wife with whom +he had lived happily for ten years, since she felt that +a poet to be true to himself and his art must not be +encumbered with domestic ties. When the crash came +Mrs. Barton Trafford, had she chosen, might have +said that she had done everything for him that it was +humanly possible to do.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>For there was a crash. Jasper Gibbons brought out +another volume of poetry; it was neither better nor +worse than the first; it was very much like the first; +it was treated with respect, but the critics made reservations; +some of them even carped. The book was a +disappointment. Its sale also. And unfortunately +Jasper Gibbons was inclined to tipple. He had never +been accustomed to having money to spend, he was +quite unused to the lavish entertainments that were +offered him, perhaps he missed his homely, common +little wife; once or twice he came to dinner at Mrs. +Barton Trafford’s in a condition that anyone less +worldly, less simple-minded than she, would have described +as blind to the world. She told her guests +gently that the bard was not quite himself that evening. +His third book was a failure. The critics tore +him limb from limb, they knocked him down and +stamped on him, and, to quote one of Edward Driffield’s +favourite songs, then they lugged him round +the room and then they jumped upon his face: they +were quite naturally annoyed that they had mistaken +a fluent versifier for a deathless poet and were determined +that he should suffer for their error. Then +Jasper Gibbons was arrested for being drunk and +disorderly in Piccadilly and Mr. Barton Trafford +had to go to Vine Street at midnight to bail him out.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Barton Trafford at this juncture was perfect. +She did not repine. No harsh word escaped her lips. +She might have been excused if she had felt a certain +bitterness because this man for whom she had done +so much had let her down. She remained tender, +gentle, and sympathetic. She was the woman who +understood. She dropped him, but not like a hot +brick, or a hot potato. She dropped him with infinite +gentleness, as softly as the tear that she doubtless +shed when she made up her mind to do something +so repugnant to her nature; she dropped him with +so much tact, with such sensibility, that Jasper Gibbons +perhaps hardly knew he was dropped. But there +was no doubt about it. She would say nothing against +him, indeed she would not discuss him at all, and +when mention was made of him she merely smiled, +a little sadly, and sighed. But her smile was the <span class='it'>coup +de grâce</span>, and her sigh buried him deep.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Barton Trafford had a passion for literature +too sincere to allow a setback of this character long +to discourage her; and however great her disappointment +she was a woman of too disinterested a nature +to let the gifts of tact, sympathy, and understanding +with which she was blessed by nature lie fallow. She +continued to move in literary circles, going to tea +parties here and there, to soirées, and to At Homes, +charming always and gentle, listening intelligently, +but watchful, critical, and determined (if I may put +it crudely) next time to back a winner. It was then +that she met Edward Driffield and formed a favourable +opinion of his gifts. It is true that he was not +young, but then he was unlikely like Jasper Gibbons +to go to pieces. She offered him her friendship. He +could not fail to be moved when, in that gentle way +of hers, she told him that it was a scandal that his +exquisite work remained known only in a narrow +circle. He was pleased and flattered. It is always +pleasant to be assured that you are a genius. She +told him that Barton Trafford was reflecting on the +possibility of writing an important article on him +for the <span class='it'>Quarterly Review</span>. She asked him to luncheon +to meet people who might be useful to him. She +wanted him to know his intellectual equals. Sometimes +she took him for a walk on the Chelsea Embankment +and they talked of poets dead and gone +and love and friendship, and had tea in an A.B.C. +shop. When Mrs. Barton Trafford came to Limpus +Street on Saturday afternoon she had the air of the +queen bee preparing herself for the nuptial flight.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Her manner with Mrs. Driffield was perfect. It +was affable, but not condescending. She always +thanked her very prettily for having allowed her to +come and see her and complimented her on her appearance. +If she praised Edward Driffield to her, +telling her with a little envy in her tone what a privilege +it was to enjoy the companionship of such a great +man, it was certainly from pure kindness, and not +because she knew that there is nothing that exasperates +the wife of a literary man more than to have +another woman tell her flattering things about him. +She talked to Mrs. Driffield of the simple things her +simple nature might be supposed to be interested in, +of cooking and servants and Edward’s health and +how careful she must be with him. Mrs. Barton +Trafford treated her exactly as you would expect a +woman of very good Scotch family, which she was, +to treat an ex-barmaid with whom a distinguished +man of letters had made an unfortunate marriage. +She was cordial, playful, and gently determined to +put her at her ease.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was strange that Rosie could not bear her; indeed, +Mrs. Barton Trafford was the only person +that I ever knew her dislike. In those days even +barmaids did not habitually use the “bitches” and +“bloodys” that are part and parcel of the current +vocabulary of the best-brought-up young ladies, and +I never heard Rosie use a word that would have +shocked my Aunt Sophie. When anyone told a story +that was a little near the knuckle she would blush to +the roots of her hair. But she referred to Mrs. Barton +Trafford as “that damned old cat.” It needed +the most urgent persuasions of her more intimate +friends to induce her to be civil to her.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t be a fool, Rosie,” they said. They all +called her Rosie and presently I, though very shyly, +got in the habit of doing so too. “If she wants to she +can make him. He must play up to her. She can work +the trick if anyone can.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Though most of the Driffields’ visitors were occasional, +appearing every other Saturday, say, or +every third, there was a little band that, like myself, +came almost every week. We were the stand-bys; we +arrived early and stayed late. Of these the most faithful +were Quentin Forde, Harry Retford, and Lionel +Hillier.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Quentin Forde was a stocky little man with a fine +head of the type that was afterward for a time much +admired in the moving pictures, a straight nose and +handsome eyes, neatly cropped gray hair, and a black +moustache; if he had been four or five inches taller +he would have been the perfect type of the villain +of melodrama. He was known to be very “well connected,” +and he was affluent; his only occupation was +to cultivate the arts. He went to all the first nights +and all the private views. He had the amateur’s +severity, and cherished for the productions of his +contemporaries a polite but sweeping contempt. I +discovered that he did not come to the Driffields’ +because Edward was a genius, but because Rosie was +beautiful.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Now that I look back I cannot get over my surprise +that I should have had to be told what was +surely so obvious. When I first knew her it never +occurred to me to ask myself whether she was pretty +or plain, and when, seeing her again after five years, +I noticed for the first time that she was very pretty, +I was interested but did not trouble to think much +about it. I took it as part of the natural order of +things, just as I took the sun setting over the North +Sea or the towers of Tercanbury Cathedral. I was +quite startled when I heard people speak of Rosie’s +beauty, and when they complimented Edward on +her looks and his eyes rested on her for a moment, +mine followed his. Lionel Hillier was a painter and +he asked her to sit for him. When he talked of the +picture he wanted to paint and told me what he saw +in her, I listened to him stupidly. I was puzzled and +confused. Harry Retford knew one of the fashionable +photographers of the period and, arranging +special terms, he took Rosie to be photographed. A +Saturday or two later the proofs were there and we +all looked at them. I had never seen Rosie in evening +dress. She was wearing a dress of white satin, +with a long train and puffy sleeves, and it was cut +low; her hair was more elaborately done than usual. +She looked very different from the strapping young +woman I had first met in Joy Lane in a boater and +a starched shirt. But Lionel Hillier tossed the photographs +aside impatiently.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rotten,” he said. “What can a photograph give +of Rosie? The thing about her is her colour.” He +turned to her. “Rosie, don’t you know that your +colour is <span class='it'>the</span> great miracle of the age?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She looked at him without answering, but her full +red lips broke into their childlike, mischievous smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“If I can only get a suggestion of it I’m made for +life,” he said. “All the rich stockbrokers’ wives will +come on their bended knees and beg me to paint them +like you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Presently I learned that Rosie was sitting to him, +but when, never having been in a painter’s studio and +looking upon it as the gateway of romance, I asked +if I might not come one day and see how the picture +was getting on, Hillier said that he did not want +anyone to see it yet. He was a man of five and thirty +and of a flamboyant appearance. He looked like a +portrait of Van Dyck in which the distinction had +been replaced by good humour. He was slightly above +the middle height, slim; and he had a fine mane of +black hair and flowing moustaches and a pointed +beard. He favoured broad-brimmed sombreros and +Spanish capes. He had lived a long time in Paris and +talked admiringly of painters, Monet, Sisley, Renoir, +of whom we had never heard, and with contempt of +Sir Frederick Leighton and Mr. Alma-Tadema and +Mr. G. F. Watts, whom in our heart of hearts we +very much admired. I have often wondered what +became of him. He spent a few years in London trying +to make his way, failed, I suppose, and then +drifted to Florence. I was told that he had a drawing +school there, but when, years later, chancing to be +in that city, I asked about him, I could find no one +who had ever heard of him. I think he must have +had some talent, for I have even now a very vivid +recollection of the portrait he painted of Rosie +Driffield. I wonder what has happened to it. Has it +been destroyed or is it hidden away, its face to the +wall, in the attic of a junk shop in Chelsea? I should +like to think that it has at least found a place on the +walls of some provincial gallery.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I was at last allowed to come and see it, I +put my foot in it fine and proper. Hillier’s studio was +in the Fulham Road, one of a group at the back of a +row of shops, and you went in through a dark and +smelly passage. It was a Sunday afternoon in March, +a fine blue day, and I walked from Vincent Square +through deserted streets. Hillier lived in his studio; +there was a large divan on which he slept, and a +tiny little room at the back where he cooked his +breakfast, washed his brushes, and, I suppose, himself.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I arrived Rosie still wore the dress in which +she had been sitting and they were having a cup of +tea. Hillier opened the door for me, and still holding +my hand led me up to the large canvas.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“There she is,” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He had painted Rosie full length, just a little less +than life-size, in an evening dress of white silk. It +was not at all like the academy portraits I was accustomed +to. I did not know what to say, so I said the +first thing that came into my head.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“When will it be finished?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It is finished,” he answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I blushed furiously. I felt a perfect fool. I had not +then acquired the technique that I flatter myself now +enables me to deal competently with the works of +modern artists. If this were the place I could write +a very neat little guide to enable the amateur of pictures +to deal to the satisfaction of their painters with +the most diverse manifestations of the creative instinct. +There is the intense “By God” that acknowledges +the power of the ruthless realist, the “It’s so +awfully sincere” that covers your embarrassment +when you are shown the coloured photograph of an +alderman’s widow, the low whistle that exhibits your +admiration for the post-impressionist, the “Terribly +amusing” that expresses what you feel about the +cubist, the “Oh!” of one who is overcome, the “Ah!” +of him whose breath is taken away.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s awfully like,” was all that then I could lamely +say.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s not chocolate-boxy enough for you,” said +Hillier.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think it’s awfully good,” I answered quickly, +defending myself. “Are you going to send it to the +Academy?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good God, no! I might send it to the Grosvenor.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I looked from the painting to Rosie and from +Rosie to the painting.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Get into the pose, Rosie,” said Hillier, “and let +him see you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She got up on to the model stand. I stared at her +and I stared at the picture. I had such a funny little +feeling in my heart. It was as though someone softly +plunged a sharp knife into it, but it was not an unpleasant +sensation at all, painful but strangely agreeable; +and then suddenly I felt quite weak at the knees. +But now I do not know if I remember Rosie in the +flesh or in the picture. For when I think of her it is +not in the shirt and boater that I first saw her in, +nor in any of the other dresses I saw her in then or +later, but in the white silk that Hillier painted, with +a black velvet bow in her hair, and in the pose he had +made her take.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I never exactly knew Rosie’s age, but reckoning +the years out as well as I can, I think she must have +been thirty-five. She did not look anything like it. +Her face was quite unlined and her skin as smooth +as a child’s. I do not think she had very good features. +They certainly had none of the aristocratic +distinction of the great ladies whose photographs +were then sold in all the shops; they were rather +blunt. Her short nose was a little thick, her eyes were +smallish, her mouth was large; but her eyes had the +blue of cornflowers, and they smiled with her lips, +very red and sensual, and her smile was the gayest, +the most friendly, the sweetest thing I ever saw. She +had by nature a heavy, sullen look, but when she +smiled this sullenness became on a sudden infinitely +attractive. She had no colour in her face; it was of +a very pale brown except under the eyes where it +was faintly blue. Her hair was pale gold and it was +done in the fashion of the day high on the head with +an elaborate fringe.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She’s the very devil to paint,” said Hillier, looking +at her and at his picture. “You see, she’s all gold, +her face and her hair, and yet she doesn’t give you +a golden effect, she gives you a silvery effect.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I knew what he meant. She glowed, but palely, +like the moon rather than the sun, or if it was like +the sun it was like the sun in the white mist of dawn. +Hillier had placed her in the middle of his canvas +and she stood, with her arms by her sides, the palms +of her hands toward you and her head a little thrown +back, in an attitude that gave value to the pearly +beauty of her neck and bosom. She stood like an +actress taking a call, confused by unexpected applause, +but there was something so virginal about +her, so exquisitely springlike, that the comparison +was absurd. This artless creature had never known +grease paint or footlights. She stood like a maiden +apt for love offering herself guilelessly, because she +was fulfilling the purposes of Nature, to the embraces +of a lover. She belonged to a generation that did not +fear a certain opulence of line, she was slender, but +her breasts were ample and her hips well marked. +When, later, Mrs. Barton Trafford saw the picture +she said it reminded her of a sacrificial heifer.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XV</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>Edward Driffield</span> worked at night, and Rosie, +having nothing to do, was glad to go out with one or +other of her friends. She liked luxury and Quentin +Forde was well-to-do. He would fetch her in a cab +and take her to dine at Kettner’s or the Savoy, and +she would put on her grandest clothes for him; and +Harry Retford, though he never had a bob, behaved +as if he had, and took her about in hansoms too and +gave her dinner at Romano’s or in one or other of +the little restaurants that were becoming modish in +Soho. He was an actor and a clever one, but he was +difficult to suit and so was often out of work. He +was about thirty, a man with a pleasantly ugly face +and a clipped way of speaking that made what he +said sound funny. Rosie liked his devil-may-care attitude +toward life, the swagger with which he wore +clothes made by the best tailor in London and unpaid +for, the recklessness with which he would put a fiver +he hadn’t got on a horse, and the generosity with +which he flung his money about when a lucky win +put him in funds. He was gay, charming, vain, boastful, +and unscrupulous. Rosie told me that once he +had pawned his watch to take her out to dinner and +then borrowed a couple of pounds from the actor +manager who had given them seats for the play in +order to take him out to supper with them afterward.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>But she was just as well pleased to go with Lionel +Hillier to his studio and eat a chop that he and she +cooked between them and spend the evening talking, +and it was only very rarely that she would dine +with me at all. I used to fetch her after I had had my +dinner in Vincent Square and she hers with Driffield, +and we would get on a bus and go to a music +hall. We went here and there, to the Pavilion or the +Tivoli, sometimes to the Metropolitan if there was +a particular turn we wanted to see; but our favourite +was the Canterbury. It was cheap and the show was +good. We ordered a couple of beers and I smoked +my pipe. Rosie looked round with delight at the +great dark smoky house, crowded to the ceiling with +the inhabitants of South London.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I like the Canterbury,” she said. “It’s so homey.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I discovered that she was a great reader. She liked +history, but only history of a certain kind, the lives +of queens and of mistresses of royal personages; and +she would tell me with a childlike wonder of the +strange things she read. She had a wide acquaintance +with the six consorts of King Henry VIII and there +was little she did not know about Mrs. Fitzherbert +and Lady Hamilton. Her appetite was prodigious +and she ranged from Lucrezia Borgia to the wives +of Philip of Spain; then there was the long list of +the royal mistresses of France. She knew them all, +and all about them, from Agnes Sorel down to +Madame du Barry.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I like to read about real things,” she said. “I +don’t much care about novels.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She liked to gossip about Blackstable and I thought +it was on account of my connection with it that she +liked to come out with me. She seemed to know all +that was going on there.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I go down every other week or so to see my +mother,” she said. “Just for the night, you know.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“To Blackstable?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was surprised.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, not to Blackstable,” Rosie smiled. “I don’t +know that I’d care to go there just yet. To Haversham. +Mother comes over to meet me. I stay at +the hotel where I used to work.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She was never a great talker. Often when, the +night being fine, we decided to walk back from the +music hall at which we had been spending the evening, +she never opened her mouth. But her silence +was intimate and comfortable. It did not exclude you +from thoughts that engaged her apart from you; it +included you in a pervasive well-being.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was talking about her once to Lionel Hillier and +I said to him that I could not understand how she +had turned from the fresh pleasant-looking young +woman I had first known at Blackstable into the +lovely creature whose beauty now practically everyone +acknowledged. (There were people who made +reservations. “Of course she has a very good figure,” +they said, “but it’s not the sort of face I very much +admire personally.” And others said: “Oh, yes, of +course, a very pretty woman; but it’s a pity she hasn’t +a little more distinction.”)</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I can explain that to you in half a jiffy,” said +Lionel Hillier. “She was only a fresh, buxom wench +when you first met her. <span class='it'>I</span> made her beauty.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I forget what my answer was, but I know it was +ribald.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right. That just shows you don’t know anything +about beauty. No one ever thought very much +of Rosie till I saw her like the sun shining silver. It +wasn’t till I painted it that anyone knew that her +hair was the most lovely thing in the world.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did you make her neck and her breasts and her +carriage and her bones?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, damn you, that’s just what I did do.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When Hillier talked of Rosie in front of her she +listened to him with a smiling gravity. A little flush +came into her pale cheeks. I think that at first when +he spoke to her of her beauty she believed he was +just making game of her; but when she found out +that he wasn’t, when he painted her silvery gold, +it had no particular effect on her. She was a trifle +amused, pleased of course, and a little surprised, but +it did not turn her head. She thought him a little +mad. I often wondered whether there was anything +between them. I could not forget all I had heard of +Rosie at Blackstable and what I had seen in the +vicarage garden; I wondered about Quentin Forde, +too, and Harry Retford. I used to watch them with +her. She was not exactly familiar with them, comradely +rather; she used to make her appointments +with them quite openly in anybody’s hearing; and +when she looked at them it was with that mischievous, +childlike smile which I had now discovered held such +a mysterious beauty. Sometimes when we were sitting +side by side in a music hall I looked at her face; I do +not think I was in love with her, I merely enjoyed the +sensation of sitting quietly beside her and looking at +the pale gold of her hair and the pale gold of her skin. +Of course Lionel Hillier was right; the strange thing +was that this gold did give one a strange moonlight +feeling. She had the serenity of a summer evening +when the light fades slowly from the unclouded sky. +There was nothing dull in her immense placidity; it +was as living as the sea when under the August sun +it lay calm and shining along the Kentish coast. She +reminded me of a sonatina by an old Italian composer +with its wistfulness in which there is yet an +urbane flippancy and its light rippling gaiety in which +echoes still the trembling of a sigh. Sometimes, feeling +my eyes on her, she would turn round and for a +moment or two look me full in the face. She did not +speak. I did not know of what she was thinking.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Once, I remember, I fetched her at Limpus Road, +and the maid, telling me she was not ready, asked +me to wait in the parlour. She came in. She was in +black velvet, with a picture hat covered with ostrich +feathers (we were going to the Pavilion and she had +dressed up for it) and she looked so lovely that it +took my breath away. I was staggered. The clothes +of that day gave a woman dignity and there was +something amazingly attractive in the way her virginal +beauty (sometimes she looked like the exquisite +statue of Psyche in the museum at Naples) contrasted +with the stateliness of her gown. She had +a trait that I think must be very rare: the skin under +her eyes, faintly blue, was all dewy. Sometimes I +could not persuade myself that it was natural, and +once I asked her if she had rubbed vaseline under her +eyes. That was just the effect it gave. She smiled, +took a handkerchief and handed it to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rub them and see,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then one night when we had walked home from +the Canterbury, and I was leaving her at her door, +when I held out my hand she laughed a little, a low +chuckle it was, and leaned forward.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You old silly,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She kissed me on the mouth. It was not a hurried +peck, nor was it a kiss of passion. Her lips, those +very full red lips of hers, rested on mine long enough +for me to be conscious of their shape and their warmth +and their softness. Then she withdrew them, but +without hurry, in silence pushed open the door, +slipped inside, and left me. I was so startled that I +had not been able to say anything. I accepted her +kiss stupidly. I remained inert. I turned away and +walked back to my lodgings. I seemed to hear still in +my ears Rosie’s laughter. It was not contemptuous +or wounding, but frank and affectionate; it was as +though she laughed because she was fond of me.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XVI</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I did</span> not go out with Rosie again for more than a +week. She was going down to Haversham to spend +a night with her mother. She had various engagements +in London. Then she asked me if I would go +to the Haymarket Theatre with her. The play was +a success and free seats were not to be had so we +made up our minds to go in the pit. We had a steak +and a glass of beer at the Café Monico and then +stood with the crowd. In those days there was no +orderly queue and when the doors were opened there +was a mad rush and scramble to get in. We were hot +and breathless and somewhat battered when at last +we pushed our way into our seats.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We walked back through St. James’s Park. The +night was so lovely that we sat down on a bench. +In the starlight Rosie’s face and her fair hair glowed +softly. She was suffused, as it were (I express it awkwardly, +but I do not know how to describe the emotion +she gave me) with a friendliness at once candid +and tender. She was like a silvery flower of the night +that only gave its perfume to the moonbeams. I +slipped my arm round her waist and she turned her +face to mine. This time it was I who kissed. She did +not move; her soft red lips submitted to the pressure +of mine with a calm, intense passivity as the water +of a lake accepts the light of the moon. I don’t know +how long we stayed there.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m awfully hungry,” she said suddenly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“So am I,” I laughed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Couldn’t we go and have some fish and chips +somewhere?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Rather.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>In those days I knew my way very well about Westminster, +not yet a fashionable quarter for parliamentary +and otherwise cultured persons, but slummy +and down-at-heel; and after we had come out of the +park, crossing Victoria Street, I led Rosie to a fried +fish shop in Horseferry Row. It was late and the only +other person there was the driver of a four-wheeler +waiting outside. We ordered our fish and chips and +a bottle of beer. A poor woman came in and bought +two penn’orth of mixed and took it away with her in +a piece of paper. We ate with appetite.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Our way back to Rosie’s led through Vincent +Square and as we passed my house I asked her:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Won’t you come in for a minute? You’ve never +seen my rooms.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What about your landlady? I don’t want to get +you into trouble.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, she sleeps like a rock.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll come in for a little.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I slipped my key into the lock and because the +passage was dark took Rosie’s hand to lead her in. +I lit the gas in my sitting room. She took off her hat +and vigorously scratched her head. Then she looked +for a glass, but I was very artistic and had taken +down the mirror that was over the chimney-piece and +there was no means in the room for anyone to see +what he looked like.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Come into my bedroom,” I said. “There’s a glass +there.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I opened the door and lit the candle. Rosie followed +me in and I held it up so that she should be able to +see herself. I looked at her in the glass as she arranged +her hair. She took two or three pins out, +which she put in her mouth, and taking one of my +brushes, brushed her hair up from the nape of the +neck. She twisted it, patted it, and put back the pins, +and as she was intent on this her eyes caught mine +in the glass and she smiled at me. When she had replaced +the last pin she turned and faced me; she did +not say anything; she looked at me tranquilly, still +with that little friendly smile in her blue eyes. I +put down the candle. The room was very small and +the dressing table was by the bed. She raised her hand +and softly stroked my cheek.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I wish now that I had not started to write this +book in the first person singular. It is all very well +when you can show yourself in an amiable or touching +light; and nothing can be more effective than +the modest heroic or pathetic humorous which in this +mode is much cultivated; it is charming to write +about yourself when you see on the reader’s eyelash +the glittering tear and on his lips the tender smile; +but it is not so nice when you have to exhibit yourself +as a plain damned fool.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>A little while ago I read in the <span class='it'>Evening Standard</span> +an article by Mr. Evelyn Waugh in the course of +which he remarked that to write novels in the first +person was a contemptible practice. I wish he had +explained why, but he merely threw out the statement +with just the same take-it-or-leave-it casualness +as Euclid used when he made his celebrated observation +about parallel straight lines. I was much +concerned and forthwith asked Alroy Kear (who +reads everything, even the books he writes prefaces +for) to recommend to me some works on the art of +fiction. On his advice I read <span class='it'>The Craft of Fiction</span> +by Mr. Percy Lubbock, from which I learned that +the only way to write novels was like Henry James; +after that I read <span class='it'>Aspects of the Novel</span> by Mr. E. M. +Forster, from which I learned that the only way to +write novels was like Mr. E. M. Forster; then I +read <span class='it'>The Structure of the Novel</span> by Mr. Edwin +Muir, from which I learned nothing at all. In none +of them could I discover anything to the point at +issue. All the same I can find one reason why certain +novelists, such as Defoe, Sterne, Thackeray, Dickens, +Emily Brontë, and Proust, well known in their day +but now doubtless forgotten, have used the method +that Mr. Evelyn Waugh reprehends. As we grow +older we become more conscious of the complexity, +incoherence, and unreasonableness of human beings; +this indeed is the only excuse that offers for the +middle-aged or elderly writer, whose thoughts should +more properly be turned to graver matters, occupying +himself with the trivial concerns of imaginary +people. For if the proper study of mankind is man +it is evidently more sensible to occupy yourself with +the coherent, substantial, and significant creatures of +fiction than with the irrational and shadowy figures of +real life. Sometimes the novelist feels himself like +God and is prepared to tell you everything about his +characters; sometimes, however, he does not; and +then he tells you not everything that is to be known +about them but the little he knows himself; and since +as we grow older we feel ourselves less and less like +God I should not be surprised to learn that with advancing +years the novelist grows less and less inclined +to describe more than his own experience has +given him. The first person singular is a very useful +device for this limited purpose.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie raised her hand and softly stroked my face. +I do not know why I should have behaved as I then +did; it was not at all how I had seen myself behaving +on such an occasion. A sob broke from my tight throat. +I do not know whether it was because I was shy and +lonely (not lonely in the body, for I spent all day +at the hospital with all kinds of people, but lonely +in the spirit) or because my desire was so great, but +I began to cry. I felt terribly ashamed of myself; I +tried to control myself, I couldn’t; the tears welled +up in my eyes and poured down my cheeks. Rosie saw +them and gave a little gasp.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, honey, what is it? What’s the matter? Don’t. +Don’t!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She put her arms round my neck and began to cry +too, and she kissed my lips and my eyes and my wet +cheeks. She undid her bodice and lowered my head +till it rested on her bosom. She stroked my smooth +face. She rocked me back and forth as though I were +a child in her arms. I kissed her breasts and I kissed +the white column of her neck; and she slipped out +of her bodice and out of her skirt and her petticoats +and I held her for a moment by her corseted waist; +then she undid it, holding her breath for an instant +to enable her to do so, and stood before me in her +shift. When I put my hands on her sides I could feel +the ribbing of the skin from the pressure of the +corsets.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Blow out the candle,” she whispered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was she who awoke me when the dawn peering +through the curtains revealed the shape of the bed +and of the wardrobe against the darkness of the +lingering night. She woke me by kissing me on the +mouth and her hair falling over my face tickled me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I must get up,” she said. “I don’t want your +landlady to see me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“There’s plenty of time.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Her breasts when she leaned over me were heavy +on my chest. In a little while she got out of bed. I +lit the candle. She turned to the glass and tied up +her hair and then she looked for a moment at her +naked body. Her waist was naturally small; though +so well developed she was very slender; her breasts +were straight and firm and they stood out from the +chest as though carved in marble. It was a body made +for the act of love. In the light of the candle, struggling +now with the increasing day, it was all silvery +gold; and the only colour was the rosy pink of the +hard nipples.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We dressed in silence. She did not put on her corsets +again, but rolled them up and I wrapped them +in a piece of newspaper. We tiptoed along the passage +and when I opened the door and we stepped out into +the street the dawn ran to meet us like a cat leaping +up the steps. The square was empty; already the +sun was shining on the eastern windows. I felt as +young as the day. We walked arm in arm till we +came to the corner of Limpus Road.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Leave me here,” said Rosie. “One never knows.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I kissed her and I watched her walk away. She +walked rather slowly, with the firm tread of the +country woman who likes to feel the good earth under +her feet, and held herself erect. I could not go back +to bed. I strolled on till I came to the Embankment. +The river had the bright hues of the early morning. +A brown barge came down stream and passed under +Vauxhall Bridge. In a dinghy two men were rowing +close to the side. I was hungry.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XVII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>After that</span> for more than a year whenever Rosie +came out with me she used on the way home to drop +into my rooms, sometimes for an hour, sometimes +till the breaking day warned us that the slaveys would +soon be scrubbing the doorsteps. I have a recollection +of warm sunny mornings when the tired air of +London had a welcome freshness, and of our footfalls +that seemed so noisy in the empty streets, and +then of scurrying along huddled under an umbrella, +silent but gay, when the winter brought cold and rain. +The policeman on point duty gave us a stare as we +passed, sometimes of suspicion; but sometimes also +there was a twinkle of comprehension in his eyes. +Now and then we would see a homeless creature huddled +up asleep in a portico and Rosie gave my arm +a friendly little pressure when (chiefly for show and +because I wanted to make a good impression on her, +for my shillings were scarce) I placed a piece of +silver on a shapeless lap or in a skinny fist. Rosie +made me very happy. I had a great affection for her. +She was easy and comfortable. She had a placidity +of temper that communicated itself to the people she +was with; you shared her pleasure in the passing +moment.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Before I became her lover I had often asked myself +if she was the mistress of the others, Forde, +Harry Retford, and Hillier, and afterward I questioned +her. She kissed me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t be so silly. I like them, you know that. I like +to go out with them, but that’s all.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I wanted to ask her if she had been the mistress +of George Kemp, but I did not like to. Though I had +never seen her in a temper, I had a notion that she +had one and I vaguely felt that this was a question +that might anger her. I did not want to give her the +opportunity of saying things so wounding that I +could not forgive her. I was young, only just over +one and twenty, Quentin Forde and the others seemed +old to me; it did not seem unnatural to me that to +Rosie they were only friends. It gave me a little +thrill of pride to think that I was her lover. When +I used to look at her chatting and laughing with all +and sundry at tea on Saturday afternoons, I glowed +with self-satisfaction. I thought of the nights we +passed together and I was inclined to laugh at the +people who were so ignorant of my great secret. But +sometimes I thought that Lionel Hillier looked at +me in a quizzical way, as if he were enjoying a good +joke at my expense, and I asked myself uneasily if +Rosie had told him that she was having an affair with +me. I wondered if there was anything in my manner +that betrayed me. I told Rosie that I was afraid +Hillier suspected something; she looked at me with +those blue eyes of hers that always seemed ready to +smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t bother about it,” she said. “He’s got a +nasty mind.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had never been intimate with Quentin Forde. He +looked upon me as a dull and insignificant young man +(which of course I was) and though he had always +been civil he had never taken any notice of me. I +thought it could only be my fancy that now he began +to be a little more frigid with me than before. But +one day Harry Retford to my surprise asked me to +dine with him and go to the play. I told Rosie.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, of course you must go. He’ll give you an +awfully good time. Good old Harry, he always makes +me laugh.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>So I dined with him. He made himself very pleasant +and I was impressed to hear him talk of actors +and actresses. He had a sarcastic humour and was +very funny at the expense of Quentin Forde, whom +he did not like; I tried to get him to talk of Rosie, +but he had nothing to say of her. He seemed to be +a gay dog. With leers and laughing innuendoes he +gave me to understand that he was a devil with the +girls. I could not but ask myself if he was standing +me this dinner because he knew I was Rosie’s lover +and so felt friendly disposed toward me. But if he +knew, of course the others knew too. I hope I did +not show it, but in my heart I certainly felt somewhat +patronizing toward them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then in winter, toward the end of January, someone +new appeared at Limpus Road. This was a +Dutch Jew named Jack Kuyper, a diamond merchant +from Amsterdam, who was spending a few weeks +in London on business. I do not know how he had +come to know the Driffields and whether it was esteem +for the author that brought him to the house, +but it was certainly not that which caused him to +come again. He was a tall, stout, dark man with a +bald head and a big hooked nose, a man of fifty, but +of a powerful appearance, sensual, determined, and +jovial. He made no secret of his admiration for +Rosie. He was rich apparently, for he sent her roses +every day; she chid him for his extravagance, but +was flattered. I could not bear him. He was blatant +and loud. I hated his fluent conversation in perfect +but foreign English; I hated the extravagant compliments +he paid Rosie; I hated the heartiness with +which he treated her friends. I found that Quentin +Forde liked him as little as I; we almost became +cordial with one another.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Mercifully he’s not staying long.” Quentin Forde +pursed his lips and raised his black eyebrows; with +his white hair and long sallow face he looked incredibly +gentlemanly. “Women are always the same; +they adore a bounder.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He’s so frightfully vulgar,” I complained.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That is his charm,” said Quentin Forde.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>For the next two or three weeks I saw next to +nothing of Rosie. Jack Kuyper took her out night +after night, to this smart restaurant and that, to one +play after another. I was vexed and hurt.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He doesn’t know anyone in London,” said Rosie, +trying to soothe my ruffled feelings. “He wants to +see everything he can while he’s here. It wouldn’t be +very nice for him to go alone all the time. He’s only +here for a fortnight more.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not see the object of this self-sacrifice on +her part.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But don’t you think he’s awful?” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No. I think he’s fun. He makes me laugh.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you know that he’s absolutely gone on +you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, it pleases him and it doesn’t do me any +harm.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He’s old and fat and horrible. It gives me the +creeps to look at him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t think he’s so bad,” said Rosie.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You couldn’t have anything to do with him,” I +protested. “I mean, he’s such an awful cad.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie scratched her head. It was an unpleasant +habit of hers.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s funny how different foreigners are from +English people,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was thankful when Jack Kuyper went back to +Amsterdam. Rosie had promised to dine with me the +day after and as a treat we arranged to dine in +Soho. She fetched me in a hansom and we drove on.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Has your horrible old man gone?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes,” she laughed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I put my arm round her waist. (I have elsewhere +remarked how much more convenient the +hansom was for this pleasant and indeed almost essential +act in human intercourse than the taxi of the +present day, so unwillingly refrain from labouring +the point.) I put my arm round her waist and kissed +her. Her lips were like spring flowers. We arrived. +I hung my hat and my coat (it was very long and +tight at the waist, with a velvet collar and velvet +cuffs; very smart) on a peg and asked Rosie to give +me her cape.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m going to keep it on,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’ll be awfully hot. You’ll only catch cold +when we go out.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t care. It’s the first time I’ve worn it. Don’t +you think it’s lovely. And look: the muff matches.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I gave the cape a glance. It was of fur. I did not +know it was sable.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It looks awfully rich. How did you get that?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Jack Kuyper gave it to me. We went and bought +it yesterday just before he went away.” She stroked +the smooth fur; she was as happy with it as a child +with a toy. “How much d’you think it cost?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I haven’t an idea.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Two hundred and sixty pounds. Do you know +I’ve never had anything that cost so much in my life? +I told him it was far too much, but he wouldn’t listen. +He made me have it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie chuckled with glee and her eyes shone. But +I felt my face go stiff and a shiver run down my +spine.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Won’t Driffield think it’s rather funny, Kuyper +giving you a fur cape that costs all that?” said I, +trying to make my voice sound natural.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie’s eyes danced mischievously.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know what Ted is, he never notices anything; +if he says anything about it I shall tell him I +gave twenty pounds for it in a pawnshop. He won’t +know any better.” She rubbed her face against the +collar. “It’s so soft. And everyone can see it cost +money.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I tried to eat and in order not to show the bitterness +in my heart I did my best to keep the conversation +going on one topic or another. Rosie did not +much mind what I said. She could only think of her +new cape and every other minute her eyes returned +to the muff that she insisted on holding on her lap. +She looked at it with an affection in which there was +something lazy, sensual, and self-complacent. I was +angry with her. I thought her stupid and common.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You look like a cat that’s swallowed a canary,” +I could not help snapping.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She only giggled.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s what I feel like.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Two hundred and sixty pounds was an enormous +sum to me. I did not know one <span class='it'>could</span> pay so much +for a cape. I lived on fourteen pounds a month and +not at all badly either; and in case any reader is not +a ready reckoner I will add that this is one hundred +and sixty-eight pounds a year. I could not believe +that anyone would make as expensive a present as +that from pure friendship; what did it mean but that +Jack Kuyper had been sleeping with Rosie, night +after night, all the time he was in London, and now +when he went away was paying her? How could she +accept it? Didn’t she see how it degraded her? Didn’t +she see how frightfully vulgar it was of him to give +her a thing that cost so much? Apparently not, for +she said to me:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It was nice of him, wasn’t it? But then Jews are +always generous.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose he could afford it,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, yes, he’s got lots of money. He said he +wanted to give me something before he went away +and asked me what I wanted. Well, I said, I could +do with a cape and a muff to match, but I never +thought he’d buy me anything like this. When we +went into the shop I asked them to show me something +in astrakhan, but he said: No, sable, and the +best money can buy. And when we saw this he absolutely +insisted on my having it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I thought of her with her white body, her skin so +milky, in the arms of that old fat gross man and his +thick loose lips kissing hers. And then I knew that +the suspicion that I had refused to believe was true; +I knew that when she went out to dinner with Quentin +Forde and Harry Retford and Lionel Hillier she +went to bed with them just as she came to bed with +me. I could not speak; I knew that if I did I should +insult her. I do not think I was jealous so much as +mortified. I felt that she had been making a damned +fool of me. I used all my determination to prevent +the bitter jibes from passing my lips.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We went on to the theatre. I could not listen to +the play. I could only feel against my arm the +smoothness of the sable cape; I could only see her +fingers for ever stroking the muff. I could have borne +the thought of the others; it was Jack Kuyper who +horrified me. How could she? It was abominable to +be poor. I longed to have enough money to tell her +that if she would send the fellow back his beastly +furs I would give her better ones instead. At last she +noticed that I did not speak.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’re very silent to-night.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Am I?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Aren’t you well?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Perfectly.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She gave me a sidelong look. I did not meet her +eyes, but I knew they were smiling with that smile +at once mischievous and childlike that I knew so +well. She said nothing more. At the end of the play, +since it was raining, we took a hansom and I gave +the driver her address in Limpus Road. She did not +speak till we got to Victoria Street, then she said:</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you want me to come home with you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Just as you like.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She lifted up the trap and gave the driver my address. +She took my hand and held it, but I remained +inert. I looked straight out of the window with angry +dignity. When we reached Vincent Square I handed +her out of the cab and let her into the house without +a word. I took off my hat and coat. She threw her +cape and her muff on the sofa.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why are you so sulky?” she asked, coming up +to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m not sulky,” I answered, looking away.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She took my face in her two hands.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How can you be so silly? Why should you be +angry because Jack Kuyper gives me a fur cape? +You can’t afford to give me one, can you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Of course I can’t.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And Ted can’t either. You can’t expect me to +refuse a fur cape that cost two hundred and sixty +pounds. I’ve wanted a fur cape all my life. It means +nothing to Jack.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You don’t expect me to believe that he gave it +you just out of friendship.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He might have. Anyhow, he’s gone back to Amsterdam, +and who knows when he’ll come back?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He isn’t the only one, either.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I looked at Rosie now, with angry, hurt, resentful +eyes; she smiled at me, and I wish I knew how to +describe the sweet kindliness of her beautiful smile; +her voice was exquisitely gentle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, my dear, why d’you bother your head about +any others? What harm does it do you? Don’t I give +you a good time? Aren’t you happy when you’re with +me?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Awfully.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, then. It’s so silly to be fussy and jealous. +Why not be happy with what you can get? Enjoy +yourself while you have the chance, I say; we shall +all be dead in a hundred years and what will anything +matter then? Let’s have a good time while +we can.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She put her arms round my neck and pressed her +lips against mine. I forgot my wrath. I only thought +of her beauty and her enveloping kindness.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You must take me as I am, you know,” she whispered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right,” I said.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XVIII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>During all</span> this time I saw really very little of Driffield. +His editorship occupied much of his day and in +the evening he wrote. He was, of course, there every +Saturday afternoon, amiable and ironically amusing; +he appeared glad to see me and chatted with me for +a little while pleasantly of indifferent things; but +naturally most of his attention was given to guests +older and more important than I. But I had a feeling +that he was growing more aloof; he was no +longer the jolly, rather vulgar companion that I had +known at Blackstable. Perhaps it was only my increasing +sensibility that discerned as it were an invisible +barrier that existed between him and the +people he chaffed and joked with. It was as though +he lived a life of the imagination that made the life +of every day a little shadowy. He was asked to speak +now and then at public dinners. He joined a literary +club. He began to know a good many people outside +the narrow circle into which his writing had drawn +him, and he was increasingly asked to luncheon and +tea by the ladies who like to gather about them distinguished +authors. Rosie was asked too, but seldom +went; she said she didn’t care for parties, and after +all they didn’t want her, they only wanted Ted. I +think she was shy and felt out of it. It may be that +hostesses had more than once let her see how tiresome +they thought it that she must be included; and +after inviting her because it was polite, ignored her +because to be polite irked them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was just about then that Edward Driffield published +<span class='it'>The Cup of Life</span>. It is not my business to criticize +his works, and of late as much has been written +about them as must satisfy the appetite of any ordinary +reader; but I will permit myself to say that +<span class='it'>The Cup of Life</span>, though certainly not the most celebrated +of his books, nor the most popular, is to my +mind the most interesting. It has a cold ruthlessness +that in all the sentimentality of English fiction strikes +an original note. It is refreshing and astringent. It +tastes of tart apples. It sets your teeth on edge, but +it has a subtle, bitter-sweet savour that is very agreeable +to the palate. Of all Driffield’s books it is the +only one I should like to have written. The scene of +the child’s death, terrible and heart-rending, but +written without slop or sickliness, and the curious +incident that follows it, cannot easily be forgotten +by anyone who has read them.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was this part of the book that caused the sudden +storm that burst on the wretched Driffield’s +head. For a few days after publication it looked as +though it would run its course like the rest of his +novels, namely that it would have substantial reviews, +laudatory on the whole but with reservations, and +that the sales would be respectable, but modest. Rosie +told me that he expected to make three hundred +pounds out of it and was talking of renting a house +on the river for the summer. The first two or three +notices were noncommittal; then in one of the morning +papers appeared a violent attack. There was a +column of it. The book was described as gratuitously +offensive, obscene, and the publishers were rated for +putting it before the public. Harrowing pictures +were drawn of the devastating effect it must have on +the youth of England. It was described as an insult +to womanhood. The reviewer protested against the +possibility of such a work falling into the hands of +young boys and innocent maidens. Other papers followed +suit. The more foolish demanded that the book +should be suppressed and some asked themselves +gravely if this was not a case where the public prosecutor +might with fitness intervene. Condemnation +was universal; if here and there a courageous writer, +accustomed to the more realistic tone of continental +fiction, asserted that Edward Driffield had never +written anything better, he was ignored. His honest +opinion was ascribed to a base desire to play to +the gallery. The libraries barred the book and the +lessors of the railway bookstalls refused to stock it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>All this was naturally very unpleasant for Edward +Driffield, but he bore it with philosophic calm. He +shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“They say it isn’t true,” he smiled. “They can go +to hell. It is true.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He was supported in this trial by the fidelity of +his friends. To admire <span class='it'>The Cup of Life</span> became a +mark of æsthetic acumen: to be shocked by it was +to confess yourself a philistine. Mrs. Barton Trafford +had no hesitation in saying that it was a masterpiece, +and though this wasn’t quite the moment for Barton’s +article in the <span class='it'>Quarterly</span>, her faith in Edward Driffield’s +future remained unshaken. It is strange (and +instructive) to read now the book that created such +a sensation; there is not a word that could bring a +blush to the cheek of the most guileless, not an episode +that could cause the novel reader of the present +day to turn a hair.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XIX</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>About six</span> months later, when the excitement over +<span class='it'>The Cup of Life</span> had subsided and Driffield had +already begun the novel which he published under +the name of <span class='it'>By Their Fruits</span>, I, being then an impatient +dresser and in my fourth year, in the course +of my duties went one day into the main hall of the +hospital to await the surgeon whom I was accompanying +on his round of the wards. I glanced at the rack +in which letters were placed, for sometimes people, +not knowing my address in Vincent Square, wrote to +me at the hospital. I was surprised to find a telegram +for me. It ran as follows:</p> + +<div class='blockquote-right90percent'> + +<p class='pindent'><span class='it'>Please come and see me at five o’clock this afternoon +without fail. Important.</span></p> + +<p class='line' style='text-align:right;margin-right:1em;'><span class='sc'>Isabel Trafford.</span></p> + +</div> + +<p class='pindent'>I wondered what she wanted me for. I had met +her perhaps a dozen times during the last two years, +but she had never taken any notice of me, and I had +never been to her house. I knew that men were scarce +at teatime and a hostess, short of them at the last +moment, might think that a young medical student +was better than nothing; but the wording of the telegram +hardly suggested a party.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The surgeon for whom I dressed was prosy and +verbose. It was not till past five that I was free and +then it took me a good twenty minutes to get down +to Chelsea. Mrs. Barton Trafford lived in a block of +flats on the Embankment. It was nearly six when I +rang at her door and asked if she was at home. But +when I was ushered into her drawing room and began +to explain why I was late she cut me short.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We supposed you couldn’t get away. It doesn’t +matter.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Her husband was there.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I expect he’d like a cup of tea,” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I think it’s rather late for tea, isn’t it?” She +looked at me gently, her mild, rather fine eyes full +of kindness. “You don’t want any tea, do you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was thirsty and hungry, for my lunch consisted +of a scone and butter and a cup of coffee, but I did +not like to say so. I refused tea.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Do you know Allgood Newton?” asked Mrs. +Barton Trafford, with a gesture toward a man who +had been sitting in a big armchair when I was shown +in, and now got up. “I expect you’ve met him at Edward’s.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had. He did not come often, but his name was +familiar to me and I remembered him. He made me +very nervous and I do not think I had ever spoken +to him. Though now completely forgotten, in those +days he was the best-known critic in England. He +was a large, fat, blond man, with a fleshy white face, +pale blue eyes, and graying fair hair. He generally +wore a pale blue tie to bring out the colour of his +eyes. He was very amiable to the authors he met at +Driffield’s and said charming and flattering things to +them, but when they were gone he was very amusing +at their expense. He spoke in a low, even voice, with +an apt choice of words: no one could with more point +tell a malicious story about a friend.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Allgood Newton shook hands with me and Mrs. +Barton Trafford, with her ready sympathy, anxious +to put me at my ease, took me by the hand and made +me sit on the sofa beside her. The tea was still on +the table and she took a jam sandwich and delicately +nibbled it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Have you seen the Driffields lately?” she asked +me as though making conversation.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was there last Saturday.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You haven’t seen either of them since?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Barton Trafford looked from Allgood Newton +to her husband and back again as though mutely +demanding their help.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Nothing will be gained by circumlocution, Isabel,” +said Newton, a faintly malicious twinkle in his eye, +in his fat precise way.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Barton Trafford turned to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then you don’t know that Mrs. Driffield has run +away from her husband.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What!”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was flabbergasted. I could not believe my ears.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Perhaps it would be better if you told him the +facts, Allgood,” said Mrs. Trafford.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The critic leaned back in his chair and placed the +tips of the fingers of one hand against the tips of +the fingers of the other. He spoke with unction.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I had to see Edward Driffield last night about a +literary article that I am doing for him and after +dinner, since the night was fine, I thought I would +walk round to his house. He was expecting me; and +I knew besides that he never went out at night except +for some function as important as the Lord +Mayor’s banquet or the Academy dinner. Imagine +my surprise then, nay, my utter and complete bewilderment, +when as I approached I saw the door +of his house open and Edward in person emerge. You +know of course that Immanuel Kant was in the +habit of taking his daily walk at a certain hour +with such punctuality that the inhabitants of Königsberg +were accustomed to set their watches by the +event and when once he came out of his house an +hour earlier than usual they turned pale, for they +knew that this could only mean that some terrible +thing had happened. They were right; Immanuel +Kant had just received intelligence of the fall of the +Bastille.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Allgood Newton paused for a moment to mark the +effect of his anecdote. Mrs. Barton Trafford gave +him her understanding smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I did not envisage so world-shaking a catastrophe +as this when I saw Edward hurrying toward me, but +it immediately occurred to me that something untoward +was afoot. He carried neither cane nor gloves. +He wore his working coat, a venerable garment in +black alpaca, and a wide-awake hat. There was +something wild in his mien and distraught in his +bearing. I asked myself, knowing the vicissitudes +of the conjugal state, whether a matrimonial difference +had driven him headlong from the house or +whether he was hastening to a letter box in order +to post a letter. He sped like Hector flying, the +noblest of the Greeks. He did not seem to see me +and the suspicion flashed across my mind that he +did not want to. I stopped him. ‘Edward,’ I said. +He looked startled. For a moment I could have +sworn he did not know who I was. ‘What avenging +furies urge you with such hot haste through the rakish +purlieus of Pimlico?’ I asked. ‘Oh, it’s you,’ he said. +‘Where are you going?’ I asked. ‘Nowhere,’ he replied.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>At this rate I thought Allgood Newton would never +finish his story and Mrs. Hudson would be vexed +with me for turning up to dinner half an hour late.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I told him on what errand I had come, and proposed +that we should return to his house where he +could more conveniently discuss the question that perturbed +me. ‘I’m too restless to go home,’ he said; +‘let’s walk. You can talk to me as we go along.’ Assenting, +I turned round and we began to walk; but +his pace was so rapid that I had to beg him to moderate +it. Even Dr. Johnson could not have carried on +a conversation when he was walking down Fleet +Street at the speed of an express train. Edward’s +appearance was so peculiar and his manner so agitated +that I thought it wise to lead him through the +less frequented streets. I talked to him of my article. +The subject that occupied me was more copious than +had at first sight appeared, and I was doubtful +whether after all I could do justice to it in the columns +of a weekly journal. I put the matter before +him fully and fairly and asked him his opinion. +‘Rosie has left me,’ he answered. For a moment I +did not know what he was talking about, but in a +trice it occurred to me that he was speaking of the +buxom and not unprepossessing female from whose +hands I had on occasion accepted a cup of tea. From +his tone I divined that he expected condolence from +me rather than felicitation.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Allgood Newton paused again and his blue eyes +twinkled.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’re wonderful, Allgood,” said Mrs. Barton +Trafford.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Priceless,” said her husband.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Realizing that the occasion demanded sympathy, +I said: ‘My dear fellow.’ He interrupted me. ‘I had +a letter by the last post,’ he said. ‘She’s run away with +Lord George Kemp.’ ”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I gasped, but said nothing. Mrs. Trafford gave +me a quick look.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Who is Lord George Kemp?’ ‘He’s a Blackstable +man,’ he replied. I had little time to think. I +determined to be frank. ‘You’re well rid of her,’ I +said. ‘Allgood!’ he cried. I stopped and put my hand +on his arm. ‘You must know that she was deceiving +you with all your friends. Her behaviour was a +public scandal. My dear Edward, let us face the +fact: your wife was nothing but a common strumpet.’ +He snatched his arm away from me and gave a sort +of low roar, like an orang-utan in the forests of +Borneo forcibly deprived of a cocoanut, and before +I could stop him he broke away and fled. I was so +startled that I could do nothing but listen to his +cries and his hurrying footsteps.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You shouldn’t have let him go,” said Mrs. Barton +Trafford. “In the state he was he might have thrown +himself in the Thames.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The thought occurred to me, but I noticed that he +did not run in the direction of the river, but plunged +into the meaner streets of the neighbourhood in +which we had been walking. And I reflected also that +there is no example in literary history of an author +committing suicide while engaged on the composition +of a literary work. Whatever his tribulations, he +is unwilling to leave to posterity an uncompleted +opus.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was astounded at what I heard and shocked and +dismayed; but I was worried too because I could not +make out why Mrs. Trafford had sent for me. She +knew me much too little to think that the story could +be of any particular interest to me; nor would she +have troubled to let me hear it as a piece of news.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Poor Edward,” she said. “Of course no one can +deny that it is a blessing in disguise, but I’m afraid +he’ll take it very much to heart. Fortunately he’s +done nothing rash.” She turned to me. “As soon as +Mr. Newton told us about it I went round to Limpus +Road. Edward was out, but the maid said he’d only +just gone; that means that he must have gone home +between the time he ran away from Allgood and +this morning. You’ll wonder why I asked you to +come and see me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not answer. I waited for her to go on.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It was at Blackstable you first knew the Driffields, +wasn’t it? You can tell us who is this Lord +George Kemp. Edward said he was a Blackstable +man.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He’s middle-aged. He’s got a wife and two sons. +They’re as old as I am.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But I don’t understand who he can be. I can’t +find him either in <span class='it'>Who’s Who</span> or in Debrett.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I almost laughed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, he’s not really a lord. He’s the local coal +merchant. They call him Lord George at Blackstable +because he’s so grand. It’s just a joke.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The quiddity of bucolic humour is often a trifle +obscure to the uninitiated,” said Allgood Newton.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We must all help dear Edward in every way we +can,” said Mrs. Barton Trafford. Her eyes rested +on me thoughtfully. “If Kemp has run away with +Rosie Driffield he must have left his wife.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose so,” I replied.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Will you do something very kind?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“If I can.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Will you go down to Blackstable and find out exactly +what has happened? I think we ought to get in +touch with the wife.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I have never been very fond of interfering in other +people’s affairs.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know how I could do that,” I answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Couldn’t you see her?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, I couldn’t.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>If Mrs. Barton Trafford thought my reply blunt +she did not show it. She smiled a little.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“At all events that can be left over. The urgent +thing is to go down and find out about Kemp. I shall +try to see Edward this evening. I can’t bear the +thought of his staying on in that odious house by +himself. Barton and I have made up our minds to +bring him here. We have a spare room and I’ll arrange +it so that he can work there. Don’t you agree +that that would be the best thing for him, Allgood?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Absolutely.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“There’s no reason why he shouldn’t stay here indefinitely, +at all events for a few weeks, and then he +can come away with us in the summer. We’re going +to Brittany. I’m sure he’d like that. It would be a +thorough change for him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The immediate question,” said Barton Trafford, +fixing on me an eye nearly as kindly as his wife’s, “is +whether this young sawbones will go to Blackstable +and find out what he can. We must know where we +are. That is essential.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Barton Trafford excused his interest in archæology +by a hearty manner and a jocose, even slangy way +of speech.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He couldn’t refuse,” said his wife, giving me a +soft, appealing glance. “You won’t refuse, will you? +It’s so important and you’re the only person who +can help us.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Of course she did not know that I was as anxious +to find out what had happened as she; she could +not tell what a bitter jealous pain stabbed my heart.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I couldn’t possibly get away from the hospital +before Saturday,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’ll do. It’s very good of you. All Edward’s +friends will be grateful to you. When shall you return?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I have to be back in London early on Monday +morning.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then come and have tea with me in the afternoon. +I shall await you with impatience. Thank God, +that’s settled. Now I must try and get hold of Edward.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I understood that I was dismissed. Allgood Newton +took his leave and came downstairs with me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Our Isabel has <span class='it'>un petit air</span> of Catherine of +Aragon to-day that I find vastly becoming,” he murmured +when the door was closed behind us. “This +is a golden opportunity and I think we may safely +trust our friend not to miss it. A charming woman +with a heart of gold. <span class='it'>Venus toute entière à sa proie +attachée.</span>”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not understand what he meant, for what I +have already told the reader about Mrs. Barton +Trafford I only learned much later, but I realized +that he was saying something vaguely malicious about +her, and probably amusing, so I sniggered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose your youth inclines you to what my +good Dizzy named in an unlucky moment the gondola +of London.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m going to take a bus,” I answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh? Had you proposed to go by hansom I was +going to ask you to be good enough to drop me on +your way, but if you are going to use the homely conveyance +which <span class='it'>I</span> in my old-fashioned manner still +prefer to call an omnibus, I shall hoist my unwieldy +carcase into a four-wheeler.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He signalled to one and gave me two flabby fingers +to shake.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I shall come on Monday to hear the result of +what dear Henry would call your so exquisitely delicate +mission.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XX</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>But it</span> was years before I saw Allgood Newton again, +for when I got to Blackstable I found a letter from +Mrs. Barton Trafford (who had taken the precaution +to note my address) asking me, for reasons that +she would explain when she saw me, not to come to +her flat but to meet her at six o’clock in the first-class +waiting room at Victoria Station. As soon then as I +could get away from the hospital on Monday I made +my way there, and after waiting for a while saw her +come in. She came toward me with little tripping +steps.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, have you anything to tell me? Let us find +a quiet corner and sit down.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We sought a place and found it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I must explain why I asked you to come here,” +she said. “Edward is staying with me. At first he did +not want to come, but I persuaded him. But he’s +nervous and ill and irritable. I did not want to run +the risk of his seeing you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I told Mrs. Trafford the bare facts of my story +and she listened attentively. Now and then she +nodded her head. But I could not hope to make her +understand the commotion I had found at Blackstable. +The town was beside itself with excitement. +Nothing so thrilling had happened there for years +and no one could talk of anything else. Humpty-dumpty +had had a great fall. Lord George Kemp +had absconded. About a week before he had announced +that he had to go up to London on business, +and two days later a petition in bankruptcy +was filed against him. It appeared that his building +operations had not been successful, his attempt to +make Blackstable into a frequented seaside resort +meeting with no response, and he had been forced +to raise money in every way he could. All kinds of +rumours ran through the little town. Quite a number +of small people who had entrusted their savings to +him were faced with the loss of all they had. The +details were vague, for neither my uncle nor my +aunt knew anything of business matters, nor had I +the knowledge to make what they told me comprehensible. +But there was a mortgage on George +Kemp’s house and a bill of sale on his furniture. His +wife was left without a penny. His two sons, lads +of twenty and twenty-one, were in the coal business, +but that, too, was involved in the general ruin. George +Kemp had gone off with all the cash he could lay +hands on, something like fifteen hundred pounds, they +said, though how they knew I cannot imagine; and +it was reported that a warrant had been issued for +his arrest. It was supposed that he had left the country; +some said he had gone to Australia and some +to Canada.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I hope they catch him,” said my uncle. “He ought +to get penal servitude for life.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The indignation was universal. They could not +forgive him because he had always been so noisy +and boisterous, because he had chaffed them and +stood them drinks and given them garden parties, because +he had driven such a smart trap and worn his +brown billycock hat at such a rakish angle. But it +was on Sunday night after church in the vestry that +the churchwarden told my uncle the worst. For the +last two years he had been meeting Rosie Driffield +at Haversham almost every week and they had been +spending the night together at a public house. The +licensee of this had put money into one of Lord +George’s wildcat schemes, and on discovering that +he had lost it blurted out the whole story. He could +have borne it if Lord George had defrauded others, +but that he should defraud him who had done him +a good turn and whom he looked upon as a chum, +that was the limit.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I expect they’ve run away together,” said my +uncle.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I shouldn’t be surprised,” said the churchwarden.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>After supper, while the housemaid was clearing +away, I went into the kitchen to talk to Mary-Ann. +She had been at church and had heard the story too. +I cannot believe that the congregation had listened +very attentively to my uncle’s sermon.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“The vicar says they’ve run away together,” I +said. I had not breathed a word of what I knew.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why, of course they ’ave,” said Mary-Ann. “He +was the only man she ever really fancied. He only +’ad to lift ’is little finger and she’d leave anyone no +matter who it was.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I lowered my eyes. I was suffering from bitter +mortification; and I was angry with Rosie: I thought +she had behaved very badly to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose we shall never see her again,” I said. +It gave me a pang to utter the words.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t suppose we shall,” said Mary-Ann cheerfully.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I had told Mrs. Barton Trafford as much +of this story as I thought she need know, she sighed, +but whether from satisfaction or distress I had no +notion.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, that’s the end of Rosie at all events,” she +said. She got up and held out her hand. “Why will +these literary men make these unfortunate marriages? +It’s all very sad, very sad. Thank you so much for +what you’ve done. We know where we are now. The +great thing is that it shouldn’t interfere with Edward’s +work.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Her remarks seemed a trifle disconnected to me. +The fact was, I have no doubt, that she was giving +me not the smallest thought. I led her out of Victoria +Station and put her into a bus that went down +the King’s Road, Chelsea; then I walked back to my +lodgings.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XXI</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>I lost</span> touch with Driffield. I was too shy to seek +him out; I was busy with my examinations, and when +I had passed them I went abroad. I remember vaguely +to have seen in the paper that he had divorced Rosie. +Nothing more was heard of her. Small sums reached +her mother occasionally, ten or twenty pounds, and +they came in a registered letter with a New York +postmark; but no address was given, no message +enclosed, and they were presumed to come from +Rosie only because no one else could possibly send +Mrs. Gann money. Then in the fullness of years +Rosie’s mother died, and it may be supposed that +in some way the news reached her, for the letters +ceased to come.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XXII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>Alroy Kear</span> and I, as arranged, met on Friday at +Victoria Station to catch the five ten to Blackstable. +We made ourselves comfortable in opposite corners +of a smoking compartment. From him I now learned +roughly what had happened to Driffield after his wife +ran away from him. Roy had in due course become +very intimate with Mrs. Barton Trafford. Knowing +him and remembering her, I realized that this was +inevitable. I was not surprised to hear that he had +travelled with her and Barton on the continent, sharing +with them to the full their passion for Wagner, +post-impressionist painting, and baroque architecture. +He had lunched assiduously at the flat in Chelsea +and when advancing years and failing health had imprisoned +Mrs. Trafford to her drawing room, notwithstanding +the many claims on his time he had gone +regularly once a week to sit with her. He had a good +heart. After her death he wrote an article about her +in which with admirable emotion he did justice to her +great gifts of sympathy and discrimination.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It pleased me to think that his kindliness should +receive its due and unexpected reward, for Mrs. +Barton Trafford had told him much about Edward +Driffield that could not fail to be of service to him +in the work of love in which he was now engaged. +Mrs. Barton Trafford, exercising a gentle violence, +not only took Edward Driffield into her house when +the flight of his faithless wife left him what Roy +could only describe by the French word <span class='it'>désemparé</span>, +but persuaded him to stay for nearly a year. She +gave him the loving care, the unfailing kindness, and +the intelligent understanding of a woman who combined +feminine tact with masculine vigour, a heart +of gold with an unerring eye for the main chance. +It was in her flat that he finished <span class='it'>By Their Fruits</span>. +She was justified in looking upon it as her book and +the dedication to her is a proof that Driffield was +not unmindful of his debt. She took him to Italy +(with Barton of course, for Mrs. Trafford knew +too well how malicious people were, to give occasion +for scandal) and with a volume of Ruskin in her +hand revealed to Edward Driffield the immortal +beauties of that country. Then she found him rooms +in the Temple and arranged little luncheons there, +she acting very prettily the part of hostess, where +he could receive the persons whom his increasing +reputation attracted.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It must be admitted that this increasing reputation +was very largely due to her. His great celebrity came +only during his last years when he had long ceased +to write, but the foundations of it were undoubtedly +laid by Mrs. Trafford’s untiring efforts. Not only +did she inspire (and perhaps write not a little, for +she had a dexterous pen) the article that Barton at +last contributed to the <span class='it'>Quarterly</span> in which the claim +was first made that Driffield must be ranked with +the masters of British fiction, but as each book came +out she organized its reception. She went here and +there, seeing editors and, more important still, proprietors +of influential organs; she gave soirées to +which everyone was invited who could be of use. She +persuaded Edward Driffield to give readings at the +houses of the very great for charitable purposes; she +saw to it that his photographs should appear in the +illustrated weeklies; she revised personally any interview +he gave. For ten years she was an indefatigable +press agent. She kept him steadily before the +public.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Barton Trafford had a grand time, but she +did not get above herself. It was useless indeed to +ask him to a party without her; he refused. And when +she and Barton and Driffield were invited anywhere +to dinner they came together and went together. She +never let him out of her sight. Hostesses might rave; +they could take it or leave it. As a rule they took it. +If Mrs. Barton Trafford happened to be a little out +of temper it was through him she showed it, for while +she remained charming, Edward Driffield would be +uncommonly gruff. But she knew exactly how to draw +him out and when the company was distinguished +could make him brilliant. She was perfect with him. +She never concealed from him her conviction that he +was the greatest writer of his day; she not only referred +to him invariably as the master, but, perhaps +a little playfully and yet how flatteringly, addressed +him always as such. To the end she retained something +kittenish.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then a terrible thing happened. Driffield caught +pneumonia and was extremely ill; for some time his +life was despaired of. Mrs. Barton Trafford did +everything that such a woman could do, and would +willingly have nursed him herself, but she was frail, +she was indeed over sixty, and he had to have professional +nurses. When at last he pulled through, the +doctors said that he must go into the country, and +since he was still extremely weak insisted that a nurse +should go with him. Mrs. Trafford wanted him to +go to Bournemouth so that she could run down for +week-ends and see that everything was well with +him, but Driffield had a fancy for Cornwall, and +the doctors agreed that the mild airs of Penzance +would suit him. One would have thought that a +woman of Isabel Trafford’s delicate intuition would +have had some foreboding of ill. No. She let him +go. She impressed on the nurse that she entrusted +her with a grave responsibility; she placed in her +hands, if not the future of English literature, at +least the life and welfare of its most distinguished +living representative. It was a priceless charge.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Three weeks later Edward Driffield wrote and +told her that he had married his nurse by special +license.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I imagine that never did Mrs. Barton Trafford exhibit +more preëminently her greatness of soul than +in the manner in which she met this situation. Did +she cry, Judas, Judas? Did she tear her hair and +fall on the floor and kick her heels in an attack of +hysterics? Did she turn on the mild and learned Barton +and call him a blithering old fool? Did she inveigh +against the faithlessness of men and the wantonness +of women or did she relieve her wounded +feelings by shouting at the top of her voice a string +of those obscenities with which the alienists tell us +the chastest females are surprisingly acquainted? Not +at all. She wrote a charming letter of congratulation +to Driffield and she wrote to his bride telling her that +she was glad to think that now she would have two +loving friends instead of one. She begged them both +to come and stay with her on their return to London. +She told everyone she met that the marriage had +made her very, very happy, for Edward Driffield +would soon be an old man and must have someone +to take care of him; who could do this better than +a hospital nurse? She never had anything but praise +for the new Mrs. Driffield; she was not exactly +pretty, she said, but she had a very nice face; of +course she wasn’t quite, quite a lady, but Edward +would only have been uncomfortable with anyone +too grand. She was just the sort of wife for him. I +think it may be not unjustly said that Mrs. Barton +Trafford fairly ran over with the milk of human +kindness, but all the same I have an inkling that if +ever the milk of human kindness was charged with +vitriol, here was a case in point.</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XXIII</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>When we</span> arrived at Blackstable, Roy and I, a car, +neither ostentatiously grand nor obviously cheap, +was waiting for him and the chauffeur had a note for +me asking me to lunch with Mrs. Driffield next day. +I got into a taxi and went to the Bear and Key. I +had learned from Roy that there was a new Marine +Hotel on the front, but I did not propose for the +luxuries of civilization to abandon a resort of my +youth. Change met me at the railway station, which +was not in its old place, but up a new road, and of +course it was strange to be driven down the High +Street in a car. But the Bear and Key was unaltered. +It received me with its old churlish indifference: there +was no one at the entrance, the driver put my bag +down and drove away; I called, no one answered; +I went into the bar and found a young lady with +shingled hair reading a book by Mr. Compton +Mackenzie. I asked her if I could have a room. She +gave me a slightly offended look and said she thought +so, but as that seemed to exhaust her interest in the +matter I asked politely whether there was anyone +who could show it to me. She got up and, opening a +door, in a shrill voice called: “Katie.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What is it?” I heard.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“There’s a gent wants a room.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>In a little while appeared an ancient and haggard +female in a very dirty print dress, with an untidy +mop of gray hair, and showed me, two flights up, a +very small grubby room.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Can’t you do something better than that for me?” +I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s the room commercials generally ’ave,” she +answered with a sniff.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Haven’t you got any others?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not single.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then give me a double room.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll go and ask Mrs. Brentford.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I accompanied her down to the first floor and she +knocked at a door. She was told to come in, and when +she opened it I caught sight of a stout woman with +gray hair elaborately marcelled. She was reading a +book. Apparently everyone at the Bear and Key was +interested in literature. She gave me an indifferent +look when Katie said I wasn’t satisfied with number +seven.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Show him number five,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I began to feel that I had been a trifle rash in declining +so haughtily Mrs. Driffield’s invitation to stay +with her and then putting aside in my sentimental +way Roy’s wise suggestion that I should stay at the +Marine Hotel. Katie took me upstairs again and +ushered me into a largish room looking on the High +Street. Most of its space was occupied by a double +bed. The windows had certainly not been opened for +a month.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I said that would do and asked about dinner.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You can ’ave what you like,” said Katie. “We +’aven’t got nothing in, but I’ll run round and get it.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Knowing English inns, I ordered a fried sole and +a grilled chop. Then I went for a stroll. I walked +down to the beach and found that they had built an +esplanade and there was a row of bungalows and +villas where I remembered only windswept fields. +But they were seedy and bedraggled and I guessed +that even after all these years Lord George’s dream +of turning Blackstable into a popular seaside resort +had not come true. A retired military man, a pair of +elderly ladies walked along the crumbling asphalt. +It was incredibly dreary. A chill wind was blowing +and a light drizzle swept over from the sea.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I went back into town and here, in the space between +the Bear and Key and the Duke of Kent, were +little knots of men standing about notwithstanding +the inclement weather; and their eyes had the same +pale blue, their high cheek bones the same ruddy +colour as that of their fathers before them. It was +strange to see that some of the sailors in blue jerseys +still wore little gold rings in their ears; and not only +old ones but boys scarcely out of their teens. I sauntered +down the street and there was the bank refronted, +but the stationery shop where I had bought +paper and wax to make rubbings with an obscure +writer whom I had met by chance was unchanged; +there were two or three cinemas and their garish +posters suddenly gave the prim street a dissipated +air so that it looked like a respectable elderly woman +who had taken a drop too much.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was cold and cheerless in the commercial room +where I ate my dinner alone at a large table laid for +six. I was served by the slatternly Katie. I asked if +I could have a fire.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not in June,” she said. “We don’t ’ave fires after +April.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll pay for it,” I protested.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Not in June. In October, yes, but not in June.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I had finished I went into the bar to have +a glass of port.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Very quiet,” I said to the shingled barmaid.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, it is quiet,” she answered.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I should have thought on a Friday night you’d +have quite a lot of people in here.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, one would think that, wouldn’t one?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then a stout red-faced man with a close-cropped +head of gray hair came in from the back and I guessed +that this was my host.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Are you Mr. Brentford?” I asked him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, that’s me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I knew your father. Will you have a glass of +port?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I told him my name, in the days of his boyhood better +known than any other at Blackstable, but somewhat +to my mortification I saw that it aroused no +echo in his memory. He consented, however, to let +me stand him a glass of port.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Down here on business?” he asked me. “We get +quite a few commercial gents at one time and another. +We always like to do what we can for them.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I told him that I had come down to see Mrs. Driffield +and left him to guess on what errand.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I used to see a lot of the old man,” said Mr. +Brentford. “He used to be very partial to dropping +in here and having his glass of bitter. Mind you, I +don’t say he ever got tiddly, but he used to like to +sit in the bar and talk. My word, he’d talk by the +hour and he never cared who he talked to. Mrs. Driffield +didn’t half like his coming here. He’d slip away, +out of the house, without saying a word to anybody, +and come toddling down. You know it’s a bit of a +walk for a man of that age. Of course when they +missed him Mrs. Driffield knew where he was, and +she used to telephone and ask if he was here. Then +she’d drive over in the car and go in and see my +wife. ‘You go in and fetch him, Mrs. Brentford,’ +she’d say; ‘I don’t like to go in the bar meself, not +with all those men hanging about’; so Mrs. Brentford +would come in and she’d say, ‘Now Mr. Driffield, +Mrs. Driffield’s come for you in the car, so +you’d better finish your beer and let her take you +home.’ He used to ask Mrs. Brentford not to say +he was here when Mrs. Driffield rang up, but of +course we couldn’t do that. He was an old man and +all that and we didn’t want to take the responsibility. +He was born in this parish, you know, and his first +wife, she was a Blackstable girl. She’s been dead these +many years. I never knew her. He was a funny old +fellow. No side, you know; they tell me they thought +a rare lot of him in London and when he died the +papers were full of him; but you’d never have known +it to talk to him. He might have been just nobody like +you and me. Of course we always tried to make him +comfortable; we tried to get him to sit in one of +them easy chairs, but no, he must sit up at the bar; +he said he liked to feel his feet on a rail. My belief +is he was happier here than anywhere. He always +said he liked a bar parlour. He said you saw life +there and he said he’d always loved life. Quite a +character he was. Reminded me of my father, except +that my old governor never read a book in his life +and he drank a bottle of French brandy a day and +he was seventy-eight when he died and his last illness +was his first. I quite missed old Driffield when +he popped off. I was only saying to Mrs. Brentford +the other day, I’d like to read one of his books some +time. They tell me he wrote several about these +parts.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XXIV</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>Next morning</span> it was cold and raw, but it was not +raining, and I walked down the High Street toward +the vicarage. I recognized the names over the shops, +the Kentish names that have been borne for centuries—the +Ganns, the Kemps, the Cobbs, the Igguldens—but +I saw no one that I knew. I felt like a +ghost walking down that street where I had once +known nearly everyone, if not to speak to, at least +by sight. Suddenly a very shabby little car passed +me, stopped, and backed, and I saw someone looking +at me curiously. A tall, heavy elderly man got out +and came toward me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Aren’t you Willie Ashenden?” he asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then I recognized him. He was the doctor’s son, +and I had been at school with him; we had passed +from form to form together, and I knew that he had +succeeded his father in his practice.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Hullo, how are you?” he asked. “I’ve just been +along to the vicarage to see my grandson. It’s a +preparatory school now, you know, and I put him +there at the beginning of this term.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He was shabbily dressed and unkempt, but he +had a fine head and I saw that in youth he must have +had unusual beauty. It was funny that I had never +noticed it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Are you a grandfather?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Three times over,” he laughed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It gave me a shock. He had drawn breath, walked +the earth and presently grown to man’s estate, married, +had children and they in turn had had children; +I judged from the look of him that he had lived, +with incessant toil, in penury. He had the peculiar +manner of the country doctor, bluff, hearty, and +unctuous. His life was over. I had plans in my head +for books and plays, I was full of schemes for the +future; I felt that a long stretch of activity and fun +still lay before me; and yet, I supposed, to others I +must seem the elderly man that he seemed to me. I +was so shaken that I had not the presence of mind +to ask about his brothers whom as a child I had +played with, or about the old friends who had been +my companions; after a few foolish remarks I left +him. I walked on to the vicarage, a roomy, rambling +house too far out of the way for the modern incumbent +who took his duties more seriously than did my +uncle and too large for the present cost of living. It +stood in a big garden and was surrounded by green +fields. There was a great square notice board that +announced that it was a preparatory school for the +sons of gentlemen and gave the name and the degrees +of the head master. I looked over the paling; +the garden was squalid and untidy and the pond in +which I used to fish for roach was choked up. The +glebe fields had been cut up into building lots. There +were rows of little brick houses with bumpy ill-made +roads. I walked along Joy Lane and there were +houses here too, bungalows facing the sea; and the +old turnpike house was a trim tea shop.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I wandered about here and there. There seemed +innumerable streets of little houses of yellow brick, +but I do not know who lived in them for I saw no one +about. I went down to the harbour. It was deserted. +There was but one tramp lying a little way out from +the pier. Two or three sailormen were sitting outside +a warehouse and they stared at me as I passed. The +bottom had fallen out of the coal trade and colliers +came to Blackstable no longer.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Then it was time for me to go to Ferne Court and +I went back to the Bear and Key. The landlord had +told me that he had a Daimler for hire and I had +arranged that it should take me to my luncheon. It +stood at the door when I came up, a brougham, but +the oldest, most dilapidated car of its make that I +had ever seen; it panted along with squeaks and +thumps and rattlings, with sudden angry jerks, so that +I wondered if I should ever reach my destination. +But the extraordinary, the amazing thing about it +was that it smelled exactly like the old landau which +my uncle used to hire every Sunday morning to go +to church in. This was a rank odour of stables and of +stale straw that lay at the bottom of the carriage; +and I wondered in vain why, after all these years, +the motor car should have it too. But nothing can +bring back the past like a perfume or a stench, and, +oblivious to the country I was trundling through, I +saw myself once more a little boy on the front seat +with the communion plate beside me and, facing +me, my aunt, smelling slightly of clean linen and eau +de cologne, in her black silk cloak and her little bonnet +with a feather, and my uncle in his cassock, a +broad band of ribbed silk round his ample waist and +a gold cross hanging over his stomach from the gold +chain round his neck.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Now, Willie, mind you behave nicely to-day. +You’re not to turn round, and sit up properly in +your seat. The Lord’s House isn’t the place to loll +in and you must remember that you should set an +example to other little boys who haven’t had your +advantages.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>When I arrived at Ferne Court Mrs. Driffield and +Roy were walking round the garden and they came +up to me as I got out of the car.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I was showing Roy my flowers,” said Mrs. Driffield, +as she shook hands with me. And then with a +sigh: “They’re all I have now.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She looked no older than when last I saw her six +years before. She wore her weeds with quiet distinction. +At her neck was a collar of white crêpe and at +her wrists cuffs of the same. Roy, I noticed, wore with +his neat blue suit a black tie; I supposed it was a sign +of respect for the illustrious dead.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll just show you my herbaceous borders,” said +Mrs. Driffield, “and then we’ll go in to lunch.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We walked round and Roy was very knowledgeable. +He knew what all the flowers were called, and +the Latin names tripped off his tongue like cigarettes +out of a cigarette-making machine. He told Mrs. +Driffield where she ought to get certain varieties that +she absolutely must have and how perfectly lovely +were certain others.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Shall we go in through Edward’s study?” suggested +Mrs. Driffield. “I keep it exactly as it was +when he was here. I haven’t changed a thing. You’d +be surprised how many people come over to see the +house, and of course above all they want to see the +room he worked in.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We went in through an open window. There was +a bowl of roses on the desk and on a little round table +by the side of the armchair a copy of the <span class='it'>Spectator</span>. +In the ash trays were the master’s pipes and there was +ink in the inkstand. The scene was perfectly set. I +do not know why the room seemed so strangely dead; +it had already the mustiness of a museum. Mrs. +Driffield went to the bookshelves and with a little +smile, half playful, half sad, passed a rapid hand +across the back of half a dozen volumes bound in +blue.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know that Edward admired your work so +much,” said Mrs. Driffield. “He reread your books +quite often.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m very glad to think that,” I said politely.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I knew very well that they had not been there on +my last visit and in a casual way I took one of them +out and ran my fingers along the top to see whether +there was dust on it. There was not. Then I took +another book down, one of Charlotte Brontë’s, and +making a little plausible conversation tried the same +experiment. No, there was no dust there either. All +I learned was that Mrs. Driffield was an excellent +housekeeper and had a conscientious maid.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We went in to luncheon, a hearty British meal of +roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, and we talked of +the work on which Roy was engaged.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I want to spare dear Roy all the labour I can,” +said Mrs. Driffield, “and I’ve been gathering together +as much of the material as I could myself. +Of course it’s been rather painful, but it’s been very +interesting, too. I came across a lot of old photographs +that I must show you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>After luncheon we went into the drawing room +and I noticed again with what perfect tact Mrs. +Driffield had arranged it. It suited the widow of a +distinguished man of letters almost more than it +had suited the wife. Those chintzes, those bowls of +pot-pourri, those Dresden china figures—there was +about them a faint air of regret; they seemed to reflect +pensively upon a past of distinction. I could have +wished on this chilly day that there were a fire in the +grate, but the English are a hardy as well as a conservative +race; and it is not difficult for them to maintain +their principles at the cost of the discomfort of +others. I doubted whether Mrs. Driffield would have +conceived the possibility of lighting a fire before the +first of October. She asked me whether I had lately +seen the lady who had brought me to lunch with the +Driffields, and I surmised from her faint acerbity +that since the death of her eminent husband the great +and fashionable had shown a distinct tendency to +take no further notice of her. We were just settling +down to talk about the defunct; Roy and Mrs. Driffield +were putting artful questions to incite me to +disclose my recollections and I was gathering my wits +about me so that I should not in an unguarded moment +let slip anything that I had made up my mind +to keep to myself; when suddenly the trim parlour-maid +brought in two cards on a small salver.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Two gentlemen in a car, mum, and they say, could +they look at the house and garden?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What a bore!” cried Mrs. Driffield, but with astonishing +alacrity. “Isn’t it funny I should have been +speaking just now about the people who want to see +the house? I never have a moment’s peace.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, why don’t you say you’re sorry you can’t +see them?” said Roy, with what I thought a certain +cattiness.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, I couldn’t do that. Edward wouldn’t have +liked me to.” She looked at the cards. “I haven’t got +my glasses on me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She handed them to me, and on one I read “Henry +Beard MacDougal, University of Virginia”; and in +pencil was written: “Assistant professor in English +Literature.” The other was “Jean-Paul Underhill” +and there was at the bottom an address in New York.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Americans,” said Mrs. Driffield. “Say I shall be +very pleased if they’ll come in.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Presently the maid ushered the strangers in. They +were both tall young men and broad-shouldered, with +heavy, clean-shaven, swarthy faces, and handsome +eyes; they both wore horn-rimmed spectacles and they +both had thick black hair combed straight back from +their foreheads. They both wore English suits that +were evidently brand new; they were both slightly +embarrassed, but verbose and extremely civil. They +explained that they were making a literary tour of +England and, being admirers of Edward Driffield, +had taken the liberty of stopping off on their way to +Rye to visit Henry James’s house in the hope that +they would be permitted to see a spot sanctified by +so many associations. The reference to Rye did not +go down very well with Mrs. Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I believe they have some very good links there,” +she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She introduced the Americans to Roy and me. I +was filled with admiration for the way in which Roy +rose to the occasion. It appeared that he had lectured +before the University of Virginia and had +stayed with a distinguished member of the faculty. +It had been an unforgettable experience. He did not +know whether he had been more impressed by the +lavish hospitality with which those charming Virginians +had entertained him or by their intelligent +interest in art and literature. He asked how So and +So was, and So and So; he had made lifelong friends +there, and it looked as though everyone he had met +was good and kind and clever. Soon the young professor +was telling Roy how much he liked his books, +and Roy was modestly telling him what in this one +and the other his aim had been and how conscious +he was that he had come far short of achieving it. +Mrs. Driffield listened with smiling sympathy, but +I had a feeling that her smile was growing a trifle +strained. It may be that Roy had too, for he suddenly +broke off.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“But you don’t want me to bore you with my +stuff,” he said in his loud hearty way. “I’m only +here because Mrs. Driffield has entrusted to me the +great honour of writing Edward Driffield’s Life.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>This of course interested the visitors very much.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s some job, believe me,” said Roy, playfully +American. “Fortunately I have the assistance of Mrs. +Driffield, who was not only a perfect wife, but an +admirable amanuensis and secretary; the materials +she has placed at my disposal are so amazingly full +that really little remains for me to do but take advantage +of her industry and her—her affectionate +zeal.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield looked down demurely at the carpet +and the two young Americans turned on her their +large dark eyes in which you could read their sympathy, +their interest, and their respect. After a little +more conversation—partly literary but also about +golf, for the visitors admitted that they hoped to get +a round or two at Rye, and here again Roy was on +the spot, for he told them to look out for such and +such a bunker and when they came to London hoped +they would play with him at Sunningdale; after this, +I say, Mrs. Driffield got up and offered to show them +Edward’s study and bedroom, and of course the garden. +Roy rose to his feet, evidently bent on accompanying +them, but Mrs. Driffield gave him a little +smile; it was pleasant but firm.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Don’t you bother to come, Roy,” she said. “I’ll +take them round. You stay here and talk to Mr. +Ashenden.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, all right. Of course.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The strangers bade us farewell and Roy and I +settled down again in the chintz armchairs.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Jolly room this is,” said Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Very.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Amy had to work hard to get it. You know the +old man bought this house two or three years before +they were married. She tried to make him sell it, +but he wouldn’t. He was very obstinate in some ways. +You see, it belonged to a certain Miss Wolfe, whose +bailiff his father was, and he said that when he was +a little boy his one idea was to own it himself and +now he’d got it he was going to keep it. One would +have thought the last thing he’d want to do was +to live in a place where everyone knew all about +his origins and everything. Once poor Amy very +nearly engaged a housemaid before she discovered +she was Edward’s great-niece. When Amy came +here the house was furnished from attic to cellar +in the best Tottenham Court Road manner; you +know the sort of thing, Turkey carpets and mahogany +sideboards, and a plush-covered suite in the +drawing room, and modern marquetry. It was his +idea of how a gentleman’s house should be furnished. +Amy says it was simply awful. He wouldn’t let +her change a thing and she had to go to work with +the greatest care; she says she simply couldn’t have +lived in it and she was determined to have things +right, so she had to change things one by one so that +he didn’t pay any attention. She told me the hardest +job she had was with his writing desk. I don’t know +whether you’ve noticed the one there is in his study +now. It’s a very good period piece; I wouldn’t mind +having it myself. Well, he had a horrible American +roll-top desk. He’d had it for years and he’d written +a dozen books on it and he simply wouldn’t part with +it, he had no feeling for things like that; he just happened +to be attached to it because he’d had it so long. +You must get Amy to tell you the story how she managed +to get rid of it in the end. It’s really priceless. +She’s a remarkable woman, you know; she generally +gets her own way.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ve noticed it,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It had not taken her long to dispose of Roy when +he showed signs of wishing to go over the house with +the visitors. He gave me a quick look and laughed. +Roy was not stupid.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You don’t know America as well as I do,” he said. +“They always prefer a live mouse to a dead lion. +That’s one of the reasons why I like America.”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XXV</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>When Mrs. Driffield</span>, having sent the pilgrims on +their way, came back she bore under her arm a portfolio.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What very nice young men!” she said. “I wish +young men in England took such a keen interest in +literature. I gave them that photo of Edward when +he was dead and they asked me for one of mine, and +I signed it for them.” Then very graciously: “You +made a great impression on them, Roy. They said +it was a real privilege to meet you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ve lectured in America so much,” said Roy, +with modesty.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, but they’ve read your books. They say that +what they like about them is that they’re so virile.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The portfolio contained a number of old photographs, +groups of schoolboys among whom I recognized +an urchin with untidy hair as Driffield only because +his widow pointed him out, Rugby fifteens with +Driffield a little older, and then one of a young sailor +in a jersey and a reefer jacket, Driffield when he ran +away to sea.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Here’s one taken when he was first married,” +said Mrs. Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>He wore a beard and black-and-white check +trousers; in his buttonhole was a large white rose +backed by maidenhair and on the table beside him a +chimney-pot hat.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“And here is the bride,” said Mrs. Driffield, trying +not to smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Poor Rosie, seen by a country photographer over +forty years ago, was grotesque. She was standing +very stiffly against a background of baronial hall, +holding a large bouquet; her dress was elaborately +draped, pinched at the waist, and she wore a bustle. +Her fringe came down to her eyes. On her head was +a wreath of orange blossoms, perched high on a +mass of hair, and from it was thrown back a long +veil. Only I knew how lovely she must have looked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She looks fearfully common,” said Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She was,” murmured Mrs. Driffield.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>We looked at more photographs of Edward, photographs +that had been taken of him when he began +to be known, photographs when he wore only a +moustache and others, all the later ones, when he +was clean-shaven. You saw his face grown thinner +and more lined. The stubborn commonplace of the +early portraits melted gradually into a weary refinement. +You saw the change in him wrought by experience, +thought, and achieved ambition. I looked again +at the photograph of the young sailorman and +fancied that I saw in it already a trace of that aloofness +that seemed to me so marked in the older ones +and that I had had years before the vague sensation +of in the man himself. The face you saw was a mask +and the actions he performed without significance. +I had an impression that the real man, to his death +unknown and lonely, was a wraith that went a silent +way unseen between the writer of his books and the +fellow who led his life, and smiled with ironical detachment +at the two puppets that the world took for +Edward Driffield. I am conscious that in what I have +written of him I have not presented a living man, +standing on his feet, rounded, with comprehensible +motives and logical activities; I have not tried to: +I am glad to leave that to the abler pen of Alroy +Kear.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I came across the photographs that Harry Retford, +the actor, had taken of Rosie, and then a photograph +of the picture that Lionel Hillier had painted of her. +It gave me a pang. That was how I best remembered +her. Notwithstanding the old-fashioned gown, she +was alive there and tremulous with the passion that +filled her. She seemed to offer herself to the assault +of love.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She gives you the impression of a hefty wench,” +said Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“If you like the milkmaid type,” answered Mrs. +Driffield. “I’ve always thought she looked rather like +a white nigger.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>That was what Mrs. Barton Trafford had been +fond of calling her, and with Rosie’s thick lips and +broad nose there was indeed a hateful truth in the +criticism. But they did not know how silvery golden +her hair was, nor how golden silver her skin; they +did not know her enchanting smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She wasn’t a bit like a white nigger,” I said. “She +was virginal like the dawn. She was like Hebe. She +was like a white rose.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield smiled and exchanged a meaning +glance with Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Mrs. Barton Trafford told me a great deal about +her. I don’t wish to seem spiteful, but I’m afraid I +don’t think that she can have been a very nice +woman.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s where you make a mistake,” I replied. +“She was a very nice woman. I never saw her in a +bad temper. You only had to say you wanted something +for her to give it to you. I never heard her say +a disagreeable thing about anyone. She had a heart +of gold.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She was a terrible slattern. Her house was always +in a mess; you didn’t like to sit down in a chair because +it was so dusty and you dared not look in the +corners. And it was the same with her person. She +could never put a skirt on straight and you’d see about +two inches of petticoat hanging down on one side.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“She didn’t bother about things like that. They +didn’t make her any the less beautiful. And she was +as good as she was beautiful.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy burst out laughing and Mrs. Driffield put her +hand up to her mouth to hide her smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, come, Mr. Ashenden, that’s really going too +far. After all, let’s face it, she was a nymphomaniac.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think that’s a very silly word,” I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, then, let me say that she can hardly have +been a very good woman to treat poor Edward as she +did. Of course it was a blessing in disguise. If she +hadn’t run away from him he might have had to bear +that burden for the rest of his life, and with such +a handicap he could never have reached the position +he did. But the fact remains that she was notoriously +unfaithful to him. From what I hear she was absolutely +promiscuous.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You don’t understand,” I said. “She was a very +simple woman. Her instincts were healthy and ingenuous. +She loved to make people happy. She loved +love.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Do you call that love?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, then, the act of love. She was naturally +affectionate. When she liked anyone it was quite +natural for her to go to bed with him. She never +thought twice about it. It was not vice; it wasn’t lasciviousness; +it was her nature. She gave herself as +naturally as the sun gives heat or the flowers their +perfume. It was a pleasure to her and she liked to +give pleasure to others. It had no effect on her character; +she remained sincere, unspoiled, and artless.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield looked as though she had taken a +dose of castor oil and had just been trying to get the +taste of it out of her mouth by sucking a lemon.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t understand,” she said. “But then I’m +bound to admit that I never understood what Edward +saw in her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Did he know that she was carrying on with all +sorts of people?” asked Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m sure he didn’t,” she replied quickly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You think him a bigger fool than I do, Mrs. Driffield,” +I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Then why did he put up with it?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I think I can tell you. You see, she wasn’t a woman +who ever inspired love. Only affection. It was absurd +to be jealous over her. She was like a clear deep pool +in a forest glade into which it’s heavenly to plunge, +but it is neither less cool nor less crystalline because +a tramp and a gipsy and a gamekeeper have plunged +into it before you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Roy laughed again and this time Mrs. Driffield +without concealment smiled thinly.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“It’s comic to hear you so lyrical,” said Roy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I stifled a sigh. I have noticed that when I am most +serious people are apt to laugh at me, and indeed +when after a lapse of time I have read passages that +I wrote from the fullness of my heart I have been +tempted to laugh at myself. It must be that there is +something naturally absurd in a sincere emotion, +though why there should be I cannot imagine, unless +it is that man, the ephemeral inhabitant of an insignificant +planet, with all his pain and all his striving +is but a jest in an eternal mind.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I saw that Mrs. Driffield wished to ask me something. +It caused her a certain embarrassment.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Do you think he’d have taken her back if she’d +been willing to come?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You knew him better than I. I should say no. I +think that when he had exhausted an emotion he took +no further interest in the person who had aroused +it. I should say that he had a peculiar combination +of strong feeling and extreme callousness.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know how you can say that,” cried Roy. +“He was the kindest man I ever met.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Mrs. Driffield looked at me steadily and then +dropped her eyes.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wonder what happened to her when she went +to America,” he asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I believe she married Kemp,” said Mrs. Driffield. +“I heard they had taken another name. Of +course they couldn’t show their faces over here +again.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“When did she die?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, about ten years ago.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“How did you hear?” I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“From Harold Kemp, the son; he’s in some sort +of business at Maidstone. I never told Edward. She’d +been dead to him for many years and I saw no reason +to remind him of the past. It always helps you if you +put yourself in other people’s shoes and I said to +myself that if I were he I shouldn’t want to be reminded +of an unfortunate episode of my youth. Don’t +you think I was right?”</p> + +<div><h1><span style="font-family:'ch';">XXVI</span></h1></div> + +<p class='noindent'><span class='sc'>Mrs. Driffield</span> very kindly offered to send me back +to Blackstable in her car, but I preferred to walk. +I promised to dine at Ferne Court next day and +meanwhile to write down what I could remember of +the two periods during which I had been in the habit +of seeing Edward Driffield. As I walked along the +winding road, meeting no one by the way, I mused +upon what I should say. Do they not tell us that style +is the art of omission? If that is so I should certainly +write a very pretty piece, and it seemed almost a pity +that Roy should use it only as material. I chuckled +when I reflected what a bombshell I could throw if +I chose. There was one person who could tell them +all they wanted to know about Edward Driffield and +his first marriage; but this fact I proposed to keep +to myself. They thought Rosie was dead; they erred; +Rosie was very much alive.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Being in New York for the production of a play +and my arrival having been advertised to all and +sundry by my manager’s energetic press representative, +I received one day a letter addressed in a handwriting +I knew but could not place. It was large and +round, firm but uneducated. It was so familiar to me +that I was exasperated not to remember whose it +was. It would have been more sensible to open the +letter at once, but instead I looked at the envelope +and racked my brain. There are handwritings I cannot +see without a little shiver of dismay and some +letters that look so tiresome that I cannot bring +myself to open them for a week. When at last I tore +open the envelope what I read gave me a strange +feeling. It began abruptly:</p> + +<div class='blockquote'> + +<p class='pindent'><span class='it'>I have just seen that you are in New York and +would like to see you again. I am not living in New +York any more, but Yonkers is quite close and if you +have a car you can easily do it in half an hour. I +expect you are very busy so leave it to you to make a +date. Although it is many years since we last met I +hope you have not forgotten your old friend</span></p> + +<p class='line' style='text-align:right;margin-right:1em;'><span class='sc'>Rose Iggulden</span> (<span class='it'>formerly Driffield</span>)</p> + +</div> + +<p class='pindent'>I looked at the address; it was the Albemarle, evidently +a hotel or an apartment house, then there was +the name of a street, and Yonkers. A shiver passed +through me as though someone had walked over my +grave. During the years that had passed I had sometimes +thought of Rosie, but of late I had said to myself +that she must surely be dead. I was puzzled for +a moment by the name. Why Iggulden and not Kemp? +Then it occurred to me that they had taken this name, +a Kentish one too, when they fled from England. My +first impulse was to make an excuse not to see her; +I am always shy of seeing again people I have not +seen for a long time; but then I was seized with +curiosity. I wanted to see what she was like and to +hear what had happened to her. I was going down to +Dobbs Ferry for the week-end, to reach which I had +to pass through Yonkers, and so answered that I +would come at about four on the following Saturday.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The Albemarle was a huge block of apartments, +comparatively new, and it looked as though it were +inhabited by persons in easy circumstances. My name +was telephoned up by a Negro porter in uniform and +I was taken up in the elevator by another. I felt uncommonly +nervous. The door was opened for me by +a coloured maid.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Come right in,” she said. “Mrs. Iggulden’s expecting +you.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I was ushered into a living room that served also +as dining room, for at one end of it was a square +table of heavily carved oak, a dresser, and four +chairs of the kind that the manufacturers in Grand +Rapids would certainly describe as Jacobean. But +the other end was furnished with a Louis XV suite, +gilt and upholstered in pale blue damask; there were +a great many small tables, richly carved and gilt, on +which stood Sèvres vases with ormolu decorations +and nude bronze ladies with draperies flowing as +though in a howling gale that artfully concealed those +parts of their bodies that decency required; and each +one held at the end of a playfully outstretched arm an +electric lamp. The gramophone was the grandest +thing I had ever seen out of a shop window, all gilt +and shaped like a sedan chair and painted with Watteau +courtiers and their ladies.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>After I had waited for about five minutes a door +was opened and Rosie came briskly in. She gave me +both her hands.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, this is a surprise,” she said. “I hate to think +how many years it is since we met. Excuse me one +moment.” She went to the door and called: “Jessie, +you can bring the tea in. Mind the water’s boiling +properly.” Then, coming back: “The trouble I’ve +had to teach that girl to make tea properly, you’d +never believe.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie was at least seventy. She was wearing a very +smart sleeveless frock of green chiffon, heavily +<span class='it'>diamanté</span>, cut square at the neck and very short; it +fitted like a bursting glove. By her shape I gathered +that she wore rubber corsets. Her nails were blood-coloured +and her eyebrows plucked. She was stout, +and she had a double chin; the skin of her bosom, +although she had powdered it freely, was red, and her +face was red too. But she looked well and healthy +and full of beans. Her hair was still abundant, but +it was quite white, shingled and permanently waved. +As a young woman she had had soft, naturally waving +hair and these stiff undulations, as though she +had just come out of a hairdresser’s, seemed more +than anything else to change her. The only thing that +remained was her smile, which had still its old childlike +and mischievous sweetness. Her teeth had never +been very good, irregular and of bad shape; but +these now were replaced by a set of perfect evenness +and snowy brilliance; they were obviously the best +money could buy.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>The coloured maid brought in an elaborate tea +with <span class='it'>pâté</span> sandwiches and cookies and candy and little +knives and forks and tiny napkins. It was all very +neat and smart.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That’s one thing I’ve never been able to do without—my tea,” +said Rosie, helping herself to a hot +buttered scone. “It’s my best meal, really, though I +know I shouldn’t eat it. My doctor keeps on saying +to me: ‘Mrs. Iggulden, you can’t expect to get your +weight down if you will eat half a dozen cookies at +tea.’ ” She gave me a smile, and I had a sudden inkling +that, notwithstanding the marcelled hair and the +powder and the fat, Rosie was the same as ever. “But +what I say is: A little of what you fancy does you +good.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I had always found her easy to talk to. Soon we +were chatting away as though it were only a few +weeks since we had last seen one another.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Were you surprised to get my letter? I put Driffield +so as you should know who it was from. We +took the name of Iggulden when we came to America. +George had a little unpleasantness when he left +Blackstable, perhaps you heard about it, and he +thought in a new country he’d better start with a new +name, if you understand what I mean.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I nodded vaguely.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Poor George, he died ten years ago, you know.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m sorry to hear that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, well, he was getting on in years. He was past +seventy though you’d never have guessed it to look +at him. It was a great blow to me. No woman could +want a better husband than what he made me. Never +a cross word from the day we married till the day +he died. And I’m pleased to say he left me very well +provided for.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m glad to know that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, he did very well over here. He went into +the building trade, he always had a fancy for it, and +he got in with Tammany. He always said the greatest +mistake he ever made was not coming over here +twenty years before. He liked the country from the +first day he set foot in it. He had plenty of go and +that’s what you want here. He was just the sort to +get on.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Have you never been back to England?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, I’ve never wanted to. George used to talk +about it sometimes, just for a trip, you know, but +we never got down to it, and now he’s gone I haven’t +got the inclination. I expect London would seem very +dead and alive to me after New York. We used to +live in New York, you know. I only came here after +his death.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What made you choose Yonkers?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, I always fancied it. I used to say to George, +when we retire we’ll go and live at Yonkers. It’s +like a little bit of England to me; you know, Maidstone +or Guildford or some place like that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I smiled, but I understood what she meant. Notwithstanding +its trams and its tootling cars, its +cinemas and electric signs, Yonkers, with its winding +main street, has a faint air of an English market +town gone jazz.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Of course I sometimes wonder what’s happened +to all the folks at Blackstable. I suppose they’re most +of them dead by now and I expect they think I am +too.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I haven’t been there for thirty years.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I did not know then that the rumour of Rosie’s +death had reached Blackstable. I dare say that someone +had brought back the news that George Kemp +was dead and thus a mistake had arisen.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I suppose nobody knows here that you were Edward +Driffield’s first wife?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, no; why, if they had I should have had the +reporters buzzing around my apartment like a swarm +of bees. You know sometimes I’ve hardly been able +to help laughing when I’ve been out somewhere playing +bridge and they’ve started talking about Ted’s +books. They like him no end in America. I never +thought so much of them myself.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You never were a great novel reader, were you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I used to like history better, but I don’t seem to +have much time for reading now. Sunday’s my great +day. I think the Sunday papers over here are lovely. +You don’t have anything like them in England. Then +of course I play a lot of bridge; I’m crazy about +contract.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>I remembered that when as a young boy I had first +met Rosie her uncanny skill at whist had impressed +me. I felt that I knew the sort of bridge player she +was, quick, bold, and accurate: a good partner and +a dangerous opponent.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You’d have been surprised at the fuss they made +over here when Ted died. I knew they thought a lot +of him, but I never knew he was such a big bug as all +that. The papers were full of him, and they had pictures +of him and Ferne Court; he always said he +meant to live in that house some day. Whatever made +him marry that hospital nurse? I always thought he’d +marry Mrs. Barton Trafford. They never had any +children, did they?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Ted would have liked to have some. It was a +great blow to him that I couldn’t have any more after +the first.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I didn’t know you’d ever had a child,” I said with +surprise.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Oh, yes. That’s why Ted married me. But I had +a very bad time when it came and the doctors said +I couldn’t have another. If she’d lived, poor little +thing, I don’t suppose I’d ever have run away with +George. She was six when she died. A dear little thing +she was and as pretty as a picture.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You never mentioned her.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, I couldn’t bear to speak about her. She got +meningitis and we took her to the hospital. They put +her in a private room and they let us stay with her. +I shall never forget what she went through, screaming, +screaming all the time, and nobody able to do +anything.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie’s voice broke.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Was it that death Driffield described in <span class='it'>The Cup +of Life</span>?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Yes, that’s it. I always thought it so funny of +Ted. He couldn’t bear to speak of it, any more than +I could, but he wrote it all down; he didn’t leave +out a thing; even little things I hadn’t noticed at the +time he put in and then I remembered them. You’d +think he was just heartless, but he wasn’t, he was +upset just as much as I was. When we used to go +home at night he’d cry like a child. Funny chap, +wasn’t he?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>It was <span class='it'>The Cup of Life</span> that had raised such a +storm of protest; and it was the child’s death and +the episode that followed it that had especially +brought down on Driffield’s head such virulent abuse. +I remembered the description very well. It was harrowing. +There was nothing sentimental in it; it did +not excite the reader’s tears, but his anger rather +that such cruel suffering should be inflicted on a little +child. You felt that God at the Judgment Day would +have to account for such things as this. It was a very +powerful piece of writing. But if this incident was +taken from life was the one that followed it also? +It was this that had shocked the public of the ’nineties +and this that the critics had condemned as not +only indecent but incredible. In <span class='it'>The Cup of Life</span> the +husband and wife (I forget their names now) had +come back from the hospital after the child’s death—they +were poor people and they lived from hand to +mouth in lodgings—and had their tea. It was latish: +about seven o’clock. They were exhausted by the +strain of a week’s ceaseless anxiety and shattered by +their grief. They had nothing to say to one another. +They sat in a miserable silence. The hours passed. +Then on a sudden the wife got up and going into +their bedroom put on her hat.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’m going out,” she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“All right.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>They lived near Victoria Station. She walked +along the Buckingham Palace Road and through the +park. She came into Piccadilly and went slowly toward +the Circus. A man caught her eye, paused and +turned round.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good-evening,” he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Good-evening.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She stopped and smiled.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Will you come and have a drink?” he asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t mind if I do.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>They went into a tavern in one of the side streets +of Piccadilly, where harlots congregated and men +came to pick them up, and they drank a glass of beer. +She chatted with the stranger and laughed with him. +She told him a cock-and-bull story about herself. +Presently he asked if he could go home with her; no, +she said, he couldn’t do that, but they could go to a +hotel. They got into a cab and drove to Bloomsbury +and there they took a room for the night. And next +morning she took a bus to Trafalgar Square and +walked through the park; when she got home her +husband was just sitting down to breakfast. After +breakfast they went back to the hospital to see about +the child’s funeral.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Will you tell me something, Rosie?” I asked. +“What happened in the book after the child’s death—did +that happen too?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She looked at me for a moment doubtfully; then +her lips broke into her still beautiful smile.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, it’s all so many years ago, what odds does +it make? I don’t mind telling you. He didn’t get it +quite right. You see, it was only guesswork on his +part. I was surprised that he knew as much as he +did; I never told him anything.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie took a cigarette and pensively tapped its end +on the table, but she did not light it.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“We came back from the hospital just like he said. +We walked back; I felt I couldn’t sit still in a cab, +and I felt all dead inside me. I’d cried so much I +couldn’t cry any more, and I was tired. Ted tried to +comfort me, but I said: ‘For God’s sake shut up.’ +After that he didn’t say any more. We had rooms +in the Vauxhall Bridge Road then, on the second +floor, just a sitting room and a bedroom, that’s why +we’d had to take the poor little thing to the hospital; +we couldn’t nurse her in lodgings; besides, the landlady +said she wouldn’t have it, and Ted said she’d +be looked after better at the hospital. She wasn’t a +bad sort, the landlady; she’d been a tart and Ted +used to talk to her by the hour together. She came +up when she heard us come in.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘How’s the little girl to-night?’ she said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘She’s dead,’ said Ted.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I couldn’t say anything. Then she brought up the +tea. I didn’t want anything, but Ted made me eat +some ham. Then I sat at the window. I didn’t look +round when the landlady came up to clear away, I +didn’t want anyone to speak to me. Ted was reading +a book; at least he was pretending to, but he didn’t +turn the pages, and I saw the tears dropping on it. +I kept on looking out of the window. It was the end +of June, the twenty-eighth, and the days were long. +It was just near the corner where we lived and I +looked at the people going in and out of the public +house and the trams going up and down. I thought +the day would never come to an end; then all of a +sudden I noticed that it was night. All the lamps were +lit. There were an awful lot of people in the street. +I felt so tired. My legs were like lead.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Why don’t you light the gas?’ I said to Ted.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Do you want it?’ he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘It’s no good sitting in the dark,’ I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He lit the gas. He began smoking his pipe. I +knew that would do him good. But I just sat and +looked at the street. I don’t know what came over +me. I felt that if I went on sitting in that room I’d +go mad. I wanted to go somewhere where there were +lights and people. I wanted to get away from Ted; +no, not so much that, I wanted to get away from all +that Ted was thinking and feeling. We only had two +rooms. I went into the bedroom; the child’s cot was +still there, but I wouldn’t look at it. I put on my hat +and a veil and I changed my dress and then I went +back to Ted.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘I’m going out,’ I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Ted looked at me. I dare say he noticed I’d got +my new dress on and perhaps something in the way +I spoke made him see I didn’t want him.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘All right,’ he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“In the book he made me walk through the park, +but I didn’t do that really. I went down to Victoria +and I took a hansom to Charing Cross. It was only +a shilling fare. Then I walked up the Strand. I’d made +up my mind what I wanted to do before I came out. +Do you remember Harry Retford? Well, he was +acting at the Adelphi then, he had the second comedy +part. Well, I went to the stage door, and sent up +my name. I always liked Harry Retford. I expect +he was a bit unscrupulous and he was rather funny +over money matters, but he could make you laugh +and with all his faults he was a rare good sort. You +know he was killed in the Boer War, don’t you?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I didn’t. I only knew he’d disappeared and one +never saw his name on playbills; I thought perhaps +he’d gone into business or something.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No, he went out at once. He was killed at Ladysmith. +After I’d been waiting a bit he came down and +I said: ‘Harry, let’s go on the razzle to-night. What +about a bit of supper at Romano’s?’ ‘Not ’alf,’ he +said. ‘You wait here and the minute the show’s over +and I’ve got my make-up off I’ll come down.’ It made +me feel better just to see him; he was playing a +racing tout and it made me laugh just to look at him +in his check suit and his billycock hat and his red +nose. Well, I waited till the end of the show and then +he came down and we walked along to Romano’s.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Are you hungry?’ he said to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Starving,’ I said; and I was.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Let’s have the best,’ he said, ‘and blow the expense. +I told Bill Terris I was taking my best girl +out to supper and I touched him for a couple of quid.’</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Let’s have champagne,’ I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Three cheers for the widow!’ he said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I don’t know if you ever went to Romano’s in the +old days. It was fine. You used to see all the theatrical +people and the racing men, and the girls from the +Gaiety used to go there. It was <span class='it'>the</span> place. And the +Roman. Harry knew him and he came up to our +table; he used to talk in funny broken English; I +believe he put it on because he knew it made people +laugh. And if someone he knew was down and out +he’d always lend him a fiver.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘How’s the kid?’ said Harry.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘Better,’ I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I didn’t want to tell him the truth. You know +how funny men are; they don’t understand some +things. I knew Harry would think it dreadful of me +to come out to supper when the poor child was lying +dead in the hospital. He’d be awfully sorry and all +that, but that’s not what I wanted; I wanted to +laugh.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie lit the cigarette that she had been playing +with.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“You know how when a woman is having a baby, +sometimes the husband can’t stand it any more and +he goes out and has another woman. And then when +she finds out, and it’s funny how often she does, she +kicks up no end of a fuss; she says, that the man +should go and do it just then, when she’s going +through hell, well, it’s the limit. I always tell her not +to be silly. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t love her, and +isn’t terribly upset, it doesn’t mean anything, it’s just +nerves; if he weren’t so upset he wouldn’t think of +it. I know, because that’s how I felt then.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“When we’d finished our supper Harry said: +‘Well, what about it?’</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘What about what?’ I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“There wasn’t any dancing in those days and there +was nowhere we could go.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘What about coming round to my flat and having +a look at my photograph album?’ said Harry.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘I don’t mind if I do,’ I said.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“He had a little bit of a flat in the Charing Cross +Road, just two rooms and a bath and a kitchenette, +and we drove round there, and I stayed the night.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“When I got back next morning the breakfast was +already on the table and Ted had just started. I’d +made up my mind that if he said anything I was going +to fly out at him. I didn’t care what happened. I’d +earned my living before, and I was ready to earn it +again. For two pins I’d have packed my box and left +him there and then. But he just looked up as I came in.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“ ‘You’ve just come in time,’ he said. ‘I was going +to eat your sausage.’</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I sat down and poured him out his tea. And he +went on reading the paper. After we’d finished breakfast +we went to the hospital. He never asked me +where I’d been. I didn’t know what he thought. He +was terribly kind to me all that time. I was miserable, +you know. Somehow I felt that I just couldn’t get +over it, and there was nothing he didn’t do to make +it easier for me.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What did you think when you read the book?” +I asked.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, it did give me a turn to see that he did +know pretty well what had happened that night. +What beat me was his writing it at all. You’d have +thought it was the last thing he’d put in a book. +You’re queer fish, you writers.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>At that moment the telephone bell rang. Rosie took +up the receiver and listened.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Why, Mr. Vanuzzi, how very nice of you to call +me up! Oh, I’m pretty well, thank you. Well, pretty +and well, if you like. When you’re my age you take +all the compliments you can get.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>She embarked upon a conversation which, I gathered +from her tone, was of a facetious and even flirtatious +character. I did not pay much attention, and +since it seemed to prolong itself I began to meditate +upon the writer’s life. It is full of tribulation. First +he must endure poverty and the world’s indifference; +then, having achieved a measure of success, he must +submit with a good grace to its hazards. He depends +upon a fickle public. He is at the mercy of journalists +who want to interview him and photographers who +want to take his picture, of editors who harry him +for copy and tax gatherers who harry him for income +tax, of persons of quality who ask him to lunch +and secretaries of institutes who ask him to lecture, +of women who want to marry him and women who +want to divorce him, of youths who want his autograph, +actors who want parts and strangers who +want a loan, of gushing ladies who want advice +on their matrimonial affairs and earnest young men +who want advice on their compositions, of agents, +publishers, managers, bores, admirers, critics, and +his own conscience. But he has one compensation. +Whenever he has anything on his mind, whether it +be a harassing reflection, grief at the death of a +friend, unrequited love, wounded pride, anger at the +treachery of someone to whom he has shown kindness, +in short any emotion or any perplexing thought, +he has only to put it down in black and white, using +it as the theme of a story or the decoration of an +essay, to forget all about it. He is the only free man.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie put back the receiver and turned to me.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“That was one of my beaux. I’m going to play +bridge to-night and he rang up to say he’d call round +for me in his car. Of course he’s a Wop, but he’s real +nice. He used to run a big grocery store down town, +in New York, but he’s retired now.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Have you never thought of marrying again, +Rosie?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“No.” She smiled. “Not that I haven’t had offers. +I’m quite happy as I am. The way I look on it is +this, I don’t want to marry an old man, and it would +be silly at my age to marry a young one. I’ve had my +time and I’m ready to call it a day.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“What made you run away with George Kemp?”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“Well, I’d always liked him. I knew him long before +I knew Ted, you know. Of course I never thought +there was any chance of marrying him. For one thing +he was married already and then he had his position +to think of. And then when he came to me one day +and said that everything had gone wrong and he was +bust and there’d be a warrant out for his arrest in +a few days and he was going to America and would +I go with him, well, what could I do? I couldn’t let +him go all that way by himself, with no money perhaps, +and him having been always so grand and living +in his own house and driving his own trap. It wasn’t +as if I was afraid of work.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I sometimes think he was the only man you ever +cared for,” I suggested.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I dare say there’s some truth in that.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I wonder what it was you saw in him.”</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Rosie’s eyes travelled to a picture on the wall that +for some reason had escaped my notice. It was an +enlarged photograph of Lord George in a carved +gilt frame. It looked as if it might have been taken +soon after his arrival in America; perhaps at the +time of their marriage. It was a three-quarter length. +It showed him in a long frock coat, tightly buttoned, +and a tall silk hat cocked rakishly on one side of his +head; there was a large rose in his buttonhole; under +one arm he carried a silver-headed cane and smoke +curled from a big cigar that he held in his right hand. +He had a heavy moustache, waxed at the ends, a +saucy look in his eye, and in his bearing an arrogant +swagger. In his tie was a horseshoe in diamonds. He +looked like a publican dressed up in his best to go +to the Derby.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>“I’ll tell you,” said Rosie. “He was always such a +perfect gentleman.”</p> + +<p class='line' style='text-align:center;margin-top:3em;margin-bottom:2em;font-size:.8em;'>THE END</p> + +<hr class='pbk'/> + +<p class='line' style='text-align:center;margin-top:4em;margin-bottom:2em;font-size:1.2em;'>TRANSCRIBER NOTES</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. +Where multiple spellings occur, majority use has been +employed.</p> + +<p class='pindent'>Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious +printer errors occur.</p> + +<p class='line'> </p> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78723 ***</div> +</body> +<!-- created with fpgen.py 4.54e on 2017-08-01 01:44:46 GMT --> +</html> diff --git a/78723-h/images/cover.jpg b/78723-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..14dadd8 --- /dev/null +++ b/78723-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/78723-h/images/font-Jacques+Francois+Shadow.ttf b/78723-h/images/font-Jacques+Francois+Shadow.ttf Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5df0a64 --- /dev/null +++ b/78723-h/images/font-Jacques+Francois+Shadow.ttf diff --git a/78723-h/images/title.jpg b/78723-h/images/title.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..ebf072b --- /dev/null +++ b/78723-h/images/title.jpg |
