He watched Fleur’s eyes quartering them, busy as bees beneath the white lids he had kissed last night. He envied her that social curiosity; to live in London without it was like being at the sea without bathing. She was quietly–he could tell–making up her mind whom she wanted to speak to among those she knew, and whom, among those she didn’t yet know, she wanted to speak to her. ‘I hope to God she’s not in for a snubbing,’ he thought, and as soon as she was engaged in talk, he slipped towards a pillar. A small voice behind him said: “Well, young Mont!” Mr. Blythe, looking like a Dover sole above Kew Bridge, was squeezed against the same pillar, his eyes goggling timorously above his beard.
“Stick to me!” he said. “These bees are too bee busy.”
“Were you in Court yesterday?” asked Michael.
“No; one read about it. You did well.”
“She did better.”
“H’m!” said Mr. Blythe. “By the way, The Evening Sun was at us again this afternoon. They compared us to kittens playing with their tails. It’s time for your second barrel, Mont.”
“I thought–on the agricultural estimates.”
“Good! Governmental purchase and control of wheat. Stress use of the present machinery. No more officials than are absolutely necessary.”
“Blythe,” said Michael suddenly, “where were you born?”
“Lincolnshire.”
“You’re English, then?”
“Pure,” said Mr. Blythe.
“So am I; so’s old Foggart–I looked him up in the stud-book. It’s lucky, because we shall certainly be assailed for lack of patriotism.”
“We ARE,” said Mr. Blythe. “‘People who can see no good in their own country… Birds who foul their own nest… Gentry never happy unless running England down in the eyes of the world… Calamity-mongers… Pessimists…’ You don’t mind that sort of gup, I hope?”
“Unfortunately,” said Michael, “I do; it hurts me inside. It’s so damned unjust. I simply can’t bear the idea of England being in a fix.”
Mr. Blythe’s eyes rolled.
“She’s bee well not going to be, if we can help it.”
“If only I amounted to something,” murmured Michael; “but I always feel as if I could creep into one of my back teeth.”
“Have it crowned. What you want is brass, Mont. And talking of brass: There’s your late adversary! SHE’S got brass all right. Look at her!”
Michael saw Marjorie Ferrar moving away from the great Italian, in not too much of a sea-green gown, with her red-gold head held high. She came to a stand a small room’s length from Fleur, and swept her eyes this way and that. Evidently she had taken up that position in deliberate challenge.
“I must go to Fleur.”
“So must I,” said Mr. Blythe, and Michael gave him a grateful look.
And now it would have been so interesting to one less interested than Michael. The long, the tapering nose of Society could be seen to twitch, move delicately upwards, and like the trunk of some wild elephant scenting man, writhe and snout this way and that, catching the whiff of sensation. Lips were smiling and moving closer to ears; eyes turning from that standing figure to the other; little reflective frowns appeared on foreheads, as if, beneath cropped and scented scalps, brains were trying to make choice. And Marjorie Ferrar stood smiling and composed; and Fleur talked and twisted the flower in her hand; and both went on looking their best. So began a battle without sign of war declared, without even seeming recognition of each other’s presence. Mr. Blythe, indeed, stood pat between the two of them. Bulky and tall, he was an effective screen. But Michael, on the other side of her, could see and grimly follow. The Nose was taking time to apprehend the full of the aroma; the Brain to make its choice. Tide seemed at balance, not moving in or out. And then, with the slow implacability of tides, the water moved away from Fleur and lapped round her rival. Michael chattered, Mr. Blythe goggled, using the impersonal pronoun with a sort of passion; Fleur smiled, talked, twisted the flower. And, over there, Marjorie Ferrar seemed to hold a little Court. Did people admire, commiserate, approve of, or sympathise with her? Or did they disapprove of himself and Fleur? Or was it just that the ‘Pet of the Panjoys’ was always the more sensational figure? Michael watched Fleur growing paler, her smile more nervous, the twitching of the flower spasmodic. And he dared not suggest going; for she would see in it an admission of defeat. But on the faces, turned their way, the expression became more and more informative. Sir James Foskisson had done his job too well; he had slavered his clients with his own self-righteousness. Better the confessed libertine than those who brought her to judgment! And Michael thought: ‘Dashed natural, after all! Why didn’t the fellow take my tip, and let us pay and look pleasant.’
And just then close to the great Italian he caught sight of a tall young man with his hair brushed back, who was looking at his fingers. By George! It was Bertie Curfew! And there, behind him, waiting for his turn ‘to meet,’ who but MacGown himself! The humour of the gods had run amok! Head in air, soothing his mangled fingers, Bertie Curfew passed them, and strayed into the group around his former flame. Her greeting of him was elaborately casual. But up went the tapering Nose, for here came MacGown! How the fellow had changed–grim, greyish, bitter? The great Italian had met his match for once. And he too, stepped into that throng.
A queer silence was followed by a burst of speech, and then by dissolution. In twos and threes they trickled off, and there were MacGown and his betrothed standing alone. Michael turned to Fleur.
“Let’s go.”
Silence reigned in their homing cab. He had chattered himself out on the field of battle, and must wait for fresh supplies of camouflage. But he slipped his hand along till it found hers, which did not return his pressure. The card he used to play at times of stress–the eleventh baronet–had failed for the last three months; Fleur seemed of late to resent his introduction as a remedy. He followed her into the dining-room, sore at heart, bewildered in mind. He had never seen her look so pretty as in that oyster-coloured frock, very straight and simply made, with a swing out above the ankles. She sat down at the narrow dining-table, and he seated himself opposite, with the costive feeling of one who cannot find words that will ring true. For social discomfiture he himself didn’t care a tinker’s curse; but she–!
And, suddenly, she said:
“And you don’t mind?”
“For myself–not a bit.”
“Yes, you’ve still got your Foggartism and your Bethnal Green.”
“If YOU care, Fleur, I care a lot.”
“IF I care!”
“How–exactly?”
“I’d rather not increase your feeling that I’m a snob.”
“I never had any such feeling.”
“Michael!”
“Hadn’t you better say what you mean by the word?”
“You know perfectly well.”
“I know that you appreciate having people about you, and like them to think well of you. That isn’t being a snob.”
“Yes; you’re very kind, but you don’t admire it.”
“I admire you.”
“You mean, desire me. You admire Norah Curfew.”
“Norah Curfew! For all I care, she might snuff out tomorrow.”
And from her face he had the feeling that she believed him.
“If it isn’t her, it’s what she stands for–all that I’m not.”
“I admire a lot in you,” said Michael, fervently; “your intelligence, your flair; I admire you with Kit and your father; your pluck; and the way you put up with me.”
“No, I admire you much more than you admire me. Only, you see, I’m not capable of devotion.”
“What about Kit?”
“I’m devoted to myself–that’s all.”
He reached across the table and touched her hand.
“Morbid, darling.”
“No. I see too clearly to be morbid.”
She was leaning back, and her throat, very white and round, gleamed in the alabaster-shaded light; little choky movements were occurring there.
“Michael, I want you to take me round the world.”
“And leave Kit?”
“He’s too young to mind. Besides, my mother would look after him.”
If she had got as far as that, this was a deliberate desire!
“But, your father–”
“He’s not really old yet, and he’d have Kit.”
“When we rise in August, perhaps–”
“No, now.”
“It’s only five months to wait. We’d have time in the vacation to do a lot of travelling.”
Fleur looked straight at him.
“I knew you cared more for Foggartism now than for me.”
“Be reasonable, Fleur.”
“For five months–with the feeling I’ve got here!” she put her hand to her breast. “I’ve had six months of it already. You don’t realise, I suppose, that I’m down and out?”
“But, Fleur, it’s all so–”
“Yes, it’s always petty to mind being a dead failure, isn’t it?”
“But, my child–”
“Oh! If you can’t feel it–”
“I can–I felt wild this evening. But all you’ve got to do is to let them see that you don’t care; and they’ll come buzzing round again like flies. It would be running away, Fleur.”
“No,” said Fleur, coldly, “it’s not that–I don’t try twice for the same prize. Very well, I’ll stay and be laughed at.”
Michael got up.
“I know you don’t think there’s anything to my job. But there is, Fleur, and I’ve put my hand to it. Oh! don’t look like that. Dash it! This is dreadful!”
“I suppose I could go by myself. That would be more thrilling.”
“Absurd! Of course you couldn’t! You’re seeing blue to-night, old thing. It’ll all seem different tomorrow.”
“To-morrow and tomorrow! No, Michael, mortification has set in, my funeral can take place any day you like!”
Michael’s hands went up. She meant what she was saying! To realise, he must remember how much store she had set on her powers as hostess; how she had worked for her collection and shone among it! Her house of cards all pulled about her ears! Cruel! But would going round the world help her? Yes! Her instinct was quite right. He had been round the world himself, nothing else would change her values in quite that way; nothing else would so guarantee oblivion in others and herself! Lippinghall, her father’s, the sea for the five months till vacation came–they wouldn’t meet her case! She needed what would give her back importance. And yet, how could he go until the vacation? Foggartism–that lean and lonely plant–unwatered and without its only gardener, would wither to its roots, if, indeed, it had any. There was some movement in it now, interest here and there–this Member and that was pecking at it. Private efforts in the same direction were gathering way. And time was going on–Big Ben had called no truce; unemployment swelling, trade dawdling, industrial trouble brewing–brewing, hope losing patience! And what would old Blythe say to his desertion now?
“Give me a week,” he muttered. “It’s not easy. I must think it over.”
Chapter X.
THE NEW LEAF
When MacGown came up to her, Marjorie Ferrar thought: ‘Does he know about Bertie?’ Fresh from her triumph over ‘that little snob,’ fluttered by the sudden appearance of her past, and confronted with her present, she was not in complete possession of her head. When they had moved away into an empty side room, she faced him.
“Well, Alec, nothing’s changed. I still have a past as lurid as it was yesterday. I’m extremely sorry I ever kept it from you. But I did practically tell you, several times; only you wouldn’t take it.”
“Because it was hell to me. Tell me everything, Marjorie!”
“You want to revel in it?”
“Tell me everything, and I’ll marry you still.”
She shook her head. “Marry! Oh! no! I don’t go out of my depth any more. It was absurd anyway. I never loved you, Alec.”
“Then you loved that–you still–”
“My dear Alec, enough!”
He put his hands to his head, and swayed. And she was touched by genuine compassion.
“I’m awfully sorry, I really am. You’ve got to cut me out; that’s all.”
She had turned to leave him, but the misery in his face stopped her. She had not quite realised.
He was burnt up! He was–! And she said quickly:
“Marry you I won’t; but I’d like to pay up, if I could–”
He looked at her.
Quivering all over from that look, she shrugged her shoulders, and walked away. Men of an old fashion! Her own fault for stepping outside the charmed circle that took nothing too seriously. She walked over the shining floor, conscious of many eyes, slipped past her hostess, and soon was in a cab.
She lay awake, thinking. Even without announcement, the return of presents would set London by the ears and bring on her again an avalanche of bills. Five thousand pounds! She got up and rummaged out the list, duplicate of that which Alec had. He might still want to pay them! After all, it was he who had spilled the ink by making her go into Court! But then his eyes came haunting her. Out of the question! And, shivering a little, she got back into bed. Perhaps she would have a brain-wave in the morning. She had so many in the night, that she could not sleep. Moscow with Bertie Curfew? The stage? America and the ‘movies’? All three? She slept at last, and woke languid and pale. With her letters was one from Shropshire House.
“DEAR MARJORIE,
“If you’ve nothing better to do, I should like to see you this morning.
“Affectionately,
“SHROPSHIRE.”
What now? She looked at herself in the glass, and decided that she MUST make up a little. At eleven o’clock she was at Shropshire House. The marquess was in his workroom at the top, among a small forest of contraptions. With coat off, he was peering through a magnifying-glass at what looked like nothing.
“Sit down, Marjorie,” he said; “I’ll have done in a minute.”
Except the floor, there seemed nowhere to sit, so she remained standing.
“I thought so,” said the marquess; “the Italians are wrong.”
He put the spy-glass down, ran his hand through his silvery hair, and drew his ruffled beard into a peak. Then, taking an eyebrow between finger and thumb, he gave it an upward twist, and scratched himself behind one ear.
“They’re wrong; there’s no reaction whatever.”
Turning towards his granddaughter, he screwed up his eyes till they were bright as pins. “You’ve never been up here before. Sit in the window.”
She seated herself on a broad window-ledge covering some sort of battery, with her back to the light.
“So you brought that case, Marjorie?”
“I had to.”
“Now, why?” He was standing with his head a little to one side, his cheeks very pink, and his eyes very shrewd. And she thought: ‘After all, I’m his granddaughter. I’ll plunge.’
“Common honesty, if you want to know.”
The marquess pouted, as if trying to understand the words.
“I read your evidence,” he said, “if you mean that.”
“No. I meant that I wanted to find out where I stood.”
“And did you?”
“Very much so.”
“Are you still going to be married?”
Really, he was a spry old boy!
“No.”
“Whose doing? Yours or his?”
“He still says he’ll marry me if I tell him everything. But I don’t choose to.”
The marquess moved two steps, placed his foot on a box, and assumed his favourite attitude. He had a red silk tie this morning which floated loose; his tweed trousers were of a blue-green, his shirt of a green-blue. He looked wonderfully bright.
“Is there much to tell?”
“A good deal.”
“Well, Marjorie, you know what I said to you.”
“Yes, Grandfather, but I don’t quite see it. I don’t want to stand for anything.”
“Ah! you’re an exception in our class–luckily! But it’s the exceptions that do the harm.”
“If people took one as any better than themselves, perhaps. But they don’t nowadays.”
“Not quite honest, that,” interrupted the marquess; “what about the feeling in your bones?”
She smiled.
“It’s good to mortify oneself, Grandfather.”
“By having a better time than you ought, um? So your marriage is off?”
“Very much so.”
“Are you in debt?”
“Yes.”
“How much do you owe?”
Marjorie Ferrar hesitated. Should she compromise, or blurt it out?
“No heel-taps, Marjorie.”
“Well, then, five thousand about.”
The old peer screwed up his lips, and a melancholy little whistle escaped.
“A good deal of it, of course, is due to my engagement.”
“Your father won a race the other day, I see.”
The old boy knew everything!
“Yes; but I believe it’s all gone.”
“It would be,” said the marquess. “What are you going to do now?”
She had a strong desire to answer: “What are you?” but restrained it, and said:
“I thought of going on the stage.”
“Well, I suppose that might be suitable. Can you act?”
“I’m not a Duse.”
“Duse?” The marquess shook his head. “One must go back to Ristori for really great acting. Duse! Very talented, of course, but always the same. So you don’t choose to marry him now?” He looked at her intently. “That, I think, is right. Have you a list of your debts?”
Marjorie Ferrar rummaged in her vanity bag. “Here it is.”
She could see his nose wrinkling above it, but whether at its scent, or its contents, she could not tell.
“Your grandmother,” he said, “spent about a fifth of what you seem to on about five times the acreage of clothes. You wear nothing nowadays, and yet it costs all this.”
“The less there is, Grandfather, the better it has to be cut, you know.”
“Have you sent your presents back?”
“I’m having them packed.”
“They must all go,” said the marquess. “Keep nothing he or any one else gave you.”
“Of course not.”
“To frank you,” he said, suddenly, “I should have to sell the Gainsborough.”
“Oh, no!”
Gainsborough’s picture of his own grandmother as a little girl–that beautiful thing. She stretched out her hand for the list. Still holding it, he put his foot to the ground, and stood peering at her with his bright, intent old eyes.
“The question is, Marjorie, how far it’s possible to strike a bargain with you. Have you a ‘word’ to keep?”
She felt the blood mounting in her cheeks.
“I think so. It depends on what I’ve got to promise. But, Grandfather, I don’t WANT you to sell the Gainsborough.”
“Unfortunately,” said the marquess, “without doing your uncle Dangerfield in the eye, I’ve nothing else. It’s been my fault, I suppose, for having had expensive children. Other people don’t seem to have had them to the same degree.”
She stifled a smile.
“Times are hard,” went on the marquess. “Land costs money, collieries cost money, Shropshire House costs money; and where’s the money? I’ve got an invention here that ought to make my fortune, but nobody will look at it.”
The poor old boy–at his age! She said with a sigh:
“I really didn’t mean to bother you with this, Grandfather. I’ll manage somehow.”
The old peer took several somewhat hampered steps, and she noticed that his red slippers were heelless. He halted, a wonderfully bright spot among the contraptions.
“To come back to what we were saying, Marjorie. If your idea of life is simply to have a good time, how can you promise anything?”
“What do you want me to promise?”
He came and stood before her again, short and a little bent.
“You look as if you had stuff in you, too, with your hair. Do you really think you could earn your living?”
“I believe I can; I know a lot of people.”
“If I clear you, will you give me your word to pay ready money in future? Now don’t say ‘Yes,’ and go out and order yourself a lot of fallals. I want the word of a lady, if you understand what that implies.”
She stood up.
“I suppose you’ve every right to say that. But I don’t want you to clear me if you have to sell the Gainsborough.”
“You must leave that to me. I might manage, perhaps, to scrape it up without. About that promise?”
“Yes; I promise that.”
“Meaning to keep it?”
“Meaning to keep it.”
“Well, that’s something.”
“Anything else, Grandfather?”
“I should have liked to ask you not to cheapen our name any more, but I suppose that would be putting the clock back. The spirit of the age is against me.”
Turning from his face, she stood looking out of the window. The spirit of the age! It was all very well, but he didn’t understand what it was. Cheapen? Why! she had RAISED the price of the family name; hoicked it out of a dusty cupboard, and made of it current coin. People sat up when they read of her. Did they sit up when they read of grandfather? But he would never see that! And she murmured:
“All right, dear, I’ll be careful. I think I shall go to America.”
His eyes twinkled.
“And start a fashion of marrying American husbands? It’s not yet been done, I believe. Get one who’s interested in electricity, and bring him over. There are great things for an American to do here. Well, I’ll keep this list and work it off somehow. Just one thing, Marjorie: I’m eighty, and you’re–what are you–twenty-five? Don’t get through life so fast–you’ll be dreadfully bored by the time you’re fifty, and there’s no greater bore than a bored person. Good-bye!” He held out his hand.
She took a long breath. Free!
And, seizing his hand, she put it to her lips. Oh! He was gazing at it–oh! Had her lips come off? And she hurried out. The old boy! He was a darling to have kept that list! A new leaf! She would go at once to Bertie Curfew and get him to turn it over for her! The expression in his eye last night!
Chapter XI.
OVER THE WINDMILL
During his period of indecision Michael struck no attitudes, and used practically no words; the thing was too serious. Perhaps Kit would change Fleur’s mood, or she would see other disadvantages, such as her father. The complete cessation, however, of any social behaviour on her part–no invitation issued, or received, no function attended, or even discussed, during that rather terrible week, proved that the iron had really seared her spirit. She was not sulky, but she was mum and listless. And she was always watching him, with a wistful expression on her face, and now and then a resentful look, as if she had made up her mind that he was going to refuse. He could consult no one, too, for to any who had not lived through this long episode, Fleur’s attitude would seem incomprehensible, even ridiculous. He could not give her away; could not even go to old Blythe, until he had decided. Complicating his mental conflict was the habitual doubt whether he was really essential to Foggartism. If only his head would swell! He had not even the comfort of feeling that a sturdy negative would impress Fleur; she thought his job a stunt, useful to make him conspicuous, but of no real importance to the country. She had the political cynicism of the woman in the street; only what threatened property or Kit would really ruffle her! He knew that his dilemma was comic. The future of England against the present of a young woman socially snubbed! But, after all, only Sir James Foggart and old Blythe so far seriously connected Foggartism with the future of England; and if, now, he went off round the world, even they would lose their faith.
On the last morning of that week, Michael, still in doubt, crossed Westminster Bridge and sought the heart of the Surrey side. It was unfamiliar, and he walked with interest. Here, he remembered, the Bickets had lived; the Bickets who had failed, and apparently were failing in Australia, too. Street after mean street! Breeding-ground of Bickets! Catch them early, catch them often, catch them before they were Bickets, spoiled for the land; make them men and women of property, give them air and give them sun–the most decent folk in the world, give them a chance! Ugly houses, ugly shops, ugly pubs! No, that wouldn’t do! Keep Beauty out of it; Beauty never went down in ‘the House’! No sentiment went down! At least, only such as was understood–‘British stock,’ ‘Patriotism,’ ‘Empire,’ ‘Moral Fibre.’ Thews and productive power–stick to the cliches! He stood listening outside a school to the dull hum of education. The English breed with its pluck and its sense of humour and its patience, all mewed-up in mean streets!
He had a sudden longing for the country. His motor-cycle! Since taking his seat in Parliament he had not been on a machine so inclined to bump his dignity. But he would have it out now, and go for a run–it might shake him into a decision!
Fleur was not in, and no lunch ordered. So he ate some ham, and by two o’clock had started.
With spit and bluster he ran out along the road past Chiswick, Slough, and Maidenhead; crossed the river and sputtered towards Reading. At Caversham he crossed again, and ran on to Pangbourne. By the towing path he tipped his machine into some bushes and sat down to smoke a pipe. Quite windless! The river between the bare poplars had a grey, untroubled look; the catkins were forming on the willows. He plucked a twig, and stirred it round the bowl of his pipe before pressing in tobacco. The shaking had done him good; his mind was working freely. The war! One had no hesitations then; but then–one had no Fleur. Besides, that was a clear, a simple issue. But now, beyond this ‘to stay or not to stay,’ Michael seemed seeing the future of his married life. The decision that he made would affect what might last another fifty years. To put your hand to the plough, and at the first request to take it off again! You might be ploughing crooked, and by twilight; but better plough by dim light than no light; a crooked furrow than none at all! Foggartism was the best course he could see, and he must stick to it! The future of England! A blackbird, close by, chuckled. Quite so! But, as old Blythe said, one must stand up to laughter! Oh! Surely in the long run Fleur would see that he couldn’t play fast and loose; see that if she wanted him to remain in Parliament–and she did–he must hang on to the line he had taken, however it amused the blackbirds. She wouldn’t like him to sink to the nonentity of a turntail. For after all she was his wife, and with his self-respect her own was bound up.
He watched the smoke from his pipe, and the low grey clouds, the white-faced Herefords grazing beyond the river, and a man fishing with a worm. He took up the twig and twirled it, admiring the yellowish-grey velvet of its budding catkins. He felt quiet in the heart, at last, but very sorry. How make up to Fleur? Beside this river, not two miles away, he had courted–queer word–if not won her! And now they had come to this snag. Well, it was up to her now, whether or no they should come to grief on it. And it seemed to him, suddenly, that he would like to tell Old Forsyte…
When he heard the splutter of Michael’s motorcycle, Soames was engaged in hanging the Fred Walker he had bought at the emporium next to Messrs. Settlewhite and Stark, memorialising his freedom from the worry of that case, and soothing his itch for the British School. Fred Walker! The fellow was old-fashioned; he and Mason had been succeeded by a dozen movements. But–like old fiddles, with the same agreeable glow–there they were, very good curiosities such as would always command a price.
Having detached a Courbet, early and about ripe, he was standing in his shirt-sleeves, with a coil of wire in his hand, when Michael entered.
“Where have you sprung from?” he said, surprised.
“I happened to be passing, sir, on my old bike. I see you’ve kept your word about the English School.”
Soames attached the wire.
“I shan’t be happy,” he said, “till I’ve got an old Crome–best of the English landscapists.”
“Awfully rare, isn’t he, old Crome?”
“Yes, that’s why I want him.”
The smile on Michael’s face, as if he were thinking: ‘You mean that’s why you consider him the best,’ was lost on Soames giving the wire a final twist.
“I haven’t seen your pictures for a long time, sir. Can I look round?”
Observing him sidelong, Soames remembered his appearance there one summer Sunday, after he had first seen Fleur in that Gallery off Cork Street. Only four years? It seemed an age! The young fellow had worn better than one had hoped; looked a good deal older, too, less flighty; an amiable chap, considering his upbringing, and that war! And suddenly he perceived that Michael was engaged in observing him. Wanted something, no doubt–wouldn’t have come down for nothing! He tried to remember when anybody had come to see him without wanting something; but could not. It was natural!
“Are you looking for a picture to go with that Fragonard?” he said. “There’s a Chardin in the corner.”
“No, no, sir; you’ve been much too generous to us already.”
Generous! How could one be generous to one’s only daughter?
“How is Fleur?”
“I wanted to tell you about her. She’s feeling awfully restless.”
Soames looked out of the window. The Spring was late!
“She oughtn’t to be, with that case out of the way.”
“That’s just it, sir.”
Soames gimleted the young man’s face.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
“Stick to me!” he said. “These bees are too bee busy.”
“Were you in Court yesterday?” asked Michael.
“No; one read about it. You did well.”
“She did better.”
“H’m!” said Mr. Blythe. “By the way, The Evening Sun was at us again this afternoon. They compared us to kittens playing with their tails. It’s time for your second barrel, Mont.”
“I thought–on the agricultural estimates.”
“Good! Governmental purchase and control of wheat. Stress use of the present machinery. No more officials than are absolutely necessary.”
“Blythe,” said Michael suddenly, “where were you born?”
“Lincolnshire.”
“You’re English, then?”
“Pure,” said Mr. Blythe.
“So am I; so’s old Foggart–I looked him up in the stud-book. It’s lucky, because we shall certainly be assailed for lack of patriotism.”
“We ARE,” said Mr. Blythe. “‘People who can see no good in their own country… Birds who foul their own nest… Gentry never happy unless running England down in the eyes of the world… Calamity-mongers… Pessimists…’ You don’t mind that sort of gup, I hope?”
“Unfortunately,” said Michael, “I do; it hurts me inside. It’s so damned unjust. I simply can’t bear the idea of England being in a fix.”
Mr. Blythe’s eyes rolled.
“She’s bee well not going to be, if we can help it.”
“If only I amounted to something,” murmured Michael; “but I always feel as if I could creep into one of my back teeth.”
“Have it crowned. What you want is brass, Mont. And talking of brass: There’s your late adversary! SHE’S got brass all right. Look at her!”
Michael saw Marjorie Ferrar moving away from the great Italian, in not too much of a sea-green gown, with her red-gold head held high. She came to a stand a small room’s length from Fleur, and swept her eyes this way and that. Evidently she had taken up that position in deliberate challenge.
“I must go to Fleur.”
“So must I,” said Mr. Blythe, and Michael gave him a grateful look.
And now it would have been so interesting to one less interested than Michael. The long, the tapering nose of Society could be seen to twitch, move delicately upwards, and like the trunk of some wild elephant scenting man, writhe and snout this way and that, catching the whiff of sensation. Lips were smiling and moving closer to ears; eyes turning from that standing figure to the other; little reflective frowns appeared on foreheads, as if, beneath cropped and scented scalps, brains were trying to make choice. And Marjorie Ferrar stood smiling and composed; and Fleur talked and twisted the flower in her hand; and both went on looking their best. So began a battle without sign of war declared, without even seeming recognition of each other’s presence. Mr. Blythe, indeed, stood pat between the two of them. Bulky and tall, he was an effective screen. But Michael, on the other side of her, could see and grimly follow. The Nose was taking time to apprehend the full of the aroma; the Brain to make its choice. Tide seemed at balance, not moving in or out. And then, with the slow implacability of tides, the water moved away from Fleur and lapped round her rival. Michael chattered, Mr. Blythe goggled, using the impersonal pronoun with a sort of passion; Fleur smiled, talked, twisted the flower. And, over there, Marjorie Ferrar seemed to hold a little Court. Did people admire, commiserate, approve of, or sympathise with her? Or did they disapprove of himself and Fleur? Or was it just that the ‘Pet of the Panjoys’ was always the more sensational figure? Michael watched Fleur growing paler, her smile more nervous, the twitching of the flower spasmodic. And he dared not suggest going; for she would see in it an admission of defeat. But on the faces, turned their way, the expression became more and more informative. Sir James Foskisson had done his job too well; he had slavered his clients with his own self-righteousness. Better the confessed libertine than those who brought her to judgment! And Michael thought: ‘Dashed natural, after all! Why didn’t the fellow take my tip, and let us pay and look pleasant.’
And just then close to the great Italian he caught sight of a tall young man with his hair brushed back, who was looking at his fingers. By George! It was Bertie Curfew! And there, behind him, waiting for his turn ‘to meet,’ who but MacGown himself! The humour of the gods had run amok! Head in air, soothing his mangled fingers, Bertie Curfew passed them, and strayed into the group around his former flame. Her greeting of him was elaborately casual. But up went the tapering Nose, for here came MacGown! How the fellow had changed–grim, greyish, bitter? The great Italian had met his match for once. And he too, stepped into that throng.
A queer silence was followed by a burst of speech, and then by dissolution. In twos and threes they trickled off, and there were MacGown and his betrothed standing alone. Michael turned to Fleur.
“Let’s go.”
Silence reigned in their homing cab. He had chattered himself out on the field of battle, and must wait for fresh supplies of camouflage. But he slipped his hand along till it found hers, which did not return his pressure. The card he used to play at times of stress–the eleventh baronet–had failed for the last three months; Fleur seemed of late to resent his introduction as a remedy. He followed her into the dining-room, sore at heart, bewildered in mind. He had never seen her look so pretty as in that oyster-coloured frock, very straight and simply made, with a swing out above the ankles. She sat down at the narrow dining-table, and he seated himself opposite, with the costive feeling of one who cannot find words that will ring true. For social discomfiture he himself didn’t care a tinker’s curse; but she–!
And, suddenly, she said:
“And you don’t mind?”
“For myself–not a bit.”
“Yes, you’ve still got your Foggartism and your Bethnal Green.”
“If YOU care, Fleur, I care a lot.”
“IF I care!”
“How–exactly?”
“I’d rather not increase your feeling that I’m a snob.”
“I never had any such feeling.”
“Michael!”
“Hadn’t you better say what you mean by the word?”
“You know perfectly well.”
“I know that you appreciate having people about you, and like them to think well of you. That isn’t being a snob.”
“Yes; you’re very kind, but you don’t admire it.”
“I admire you.”
“You mean, desire me. You admire Norah Curfew.”
“Norah Curfew! For all I care, she might snuff out tomorrow.”
And from her face he had the feeling that she believed him.
“If it isn’t her, it’s what she stands for–all that I’m not.”
“I admire a lot in you,” said Michael, fervently; “your intelligence, your flair; I admire you with Kit and your father; your pluck; and the way you put up with me.”
“No, I admire you much more than you admire me. Only, you see, I’m not capable of devotion.”
“What about Kit?”
“I’m devoted to myself–that’s all.”
He reached across the table and touched her hand.
“Morbid, darling.”
“No. I see too clearly to be morbid.”
She was leaning back, and her throat, very white and round, gleamed in the alabaster-shaded light; little choky movements were occurring there.
“Michael, I want you to take me round the world.”
“And leave Kit?”
“He’s too young to mind. Besides, my mother would look after him.”
If she had got as far as that, this was a deliberate desire!
“But, your father–”
“He’s not really old yet, and he’d have Kit.”
“When we rise in August, perhaps–”
“No, now.”
“It’s only five months to wait. We’d have time in the vacation to do a lot of travelling.”
Fleur looked straight at him.
“I knew you cared more for Foggartism now than for me.”
“Be reasonable, Fleur.”
“For five months–with the feeling I’ve got here!” she put her hand to her breast. “I’ve had six months of it already. You don’t realise, I suppose, that I’m down and out?”
“But, Fleur, it’s all so–”
“Yes, it’s always petty to mind being a dead failure, isn’t it?”
“But, my child–”
“Oh! If you can’t feel it–”
“I can–I felt wild this evening. But all you’ve got to do is to let them see that you don’t care; and they’ll come buzzing round again like flies. It would be running away, Fleur.”
“No,” said Fleur, coldly, “it’s not that–I don’t try twice for the same prize. Very well, I’ll stay and be laughed at.”
Michael got up.
“I know you don’t think there’s anything to my job. But there is, Fleur, and I’ve put my hand to it. Oh! don’t look like that. Dash it! This is dreadful!”
“I suppose I could go by myself. That would be more thrilling.”
“Absurd! Of course you couldn’t! You’re seeing blue to-night, old thing. It’ll all seem different tomorrow.”
“To-morrow and tomorrow! No, Michael, mortification has set in, my funeral can take place any day you like!”
Michael’s hands went up. She meant what she was saying! To realise, he must remember how much store she had set on her powers as hostess; how she had worked for her collection and shone among it! Her house of cards all pulled about her ears! Cruel! But would going round the world help her? Yes! Her instinct was quite right. He had been round the world himself, nothing else would change her values in quite that way; nothing else would so guarantee oblivion in others and herself! Lippinghall, her father’s, the sea for the five months till vacation came–they wouldn’t meet her case! She needed what would give her back importance. And yet, how could he go until the vacation? Foggartism–that lean and lonely plant–unwatered and without its only gardener, would wither to its roots, if, indeed, it had any. There was some movement in it now, interest here and there–this Member and that was pecking at it. Private efforts in the same direction were gathering way. And time was going on–Big Ben had called no truce; unemployment swelling, trade dawdling, industrial trouble brewing–brewing, hope losing patience! And what would old Blythe say to his desertion now?
“Give me a week,” he muttered. “It’s not easy. I must think it over.”
Chapter X.
THE NEW LEAF
When MacGown came up to her, Marjorie Ferrar thought: ‘Does he know about Bertie?’ Fresh from her triumph over ‘that little snob,’ fluttered by the sudden appearance of her past, and confronted with her present, she was not in complete possession of her head. When they had moved away into an empty side room, she faced him.
“Well, Alec, nothing’s changed. I still have a past as lurid as it was yesterday. I’m extremely sorry I ever kept it from you. But I did practically tell you, several times; only you wouldn’t take it.”
“Because it was hell to me. Tell me everything, Marjorie!”
“You want to revel in it?”
“Tell me everything, and I’ll marry you still.”
She shook her head. “Marry! Oh! no! I don’t go out of my depth any more. It was absurd anyway. I never loved you, Alec.”
“Then you loved that–you still–”
“My dear Alec, enough!”
He put his hands to his head, and swayed. And she was touched by genuine compassion.
“I’m awfully sorry, I really am. You’ve got to cut me out; that’s all.”
She had turned to leave him, but the misery in his face stopped her. She had not quite realised.
He was burnt up! He was–! And she said quickly:
“Marry you I won’t; but I’d like to pay up, if I could–”
He looked at her.
Quivering all over from that look, she shrugged her shoulders, and walked away. Men of an old fashion! Her own fault for stepping outside the charmed circle that took nothing too seriously. She walked over the shining floor, conscious of many eyes, slipped past her hostess, and soon was in a cab.
She lay awake, thinking. Even without announcement, the return of presents would set London by the ears and bring on her again an avalanche of bills. Five thousand pounds! She got up and rummaged out the list, duplicate of that which Alec had. He might still want to pay them! After all, it was he who had spilled the ink by making her go into Court! But then his eyes came haunting her. Out of the question! And, shivering a little, she got back into bed. Perhaps she would have a brain-wave in the morning. She had so many in the night, that she could not sleep. Moscow with Bertie Curfew? The stage? America and the ‘movies’? All three? She slept at last, and woke languid and pale. With her letters was one from Shropshire House.
“DEAR MARJORIE,
“If you’ve nothing better to do, I should like to see you this morning.
“Affectionately,
“SHROPSHIRE.”
What now? She looked at herself in the glass, and decided that she MUST make up a little. At eleven o’clock she was at Shropshire House. The marquess was in his workroom at the top, among a small forest of contraptions. With coat off, he was peering through a magnifying-glass at what looked like nothing.
“Sit down, Marjorie,” he said; “I’ll have done in a minute.”
Except the floor, there seemed nowhere to sit, so she remained standing.
“I thought so,” said the marquess; “the Italians are wrong.”
He put the spy-glass down, ran his hand through his silvery hair, and drew his ruffled beard into a peak. Then, taking an eyebrow between finger and thumb, he gave it an upward twist, and scratched himself behind one ear.
“They’re wrong; there’s no reaction whatever.”
Turning towards his granddaughter, he screwed up his eyes till they were bright as pins. “You’ve never been up here before. Sit in the window.”
She seated herself on a broad window-ledge covering some sort of battery, with her back to the light.
“So you brought that case, Marjorie?”
“I had to.”
“Now, why?” He was standing with his head a little to one side, his cheeks very pink, and his eyes very shrewd. And she thought: ‘After all, I’m his granddaughter. I’ll plunge.’
“Common honesty, if you want to know.”
The marquess pouted, as if trying to understand the words.
“I read your evidence,” he said, “if you mean that.”
“No. I meant that I wanted to find out where I stood.”
“And did you?”
“Very much so.”
“Are you still going to be married?”
Really, he was a spry old boy!
“No.”
“Whose doing? Yours or his?”
“He still says he’ll marry me if I tell him everything. But I don’t choose to.”
The marquess moved two steps, placed his foot on a box, and assumed his favourite attitude. He had a red silk tie this morning which floated loose; his tweed trousers were of a blue-green, his shirt of a green-blue. He looked wonderfully bright.
“Is there much to tell?”
“A good deal.”
“Well, Marjorie, you know what I said to you.”
“Yes, Grandfather, but I don’t quite see it. I don’t want to stand for anything.”
“Ah! you’re an exception in our class–luckily! But it’s the exceptions that do the harm.”
“If people took one as any better than themselves, perhaps. But they don’t nowadays.”
“Not quite honest, that,” interrupted the marquess; “what about the feeling in your bones?”
She smiled.
“It’s good to mortify oneself, Grandfather.”
“By having a better time than you ought, um? So your marriage is off?”
“Very much so.”
“Are you in debt?”
“Yes.”
“How much do you owe?”
Marjorie Ferrar hesitated. Should she compromise, or blurt it out?
“No heel-taps, Marjorie.”
“Well, then, five thousand about.”
The old peer screwed up his lips, and a melancholy little whistle escaped.
“A good deal of it, of course, is due to my engagement.”
“Your father won a race the other day, I see.”
The old boy knew everything!
“Yes; but I believe it’s all gone.”
“It would be,” said the marquess. “What are you going to do now?”
She had a strong desire to answer: “What are you?” but restrained it, and said:
“I thought of going on the stage.”
“Well, I suppose that might be suitable. Can you act?”
“I’m not a Duse.”
“Duse?” The marquess shook his head. “One must go back to Ristori for really great acting. Duse! Very talented, of course, but always the same. So you don’t choose to marry him now?” He looked at her intently. “That, I think, is right. Have you a list of your debts?”
Marjorie Ferrar rummaged in her vanity bag. “Here it is.”
She could see his nose wrinkling above it, but whether at its scent, or its contents, she could not tell.
“Your grandmother,” he said, “spent about a fifth of what you seem to on about five times the acreage of clothes. You wear nothing nowadays, and yet it costs all this.”
“The less there is, Grandfather, the better it has to be cut, you know.”
“Have you sent your presents back?”
“I’m having them packed.”
“They must all go,” said the marquess. “Keep nothing he or any one else gave you.”
“Of course not.”
“To frank you,” he said, suddenly, “I should have to sell the Gainsborough.”
“Oh, no!”
Gainsborough’s picture of his own grandmother as a little girl–that beautiful thing. She stretched out her hand for the list. Still holding it, he put his foot to the ground, and stood peering at her with his bright, intent old eyes.
“The question is, Marjorie, how far it’s possible to strike a bargain with you. Have you a ‘word’ to keep?”
She felt the blood mounting in her cheeks.
“I think so. It depends on what I’ve got to promise. But, Grandfather, I don’t WANT you to sell the Gainsborough.”
“Unfortunately,” said the marquess, “without doing your uncle Dangerfield in the eye, I’ve nothing else. It’s been my fault, I suppose, for having had expensive children. Other people don’t seem to have had them to the same degree.”
She stifled a smile.
“Times are hard,” went on the marquess. “Land costs money, collieries cost money, Shropshire House costs money; and where’s the money? I’ve got an invention here that ought to make my fortune, but nobody will look at it.”
The poor old boy–at his age! She said with a sigh:
“I really didn’t mean to bother you with this, Grandfather. I’ll manage somehow.”
The old peer took several somewhat hampered steps, and she noticed that his red slippers were heelless. He halted, a wonderfully bright spot among the contraptions.
“To come back to what we were saying, Marjorie. If your idea of life is simply to have a good time, how can you promise anything?”
“What do you want me to promise?”
He came and stood before her again, short and a little bent.
“You look as if you had stuff in you, too, with your hair. Do you really think you could earn your living?”
“I believe I can; I know a lot of people.”
“If I clear you, will you give me your word to pay ready money in future? Now don’t say ‘Yes,’ and go out and order yourself a lot of fallals. I want the word of a lady, if you understand what that implies.”
She stood up.
“I suppose you’ve every right to say that. But I don’t want you to clear me if you have to sell the Gainsborough.”
“You must leave that to me. I might manage, perhaps, to scrape it up without. About that promise?”
“Yes; I promise that.”
“Meaning to keep it?”
“Meaning to keep it.”
“Well, that’s something.”
“Anything else, Grandfather?”
“I should have liked to ask you not to cheapen our name any more, but I suppose that would be putting the clock back. The spirit of the age is against me.”
Turning from his face, she stood looking out of the window. The spirit of the age! It was all very well, but he didn’t understand what it was. Cheapen? Why! she had RAISED the price of the family name; hoicked it out of a dusty cupboard, and made of it current coin. People sat up when they read of her. Did they sit up when they read of grandfather? But he would never see that! And she murmured:
“All right, dear, I’ll be careful. I think I shall go to America.”
His eyes twinkled.
“And start a fashion of marrying American husbands? It’s not yet been done, I believe. Get one who’s interested in electricity, and bring him over. There are great things for an American to do here. Well, I’ll keep this list and work it off somehow. Just one thing, Marjorie: I’m eighty, and you’re–what are you–twenty-five? Don’t get through life so fast–you’ll be dreadfully bored by the time you’re fifty, and there’s no greater bore than a bored person. Good-bye!” He held out his hand.
She took a long breath. Free!
And, seizing his hand, she put it to her lips. Oh! He was gazing at it–oh! Had her lips come off? And she hurried out. The old boy! He was a darling to have kept that list! A new leaf! She would go at once to Bertie Curfew and get him to turn it over for her! The expression in his eye last night!
Chapter XI.
OVER THE WINDMILL
During his period of indecision Michael struck no attitudes, and used practically no words; the thing was too serious. Perhaps Kit would change Fleur’s mood, or she would see other disadvantages, such as her father. The complete cessation, however, of any social behaviour on her part–no invitation issued, or received, no function attended, or even discussed, during that rather terrible week, proved that the iron had really seared her spirit. She was not sulky, but she was mum and listless. And she was always watching him, with a wistful expression on her face, and now and then a resentful look, as if she had made up her mind that he was going to refuse. He could consult no one, too, for to any who had not lived through this long episode, Fleur’s attitude would seem incomprehensible, even ridiculous. He could not give her away; could not even go to old Blythe, until he had decided. Complicating his mental conflict was the habitual doubt whether he was really essential to Foggartism. If only his head would swell! He had not even the comfort of feeling that a sturdy negative would impress Fleur; she thought his job a stunt, useful to make him conspicuous, but of no real importance to the country. She had the political cynicism of the woman in the street; only what threatened property or Kit would really ruffle her! He knew that his dilemma was comic. The future of England against the present of a young woman socially snubbed! But, after all, only Sir James Foggart and old Blythe so far seriously connected Foggartism with the future of England; and if, now, he went off round the world, even they would lose their faith.
On the last morning of that week, Michael, still in doubt, crossed Westminster Bridge and sought the heart of the Surrey side. It was unfamiliar, and he walked with interest. Here, he remembered, the Bickets had lived; the Bickets who had failed, and apparently were failing in Australia, too. Street after mean street! Breeding-ground of Bickets! Catch them early, catch them often, catch them before they were Bickets, spoiled for the land; make them men and women of property, give them air and give them sun–the most decent folk in the world, give them a chance! Ugly houses, ugly shops, ugly pubs! No, that wouldn’t do! Keep Beauty out of it; Beauty never went down in ‘the House’! No sentiment went down! At least, only such as was understood–‘British stock,’ ‘Patriotism,’ ‘Empire,’ ‘Moral Fibre.’ Thews and productive power–stick to the cliches! He stood listening outside a school to the dull hum of education. The English breed with its pluck and its sense of humour and its patience, all mewed-up in mean streets!
He had a sudden longing for the country. His motor-cycle! Since taking his seat in Parliament he had not been on a machine so inclined to bump his dignity. But he would have it out now, and go for a run–it might shake him into a decision!
Fleur was not in, and no lunch ordered. So he ate some ham, and by two o’clock had started.
With spit and bluster he ran out along the road past Chiswick, Slough, and Maidenhead; crossed the river and sputtered towards Reading. At Caversham he crossed again, and ran on to Pangbourne. By the towing path he tipped his machine into some bushes and sat down to smoke a pipe. Quite windless! The river between the bare poplars had a grey, untroubled look; the catkins were forming on the willows. He plucked a twig, and stirred it round the bowl of his pipe before pressing in tobacco. The shaking had done him good; his mind was working freely. The war! One had no hesitations then; but then–one had no Fleur. Besides, that was a clear, a simple issue. But now, beyond this ‘to stay or not to stay,’ Michael seemed seeing the future of his married life. The decision that he made would affect what might last another fifty years. To put your hand to the plough, and at the first request to take it off again! You might be ploughing crooked, and by twilight; but better plough by dim light than no light; a crooked furrow than none at all! Foggartism was the best course he could see, and he must stick to it! The future of England! A blackbird, close by, chuckled. Quite so! But, as old Blythe said, one must stand up to laughter! Oh! Surely in the long run Fleur would see that he couldn’t play fast and loose; see that if she wanted him to remain in Parliament–and she did–he must hang on to the line he had taken, however it amused the blackbirds. She wouldn’t like him to sink to the nonentity of a turntail. For after all she was his wife, and with his self-respect her own was bound up.
He watched the smoke from his pipe, and the low grey clouds, the white-faced Herefords grazing beyond the river, and a man fishing with a worm. He took up the twig and twirled it, admiring the yellowish-grey velvet of its budding catkins. He felt quiet in the heart, at last, but very sorry. How make up to Fleur? Beside this river, not two miles away, he had courted–queer word–if not won her! And now they had come to this snag. Well, it was up to her now, whether or no they should come to grief on it. And it seemed to him, suddenly, that he would like to tell Old Forsyte…
When he heard the splutter of Michael’s motorcycle, Soames was engaged in hanging the Fred Walker he had bought at the emporium next to Messrs. Settlewhite and Stark, memorialising his freedom from the worry of that case, and soothing his itch for the British School. Fred Walker! The fellow was old-fashioned; he and Mason had been succeeded by a dozen movements. But–like old fiddles, with the same agreeable glow–there they were, very good curiosities such as would always command a price.
Having detached a Courbet, early and about ripe, he was standing in his shirt-sleeves, with a coil of wire in his hand, when Michael entered.
“Where have you sprung from?” he said, surprised.
“I happened to be passing, sir, on my old bike. I see you’ve kept your word about the English School.”
Soames attached the wire.
“I shan’t be happy,” he said, “till I’ve got an old Crome–best of the English landscapists.”
“Awfully rare, isn’t he, old Crome?”
“Yes, that’s why I want him.”
The smile on Michael’s face, as if he were thinking: ‘You mean that’s why you consider him the best,’ was lost on Soames giving the wire a final twist.
“I haven’t seen your pictures for a long time, sir. Can I look round?”
Observing him sidelong, Soames remembered his appearance there one summer Sunday, after he had first seen Fleur in that Gallery off Cork Street. Only four years? It seemed an age! The young fellow had worn better than one had hoped; looked a good deal older, too, less flighty; an amiable chap, considering his upbringing, and that war! And suddenly he perceived that Michael was engaged in observing him. Wanted something, no doubt–wouldn’t have come down for nothing! He tried to remember when anybody had come to see him without wanting something; but could not. It was natural!
“Are you looking for a picture to go with that Fragonard?” he said. “There’s a Chardin in the corner.”
“No, no, sir; you’ve been much too generous to us already.”
Generous! How could one be generous to one’s only daughter?
“How is Fleur?”
“I wanted to tell you about her. She’s feeling awfully restless.”
Soames looked out of the window. The Spring was late!
“She oughtn’t to be, with that case out of the way.”
“That’s just it, sir.”
Soames gimleted the young man’s face.
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