”
“Quite so,” said Michael. “Idealism is just a by-product of geography–it’s the haze that lies in the middle distance. The farther you are from bed-rock, the less quick you need be to see it. We’re twenty sea-miles more idealistic about the European situation than the French are. And you’re three thousand sea-miles more idealistic than we are. But when it’s a matter of niggers, we’re three thousand sea-miles more idealistic than you; isn’t that so?”
Francis Wilmot narrowed his dark eyes.
“It is,” he said. “The farther North we go in the States, the more idealistic we get about the negro. Anne and I’ve lived all our life with darkies, and never had trouble; we love them, and they love us; but I wouldn’t trust myself not to join in lynching one that laid his hands on her. I’ve talked that over many times with Jon. He doesn’t see it that way; he says a darky should be tried like a white man; but he doesn’t know the real South. His mind is still three thousand sea-miles away.”
Michael was silent. Something within him always closed up at mention of a name which he still spelt mentally with an h.
Francis Wilmot added ruminatively: “There are a few saints in every country proof against your theory; but the rest of us, I reckon, aren’t above human nature.”
“Talking of human nature,” said Michael, “here’s my father-inlaw!”
Chapter VI.
SOAMES KEEPS HIS EYES OPEN
Soames, having prolonged his week-end visit, had been spending the afternoon at the Zoological Gardens, removing his great-nephews, the little Cardigans, from the too close proximity of monkeys and cats. After standing them once more in Imogen’s hall, he had roosted at his Club till, idly turning his evening paper, he had come on this paragraph, in the “Chiff-chaff” column:
“A surprise for the coming Session is being confectioned at the Wednesday gatherings of a young hostess not a hundred miles from Westminster. Her husband, a prospective baronet lately connected with literature, is to be entrusted with the launching in Parliament of a policy which enjoys the peculiar label of Foggartism, derived from Sir James Foggart’s book called “The Parlous State of England.” This amusing alarum is attributed to the somewhat fantastic brain which guides a well-known weekly. We shall see what comes of it. In the meantime the enterprising little lady in question is losing no chance of building up her ‘salon’ on the curiosity which ever surrounds any buccaneering in politics.”
Soames rubbed his eyes; then read it again with rising anger. ‘Enterprising little lady is losing no chance of building up her “salon.”’ Who had written that? He put the paper in his pocket–almost the first theft he had ever committed–and all the way across St. James’s Park in the gathering twilight he brooded on that anonymous paragraph. The allusion seemed to him unmistakable, and malicious into the bargain. ‘Lion-hunter’ would not have been plainer. Unfortunately, in a primary sense ‘lion-hunter’ was a compliment, and Soames doubted whether its secondary sense had ever been ‘laid down’ as libellous. He was still brooding deeply, when the young men ranged alongside.
“Well, sir?”
“Ah!” said Soames. “I want to speak to you. You’ve got a traitor in the camp.” And, without meaning to at all, he looked angrily at Francis Wilmot.
“Now, sir?” said Michael, when they were in his study.
Soames held out the folded paper.
Michael read the paragraph and made a face.
“Whoever wrote that comes to your evenings,” said Soames; “that’s clear. Who is he?”
“Very likely a she.”
“D’you mean to say they print such things by women?”
Michael did not answer. Old Forsyte was behind the times.
“Will they tell me who it is, if I go down to them?” asked Soames.
“No, fortunately.”
“How d’you mean ‘fortunately’?”
“Well, sir, the Press is a sensitive plant. I’m afraid you might make it curl up. Besides, it’s always saying nice things that aren’t deserved.”
“But this–” began Soames; he stopped in time, and substituted: “Do you mean that we’ve got to sit down under it?”
“To lie down, I’m afraid.”
“Fleur has an evening tomorrow.”
“Yes.”
“I shall stay up for it, and keep my eyes open.”
Michael had a vision of his father-inlaw, like a plainclothes man in the neighbourhood of wedding-presents.
But in spite of assumed levity, Michael had been hit. The knowledge that his adored one had the collector’s habit, and flitted, alluring, among the profitable, had, so far, caused him only indulgent wonder. But now it seemed more than an amusing foible. The swiftness with which she turned her smile off and on as though controlled by a switch under her shingled hair; the quick turns of her neck, so charming and exposed; the clever roving, disguised so well but not quite well enough, of the pretty eyes; the droop and flutter of their white lids; the expressive hands grasping, if one could so call such slim and dainty apprehensions, her career–all this suddenly caused Michael pain. Still she was doing it for him and Kit! French women, they said, co-operated with their husbands in the family career. It was the French blood in her. Or perhaps just idealism, the desire to have and be the best of whatever bunch there was about! Thus Michael, loyally. But his uneasy eyes roved from face to face of the Wednesday gathering, trying to detect signs of quizzicality.
Soames followed another method. His mind, indeed, was uncomplicated by the currents awash in that of one who goes to bed with the object of his criticism. For him there was no reason why Fleur should not know as many aristocrats, Labour members, painters, ambassadors, young fools, and even writing fellows, as might flutter her fancy. The higher up they were, the less likely, he thought with a certain naivete would they be to borrow money or get her into a mess. His daughter was as good or better than any of them, and his deep pride was stung to the quick by the notion that people should think she had to claw and scrape to get them round her. It was not she who was after them, but they who were after her! Standing under the Fragonard which he had given her, grizzled, neatly moustached, close-faced, chinny, with a gaze concentrated on nothing in particular, as of one who has looked over much and found little in it, he might have been one of her ambassadors.
A young woman, with red-gold hair, about an inch long on her de-shingled neck, came and stood with her back to him, beside a soft man, who kept washing his hands. Soames could hear every word of their talk.
“Isn’t the little Mont amusing? Look at her now, with ‘Don Fernando’–you’d think he was her only joy. Ah! There’s young Rashly! Off she goes. She’s a born little snob. But that doesn’t make this a ‘salon,’ as she thinks. To found a ‘salon’ you want personality, and wit, and the ‘don’t care a damn’ spirit. She hasn’t got a scrap. Besides, who is she?”
“Money?” said the soft man.
“Not so very much. Michael’s such dead nuts on her that he’s getting dull; though it’s partly Parliament, of course. Have you heard them talk this Foggartism? All food, children, and the future–the very dregs of dulness.”
“Novelty,” purred the soft man, “is the vice of our age.”
“One resents a nobody like her climbing in on piffle like this Foggartism. Did you read the book?”
“Hardly. Did you?”
“No jolly fear! I’m sorry for Michael. He’s being exploited by that little snob.”
Penned without an outlet, Soames had begun breathing hard. Feeling a draught, perhaps, the young woman turned to encounter a pair of eyes so grey, so cold, in a face so concentrated, that she moved away. “Who was that old buffer?” she asked of the soft man; “he gave me ‘the jim-jams.’”
The soft man thought it might be a poor relation–he didn’t seem to know anybody.
But Soames had already gone across to Michael.
“Who’s that young woman with the red hair?”
“Marjorie Ferrar.”
“She’s the traitress–turn her out!”
Michael stared.
“But we know her quite well–she’s a daughter of Lord Charles Ferrar, and–”
“Turn her out!” said Soames again.
“How do you know that she’s the traitress, sir?”
“I’ve just heard her use the very words of that paragraph, and worse.”
“But she’s our guest.”
“Pretty guest!” growled Soames through his teeth.
“One can’t turn a guest out. Besides, she’s the grand-daughter of a marquess and the pet of the Panjoys–it would make the deuce of a scandal.”
“Make it, then!”
“We won’t ask her again; but really, that’s all one can do.”
“Is it?” said Soames; and walking past his son-inlaw, he went towards the object of his denunciation. Michael followed, much perturbed. He had never yet seen his father-inlaw with his teeth bared. He arrived in time to hear him say in a low but quite audible voice:
“You were good enough, madam, to call my daughter a snob in her own house.”
Michael saw the de-shingled neck turn and rear, the hard blue eyes stare with a sort of outraged impudence; he heard her laugh, then Soames saying:
“You are a traitress; be so kind as to withdraw.”
Of the half-dozen people round, not a soul was missing it! Oh, hell! And he the master of the house! Stepping forward, he put his arm through that of Soames:
“That’ll do, sir,” he said, quietly; “this is not a Peace Conference.”
There was a horrid hush; and in all the group only the soft man’s white hands, washing each other, moved.
Marjorie Ferrar took a step towards the door.
“I don’t know who this person is,” she said; “but he’s a liar.”
“I reckon not.”
At the edge of the little group was a dark young man. His eyes were fixed on Marjorie Ferrar’s, whose eyes in turn were fixed on his.
And, suddenly, Michael saw Fleur, very pale, standing just behind him. She must have heard it all! She smiled, waved her hand, and said:
“Madame Carelli’s going to play.”
Marjorie Ferrar walked on towards the door, and the soft man followed her, still washing those hands, as if trying to rid them of the incident. Soames, like a slow dog making sure, walked after them; Michael walked after him. The words “How amusing!” floated back, and a soft echoing snigger. Slam! Both outer door and incident were closed.
Michael wiped his forehead. One half of the brain behind admired his father-inlaw; the other thought: ‘Well, the old man HAS gone and done it!’ He went back into the drawing-room. Fleur was standing near the clavichord, as if nothing had happened. But Michael could see her fingers crisping at her dress; and his heart felt sore. He waited, quivering, for the last chord.
Soames had gone up-stairs. Before “The White Monkey” in Michael’s study, he reviewed his own conduct. He regretted nothing. Red-headed cat! ‘Born snob!’ ‘Money? Not very much.’ Ha! ‘A nobody like her!’ Grand-daughter of a marquess, was she? Well, he had shown the insolent baggage the door. All that was sturdy in his fibre, all that was acrid in his blood, all that resented patronage and privilege, the inherited spirit of his forefathers, moved within him. Who were the aristocracy, to give themselves airs? Jackanapes! Half of ’em descendants of those who had got what they had by robbery or jobbery! That one of them should call his daughter, HIS daughter, a snob! He wouldn’t lift a finger, wouldn’t cross a road, to meet the Duke of Seven Dials himself! If Fleur liked to amuse herself by having people round her, why shouldn’t she? His blood ran suddenly a little cold. Would she say that he had spoiled her ‘salon’? Well! He couldn’t help it if she did; better to have had the thing out, and got rid of that cat, and know where they all were. ‘I shan’t wait up for her,’ he thought. ‘Storm in a teacup!’
The thin strumming of the clavichord came up to him out on the landing, waiting to climb to his room. He wondered if these evenings woke the baby. A gruff sound at his feet made him jump. That dog lying outside the baby’s door! He wished the little beggar had been down-stairs just now–he would have known how to put his teeth through that red-haired cat’s nude stockings. He passed on up, looking at Francis Wilmot’s door, which was opposite his own.
That young American chap must have overheard something too; but he shouldn’t allude to the matter with him; not dignified. And, shutting his door on the strumming of the clavichord, Soames closed his eyes again as best he could.
Chapter VII.
SOUNDS IN THE NIGHT
Michael had never heard Fleur cry, and to see her, flung down across the bed, smothering her sobs in the quilt, gave him a feeling akin to panic. She stopped at his touch on her hair, and lay still.
“Buck up, darling!” he said, gently. “If you aren’t one, what does it matter?”
She struggled up, and sat cross-legged, her flushed face smudged with tears, her hair disordered.
“Who cares what one is? It’s what one’s labelled.”
“Well, we’ve labelled her ‘Traitress.’”
“As if that made it better! We all talk behind people’s backs. Who minds that? But how can I go on when everybody is sniggering and thinking me a lion-hunting snob? She’ll cry it all over London in revenge. How can I have any more evenings?”
Was it for her career, or his, that she was sorrowing? Michael went round to the other side of the bed and put his arms about her from behind.
“Never mind what people think, my child. Sooner or later one’s got to face that anyway.”
“It’s you who aren’t facing it. If I’m not thought nice, I can’t BE nice.”
“Only the people who really know one matter.”
“Nobody knows one,” said Fleur, sullenly. “The fonder they are, the less they know, and the less it matters what they think.”
Michael withdrew his arms.
She sat silent for so long that he went back to the other side of the bed to see if he could tell anything from her face resting moodily on her hands. The grace of her body thus cramped was such that his senses ached. And since caresses would only worry her, they ached the more.
“I hate her,” she said, at last; “and if I can hurt her, I will.”
He would have liked to hurt the ‘pet of the Panjoys’ himself, but it did not console him to hear Fleur utter that sentiment; it meant more from her than from himself, who, when it came to the point, was a poor hand at hurting people.
“Well, darling,” he said, “shall we sleep on it?”
“I said I wouldn’t have any more evenings; but I shall.”
“Good!” said Michael; “that’s the spirit.”
She laughed. It was a funny hard little sound in the night. And with it Michael had to remain discontented.
All through the house it was a wakeful night. Soames had the three o’clock tremors, which cigars and the fresh air wherein he was obliged to play his golf had subdued for some time past. He was disturbed, too, by that confounded great clock from hour to hour, and by a stealthy noise between three and four, as of some one at large in the house.
This was, in fact, Francis Wilmot. Ever since his impulsive denial that Soames was a liar, the young man had been in a peculiar state of mind. As Soames surmised, he too had overheard Marjorie Ferrar slandering her hostess; but in the very moment of his refutation, like Saul setting forth to attack the Christians, he had been smitten by blindness. Those blue eyes, pouring into his the light of defiance, had finished with a gleam which seemed to say: ‘Young man, you please me!’ And it haunted him. That lissome nymph–with her white skin and red-gold hair, her blue eyes full of insolence, her red lips full of joy, her white neck fragrant as a pine-wood in sunshine–the vision was abiding. He had been watching her all through the evening; but it was uncanny the way she had left her image on his senses in that one long moment, so that now he got no sleep. Though he had not been introduced, he knew her name to be Marjorie Ferrar, and he thought it ‘fine.’ Countryman that he was and with little knowledge of women–she was unlike any woman he had known. And he had given her the lie direct! This made him so restless that he drank the contents of his water-bottle, put on his clothes, and stole down-stairs. Passing the Dandie, who stirred as though muttering: ‘Unusual! But I know those legs!’ he reached the hall, where a milky glimmer came in through the fanlight. Lighting a cigarette, he sat down on the marble coat-sarcophagus. It cooled his anatomy, so that he got off it, turned up the light, saw a telephone directory resting beside him, and mechanically sought the letter ‘F.’ There she was! “Ferrar, Marjorie, 3, River Studios, Wren Street.” Switching off the light, he slipped back the door-chain, and stole out. He knew his way to the river, and went towards it.
It was the hour when sound, exhausted, has trailed away, and one can hear a moth pass. London, in clear air, with no smoke going up, slept beneath the moon. Bridges, towers, water, all silvered, had a look as if withdrawn from man. Even the houses and the trees enjoyed their moony hour apart, and seemed to breathe out with Francis Wilmot a stanza from “The Ancient Mariner”:
‘O Sleep, it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole!
To Mary Queen the praise be given,
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven
That slid into my soul!’
He turned at random to the right along the river. Never in his life had he walked through a great city at the dead hour. Not a passion alive, nor a thought of gain; haste asleep, and terrors dreaming; here and there would be one turning on his bed; perchance a soul passing. Down on the water lighters and barges lay shadowy and abandoned, with red lights burning; the lamps along the Embankment shone without purpose, as if they had been freed. Man was away. In the whole town only himself up and doing–what? Natively shrewd and resourceful in all active situations, the young Southerner had little power of diagnosis, and certainly did not consider himself ridiculous wandering about like this at night, not even when he suddenly felt that if he could ‘locate’ her windows, he could go home and sleep. He passed the Tate Gallery and saw a human being with moonlit buttons.
“Pardon me, officer,” he said, “but where is Wren Street?”
“Straight on and fifth to the right.”
Francis Wilmot resumed his march. The ‘moving’ moon was heeling down, the stars were gaining light, the trees had begun to shiver. He found the fifth turning, walked down ‘the block,’ and was no wiser; it was too dark to read names or numbers. He passed another buttoned human effigy and said:
“Pardon me, officer, but where are River Studios?”
“Comin’ away from them; last house on the right.”
Francis Wilmot retraced his steps. There it was, then–by itself, back from the street. He stood before it and gazed at dark windows. She might be behind any one of them! Well! He had ‘located’ her; and, in the rising wind, he turned and walked home. He went up-stairs stealthily as he had come down, past the Dandie, who again raised his head, muttered: ‘Still more unusual, but the same legs!’ entered his room, lay down, and fell asleep like a baby.
Chapter VIII.
ROUND AND ABOUT
General reticence at breakfast concerning the incident of the night before, made little impression on Soames, because the young American was present, before whom, naturally, one would not discuss it; but he noted that Fleur was pale. In his early-morning vigil legal misgivings had assailed him. Could one call even a red-haired baggage ‘traitress’ in the hearing of some half-dozen persons with impunity? He went off to his sister Winifred’s after breakfast, and told her the whole story.
“Quite right, my dear boy,” was her comment. “They tell me that young woman is as fast as they’re made. Her father, you know, owned the horse that didn’t beat the French horse–I never can remember its name–in that race, the Something Stakes, at–dear me! what was the meeting?”
“I know nothing about racing,” said Soames.
But that afternoon at ‘The Connoisseurs Club’ a card was brought to him:
LORD CHARLES FERRAR
High Marshes,
Nr. Newmarket. Burton’s Club.
For a moment his knees felt a little weak; but the word ‘snob’ coming to his assistance, he said drily: “Show him into the strangers’ room.” He was not going to hurry himself for this fellow, and finished his tea before repairing to that forlorn corner.
A tallish man was standing in the middle of the little room, thin and upright, with a moustache brushed arrogantly off his lips, and a single eyeglass which seemed to have grown over the right eye, so unaided was it. There were corrugations in his thin weathered cheeks, and in his thick hair flecked at the sides with grey. Soames had no difficulty in disliking him at sight.
“Mr. Forsyte, I believe?”
Soames inclined his head.
“You made use of an insulting word to my daughter last night in the presence of several people.”
“Yes; it was richly deserved.”
“You were not drunk, then?”
“Not at all,” said Soames.
His dry precision seemed to disconcert the visitor, who twisted his moustache, frowned his eyeglass closer to his eye, and said:
“I have the names of those who overheard it. You will be good enough to write to each of them separately withdrawing your expression unreservedly.”
“I shall do nothing of the kind.”
A moment’s silence ensued.
“You are an attorney, I believe?”
“A solicitor.”
“Then you know the consequences of refusal.”
“If your daughter likes to go into Court, I shall be happy to meet her there.”
“You refuse to withdraw?”
“Absolutely.”
“Good evening, then!”
“Good evening!”
For two pins he would have walked round the fellow, the bristles rising on his back, but, instead, he stood a little to one side to let him out. Insolent brute! He could so easily hear again the voice of old Uncle Jolyon, characterising some person of the eighties as ‘a pettifogging little attorney.’ And he felt that, somehow or other, he must relieve his mind. ‘Old Mont’ would know about this fellow–he would go across and ask him.
At ‘The Aeroplane’ he found not only Sir Lawrence Mont, looking almost grave, but Michael, who had evidently been detailing to his father last evening’s incident. This was a relief to Soames, who felt the insults to his daughter too bitterly to talk of them. Describing the visit he had just received, he ended with the words:
“This fellow–Ferrar–what’s his standing?”
“Charlie Ferrar? He owes money everywhere, has some useful horses, and is a very good shot.”
“He didn’t strike me as a gentleman,” said Soames.
Sir Lawrence cocked his eyebrow, as if debating whether he ought to answer this remark about one who had ancestors, from one who had none.
“And his daughter,” said Soames, “isn’t a lady.”
Sir Lawrence wagged his head.
“Single-minded, Forsyte, single-minded; but you’re right; there’s a queer streak in that blood. Old Shropshire’s a dear old man; it skipped his generation, but it’s there–it’s there. His aunt–”
“He called me an attorney,” said Soames with a grim smile, “and she called me a liar. I don’t know which is worse.”
Sir Lawrence got up and looked into St. James’s Street. Soames had the feeling that the narrow head perched up on that straight thin back counted for more than his own, in this affair. One was dealing here with people who said and did what they liked and damned the consequences; this baronet chap had been brought up in that way himself, no doubt, he ought to know how their minds worked.
Sir Lawrence turned.
“She may bring an action, Forsyte; it was very public. What evidence have you?”
“My own ears.”
Sir Lawrence looked at the ears, as if to gauge their length.
“M’m! Anything else?”
“That paragraph.”
“She’ll get at the paper. Yes?”
“The man she was talking to.”
Michael ejaculated: “Philip Quinsey–put not your trust in Gath!”
“What more?”
“Well,” said Soames, “there’s what that young American overheard, whatever it was.”
“Ah!” said Sir Lawrence: “Take care she doesn’t get at HIM. Is that all?”
Soames nodded. It didn’t seem much, now he came to think of it!
“You say she called you a liar. How would it be to take the offensive?”
There was a silence; then Soames said: “Women? No!”
“Quite right, Forsyte! They have their privileges still. There’s nothing for it but to wait and see how the cat jumps. Traitress! I suppose you know how much the word costs?”
“The cost,” said Soames, “is nothing; it’s the publicity!”
His imagination was playing streets ahead of him. He saw himself already in ‘the box,’ retailing the spiteful purrings of that cat, casting forth to the public and the papers the word ‘snob,’ of his own daughter; for if he didn’t, he would have no defence. Too painful!
“What does Fleur say?” he asked, suddenly, of Michael.
“War to the knife.”
Soames jumped in his chair.
“Ah!” he said: “That’s a woman all over–no imagination!”
“That’s what I thought at first, sir, but I’m not so sure. She says if Marjorie Ferrar is not taken by the short hairs, she’ll put it across everybody–and that the more public the thing is, the less harm she can do.”
“I think,” said Sir Lawrence, coming back to his chair, “I’ll go and see old Shropshire. My father and his shot woodcock together in Albania in ‘fifty-four.”
Soames could not see the connection, but did not snub the proposal. A marquess was a sort of gone-off duke; even in this democratic age, he would have some influence, one supposed.
“He’s eighty,” went on Sir Lawrence, “and gets gout in the stomach, but he’s as brisk as a bee.”
Soames could not be sure whether it was a comfort.
“The grass shall not grow, Forsyte. I’ll go there now.”
They parted in the street, Sir Lawrence moving north–towards Mayfair.
The Marquess of Shropshire was dictating to his secretary a letter to his County Council, urging on them an item of his lifelong programme for the electrification of everything. One of the very first to take up electricity, he had remained faithful to it all his brisk and optimistic days. A short, bird-like old man, in shaggy Lovat tweeds, with a blue tie of knitted silk passed through a ring, bright cheeks and well-trimmed white beard and moustache, he was standing in his favourite attitude, with one foot on a chair, his elbow on his knee, and his chin on his hand.
“Ah! young Mont!” he said: “Sit down.”
Sir Lawrence took a chair, crossed his knees, and threaded his finger-tips. He found it pleasing to be called ‘young Mont,’ at sixty-six or so.
“Have you brought me another of your excellent books?”
“No, Marquess; I’ve come for your advice.”
“Ah! Go on, Mr. Mersey: ‘In this way, gentlemen, you will save at least three thousand a year to your rate-payers; confer a blessing on the countryside by abolishing the smoke of four filthy chimneys; and make me your obliged servant,
‘SHROPSHIRE.’
Thank you, Mr. Mersey. Now, my dear young Mont?”
Having watched the back of the secretary till it vanished, and the old peer pivot his bright eyes, with their expression of one who means to see more every day, on the face of his visitor, Sir Lawrence took his eyeglass between thumb and finger, and said:
“Your granddaughter, sir, and my daughter-inlaw want to fight like billy-o.”
“Marjorie?” said the old man, and his head fell to one side like a bird’s. “I draw the line–a charming young woman to look at, but I draw the line. What has she done now?”
“Called my daughter-inlaw a snob and a lion-hunter; and my daughter-inlaw’s father has called your granddaughter a traitress to her face.”
“Bold man,” said the marquess; “bold man! Who is he?”
“His name is Forsyte.”
“Forsyte?” repeated the old peer; “Forsyte? The name’s familiar–now where would that be? Ah! Forsyte and Treffry–the big tea men. My father had his tea from them direct–real caravan; no such tea now. Is that the–?”
“Some relation, perhaps. This man is a solicitor–retired; chiefly renowned for his pictures. A man of some substance, and probity.”
“Indeed! And IS his daughter a–a lion-hunter?”
Sir Lawrence smiled.
“She’s a charmer. Likes to have people about her. Very pretty. Excellent little mother; some French blood.”
“Ah!” said the marquess: “the French! Better built round the middle than our people. What do you want me to do?”
“Speak to your son Charles.”
The old man took his foot off the chair, and stood nearly upright. His head moved sideways with a slight continuous motion.
“I never speak to Charlie,” he said, gravely. “We haven’t spoken for six years.”
“I beg your pardon, sir. Didn’t know. Sorry to have bothered you.”
“No, no; pleasure to see you. If I run across Marjorie, I’ll see–I’ll see. But, my dear Mont, what shall we do with these young women–no sense of service;
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
“Quite so,” said Michael. “Idealism is just a by-product of geography–it’s the haze that lies in the middle distance. The farther you are from bed-rock, the less quick you need be to see it. We’re twenty sea-miles more idealistic about the European situation than the French are. And you’re three thousand sea-miles more idealistic than we are. But when it’s a matter of niggers, we’re three thousand sea-miles more idealistic than you; isn’t that so?”
Francis Wilmot narrowed his dark eyes.
“It is,” he said. “The farther North we go in the States, the more idealistic we get about the negro. Anne and I’ve lived all our life with darkies, and never had trouble; we love them, and they love us; but I wouldn’t trust myself not to join in lynching one that laid his hands on her. I’ve talked that over many times with Jon. He doesn’t see it that way; he says a darky should be tried like a white man; but he doesn’t know the real South. His mind is still three thousand sea-miles away.”
Michael was silent. Something within him always closed up at mention of a name which he still spelt mentally with an h.
Francis Wilmot added ruminatively: “There are a few saints in every country proof against your theory; but the rest of us, I reckon, aren’t above human nature.”
“Talking of human nature,” said Michael, “here’s my father-inlaw!”
Chapter VI.
SOAMES KEEPS HIS EYES OPEN
Soames, having prolonged his week-end visit, had been spending the afternoon at the Zoological Gardens, removing his great-nephews, the little Cardigans, from the too close proximity of monkeys and cats. After standing them once more in Imogen’s hall, he had roosted at his Club till, idly turning his evening paper, he had come on this paragraph, in the “Chiff-chaff” column:
“A surprise for the coming Session is being confectioned at the Wednesday gatherings of a young hostess not a hundred miles from Westminster. Her husband, a prospective baronet lately connected with literature, is to be entrusted with the launching in Parliament of a policy which enjoys the peculiar label of Foggartism, derived from Sir James Foggart’s book called “The Parlous State of England.” This amusing alarum is attributed to the somewhat fantastic brain which guides a well-known weekly. We shall see what comes of it. In the meantime the enterprising little lady in question is losing no chance of building up her ‘salon’ on the curiosity which ever surrounds any buccaneering in politics.”
Soames rubbed his eyes; then read it again with rising anger. ‘Enterprising little lady is losing no chance of building up her “salon.”’ Who had written that? He put the paper in his pocket–almost the first theft he had ever committed–and all the way across St. James’s Park in the gathering twilight he brooded on that anonymous paragraph. The allusion seemed to him unmistakable, and malicious into the bargain. ‘Lion-hunter’ would not have been plainer. Unfortunately, in a primary sense ‘lion-hunter’ was a compliment, and Soames doubted whether its secondary sense had ever been ‘laid down’ as libellous. He was still brooding deeply, when the young men ranged alongside.
“Well, sir?”
“Ah!” said Soames. “I want to speak to you. You’ve got a traitor in the camp.” And, without meaning to at all, he looked angrily at Francis Wilmot.
“Now, sir?” said Michael, when they were in his study.
Soames held out the folded paper.
Michael read the paragraph and made a face.
“Whoever wrote that comes to your evenings,” said Soames; “that’s clear. Who is he?”
“Very likely a she.”
“D’you mean to say they print such things by women?”
Michael did not answer. Old Forsyte was behind the times.
“Will they tell me who it is, if I go down to them?” asked Soames.
“No, fortunately.”
“How d’you mean ‘fortunately’?”
“Well, sir, the Press is a sensitive plant. I’m afraid you might make it curl up. Besides, it’s always saying nice things that aren’t deserved.”
“But this–” began Soames; he stopped in time, and substituted: “Do you mean that we’ve got to sit down under it?”
“To lie down, I’m afraid.”
“Fleur has an evening tomorrow.”
“Yes.”
“I shall stay up for it, and keep my eyes open.”
Michael had a vision of his father-inlaw, like a plainclothes man in the neighbourhood of wedding-presents.
But in spite of assumed levity, Michael had been hit. The knowledge that his adored one had the collector’s habit, and flitted, alluring, among the profitable, had, so far, caused him only indulgent wonder. But now it seemed more than an amusing foible. The swiftness with which she turned her smile off and on as though controlled by a switch under her shingled hair; the quick turns of her neck, so charming and exposed; the clever roving, disguised so well but not quite well enough, of the pretty eyes; the droop and flutter of their white lids; the expressive hands grasping, if one could so call such slim and dainty apprehensions, her career–all this suddenly caused Michael pain. Still she was doing it for him and Kit! French women, they said, co-operated with their husbands in the family career. It was the French blood in her. Or perhaps just idealism, the desire to have and be the best of whatever bunch there was about! Thus Michael, loyally. But his uneasy eyes roved from face to face of the Wednesday gathering, trying to detect signs of quizzicality.
Soames followed another method. His mind, indeed, was uncomplicated by the currents awash in that of one who goes to bed with the object of his criticism. For him there was no reason why Fleur should not know as many aristocrats, Labour members, painters, ambassadors, young fools, and even writing fellows, as might flutter her fancy. The higher up they were, the less likely, he thought with a certain naivete would they be to borrow money or get her into a mess. His daughter was as good or better than any of them, and his deep pride was stung to the quick by the notion that people should think she had to claw and scrape to get them round her. It was not she who was after them, but they who were after her! Standing under the Fragonard which he had given her, grizzled, neatly moustached, close-faced, chinny, with a gaze concentrated on nothing in particular, as of one who has looked over much and found little in it, he might have been one of her ambassadors.
A young woman, with red-gold hair, about an inch long on her de-shingled neck, came and stood with her back to him, beside a soft man, who kept washing his hands. Soames could hear every word of their talk.
“Isn’t the little Mont amusing? Look at her now, with ‘Don Fernando’–you’d think he was her only joy. Ah! There’s young Rashly! Off she goes. She’s a born little snob. But that doesn’t make this a ‘salon,’ as she thinks. To found a ‘salon’ you want personality, and wit, and the ‘don’t care a damn’ spirit. She hasn’t got a scrap. Besides, who is she?”
“Money?” said the soft man.
“Not so very much. Michael’s such dead nuts on her that he’s getting dull; though it’s partly Parliament, of course. Have you heard them talk this Foggartism? All food, children, and the future–the very dregs of dulness.”
“Novelty,” purred the soft man, “is the vice of our age.”
“One resents a nobody like her climbing in on piffle like this Foggartism. Did you read the book?”
“Hardly. Did you?”
“No jolly fear! I’m sorry for Michael. He’s being exploited by that little snob.”
Penned without an outlet, Soames had begun breathing hard. Feeling a draught, perhaps, the young woman turned to encounter a pair of eyes so grey, so cold, in a face so concentrated, that she moved away. “Who was that old buffer?” she asked of the soft man; “he gave me ‘the jim-jams.’”
The soft man thought it might be a poor relation–he didn’t seem to know anybody.
But Soames had already gone across to Michael.
“Who’s that young woman with the red hair?”
“Marjorie Ferrar.”
“She’s the traitress–turn her out!”
Michael stared.
“But we know her quite well–she’s a daughter of Lord Charles Ferrar, and–”
“Turn her out!” said Soames again.
“How do you know that she’s the traitress, sir?”
“I’ve just heard her use the very words of that paragraph, and worse.”
“But she’s our guest.”
“Pretty guest!” growled Soames through his teeth.
“One can’t turn a guest out. Besides, she’s the grand-daughter of a marquess and the pet of the Panjoys–it would make the deuce of a scandal.”
“Make it, then!”
“We won’t ask her again; but really, that’s all one can do.”
“Is it?” said Soames; and walking past his son-inlaw, he went towards the object of his denunciation. Michael followed, much perturbed. He had never yet seen his father-inlaw with his teeth bared. He arrived in time to hear him say in a low but quite audible voice:
“You were good enough, madam, to call my daughter a snob in her own house.”
Michael saw the de-shingled neck turn and rear, the hard blue eyes stare with a sort of outraged impudence; he heard her laugh, then Soames saying:
“You are a traitress; be so kind as to withdraw.”
Of the half-dozen people round, not a soul was missing it! Oh, hell! And he the master of the house! Stepping forward, he put his arm through that of Soames:
“That’ll do, sir,” he said, quietly; “this is not a Peace Conference.”
There was a horrid hush; and in all the group only the soft man’s white hands, washing each other, moved.
Marjorie Ferrar took a step towards the door.
“I don’t know who this person is,” she said; “but he’s a liar.”
“I reckon not.”
At the edge of the little group was a dark young man. His eyes were fixed on Marjorie Ferrar’s, whose eyes in turn were fixed on his.
And, suddenly, Michael saw Fleur, very pale, standing just behind him. She must have heard it all! She smiled, waved her hand, and said:
“Madame Carelli’s going to play.”
Marjorie Ferrar walked on towards the door, and the soft man followed her, still washing those hands, as if trying to rid them of the incident. Soames, like a slow dog making sure, walked after them; Michael walked after him. The words “How amusing!” floated back, and a soft echoing snigger. Slam! Both outer door and incident were closed.
Michael wiped his forehead. One half of the brain behind admired his father-inlaw; the other thought: ‘Well, the old man HAS gone and done it!’ He went back into the drawing-room. Fleur was standing near the clavichord, as if nothing had happened. But Michael could see her fingers crisping at her dress; and his heart felt sore. He waited, quivering, for the last chord.
Soames had gone up-stairs. Before “The White Monkey” in Michael’s study, he reviewed his own conduct. He regretted nothing. Red-headed cat! ‘Born snob!’ ‘Money? Not very much.’ Ha! ‘A nobody like her!’ Grand-daughter of a marquess, was she? Well, he had shown the insolent baggage the door. All that was sturdy in his fibre, all that was acrid in his blood, all that resented patronage and privilege, the inherited spirit of his forefathers, moved within him. Who were the aristocracy, to give themselves airs? Jackanapes! Half of ’em descendants of those who had got what they had by robbery or jobbery! That one of them should call his daughter, HIS daughter, a snob! He wouldn’t lift a finger, wouldn’t cross a road, to meet the Duke of Seven Dials himself! If Fleur liked to amuse herself by having people round her, why shouldn’t she? His blood ran suddenly a little cold. Would she say that he had spoiled her ‘salon’? Well! He couldn’t help it if she did; better to have had the thing out, and got rid of that cat, and know where they all were. ‘I shan’t wait up for her,’ he thought. ‘Storm in a teacup!’
The thin strumming of the clavichord came up to him out on the landing, waiting to climb to his room. He wondered if these evenings woke the baby. A gruff sound at his feet made him jump. That dog lying outside the baby’s door! He wished the little beggar had been down-stairs just now–he would have known how to put his teeth through that red-haired cat’s nude stockings. He passed on up, looking at Francis Wilmot’s door, which was opposite his own.
That young American chap must have overheard something too; but he shouldn’t allude to the matter with him; not dignified. And, shutting his door on the strumming of the clavichord, Soames closed his eyes again as best he could.
Chapter VII.
SOUNDS IN THE NIGHT
Michael had never heard Fleur cry, and to see her, flung down across the bed, smothering her sobs in the quilt, gave him a feeling akin to panic. She stopped at his touch on her hair, and lay still.
“Buck up, darling!” he said, gently. “If you aren’t one, what does it matter?”
She struggled up, and sat cross-legged, her flushed face smudged with tears, her hair disordered.
“Who cares what one is? It’s what one’s labelled.”
“Well, we’ve labelled her ‘Traitress.’”
“As if that made it better! We all talk behind people’s backs. Who minds that? But how can I go on when everybody is sniggering and thinking me a lion-hunting snob? She’ll cry it all over London in revenge. How can I have any more evenings?”
Was it for her career, or his, that she was sorrowing? Michael went round to the other side of the bed and put his arms about her from behind.
“Never mind what people think, my child. Sooner or later one’s got to face that anyway.”
“It’s you who aren’t facing it. If I’m not thought nice, I can’t BE nice.”
“Only the people who really know one matter.”
“Nobody knows one,” said Fleur, sullenly. “The fonder they are, the less they know, and the less it matters what they think.”
Michael withdrew his arms.
She sat silent for so long that he went back to the other side of the bed to see if he could tell anything from her face resting moodily on her hands. The grace of her body thus cramped was such that his senses ached. And since caresses would only worry her, they ached the more.
“I hate her,” she said, at last; “and if I can hurt her, I will.”
He would have liked to hurt the ‘pet of the Panjoys’ himself, but it did not console him to hear Fleur utter that sentiment; it meant more from her than from himself, who, when it came to the point, was a poor hand at hurting people.
“Well, darling,” he said, “shall we sleep on it?”
“I said I wouldn’t have any more evenings; but I shall.”
“Good!” said Michael; “that’s the spirit.”
She laughed. It was a funny hard little sound in the night. And with it Michael had to remain discontented.
All through the house it was a wakeful night. Soames had the three o’clock tremors, which cigars and the fresh air wherein he was obliged to play his golf had subdued for some time past. He was disturbed, too, by that confounded great clock from hour to hour, and by a stealthy noise between three and four, as of some one at large in the house.
This was, in fact, Francis Wilmot. Ever since his impulsive denial that Soames was a liar, the young man had been in a peculiar state of mind. As Soames surmised, he too had overheard Marjorie Ferrar slandering her hostess; but in the very moment of his refutation, like Saul setting forth to attack the Christians, he had been smitten by blindness. Those blue eyes, pouring into his the light of defiance, had finished with a gleam which seemed to say: ‘Young man, you please me!’ And it haunted him. That lissome nymph–with her white skin and red-gold hair, her blue eyes full of insolence, her red lips full of joy, her white neck fragrant as a pine-wood in sunshine–the vision was abiding. He had been watching her all through the evening; but it was uncanny the way she had left her image on his senses in that one long moment, so that now he got no sleep. Though he had not been introduced, he knew her name to be Marjorie Ferrar, and he thought it ‘fine.’ Countryman that he was and with little knowledge of women–she was unlike any woman he had known. And he had given her the lie direct! This made him so restless that he drank the contents of his water-bottle, put on his clothes, and stole down-stairs. Passing the Dandie, who stirred as though muttering: ‘Unusual! But I know those legs!’ he reached the hall, where a milky glimmer came in through the fanlight. Lighting a cigarette, he sat down on the marble coat-sarcophagus. It cooled his anatomy, so that he got off it, turned up the light, saw a telephone directory resting beside him, and mechanically sought the letter ‘F.’ There she was! “Ferrar, Marjorie, 3, River Studios, Wren Street.” Switching off the light, he slipped back the door-chain, and stole out. He knew his way to the river, and went towards it.
It was the hour when sound, exhausted, has trailed away, and one can hear a moth pass. London, in clear air, with no smoke going up, slept beneath the moon. Bridges, towers, water, all silvered, had a look as if withdrawn from man. Even the houses and the trees enjoyed their moony hour apart, and seemed to breathe out with Francis Wilmot a stanza from “The Ancient Mariner”:
‘O Sleep, it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole!
To Mary Queen the praise be given,
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven
That slid into my soul!’
He turned at random to the right along the river. Never in his life had he walked through a great city at the dead hour. Not a passion alive, nor a thought of gain; haste asleep, and terrors dreaming; here and there would be one turning on his bed; perchance a soul passing. Down on the water lighters and barges lay shadowy and abandoned, with red lights burning; the lamps along the Embankment shone without purpose, as if they had been freed. Man was away. In the whole town only himself up and doing–what? Natively shrewd and resourceful in all active situations, the young Southerner had little power of diagnosis, and certainly did not consider himself ridiculous wandering about like this at night, not even when he suddenly felt that if he could ‘locate’ her windows, he could go home and sleep. He passed the Tate Gallery and saw a human being with moonlit buttons.
“Pardon me, officer,” he said, “but where is Wren Street?”
“Straight on and fifth to the right.”
Francis Wilmot resumed his march. The ‘moving’ moon was heeling down, the stars were gaining light, the trees had begun to shiver. He found the fifth turning, walked down ‘the block,’ and was no wiser; it was too dark to read names or numbers. He passed another buttoned human effigy and said:
“Pardon me, officer, but where are River Studios?”
“Comin’ away from them; last house on the right.”
Francis Wilmot retraced his steps. There it was, then–by itself, back from the street. He stood before it and gazed at dark windows. She might be behind any one of them! Well! He had ‘located’ her; and, in the rising wind, he turned and walked home. He went up-stairs stealthily as he had come down, past the Dandie, who again raised his head, muttered: ‘Still more unusual, but the same legs!’ entered his room, lay down, and fell asleep like a baby.
Chapter VIII.
ROUND AND ABOUT
General reticence at breakfast concerning the incident of the night before, made little impression on Soames, because the young American was present, before whom, naturally, one would not discuss it; but he noted that Fleur was pale. In his early-morning vigil legal misgivings had assailed him. Could one call even a red-haired baggage ‘traitress’ in the hearing of some half-dozen persons with impunity? He went off to his sister Winifred’s after breakfast, and told her the whole story.
“Quite right, my dear boy,” was her comment. “They tell me that young woman is as fast as they’re made. Her father, you know, owned the horse that didn’t beat the French horse–I never can remember its name–in that race, the Something Stakes, at–dear me! what was the meeting?”
“I know nothing about racing,” said Soames.
But that afternoon at ‘The Connoisseurs Club’ a card was brought to him:
LORD CHARLES FERRAR
High Marshes,
Nr. Newmarket. Burton’s Club.
For a moment his knees felt a little weak; but the word ‘snob’ coming to his assistance, he said drily: “Show him into the strangers’ room.” He was not going to hurry himself for this fellow, and finished his tea before repairing to that forlorn corner.
A tallish man was standing in the middle of the little room, thin and upright, with a moustache brushed arrogantly off his lips, and a single eyeglass which seemed to have grown over the right eye, so unaided was it. There were corrugations in his thin weathered cheeks, and in his thick hair flecked at the sides with grey. Soames had no difficulty in disliking him at sight.
“Mr. Forsyte, I believe?”
Soames inclined his head.
“You made use of an insulting word to my daughter last night in the presence of several people.”
“Yes; it was richly deserved.”
“You were not drunk, then?”
“Not at all,” said Soames.
His dry precision seemed to disconcert the visitor, who twisted his moustache, frowned his eyeglass closer to his eye, and said:
“I have the names of those who overheard it. You will be good enough to write to each of them separately withdrawing your expression unreservedly.”
“I shall do nothing of the kind.”
A moment’s silence ensued.
“You are an attorney, I believe?”
“A solicitor.”
“Then you know the consequences of refusal.”
“If your daughter likes to go into Court, I shall be happy to meet her there.”
“You refuse to withdraw?”
“Absolutely.”
“Good evening, then!”
“Good evening!”
For two pins he would have walked round the fellow, the bristles rising on his back, but, instead, he stood a little to one side to let him out. Insolent brute! He could so easily hear again the voice of old Uncle Jolyon, characterising some person of the eighties as ‘a pettifogging little attorney.’ And he felt that, somehow or other, he must relieve his mind. ‘Old Mont’ would know about this fellow–he would go across and ask him.
At ‘The Aeroplane’ he found not only Sir Lawrence Mont, looking almost grave, but Michael, who had evidently been detailing to his father last evening’s incident. This was a relief to Soames, who felt the insults to his daughter too bitterly to talk of them. Describing the visit he had just received, he ended with the words:
“This fellow–Ferrar–what’s his standing?”
“Charlie Ferrar? He owes money everywhere, has some useful horses, and is a very good shot.”
“He didn’t strike me as a gentleman,” said Soames.
Sir Lawrence cocked his eyebrow, as if debating whether he ought to answer this remark about one who had ancestors, from one who had none.
“And his daughter,” said Soames, “isn’t a lady.”
Sir Lawrence wagged his head.
“Single-minded, Forsyte, single-minded; but you’re right; there’s a queer streak in that blood. Old Shropshire’s a dear old man; it skipped his generation, but it’s there–it’s there. His aunt–”
“He called me an attorney,” said Soames with a grim smile, “and she called me a liar. I don’t know which is worse.”
Sir Lawrence got up and looked into St. James’s Street. Soames had the feeling that the narrow head perched up on that straight thin back counted for more than his own, in this affair. One was dealing here with people who said and did what they liked and damned the consequences; this baronet chap had been brought up in that way himself, no doubt, he ought to know how their minds worked.
Sir Lawrence turned.
“She may bring an action, Forsyte; it was very public. What evidence have you?”
“My own ears.”
Sir Lawrence looked at the ears, as if to gauge their length.
“M’m! Anything else?”
“That paragraph.”
“She’ll get at the paper. Yes?”
“The man she was talking to.”
Michael ejaculated: “Philip Quinsey–put not your trust in Gath!”
“What more?”
“Well,” said Soames, “there’s what that young American overheard, whatever it was.”
“Ah!” said Sir Lawrence: “Take care she doesn’t get at HIM. Is that all?”
Soames nodded. It didn’t seem much, now he came to think of it!
“You say she called you a liar. How would it be to take the offensive?”
There was a silence; then Soames said: “Women? No!”
“Quite right, Forsyte! They have their privileges still. There’s nothing for it but to wait and see how the cat jumps. Traitress! I suppose you know how much the word costs?”
“The cost,” said Soames, “is nothing; it’s the publicity!”
His imagination was playing streets ahead of him. He saw himself already in ‘the box,’ retailing the spiteful purrings of that cat, casting forth to the public and the papers the word ‘snob,’ of his own daughter; for if he didn’t, he would have no defence. Too painful!
“What does Fleur say?” he asked, suddenly, of Michael.
“War to the knife.”
Soames jumped in his chair.
“Ah!” he said: “That’s a woman all over–no imagination!”
“That’s what I thought at first, sir, but I’m not so sure. She says if Marjorie Ferrar is not taken by the short hairs, she’ll put it across everybody–and that the more public the thing is, the less harm she can do.”
“I think,” said Sir Lawrence, coming back to his chair, “I’ll go and see old Shropshire. My father and his shot woodcock together in Albania in ‘fifty-four.”
Soames could not see the connection, but did not snub the proposal. A marquess was a sort of gone-off duke; even in this democratic age, he would have some influence, one supposed.
“He’s eighty,” went on Sir Lawrence, “and gets gout in the stomach, but he’s as brisk as a bee.”
Soames could not be sure whether it was a comfort.
“The grass shall not grow, Forsyte. I’ll go there now.”
They parted in the street, Sir Lawrence moving north–towards Mayfair.
The Marquess of Shropshire was dictating to his secretary a letter to his County Council, urging on them an item of his lifelong programme for the electrification of everything. One of the very first to take up electricity, he had remained faithful to it all his brisk and optimistic days. A short, bird-like old man, in shaggy Lovat tweeds, with a blue tie of knitted silk passed through a ring, bright cheeks and well-trimmed white beard and moustache, he was standing in his favourite attitude, with one foot on a chair, his elbow on his knee, and his chin on his hand.
“Ah! young Mont!” he said: “Sit down.”
Sir Lawrence took a chair, crossed his knees, and threaded his finger-tips. He found it pleasing to be called ‘young Mont,’ at sixty-six or so.
“Have you brought me another of your excellent books?”
“No, Marquess; I’ve come for your advice.”
“Ah! Go on, Mr. Mersey: ‘In this way, gentlemen, you will save at least three thousand a year to your rate-payers; confer a blessing on the countryside by abolishing the smoke of four filthy chimneys; and make me your obliged servant,
‘SHROPSHIRE.’
Thank you, Mr. Mersey. Now, my dear young Mont?”
Having watched the back of the secretary till it vanished, and the old peer pivot his bright eyes, with their expression of one who means to see more every day, on the face of his visitor, Sir Lawrence took his eyeglass between thumb and finger, and said:
“Your granddaughter, sir, and my daughter-inlaw want to fight like billy-o.”
“Marjorie?” said the old man, and his head fell to one side like a bird’s. “I draw the line–a charming young woman to look at, but I draw the line. What has she done now?”
“Called my daughter-inlaw a snob and a lion-hunter; and my daughter-inlaw’s father has called your granddaughter a traitress to her face.”
“Bold man,” said the marquess; “bold man! Who is he?”
“His name is Forsyte.”
“Forsyte?” repeated the old peer; “Forsyte? The name’s familiar–now where would that be? Ah! Forsyte and Treffry–the big tea men. My father had his tea from them direct–real caravan; no such tea now. Is that the–?”
“Some relation, perhaps. This man is a solicitor–retired; chiefly renowned for his pictures. A man of some substance, and probity.”
“Indeed! And IS his daughter a–a lion-hunter?”
Sir Lawrence smiled.
“She’s a charmer. Likes to have people about her. Very pretty. Excellent little mother; some French blood.”
“Ah!” said the marquess: “the French! Better built round the middle than our people. What do you want me to do?”
“Speak to your son Charles.”
The old man took his foot off the chair, and stood nearly upright. His head moved sideways with a slight continuous motion.
“I never speak to Charlie,” he said, gravely. “We haven’t spoken for six years.”
“I beg your pardon, sir. Didn’t know. Sorry to have bothered you.”
“No, no; pleasure to see you. If I run across Marjorie, I’ll see–I’ll see. But, my dear Mont, what shall we do with these young women–no sense of service;
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