“My dear Roger,” said Mrs. North, with that peculiar guinea-hen quality
in her voice which it was her privilege and pleasure to keep especially
for her husband, “have you nothing of interest to tell us? No one has
seen you since four o’clock yesterday afternoon. At any rate, not to
speak to.”
North looked across the beautifully appointed lunch-table at the
ill-chosen partner of his joys and sorrows, while the silence, which
usually followed one of her direct attacks on him, fell upon the party
surrounding it.
“I see you brought Larry back with you, and conclude you found him at
Thorpe,” continued Mrs. North, “and I suppose you saw Miss Seer. As it
is a moot point whether we call on her or not, you might rouse yourself
so far as to tell us what you thought of her. I am sure Arthur would
like to hear too.”
“Very much! Very much!” said the fair, cherubic-looking little man
sitting on her right hand. “Thorpe was such a pleasant house in poor
dear Carey’s time. It would be a serious loss if the new owner were
impossible. I look upon the changes in the neighbourhood very seriously,
very seriously indeed. I was only thinking yesterday that of our old
circle only poor old Mentmore, the Condors, and ourselves are left. The
Court and Whitemead both bought by newly rich people, whom I really
dread inspecting.”
“The St. Ubes may be all right,” interpolated Mrs. North. “I hear they
made their money doing something with shipping, and St. Ubes does not
sound a bad name.”
“No,” allowed Mr. Fothersley. “No. Yet I do not remember to have heard
it before. It has a Cornish sound. We must inquire. They have not
arrived yet, I gather, as the new servants’ wing is not ready. But the
people at the Grange, I fear, are not only Jews, but German Jews! What a
_milieu_! And we were such a happy little set before the war, very
happy—yes.”
“At any rate,” said the fourth member of the lunch party, a very
beautiful young woman, the only child and married daughter of the house,
“they have all an amazing amount of money, which I have no doubt they
are prepared to spend, and the German Jews I conclude you will not take
up. As for Thorpe, it is disgusting that anyone should have it. What
_is_ the woman like, father?”
“Oh, all right,” said North. “She is looking after the place well, and
hasn’t been seized with the present mania for building billiard-rooms
and winter gardens and lordly garages.”
“But what is she _like_?” asked Mrs. North.
“Is she a lady, or isn’t she? You can’t call on a woman because she
hasn’t built a winter garden.”
“Why not?” returned her husband, in his most irritating fashion.
“By the way,” interposed Mr. Fothersley adroitly, “I hear Miss Seer
intends building cottages. A thing I do not consider at all desirable.”
“Why not?” asked his host again.
“We want nothing of that sort in Mentmore,” said Fothersley decisively.
“It is, in its way, the most perfect specimen of an English village in
the country—I might say in England. Building new cottages is only the
thin end of the wedge.”
“They appear to be wanted,” said North, pushing the cigars towards his
guest.
“That is the Government’s business,” answered Mr. Fothersley, making a
careful selection. “And we may at least hope they will put them up in
suitable places. Thank Heaven the price of land here is prohibitive.
There, however, is the danger of these newly rich people. They must
spend their money somehow. However, it may not be true. I only heard it
this morning.”
“Did she say anything about it, Roger?” asked Mrs. North.
“Yes she mentioned it,” answered North curtly.
Mrs. North made an exaggerated gesture of despair as she struggled with
a cigarette. She had never succeeded in mastering the art of smoking.
“Are you going to tell us what we want to know or not?” she asked, with
ominous calmness. “Do you advise calling on the woman, or don’t you?”
Here Violet Riversley broke in.
“When will you learn to put things quite plainly to father?” she asked.
“You know he can’t understand our euphuisms. I suppose it’s one of the
defects of a scientific brain.”
She helped herself to a cigarette and held it out to North for a light.
“What we want to know, father, is just this. Do you think Miss Seer is
likely to subscribe to the Hunt and various other things we are
interested in? If to this she adds the desire to entertain us, so much
the better, but the subscriptions are the primary things.”
“No, no, my dear!” exclaimed Mr. Fothersley, deeply pained. “That is
just what I complain about in you young people of the present day. You
have not the social sense—you——”
“Dear Arthur,” Violet cut him short ruthlessly, “don’t be a humbug with
me. Your Violet has known you since she was two years old. Let us in our
family circle be honest. Lord Mentmore and the Condors called on the
Pithey people because Mr. Pithey has subscribed liberally to the Hunt,
and you and mother have called because they did. Incidentally they will
probably give us excellent dinners. All I can say is, I hope you will
draw the line at the German Jews, however much money they have.”
“Well, Roger,” said Mrs. North, who had kept her eyes fixed on her
husband during her daughter’s diversion, “shall I call or not? Surely
you are the proper person to advise me, as you have met Miss Seer.”
North frowned irritably.
“No, I certainly should not call,” he said, rising from the table. “She
_is_ a lady, but you would have nothing in common, and I should not
think she has enough money to make it worth while from the point of view
Vi has put so delicately before us. That all right, Vi?”
His daughter rose too, and slipped her arm through his.
“Quite good for you!” she said. “And now come and smoke your cigar with
me in the garden. Arthur will excuse you.”
“Certainly! Certainly!” said Mr. Fothersley, who sincerely liked both
husband and wife apart, and inwardly deplored the necessity that they
should ever be together. He recognized the lack of fine feeling in the
wife which so constantly irritated the husband, but which did not
alienate Fothersley himself because his own mind moved really on the
same plane, in that he cherished no finer ideals. He recognized, too,
the corresponding irritation North’s total lack of the social instinct
was to a woman of his wife’s particular type. Pretty, vivacious, with a
passionate love of dress, show, and amusement, Mrs. North would have
liked to go to a party of some sort, or give one, every day in the year.
She was an admirable and successful hostess, and Mr. Fothersley was wont
to declare that Mentmore would be lost without Mrs. North.
They were great friends. Mr. Fothersley had never seen his way to embark
on matrimony. At the same time he enjoyed the society of women. As a
matter of fact he was on terms of platonic, genuinely platonic,
friendship, with every attractive woman within reasonable reach of
Mentmore. Undoubtedly, however, Mrs. North held the first place. For one
thing the Norths were his tenants, occupying the Dower House on his
estate. It was always easy to run across to Westwood, hot foot with any
little bit of exciting gossip. They both took a lively interest in their
neighbours’ private affairs. Violet Riversley had once said that if
there was nothing scandalous to talk about, they evolved something,
after the fashion of the newspapers in the silly season. They both
loved, not money, but the things which money means. To give a perfect
little dinner, rich with all the delicacies of the season, was to them
both a keen delight. He was nearly as fond of pretty clothes as she was,
and liked to escort her to the parties, where she was always the centre
of the liveliest group and from which North shrank in utter boredom.
They agreed on all points on matters of the day, both social and
political; he gathered his opinions from _The Times_ and she from the
_Daily Mail_. He looked upon her as an extremely clever and intelligent
woman. Also he was in entire sympathy with her intense and permanent
resentment against her husband because he had persisted in devoting to
further chemical research the very large sums of money which his
scientific discoveries had brought him in from time to time. The fact
that, in addition to these sums, he derived a considerable income from a
flourishing margarine factory started by his late father’s energy and
enterprise, of which income she certainly spent by far the larger
portion, consoled her not at all. She spent much, but she could very
easily have spent more. She too could have done with four or five cars,
she too could have enlarged and expanded in various expensive
directions, even as these new _nouveaux riches_. Fothersley, who
devoutly held the doctrine that not only whatsoever a man earned, but
whatsoever he inherited, was for his own and his family’s benefit and
spending, with a reasonable contribution to local charities, or any
exceptional collection in time of stress authorized by the Mayor, felt
that Mrs. North’s resentment was wholly natural. A yearly contribution
of, say, twenty-five guineas, to research would have amply covered any
possible claim on even a scientist’s philanthropy in this direction, and
he had even told North so.
Therefore it was only natural for Mrs. North to turn to him, even more
than to her other friends, for sympathy and understanding.
“There now!” she exclaimed as her husband left the room. “Can you
imagine any man being so disagreeable and surly? Just because he was
asked a perfectly natural question. And I shall certainly call on the
woman.”
“I believe she is quite possible from all I have heard,” said Mr.
Fothersley, adroitly lighting Mrs. North’s cigarette, which had gone
out. “As you know, I mean to call myself, if you would prefer to wait
for my report.”
“Thank you. But may as well come with you. I shall probably be a help,
and you see Roger says she is a lady, and, funnily enough, he really
knows. I expect she is as dull as ditchwater; I hear she was something
in the nature of a companion before she came into some money. But
anything must be better than the Pitheys.”
She shuddered as she replenished Mr. Fothersley’s wineglass.
“They appear from all accounts to be very bad,” sighed Mr. Fothersley.
“I could bear their commonness,” said Mrs. North, “one has got used to
it these days, when one meets everyone everywhere, but it is the man’s
self-satisfaction that is so overpowering. However, I am depending on
you to look after him this afternoon. Roger won’t, and Violet is nearly
as bad. I don’t know if you have noticed it, but Violet is getting
Roger’s nasty sarcastic way of saying things, and she always seems to
back him up now against me.”
Her pretty eyes were tearful, and Mr. Fothersley looked distressed.
“Dear Violet has never been the same since poor Carey’s death,” he said.
Mrs. North agreed. “And yet, as you know,” she added, “I never really
approved of the engagement. Poor Dick was a dear—no one could help
liking him; but, after all, there was no getting away from the fact that
he was old enough to be her father, and besides he was not very well
off, and owing to Roger’s folly, wasting his money as he has, we could
not have made Violet a big allowance. Really, you know, Fred is a much
better match for her in every way.”
“Quite, quite,” assented Mr. Fothersley. “But there is no doubt she felt
Carey’s death very much at the time. I certainly have noticed a
difference in her since, which her marriage has not dispelled. But
indeed all the young people seem altered since this terrible war—there
is—how shall I put it?—a want of reticence—of respect for the
conventions.” Mr. Fothersley shook his head. “I regret it very much—very
much.”
In the meantime North and his daughter had wandered out into the shade
of the great beech-tree which was the crowning glory of an exquisite
lawn. The garden was in full perfection this wonderful May, and the
gardeners were busy putting the finishing touches before the afternoon’s
party. Not a weed or stray leaf was to be seen. Every edge was clipped
to perfection. The three tennis courts were newly marked out, their nets
strung to the exact height, while six new balls were neatly arranged on
each service line. Presently Mrs. North would come out and say exactly
where each chair and table should go.
Violet Riversley looked at the pretty friendly scene with her beautiful
gold brown eyes, and the misery in them was like a devouring fire. She
was one of the tragedies of the war. She could neither endure nor
forget. With her mother’s good looks, pleasure-loving temperament, and
quick temper, she had much of her father’s ability. Spoilt from her
cradle, she had gone her own way and taken greedily of the good things
of this world with both hands, until Dick Carey’s death had smitten her
life into ruins.
She was twenty-four, and she had never before known pain, sorrow or
trouble. Always she had had everything she wanted. Other people’s griefs
passed her by. She simply had no understanding of them. She was not
generous, because she never realized what it was to go without. And yet
everyone liked and many loved her. She was so gay and glad and beautiful
a thing.
When she said good-bye to Dick Carey, she was simply unable to grasp
that he could be taken from her, and when the news of his death came she
had passionately and vehemently fought against the agony and pain and
desolation that came with it. She had genuinely and really loved him,
and nothing, absolutely nothing, seemed left. There was no pleasure any
more in anything. That was what she could not understand, could not cope
with. Her conventional faith fell from her, and she let it go without a
struggle. But her happiness she refused to let go. She clung to it, or
to the mirage of it, savagely, desperately. Dick was dead, yes, and she
wanted him with a devouring hunger. But all the other things were left.
Things she had loved. Things that had made her happy. She would not let
them go.
After a brief space, in which the devils of bitterness and resentment
and impotent wrath rent her in pieces, she took up her old life again,
with apparently added zest. Her friends said “Violet was very plucky,”
and no one was astonished when after a year she accepted and married
Fred Riversley. It was altogether a more suitable match than one with
poor Dick Carey. Riversley was of more suitable age, rich, devoted, and
a good fellow, and as North said to her best friends, “Violet was never
suited for the wife of a poor man.” Only Roger North watched her
anxiously at times. She had been her mother’s child before, but since
Dick’s death she had turned more and more to her father. Something of
his dogged patient strength of mind seemed to become clear to her.
Something of the courage with which he faced life.
She remembered a saying of his one day when her mother had been
flagrantly unjust and bitter to him on some matter of expenditure, so
that even she had felt ashamed. Whatever her father’s faults, his
generosity was past question. She had gone into the study and striven to
make amends, and he had looked at her with those tired humorous eyes of
his and said:
“My dear, nothing can hurt you if you don’t let it.”
She seized on that as some sort of creed amid the welter of all she had
ever thought she believed.
She would not let things hurt her, She plunged more eagerly than ever
into the amusements of her world. After her marriage she started and ran
a smart officers’ hospital in London. Mrs. Riversley’s name was on many
committees. She was a noted giver of the then fashionable boy and girl
dances. A celebrated personage said she reminded him of a human fire.
There seemed a fever in her body, a restlessness which never left her.
Since the cessation of hostilities this restlessness had increased, or
possibly now that others were ceasing their activities it was more
noticeable.
While North sat smoking his cigar she fetched a racquet and began to
practice her service on the court nearest him. She served over-hand a
swift hard service, and North watched the long slim line of her figure,
her exquisite poise, as she swung her racquet above her head and drove
the ball home. It was typical somehow of the driving force that seemed
behind her restlessness.
Presently she stopped, and came and sat down close beside him, and when
he looked at her he saw that her mask was down and the tormented soul of
her for a moment bare.
“It all looks just the same as ever, doesn’t it!” she said. “And we’ve
got to get through it somehow to the very end.
“My dear,” began her father, and stopped. A blank hideous horror of
emptiness possessed him. He shivered in the hot sunshine. There was
nothing to say. He had no comfort to give her.
“Heaven knows I’ve done my best,” she said. “I swore I wouldn’t let
Dick’s death spoil my life. I married Fred because he could give me
everything else—everything but what was impossible, and he’s a good
fellow.” She paused, then went on again, her voice very low and thin.
“There’s only one thing would do me any good—if I could hurt those
who’ve hurt me. That God, who let all this happen. I’m not the only one.
That God they teach us is almighty, and this is the best he can do for
us. You don’t believe He’s there at all, father—oh no, you don’t—I’m not
a fool! But I do, and I see Him watching it all happening, _letting_ it
all happen, according to plan, as those damned Germans used to say. If
only I could hurt them—hurt them myself. If they had only one neck that
I could wring—with my own two hands—slowly—very slowly—I think that
would do me good.”
North pulled himself together.
“How long have you been feeling like this, Vi?” he asked.
“Ever since they killed Dick,” she said dully, as if the fire had
smouldered down, after a sudden sheet of flame. “I think I am made up of
hate, father. It’s the strongest thing in me. It’s so strong that I
can’t love any more. I don’t think I love Dick now. And Fred, sometimes
I hate Fred, and he’s a good fellow, you know.”
The words filled North with a vague uncanny horror. He struggled after
normal, everyday words, but for a moment none came. He knew the girl was
overwrought, suffering from strain, but what was it that had looked at
him out of those vehement, passionate eyes?
“Look here, Vi,” he said at length, striving to speak naturally, “you
are just imagining things. Can’t you take a pull on yourself and go easy
for a bit? You’re overdoing it, you know, and these sort of ideas are
the result.”
“I’m sorry, father.”
She bent sideways, letting her head rest against his shoulder, and
seeking his hand, held it close. Such a demonstration was foreign to her
with him. When she was small, some queer form of jealousy on her
mother’s part had come between them. He felt shy and awkward.
“I don’t know what made me break out like that,” she went on. “I think
it must have been coming back here and seeing everything just the same
as it used to be before the war came. Until to-day, when I’ve been down
it’s been so quiet and different, with no parties, and nothing going on.
Now it’s gone back like everything else is going back—only I cannot.”
“Nothing goes back, dear,” answered North. “It’s not the same for anyone
really. Not even for the quiet young people who’ll come and play here
without a trouble as you used to. But there’s always the interest of
going forward. If we’ve suffered, at least we’ve gained experience from
it, which is knowledge. And there’s always some work to be done for
every season that could not be done sooner or later. That helps, I
think.”
“Dear old father,” she said softly. “We used not to be really great
friends in the old days. But now somehow you’re the only person I find
any comfort in. I think perhaps it is because we are both putting up a
hard fight.”
“Don’t forget the spice of life is battle, Vi, as Stevenson has it. I’m
inclined to think, though”—he spoke slowly as one envolving a thought
new to him—“I’m inclined to think we sometimes confuse bitterness and
rebellion with it. That’s not clean fighting. My dear, put that hate you
speak of away from you, if you can—and have nothing to do with
bitterness—they are forces which can only make for evil.”
There was a little pause.
“I don’t think I can, father. It’s part of me. Sometimes I think it’s
all me, and sometimes I’m frightened.”
“Look here, Vi,” said North, struggling with a disinclination to make
the proposition that was in his mind, a disinclination that he felt was
ridiculous, “I wish you would go over to Thorpe and get to know Miss
Seer.”
Violet sat up and looked at him with wide-open eyes.
“But why? I should hate it!” she exclaimed. “It would remind me—oh, of
so many things! It would make me feel even worse——”
“Well, so I thought,” said North. “I can tell you I dreaded going. But
the old place is full of a—a strange sort of rest. I didn’t realize how
full of bitterness and resentment I had been until sitting there it all
dropped away from me. It was as if a stone had been rolled away. I
hadn’t realized how it was hurting until it left off.”
He spoke disjointedly, and as if almost against his will. He was glad
when the sound of his wife’s and Mr. Fothersley’s approaching voices
made Violet release his hand and stand up.
“You think Thorpe would lay my devils too?” she asked, looking down at
him.
“I think,” he said gravely, “it is worth trying.”