‘I nearly did--especially as I had put a weight on my shoulders
to represent my kit. I kept at it for a week, but I knew the
game was up. The discovery was pretty grim, Roger.’
‘Don’t you bother about that part of it. You are doing your
share, taking care of mother and Emma.’
Mr. Torrance emits a laugh of self-contempt. ‘I am not taking
care of them. It is you who are taking care of them. My friend,
you are the head of the house now.’
‘Father!’
‘Yes, we have come back to hard facts, and the defender of the
house is the head of it.’
‘Me? Fudge.’
‘It’s true. The thing that makes me wince most is that some
of my contemporaries have managed to squeeze back: back into
youth, Roger, though I guess they were a pretty tight fit in
the turnstile. There is Coxon; he is in khaki now, with his
hair dyed, and when he and I meet at the club we know that we
belong to different generations. I’m a decent old fellow, but I
don’t really count any more, while Coxon, lucky dog, is being
damned daily on parade.’
‘I hate your feeling it in that way, father.’
‘I don’t say it is a palatable draught, but when the war is
over we shall all shake down to the new conditions. No fear of
my being sarcastic to you then, Roger. I’ll have to be jolly
respectful.’
‘Shut up, father!’
‘You’ve begun, you see. Don’t worry, Roger. Any rawness I
might feel in having missed the chance of seeing whether I
was a man--like Coxon, confound him!--is swallowed up in the
pride of giving the chance to you. I’m in a shiver about you,
but----It’s all true, Roger, what your mother said about
2nd Lieutenants. Till the other day we were so little of a
military nation that most of us didn’t know there _were_ 2nd
Lieutenants. And now, in thousands of homes we feel that
there is nothing else. 2nd Lieutenant! It is like a new word
to us--one, I daresay, of many that the war will add to our
language. We have taken to it, Roger. If a son of mine were to
tarnish it----’
‘I’ll try not to,’ Roger growls.
‘If you did, I should just know that there had been something
wrong about me.’
Gruffly, ‘You’re all right.’
‘If I am, you are.’ It is a winning face that Mr. Torrance
turns on his son. ‘I suppose you have been asking yourself of
late, what if you were to turn out to be a funk!’
‘Father, how did you know?’
‘I know because you are me. Because ever since there was talk
of this commission I have been thinking and thinking what were
you thinking--so as to help you.’
This itself is a help. Roger’s hand--but he withdraws it
hurriedly.
‘They all seem to be so frightfully brave, father,’ he says
wistfully.
‘I expect, Roger, that the best of them had the same qualms as
you before their first engagement.’
‘I--I kind of think, father, that I won’t be a funk.’
‘I kind of think so too, Roger.’ Mr. Torrance forgets himself.
‘Mind you don’t be rash, my boy; and for God’s sake, keep your
head down in the trenches.’
Roger has caught him out. He points a gay finger at his anxious
father.
‘You know you laughed at mother for saying that!’
‘Did I? Roger, your mother thinks that I have an unfortunate
manner with you.’
The magnanimous Roger says, ‘Oh, I don’t know. It’s just the
father-and-son complication.’
‘That is really all it is. But she thinks I should show my
affection for you more openly.’
Roger wriggles again. Earnestly, ‘I wouldn’t do that.’ Nicely,
‘Of course for this once--but in a general way I wouldn’t do
that. _We_ know, you and I.’
‘As long as we know, it’s no one else’s affair, is it?’
‘That’s the ticket, father.’
‘Still----’ It is to be feared that Mr. Torrance is now
taking advantage of his superior slyness. ‘Still, before your
mother--to please her--eh?’
Faltering, ‘I suppose it would.’
‘Well, what do you say?’
‘I know she would like it.’
‘Of course you and I know that display of that sort is all
bunkum--repellent even to our natures.’
‘Lord, yes!’
‘But to gratify her.’
‘I should be so conscious.’
Mr. Torrance is here quite as sincere as his son. ‘So should I.’
Roger considers it. ‘How far would you go?’
‘Oh, not far. Suppose I called you “Old Rogie”? There’s not
much in that.’
‘It all depends on the way one says these things.’
‘I should be quite casual.’
‘Hum. What would you like me to call you?’
Severely, ‘It isn’t what would _I_ like. But I daresay your
mother would beam if you called me “dear father.”’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘You know quite well that you think so, Roger.’
‘It’s so effeminate.’
‘Not if you say it casually.’
With something very like a snort Roger asks, ‘How does one say
a thing like that casually?’
‘Well, for instance, you could whistle while you said it--or
anything of that sort.’
‘Hum. Of course you--if we were to--be like that, you wouldn’t
_do_ anything.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘You wouldn’t paw me?’
‘Roger,’ with some natural indignation, ‘you forget yourself.’
But apparently it is for him to continue. ‘That reminds me of a
story I heard the other day of a French general. He had asked
for volunteers from his airmen for some specially dangerous
job--and they all stepped forward. Pretty good that. Then
three were chosen and got their orders and saluted, and were
starting off when he stopped them. “Since when,” he said, “have
brave boys departing to the post of danger omitted to embrace
their father?” They did it then. Good story?’
Roger lowers. ‘They were French.’
‘Yes, I said so. Don’t you think it’s good?’
‘Why do you tell it to me?’
‘Because it’s a good story.’
‘You are sure, father,’ sternly, ‘that there is no other
reason?’ Mr. Torrance tries to brazen it out, but he looks
guilty. ‘You know, father, that is barred.’
Just because he knows that he has been playing it low, Mr.
Torrance snaps angrily, ‘What is barred?’
‘You know,’ says his monitor.
Mr. Torrance shouts.
‘I know that you are a young ass.’
‘Really, father----’
‘Hold your tongue.’
Roger can shout also.
‘I must say, father----’
‘Be quiet, I tell you.’
It is in the middle of this competition that the lady who dotes
on them both chooses to come back, still without her spectacles.
‘Oh dear! And I had hoped----Oh, John!’
Mr. Torrance would like to kick himself. ‘My fault,’ he says
with a groan.
‘But whatever is the matter?’
‘Nothing, mater.’ The war is already making Roger quite smart.
‘Only father wouldn’t do as I told him.’
Mr. Torrance cannot keep pace with his son’s growth. He raps
out, ‘Why the dickens should I?’
Roger is imperturbable; this will be useful in France. ‘You
see, mater, he said I was the head of the house.’
‘You, Rogie!’ She goes to her husband’s side. ‘What nonsense!’
Roger grins. ‘Do you like my joke, father?’
The father smiles upon him and is at once uproariously happy.
He digs his boy boldly in the ribs.
‘Roger, you scoundrel!’
‘That’s better,’ says Mrs. Torrance at a venture.
Roger feels that things have perhaps gone far enough. ‘I think
I’ll go to my room now. You will come up, mater?’
‘Yes, dear. I shan’t be five minutes, John.’
‘More like half an hour.’
She hesitates. ‘There is nothing wrong, is there? I thought I
noticed a--a----’
‘A certain liveliness, my dear. No, we were only having a good
talk.’
‘What about, John?’ wistfully.
‘About the war,’ Roger breaks in hurriedly.
‘About tactics and strategy, wasn’t it, Roger?’
‘Yes.’
‘The fact is, Ellen, I have been helping Roger to take his
first trench.’ With a big breath, ‘And we took it too,
together, didn’t we, Roger?’
‘You bet,’ says Roger valiantly.
‘Though I suppose,’ sighing, ‘it is one of those trenches that
the enemy retake during the night.’
‘Oh, I--I don’t know, father.’
The lady asks, ‘Whatever are you two talking about?’
‘Aha,’ says Mr. Torrance in high feather, patting her, but
unable to resist a slight boast, ‘it is very private. _We_
don’t tell you everything, you know, Ellen.’
She beams, though she does not understand.
‘Come on, mater, it’s only his beastly sarcasm again. ’Night,
father; I won’t see you in the morning.’
‘’Night,’ says Mr. Torrance.
But Roger has not gone yet. He seems to be looking for
something--a book, perhaps. Then he begins to whistle--casually.
‘Good-night, dear father.’
Mr. John Torrance is left alone, rubbing his hands.
BARBARA’S WEDDING
The Colonel is in the sitting-room of his country cottage, staring
through the open windows at his pretty garden. He is a very old man,
and is sometimes bewildered nowadays. He calls to Dering, the gardener,
who is on a ladder, pruning. Dering, who comes to him, is a rough,
capable young fellow with fingers that are already becoming stumpy
because he so often uses his hands instead of a spade. This is a sign
that Dering will never get on in the world. His mind is in the same
condition as his fingers, working back to clods. He will get a rise of
one and sixpence in a year or two, and marry on it and become duller
and heavier; and, in short, the clever ones could already write his
epitaph.
‘A beautiful morning, Dering.’
‘Too much sun, sir. The roses be complaining, and, to make
matters worse, Miss Barbara has been watering of them--in the
heat of the day.’
The Colonel is a very gentle knight nowadays. ‘Has she?
She means well.’ But that is not what is troubling him. He
approaches the subject diffidently. ‘Dering, you heard it,
didn’t you?’ He is longing to be told that Dering heard it.
‘What was that, sir?’
‘The thunderstorm--early this morning.’
‘There was no thunderstorm, sir.’
Dispirited, ‘That is what they all say.’ The Colonel is too
courteous to contradict any one, but he tries again; there is
about him the insistence of one who knows that he is right. ‘It
was at four o’clock. I got up and looked out at the window. The
evening primroses were very beautiful.’
Dering is equally dogged. ‘I don’t hold much with evening
primroses, sir; but I was out and about at four; there was no
thunderstorm.’
The Colonel still thinks that there was a thunderstorm, but he
wants to placate Dering. ‘I suppose I just thought there was
one. Perhaps it was some thunderstorm of long ago that I heard.
They do come back, you know.’
Heavily, ‘Do they, sir?’
‘I am glad to see you moving about in the garden, Dering, with
everything just as usual.’
There is a cautious slyness about this, as if the Colonel was
fishing for information; but it is too clever for Dering, who
is going with a ‘Thank you, sir.’
‘No, don’t go.’ The old man lowers his voice and makes a
confession reluctantly, ‘I am--a little troubled, Dering.’
Dering knows that his master has a wandering mind, and he
answers nicely, ‘Everything be all right, sir.’
‘I’m glad of that,’ the Colonel says with relief. ‘It is
pleasant to see that you have come back, Dering. Why did you go
away for such a long time?’
‘Me, sir?’ Dering is a little aggrieved. ‘I haven’t had a day
off since Christmas.’
‘Haven’t you? I thought----’
The Colonel tries to speak casually, but there is a trembling
eagerness in his voice. ‘Is everything just as usual, Dering?’
‘Yes, sir. There never were a place as changed less than this.’
‘That’s true.’ The Colonel is appeased. ‘Thank you, Dering,
for saying that.’ But next moment he has lowered his voice
again. ‘Dering, there is nothing wrong, is there? Is anything
happening that I am not being told about?’
‘Not that I know of, sir.’
‘That is what they all say, but--I don’t know.’ He stares at
his old sword which is hanging on the wall. ‘Dering, I feel as
if I was needed somewhere. I don’t know where it is. No one
will tell me. Where is every one?’
‘They’re all about, sir. There’s a cricket match on at the
village green.’
‘Is there?’
‘If the wind had a bit of south in it you could hear their
voices. You were a bit of a nailer at cricket yourself, sir.’
The Colonel sees himself standing up to fast ones. He is
gleeful over his reminiscences.
‘Ninety-nine against Mallowfield, and then bowled off my pads.
Biggest score I ever made. Mallowfield wanted to add one to
make it the hundred, but I wouldn’t let them. I was pretty good
at steering them through the slips, Dering! Do you remember my
late cut? It didn’t matter where point stood, I got past him.
You used to stand at point, Dering.’
‘That was my grandfather, sir. If he was to be believed, he
used to snap you regular at point.’
The Colonel is crestfallen, but he has a disarming smile.
‘Did he? I daresay he did. I can’t play now, but I like to
watch it still.’ He becomes troubled again. ‘Dering, there’s
no cricket on the green to-day. I have been down to look. I
don’t understand it, Dering. When I got there the green was
all dotted with them--it’s the prettiest sight and sound in
England. But as I watched them they began to go away, one and
two at a time; they weren’t given out, you know, they went
as if they had been called away. Some of the little shavers
stayed on--and then they went off, as if they had been called
away too. The stumps were left lying about. Why is it?’
‘It’s just fancy, sir,’ Dering says soothingly. ‘I saw Master
Will oiling his bat yesterday.’
‘Did you?’ avidly. ‘I should have liked to see that. I have
often oiled their bats for them. Careless lads, they always
forget. Was that nice German boy with him?’
‘Mr. Karl? Not far off, sir. He was sitting by the bank of the
stream playing on his flute; and Miss Barbara, she had climbed
one of my apple-trees,--she says they are your trees.’ He
lowers.
‘They are, you know, Dering,’ the Colonel says meekly.
‘Yes, sir, in a sense,’ brushing the spurious argument aside,
‘but I don’t like any of you to meddle with them. And there she
sat, pelting the two of them with green apples.’
‘How like her!’ The Colonel shakes his head indulgently. ‘I
don’t know how we are to make a demure young lady of her.’
Dering smirks. ‘They say in the village, sir, that Master Will
would like to try.’
To the Colonel this is wit of a high order.
‘Ha! ha! he is just a colt himself.’ But the laughter breaks
off. He seems to think that he will get the truth if Dering
comes closer. ‘Who are all here now, Dering; in the house, I
mean? I sometimes forget. They grow old so quickly. They go out
at one door in the bloom of youth, and come back by another,
tired and grey. Haven’t you noticed it?’
‘No, sir. The only visitors staying here are Miss Barbara and
Mr. Karl. There’s just them and yourselves, sir, you and the
mistress and Master Will. That’s all.’
‘Yes, that’s all,’ his master says, still unconvinced. ‘Who is
the soldier, Dering?’
‘Soldier, sir? There is no soldier here except yourself.’
‘Isn’t there? There was a nurse with him. Who is ill?’
‘No one, sir. There’s no nurse.’ Dering backs away from the old
man. ‘Would you like me to call the mistress, sir?’
‘No, she has gone down to the village. She told me why, but I
forget. Miss Barbara is with her.’
‘Miss Barbara is down by the stream, sir.’
‘Is she? I think they said they were going to a wedding.’ With
an old man’s curiosity, ‘Who is being married to-day, Dering?’
‘I have heard of no wedding, sir. But here is Miss Barbara.’
It is perhaps the first time that Dering has been glad to see
Miss Barbara, who romps in, a merry hoyden, running over with
animal spirits.
‘Here’s the tomboy!’ the Colonel cries gaily.
Barbara looks suspiciously from one to the other.
‘Dering, I believe you are complaining to the Colonel about my
watering the flowers at the wrong time of day.’
‘Aha! Aha!’ The Colonel thinks she is even wittier than Dering,
who is properly abashed.
‘I did just mention it, miss.’
‘You horrid!’ Barbara shakes her mop of hair at the gardener.
‘Dear, don’t mind him. And every time he says they are _his_
flowers and _his_ apples, you tell me, and I shall say to his
face that they are _yours_.’
‘The courage of those young things!’ says the happy Colonel.
Dering’s underlip becomes very pronounced, but he goes off into
the garden. Barbara attempts to attend to the Colonel’s needs.
‘Let me make you comfy--the way granny does it.’
She arranges his cushions clumsily.
‘That is not quite the way she does it,’ the Colonel says
softly. ‘Do you call her granny, Barbara?’
‘She asked me to--for practice.’ Barbara is curious. ‘Don’t you
remember why?’
Of course the Colonel remembers.
‘I know! Billy boy.’
‘You _are_ quick to-day. Now, wait till I get your cane.’
‘I don’t need my cane while I’m sitting.’
‘You look so beau’ful, sitting holding your cane.’ She knocks
over his cushions. ‘Oh dear! I am a clumsy.’
Politely, ‘Not at all, but perhaps if I were to do it for
myself.’ He makes himself comfortable. ‘That’s better. Thank
you, Barbara, very much.’
‘_I_ didn’t do it. I’m all thumbs. What a ghastly nurse I
should make.’
‘Nurse?’ The Colonel’s troubles return to him. ‘Who is she,
Barbara?’
‘Who is who, dear?’
‘That nurse?’
‘There’s no nurse here.’
‘Isn’t there?’
Barbara feels that she is of less use than ever to-day. ‘Where
is granny?’
‘She has gone down to the village to a wedding.’
‘There’s no wedding. Who could be being married?’
‘I think it’s people I know, but I can’t remember who they are.
I thought you went too, Barbara.’
‘Not I. Catch me missing it if there had been a wedding!’
‘You and the nurse.’
‘Dear, you have just been imagining things again. Shall I play
to you, or sing?’ She knocks over a chair. ‘Oh dear, everything
catches in me. Would you like me to sing “Robin Adair,” dear?’
The Colonel is polite, but firm. ‘No, thank you, Barbara.’
For a few moments he forgets her; his mind has gone wandering
again. ‘Barbara, the house seems so empty. Where are Billy and
Karl?’
‘Billy is where Karl is, you may be sure.’
‘And where is Karl?’
‘He is where Billy boy is, you may be sure.’
‘And where are they both?’
‘Not far from where Barbara is, you bet.’ She flutters to the
window and waves her hand. ‘Do you hear Karl’s flute? They
have been down all the morning at the pool where the alder is,
trying to catch that bull-trout.’
‘They didn’t get him, I’ll swear!’
‘You can ask them.’
‘I spent a lot of my youth trying to get that bull-trout. I
tumbled in there sixty years ago.’
‘I tumbled in sixty minutes ago! It can’t be the same trout,
dear.’
‘Same old rascal!’
Billy and Karl come in by the window, leaving a fishing-rod
outside. They are gay, careless, attractive youths.
BARBARA, with her nose in the air, ‘You muddy things!’
COLONEL, gaily firing his dart, ‘Did you get the bull-trout, Billy boy?’
BILLY. ‘He’s a brute that.’
COLONEL. ‘He is, you know.’
BILLY. ‘He came up several times and had a look at my fly. Didn’t flick
it, or do anything as complimentary as that. Just yawned and went
down.’
COLONEL. ‘Yawned, did he? Used to wink in my time. Did you and Billy
fish at Heidelberg, Karl?’
KARL. ‘We were more worthily employed, sir, but we did unbend at times.
Billy, do you remember----’ He begins a gay dance.
BILLY. ‘Not I.’ Then he joins in.
BARBARA. ‘Young gentlemen, how disgraceful!’ She joins in.
COLONEL. ‘Harum-scarums!’
KARL. ‘Does he know about you two?’
BILLY. ‘He often forgets. I’ll tell him again. Grandfather, Barbara
and I have something to say to you. It’s this.’ He puts his arm round
Barbara.
COLONEL, smiling, ‘I know--I know. There’s nothing like it. I’m very
glad, Barbara.’
BARBARA. ‘You see, dear, I’ve loved Billy boy since the days when he
tried to catch the bull-trout with a string and a bent pin, and I
held on to his pinafore to prevent his tumbling in. We used to play
at school at marrying and giving in marriage, and the girl who was my
bridegroom had always to take the name of Billy. “Do you, woman, take
this man Billy----” the clergyman in skirts began, and before I could
answer diffidently, some other girl was sure to shout, “I should rather
think she does.”’
COLONEL, in high good humour, ‘Don’t forget the ring, Billy. You know,
when I was married I think I couldn’t find the ring!’
KARL. ‘Were you married here, sir?’
COLONEL. ‘Yes, at the village church.’
BILLY. ‘So were my father and mother.’
COLONEL, as his eyes wander to the garden, ‘I remember walking back
with my wife and bringing her in here through the window. She kissed
some of the furniture.’
BILLY. ‘I suppose you would like a grander affair, Barbara?’
BARBARA. ‘No, just the same.’
BILLY. ‘I hoped you would say that.’
BARBARA. ‘But, Billy, I’m to have such a dream of a wedding gown.
Granny is going with me to London to choose it’--laying her head on the
Colonel’s shoulder--‘if you can do without her for a day, dear.’
COLONEL, gallantly, ‘I shall go with you. I couldn’t trust you and
granny to choose the gown.’
KARL. ‘You must often be pretty lonely, sir, when we are all out and
about enjoying ourselves.’
COLONEL. ‘They all say that. But that is the time when I’m not lonely,
Karl. It’s then I see things most clearly--the past, I suppose. It all
comes crowding back to me--India, the Crimea, India again--and it’s
so real, especially the people. They come and talk to me. I seem to
see them; I don’t know they haven’t been here, Billy, till your granny
tells me afterwards.’
BILLY. ‘Yes, I know. I wonder where granny is.’
BARBARA. ‘It isn’t often she leaves you for so long, dear.’
COLONEL. ‘She told me she had to go out, but I forget where. Oh, yes,
she has gone down to the village to a wedding.’
BILLY. ‘A wedding?’
BARBARA. ‘It’s curious how he harps on that.’
COLONEL. ‘She said to me to listen and I would hear the wedding bells.’
BARBARA. ‘Not to-day, dear.’
BILLY. ‘Best not to worry him.’
BARBARA. ‘But granny says we should try to make things clear to him.’
BILLY. ‘Was any one with granny when she said she was going to a
wedding?’
COLONEL, like one begging her to admit it, ‘You were there, Barbara.’
BARBARA. ‘No, dear. He said that to me before. And something about a
nurse.’
COLONEL, obstinately, ‘She was there, too.’
BILLY. ‘Any one else?’
COLONEL. ‘There was that soldier.’
BARBARA. ‘A soldier also!’
COLONEL. ‘Just those three.’
BILLY. ‘But that makes four. Granny and Barbara and a nurse and a
soldier.’
COLONEL. ‘They were all there; but there were only three.’
BILLY. ‘Odd.’
BARBARA, soothingly, ‘Never mind, dear. Granny will make it all right.
She is the one for you.’
COLONEL. ‘She is the one for me.’
KARL. ‘If there had been a wedding, wouldn’t she have taken the Colonel
with her?’
BARBARA. ‘Of course she would.’
KARL. ‘You are not too old to have a kind eye for a wedding, sir.’
COLONEL, wagging his head, ‘Aha, aha! You know, if I had gone, very
likely I should have kissed the bride. Brides look so pretty on their
wedding day. They are often not pretty at other times, but they are all
pretty on their wedding day.’
KARL. ‘You have an eye for a pretty girl still, sir!’
COLONEL. ‘Yes, I have; yes, I have!’
BARBARA. ‘I do believe I see it all. Granny has been talking to you
about Billy boy and me, and you haven’t been able to wait; you have
hurried on the wedding!’
BILLY. ‘Bravo, Barbara, you’ve got it.’
COLONEL, doubtfully, ‘That may be it. Because I am sure you were to be
there, Barbara.’
BARBARA. ‘Our wedding, Billy!’
KARL. ‘It doesn’t explain those other people, though.’
The Colonel moves about in agitation.
BARBARA. ‘What is it, dear?’
COLONEL. ‘I can’t quite remember, but I think that is why she didn’t
take me. It is your wedding, Barbara, but I don’t think Billy boy is to
be there, my love.’
BARBARA. ‘Not at my wedding!’
BILLY. ‘Grandfather!’
COLONEL. ‘There’s something sad about it.’
BARBARA. ‘There can’t be anything sad about a wedding, dear. Granny
didn’t say it was a sad wedding, did she?’
COLONEL. ‘She was smiling.’
BARBARA. ‘Of course she was.’
COLONEL. ‘But I think that was only to please the nurse.’
BARBARA. ‘That nurse again! Dear, don’t think any more about it.
There’s no wedding.’
COLONEL, gently, though he wonders why they can go on deceiving him,
‘Is there not?’
The village wedding bells begin to ring. The Colonel is
triumphant. ‘I told you! There is a wedding!’
The bells ring on gaily. Billy and Barbara take a step nearer
to each other, but can go no closer. The bells ring on, and the
three young people fade from the scene.
When they are gone and he is alone, the Colonel still addresses
them. ‘It’s Barbara’s wedding. Billy boy, why are you not at
Barbara’s wedding?’