(_BY MR. PUNCH'S STAFF OF LEARNED CLERKS_.)
A volume called _Curious Happenings_ (MILLS AND BOON) can boast at
least a highly attractive, open-and-see title; to which is added, in
the present instance, a wrapper-picture of the most intriguing brand.
Perhaps not quite all the contents of Miss MARJORIE BOWEN'S book
of short stories fully live up to the promise of its outside (what
stories could?), but they have amongst them one, from which both title
and picture are taken, of very unusual and haunting quality. So, if
you should only be able to snatch so much time from work of National
importance as suffices to read a single tale, begin at the start, and
be assured of having the best. Not that the others are without their
attractions, though one is rather gratuitously revolting. Laid in the
picturesque eighteenth century, they all exhibit Miss BOWEN'S very
pretty gift for costume-drama at its happiest. The trouble is that,
with a volume of such short tales, stories of situation, one gets too
familiar with the method--as, for example, in "The Folding Doors,"
where a lady's husband and lover had played out their scene before the
closed doors (with an alleged cut finger for the husband), and I
knew only too well in what state the flinging open of the doors would
reveal the lady herself. But perhaps I am exceptionally cursed in this
matter; and, anyhow, a volume that contains even one story so good as
"The Pond" is a thing for gratitude and rejoicing.
* * * * *
I may have been wrong in turning to a novel for mental relief; anyhow,
I have just come through one of the toughest bouts of relaxation I can
remember, and my only solace for the slight weariness of such repose
is the thought how much more tired the author, Mr. BASIL CREIGHTON,
must be. With such a hail-storm of metaphor and epigram constantly
dissolving in impalpable mist of mere words has he assaulted _The
History of an Attraction_ (CHATTO AND WINDUS) that the poor thing,
atomised, vaporised and analysed to the bone, lies limp and lifeless
between the covers, with hardly a decent rag of incident or story to
cover it. And there one might perhaps be content to let it rest, but
for the fact that _Anita_, the lady of the "Attraction," is worthy of
a better fate. The principal man of the book, who, after much wobbling
consideration, and in spite of his quite fortuitous marriage with some
one else in the meantime, discovers at last that he does love _Anita_,
is the merest peg on which to hang endless philosophisings; and so
is his impossible wife _Janet_ herself, the lady who, after having
accepted his dubious courtship for no particular reason, fortunately
deserts him without any better excuse, thus clearing the way for a
most decorous divorce and readjustment. Neither is the writer's inner
thesis--the immoralness of ordinary morality, so far as I can make
out--particularly agreeable; but _Anita_, though far from being the
sort of person one would look to meet in real life, is intriguing
after a fashion, and just possibly repays the hard work needed for the
making of her acquaintance.
* * * * *
Miss M.E.F. IRWIN, whose previous books I remember to have greatly
enjoyed, has produced for her third a story of much originality and
power, called _Out of the House_ (CONSTABLE). The title may perplex
you at first. It comes from the struggles of the heroine to wrench
herself free from encompassing family ties and the tradition of
intermarriage, in order to join her life to the outside lover who
calls to her. You might therefore consider it, in some sense, a story
of eugenics, but that its outlook is emotional rather than
scientific. Yet the _Pomfrets_, as a result of family pride and
over-specialization, had become a sufficiently queer lot to warrant
a normal girl in any violence of house-breaking to be free of them.
Therein of course lies the cleverness of the book; it is full of
atmosphere, and the atmosphere is full of dust, _Pomfret_ dust. You
can feel how heavy to rebellious lungs must have been the air of the
_Pomfret_ houses, where lived _Philip_, the intriguing father, and his
sons _Anthony_ (a little mad) and _Charles_ (much more mad, but with
at least the instincts of a lunatic gentleman). It is not, you will
guess, precisely a lively tale, but the force of it is undeniable.
Miss IRWIN has now more than ever proved herself a fastidious and
careful artist, with a touch of austerity that gives weight to a tale
so frankly one of sentiment, and she will, I hope, continue to keep
her work above the ordinary level.
* * * * *
_The Wane of Uxenden_ (ARNOLD) seems to be one of those novels which
may be classed as worthy in intention without being exactly happy in
execution. Miss LEGGE has a desire to warn us all against the perils
of monkeying with spiritism, and she has chosen the method of making
it tiresome even to read about. Well, it is a method certainly.
_Uxenden_ was a nice old family, which had come down to cutting its
timber while a rich Jewish soap-and-scent-manufacturer sat rubbing his
hands on a slice of the property, waiting for the rest of it to come
his way. _Uxenden_ eventually waned entirely, and without tears so far
as I was concerned. I feel sure _Mr. La Haye_ (_né Levinstein_) would
make a better landlord than the old squire, in spite of the prejudices
of the countryside.... No, I am afraid it would be stretching a point
to promise you any great entertainment from this well-intentioned but
rather woolly book. _Brother Jenkins_, the fraud, of the Society of
Seven, is about the most entertaining of the marionettes.
* * * * *
[Illustration: _Lady Customer_. "BUT ARE YOU SURE THAT THIS CHAIR IS
GENUINE CHARLES II.? IT LOOKS RATHER NEW."
_Fake Antique Dealer_ (_off his guard_). "I'M SORRY, MADAM, WE HAVE NO
_REAL_ ANTIQUES IN STOCK. YOU SEE WE CAN'T GET THE LABOUR."]
* * * * *