WINGFIELD ALTER
John’s request to leave the Service did not find his mother wholly
unprepared. Her realization of the mistake he had made had been
earlier than his own, and for many months now she had considered
the possibility of obtaining his release should he demand it. The
difficulties were, as John knew, wholly financial. She could afford
to pay the sum which the Admiralty would require as the price of his
liberty, but she could not re-educate him as she felt it was essential
he should be re-educated. If he abandoned the Service he would have
to earn his living as an unqualified man. Journalism? She had heard
enough from Wingfield Alter to teach her the meaning of life in the
lower ranks of provincial journalism. And the alternatives for the
unqualified were a clerkship in a City office or manual labour.
To Wingfield Alter, from whom she might have sought the advice and
assistance she so badly needed, she would not go. On the evening after
the arrival of John’s letter her resolution on this point nearly gave
way. The need was imperative. It was her son’s need, not her own.
And Wingfield Alter would help abundantly and willingly--she knew
that. Yet, it was impossible to approach him. If it had been no more
than advice she needed she might not have hesitated; but it was
money--money. No fair words, no tact of his or hers could disguise that
fact. And before he helped her son he would ask her to marry him. She
foresaw that quite clearly. Her request for help would, in effect, be
a request for a proposal.
She closed her eyes, pressing the lids tightly together.
When she opened them her mind was made up. Years ago, when it was
impossible that they should marry, she and Alter had cared for each
other too well and with too much silent restraint for her to spoil
it all now. Because she had been married no word of love had passed
between them. When the strain became unendurable, he had gone away with
his wife, leaving her to dream through a few months, and then to marry
John’s father. And now, John’s father being dead and Alter’s wife too,
they met again. She knew he loved her still, but he had said nothing.
Why she could not imagine. He must _know_; he must have seen. She had
no doubt of him--why should he have doubt of her? Why? Heaven knew! She
would do no more. She would not go to him.
She could not go to him.
Meanwhile, Alter was waiting for signs and failing to recognize them.
He was not, he told himself, the man he had once been, and to his eye
she seemed to have changed very little in all the years. Moreover, the
fact that there had been real affection between her and her husband
made her seem difficult to approach. He was by no means convinced
that her old love for himself had survived. It was natural that their
present friendship should have taken its place, and any attempt on his
part to insist upon love might sever the friendship for which now he
chiefly lived.
Then came Hartington’s letter. John needed help. It gave Alter his
chance, his opening. But he could not be blind to the fact that, if he
offered to help the son, the mother, in accepting, would feel that she
had placed herself under some obligation; and, whether the offer of
marriage were coincident with or subsequent to the offer of assistance,
the acceptance of one would at least be a powerful argument for the
acceptance of the other. And he wanted her choice to be free. He wanted
her to accept him for his own sake, not for that of her son. Yet, apart
from all other considerations, he was eager to help John because he
felt that John was worth assistance. Alter had reached the point in the
lives of successful men at which the highest good and the most intense
personal satisfaction seem to spring from the help it is possible to
give to others.
Far into the night he sat with Hartington’s letter on his knee,
considering how best to help, and cursing the impossibility of
frankness in this instance. It would have been so easy could he have
gone to John’s mother and have said: “You can count on me. Have
the boy out. I’ll see him through Oxford. I’ll give him the start
which, as I understand him, is all he needs. And all this you will
please regard as a side issue. It has nothing whatever to do with our
relations with each other. There’s no kind of obligation on you.” But
that was impossible. This, by the evil decree of Fate, was a question
of money, and money set up an obligation which, where man and woman
were concerned, no good-will or friendship could nullify. Hartington
said that John had written home. The letter must have arrived. If he
went straight to her now, making no mention of his knowledge, she
would inevitably look upon him as the man who was able to solve the
problem with which her son had confronted her. Her decision would be
influenced one way or the other. And, what was more, she would tell him
about John; she would feel bound to tell him. He would have to confess
foreknowledge, and unending complications would ensue.
No; there was one thing to be done, one thing only. He went to his
table and wrote to Hartington.
“_His mother cannot possibly afford to re-educate him. Therefore, she
will certainly refuse to apply for his withdrawal from the Service,
and she will persist in this refusal unless extreme pressure from him
forces her to act at last against her better judgment. You and I, Mr.
Hartington, must pull together in this matter. I am interested in
Lynwood; I am sure he has real ability; and I am willing and eager
to take full responsibility for giving him a fresh start. But, for
reasons of my own, I cannot at present approach his mother on the
subject. Before I go to her it is necessary that the prospect of her
son’s leaving the Service should be banished from her mind. She must
feel that a decision has been taken in which Lynwood himself has
acquiesced, and that the whole matter is over and done with. Then,
and not till then, I can go to her_.
“_Your job is to obtain Lynwood’s complete acquiescence. You must say
nothing of my intent to help him. You must persuade him to bow to
the inevitable with the best grace possible. In other words, when his
mother’s refusal arrives--and it should reach the ship in the same
mail with this letter of mine--he must write again to her, accepting
her decision, and--for the sake of her peace of mind--accepting it
willingly...._
“_It is not necessary for me to give in detail my reasons for
requiring this of you. I suspect that you have already guessed them.
It is enough for me to say that I wish Mrs. Lynwood to be under
no obligation to me. Also, when I go to her, I want her not to be
thinking of her son’s future. She must feel that that is settled,
and that young Lynwood himself is satisfied with the settlement.
Then, knowing her to be a free agent, I shall be able to act more
easily...._
“_Write to me at once and tell me what Lynwood does. Give me,
too, your considered opinion upon the question of his leaving the
Service. It may be a little difficult, when the time comes, to
persuade Mrs. Lynwood that her son’s acquiescence was not indeed the
result of a change of mind. Like most women, she thinks the Navy
an ideal profession for men. A letter from you, telling me of the
circumstances in which Lynwood was persuaded to accept his mother’s
decision, and giving a definite assurance--supported, if possible, by
his own words spoken privately to you--as to his real inclination,
might be needed to persuade her that, for all his apparent consent,
he is still at heart eager to break free...._”
Having finished his letter, Wingfield Alter returned to those words
he had written, “break free.” They implied more than he had meant to
imply; but, as he considered them, he had no desire to weaken his
phrase.
“My God!” he said aloud, “the younger generation is in a hell of a
mess!”
He picked up an envelope and laid it face downwards on the mantelpiece.
On its back he wrote:
“_Children of Capital; Children of Labour. They suffer in the
transition. They pay for the bitter triumphs. They are weighed down
by the pride. If the young men could but learn that gain is without
profit they would know that force is barren. When all the world has
that knowledge_”....
He tore up the envelope.
“But that’s the coming of the Kingdom,” he thought. Did he himself
believe, with absolute belief, that force was barren? It was easier to
compromise, to risk nothing, to wait; safer to go slowly. Everything
would right itself in time. That was a comfortable thought--but a lie.
He shifted his feet on the carpet, and, turning, peered beyond the soft
blur of his reading-lamp into the dark room. And a phrase came upon
him suddenly, like galloping hoofs ringing close in the dark against a
frost-bit road. Its strange rhythm startled him as if it had been the
clatter of horses riding him down.
“... Finally to beat down Satan under our feet ... finally to beat down
Satan under our feet....”