If old Jolyon, as he got into his cab, had said: “I _won’t_
believe a word of it!” he would more truthfully have expressed
his sentiments.
The notion that James and his womankind had seen him in the
company of his son had awakened in him not only the impatience he
always felt when crossed, but that secret hostility natural
between brothers, the roots of which—little nursery
rivalries—sometimes toughen and deepen as life goes on, and, all
hidden, support a plant capable of producing in season the
bitterest fruits.
Hitherto there had been between these six brothers no more
unfriendly feeling than that caused by the secret and natural
doubt that the others might be richer than themselves; a feeling
increased to the pitch of curiosity by the approach of death—that
end of all handicaps—and the great “closeness” of their man of
business, who, with some sagacity, would profess to Nicholas
ignorance of James’ income, to James ignorance of old Jolyon’s,
to Jolyon ignorance of Roger’s, to Roger ignorance of Swithin’s,
while to Swithin he would say most irritatingly that Nicholas
must be a rich man. Timothy alone was exempt, being in gilt-edged
securities.
But now, between two of them at least, had arisen a very
different sense of injury. From the moment when James had the
impertinence to pry into his affairs—as he put it—old Jolyon no
longer chose to credit this story about Bosinney. His
grand-daughter slighted through a member of “that fellow’s”
family! He made up his mind that Bosinney was maligned. There
must be some other reason for his defection.
June had flown out at him, or something; she was as touchy as she
could be!
He would, however, let Timothy have a bit of his mind, and see if
he would go on dropping hints! And he would not let the grass
grow under his feet either, he would go there at once, and take
very good care that he didn’t have to go again on the same
errand.
He saw James’ carriage blocking the pavement in front of “The
Bower”. So they had got there before him—cackling about having
seen him, he dared say! And further on, Swithin’s greys were
turning their noses towards the noses of James’ bays, as though
in conclave over the family, while their coachmen were in
conclave above.
Old Jolyon, depositing his hat on the chair in the narrow hall,
where that hat of Bosinney’s had so long ago been mistaken for a
cat, passed his thin hand grimly over his face with its great
drooping white moustaches, as though to remove all traces of
expression, and made his way upstairs.
He found the front drawing-room full. It was full enough at the
best of times—without visitors—without any one in it—for Timothy
and his sisters, following the tradition of their generation,
considered that a room was not quite “nice” unless it was
“properly” furnished. It held, therefore, eleven chairs, a sofa,
three tables, two cabinets, innumerable knicknacks, and part of a
large grand piano. And now, occupied by Mrs. Small, Aunt Hester,
by Swithin, James, Rachel, Winifred, Euphemia, who had come in
again to return “Passion and Paregoric” which she had read at
lunch, and her chum Frances, Roger’s daughter (the musical
Forsyte, the one who composed songs), there was only one chair
left unoccupied, except, of course, the two that nobody ever sat
on—and the only standing room was occupied by the cat, on whom
old Jolyon promptly stepped.
In these days it was by no means unusual for Timothy to have so
many visitors. The family had always, one and all, had a real
respect for Aunt Ann, and now that she was gone, they were coming
far more frequently to The Bower, and staying longer.
Swithin had been the first to arrive, and seated torpid in a red
satin chair with a gilt back, he gave every appearance of lasting
the others out. And symbolizing Bosinney’s name “the big one,”
with his great stature and bulk, his thick white hair, his puffy
immovable shaven face, he looked more primeval than ever in the
highly upholstered room.
His conversation, as usual of late, had turned at once upon
Irene, and he had lost no time in giving Aunts Juley and Hester
his opinion with regard to this rumour he heard was going about.
No—as he said—she might want a bit of flirtation—a pretty woman
must have her fling; but more than that he did not believe.
Nothing open; she had too much good sense, too much proper
appreciation of what was due to her position, and to the family!
No sc—, he was going to say “scandal” but the very idea was so
preposterous that he waved his hand as though to say—“but let
that pass!”
Granted that Swithin took a bachelor’s view of the
situation—still what indeed was not due to that family in which
so many had done so well for themselves, had attained a certain
position? If he _had_ heard in dark, pessimistic moments the
words “yeomen” and “very small beer” used in connection with his
origin, did he believe them?
No! he cherished, hugging it pathetically to his bosom the secret
theory that there was something distinguished somewhere in his
ancestry.
“Must be,” he once said to young Jolyon, before the latter went
to the bad. “Look at us, _we’ve_ got on! There must be good blood
in us somewhere.”
He had been fond of young Jolyon: the boy had been in a good set
at College, had known that old ruffian Sir Charles Fiste’s sons—a
pretty rascal one of them had turned out, too; and there was
style about him—it was a thousand pities he had run off with that
half-foreign governess! If he must go off like that why couldn’t
he have chosen someone who would have done them credit! And what
was he now?—an underwriter at Lloyd’s; they said he even painted
pictures—pictures! Damme! he might have ended as Sir Jolyon
Forsyte, Bart., with a seat in Parliament, and a place in the
country!
It was Swithin who, following the impulse which sooner or later
urges thereto some member of every great family, went to the
Heralds’ Office, where they assured him that he was undoubtedly
of the same family as the well-known Forsites with an “i,” whose
arms were “three dexter buckles on a sable ground gules,” hoping
no doubt to get him to take them up.
Swithin, however, did not do this, but having ascertained that
the crest was a “pheasant proper,” and the motto “For Forsite,”
he had the pheasant proper placed upon his carriage and the
buttons of his coachman, and both crest and motto on his
writing-paper. The arms he hugged to himself, partly because, not
having paid for them, he thought it would look ostentatious to
put them on his carriage, and he hated ostentation, and partly
because he, like any practical man all over the country, had a
secret dislike and contempt for things he could not understand he
found it hard, as anyone might, to swallow “three dexter buckles
on a sable ground gules.”
He never forgot, however, their having told him that if he paid
for them he would be entitled to use them, and it strengthened
his conviction that he was a gentleman. Imperceptibly the rest of
the family absorbed the “pheasant proper,” and some, more serious
than others, adopted the motto; old Jolyon, however, refused to
use the latter, saying that it was humbug meaning nothing, so far
as he could see.
Among the older generation it was perhaps known at bottom from
what great historical event they derived their crest; and if
pressed on the subject, sooner than tell a lie—they did not like
telling lies, having an impression that only Frenchmen and
Russians told them—they would confess hurriedly that Swithin had
got hold of it somehow.
Among the younger generation the matter was wrapped in a
discretion proper. They did not want to hurt the feelings of
their elders, nor to feel ridiculous themselves; they simply used
the crest....
“No,” said Swithin, “he had had an opportunity of seeing for
himself, and what he should say was, that there was nothing in
her manner to that young Buccaneer or Bosinney or whatever his
name was, different from her manner to himself; in fact, he
should rather say....” But here the entrance of Frances and
Euphemia put an unfortunate stop to the conversation, for this
was not a subject which could be discussed before young people.
And though Swithin was somewhat upset at being stopped like this
on the point of saying something important, he soon recovered his
affability. He was rather fond of Frances—Francie, as she was
called in the family. She was so smart, and they told him she
made a pretty little pot of pin-money by her songs; he called it
very clever of her.
He rather prided himself indeed on a liberal attitude towards
women, not seeing any reason why they shouldn’t paint pictures,
or write tunes, or books even, for the matter of that, especially
if they could turn a useful penny by it; not at all—kept them out
of mischief. It was not as if they were men!
“Little Francie,” as she was usually called with good-natured
contempt, was an important personage, if only as a standing
illustration of the attitude of Forsytes towards the Arts. She
was not really “little,” but rather tall, with dark hair for a
Forsyte, which, together with a grey eye, gave her what was
called “a Celtic appearance.” She wrote songs with titles like
“Breathing Sighs,” or “Kiss me, Mother, ere I die,” with a
refrain like an anthem:
“Kiss me, Mother, ere I die;
Kiss me-kiss me, Mother, ah!
Kiss, ah! kiss me e-ere I—
Kiss me, Mother, ere I d-d-die!”
She wrote the words to them herself, and other poems. In lighter
moments she wrote waltzes, one of which, the “Kensington Coil,”
was almost national to Kensington, having a sweet dip in it.
Thus:
It was very original. Then there were her “Songs for Little
People,” at once educational and witty, especially “Gran’ma’s
Porgie,” and that ditty, almost prophetically imbued with the
coming Imperial spirit, entitled “Black Him In His Little Eye.”
Any publisher would take these, and reviews like “High Living,”
and the “Ladies’ Genteel Guide” went into raptures over: “Another
of Miss Francie Forsyte’s spirited ditties, sparkling and
pathetic. We ourselves were moved to tears and laughter. Miss
Forsyte should go far.”
With the true instinct of her breed, Francie had made a point of
knowing the right people—people who would write about her, and
talk about her, and people in Society, too—keeping a mental
register of just where to exert her fascinations, and an eye on
that steady scale of rising prices, which in her mind’s eye
represented the future. In this way she caused herself to be
universally respected.
Once, at a time when her emotions were whipped by an
attachment—for the tenor of Roger’s life, with its whole-hearted
collection of house property, had induced in his only daughter a
tendency towards passion—she turned to great and sincere work,
choosing the sonata form, for the violin. This was the only one
of her productions that troubled the Forsytes. They felt at once
that it would not sell.
Roger, who liked having a clever daughter well enough, and often
alluded to the amount of pocket-money she made for herself, was
upset by this violin sonata.
“Rubbish like that!” he called it. Francie had borrowed young
Flageoletti from Euphemia, to play it in the drawing-room at
Prince’s Gardens.
As a matter of fact Roger was right. It was rubbish,
but—annoying! the sort of rubbish that wouldn’t sell. As every
Forsyte knows, rubbish that sells is not rubbish at all—far from
it.
And yet, in spite of the sound common sense which fixed the worth
of art at what it would fetch, some of the Forsytes—Aunt Hester,
for instance, who had always been musical—could not help
regretting that Francie’s music was not “classical”. the same
with her poems. But then, as Aunt Hester said, they didn’t see
any poetry nowadays, all the poems were “little light things.”
There was nobody who could write a poem like “Paradise Lost,” or
“Childe Harold”; either of which made you feel that you really
had read something. Still, it was nice for Francie to have
something to occupy her; while other girls were spending money
shopping she was making it!
And both Aunt Hester and Aunt Juley were always ready to listen
to the latest story of how Francie had got her price increased.
They listened now, together with Swithin, who sat pretending not
to, for these young people talked so fast and mumbled so, he
never could catch what they said.
“And I can’t think,” said Mrs. Septimus, “how you do it. I should
never have the audacity!”
Francie smiled lightly. “I’d much rather deal with a man than a
woman. Women are so sharp!”
“My dear,” cried Mrs. Small, “I’m sure we’re not.”
Euphemia went off into her silent laugh, and, ending with the
squeak, said, as though being strangled: “Oh, you’ll kill me some
day, auntie.”
Swithin saw no necessity to laugh; he detested people laughing
when he himself perceived no joke. Indeed, he detested Euphemia
altogether, to whom he always alluded as “Nick’s daughter, what’s
she called—the pale one?” He had just missed being her
god-father—indeed, would have been, had he not taken a firm stand
against her outlandish name. He hated becoming a godfather.
Swithin then said to Francie with dignity: “It’s a fine
day—er—for the time of year.” But Euphemia, who knew perfectly
well that he had refused to be her godfather, turned to Aunt
Hester, and began telling her how she had seen Irene—Mrs.
Soames—at the Church and Commercial Stores.
“And Soames was with her?” said Aunt Hester, to whom Mrs. Small
had as yet had no opportunity of relating the incident.
“_Soames_ with her? Of _course_ not!”
“But was she all alone in London?”
“Oh, no; there was Mr. Bosinney with her. She was _perfectly_
dressed.”
But Swithin, hearing the name Irene, looked severely at Euphemia,
who, it is true, never did look well in a dress, whatever she may
have done on other occasions, and said:
“Dressed like a lady, I’ve no doubt. It’s a pleasure to see her.”
At this moment James and his daughters were announced. Dartie,
feeling badly in want of a drink, had pleaded an appointment with
his dentist, and, being put down at the Marble Arch, had got into
a hansom, and was already seated in the window of his club in
Piccadilly.
His wife, he told his cronies, had wanted to take him to pay some
calls. It was not in his line—not exactly. Haw!
Hailing the waiter, he sent him out to the hall to see what had
won the 4.30 race. He was dog-tired, he said, and that was a
fact; had been drivin’ about with his wife to “shows” all the
afternoon. Had put his foot down at last. A fellow must live his
own life.
At this moment, glancing out of the bay window—for he loved this
seat whence he could see everybody pass—his eye unfortunately, or
perhaps fortunately, chanced to light on the figure of Soames,
who was mousing across the road from the Green Park-side, with
the evident intention of coming in, for he, too, belonged to “The
Iseeum.”
Dartie sprang to his feet; grasping his glass, he muttered
something about “that 4.30 race,” and swiftly withdrew to the
card-room, where Soames never came. Here, in complete isolation
and a dim light, he lived his own life till half past seven, by
which hour he knew Soames must certainly have left the club.
It would not do, as he kept repeating to himself whenever he felt
the impulse to join the gossips in the bay-window getting too
strong for him—it absolutely would not do, with finances as low
as his, and the “old man” (James) rusty ever since that business
over the oil shares, which was no fault of his, to risk a row
with Winifred.
If Soames were to see him in the club it would be sure to come
round to her that he wasn’t at the dentist’s at all. He never
knew a family where things “came round” so. Uneasily, amongst the
green baize card-tables, a frown on his olive coloured face, his
check trousers crossed, and patent-leather boots shining through
the gloom, he sat biting his forefinger, and wondering where the
deuce he was to get the money if Erotic failed to win the
Lancashire Cup.
His thoughts turned gloomily to the Forsytes. What a set they
were! There was no getting anything out of them—at least, it was
a matter of extreme difficulty. They were so d—-d particular
about money matters; not a sportsman amongst the lot, unless it
were George. That fellow Soames, for instance, would have a fit
if you tried to borrow a tenner from him, or, if he didn’t have a
fit, he looked at you with his cursed supercilious smile, as if
you were a lost soul because you were in want of money.
And that wife of his (Dartie’s mouth watered involuntarily), he
had tried to be on good terms with her, as one naturally would
with any pretty sister-in-law, but he would be cursed if the (he
mentally used a coarse word)—would have anything to say to
him—she looked at him, indeed, as if he were dirt—and yet she
could go far enough, he wouldn’t mind betting. He knew women;
they weren’t made with soft eyes and figures like that for
nothing, as that fellow Soames would jolly soon find out, if
there were anything in what he had heard about this Buccaneer
Johnny.
Rising from his chair, Dartie took a turn across the room, ending
in front of the looking-glass over the marble chimney-piece; and
there he stood for a long time contemplating in the glass the
reflection of his face. It had that look, peculiar to some men,
of having been steeped in linseed oil, with its waxed dark
moustaches and the little distinguished commencements of side
whiskers; and concernedly he felt the promise of a pimple on the
side of his slightly curved and fattish nose.
In the meantime old Jolyon had found the remaining chair in
Timothy’s commodious drawing-room. His advent had obviously put a
stop to the conversation, decided awkwardness having set in. Aunt
Juley, with her well-known kindheartedness, hastened to set
people at their ease again.
“Yes, Jolyon,” she said, “we were just saying that you haven’t
been here for a long time; but we mustn’t be surprised. You’re
busy, of course? James was just saying what a busy time of
year....”
“Was he?” said old Jolyon, looking hard at James. “It wouldn’t be
half so busy if everybody minded their own business.”
James, brooding in a small chair from which his knees ran uphill,
shifted his feet uneasily, and put one of them down on the cat,
which had unwisely taken refuge from old Jolyon beside him.
“Here, you’ve got a cat here,” he said in an injured voice,
withdrawing his foot nervously as he felt it squeezing into the
soft, furry body.
“Several,” said old Jolyon, looking at one face and another; “I
trod on one just now.”
A silence followed.
Then Mrs. Small, twisting her fingers and gazing round with
“pathetic calm”, asked: “And how is dear June?”
A twinkle of humour shot through the sternness of old Jolyon’s
eyes. Extraordinary old woman, Juley! No one quite like her for
saying the wrong thing!
“Bad!” he said; “London don’t agree with her—too many people
about, too much clatter and chatter by half.” He laid emphasis on
the words, and again looked James in the face.
Nobody spoke.
A feeling of its being too dangerous to take a step in any
direction, or hazard any remark, had fallen on them all.
Something of the sense of the impending, that comes over the
spectator of a Greek tragedy, had entered that upholstered room,
filled with those white-haired, frock-coated old men, and
fashionably attired women, who were all of the same blood,
between all of whom existed an unseizable resemblance.
Not that they were conscious of it—the visits of such fateful,
bitter spirits are only felt.
Then Swithin rose. He would not sit there, feeling like that—he
was not to be put down by anyone! And, manoeuvring round the room
with added pomp, he shook hands with each separately.
“You tell Timothy from me,” he said, “that he coddles himself too
much!” Then, turning to Francie, whom he considered “smart,” he
added: “You come with me for a drive one of these days.” But this
conjured up the vision of that other eventful drive which had
been so much talked about, and he stood quite still for a second,
with glassy eyes, as though waiting to catch up with the
significance of what he himself had said; then, suddenly
recollecting that he didn’t care a damn, he turned to old Jolyon:
“Well, good-bye, Jolyon! You shouldn’t go about without an
overcoat; you’ll be getting sciatica or something!” And, kicking
the cat slightly with the pointed tip of his patent leather boot,
he took his huge form away.
When he had gone everyone looked secretly at the others, to see
how they had taken the mention of the word “drive”—the word which
had become famous, and acquired an overwhelming importance, as
the only official—so to speak—news in connection with the vague
and sinister rumour clinging to the family tongue.
Euphemia, yielding to an impulse, said with a short laugh: “I’m
glad Uncle Swithin doesn’t ask me to go for drives.”
Mrs. Small, to reassure her and smooth over any little
awkwardness the subject might have, replied: “My dear, he likes
to take somebody well dressed, who will do him a little credit. I
shall never forget the drive he took me. It was an experience!”
And her chubby round old face was spread for a moment with a
strange contentment; then broke into pouts, and tears came into
her eyes. She was thinking of that long ago driving tour she had
once taken with Septimus Small.
James, who had relapsed into his nervous brooding in the little
chair, suddenly roused himself: “He’s a funny fellow, Swithin,”
he said, but in a half-hearted way.
Old Jolyon’s silence, his stern eyes, held them all in a kind of
paralysis. He was disconcerted himself by the effect of his own
words—an effect which seemed to deepen the importance of the very
rumour he had come to scotch; but he was still angry.
He had not done with them yet—No, no—he would give them another
rub or two.
He did not wish to rub his nieces, he had no quarrel with them—a
young and presentable female always appealed to old Jolyon’s
clemency—but that fellow James, and, in a less degree perhaps,
those others, deserved all they would get. And he, too, asked for
Timothy.
As though feeling that some danger threatened her younger
brother, Aunt Juley suddenly offered him tea: “There it is,” she
said, “all cold and nasty, waiting for you in the back drawing
room, but Smither shall make you some fresh.”
Old Jolyon rose: “Thank you,” he said, looking straight at James,
“but I’ve no time for tea, and—scandal, and the rest of it! It’s
time I was at home. Good-bye, Julia; good-bye, Hester; good-bye,
Winifred.”
Without more ceremonious adieux, he marched out.
Once again in his cab, his anger evaporated, for so it ever was
with his wrath—when he had rapped out, it was gone. Sadness came
over his spirit. He had stopped their mouths, maybe, but at what
a cost! At the cost of certain knowledge that the rumour he had
been resolved not to believe was true. June was abandoned, and
for the wife of that fellow’s son! He felt it was true, and
hardened himself to treat it as if it were not; but the pain he
hid beneath this resolution began slowly, surely, to vent itself
in a blind resentment against James and his son.
The six women and one man left behind in the little drawing-room
began talking as easily as might be after such an occurrence, for
though each one of them knew for a fact that he or she never
talked scandal, each one of them also knew that the other six
did; all were therefore angry and at a loss. James only was
silent, disturbed, to the bottom of his soul.
Presently Francie said: “Do you know, I think Uncle Jolyon is
terribly changed this last year. What do you think, Aunt Hester?”
Aunt Hester made a little movement of recoil: “Oh, ask your Aunt
Julia!” she said; “I know nothing about it.”
No one else was afraid of assenting, and James muttered gloomily
at the floor: “He’s not half the man he was.”
“I’ve noticed it a long time,” went on Francie; “he’s aged
tremendously.”
Aunt Juley shook her head; her face seemed suddenly to have
become one immense pout.
“Poor dear Jolyon,” she said, “somebody ought to see to it for
him!”
There was again silence; then, as though in terror of being left
solitarily behind, all five visitors rose simultaneously, and
took their departure.
Mrs. Small, Aunt Hester, and their cat were left once more alone,
the sound of a door closing in the distance announced the
approach of Timothy.
That evening, when Aunt Hester had just got off to sleep in the
back bedroom that used to be Aunt Juley’s before Aunt Juley took
Aunt Ann’s, her door was opened, and Mrs. Small, in a pink
night-cap, a candle in her hand, entered: “Hester!” she said.
“Hester!”
Aunt Hester faintly rustled the sheet.
“Hester,” repeated Aunt Juley, to make quite sure that she had
awakened her, “I am quite troubled about poor dear Jolyon.
_What_,” Aunt Juley dwelt on the word, “do you think ought to be
done?”
Aunt Hester again rustled the sheet, her voice was heard faintly
pleading: “Done? How should I know?”
Aunt Juley turned away satisfied, and closing the door with extra
gentleness so as not to disturb dear Hester, let it slip through
her fingers and fall to with a “crack.”
Back in her own room, she stood at the window gazing at the moon
over the trees in the Park, through a chink in the muslin
curtains, close drawn lest anyone should see. And there, with her
face all round and pouting in its pink cap, and her eyes wet, she
thought of “dear Jolyon,” so old and so lonely, and how she could
be of some use to him; and how he would come to love her, as she
had never been loved since—since poor Septimus went away.