“_Broken Music_”
“_BROKEN MUSIC_”
_By Phyllis Bottome, Author of “The Imperfect
Gift,” “Crooked Answers,” “The Common Chord,” etc._
[Illustration]
BOSTON AND NEW YORK:
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
THE RIVERSIDE PRESS, CAMBRIDGE
1914
_Printed in Great Britain_
_DEDICATION_
“_To the Memory of the Siegfried Idyll_”
PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR.
The material for the French life in this book I owe entirely to a
friend, without whose knowledge and assistance it would not have been
written, but whose name I am not at liberty to disclose.
The faults of the work are my own, but the merit, if there is any
merit, is his; if there is not, the misfortune is his as well as
the public’s, since an abler hand should have made something of the
material he placed at my disposal.
The actual characters are not, as children say of fairy tales, “true”;
but many of them belong to that system of parallel cases which runs
side by side with the truth.
“BROKEN MUSIC”
CHAPTER I
“SO she’s sent for you too, has she?” said the doctor. Of course he
knew that Miss Prenderghast must have sent for Monsieur le Curé as she
had sent for the doctor himself, for neither of them would have gone to
the Castle uninvited. They would have cheerfully borne with many things
for the sake of Jean D’Ucelles, but they would not have gone uninvited
to see his aunt, especially not for _déjeuner_.
The Curé hesitated; if he could have made a mystery out of his
invitation he would have done so; he loved mysteries quite as much as
the doctor loved probing them, but he was not quite such an adept at
inventing them--he preferred those which had been already invented for
him.
“She intimated that she desired to see me,” he cautiously replied. “I
could have refused, but she is, as we all know, alas! a Protestant, and
as such her soul is in hourly peril. I said to myself: ‘Perhaps this is
an awakening to the truth.’ It’s true I should have preferred to go
up to the Castle after _déjeuner_. It is a strange thing--I have often
remarked it--that Protestants enjoy neither the fruits of the spirit
nor the fruits of the earth. It was not so always at the Château. I
can remember well enough in the late Baron’s time what a table she
kept--the poor young English wife--even in his absence. She was not
born a Catholic, it is true; but she became one. She spared no expense,
and she had a great respect for the clergy. She was always telling me
to take care of myself. She had a cook trained in Paris.”
“Perhaps she was able to train her cook,” said the doctor. “The more
pity she couldn’t train her husband--the poor Baron, he was always a
wild one. I had hoped the marriage would steady him, but it never did!
How well I remember his saying to me: ‘You believe in nature, then,
Monsieur; so do I. She has made the plants to keep still, but men she
has made to move about--do not trouble yourself, then, that I fulfil my
destiny!’ He was going to Paris, of course; he always was. I remember
it was before Monsieur Jean’s birth. I had ventured to implore him to
remain. I knew it was a liberty, but what would you? The Baronne was
in a very delicate condition. I feared that she had anxieties, there
was much talk about the Baron’s long absences--always without her, you
understand, but not always, I fear, without others--and I had much
sympathy with the poor lady, alone, and in a strange land. She was
very young, too, and neurotic; she wanted to die.” The doctor blew his
nose.
“That was a sin,” said the Curé severely. “I can hardly believe that
of Madame; she never mentioned the fact to me. I think you must be
exaggerating.”
“Bah!” snapped Dr. Bonnet. “I am not a priest. I have some experience
of women; she was in love with her husband. English women are droll; it
is a great mistake, I find, this love of the husband--it leads nowhere.
However, it is not so easy to die when one is twenty-five and has a man
of science against one, and then when Monsieur Jean was born it was all
another story! The Baron sent a telegram in the best of taste, and came
down later with the Comte and Comtesse D’Ucelles to the christening.”
The Curé nodded.
“It was a magnificent christening,” he said. “I myself officiated.
There was talk of the Bishop of the Diocese, but Madame was firm;
she said I should be the one to make her son a Christian, as I had
made his mother Catholic. Yes, yes, doubtless she is with the Blessed
Saints--the little English lady--and I hope the Baron too, though of
that we cannot be quite so sure.”
Monsieur le Curé made the sign of the cross and looked very grave.
There was every reason why he should, for the Baron D’Ucelles had shot
himself through the head five years ago--two years after his wife’s
death. It was natural that he should regret her. She had spent six
months in giving him what he wanted, and thirteen years in not giving
him what he didn’t want. She would have made an ideal wife for any man.
Still it was not altogether on her account that he had followed her
to the grave. The late Baron had been a little extravagant both with
his money and with his life, and when he had at length discovered that
he would shortly become a helpless paralytic on a very small income,
he had decided to take the only means left him to avoid these issues.
He had left behind him only Ucelles itself and two small farms, which
was all that could be saved for his son out of his once handsome
inheritance. His family said that this was what came of having married
an English woman without a _dot_.
“There is one thing,” said the Curé, after a pause, “that I have never
quite understood, and this is why Monsieur Jean should have been
brought up by this English relation?”
The doctor shrugged his shoulders.
“I too have wondered,” he said. “But what will you? The Comte, his
guardian, married a rich wife of the _bourgeoisie_, and they have a
large house in Paris and a big income; they have no children of their
own. What more likely, it would seem, than that they should adopt
Monsieur Jean? In this world, so I take it, what is likely does not
happen. Instead, one fine day this English aunt arrives, who knows
nothing of our tongue or of our ways, and nothing--it would seem--of
children, it is to her, then, that they entrust our little Baron. For
myself, I am a philosopher, I have no theories--all I believe is that
in the long run nature has her way, and her way is, perhaps, the best;
at any rate it is the only one I know.”
“I have always endeavoured to guard him against her errors,” said the
Curé; and indeed he had done his best. He had baptized Jean, he had
taught him his catechism, and prepared him for confirmation and for his
first communion; he had also taught him a little Latin, a great deal
of theology, and what he thought was literature. He really believed
that Jean thought so too, but then he had watched Jean so carefully and
incessantly for twenty years that he knew nothing about him at all. The
doctor, who had not seen nearly so much of Jean, understood him a great
deal better. He had kept a fresher eye for change.
Both men were silent after this. Little St. Jouin lay in the broiling
sun behind them, a small, huddled town in the ancient stubble-fields
of the plain. The broad white road, through which life flashed by
in swift, infrequent modern traffic, divided it from a fashionable
watering-place on the one side and from a commercial seaport on the
other. But nobody ever stopped at St. Jouin, there was no reason why
they should; it had nothing rare enough about it to ensure its ruin
and there was no one to realize that in being so near modernity it had
altogether escaped it. Certainly the two figures that plodded along
the broad white road had no such fancies; they had no fancies at all.
They had lived in St. Jouin nearly all their lives. Monsieur le Curé
in particular, with his high, narrow head and irritable, unseeing
eyes (the kind of eyes that are always glancing about, driven by a
suspicion that there is something wrong to be observed, and overlooking
everything else), was not likely to approve of fancies. Why should he?
his religion was sufficient for him. He was the most important person
in St. Jouin; there was no unbelief there (in spite of the newspapers)
and very little faith. Everybody went to church, so that their lives
were always under the Curé’s eyes; only their souls escaped him.
The doctor had his ideas, of course, but he was terribly scientific; he
had spent a year in Paris thirty years ago, and he took in a Radical
newspaper. He thought he was a red-hot Socialist and a cynic, but
he was really a very kind-hearted man and treated all his poorest
patients free of charge, only he was a little impatient about what he
did not understand. He was quite sure that what did not appeal to him
personally was either old-fashioned or new-fangled, and when he talked
about progress, he meant his own ideas.
The great bell at the Château rang out the hour of noon; it seemed to
shake the hot air round them and to keep the silence listening to its
deep reverberations. The Curé stopped, crossed himself, and repeated
his _Ave_ with bowed head. The doctor, who was a stout man, was glad of
the pause, but lest his friend should suppose that he was putting it to
a religious purpose, he whistled--at least he tried to; but he was too
much out of breath to make a success of it.
Through the opening in the trees beyond them Ucelles itself appeared.
It was a long, low house, with a steep, grey roof, in which tiny round
windows were thickly set. At a distance it still looked, what it had
once been, the chief mansion in the district--the Château of Ucelles.
The garden had been allowed to run to seed, but the long avenue of
limes approaching the house made stout sentinels for its dignity.
In a small wood of fir and plane trees, close to the house, stood the
family chapel; the sun shone through the leaves above it, and the
priest and the doctor caught a glimpse through the open _grille_ of a
tiny altar covered with fresh flowers. In front of the house stretched
an uncultivated meadow, but in the centre a square was trimmed with
neat little box hedges, and in the middle of the square was a small
pond covered deep with water-lilies. Around it late roses and early
chrysanthemums mingled their blooms together.
“He has always kept his mother’s garden gay,” said the Curé
approvingly; “and the flowers in the chapel there are fresh. I prefer
myself the artificial ones, but we must be indulgent to youth; the
Church has always recognized that.”
The doctor frowned. The Curé had never revealed to him what his
ambition for Jean was, but the doctor had long ago guessed it. You
cannot know a man for thirty years and be entirely ignorant of his
favourite idea, especially when he has not got more than one. The Curé
wished Jean to become a priest, and the doctor hated the idea with
all his heart. He was a Socialist, you must remember, a Radical and a
cynic, so of course he wanted Jean to become a grand seigneur--a man of
the world, and at the same time noted for his domestic happiness, with
a large family of sons.
As for Jean himself, he wanted to become a musician, but nobody minded
very much what Jean wanted.
“It has occurred to me,” said the Curé, after he had finished saying
his _Ave_, “that we have been sent for--of course, you must understand
that I have no authority for my idea; I am merely expressing what
has passed through my mind--that we may be asked to consult with
Mademoiselle Prenderghast on the subject of Monsieur Jean’s future.”
The Curé coughed.
“There’s his uncle,” growled the doctor. “He ought to settle the
question.”
“I think the boy’s taste should be considered,” suggested the Curé. He
thought that he had formed Jean’s taste, and that he might safely leave
it to settle matters his way.
“I wish he could have done his military service,” said the doctor. “If
I had been the fool at the Maire de Valbranche I would have passed
him; he is delicate, but it’s only raw, untrained nerves and morbid
religious fancies. The old adhesion in the left lung they thought
themselves so clever in spotting, why, it’s nothing--nothing at all,
I tell you; just the result of that English spinster’s notion of how
to treat a delicate child with measles. But there! modern science only
goes by what’s at the end of a stethoscope, or a microscope, or a
misanthrope,” said the doctor. He was not quite sure what a misanthrope
was; however, it sounded all right, and, after all, the Curé wouldn’t
know any better. “It doesn’t allow for life forces.”
“I have often told you that,” said the Curé complacently; “only I
expressed it better. Science has tried to lead faith when she should
have knelt before her.”
“Rubbish!” said the doctor.
By this time they had reached the house. Ucelles did not look quite
so grand on a near approach. The long French windows opening on the
_terrasse_ had a cold and vacant air, most of the house was closed, so
that it appeared half blind and wholly dumb; it needed all the sunshine
of summer to help the observer to bear the freezing sense of departed
life. When the doctor rang the bell it echoed hauntingly through the
empty corridors, and it was a long while before Miss Prenderghast’s
reliable English maid answered it. She did at last, and received the
men’s greetings with all the sourness of an exiled mind. If Miss
Prenderghast was not at home in France, Elizabeth was still less likely
to be so. Miss Prenderghast regarded it with suspicion, but Elizabeth
with open-eyed hostility. Everything was different from what Elizabeth
had been accustomed to, and Elizabeth knew that everything which was
different was wrong. But all human consistency breaks down somewhere;
Elizabeth’s broke down over Jean. When she first saw him he was a
little French boy, very French indeed, and a Catholic; and he was not
the less French now nor less Catholic at twenty; but Elizabeth was
human and she loved him. That was why she stayed in a heathen country.
“If you will please to come this way, sir,” she said, addressing the
doctor--she pretended not to see the Curé, she was Protestant to the
core; then she led them along the polished parquet corridor, till at
last they reached the smallest of a suite of reception-rooms. It was
full of sunshine and golden dust that glistened in the sunbeams between
the ceiling and the floor, but there was very little else in the room
except Miss Prenderghast; she was knitting.
“You can serve lunch, Elizabeth,” she said, before she greeted her
visitors.
“Yes, ma’am,” said Elizabeth, but she did not intend to serve lunch
until Jean came; her idea of veracity was as strictly relative as if
she had been a Jesuit.
Miss Prenderghast’s dress was very high about the neck and rather short
about the ankles. Her nose was her most prominent feature, and she
looked as if she felt cold but would have thought it extremely foolish
to take any precautions against it.
It is easy to distinguish in the faces of the middle-aged those from
whom life has receded from those, in whose existence, it has never
played a formidable part. It was to this latter category that Miss
Prenderghast belonged. From her earliest years she had been taught to
repress all her emotions, and she had repressed them so thoroughly
that at times it seemed even to herself as if she no longer had any to
suppress. She had put her heart into her sense of duty, a performance
which had resulted in developing her conscience at the expense of
all her natural instincts. Nobody likes having to deal with a robust
conscience and anæmic emotions, the Latin races least of all. The two
men, who bowed low, and obediently took the two small cane chairs
provided for them, never considered Miss Prenderghast in the light
of a human being. She appeared to them as a natural phenomenon of a
disagreeable nature, such as a land-slide or a series of bad harvests.
“English ladies can have no temptations,” thought the Curé. “That is
why they are Protestants.”
“We shall have trouble with Jean sooner or later,” the doctor said to
himself; “he has his father’s blood in him, and he has been brought up
by a stone.”
“It was very kind of you both to come,” said Miss Prenderghast coldly;
“you must have found the walk from St. Jouin long and dusty.”
“On the contrary,” said the doctor politely, “where the destination is
agreeable the path is scattered with flowers.”
“The wild flowers in this part of the country are remarkably scarce,”
observed Miss Prenderghast. “I have often regretted it.”
A silence followed. The Curé drew out his handkerchief and spilt some
snuff on the floor. The doctor sneezed and Miss Prenderghast frowned.
She disliked French habits.
“I have received a letter from the Comte D’Ucelles,” she observed
finally; “he is, as you may remember, Jean’s nearest relation upon the
French side--in fact, his only near French relation.”
“_Parfaitement_,” replied the doctor, “he is a gallant man and has had
a certain success in Paris. There is a remarkable resemblance between
him and the late Baron.”
“Ah!” said Miss Prenderghast thoughtfully, “I trust it is only
superficial. Still it cannot be helped; he is Jean’s uncle, and he has
at last chosen to intimate some interest in the boy’s future.”
“Very natural, very natural indeed,” exclaimed the Curé. “Nothing could
be more _convenable_, madame, the true spirit of a good Catholic and of
an uncle!”
“It may be as you say,” replied Miss Prenderghast, with knitted brows.
“In any case, he has waited long enough before showing either of them.
However, it is not easy for me to make up my mind what it is best to
do.”
“And Jean, what is his opinion?” asked the doctor.
“I have not consulted him upon the question,” said Miss Prenderghast.
“It is possible I should have done so, in which case I should hardly
have troubled you for your advice; but yesterday a very, very painful
incident occurred, which has greatly shaken my intention.”
Both the doctor and the priest started; they did not look at each
other, though they were thinking the same thought.
“He has fallen from grace,” the priest said to himself.
“He has become a man,” thought the doctor.
“He has written an opera,” said Miss Prenderghast impressively. Neither
of the men could help looking a little disappointed.
“You may well be surprised,” said Miss Prenderghast with satisfaction.
“I was myself perfectly unprepared for this blow. I knew he was musical
and that--as I thought most unnecessarily, Monsieur le Curé--you had
encouraged it by allowing him to play the organ in your church.” The
Curé collapsed, the doctor looked radiant. “And you, doctor,” said
Miss Prenderghast, “have not improved matters by insisting upon him
attending the meetings of a disreputable orchestral society! This is
the result.”
“Well, well,” said the doctor bravely, “his mother was a neurotic!”
“There are certain professions,” said the Curé mildly, “in which a
knowledge of music is not altogether a misfortune. I have myself
studied harmony for a fortnight during my training at the Seminary. I
have never regretted it.”
“No, but your congregation has,” snapped the doctor.
“What do you suggest?” asked Miss Prenderghast.
The doctor looked at the Curé. He really had no idea in his head
at all, but the Curé looked so full of his own importance and so
determined on making Jean a priest that the doctor found himself saying:
“Paris!” He only meant it as a joke.
“Paris?” said Miss Prenderghast thoughtfully.
“Paris!” echoed the Curé in horror.
“Paris?” said a clear boy’s voice just behind them.
It was Jean himself, fresh from a morning in the woods, with a
retriever puppy gamboling at his heels. It was youth, and hope, and
ardour, and all incredible, dauntless things! It was the spirit of
growing life and spring, and it was followed by Elizabeth, who promptly
announced _déjeuner_, half an hour after the usual time.
“We will finish this discussion later on,” said Miss Prenderghast.
Jean greeted his two old friends cordially.
“But what is all this about Paris, Aunt Anne?” he asked, smiling a
little as he held back the _portière_ for her to pass out. “Have you
and Monsieur le Curé and the doctor just discovered it?”
“You should not come into rooms suddenly,” said Miss Prenderghast
coldly. “Then you would not overhear parts of other people’s
conversations which were not meant for your ears.”
Jean frowned and apologized. Miss Prenderghast resented the frown, and
ignored the apology.
It is so seldom that the very observant observe the right things. It
was a dull lunch party; the doctor was a little frightened at Miss
Prenderghast’s reception of his suggestion; the Curé was thinking how
bad the lunch was, and how he could influence Jean to accept his point
of view. Miss Prenderghast was greatly annoyed with Elizabeth. And to
Jean the word “Paris” was like a lighted torch to a bundle of dry hay.
Suddenly all his ideas had taken fire--but like all the fires of youth
it burned silently, and none of his elders had the least idea that they
were attending at a conflagration.