"A DAY and a half to wait before seeing Miss Brooke again," was Paul's
first reflection the next morning. "All I should have laughed at as
absurd a month ago, proves to be true. I am fast in the toils." And all
through the day Miss Brooke filled his thoughts. He was, somehow, a
different person from before, as if he had awakened from some sluggish
torpor.
All his life Paul had suffered from an excess of parental love, which
had considerably curtailed his freedom; and even when the death of his
father a year before had left him his own master, he had no thought of
living away from his mother, much to her secret gratification. Her
fondness for him had been such that she had had him educated at home for
several years, and was only persuaded to let him go to school under
great pressure from her husband. She had established her influence over
her boy from the beginning, and his pliable and obedient disposition had
enabled her to maintain it now that he was grown up. His father, who had
divided his time between collecting beautiful beetles, representing a
rural constituency, enacting the good Samaritan, and, as Paul had told
Miss Brooke, thundering and writing letters to the press against foreign
missions, had cherished an ambitious career for his son. He himself, he
felt, was a mere pawn on the parliamentary chessboard, and he dreamt of
a really great political future for Paul, who, moreover, he hoped, would
leave his mark on the social life of the generation by promoting the
increase of public fine-art collections. Beautiful centres of
art--beautiful buildings with beautiful contents--could be established,
he argued, if the money subscribed for foreign missions could be used
for the purpose; and he had the necessary statistics ready to hurl at
the head of the sceptic.
Acting on the advice of a friend who considered the Bar afforded the
best training in oratory, he began by placing the boy in a solicitor's
office immediately after he had left college. Some eighteen months later
the father was carried off in an epidemic of influenza. Paul, who had
long since discovered that oratory _via_ the law was not adapted to one
of his temperament, had decision enough to desist from it. His attitude
towards his sire's dream had never been a very reverent one, for he knew
well he was not of the stuff of which Parliamentary leaders are made.
But, as the affection between the two had been really strong, the son
wished to respect the father's ideas so far as possible, if only for
sentimental reasons; and, finding in himself a natural taste for making
beautiful designs as well as an innocent love for illuminated books, old
carvings and mouldings, and such curious antiques as had a real art
value, it occurred to him he might make a thorough study of architecture
from the art as well as the practical side. Later on he would design art
galleries for the people, and set a movement on foot to promote their
construction. Without taking himself too solemnly, he liked to think
that what he purposed would have given his father pleasure; and he was
always able to take good-humouredly such jesting remarks as had
reference to his schemes.
Meanwhile mother and son had settled down in a small house in Elm Park
Road. The country house was let on a long lease, as Mrs. Middleton did
not wish to have the trouble of keeping it up, preferring to travel for
three months in the year. The household consumed but a small part of
their revenues, and consequently the amount of money in the family
threatened to increase from year to year, despite that Mr. Middleton's
good works were continued, and that Paul, going a-slumming, started
additional good works on his own account.
Mrs. Middleton was only too pleased at Paul's leaving "that nasty dark,
close office," asserting it must have injured his health. Besides, her
faith in his talents was so absolute that she was certain he would one
day be a very great man indeed, whatever the profession he espoused. So
she ceded to him for his study perhaps the pleasantest room in the
house. It was at the back and opened on to a narrow garden, so that he
could saunter out occasionally and pace up and down. As he was here
quite isolated, he never felt the need of having rooms elsewhere.
Despite the vigilance under which Paul had grown up, he had yet managed
to have one or two boyish love-affairs without his parents suspecting
anything; and he had at times dreamt of an ideal love and an ideal
happiness. But of late he had developed different notions, and had come
to pride himself on his freedom from all mawkish sentiment.
Notwithstanding this, he was chivalrous enough to believe that women
were angels; which belief, curiously enough, was unimpaired by the fact
that, in practice, he was a little bit afraid and suspicious of them.
Nor did he always find them interesting; he would sooner play a game of
chess any day than talk to one of them.
Cousin Celia was often at the house to join him and his mother at their
quiet tea, and one day the idea entered his head that Mrs. Middleton had
a certain pet scheme. But modesty prevented it from taking root in him,
and he preferred to believe that the notion of a marriage between him
and Celia had occurred only to himself, and would greatly surprise
everybody else if he broached it. Celia was an orphan, and he had heard
her pitied all his life. She was considered to possess an extraordinary
share of good looks and an uncommon degree of affability. Good judges
assured one another she would make an excellent wife, and Mrs. Middleton
had taken good care that the said judges should discuss the girl in the
presence of her boy, who could scarcely contend against so subtle an
undermining. Despite his vague knowledge of the wiles of match-making,
he began to persuade himself that he really liked Celia, and he played
more and more with the idea of marrying her. The leading-strings were
handled so lightly and skilfully, he would have been much astonished to
hear that his inclinations were not absolutely uninfluenced. In Celia
was all that straightforwardness by which he set such store; from her
was absent all that caprice and flirtatiousness he was so afraid of. It
was easy to know her wishes, easy to please her; and she had never made
him the victim of moods.
And the more he thought of marrying her, the more he began to decry
romantic love to himself. Whether it really existed or not he would not
pretend to say, though, in the light of his own experience, he could
just imagine its existence. Those old boyish ideas of his were all a
mistake. And thereupon he fell back eagerly on the theory of sensible
companionship as the only sound basis for marriage--which theory had now
abruptly to be rejected.
Already Paul, promenading his garden whilst beautiful coloured plates of
Egyptian decoration lay neglected on his table, was bothering himself as
to whether he could leave Celia out of the account with a clear
conscience. The question he kept asking himself was whether such
attention as he had paid her could reasonably be interpreted as bearing
any real significance. He was certain he had never actively made love to
her, as he had always hesitated to begin, but he had seen a great deal
of her of late and their intimacy had made great strides. Moreover, she
had allowed him his five dances the evening before without a word of
demur. He knew, too, he had often felt himself flushing on hearing her
praised, feeling a sort of proprietary pride in the subject of
discussion; and he wondered now if his demeanour on such occasions had
been observed.
All these considerations caused him considerable uneasiness in view of
the fact that he was perfectly sure now he did not want to marry her.
Miss Brooke had come into his horizon, and lo! the whole world was
changed. Oh, to be free to woo and win such a girl!
Suddenly he had a flash of shrewder insight, and he was able to find
comfort in that first suspicion, which now returned to him, that his
mother was really responsible for this Celia affair. Why--and his
awakened mind now ran over a score of memories--he had scarcely ever met
Celia out without his mother having supplied the impulse for his going
to the particular place! He had been a fool not to see how she had
worked matters from the beginning. And now there arose in him a shade of
resentment against her, and his man's independence revolted for the
first time against this subtle subordination of his will to hers. He had
a definite perception--attended with a distinct sense of shame--of the
fact that he had never really ceased to be, so far as she was
concerned, the good little boy who had learnt his letters at her knee.
He had an individuality of his own, he told himself, and it behoved him
to play the part of a man. He should begin his emancipation at once by
putting a prompt stop to "this Celia business."