The Complete Project Gutenberg Works of Galsworthy

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Shelton was much struck by the practical way in which she looked at
things. Restore his self-respect! It seemed quite a splendid notion!
He smiled, and said,

"You're too kind. I think--"

"I don't believe in doin' things by halves," said Mrs. Dennant; "he does
n't drink, I suppose?"

"Oh, no," said Shelton. "He's rather a tobacco maniac, of course."

"Well, that's a mercy! You would n't believe the trouble I 've had with
drink, especially over cooks and coachmen. And now Bunyan's taken to
it."

"Oh, you'd have no trouble with Ferrand," returned Shelton; "you couldn't
tell him from a gentleman as far as manners go."

Mrs. Dennant smiled one of her rather sweet and kindly smiles.

"My dear Dick," she said, "there's not much comfort in that. Look at
poor Bobby Surcingle, look at Oliver Semples and Victor Medallion; you
could n't have better families. But if you 're sure he does n't drink!
Algy 'll laugh, of course; that does n't matter--he laughs at
everything."

Shelton felt guilty; being quite unprepared for so rapid an adoption of
his client.

"I really believe there's a lot of good in him," he stammered; "but, of
course, I know very little, and from what he tells me he's had a very
curious life. I shouldn't like--"

"Where was he educated?" inquired Mrs. Dennant. "They have no public
schools in France, so I 've been told; but, of course, he can't help
that, poor young fellow! Oh, and, Dick, there 's one thing--has he
relations? One has always to be so careful about that. It 's one thing
to help a young fellow, but quite another to help his family too. One
sees so many cases of that where men marry girls without money, don't you
know."

"He has told me," answered Shelton, "his only relations are some cousins,
and they are rich."

Mrs. Dennant took out her handkerchief, and, bending above the rose,
removed a tiny insect.

"These green-fly get in everywhere," she said.

"Very sad story; can't they do anything for him?" and she made researches
in the rose's heart.

"He's quarrelled with them, I believe," said Shelton; "I have n't liked
to press him, about that."

"No, of course not," assented Mrs. Dennant absently--she had found
another green-fly "I always think it's painful when a young man seems so
friendless."

Shelton was silent; he was thinking deeply. He had never before felt so
distrustful of the youthful foreigner.

"I think," he said at last, "the best thing would be for you to see him
for yourself."

"Very well," said Mrs. Dennant. "I should be so glad if you would tell
him to come up. I must say I do think that was a most touchin' story
about Paris. I wonder whether this light's strong enough now for me to
photograph this rose."

Shelton withdrew and went down-stairs. Ferrand was still at breakfast.
Antonia stood at the sideboard carving beef for him, and in the window
sat Thea with her Persian kitten.

Both girls were following the traveller's movements with inscrutable blue
eyes. A shiver ran down Shelton's spine. To speak truth, he cursed the
young man's coming, as though it affected his relations with Antonia.




CHAPTER XXVII

SUB ROSA

From the interview, which Shelton had the mixed delight of watching,
between Ferrand and the Honourable Mrs. Dennant, certain definite results
accrued, the chief of which was the permission accorded the young
wanderer to occupy the room which had formerly been tenanted by the
footman John. Shelton was lost in admiration of Ferrand's manner in this
scene.. Its subtle combination of deference and dignity was almost
paralysing; paralysing, too, the subterranean smile upon his lips.

"Charmin' young man, Dick," said Mrs. Dennant, when Shelton lingered to
say once more that he knew but very little of him; "I shall send a note
round to Mrs. Robinson at once. They're rather common, you know--the
Robinsons. I think they'll take anyone I recommend."

"I 'm sure they will," said Shelton; "that's why I think you ought to
know--"

But Mrs. Dennant's eyes, fervent, hare-like, were fixed on something far
away; turning, he saw the rose in a tall vase on a tall and spindly
stool. It seemed to nod towards them in the sunshine. Mrs. Dennant
dived her nose towards her camera.

"The light's perfect now," she said, in a voice muffled by the cloth. "I
feel sure that livin' with decent people will do wonders for him. Of
course, he understands that his meals will be served to him apart."

Shelton, doubly anxious, now that his efforts had lodged his client in a
place of trust, fell, back on hoping for the best; his instinct told him
that, vagabond as Ferrand was, he had a curious self-respect, that would
save him from a mean ingratitude.

In fact, as Mrs. Dennant, who was by no means void of common-sense,
foresaw, the arrangement worked all right. Ferrand entered on his duties
as French tutor to the little Robinsons. In the Dennants' household he
kept himself to his own room, which, day and night, he perfumed with
tobacco, emerging at noon into the garden, or, if wet, into the study, to
teach young Toddles French. After a time it became customary for him to
lunch with the house-party, partly through a mistake of Toddles, who
seemed to think that it was natural, and partly through John Noble, one
of Shelton's friends, who had come to stay, and discovered Ferrand to be
a most awfully interesting person he was always, indeed, discovering the
most awfully interesting persons. In his grave and toneless voice,
brushing his hair from off his brow, he descanted upon Ferrand with
enthusiasm, to which was joined a kind of shocked amusement, as who
should say, "Of course, I know it's very odd, but really he 's such an
awfully interesting person." For John Noble was a politician, belonging
to one of those two Peculiar parties, which, thoroughly in earnest, of an
honesty above suspicion, and always very busy, are constitutionally
averse to anything peculiar for fear of finding they have overstepped the
limit of what is practical in politics. As such he inspired confidence,
not caring for things unless he saw some immediate benefit to be had from
them, having a perfect sense of decency, and a small imagination. He
discussed all sorts of things with Ferrand; on one occasion Shelton
overheard them arguing on anarchism.

"No Englishman approves of murder," Noble was saying, in the gloomy voice
that contrasted with the optimistic cast of his fine head, "but the main
principle is right. Equalisation of property is bound to come. I
sympathise with then, not with their methods."

"Forgive me," struck in Ferrand; "do you know any anarchists?"

"No," returned Noble; "I certainly do not."

"You say you sympathise with them, but the first time it comes to
action--"

"Well?"

"Oh, monsieur! one doesn't make anarchism with the head."

Shelton perceived that he had meant to add, "but with the heart, the
lungs, the liver." He drew a deeper meaning from the saying, and seemed
to see, curling with the smoke from Ferrand's lips, the words: "What do
you, an English gentleman, of excellent position, and all the prejudices
of your class, know about us outcasts? If you want to understand us you
must be an outcast too; we are not playing at the game."

This talk took place upon the lawn, at the end of one of Toddles's French
lessons, and Shelton left John Noble maintaining to the youthful
foreigner, with stubborn logic, that he, John Noble, and the anarchists
had much, in common. He was returning to the house, when someone called
his name from underneath the holm oak. There, sitting Turkish fashion on
the grass, a pipe between his teeth, he found a man who had arrived the
night before, and impressed him by his friendly taciturnity. His name
was Whyddon, and he had just returned from Central Africa; a brown-faced,
large-jawed man, with small but good and steady eyes, and strong, spare
figure.

"Oh, Mr. Shelton!" he said, "I wondered if you could tell me what tips I
ought to give the servants here; after ten years away I 've forgotten all
about that sort of thing."

Shelton sat down beside him; unconsciously assuming, too, a cross-legged
attitude, which caused him much discomfort.

"I was listening," said his new acquaintance, "to the little chap
learning his French. I've forgotten mine. One feels a hopeless duffer
knowing no, languages."

"I suppose you speak Arabic?" said Shelton.

"Oh, Arabic, and a dialect or two; they don't count. That tutor has a
curious face."

"You think so?" said Shelton, interested. "He's had a curious life."

The traveller spread his hands, palms downwards, on the grass and looked
at Shelton with, a smile.

"I should say he was a rolling stone," he said. "It 's odd, I' ve seen
white men in Central Africa with a good deal of his look about them.

"Your diagnosis is a good one," answered Shelton.

"I 'm always sorry for those fellows. There's generally some good in
them. They are their own enemies. A bad business to be unable to take
pride in anything one does!" And there was a look of pity on his face.

"That's exactly it," said Shelton. "I 've often tried to put it into
words. Is it incurable?"

"I think so."

"Can you tell me why?"

Whyddon pondered.

"I rather think," he said at last, "it must be because they have too
strong a faculty of criticism. You can't teach a man to be proud of his
own work; that lies in his blood "; folding his arms across his breast,
he heaved a sigh. Under the dark foliage, his eyes on the sunlight, he
was the type of all those Englishmen who keep their spirits bright and
wear their bodies out in the dark places of hard work. "You can't
think," he said, showing his teeth in a smile, "how delightful it is to
be at home! You learn to love the old country when you're away from it."

Shelton often thought, afterwards; of this diagnosis of the vagabond, for
he was always stumbling on instances of that power of subtle criticism
which was the young foreigner's prime claim to be "a most awfully
interesting" and perhaps a rather shocking person.

An old school-fellow of Shelton's and his wife were staying in the house,
who offered to the eye the picture of a perfect domesticity. Passionless
and smiling, it was impossible to imagine they could ever have a
difference. Shelton, whose bedroom was next to theirs, could hear them
in the mornings talking in exactly the tones they used at lunch, and
laughing the same laughs. Their life seemed to accord them perfect
satisfaction; they were supplied with their convictions by Society just
as, when at home, they were supplied with all the other necessaries of
life by some co-operative stores. Their fairly handsome faces, with the
fairly kind expressions, quickly and carefully regulated by a sense of
compromise, began to worry him so much that when in the same room he
would even read to avoid the need of looking at them. And yet they were
kind--that is, fairly kind--and clean and quiet in the house, except when
they laughed, which was often, and at things which made him want to howl
as a dog howls at music.

"Mr. Shelton," Ferrand said one day, "I 'm not an amateur of
marriage--never had the chance, as you may well suppose; but, in any
case, you have some people in the house who would make me mark time
before I went committing it. They seem the ideal young married
people--don't quarrel, have perfect health, agree with everybody, go to
church, have children--but I should like to hear what is beautiful in
their life," and he grimaced. "It seems to me so ugly that I can only
gasp. I would much rather they ill-treated each other, just to show they
had the corner of a soul between them. If that is marriage, 'Dieu m'en
garde!'"

But Shelton did not answer; he was thinking deeply.

The saying of John Noble's, "He's really a most interesting person," grew
more and more upon his nerves; it seemed to describe the Dennant attitude
towards this stranger within their gates. They treated him with a sort
of wonder on the "don't touch" system, like an object in an exhibition.
The restoration, however, of, his self-respect proceeded with success.
For all the semblance of having grown too big for Shelton's clothes, for
all his vividly burnt face, and the quick but guarded play of cynicism on
his lips--he did much credit to his patrons. He had subdued his terror
of a razor, and looked well in a suit of Shelton's flannels. For, after
all, he had only been eight years exiled from middle-class gentility, and
he had been a waiter half that time. But Shelton wished him at the
devil. Not for his manners' sake--he was never tired of watching how
subtly the vagabond adapted his conduct to the conduct of his hosts,
while keeping up his critical detachment--but because that critical
detachment was a constant spur to his own vision, compelling him to
analyse the life into which, he had been born and was about to marry.
This process was disturbing; and to find out when it had commenced, he
had to go back to his meeting with Ferrand on the journey up from Dover.

There was kindness in a hospitality which opened to so strange a bird;
admitting the kindness, Shelton fell to analysing it. To himself, to
people of his class, the use of kindness was a luxury, not significant of
sacrifice, but productive of a pleasant feeling in the heart, such as
massage will setup in the legs. "Everybody's kind," he thought; "the
question is, What understanding is there, what real sympathy?" This
problem gave him food for thought.

The progress, which Mrs. Dennant not unfrequently remarked upon, in
Ferrand's conquest of his strange position, seemed to Shelton but a sign
that he was getting what he could out of his sudden visit to green
pastures; under the same circumstances, Shelton thought that he himself
would do the same. He felt that the young foreigner was making a
convenient bow to property, but he had more respect for the sarcastic
smile on the lips of Ferrand's heart.

It was not long before the inevitable change came in the spirit of the
situation; more and more was Shelton conscious of a quaint uneasiness in
the very breathing of the household.

"Curious fellow you've got hold of there, Shelton," Mr. Dennant said to
him during a game of croquet; "he 'll never do any good for himself, I'm
afraid."

"In one sense I'm afraid not," admitted Shelton.

"Do you know his story? I will bet you sixpence"--and Mr. Dennant
paused to swing his mallet with a proper accuracy "that he's been in
prison."

"Prison!" ejaculated Shelton.

"I think," said Mr. Dennant, with bent knees carefully measuring his next
shot, "that you ought to make inquiries--ah! missed it! Awkward these
hoops! One must draw the line somewhere."

"I never could draw," returned Shelton, nettled and uneasy; "but I
understand--I 'll give him a hint to go."

"Don't," said Mr. Dennant, moving after his second ball, which Shelton
had smitten to the farther end, "be offended, my dear Shelton, and by no
means give him a hint; he interests me very much--a very clever, quiet
young fellow."

That this was not his private view Shelton inferred by studying Mr.
Dennant's manner in the presence of the vagabond. Underlying the
well-bred banter of the tranquil voice, the guarded quizzicality of his
pale brown face, it could be seen that Algernon Cuffe Dennant, Esq.,
J.P., accustomed to laugh at other people, suspected that he was being
laughed at. What more natural than that he should grope about to see how
this could be? A vagrant alien was making himself felt by an English
Justice of the Peace--no small tribute, this, to Ferrand's personality.
The latter would sit silent through a meal, and yet make his effect. He,
the object of their kindness, education, patronage, inspired their fear.
There was no longer any doubt; it was not of Ferrand that they were
afraid, but of what they did not understand in him; of horrid subtleties
meandering in the brain under that straight, wet-looking hair; of
something bizarre popping from the curving lips below that thin, lopsided
nose.

But to Shelton in this, as in all else, Antonia was what mattered. At
first, anxious to show her lover that she trusted him, she seemed never
tired of doing things for his young protege, as though she too had set
her heart on his salvation; but, watching her eyes when they rested on
the vagabond, Shelton was perpetually reminded of her saying on the first
day of his visit to Holm Oaks, "I suppose he 's really good--I mean all
these things you told me about were only...."

Curiosity never left her glance, nor did that story of his four days'
starving leave her mind; a sentimental picturesqueness clung about that
incident more valuable by far than this mere human being with whom she
had so strangely come in contact. She watched Ferrand, and Shelton
watched her. If he had been told that he was watching her, he would have
denied it in good faith; but he was bound to watch her, to find out with
what eyes she viewed this visitor who embodied all the rebellious
under-side of life, all that was absent in herself.

"Dick," she said to him one day, "you never talk to me of Monsieur
Ferrand."

"Do you want to talk of him?"

"Don't you think that he's improved?"

"He's fatter."

Antonia looked grave.

"No, but really?"

"I don't know," said Shelton; "I can't judge him."

Antonia turned her face away, and something in her attitude alarmed him.

"He was once a sort of gentleman," she said; "why shouldn't he become one
again?"

Sitting on the low wall of the kitchen-garden, her head was framed by
golden plums. The sun lay barred behind the foliage of the holm oak, but
a little patch filtering through a gap had rested in the plum-tree's
heart. It crowned the girl. Her raiment, the dark leaves, the red wall,
the golden plums, were woven by the passing glow to a block of pagan
colour. And her face above it, chaste, serene, was like the scentless
summer evening. A bird amongst the currant bushes kept a little chant
vibrating; and all the plum-tree's shape and colour seemed alive.

"Perhaps he does n't want to be a gentleman," said Shelton.

Antonia swung her foot.

"How can he help wanting to?"

"He may have a different philosophy of life."

Antonia was slow to answer.

"I know nothing about philosophies of life," she said at last.

Shelton answered coldly,

"No two people have the same."

With the falling sun-glow the charm passed off the tree. Chilled and
harder, yet less deep, it was no more a block of woven colour, warm and
impassive, like a southern goddess; it was now a northern tree, with a
grey light through its leaves.

"I don't understand you in the least," she said; "everyone wishes to be
good."

"And safe?" asked Shelton gently.

Antonia stared.

"Suppose," he said--"I don't pretend to know, I only suppose--what
Ferrand really cares for is doing things differently from other people?
If you were to load him with a character and give him money on condition
that he acted as we all act, do you think he would accept it?"

"Why not?"

"Why are n't cats dogs; or pagans Christians?"

Antonia slid down from the wall.

"You don't seem to think there 's any use in trying," she said, and
turned away.

Shelton made a movement as if he would go after her, and then stood
still, watching her figure slowly pass, her head outlined above the wall,
her hands turned back across her narrow hips. She halted at the bend,
looked back, then, with an impatient gesture, disappeared.

Antonia was slipping from him!

A moment's vision from without himself would have shown him that it was
he who moved and she who was standing still, like the figure of one
watching the passage of a stream with clear, direct, and sullen eyes.




CHAPTER XXVIII

THE RIVER

One day towards the end of August Shelton took Antonia on the river--the
river that, like soft music, soothes the land; the river of the reeds and
poplars, the silver swan-sails, sun and moon, woods, and the white
slumbrous clouds; where cuckoos, and the wind, the pigeons, and the weirs
are always singing; and in the flash of naked bodies, the play of
waterlily leaves, queer goblin stumps, and the twilight faces of the
twisted tree-roots, Pan lives once more.

The reach which Shelton chose was innocent of launches, champagne bottles
and loud laughter; it was uncivilised, and seldom troubled by these
humanising influences. He paddled slowly, silent and absorbed, watching
Antonia. An unaccustomed languor clung about her; her eyes had shadows,
as though she had not slept; colour glowed softly in her cheeks, her
frock seemed all alight with golden radiance. She made Shelton pull into
the reeds, and plucked two rounded lilies sailing like ships against
slow-moving water.

"Pull into the shade, please," she said; "it's too hot out here."

The brim of her linen hat kept the sun from her face, but her head was
drooping like a flower's head at noon.

Shelton saw that the heat was really harming her, as too hot a day will
dim the icy freshness of a northern plant. He dipped his sculls, the
ripples started out and swam in grave diminuendo till they touched the
banks.

He shot the boat into a cleft, and caught the branches of an overhanging
tree. The skiff rested, balancing with mutinous vibration, like a living
thing.

"I should hate to live in London," said Antonia suddenly; "the slums must
be so awful. What a pity, when there are places like this! But it's no
good thinking."

"No," answered Shelton slowly! "I suppose it is no good."

"There are some bad cottages at the lower end of Cross Eaton. I went
them one day with Miss Truecote. The people won't help themselves. It's
so discouraging to help people who won't help themselves."

She was leaning her elbows on her knees, and, with her chin resting on
her hands, gazed up at Shelton. All around them hung a tent of soft,
thick leaves, and, below, the water was deep-dyed with green refraction.
Willow boughs, swaying above the boat, caressed Antonia's arms and
shoulders; her face and hair alone were free.

"So discouraging," she said again.

A silence fell.... Antonia seemed thinking deeply.

"Doubts don't help you," she said suddenly; "how can you get any good
from doubts? The thing is to win victories."

"Victories?" said Shelton. "I 'd rather understand than conquer!"

He had risen to his feet, and grasped stunted branch, canting the boat
towards the bank.

"How can you let things slide like that, Dick? It's like Ferrand."

"Have you such a bad opinion of him, then?" asked Shelton. He felt on
the verge of some, discovery.

She buried her chin deeper in her hands.

"I liked him at first," she said; "I thought that he was different. I
thought he couldn't really be--"

"Really be what?"

Antonia did not answer.

"I don't know," she said at last. "I can't explain. I thought--"

Shelton still stood, holding to the branch, and the oscillation of the
boat freed an infinity of tiny ripples.

"You thought--what?" he said.

He ought to have seen her face grow younger, more childish, even timid.
She said in a voice smooth, round, and young:

"You know, Dick, I do think we ought to try. I know I don't try half
hard enough. It does n't do any good to think; when you think,
everything seems so mixed, as if there were nothing to lay hold of. I do
so hate to feel like that. It is n't as if we didn't know what's right.
Sometimes I think, and think, and it 's all no good, only a waste of
time, and you feel at the end as if you had been doing wrong."

Shelton frowned.

"What has n't been through fire's no good," he said; and, letting go the
branch, sat down. Freed from restraint, the boat edged out towards the
current. "But what about Ferrand?"

"I lay awake last night wondering what makes you like him so. He's so
bitter; he makes me feel unhappy. He never seems content with anything.
And he despises"--her face hardened--"I mean, he hates us all!"

"So should I if I were he," said Shelton.

The boat was drifting on, and gleams of sunlight chased across their
faces. Antonia spoke again.

"He seems to be always looking at dark things, or else he seems as if--as
if he could--enjoy himself too much. I thought--I thought at first," she
stammered, "that we could do him good."

"Do him good! Ha, ha!"

A startled rat went swimming for its life against the stream; and Shelton
saw that he had done a dreadful thing: he had let Antonia with a jerk
into a secret not hitherto admitted even by himself--the secret that her
eyes were not his eyes, her way of seeing things not his nor ever would
be. He quickly muffled up his laughter. Antonia had dropped her gaze;
her face regained its languor, but the bosom of her dress was heaving.
Shelton watched her, racking his brains to find excuses for that fatal
laugh; none could he find. It was a little piece of truth. He paddled
slowly on, close to the bank, in the long silence of the river.

The breeze had died away, not a fish was rising; save for the lost music
of the larks no birds were piping; alone, a single pigeon at brief
intervals cooed from the neighbouring wood.