The Complete Project Gutenberg Works of Galsworthy

J >> John Galsworthy >> The Complete Project Gutenberg Works of Galsworthy


"Where do you get your things?" he said in an aggravated voice. "I never
see Rachel and Cicely looking half so well. That rose-point, now--that's
not real!"

Irene came close, to prove to him that he was in error.

And, in spite of himself, James felt the influence of her deference, of
the faint seductive perfume exhaling from her. No self-respecting
Forsyte surrendered at a blow; so he merely said: He didn't know--he
expected she was spending a pretty penny on dress.

The gong sounded, and, putting her white arm within his, Irene took him
into the dining-room. She seated him in Soames's usual place, round the
corner on her left. The light fell softly there, so that he would not be
worried by the gradual dying of the day; and she began to talk to him
about himself.

Presently, over James came a change, like the mellowing that steals upon
a fruit in the, sun; a sense of being caressed, and praised, and petted,
and all without the bestowal of a single caress or word of praise. He
felt that what he was eating was agreeing with him; he could not get that
feeling at home; he did not know when he had enjoyed a glass of champagne
so much, and, on inquiring the brand and price, was surprised to find
that it was one of which he had a large stock himself, but could never
drink; he instantly formed the resolution to let his wine merchant know
that he had been swindled.

Looking up from his food, he remarked:

"You've a lot of nice things about the place. Now, what did you give for
that sugar-sifter? Shouldn't wonder if it was worth money!"

He was particularly pleased with the appearance of a picture, on the wall
opposite, which he himself had given them:

"I'd no idea it was so good!" he said.

They rose to go into the drawing-room, and James followed Irene closely.

"That's what I call a capital little dinner," he murmured, breathing
pleasantly down on her shoulder; "nothing heavy--and not too Frenchified.
But I can't get it at home. I pay my cook sixty pounds a year, but she
can't give me a dinner like that!"

He had as yet made no allusion to the building of the house, nor did he
when Soames, pleading the excuse of business, betook himself to the room
at the top, where he kept his pictures.

James was left alone with his daughter-in-law. The glow of the wine, and
of an excellent liqueur, was still within him. He felt quite warm
towards her. She was really a taking little thing; she listened to you,
and seemed to understand what you were saying; and, while talking, he
kept examining her figure, from her bronze-coloured shoes to the waved
gold of her hair. She was leaning back in an Empire chair, her shoulders
poised against the top--her body, flexibly straight and unsupported from
the hips, swaying when she moved, as though giving to the arms of a
lover. Her lips were smiling, her eyes half-closed.

It may have been a recognition of danger in the very charm of her
attitude, or a twang of digestion, that caused a sudden dumbness to fall
on James. He did not remember ever having been quite alone with Irene
before. And, as he looked at her, an odd feeling crept over him, as
though he had come across something strange and foreign.

Now what was she thinking about--sitting back like that?

Thus when he spoke it was in a sharper voice, as if he had been awakened
from a pleasant dream.

"What d'you do with yourself all day?" he said. "You never come round to
Park Lane!"

She seemed to be making very lame excuses, and James did not look at her.
He did not want to believe that she was really avoiding them--it would
mean too much.

"I expect the fact is, you haven't time," he said; "You're always about
with June. I expect you're useful to her with her young man,
chaperoning, and one thing and another. They tell me she's never at home
now; your Uncle Jolyon he doesn't like it, I fancy, being left so much
alone as he is. They tell me she's always hanging about for this young
Bosinney; I suppose he comes here every day. Now, what do you think of
him? D'you think he knows his own mind? He seems to me a poor thing. I
should say the grey mare was the better horse!"

The colour deepened in Irene's face; and James watched her suspiciously.

"Perhaps you don't quite understand Mr. Bosinney," she said.

"Don't understand him!" James hummed out: "Why not?--you can see he's one
of these artistic chaps. They say he's clever--they all think they're
clever. You know more about him than I do," he added; and again his
suspicious glance rested on her.

"He is designing a house for Soames," she said softly, evidently trying
to smooth things over.

"That brings me to what I was going to say," continued James; "I don't
know what Soames wants with a young man like that; why doesn't he go to a
first-rate man?"

"Perhaps Mr. Bosinney is first-rate!"

James rose, and took a turn with bent head.

"That's it'," he said, "you young people, you all stick together; you all
think you know best!"

Halting his tall, lank figure before her, he raised a finger, and
levelled it at her bosom, as though bringing an indictment against her
beauty:

"All I can say is, these artistic people, or whatever they call
themselves, they're as unreliable as they can be; and my advice to you
is, don't you have too much to do with him!"

Irene smiled; and in the curve of her lips was a strange provocation.
She seemed to have lost her deference. Her breast rose and fell as
though with secret anger; she drew her hands inwards from their rest on
the arms of her chair until the tips of her fingers met, and her dark
eyes looked unfathomably at James.

The latter gloomily scrutinized the floor.

"I tell you my opinion," he said, "it's a pity you haven't got a child to
think about, and occupy you!"

A brooding look came instantly on Irene's face, and even James became
conscious of the rigidity that took possession of her whole figure
beneath the softness of its silk and lace clothing.

He was frightened by the effect he had produced, and like most men with
but little courage, he sought at once to justify himself by bullying.

"You don't seem to care about going about. Why don't you drive down to
Hurlingham with us? And go to the theatre now and then. At your time of
life you ought to take an interest in things. You're a young woman!"

The brooding look darkened on her face; he grew nervous.

"Well, I know nothing about it," he said; "nobody tells me anything.
Soames ought to be able to take care of himself. If he can't take care
of himself he mustn't look to me--that's all."

Biting the corner of his forefinger he stole a cold, sharp look at his
daughter-in-law.

He encountered her eyes fixed on his own, so dark and deep, that he
stopped, and broke into a gentle perspiration.

"Well, I must be going," he said after a short pause, and a minute later
rose, with a slight appearance of surprise, as though he had expected to
be asked to stop. Giving his hand to Irene, he allowed himself to be
conducted to the door, and let out into the street. He would not have a
cab, he would walk, Irene was to say good-night to Soames for him, and if
she wanted a little gaiety, well, he would drive her down to Richmond any
day.

He walked home, and going upstairs, woke Emily out of the first sleep she
had had for four and twenty hours, to tell her that it was his impression
things were in a bad way at Soames's; on this theme he descanted for half
an hour, until at last, saying that he would not sleep a wink, he turned
on his side and instantly began to snore.

In Montpellier Square Soames, who had come from the picture room, stood
invisible at the top of the stairs, watching Irene sort the letters
brought by the last post. She turned back into the drawing-room; but in
a minute came out, and stood as if listening. Then she came stealing up
the stairs, with a kitten in her arms. He could see her face bent over
the little beast, which was purring against her neck. Why couldn't she
look at him like that?

Suddenly she saw him, and her face changed.

"Any letters for me?" he said.

"Three."

He stood aside, and without another word she passed on into the bedroom.




CHAPTER VII

OLD JOLYON'S PECCADILLO

Old Jolyon came out of Lord's cricket ground that same afternoon with the
intention of going home. He had not reached Hamilton Terrace before he
changed his mind, and hailing a cab, gave the driver an address in
Wistaria Avenue. He had taken a resolution.

June had hardly been at home at all that week; she had given him nothing
of her company for a long time past, not, in fact, since she had become
engaged to Bosinney. He never asked her for her company. It was not his
habit to ask people for things! She had just that one idea now--Bosinney
and his affairs--and she left him stranded in his great house, with a
parcel of servants, and not a soul to speak to from morning to night.
His Club was closed for cleaning; his Boards in recess; there was
nothing, therefore, to take him into the City. June had wanted him to go
away; she would not go herself, because Bosinney was in London.

But where was he to go by himself? He could not go abroad alone; the sea
upset his liver; he hated hotels. Roger went to a hydropathic--he was
not going to begin that at his time of life, those new-fangled places
we're all humbug!

With such formulas he clothed to himself the desolation of his spirit;
the lines down his face deepening, his eyes day by day looking forth with
the melancholy which sat so strangely on a face wont to be strong and
serene.

And so that afternoon he took this journey through St. John's Wood, in
the golden-light that sprinkled the rounded green bushes of the acacia's
before the little houses, in the summer sunshine that seemed holding a
revel over the little gardens; and he looked about him with interest; for
this was a district which no Forsyte entered without open disapproval and
secret curiosity.

His cab stopped in front of a small house of that peculiar buff colour
which implies a long immunity from paint. It had an outer gate, and a
rustic approach.

He stepped out, his bearing extremely composed; his massive head, with
its drooping moustache and wings of white hair, very upright, under an
excessively large top hat; his glance firm, a little angry. He had been
driven into this!

"Mrs. Jolyon Forsyte at home?"

"Oh, yes sir!--what name shall I say, if you please, sir?"

Old Jolyon could not help twinkling at the little maid as he gave his
name. She seemed to him such a funny little toad!

And he followed her through the dark hall, into a small double,
drawing-room, where the furniture was covered in chintz, and the little
maid placed him in a chair.

"They're all in the garden, sir; if you'll kindly take a seat, I'll tell
them."

Old Jolyon sat down in the chintz-covered chair, and looked around him.
The whole place seemed to him, as he would have expressed it, pokey;
there was a certain--he could not tell exactly what--air of shabbiness,
or rather of making two ends meet, about everything. As far as he could
see, not a single piece of furniture was worth a five-pound note. The
walls, distempered rather a long time ago, were decorated with
water-colour sketches; across the ceiling meandered a long crack.

These little houses were all old, second-rate concerns; he should hope
the rent was under a hundred a year; it hurt him more than he could have
said, to think of a Forsyte--his own son living in such a place.

The little maid came back. Would he please to go down into the garden?

Old Jolyon marched out through the French windows. In descending the
steps he noticed that they wanted painting.

Young Jolyon, his wife, his two children, and his dog Balthasar, were all
out there under a pear-tree.

This walk towards them was the most courageous act of old Jolyon's life;
but no muscle of his face moved, no nervous gesture betrayed him. He
kept his deep-set eyes steadily on the enemy.

In those two minutes he demonstrated to perfection all that unconscious
soundness, balance, and vitality of fibre that made, of him and so many
others of his class the core of the nation. In the unostentatious conduct
of their own affairs, to the neglect of everything else, they typified
the essential individualism, born in the Briton from the natural
isolation of his country's life.

The dog Balthasar sniffed round the edges of his trousers; this friendly
and cynical mongrel--offspring of a liaison between a Russian poodle and
a fox-terrier--had a nose for the unusual.

The strange greetings over, old Jolyon seated himself in a wicker chair,
and his two grandchildren, one on each side of his knees, looked at him
silently, never having seen so old a man.

They were unlike, as though recognising the difference set between them
by the circumstances of their births. Jolly, the child of sin,
pudgy-faced, with his tow-coloured hair brushed off his forehead, and a
dimple in his chin, had an air of stubborn amiability, and the eyes of a
Forsyte; little Holly, the child of wedlock, was a dark-skinned, solemn
soul, with her mother's, grey and wistful eyes.

The dog Balthasar, having walked round the three small flower-beds, to
show his extreme contempt for things at large, had also taken a seat in
front of old Jolyon, and, oscillating a tail curled by Nature tightly
over his back, was staring up with eyes that did not blink.

Even in the garden, that sense of things being pokey haunted old Jolyon;
the wicker chair creaked under his weight; the garden-beds looked
'daverdy'; on the far side, under the smut-stained wall, cats had made a
path.

While he and his grandchildren thus regarded each other with the peculiar
scrutiny, curious yet trustful, that passes between the very young and
the very old, young Jolyon watched his wife.

The colour had deepened in her thin, oval face, with its straight brows,
and large, grey eyes. Her hair, brushed in fine, high curves back from
her forehead, was going grey, like his own, and this greyness made the
sudden vivid colour in her cheeks painfully pathetic.

The look on her face, such as he had never seen there before, such as she
had always hidden from him, was full of secret resentments, and longings,
and fears. Her eyes, under their twitching brows, stared painfully. And
she was silent.

Jolly alone sustained the conversation; he had many possessions, and was
anxious that his unknown friend with extremely large moustaches, and
hands all covered with blue veins, who sat with legs crossed like his own
father (a habit he was himself trying to acquire), should know it; but
being a Forsyte, though not yet quite eight years old, he made no mention
of the thing at the moment dearest to his heart--a camp of soldiers in a
shop-window, which his father had promised to buy. No doubt it seemed to
him too precious; a tempting of Providence to mention it yet.

And the sunlight played through the leaves on that little party of the
three generations grouped tranquilly under the pear-tree, which had long
borne no fruit.

Old Jolyon's furrowed face was reddening patchily, as old men's faces
redden in the sun. He took one of Jolly's hands in his own; the boy
climbed on to his knee; and little Holly, mesmerized by this sight, crept
up to them; the sound of the dog Balthasar's scratching arose
rhythmically.

Suddenly young Mrs. Jolyon got up and hurried indoors. A minute later
her husband muttered an excuse, and followed. Old Jolyon was left alone
with his grandchildren.

And Nature with her quaint irony began working in him one of her strange
revolutions, following her cyclic laws into the depths of his heart. And
that tenderness for little children, that passion for the beginnings of
life which had once made him forsake his son and follow June, now worked
in him to forsake June and follow these littler things. Youth, like a
flame, burned ever in his breast, and to youth he turned, to the round
little limbs, so reckless, that wanted care, to the small round faces so
unreasonably solemn or bright, to the treble tongues, and the shrill,
chuckling laughter, to the insistent tugging hands, and the feel of small
bodies against his legs, to all that was young and young, and once more
young. And his eyes grew soft, his voice, and thin-veined hands soft,
and soft his heart within him. And to those small creatures he became at
once a place of pleasure, a place where they were secure, and could talk
and laugh and play; till, like sunshine, there radiated from old Jolyon's
wicker chair the perfect gaiety of three hearts.

But with young Jolyon following to his wife's room it was different.

He found her seated on a chair before her dressing-glass, with her hands
before her face.

Her shoulders were shaking with sobs. This passion of hers for suffering
was mysterious to him. He had been through a hundred of these moods; how
he had survived them he never knew, for he could never believe they were
moods, and that the last hour of his partnership had not struck.

In the night she would be sure to throw her arms round his neck and say:
"Oh! Jo, how I make you suffer!" as she had done a hundred times before.

He reached out his hand, and, unseen, slipped his razor-case into his
pocket. 'I cannot stay here,' he thought, 'I must go down!' Without a
word he left the room, and went back to the lawn.

Old Jolyon had little Holly on his knee; she had taken possession of his
watch; Jolly, very red in the face, was trying to show that he could
stand on his head. The dog Balthasar, as close as he might be to the
tea-table, had fixed his eyes on the cake.

Young Jolyon felt a malicious desire to cut their enjoyment short.

What business had his father to come and upset his wife like this? It
was a shock, after all these years! He ought to have known; he ought to
have given them warning; but when did a Forsyte ever imagine that his
conduct could upset anybody! And in his thoughts he did old Jolyon
wrong.

He spoke sharply to the children, and told them to go in to their tea.
Greatly surprised, for they had never heard their father speak sharply
before, they went off, hand in hand, little Holly looking back over her
shoulder.

Young Jolyon poured out the tea.

"My wife's not the thing today," he said, but he knew well enough that
his father had penetrated the cause of that sudden withdrawal, and almost
hated the old man for sitting there so calmly.

"You've got a nice little house here," said old Jolyon with a shrewd
look; "I suppose you've taken a lease of it!"

Young Jolyon nodded.

"I don't like the neighbourhood," said old Jolyon; "a ramshackle lot."

Young Jolyon replied: "Yes, we're a ramshackle lot."'

The silence was now only broken by the sound of the dog Balthasar's
scratching.

Old Jolyon said simply: "I suppose I oughtn't to have come here, Jo; but
I get so lonely!"

At these words young Jolyon got up and put his hand on his father's
shoulder.

In the next house someone was playing over and over again: 'La Donna
mobile' on an untuned piano; and the little garden had fallen into shade,
the sun now only reached the wall at the end, whereon basked a crouching
cat, her yellow eyes turned sleepily down on the dog Balthasar. There
was a drowsy hum of very distant traffic; the creepered trellis round the
garden shut out everything but sky, and house, and pear-tree, with its
top branches still gilded by the sun.

For some time they sat there, talking but little. Then old Jolyon rose
to go, and not a word was said about his coming again.

He walked away very sadly. What a poor miserable place; and he thought
of the great, empty house in Stanhope Gate, fit residence for a Forsyte,
with its huge billiard-room and drawing-room that no one entered from one
week's end to another.

That woman, whose face he had rather liked, was too thin-skinned by half;
she gave Jo a bad time he knew! And those sweet children! Ah! what a
piece of awful folly!

He walked towards the Edgware Road, between rows of little houses, all
suggesting to him (erroneously no doubt, but the prejudices of a Forsyte
are sacred) shady histories of some sort or kind.

Society, forsooth, the chattering hags and jackanapes--had set themselves
up to pass judgment on his flesh and blood! A parcel of old women! He
stumped his umbrella on the ground, as though to drive it into the heart
of that unfortunate body, which had dared to ostracize his son and his
son's son, in whom he could have lived again!

He stumped his umbrella fiercely; yet he himself had followed Society's
behaviour for fifteen years--had only today been false to it!

He thought of June, and her dead mother, and the whole story, with all
his old bitterness. A wretched business!

He was a long time reaching Stanhope Gate, for, with native perversity,
being extremely tired, he walked the whole way.

After washing his hands in the lavatory downstairs, he went to the
dining-room to wait for dinner, the only room he used when June was
out--it was less lonely so. The evening paper had not yet come; he had
finished the Times, there was therefore nothing to do.

The room faced the backwater of traffic, and was very silent. He
disliked dogs, but a dog even would have been company. His gaze,
travelling round the walls, rested on a picture entitled: 'Group of Dutch
fishing boats at sunset'; the chef d'oeuvre of his collection. It gave
him no pleasure. He closed his eyes. He was lonely! He oughtn't to
complain, he knew, but he couldn't help it: He was a poor thing--had
always been a poor thing--no pluck! Such was his thought.

The butler came to lay the table for dinner, and seeing his master
apparently asleep, exercised extreme caution in his movements. This
bearded man also wore a moustache, which had given rise to grave doubts
in the minds of many members--of the family--, especially those who, like
Soames, had been to public schools, and were accustomed to niceness in
such matters. Could he really be considered a butler? Playful spirits
alluded to him as: 'Uncle Jolyon's Nonconformist'; George, the
acknowledged wag, had named him: 'Sankey.'

He moved to and fro between the great polished sideboard and the great
polished table inimitably sleek and soft.

Old Jolyon watched him, feigning sleep. The fellow was a sneak--he had
always thought so--who cared about nothing but rattling through his work,
and getting out to his betting or his woman or goodness knew what! A
slug! Fat too! And didn't care a pin about his master!

But then against his will, came one of those moments of philosophy which
made old Jolyon different from other Forsytes:

After all why should the man care? He wasn't paid to care, and why
expect it? In this world people couldn't look for affection unless they
paid for it. It might be different in the next--he didn't know--couldn't
tell! And again he shut his eyes.

Relentless and stealthy, the butler pursued his labours, taking things
from the various compartments of the sideboard. His back seemed always
turned to old Jolyon; thus, he robbed his operations of the unseemliness
of being carried on in his master's presence; now and then he furtively
breathed on the silver, and wiped it with a piece of chamois leather. He
appeared to pore over the quantities of wine in the decanters, which he
carried carefully and rather high, letting his heard droop over them
protectingly. When he had finished, he stood for over a minute watching
his master, and in his greenish eyes there was a look of contempt:

After all, this master of his was an old buffer, who hadn't much left in
him!

Soft as a tom-cat, he crossed the room to press the bell. His orders
were 'dinner at seven.' What if his master were asleep; he would soon
have him out of that; there was the night to sleep in! He had himself to
think of, for he was due at his Club at half-past eight!

In answer to the ring, appeared a page boy with a silver soup tureen.
The butler took it from his hands and placed it on the table, then,
standing by the open door, as though about to usher company into the
room, he said in a solemn voice:

"Dinner is on the table, sir!"

Slowly old Jolyon got up out of his chair, and sat down at the table to
eat his dinner.




CHAPTER VIII

PLANS OF THE HOUSE

Forsytes, as is generally admitted, have shells, like that extremely
useful little animal which is made into Turkish delight, in other words,
they are never seen, or if seen would not be recognised, without
habitats, composed of circumstance, property, acquaintances, and wives,
which seem to move along with them in their passage through a world
composed of thousands of other Forsytes with their habitats. Without a
habitat a Forsyte is inconceivable--he would be like a novel without a
plot, which is well-known to be an anomaly.

To Forsyte eyes Bosinney appeared to have no habitat, he seemed one of
those rare and unfortunate men who go through life surrounded by
circumstance, property, acquaintances, and wives that do not belong to
them.