‘Well, go out and buy one,’ commanded Morcar. He named the firm where the purchase should be made, together with the make and appropriate price of the car. ‘Show some sense, now. Sober colours and not too many gadgets.’
‘It’s very kind of you, Uncle Harry,’ said Jonathan as before.
‘Yes, indeed it is,’ echoed Chuff.
The conversation seemed over, but none of the three quite knew how to get away. ‘Is Jessopp there, Jonathan?’
‘Not yet. There’s a leader in The Times this morning about the need for increasing our exports,’ offered Jonathan.
‘Tell me something I don’t know,’ said Morcar roughly, vexed.
‘How much do you export every year, Grandfather?’
‘Getting on for a million.’
‘Yards? Pounds?’ said Chuff, awestruck.
‘Aye, sterling.’
‘That’s a lot.’
‘I know firms who do plenty more. One I know has a turnover of six million - but that includes yarn, of course.’ ‘Here’s Jessopp now, Uncle Harry.’
‘I must be off. Go and buy that car, and, Jonathan, get some L plates and take Chuff to put his name down for a driving test.’
‘I can drive, Grandfather.’
‘You’ll have to take a test. And show him where the Technical College is. If it’s open, get a prospectus about textile classes. I shan’t be in to lunch,’ said Morcar, stepping out of the window and walking briskly along to where Jessopp waited with the car.
’You’re going into textiles, then? I’m glad for Uncle Harry’s sake,’ said Jonathan.
‘Thank you for nothing. If you don’t want to share a car with me, why don’t you say so instead of just looking down your nose?’
‘My reluctance about the car has nothing to do with you,’ said Jonathan. The truth was that he had agreed to accept a half-share in a car entirely for Chuff’s sake, but he thought it would be low to say so.
‘What has it to do with, then?’
‘I don’t wish to be indebted to Mr Morcar more than I can help. He’s not my grandfather,’ said Jonathan.
‘You’re an odd fellow, Jonathan. I can’t read you,’ said Chuff in a more friendly tone.
‘Well, I’m not in the curriculum.’
‘There you go again. I don’t know what that means.’
‘I mean that we can behave in a civilized way to each other without especially liking or understanding each other.’
‘Pretty grim. Still, I agree to those terms,’ said Chuff with a grin.
How like his grandfather he is, thought Jonathan, amused. Aloud he said: ‘I could find a book or two for you in the municipal library, to put you in the picture about the textile processes, if you like.’
‘Books?’ said Chuff, suspicious. Always books and fine words from Jonathan, he thought with disgust. ‘Well, thanks,’ he said ungraciously.
17. Jessopp and the Past
‘I’m very sorry, very sorry indeed, Mrs Jessopp,’ said Morcar soberly to the widow. ‘To lose Jessopp leaves a great hole in my life. We’ve been together for so long.’
Mrs Jessopp, a fresh-complexioned buxom woman in her early sixties, with her light hair, scarcely at all grey, drawn tightly back from her face in an old-fashioned knot, rocked herself slowly back and forth in an old-fashioned rocking-chair covered in black horsehair. Her hands, roughened with the honest toil of a lifetime, lay clasped slackly in her lap, and her eyes were red with weeping.
‘He had a good life, Mr Morcar,’ she said. ‘The children have turned out well, you know. And it was all due to you. We don’t forget that, Mr Morcar.’ She looked up to where, over one end of the mantelpiece, hung a small faded photograph in a rather ornate silver frame. ‘You’re all there,’ she concluded, nodding towards it.
Morcar got up and inspected the photograph. With a shock he saw himself, Charlie Shaw, and Jessopp, in 1914 uniforms, those short ill-fitting jackets, those huge clumsy boots, those nuisances of puttees. Jessopp and Morcar stood stiffly side by side, solid and solemn; Charlie sat on a table-edge, swinging his foot, insouciant, lively, bright-eyed, laughing, as always. What a simple, ingenuous, ignorant donkey of a lad I was in those days, thought Morcar; Charlie was always worth two of me. The past rose out of its dusty bed and stabbed his heart full of pain. He grieved.
‘You saved his life, Mr Morcar,’ said Mrs Jessopp.
Yes, it’s true, I did, thought Morcar. I went back towards the shell crater and dragged Jessopp to the trench. And suppose I hadn’t? Suppose I had left him out there in no-man’s land and stayed in the trench by Charlie? Jessopp’s children wouldn’t exist. I should be still married to Winnie. As Winnie says, with a wife and child round my neck I shouldn’t have risen so far, so fast. I should have stayed in old Mr Shaw’s firm. He wouldn’t have plagiarized my cloths. I shouldn’t have needed a counsel’s opinion, shouldn’t have met Harington or Christina. David wouldn’t have met Jennifer, Jonathan wouldn’t exist. He mused sombrely on the strangely interwoven patterns of life.
‘I shall miss Jessopp terribly,’ he said.
‘But you’ve often driven yourself, Mr Morcar.’
‘Well, naturally. Sometimes it’s best so. Depends what your errand is. But Jessopp’s always been in the background, and lately I’ve relied on him more and more.’
‘Yes, I’ve noticed that. None of us get any younger, Mr Morcar.’
‘No, indeed,’ said Morcar, wincing. ‘It’s a real grief to me that I was away in Norway when Alfred died, Mrs Jessopp.’
‘It came rather sudden at the end,’ said Mrs Jessopp, and for the third or fourth time since Morcar’s arrival she narrated the sudden onset of the rheumatic fever which had brought her husband to death. Morcar listened patiently, with respect; he knew from long experience that these narrations brought comfort to the bereaved.
‘We were very sorry you couldn’t be at the funeral,’ concluded Mrs Jessopp.
‘So was I. But I was up country and didn’t hear about it till it was all over,’ said Morcar sincerely.
‘It was good of Mrs Morcar to send a wreath,’ said Mrs Jessopp doubtfully. ‘We appreciated it.’
Blast Winnie, thought Morcar in a fury. Seeing how she hated Jessopp, she can only have sent a wreath to vex me. Or was it perhaps a genuine expression of a lately conceived regret? Try to be fair to her. I can’t, said Morcar savagely. I can not be fair to Winnie.
‘Were all your family able to be present at the funeral?’ he inquired politely.
‘All but Fred’s wife. She’s having her third, and the doctor thought it was safer not.’
‘Yes, I’m sure he was right. And what about your lads, then, Mrs Jessopp?’ said Morcar. ‘I’ve one with me, I think, at Daisy?’
‘That’s right, he’s in the press room at Daisy. That’s the eldest, Fred. And Alf, he’s a policeman in Wakefield.’
‘Really!’
‘Yes. He’s a sergeant, doing well. And Clarice, she’s married, of course. Down South they’ve gone. They’re all married; I have eight grandchildren, Mr Morcar.’
‘Splendid,’ said Morcar heartily. ‘You won’t be lonely, then.’
Mrs Jessopp’s fresh face clouded. ‘None of them are very near,’ she said. ‘Clarice wants me to go live with them, but I don’t think I shall. Near London, it is. I shouldn’t feel at home down there. But I don’t know what I shall do, yet.’
‘Mrs Jessopp,’ said Morcar on an impulse. ‘Come and keep house for me.’
‘I don’t think I should be equal to it, Mr Morcar,’ said Mrs Jessopp shyly.
‘Mrs Jessopp, you kept house for me for years, at one time.’
‘But that’s a long time ago. You’ve grander ideas now.
Mrs Oldroyd, she’s from the South and that.’
‘I must tell you in confidence,’ said Morcar, ‘that Mrs Oldroyd may be leaving us. She may marry again. I think she will. She thinks she hasn’t made up her mind yet, but I think she has.’
‘A
h. It’s Nat Armitage, isn’t it,’ agreed Mrs Jessopp, nodding.
There was no reason, Morcar told himself, why he should feel vexed that Armitage’s feeling for Jennifer should be common knowledge, but all the same he had that feeling. He did not intend, however, to show it.
‘So you’ve heard rumours,’ he said pleasantly.
‘Well, yes. Alfred noticed it sometimes when he drove Mrs Oldroyd to concerts and such. Mr Armitage seemed often to be there, you know.’
‘Yes. Well, she’s been a real daughter to me, and deserves all the happiness she can find. But it’s my grand-daughter who’s worrying me, you see. She needs care.’
‘Little Susie. A sweet little thing, Alfred said, but frosted, like, by losing her father.’
‘You’re very fond of children, and good with them,’ said Morcar.
‘My own have grown up well, and that’s a fact,’ said Mrs Jessopp. A more cheerful note had come into her voice, she smiled slightly and unclasped her hands.
‘Well, think it over, and talk it over with Clarice and your sons,’ said Morcar. ‘I’ll let you have a note about wages in a day or two.’
‘It wouldn’t be the wages that’d worry me, Mr Morcar,’ said Mrs Jessopp with dignity. ‘I know I can rely on you to do what’s right, and Alfred has left quite a tidy bit, you know, being in good work all these years, and there’s his insurance, and the children are all doing well. But something useful for me to do, that—’ She paused and looked at Morcar; but knowing the West Riding character, he knew better than to try to push her, and simply smiled encouragement. ‘That might be different. That might be different,’ concluded Mrs Jessopp, slightly tossing her head.
18. Susie
Attacking his boiled breakfast egg with the appropriate spoon one autumn morning, Morcar gave a violent start - a portion had broken off and now flew vigorously through the air. Susie broke into a merry laugh. It was the first time since she came to England that Morcar had heard her laugh, and he was delighted by the sound.
‘What’s the joke?’ he said.
Susie continued to laugh, and Chuff also grinned widely.
‘It’s not a real egg. Grandfather,’ he said.
Morcar looked down at the egg, and perceived that it was in fact completely hollow, and composed of thick pottery, suitably coloured.
‘Why, you naughty little pussy, Susie; he said, laughing. ‘You young scamp! Poor Grandfather! No egg for breakfast!’
‘It was Chuff’s idea,’ said Susie, laughing again. ‘We saw it in Woolworth’s.’
‘Run along and get grandfather’s real egg from Mrs Jessopp, dear,’ said Jennifer.
It was clear that all three - it was term-time and Jonathan of course was in Oxford - had shared the secret of the artificial egg, but Jennifer’s smile struck Morcar as rather faint. It occurred to him that whereas in previous years the occupants of Stanney Royd had been one-and-a-half Morcars and two Oldroyd’s (counting old Mrs Morcar as a half), at present there were three Morcars and only one Oldroyd. Jennifer might well feel outnumbered ~ and an imitation egg was rather too childish a joke to appeal to Edward Harington’s daughter. She smiled kindly, but did not really find it funny, whereas the three Morcars certainly did.
A few days later - it was evening, and Morcar sat in his den checking some figures - Susie came in; she sidled up to him and laid a hand on the arm of his chair.
‘Well, Susie,’ said Morcar encouragingly.
‘Pussy,’ said Susie, laughing. ‘That’s what you called me, Grandfather. Pussy.’
’Very well,’ agreed Morcar good-humouredly. ‘Pussy. That’s a nice name for a little girl.’
‘Just between ourselves. A kind of secret.’
‘Certainly,’ agreed Morcar, touched. He put his arm round the child and hugged her to him. ‘What do you want, Pussy, eh?’
Susie swayed back and forth within the circle of his arm for a few moments in hesitation, then looking down got out with some difficulty:
‘Did you think it was unkind of me on Wednesday, Grandfather? About the egg?’
‘No, good gracious me, no,’ said Morcar, laughing. ‘I enjoyed the joke.’
‘Jonathan thinks it was rather unkind, he thinks you might have been hurt.’
‘Jonathan?’
‘I told him about it in a letter, and he thinks you might have been hurt.’
‘Oh, so you and Jonathan write letters to each other, do you?’ said Morcar, surprised.
‘Yes. He writes to me, so I write back. Chuff addressed the envelope for me the first time, but I can do it myself now.’
‘I see. Well, it was kind of Jonathan to mind about me being hurt, Pussy,’ said Morcar, not without irony, ‘but I wasn’t hurt at all.’
‘He is a very kind boy,’ said Susie earnestly.
19. Chuff
‘Nathan !’ called Chuff From The Yard.
‘He shouts for me just like you do, Mr Morcar,’ said Nathan, smiling.
‘Don’t be a sentimental old ass,’ growled Morcar, nevertheless unable to suppress a grin. ‘Call him up, will you? I must give him a serious talking-to.’
‘He won’t like that, Mr Morcar.’
‘I don’t expect him to.’
‘Will you come up, please, Mr Chuff? Mr Morcar wants to speak to you,’ said Nathan decorously from the window.
He withdrew with his hands full of letters and patterns as Chuff came with his slow slouching stride into the room.
‘Close the door,’ said Morcar in an ominous tone.
Chuff’s face clouded, he closed the door and returned to the desk with a look of sulky defiance, once frequent on his face but of late rarely seen.
‘Now, Chuff, what’s all this,’ said Morcar, picking up Chuff’s term report from the Annotsfield Technical College, which lay on his desk. ‘Your textile subjects are all good. In fact one or two of them are very good. I’ve no complaint there.’
‘Thanks,’ said Chuff, intending sarcasm.
‘But your English is poor and your mathematics almost as bad. Inattentive. Careless work. Could do better. Shows no interest. What does that mean, eh?’
‘It means I’m not interested,’ said Chuff, insolent.
‘Do you want to run a successful firm, or don’t you?’
‘English and Maths haven’t anything to do with textiles,’ said Chuff.
‘Oh yes, they have. How many times have I to tell you that it isn’t enough nowadays to make good stuff? You’ve got to sell it as well.’
‘It oughtn’t to be like that.’
‘Well, it is. Your handwriting, too, that’s appalling.’
‘You don’t write letters nowadays. You dictate them.’
‘You couldn’t dictate a readable letter to Miss Mellor to save your life.’
Chuff coloured, and was silent.
‘Maths, too. A businessman has to be good at Maths.’
‘You have an accountant,’ mumbled Chuff.
‘What’s the use of an accountant in Annotsfield when you’re in Berlin and customers are trying to knock down your price? You must be able to calculate quickly, in your head mind, no paperwork, what a ha’penny a yard off is going to cost you for the whole order and whether it’s worth it.’
‘I wish we had decimal coinage,’ muttered Chuff.
‘There I agree with you.’
‘I’ve no head for Maths.’
‘You’d better grow one, then. Besides, that’s not true. Your design work is good - yes it says here: Good and promising,’ said Morcar. ‘And that means good graph work.’ Mollified, he went on in a kinder tone: ‘Now don’t go and spoil everything by a fit of sulks, Chuff.’
‘I’m not having a fit of sulks,’ shouted Chuff suddenly, furious.
‘You’ve got to learn to write good English, and speak it too.’
‘Like Jonathan, I suppose,’ said Chuff.
‘Aye! Like Jonathan. He’s got English and no textiles, you’ve got textiles and no English. If I could mix you,
the result might be some good to me. Now Susie, now she’s come to herself, is much more fluent than you are, Chuff. How is that, eh?’
‘It’s just the way she is,’ muttered Chuff, in, however, a less hostile tone. He was fond and proud of his sister, Morcar had observed, though he concealed it as much as possible.
‘Well, come now, Chuff,’ said Morcar, descending gradually with each speech from the heights of anger towards ordinary relationship level: ‘Have another try. Careless, inattentive, could do better; I don’t like to see that, you know. It sounds a bit spineless.’
‘No!’ objected Chuff. ‘I’m not spineless.’
‘No, I don’t think you are. I’m pleased with your work in the mill, you know. Yes, you’ve made quite a good start. You don’t get on too badly with the men, either.’
‘I don’t stand any nonsense from them,’ said Chuff, flushing.
‘That’s all right so long as you realize they won’t stand any nonsense from you.’
Chuff sniffed. ‘They’re working up for a row in the far weaving shed,’ he said. ‘Those Pakistanis, you know.’
‘What’s the matter with them?’ said Morcar sharply.
‘Well, nothing, really. Just that black and white don’t get on together.’
‘Now, Chuff, you’ve got to forget all that prejudice -we’ve all got to forget all our prejudices, or we’re going to blow the world up between us.’
‘I can’t forget my father and mother,’ said Chuff, scowling.
‘No, and black folk can’t forget the slave trade, I daresay.’
‘Jonathan’s all wrong about it.’
‘Well, I don’t know,’ said Morcar carefully, uncertain whether or not to feel pleased. ‘He’s young and full of big ideas.’
‘And I’m young and not full of big ideas, is that it?’
‘I don’t know what your ideas are, Chuff; you don’t express them.’
Chuff swung away with such violence that he stamped his foot on the floor.
‘Now, Chuff,’ said Morcar in his kindest tone: ‘I shan’t say any more about it, but I look forward to seeing a different report next term.’
Chuff made a sound between a snort and a groan, and flung out of the office.
A Man of His Time Page 12
