The Forsyte Saga, Volume 1

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The Forsyte Saga, Volume 1 Page 11

by John Galsworthy


  Soames made a deprecating movement; he had been identified with a gentleman; not for a good deal of money now would he be classed with manufacturers. But his innate distrust of general principles revived. What the deuce was the good of talking about regularity and self-respect? It looked to him as if the house would be cold.

  ‘Irene can’t stand the cold!’ he said.

  ‘Ah!’ said Bosinney sarcastically. ‘Your wife! She doesn’t like the cold? I’ll see to that; she shan’t be cold! Look here!’ he pointed to four marks at regular intervals on the walls of the court ‘I’ve given you hot-water pipes in aluminium casings; you can get them with very good designs.’

  Soames looked suspiciously at these marks.

  ‘It’s all very well, all this,’ he said, ‘but what’s it going to cost?’

  The architect took a sheet of paper from his pocket.

  ‘The house, of course, should be built entirely of stone, but, as I thought you wouldn’t stand that, I’ve compromised for a facing. It ought to have a copper roof, but I’ve made it green slate. As it is, including metal work, it’ll cost you eight thousand five hundred.’

  ‘Eight thousand five hundred?’ said Soames. ‘Why, I gave you an outside limit of eight!’

  ‘Can’t be done for a penny less,’ replied Bosinney coolly. ‘You must take it or leave it!’

  It was the only way, probably, that such a proposition could have been made to Soames. He was nonplussed. Conscience told him to throw the whole thing up. But the design was good, and he knew it – there was completeness about it, and dignity; the servants’ apartments were excellent too. He would gain credit by living in a house like that – with such individual features, yet perfectly well-arranged.

  He continued poring over the plans, while Bosinney went into his bedroom to shave and dress.

  The two walked back to Montpelier Square in silence, Soames watching him out of the corner of his eye.

  The Buccaneer was rather a good-looking fellow – so he thought – when he was properly got up.

  Irene was bending over her flowers when the two men came in.

  She spoke of sending across the Park to fetch June.

  ‘No, no,’ said Soames, ‘we’ve still got business to talk over!’

  At lunch he was almost cordial, and kept pressing Bosinney to eat. He was pleased to see the architect in such high spirits and left him to spend the afternoon with Irene, while he stole off to his pictures, after his Sunday habit. At tea-time he came down to the drawing-room, and found them talking, as he expressed it, nineteen to the dozen.

  Unobserved in the doorway, he congratulated himself that things were taking the right turn. It was lucky she and Bosinney got on; she seemed to be falling into line with the idea of the new house.

  Quiet meditation among his pictures had decided him to spring the five hundred if necessary; but he hoped that the afternoon might have softened Bosinney’s estimates. It was so purely a matter which Bosinney could remedy if he liked; there must be a dozen ways in which he could cheapen the production of a house without spoiling the effect.

  He awaited, therefore, his opportunity till Irene was handing the architect his first cup of tea. A chink – of sunshine through the lace of the blinds warmed her cheek, shone in the gold of her hair, and in her soft eyes. Possibly the same gleam deepened Bosinney’s colour, gave the rather startled look to his face.

  Soames hated sunshine, and he at once got up to draw the blind. Then he took his own cup of tea from his wife, and said, more coldly than he had intended:

  ‘Can’t you see your way to do it for eight thousand after all? There must be a lot of little things you could alter.’

  Bosinney drank off his tea at a gulp, put down his cup, and answered:

  ‘Not one!’

  Soames saw that his suggestion had touched some unintelligible point of personal vanity.

  ‘Well,’ he agreed, with sulky resignation; ‘you must have it your own way, I suppose.’

  A few minutes later Bosinney rose to go, and Soames rose too, to see him off the prémises. The architect seemed in absurdly high spirits. After watching him walk away at a swinging pace, Soames returned moodily to the drawing-room where Irene was putting away the music, and, moved by an uncontrollable spasm of curiosity, he asked:

  ‘Well, what do you think of “The Buccaneer”?’

  He looked at the carpet while waiting for her answer, and he had to wait some time.

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said at last.

  ‘Do you think he’s good-looking?’

  Irene smiled. And it seemed to Soames that she was mocking him.

  ‘Yes,’ she answered; ‘very’.

  Chapter Nine

  DEATH OF AUNT ANN

  THERE came a morning at the end of September when Aunt Ann was unable to take from Smither’s hands the insignia of personal dignity. After one look at the old face, the doctor, hurriedly sent for, announced that Miss Forsyte had passed away in her sleep.

  Aunts Juley and Hester were overwhelmed by the shock. They had never imagined such an ending. Indeed, it is doubtful whether they had ever realized that an ending was bound to come. Secretly they felt it unreasonable of Ann to have left them like this without a word, without even a struggle. It was unlike her.

  Perhaps what really affected them so profoundly was the thought that a Forsyte should have let go her grasp on life. If one, then why not all!

  It was a full hour before they could make up their minds to tell Timothy. If only it could be kept from him! If only it could be broken to him by degrees!

  And long they stood outside his door whispering together. And when it was over they whispered together again.

  He would feel it more, they were afraid, as time went on. Still, he had taken it better than could have been expected. He would keep his bed, of course!

  They separated, crying quietly.

  Aunt Juley stayed in her room, prostrated by the blow. Her face, discoloured by tears, was divided into compartments by the little ridges of pouting flesh which had swollen with emotion. It was impossible to conceive of life without Ann, who had lived with her for seventy-three years, broken only by the short interregnum of her married life, which seemed now so unreal. At fixed intervals she went to her drawer, and took from beneath the lavender bags a fresh pocket-handkerchief. Her warm heart could not bear the thought that Ann was lying there so cold.

  Aunt Hester, the silent, the patient, that backwater of the family energy, sat in the drawing-room, where the blinds were drawn; and she, too, had wept at first, but quietly, without visible effect. Her guiding principle, the conservation of energy, did not abandon her in sorrow. She sat, slim, motionless, studying the grate, her hands idle in the lap of her black silk dress. They would want to rouse her into doing something, no doubt. As if there were any good in that! Doing something would not bring back Ann! Why worry her?

  Five o’clock brought three of the brothers, Jolyon and James and Swithin: Nicholas was at Yarmouth, and Roger had a bad attack of gout. Mrs Hayman had been by herself earlier in the day, and, after seeing Ann, had gone away, leaving a message for Timothy – which was kept from him – that she ought to have been told sooner. In fact, there was a feeling amongst them all that they ought to have been told sooner, as though they had missed something; and James said:

  ‘I knew how it’d be; I told you she wouldn’t last through the summer.’

  Aunt Hester made no reply; it was nearly October, but what was the good of arguing; some people were never satisfied.

  She sent up to tell her sister that the brothers were there. Mrs Small came down at once. She had bathed her face, which was still swollen, and though she looked severely at Swithin’s trousers, for they were of light blue – he had come straight from the Club, where the news had reached him – she wore a more cheerful expression than usual, the instinct for doing the wrong thing being even now too strong for her.

  Presently all five went up to look at the body. Unde
r the pure white sheet a quilted counterpane had been placed, for now, more than ever, Aunt Ann had need of warmth; and, the pillows removed, her spine and head rested flat, with the semblance of their life-long inflexibility; the coif banding the top of her brow was drawn on either side to the level of the ears, and between it and the sheet her face, almost as white, was turned with closed eyes to the faces of her brothers and sisters. In its extraordinary peace the face was stronger than ever, nearly all bone now under the scarce-wrinkled parchment of skin – square jaw and chin, cheek-bones, forehead with hollow temples, chiselled nose – the fortress of an unconquerable spirit that had yielded to death, and in its upward sightlessness seemed trying to regain that spirit, to regain the guardianship it had just laid down.

  Swithin took but one look at the face, and left the room; the sight, he said afterwards, made him very queer. He went downstairs shaking the whole house, and, seizing his hat, clambered into his brougham, without giving any directions to the coachman. He was driven home, and all the evening sat in his chair without moving.

  He could take nothing for dinner but a partridge, with an imperial pint of champagne.…

  Old Jolyon stood at the bottom of the bed, his hands folded in front of him. He alone of those in the room remembered the death of his mother, and though he looked at Ann, it was of her that he was thinking. Ann was an old woman, but death had come to her at last – death came to all! His face did not move, his gaze seemed travelling from very far.

  Aunt Hester stood beside him. She did not cry now, tears were exhausted – her nature refused to permit a further escape of force; she twisted her hands, looking, not at Ann, but from side to side, seeking some way of escaping the effort of realization.

  Of all the brothers and sisters James manifested the most emotion. Tears rolled down the parallel furrows of his thin face; where he should go now to tell his troubles he did not know; Juley was no good, Hester worse than useless! He felt Ann’s death more than he had ever thought he should; this would upset him for weeks!

  Presently Aunt Hester stole out, and Aunt Juley began moving about, doing ‘what was necessary’, so that twice she knocked against something. Old Jolyon, roused from his reverie, that reverie of the long, long past, looked sternly at her, and went away. James alone was left by the bedside; glancing stealthily round, to see that he was not observed, he twisted his long body down, placed a kiss on the dead forehead, then he, too, hastily left the room. Encountering Smither in the hall, he began to ask her about the funeral, and, finding that she knew nothing, complained bitterly that, if they didn’t take care, everything would go wrong. She had better send for Mr Soames – he knew all about that sort of thing; her master was very much upset, he supposed – he would want looking after; as for her mistresses, they were no good – they had no gumption! They would be ill too, he shouldn’t wonder. She had better send for the doctor; it was best to take things in time. He didn’t think his sister Ann had had the best opinion; if she’d had Blank she would have been alive now. Smither might send to Park Lane any time she wanted advice. Of course, his carriage was at their service for the funeral. He supposed she hadn’t such a thing as a glass of claret and a biscuit – he had had no lunch!

  The days before the funeral passed quietly. It had long been known, of course, that Aunt Ann had left her little property to Timothy. There was, therefore, no reason for the slightest agitation. Soames, who was sole executor, took charge of all arrangements, and in due course sent out the following invitation to every male member of-the family:

  To —

  Your presence is requested at the funeral of Miss Ann Forsyte, in Highgate Cemetery, at noon of Oct. 1st. Carriages will meet at The Bower, Bayswater Road, at 10.45. No flowers by request.

  R.S.V.P.

  The morning came, cold, with a high, grey, London sky, and at half past ten the first carriage, that of James, drove up. It contained James and his son-in-law Dartie, a fine man, with a square chest, buttoned very tightly into a frock-coat, and a sallow, fattish face adorned with dark, well-curled moustaches, and that incorrigible commencement of whisker which, eluding the strictest atttempts at shaving, seems the mark of something deeply ingrained in the personality of the shaver, being especially noticeable in men who speculate.

  Soames, in his capacity of executor, received the guests, for Timothy still kept his bed; he would get up after the funeral; and Aunts Juley and Hester would not be coming down till all was over, when it was understood there would be lunch for anyone who cared to come back. The next to arrive was Roger, still limping from the gout, and encircled by three of his sons – young Roger, Eustace, and Thomas. George, the remaining son, arrived almost immediately afterwards in a hansom, and paused in the hall to ask Soames how he found undertaking pay.

  They disliked each other.

  Then came two Haymans – Giles and Jesse – perfectly silent, and very well dressed, with special creases down their evening trousers. Then old Jolyon alone. Next, Nicholas, with a healthy colour in his face, and a carefully veiled sprightliness in every movement of his head and body. One of his sons followed him, meek and subdued. Swithin Forsyte and Bosinney arrived at the same moment, and stood bowing precedence to each other, but on the door opening they tried to enter together; they renewed their apologies in the hall, and Swithin, settling his stock, which had become disarranged in the struggle, very slowly mounted the stairs. The other Hayman, two married sons of Nicholas, together with Tweetyman, Spender, and Warry, the husbands of married Forsyte and Hayman daughters. The company was then complete, twenty-one in all, not a male member of the family being absent but Timothy and young Jolyon.

  Entering the scarlet and green drawing-room, whose apparel made so vivid a setting for their unaccustomed costumes, each tried nervously to find a seat, desirous of hiding the emphatic blackness of his trousers. There seemed a sort of indecency in that blackness and in the colour of their gloves – a sort of exaggeration of the feelings; and many cast shocked looks of secret envy at ‘The Buccaneer’, who had no gloves, and was wearing grey trousers. A subdued hum of conversation rose, no one speaking of the departed, but each asking after the other, as though thereby casting an indirect libation to this event, which they had come to honour.

  And presently James said:

  ‘Well, I think we ought to be starting.’

  They went downstairs, and, two and two, as they had been told off in strict precedence, mounted the carriages.

  The hearse started at a foot’s pace; the carriages moved slowly after. In the first went old Jolyon with Nicholas; in the second, the twins, Swithin and James; in the third, Roger and young Roger; Soames, young Nicholas, George, and Bosinney followed in the fourth. Each of the other carriages, eight in all, held three or four of the family; behind them came the doctor’s brougham; then, at a decent interval, cabs containing family clerks and servants; and at the very end, one containing nobody at all, but bringing the total cortège up to the number of thirteen.

  So long as the procession kept to the highway of the Bays-water Road, it retained the foot’s pace, but, turning into less important thoroughfares, it soon broke into a trot, and so proceeded, with intervals of walking in the more fashionable streets, until it arrived. In the first carriage old Jolyon and Nicholas were talking of their wills. In the second the twins, after a single attempt, had lapsed into complete silence; both were rather deaf, and the exertion of making themselves heard was too great. Only once James broke this silence:

  ‘I shall have to be looking about for some ground somewhere. What arrangements have you made, Swithin?’

  And Swithin, fixing him with a dreadful stare, answered:

  ‘Don’t talk to me about such things!’

  In the fourth carriage a disjointed conversation was carried on in the intervals of looking out to see how far they had got, George remarking, ‘Well, it was really time that the poor old lady “went”.’ He didn’t believe in people living beyond seventy. Young Nicholas replied mildly that
the rule didn’t seem to apply to the Forsytes. George said he himself intended to commit suicide at sixty. Young Nicholas, smiling and stroking a long chin, didn’t think his father would like that theory; he had made a lot of money since he was sixty. Well, seventy was the outside limit; it was then time, George said, for them to go and leave their money to their children. Soames, hitherto silent, here joined in; he had not forgotten the remark about the ‘undertaking’, and, lifting his eyelids almost imperceptibly, said it was all very well for people who never made money to talk. He himself intended to live as long as he could. This was a hit at George, who was notoriously hard up. Bosinney muttered abstractedly ‘Hear, hear!’ and, George yawning, the conversation dropped.

  Upon arriving, the coffin was borne into the chapel, and, two by two, the mourners filed in behind it. This guard of men, all attached to the dead by the bond of kinship, was an impressive and singular sight in the great city of London, with its overwhelming diversity of life, its innumerable vocations, pleasures, duties, its terrible hardness, its terrible call to individualism.

  The family had gathered to triumph over all this, to give a show of tenacious unity, to illustrate gloriously that law of property underlying the growth of their tree, by which it had thriven and spread, trunk and branches, the sap flowing through all, the full growth reached at the appointed time. The spirit of the old woman lying in her last sleep had called them to this demonstration. It was her final appeal to that unity which had been their strength – it was her final triumph that she had died while the tree was yet whole.

  She was spared the watching of the branches just out beyond the point of balance. She could not look into the hearts of her followers. The same law that had worked in her, bringing her up from a tall, straight-backed slip of a girl to a woman strong and grown, from a woman grown to a woman old, angular, feeble, almost witch-like, with individuality all sharpened and sharpened, as all rounding from the world’s contact fell off from her – that same law would work, was working, in the family she had watched like a mother.

 

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