He would not be drawn. He shuffled, and she felt that he was taking stock of her, unfavourably. At the same time she divined a loyal devotion to Miles.
“Mr. Vane-Merrick,” she said impulsively, “strikes me as a very remarkable person.”
“Oh yes,” said Bretton; “yes.” He seemed inclined to say more, but relapsed abruptly into the same reticence.
She was nonplussed.
“How stupid of me, Mr. Bretton,—won’t you have a drink? I believe there’s some whisky in the cupboard. No, don’t move; let me get it for you.”
She half expected him to say that he did not drink, but he let her go to the cupboard and find a glass, a syphon, and the bottle of whisky. She was relieved to see that he would accept a generous helping. He watched her pretty hands as she set down the bottle.
“Thanks,” he said, and added “Here’s luck.”
“Luck to Mr. Vane-Merrick at the next election,” the replied.
Bretton grunted. Then he drank.
“Has he a great future, do you think?”
“A great future, Mrs. Jarrold? Will he have a seat in the next Cabinet, do you mean?” His tone was full of scorn.
“I suppose I do mean thatt,—I don’t know much about it.”
“He might have,” said Bretton, “under a Tory government.”
He stopped again, with the same air of leaving things unsaid.
“But he isn’t a Tory.”
She refilled his glass.
“Mr. Bretton,—forgive my ignorance,—but isn’t it rather remarkable that he shouldn’t be a Tory.”
“Given his birth, you mean?” said Bretton, looking at her with a contempt that made her wince.
“Well . . .” said Evelyn. Any comment on this remark could only have been couched in terms which she could not bring herself to pronounce. She let it go, rather lamely, saying, “Well, one would expect to find someone of his sort on the safe side.”
“Of his sort, yes, but not him.”
For the first time, Bretton’s appreciation peeped out.
“Thatt’s all the more to his credit, Mr. Bretton.”
“Yes.”
She had said the wrong thing; she had implied patronage. She tried an extreme simplicity, which was not wholly insincere.
“Mr. Bretton, I do believe very truly in Mr. Vane-Merrick’s ability. Thatt’s why I started talking to you about him, in this rather impertinent way. I hope you won’t resent it.”
“Ability,—he’s got plenty of ability.”
“Perhaps his views aren’t extreme enough to please you?” said Evelyn, smiling.
Bretton did not answer; he only emptied his glass. Evelyn could not flatter herself that she had made much headway. She was relieved when Miles came in with Caesar and Dan at his heels, and a blast of cold air.
Bretton was not sulky with Miles. He relaxed at once. He was reserved still, but not sulky. Miles chaffed him, and he consented to grin. Evelyn felt that he was won over by Miles even against what he might consider to be his better judgment. She liked Bretton now, but he still made her acutely uncomfortable. She was thankful when he—somewhat ungraciously—declined Miles’ invitation to stay to luncheon.
Dan burst out in indignation.
“What a horrible man, Miles! I nearly hit him for being so rude to you.”
“He hasn’t got your Eton manners, Dan.”
Dan looked taken aback.
“I don’t understand. Surely manners matter? You’ve got good manners yourself.”
“So has your uncle Geoffrey.”
“And you mean,—give you Bretton every time?”
“Yes, give me Bretton every time. Though he may cut my throat before he’s done with me.”
Evelyn got a letter from Ruth. It was written on Newlands writing-paper, and there was a coronet now instead of a crest on the flap of the envelope.
Jan. 10th, 1932.
DEAREST EVELYN—I don’t know where you are, so I send this letter to your flat to be forwarded. We are still here. Uncle Evan has left. We think he had a row with Grandpapa, but we don’t quite know. Anyhow he has left, and we don’t mention his name. We think better not. Grandpapa says sarcastic things about him from time to time. Grandpapa is very sarcastic altogether. He says what a look-out for the country when a lot of ignorant young men think they can run it. Such as Miles Vane-Merrick. He says there is no sense left anywhere. It is rather dull here. The Beckwiths came to tea. What lovely weather. It doesn’t look as though Dan would get any skating. I hope you are both in the country, enjoying yourselves. Everybody seems to be out of London, so I don’t suppose London would be much fun just now. I suppose you will be going back there before long. Let me know when you do. In the meantime I send my love, as Mother would if she were in the room.—Your loving
RUTH.
P.S.—When you were staying with Miles Vane-Merrick (I think you said you and Dan were going to his old castle) was Princess Charskaya there? I am told that she and M. V.-M. have been having an affair for years!!!
P.S.S.—Minnie has been simply unbearable. She put a mouse into Cocoa’s bed (a live one) and two hairbrushes into mine.
Evelyn was not unduly upset by this letter. When she first read it, she smiled compassionately and thought “Poor little Ruth.” Ruth was no stylist, and her methods were crude. She was sorry for Ruth, but Ruth was really so crude and raw as to be negligible. Ruth had no importance at all. She was sorry for Ruth, but really one must be ruthless. She made the pun deliberately. It seemed to absolve her from any responsibility towards Ruth.
Why should she feel any responsibility towards Ruth? Miles was fair game; and if she had snared Miles when Ruth had failed to snare him, thatt was Ruth’s funeral. They had started at scratch; Ruth, even, had known him first. She could absolve herself from any feeling of guilt towards Ruth.
Then Ruth’s letter began to fester. Not very seriously. She scoffed at herself for remembering it even after it was thrown into the fire. Betsy Charskaya . . .
“Miles,” she said, “you know Betsy Charskaya?” He looked up from his book.
“Betsy Charskaya?” he said, “Yes. of course I do. Why?” “What do you think of her?”
“I don’t think anything. A parasite. I suppose circumstances have driven her.”
“How well do you know her?”
“Well, I suppose I’ve played bridge with her three or four times. Why? What made you think of her?”
“I met her the other day in a dressmaker’s shop. You don’t know her at all intimately?”
“God forbid.”
No, Miles thought very little about women. Thatt seemed certain. It was bad enough to have to compete against his book, and against Bretton and all that Bretton stood for,—a much more serious rivalry. A rivalry, indeed, against which she could not and must not compete. She must be content to absorb one half of his life, and must count herself lucky in the apportionment. It was hard for her to compromise, with her domineering temperament and the excess of her love for Miles, but she was determined to be wise. Miles had to be ridden with a light rein.
He seemed to know something of the struggle in her mind and to take a wicked pleasure in testing and humiliating her. Exasperated, she accused him of sadistic qualities. He laughed and said that she had them too. He looked at her with a hard, mocking gleam in his eyes. She was frightened of him when he looked at her like thatt, seeing how pitiless he might be if he chose. Then at other times he would be so charming, so tender, and so boyishly simple, that she forgot her fears.
She wondered, however, whether she would be able to control herself if he displayed any interest in another woman.
He surprised her by asking her what she thought their future would be. At thatt, she turned on him a look so anguished that even he was touched.
“You say thatt, knowing quite well that it is enough.”
“For the moment, yes. But . . . oh well, never mind.”
“Tell me, Evelyn, could you be jealous?”
“Atrociously,” she said in a low voice.
“Yes, I need not have asked. I see that I must be careful, or the mutilated body of a young man will be found under a hedge in Kent.”
“Don’t tease me, Miles.”
“But I like teasing you.”
“Yes, I know you do. Tease me about something else. It’s only too horribly probable that you will make me jealous before you’ve done with me. I don’t want to anticipate it. I want to live in the present.”
“Wise woman.”
“No, Miles, I’m afraid I’m not very wise.”
He let her go back to London finally, because he was obliged to go there himself. Dan insisted that he should come frequently to the flat. He pressed invitations upon Miles while Evelyn silently listened, feeling that fate in this respect was kind to her. In spite of Miles’ sarcasm, she still shrank from the Jarrolds’ inquisitive criticism of her sudden intimacy with this young man. They would be bound to find it out sooner or later, even if Ruth did not make it her business to tell them,—and Evelyn had a shrewd suspicion that Ruth, for sore and private reasons, would keep her own counsel,—they would be bound to find it out, because in the close family circle which the Jarrolds traced round all their members nothing could long remain hidden; the connexion was too well maintained, too constant. If Mrs. Jarrold,—Lady Orlestone—or Mrs. Geoffrey, or Evan, should come to the flat at tea-time three times in the week, as they were apt severally to do, having the true bourgeois conception of a nice, smug, cosy, family life within the clan, and if one of them were to coincide with Miles on each occasion, then it would not be long before they began to compare notes and to draw the inevitable conclusion. Hitherto Evelyn, beyond a vague boredom, had never questioned their right to arrive unannounced at her flat at all hours of the day. She herself sprang from the same bourgeois tradition. She had accepted, as a matter of course, the theory that one was fond of one’s relations because they were one’s relations. But now Miles’ influence was stretching her ideas to a greater elasticity; his unconventionality was contagious; she grew impatient of this assumption of family rights over her privacy.
She chose to put it in those terms in her own mind; she chose to tell herself that these incursions into her private life were intolerable. In truth, she was discovering only that love brings its peculiar complications. She wanted to be free for her lover.
She despised herself for considering the opinion of the Jarrolds, yet so strong was her training that she could not help considering it. Thatt was what made Miles’ renewed suggestion of marriage so especially tempting. Absurdly, she did not want the old Jarrolds to criticise Miles for compromising her in the eyes of the world. Yet she knew she must never consent to marry him. It would not be fair. She clung to thatt, as a principle.
But if she could put half the responsibility on to Dan, she was saved. If she could represent Miles as Dan’s friend, philosopher, and guide, she might hoodwink the old Jarrolds. They were simple and unsuspicious souls; or, if not simple and unsuspicious, they were at least self-deceiving enough to seize on any pretext to excuse their daughter-in-law in their own eyes.
Whether they would approve of Miles as friend, philosopher, and guide to Dan, was another matter.
Then there were her own servants. She was even more ashamed of shrinking before the scrutiny of her servants than of shrinking before the scrutiny of the Jarrolds. She knew that she ought to be above such things. Yet she foresaw with dread the sly and sneering expression with which Mason, or Privett,—especially Privett, since she was probably committed to Privett for life, whereas Mason might leave at any moment,—would open the door to announce “Mr. Vane-Merrick!” and would shut it again, retiring to the kitchen to make furtive jokes at her expense.
She hated herself for this timorousness. She knew only too well that it had never crossed Miles’ mind that the Mundays might speculate as to their relationship. Anyway, the Mundays probably hadn’t. Or, if they had, they had accepted it in a straightforward country way. They had probably said, at most, that it was a pity their young master hadn’t taken up with a lady nearer his own age; that he might have married and begotten an heir. Several heirs. Sons and daughters. (She wished now that she had taken more trouble to win over the Mundays.) But Mason and Privett were London servants. Mason would snigger; and Privett would sourly disapprove.
But if she could say to Privett, “Mr. Vane-Merrick is coming this evening to see Mr. Dan,”—then, again, she would be saved.
Dan would go back to school at the end of January. But by thatt time Miles would be established as a constant visitor. She knew the value of an established habit to minds like Privett’s.
“By the way, Privett,” she said, “Mr. Vane-Merrick may be coming this evening to see Mr. Dan. I may be out when he comes.”
“Will they want dinner?” Privett was always grumpy.
“Dinner? Oh, no.—Oh, well, yes, perhaps it would be just as well to provide dinner. Mr. Dan may persuade Mr. Vane-Merrick to stay for dinner,—you know what Mr. Dan is. He doesn’t realise that shops shut at six. Boys don’t. Order a grouse, will you, Privett? And some oysters. And tell Mason to lay three places.”
She stayed out late, deliberately, in order to keep Miles waiting. With her return to London she had regained something of her feminine self-assurance. She was no longer so much at Miles’ mercy that he could make her tramp in his wake across muddy fields. It was a cold, snowy evening, and she longed for nothing so much as for the comfort of her own warm room and Miles’ presence there. Well, Miles might solace himself with Dan. She would not trot to Miles’ beck and call. Snug in her own car, she had herself driven to Rivers and Roberts’.
She did not want in the least to go to Rivers and Roberts’. She wanted to be at home with Miles. She really hated, now, the luxury and extravagance of Rivers and Roberts’. She compared the mincing obsequiousness of Mr. Rivers with the sullen reticence of Bretton. Disquieted, she was more than usually charming to Mr. Rivers; more than usually discerning about the creations he paraded for her benefit. He decided that Mrs. Tommy Jarrold was really, from every point of view, one of his most satisfactory clients. She was a charming woman and she did credit to his clothes.
“We haven’t seen you for some time, Mrs. Jarrold. We’ve missed you,—yes, I declare we have.”
“I’ve been in the country, Mr. Rivers.”
“In the country? At this time of year? Surely thatt’s very unlike you, Mrs. Jarrold? Now, the country in summer . . . well, one can put up with it. But in January!”
She remembered walking with Miles up and down the garden path, with the tower pricking up into a clean sky.
“Dreadfully cold and muddy, Mr. Rivers! But one can’t always do what one likes.”
He bowed:
“I quite appreciate thatt, Mrs. Jarrold.—I hope Lord Orlestone is well?”
So he thought she had been at Newlands.
“Very well indeed, thank you. He is really wonderful for his age.”
“Seventy, is it?”
“Seventy-five.”
“Dear me!—And thatt handsome boy of yours, Mrs. Jarrold? Let me see, he must be the heir? Fourteen, is he?”
“Nearly eighteen, I’m afraid.”
“Dear me! How time does fly. Nearly eighteen! No one could believe it, to look at his mother,—if I may say so without impertinence. Nearly eighteen! Tut, tut!—And will he be going back to Eton,—he is at Eton, of course?— or is he leaving?”
> “No, he goes back at the end of this month.”
“And then what will you be doing, Mrs. Jarrold? Not staying in this horribly damp island, of course? Oh dear me, no! The sun,—the sun calls us at this time of year, does it not? The Riviera, perhaps? Or Egypt? But not England,—oh dear me, no! One must get away, must one not, if only for the sake of one’s health?”
“Are you going away, Mr. Rivers?”
He sighed and displayed the palms of his hands.
“Alas, Mrs. Jarrold! Business obligations, you know. Perhaps a little later on . . . A brief little dash down to Cannes.”
“Indeed, I can’t imagine what Madame Louise would do without you.”
“You are too kind, Mrs. Jarrold. You flatter me. Madame Louise is not here today, I fear; a slight chill . . . Oh, nothing at all. I have sent one of our young ladies with some grapes. And a spray of gardenias. A very chaste perfume, I always think, do you not agree? I see you have a spray of rosemary pinned into your coat. Very original,—very becoming. Not orchids,—no. Rosemary. Far more subtle. There are so few flowers at this time of year, are there not? Nothing but orchids and gardenias. And lilac of course; but thatt is scarcely for the buttonhole. Rosemary,—yes, I must remember thatt. Rosemary for remembrance, I think? Ah, very subtle, very charming. We all have something we would like to remember, have we not?—Now come, Mrs. Jarrold, I mustn’t waste your time talking about the things we would all like to remember. Where are my young ladies? I must clap my hands . . .”
He clapped them.
All the time, she had been thinking only of what clothes she could buy to please Miles. She knew his tastes by now. She would go home with something new and exquisite to wear at dinner.
Mr. Rivers, an impatient little autocrat in his own domain, clapped his hands again.
She came home to find Dan alone.
“At last, Mummy! Miles was here,—he’s gone.”
“Gone?”
“Yes, he said he couldn’t wait. Granny came too.”
“Did she find you with Miles?”
“Yes. Why were you so late, Mummy? Did you forget Miles was coming? He stayed for about an hour,—of course poor Granny was terribly in the way,—we couldn’t talk about anything,—such a bore. Miles talked to her about rhododendrons. Miles seems to know something about everything. Granny was delighted, I thought she’d never go away. You might have remembered, Mummy.”
Family History Page 13
