Nothing

by Henry Green

  “One bit of jewellery I always did swear could be worth a bust was the engagement ring.”

  “Oh I know you don’t like it or him,” she wailed, sharply withdrawing her hand.

  “Now my dear,” he interrupted “we can’t have this! You’re overwrought. Good God you’ve your own lives to lead haven’t you? I think the good ring very suitable, so there.”

  “Do you,” she murmured seeming mollified. “And you won’t so much as breathe to Mrs. Weatherby about the other business?”

  “See here what sort and kind of a parent d’you take me for? Why naturally not,” he replied.

  •

  Knowing his daughter was to be out of London the next forty-eight hours on some trip in connection with her Government job Mr. Pomfret at once got on the telephone to Jane and asked the lady round the next day to what he called a scratch meal at his flat.

  After giving her a drink he led the way into the next room where a spectacular supper was laid out and which began with caviar. Once she had exclaimed at this and he had been able to sketch in the devious methods he employed to lay hands on such a delicacy, he so to speak cut right down into the heart of things by saying,

  “Well I’ve seen the ring.”

  “Oh my dear,” she replied “so have I!”

  He considered Mrs. Weatherby very carefully at this response but she was eating her sturgeon’s eggs with a charming concentration that was also the height of graceful greed, her shining mouth and brilliant teeth snapping just precisely enough to show enthusiasm without haste, the great eyes reverently lowered on her plate.

  “Did you help Philip choose?”

  “Me? Dear no,” she answered, carefully selecting a piece of toast.

  “I know better than to interfere ever,” she said. “But you make me feel such a perfect fool John,” she continued. “There was I the other evening wanting so much to be told how you would manage when you had to live alone and now you put me to absolute shame with a lovely choice meal like this.”

  “Oh we don’t do it every day,” he laughed then turned serious once more. “And do you like the ring Jane?”

  “No” she said “who could? I was so vexed.”

  “I would only say it to you my dear,” Mr. Pomfret announced “but the boy must have gone to ——’s” and he gave the name of a shop which extensively advertised cheap engagement hoops.

  She raised her eyes to his from the caviar with reluctance and a charming smile.

  “One has to be so careful never to butt in,” she explained “or rather, and am I being wicked, never to seem that one is arranging their little affairs for them. I tried to make him give dear Mary a solitaire darling Mother left me in her will and that somehow I’ve not had the heart to sell.” She now looked down at her plate again and went on unhurriedly eating caviar. Then she squeezed some more lemon with an entrancing grimace of alarm, presumably lest a drop lodge in the comer of an eye. “How delicious and good this is,” she sighed.

  “And Philip wouldn’t have it?” he asked.

  “Philip simply wouldn’t,” she confirmed.

  There was a pause.

  “Then I had so hoped,” she calmly went on at last “for you know what he is about family feelings,—well I don’t say this ring of Mother’s was enormously valuable or of course it would have gone long before now, one can’t go round London barefoot after all,—but in a way the thing’s an heirloom and he’d only have had to get it lined because of course Mother had such small bones.”

  “You don’t think Mary’s fingers are like bananas?”

  “John!” she screamed, eyeing him in alarm. “I don’t find that funny do you?”

  “Well all right then,” he said. “But what are we to do about this ring he’s given her?”

  “Doesn’t she like it?”

  “You know how you felt just now yourself Jane.”

  “Oh yes but we mustn’t make everything more difficult for them dear. You realize it’s not going to be easy for those two sweet loves our being such old friends you and I. But has Mary actually put it into words about the thing?”

  “No. How could she?”

  “She’s wonderful! So d’you think we would be absolutely wise to interfere?”

  “Yet you can’t let her walk round with that on her left hand Jane.”

  Mrs. Weatherby faced him squarely at this.

  “Wait a moment John please,” she said in a level voice. “Exactly what have you on your mind?”

  “Awkward,” he grumbled. “Damned awkward! It’s simply as an old friend I feel that it may reflect on you and yours,” he said.

  She pushed away from in front of her the plate which by now was dry as if a cat had licked it.

  “But my dear,” she cried “on me? After all I’ve done? When he wouldn’t have darling Mother’s which I’m almost sure Mary has never even seen. You mean poor Philip’s one’s too cheap?”

  “I do.”

  “I don’t call fifteen guineas cheap.”

  “Not for what he got.”

  “Oh my dear I can’t think when I’ve been so upset in my life,” she gasped but not altogether convincingly.

  He laid a hand over hers which she did not withdraw.

  “To do a thing like that might come back on us both,” he said.

  “You mean our friends . . . ?”

  “Yes.”

  “What does Liz say?” she asked.

  “I don’t know for the very simple reason that I haven’t enquired,” he answered. “And I shan’t.”

  “So you’re just guessing, is that it John?”

  “I’ve lived enough in our lot not to have to ask.”

  He proceeded to serve Mrs. Weatherby with lobster mayonnaise.

  “Well if it all doesn’t come back on my poor shoulders . . .” she murmured. “When I’ve done nothing but my best.”

  “All the same Jane we must find something.”

  “But oh they’re so independent,” she wailed.

  “Can’t he give her another?”

  “What with?”

  “How d’you mean Jane, what with? You could sell the solitaire couldn’t you and let him have the proceeds?”

  “And he does go on so, that they must live on what they earn.”

  “Well my dear,” he said “we haven’t been into that together yet have we? The last time you’d just come from seeing Thicknesse and didn’t feel like it if you remember.”

  “No more I do now John.”

  “All right. I don’t wish to press you. But we shall have to take some step about this engagement ring or we might be a laughing stock.”

  “John,” she announced after a pause “sometimes I feel rather inclined to say ‘damn the children, they’re more trouble than they’re worth.’ ”

  “Well I don’t know about that Jane.”

  “Don’t you? But why can’t they do things the way we did?”

  “Money I suppose. Besides I wouldn’t care for ’em to get into the mess we got into.”

  “Now darling you’re not to speak so of what is still absolutely sacred to me. How delicious this lobster is! Where did you go to find it?”

  He told her.

  She ate with evident appreciation.

  “You don’t care for Philip’s hats either I hear?” she said sweetly.

  “No more I do,” Mr. Pomfret replied.

  “On the whole wouldn’t you say John it’s rather best for them to make their own mistakes?”

  “It all depends.”

  “In what way dear?”

  He turned very white.

  “I don’t want us to look ridiculous Jane!”

  She raised her eyebrows and stared coolly at him.

  “I’m not sure what you mean?” she said.

  In a trembling voice, with an obvious and complete loss of temper he cried all at once,

  “By trying to stop this marriage by saying as I’m told you are that Philip is my son.”

  She put kn
ife and fork carefully down on the plate, turned her face half away from him, closed her eyes and waited in silence. Within twenty seconds two great tears had slipped from beneath black lashes and were on their way over her full cheeks, shortly followed by others. But she made no sound.

  He blew his nose loudly, his colour began to come back. He watched. Soon his breathing became normal again.

  “I’m sorry,” he muttered at last.

  “Excuse me,” she said getting up from the table and hastened out of the room. He waited. He hung his head to listen, perhaps for the front door. When the bathroom lock clicked he appeared to relax.

  Eventually she returned like a ship in full sail. He stood as she came in the door. She stopped close enough to hit him.

  “How dare you!” she hissed.

  “Oh my dear I do apologize,” he said and wrung his hands. “Last thing in the world I wished to blurt out.”

  “How dare you John!”

  “Look here sit down once more Jane. That silly remark slipped from me I swear it!”

  “I oughtn’t to stay here another minute,” she announced and sat in her place. He seated himself. He mopped at his face with a handkerchief. She watched her plate of lobster mayonnaise. “This is Liz’s doing,” she added.

  “No Jane don’t,” he implored.

  “Well that was her wasn’t it?”

  “Yes I suppose so.”

  She took up knife and fork again, began to push the food around the plate.

  “I say it for your own good John,” she said. “You should have nothing more to do with that young woman before she ruins you!”

  “Now Jane,” he cried raising a glass to his lips with trembling hands.

  “Because when you allow the squalid girls you choose for your wicked selfish pleasures to interfere between my son and your girl then you aren’t fit.”

  “And Richard Abbot?” he muttered.

  “Is one of nature’s gentlemen,” she royally replied. “Now not another word of this or I leave at once never to step over your doorstep again.”

  After which the conversation limped for some time then she laughed and in another thirty minutes he tried a laugh and in the end as old friends they parted early without another mention of the children.

  •

  A week later Miss Jennings did something she had never done before, she asked Richard Abbot round for a drink.

  “Have you heard about poor darling John?” she said and giggled. “His doctor’s told him he’s got a touch of this awful diabetes.”

  “Good Lord, sorry to learn that.”

  She giggled again.

  “No one knows. Of course he told me. I’m so very worried for him. Isn’t it merciful they discovered about insulin in time?”

  “No danger in diabetes nowadays,” Mr. Abbot agreed. “Rotten thing to catch though.”

  “How ought he to look after himself Richard?”

  “Just take it easy and they can give themselves the injections.”

  “Themselves? Injections! Oh no surely a woman must do for them, I mean you can’t jab a needle into your own arm surely?”

  “Or a leg. That’s what they say Liz.”

  “Of course there’s Mary,” Miss Jennings continued. “She could be the one until she actually marries Philip. But once those two get away on their own how will John manage Richard?”

  “They can do it for themselves,” he repeated.

  “Does Jane know?”

  “The way to give hypodermics? Couldn’t say I’m sure.”

  “No no I naturally didn’t mean was Jane a nurse. Has she heard d’you think?”

  “Couldn’t be certain. Not mentioned a word to me.”

  “Because I’ll tell you what. John’s having diabetes like this alters everything. There is bound to be a change in Jane’s whole attitude to the children’s marriage.”

  “Can’t follow you at all.”

  “Oh but of course you do. Don’t play the innocent Richard. She’s been simply fixed on stopping it by every means. But now he’ll need looking after, she won’t leave Mary home to do the nursing.”

  “And d’you imagine John will have no say in that?” Mr. Abbot enquired. “He’s got you hasn’t he? You’ll have to take lessons Liz.”

  “He’s got me all right” she said. “Yes. But have I got him, there’s the question” and she laughed outright then at once grew serious once again.

  “Then will he have terrible pricks all over his poor arms and legs?” she cried.

  He gently laughed.

  “Oh come Liz,” he argued. “That’s only a detail.”

  “A detail? Will there be something else as well?”

  “No but what’s the matter with a few dots on his skin?”

  “I thought you meant he might have to have some other ghastly treatment Richard. I was so nervous for a minute. I believe you’re teasing me you horrid man.”

  “You’re all right Liz.”

  “I wish I was. Has Jane really said nothing to you about the marriage?”

  “Not to me.”

  “Because she’ll force it on now, you mark my words.”

  “Whatever she does is perfect by me Liz.”

  “Has there ever been anyone as loyal as you dear Richard! You are so good.”

  “Mind if I say something?”

  “Of course not. How could I?”

  “Might be you make too much of things.”

  “Oh come now Richard you aren’t going to say ‘mountains out of molehills,’ not as late in the day as this surely?”

  “I could.”

  “But don’t you see what’s going on under your very own nose?” she goodhumouredly demanded.

  “Cheer up,” he said. “It needn’t happen.”

  “And shan’t if I have anything to do with things. I used to love old John. I can’t bear to stand by and see him ruined.”

  Mr. Abbot’s eyes widened. He watched the woman with plain amazement and some cunning.

  “Don’t look at me as though you’d seen a ghost,” Miss Jennings softly said. “I’ve been around all this time even if you have only just noticed.”

  “Sorry,” he said at once. “But you’re a surprising person Liz.”

  “Of course I am,” she replied.

  “You were keen enough on the children’s marriage once,” he pointed out.

  “Well naturally,” she answered.

  “And now you want a girl of nineteen to stay at home single so as to give her father injections?”

  “But John dines with Jane every other night already!”

  “You and I couldn’t stop them even if we wanted to.”

  “Perhaps not Richard,” she admitted. “Still we might try and keep it at that and then they could conceivably quarrel over the arrangements even yet, who knows? Because I won’t have those two children made into pawns, their whole lives I mean, their own futures, just for Jane to play sicknurse to poor John.”

  “I thought you were the one who was so keen on Philip marrying Mary.”

  “I was,” she wailed.

  “Well then why change when the wind seems to blow the other way? We aren’t weathercocks after all.”

  “I am where John’s concerned.”

  “But you just said Liz . . .”

  “I know,” she interrupted “but I simply can’t bear the thought of that woman sticking needles in his arm.”

  “Liz!” he warned.

  “Oh what must you think of me?” she cried. “Yet I just can’t help myself and you know she’d give him blood-poisoning.”

  “If he won’t learn to manage by himself why shouldn’t you be the one for the chap?”

  “Would you like that best Richard?”

  He paused and looked about.

  “Me?” he asked at last.

  “Yes you.”

  “How do I come in?”

  “Oh well if you won’t talk” she replied with a small voice. “Of course I’ve no right to go on like this
. Yes well there you are.”

  “Hope I didn’t seem rude at all,” he said at once. “Excuse me will you? Fact is I’ve got a feeling no one has any right to interfere with the lives of others.”

  “But don’t they interfere all the time in yours.”

  “Shouldn’t be surprised.”

  “Well then!”

  “There’s no ‘well then’ about this” he protested sharply. “Can’t be too grateful to old Jane,” he muttered “and I like those two kids.”

  “Richard you are sweet and wonderful,” she said with apparent sincerity shortly after which, and time was getting on, he went off alone to dine at the Club.

  •

  Upon which Mrs. Weatherby again asked John Pomfret to dinner.

  “Oh my dear I’m so worried about little Penelope once more,” she began as soon as he came in.

  “Why how’s that?” he asked.

  “It’s all to do with this horrid new thing you’ve got,” Jane explained. “The poor sweet will insist on sticking pins into herself now.”

  He laughed rather bitterly.

  “Oh dear,” he said.

  “I know it’s dreadful of me,” she admitted. “There you are chock full of diabetes so to speak yet I can’t but worry my heart out over the little saint. What d’you suppose will stop her?”

  “How d’you mean?”

  “Well she can’t just go on pretending to inject herself all of every day can she? It’s even so dangerous. She might get blood-poisoning. And oh my dear in what way will you manage yourself? Have you thought of that? Because after a little while there won’t be any free space left?”

  He laughed once more.

  “There is the diet treatment,” he suggested.

  “Then do tell Pen so with your own lips,” she pleaded.

  “But Jane you wouldn’t want the child to starve herself?”

  Mrs. Weatherby chuckled.

  “Good Lord what a perfect fool I am not to have thought of that,” she admitted. “If you hadn’t said we might’ve had her really on our hands! Now darling how about you? Are you all right?”

  “Well yes I imagine so,” he conceded. “Of course it’s a bore but one has to be thankful it’s not worse I suppose.”