by Joan Smith
It took no more than one knock to bring the butler, and as we were shown in, our eyes were again busy to take in the many glories of Belview. A veritable ocean of shiny oaken floors stretched into the distance before us, and to the left an ornately carved grand staircase with shallow, broad steps led upstairs, the stairway wall hung with painted faces, ancestors of the Duke. They were all as ugly as he, dark, and saturnine, even the women.
As I peered up at these framed faces, the flesh-and-blood Clavering descended, running lightly in a manner that was at odds with all the solemn formality of the house. He smiled faintly at me, reserving his better expression for his lady friend.
“How kind of you to come,” he said to her.
While she gushed out her delight at being here, I took another look around. No statues in niches, in fact, no niches. The walls were straight, covered with yellow silk, with a gilt-edged mirror hanging over a carved table where flowers in a real tub made of brass nodded at themselves in the mirror. But then the hallway was so immense that anything less than a tub would have been lost. How odd it was to think of one man living all alone in this museum of a home, with his fifty bedrooms.
We were shown into a room that bore not one single sign of a resemblance to Seaview (you know where I mean) except for the pointed windows along the front wall, and it was supposedly its resemblance to our own home that had brought us here. Someone in that house was fond of yellow. As in the hall with it yellow walls, there was a quantity of yellow in this room. The draperies were gold, and there were golden and green sofas and chairs spaced around the room between tables and windows. It was all very elegant, too much so for my taste, with fine Persian carpets whose price I was familiar with from looking for replacements at home. A welter of priceless bibelots, porcelain, jade, and faience, littered the surfaces of the furniture. Lady Inglewood would have been aux anges; she liked a room to look cluttered. For myself, I like things neat and tidy. I took pains that not a jot of admiration escape my eyes, but after I had been seated a few minutes, I discovered that a feeling of happy peace came over me. The yellow was well chosen; it brought sunshine into the room, and there was some tranquility transferred by the order of the place, the two fireplaces ranged along the outer wall, not marble but again carved in oak. There was a good deal of carving throughout the place.
Slack had been dumping the butter boat on him in praise of every chair and footstool in the room. “Very pleasant,” I complimented him, so as not to appear surly.
"Thank you,” he replied punctiliously. “A pity you could not have had a ride today, Miss Denver. The weather hasn’t turned bad yet.”
“I did ride,” I said, before I recalled the full day I had outlined to him.
“For an hour before we went calling,” Slack threw in, rather deftly, I must confess.
He was out to win us and did not suggest by a single gesture that he didn’t believe it. “You are wise to take every opportunity before the gales arrive,” was all he said. “Well, would you like your tea now or later? You were going to have a look around the house."
“I’m not at all hungry yet,” Slack said, though he had actually put the question to me, but I, too, was more curious than hungry, and the house was to be seen first.
“This is the Marine Saloon,” he said, taking us to the hall and off to the right. We entered a large, well-lit room, whose only claim to being a Marine Room was two huge glass-fronted cabinets full of shells and a clutch of dull marinescapes hung on the walls. Other than that, it was another sitting room, done in depressing shades of blue and green, with sea-green window hangings.
“We have done it in sea shades,” he said, and walked to one of the cabinets. There were all kinds of shells, some great things as big as a man’s head in conch and other convoluted shapes, as well as one flatter one of the oyster shell shape that was between twelve and eighteen inches across, and had a whole shelf to itself. From these giant sizes they ranged down to some no bigger than my thumb. I mentioned that I had never seen such interesting variety on our beach, and learned that an ancestor had collected these specimens from all over the world. The acquisitive streak was deep-rooted in the family, as was the labelling streak. Each shell had its own card. I found my interest in shells to be not so great as either Clavering’s or Slack’s. For an interminable length of time she lifted them up one by one, marvelling that it had come from Jamaica or Brazil, or whatever the card might say. More marvelous to me was that anyone could have been bothered either going or sending around the globe for such worthless objects, and then to set them up as an ornamental feature.
Slack’s questions all answered, we went into a pokey little study, a dark and uninviting chamber. “This is the room that most closely resembles Seaview,” he told us. It was not so very unlike my largest saloon, but still it was an unhappy comparison, his worst and my best. There was the same panelling high up on the walls, roughly the same dimensions, though it looked smaller after his own huge saloons, and was not so well windowed. My new rose draperies, too, made my own saloon appear more elegant than this one we stood in. Our attention was called to some carving by someone named Grinling Gibbons, who had also done the carving at Seaview, not for my house actually. It had originally decorated a bedchamber at Belview and been physically prised from there to decorate my saloon. A singularly futile arrangement, in my view, but I assume Miss Tilbridge had admired Grinling Gibbons a good deal more than I did myself.
“But it is really my collection I want you to see,” he said, when we had looked our fill at the study.
“Another collection?” I asked, hoping to convey the idea I did not approve of all this amassing of possessions. “My, you will have to begin collecting more houses to store so much treasure.”
I could see the muscle in his jaw work with the effort of being civil at this taunt, but when he spoke he maintained his calm. “My Roman things. I keep them in the library, for lack of a better spot.”
They made a great mess of his library. The room would have been very well if not littered with broken bits of rubbish. Smashed heads of statues, some minus a nose, some with a whole chin knocked off, legs, feet, arms, and hands were spread over tables much too good for this rough usage. What anyone could want with this marble anatomy passed imagining. Bits and pieces other than human were there, too, pridefully displayed as though they were objets d’art. There were pots and jugs with and without handles and in various states of disrepair. One very large and ugly piece sat alone in state on a pedestal that would more properly have held an unbroken piece of statuary. This piece was a head, even dirty and encrusted with moss—of an old soldier, I thought.
“I believe this is a head of Mithras,” he said, looking at us for praise.
“Very handsome,” Slack humoured him. “Who was Mithras?”
“A Persian sun god.”
“I thought it was Roman—things you collected?” I hardly knew what word to apply to his debris.
“He was discovered in Persia by the legionnaires and became the soldiers’ deity. He came right along to Britain with them.”
"Imagine that; it came all the way from Persia!”
Slack said, craning her neck the better to view the oddity.
“No, no, it was rather the idea they brought with them. This was carved in Britain—it is native stone,” he said, offended.
“I didn’t think anyone would have bothered carrying it all the way from Persia,” I said. Again the jaws twitched, and again he contained his spleen.
The only piece in the entire collection that had the least approval from me was a brass statue of a young girl. Slack cast only a cursory glance at it, since the young girl was undraped. “Stark naked” she later described it to me, shocked. But it was neither chipped nor broken nor bent, and it was better than most of his treasures in my estimation.
“I have much more in the attics,” he told us. I hurriedly proclaimed there was not the least necessity to have them brought down. He spoke for some time
of coins and swords and “artifacts,” which appeared to be everyday carpentry tools, surgical instruments, and farming implements, of which a nearly exact replica could be bought today in any shop.
“They really ought to be available for the public to see,” he finished up his lecture.
I was quite simply amazed that he would speak of sharing his things with anyone, let alone the unwashed public. Crowds of curious gawkers tramping through Belview could not be what he had in mind. “How would you do it?” I asked. “You wouldn’t want anyone here.”
“Well, I wouldn’t want everyone here, in my home,” he said, with just a glint of understanding, I think. “In fact, I have a confession to make. Help me, Miss Slack.”
Slack would gladly have helped him chop off a head, such a state of infatuation had she achieved, but her blank stare told me that she was not in league with him on this mysterious matter, at least.
"The fact is, I hope to set up a small museum,” he said, in the tone of an announcement. “Eastbourne has one, and Pevensey could do with one, too. It is really a shame that so few know about or care about our Roman heritage.”
“This is a strange thing to feel you must confess,” I told him. “There can be no harm in opening a museum.”
“Ah, but the museum I have in mind is Seaview. It is particularly appropriate."
“It happens to be occupied!” I pointed out sharply. “And its appropriateness I must say escapes me, that being the case, unless you feel Miss Slack and I are ancient enough to be displayed as antiques."
“Shall we go back to the Yellow Saloon and sit down?” he suggested in an attempt to turn aside my wrath. He thought I would be too civil to argue over the teacups, a view in which he was mistaken.
He raised an eyebrow at a servant who passed us in the hall, which was a command to bring tea. A silver tray that required a very stout man to carry it was soon placed on the tea table.
“Would you be kind enough to pour, Miss Denver?” he asked. I lifted, with some trouble, the large silver pot and poured into fine Wedgwood cups. Dainty sandwiches had been made, and they were delicious. A tempting variety of sweets were also laid out on a tiered dish. It was an excellent tea.
I was not turned from my track by it, however. “You were saying you may consider my home particularly suitable for your museum. Would you be kind enough to explain that rather strange statement, Your Grace?”
“Oh, dear!” he said, and set down his cup. It sounded an absurdly mild phrase to issue from that swarthy face. “I always feel, you know, when young ladies go on calling me 'Your Grace’ that I have offended them. But there is justice in selecting Seaview as the site of the museum. I do not consider it peculiarly my own, the museum. I intend endowing it, but giving it to the town.”
“I don’t know about justice, but there is surely some injustice in cashiering a private dwelling for such a purpose.”
“No injustice is intended. You recall we spoke of thirty-five hundred pounds.”
“No, Your Grace, I recall you spoke of thirty-five hundred pounds. I recall as well you had an invalid aunt on whose behalf you sought the place. Tell me, has there been a sudden death in your family, or has she recovered from her serious lung trouble without benefit of our local gales?”
“I had hoped to appeal to your tender compassion for an elderly invalid. Finding such an emotion lacking, I revert to business instead. There is an invalid aunt, incidentally. I had thought I might put my Aunt Eileen there till I had the museum plans settled, hoping a year by the sea might do her good. But you give me no opportunity to explain my mentioning justice. Seaview is built on the remains of a Roman fort, of course."
“A Roman fort? I heard nothing of that!” I exclaimed.
“Did you not? But surely you mentioned to me haying been in the cellars the other day. You must have seen the stone wall.”
“Stone wall? Certainly I saw stone walls, one vastly superior to the others..."
“The wall below the rattling grate is the remains of one of the old Roman forts. I blush to confess my great-grandfather had the unwisdom to build over it. The desecration that has been done to the Roman ruins is really appalling. The fort was one of the chain that formed the fortification known as the Forts of the Saxon Shore. From Richborough to Portsmouth, to guard against invasion. Porchester Castle is another of them. They were right on the shore in those days, but the sea has receded, and some of them are quite far inland now. This one is closer to the sea than most.”
“I noticed that wall was finer than the others. But you mean it is actually surviving from the Roman period? How old would it be?”
“The Saxon pirates were in the Channel around A.D. 280. It would be more than fifteen hundred years old.”
“Just to think!” I said, becoming excited now. “And it looks as good as new.”
“Better than the stonework done today. Well, their roads still survive, and they are some of our better roads, too, straight and smooth-surfaced. They built them to last—a bed of gravel, then flint laid in cement. We have had nothing to approach them till Telford and Macadam came along just recently.”
“It is only because of that wall in the basement you think my house would be suitable?”
“I said poetic justice. My family destroyed one of the old Saxon Forts. I would like to do something to repay our debt to historians and collect in one spot such material as I can find relating to the period. Why, at Seaview even the cellars would be of interest, you see.”
“Surely the city itself would be a better location— more easily accessible to everyone. Seaview is a long walk from Pevensey, and not everyone has a horse or carriage. Then, too,” I added with a significant voice, “the roads are flooded every spring.”
“Not every spring,” he admitted sheepishly.
“No, not since the last century, according to Lady Inglewood. But my objection still stands, and I think it is a valid one. The city itself would be the better location.”
“The old Roman fort was actually standing there, you know. It would give a great sense of being there, to realize that where you stood looking at the artifacts Roman soldiers actually once looked out at the invaders.”
“I see your point. A great sense of immediacy would be gained," Slack took it up, nodding her head at his every word. It infuriated me to see her make up to him so.
“You speak of fifteen hundred years ago or more, Your Grace. Nineteen years will be as a drop in the bucket when you are speaking of millennia. In nineteen years you can set up your museum. Meanwhile, I see no reason why I should give up my home for your hobby.”
"To benefit the community,” he said simply.
“I doubt the community at large has much interest in Roman remains. I suggest if you feel this wild passion in benefiting the community, you rid your lands of mantraps before you maim anyone else.”
“Ah, you have met Leo Milkin.”
“I heard from the servant at the Lighthouse what happened to him. Kind of you not to prosecute!”
“That’s Milkin.”
“I wasn’t sure he wasn’t another of your victims.”
“There has been only one victim.”
“So far! One is one too many—to see that poor man crippled for life because you..."
“He fell into the..." he began suddenly, then stopped as suddenly, as if he disliked to do so, as if he wanted to say more, give some excuse for his behavior.
I had determined to bring the matter to Clavering’s attention and I had done it. It pretty effectually ruined the tea party, and I saw Slack was unhappy with me, but I was glad I had done it nevertheless. I would have felt morally negligent had I not.
“You are not at all interested in my project then?” he asked stiffly.
“It sounds an excellent project, but I suggest you find yourself another location.”
“I mean, as I think you realize, you will not sell Seaview to me?”
“Prove to me you really care about benefiting the commu
nity,” I suggested. “Remove the mantraps, and we’ll discuss the matter.”
“Impossible!” he said, without even giving it a moment’s thought.
One word revealed him for the hypocrite he was—the arrogant, overbearing, selfish hypocrite. He no more cared for truly benefiting the people than I cared for his old museum. He had a hobby that amused him for the present while. The choice of Seaview as its location told me it was for his personal pleasure. No thought to the convenience of the visitors occurred to him.
“Also impossible for me to sell my house, which, incidentally, I have called Willow Hall,” I said, and arose with a commanding look at Slack to accompany me. She said not a word in the hero’s defence, but looked disappointed in him. I had some hopes this incident would return her to her usual good sense.
“That is absurd! It is not a hall, and there isn’t a willow anywhere near it!” he answered angrily, but, of course, it wasn’t the new name that angered him so much as my daring not to do as he wished.
“You are mistaken. There is a beautiful willow tree in the back garden, and if I want to call it a hall, I will.”
He glared, the jaw working, and I went on politely, “Thank you for the tea, Your Grace, and the tour. Both very enjoyable. Do feel free to call on us at Willow Hall any time you are passing by.” This was pure irony, and of no very high calibre either, I realize, but he wasn’t the only one who was angry. Naturally he would not call again.
“You’re making a mistake, Miss Denver,” he said in a cold, hard voice that sounded strangely like a threat.
“Do you think so? Who knows, you may tire of collecting bits of broken old rubbish soon and will be happy I saved you the expense of buying them a home,” I answered in a honeyed voice.
“Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he replied, then turned us over to the butler for showing out. While we were still in the hallway he was going up the stairs, showing us his back in a very underbred way. Slack didn’t say a word in his defence as I reviled him scathingly all the way home. As we dismounted she even went so far as to say, “I am disappointed in him."
