Honeywood Settlement

by Creswell, H. B.

  Yours sincerely,

  This letter suggests that it is not the drains that require the attentions of an expert, but Lady Brash. We must feel sorry for the poor woman, but this need not prevent us from being far more sorry for Spinlove.

  SPINLOVE TO BRASH

  Dear Sir Leslie Brash, 26.3.26.

  I was naturally disturbed by the contents of your letter, but after reading it attentively more than once I cannot help feeling that the case is not so bad as you think, for I am convinced that the drainage system at Honeywood, both inside the house and out, is perfectly sound; and if it were conceivable that anything had gone wrong it could not possibly give rise to such a state of affairs as you describe. It is incredible that the house can be “stuffy” or “fuggy” except for reasons which may give rise to that condition in any house—such as overheating of radiators, accumulations of dust, dirty carpets, lack of ventilation, etc.

  I will, of course, give the matter my particular attention and do my best to discover the reason for the complaint, but I shall not be able to spare a day before the end of next week. In the meantime perhaps you will be able to find the true source of the unpleasant conditions, which certainly can have no connection with drainage.

  With kind regards,

  Yours sincerely,

  Spinlove is not happy in the wording of the sentence in which he seeks to discredit the idea that the house can be stuffy.

  SPINLOVE TO GRIGBLAY

  Dear Sirs, 26.3.26.

  I enclose a letter I have received from Sir Leslie Brash. I have had previous complaints of smells in the house. As I cannot go down for a fortnight, and have no time to waste, and you have work going on in the neighbourhood, I win ask Mr. Grigblay to take an early opportunity of calling at Honeywood and to let me know what he makes of it all. Perhaps he will be able to see Lady Brash and establish her peace of mind, which I have, unfortunately, not been able to do. You will remember there was the same kind of trouble over the smell of the new oak when the house was being built. They may have been overstoking and keeping the radiators too hot.

  I note that waterproofing of chimneys will have to stand over till the summer.

  I still have not yet received your summary of variations account.

  Yours faithfully,

  The stuffy, close, stale air associated with radiators is due to the hot iron causing the paint on it, and on adjoining surfaces, to smell until it has thoroughly dried up, which, in the case of oily paints, takes some time; and also to the rising currents of heated air carrying up dust particles. There is, rightly speaking, no such thing as “scorched air,” though the term is sometimes used as an explanation of these unpleasant associations of radiators. Radiators, however, only in part warm by radiation; a great part of their heat is disseminated by convection, and the repeated circulation of the same air against the heated iron dries it and vitiates it. Many heating systems by hot-water radiators are enervating and dispiriting to live with. These conditions are much aggravated when the radiators are allowed to get above a certain temperature, and are remedied by good ventilation.

  BRASH TO SPINLOVE

  Dear Mr. Spinlove, 30.3.26.

  Your communication encourages optimistic anticipations, though you must allow me to intimate the suggestion that it is not reasonably consistent with what you previously indited to Lady Brash. You must permit me, however, to object most strongly to the astounding suggestion that the conditions I complain of are due to improper neglect of cleanliness at Honeywood. The house, I must beg permission to inform you, is not unventilated, dusty and dirty, and I am amazed that one from whom I have learnt to anticipate polite behaviour on all occasions should so far forget decorum as to offer any such monstrous explanatory solution of the matter in complaint.

  That the house is stuffy, and impregnated with obnoxious effluviums of some kind, there is abundant evidence to substantially prove. The source of the annoyance, which is a danger to health, is for you to definitely determine, and for Mr. Grigblay to curatively ameliorate without delay.

  Yours sincerely,

  SPINLOVE TO BRASH

  Dear Sir Leslie Brash, 2.4.26.

  I assure you that you entirely misread my letter. I admit that my wording was ambiguous, but I had no intention of suggesting what you suppose. My argument was that a defect in the drains could not possibly give rise to the conditions you describe; that those conditions were such as would be occasioned by overheated radiators, dust, lack of ventilation and so forth and that-as you knew these conditions did not exist at Honeywood—the explanation must lie in some other direction. That is all I meant to say. It never entered my head that you would suppose I could mean that Honeywood was in such a condition; and if I had supposed it was, I should, of course, have been careful not to let you think I thought so. Please accept the will for the deed. [The finishing touch!]

  I do not know what more I can say until I come down to investigate for myself. That cannot, however, be immediately, as I have to go out of town on business, but I will get in touch with you as soon as I can next week.

  With kind regards,

  Yours sincerely,

  This letter is a wretched performance. Spinlove not only says a great deal too much, but makes it appear that his offending letter was written in the belief that his explanation of the “noxious emanations” was the true one. He then indicates that he does not consider the matter of any pressing importance, and by making plain, with characteristic tenacity, that he regards the whole thing as a mare’s nest, he returns, like a fly, to the bald place from which Brash has just driven him.

  GRIGBLAY ON DRAINS

  GRIGBLAY TO SPINLOVE

  Sir, 6.4.26.

  I had a chance yesterday and called at the house to examine into all these effluviums and emanations and other polite stinks that are going about, but can make nothing of it. Every house in my opinion has its own smells, different in different houses, if you sit down and wait for them. There were only two real Oh Mys at Honeywood on Tuesday: one was Lysol—and the other was her Ladyship who was carrying so much scent that though I have as good a nose as most it had ought to be forty feet long to reach—anything else when the lady was by. She had such a lot of things to tell me, too, that it was difficult to find Out anything for myself. The plumbing everywhere is a picture to see; there never was a better job. Rumble was on it, and he’s a craftsman if there ever was one: it’s a pleasure to look at his wiped joints. No spigotting anywhere, you may be sure; no rubber cones.; solid lead tacks wiped on front angles and screwed and plugged; all joints between lead and iron or stoneware made with brass thimbles-beautiful; but you know all about it, sir, having ordered and saw the work being done.

  All I could get at was that the bedrooms smelt funny, and the scullery—and why wouldn’t that smell, I should like to know? There was an intelligent young girt there who had taught herself how to pull the cobweb grating out of the wash-up, and there she was with a bit of telegraph wire with a sharp burred end to go pushing into the trap when it gets blocked every half hour and cut a hole in the lead before anyone has time to discover what a clearing eye is for. They had hung up this grating, and the key of the back door, so that they shouldn’t be wasted, to keep the clock going, because the weight had been lost plumbing the rain-water well.

  There was talk that a smell came in at the window; so I told this same slut if you don’t like stinks you shouldn’t make them, for she had the grease-trap outside all clogged and mucked up with kitchen filth, the container not having been emptied all the time they’ve been there—nor never would be if I hadn’t noticed. The gully by the back entrance was flooding over. They had taken the grating out and broke it with a sledge-hammer in case someone should remember what it was for, so as to make it easy to pour down the water they wash the floors with without the trouble of taking scrubbing-brushes and clouts out of the bucket first. That was what Jossling found stopping the trap when I told him get it cleared, along with a vacuum-cleaner fitting and a
few other trifles that wouldn’t be missed. That is all I could find wrong with the drains; but it’s none of her business, says cook, and the chauffeur says it is none of his, so there you are, and we shall have more complaints before long unless Sir Leslie is told what is going on.

  As for the smell in the bedrooms it is difficult to say. The cook had a lot of complaint and said it gave her asthma. It will give you measles, I told her, before ever it will give you asthma, and I think she feels more contented now; but there certainly was a close, stuffy smell in the fifth room on the second floor, in particular, though it had never been used; and my opinion is that smoky air from outside is drawn down the chimneys by the pull of other flues, or perhaps it’s down-draught. These damp flues where the rain beats into them would be likely to lead to that kind of trouble.

  There was a close air in three other of the maids’ rooms that was not accounted for by the windows being shut, nor yet by two towels and a newspaper pushed into the chimney-throat of one of them to plug it in case of ventilation. Her Ladyship says her own room on the first floor is very stuffy; I could not notice anything, but, there you are! I am not in the perfumery myself, and a musk-rat or a civet-cat or whatever it is, spiced up with a touch of Lysol—which is about in saucers and everywhere it has no occasion to be-smells to me after half an hour pretty much like badger. Her Ladyship uses the Lysol so she won’t notice the drains, and the scent so she won’t notice the Lysol, which is a queer way to go to work if you ask my opinion.

  However, I told the lady I could find nothing wrong except perhaps some down-draught in the chimneys, and that everything would be all right in the summer. She seemed satisfied and was very grateful and friendly and had lunch specially served to me though it was early; so I hope we shall have no more old tommy-rot about the drains.

  I am sir,

  Yours faithfully,

  The erratic script of this letter, conjoined with Grigblay’s authentic voice, indicates that he typed it himself. We may well suppose that, if persuasion of any kind could do so, Grigblay’s massive resources consoled Lady Brash. Grigblay, however, here definitely oversteps the mark. He takes a great deal too much on himself: he involves Spinlove in a kind of disloyalty to his client, and the extreme intimacy of his facetiousness is subversive of discipline and, definitely, not allowable, but—as Grigblay would say—”there you are!” Spinlove has allowed himself to look to Grigblay for direction in a degree which a more substantial individuality would not tolerate.

  SPINLOVE TO GRIGBLAY

  Dear Sirs, 10.4.26.

  I am much obliged for Mr. Grigblay’s report on drains, etc. Things are very much as I supposed. I have written to Sir Leslie Brash calling attention to his servants’ neglect, and have no doubt the complaint of bad smells is now disposed of. Please fix the sink grids. I do not understand how that in the scullery could be taken out.

  Will you let me have your final Statement of Account without further delay? I have several times asked for this.

  Yours faithfully,

  SPINLOVE TO BRASH

  Dear Sir Leslie Brash, 10.4.26.

  I came back to the office to-day to find awaiting me there a letter from Mr. Grigblay who, in my absence and at my orders, made a thorough investigation into the cause of the smells complained of, as no doubt you may have heard. He finds the “closeness” of the bedrooms to be due to the windows being kept shut, and also, perhaps, to slight down-draught carrying smoky air down the chimneys. This is due to the stacks being damp, and will disappear when the summer comes. The chimney-throat in one of the servants’ rooms was found to be stopped up. This should be discouraged, as the flues ought to be open to ventilate the rooms.

  Mr. Grigblay, however, found a most insanitary state of affairs, productive of bad smells, in the scullery; due, not to any fault in the drainage arrangements or defect in the work, but to the neglect and deliberate ill-usage of the appliances provided, by your servants. The grating of the sink waste has been mischievously forced out so that the trap gets choked with filth; and this is cleared by violently ramming a steel wire down and damaging the pipe, instead of removing the screwed eye provided to make such ill-usage unnecessary. Then the greasetrap into which the sinks discharge has never been once emptied; and as a consequence the whole thing is clogged with congealed fat and stinking filth. This allows grease to get into the drain which it is the special purpose of the device to prevent. The iron receptacle in the gully should be lifted out and emptied once a week. In addition to this, the gully by the yard entrance has had its grid removed and deliberately broken, and a scrubbing brush and floor clouts and other things had been thrown into the drain, stopping the trap and flooding the yard with sewage.

  I was certain, as I told you, that there could be nothing wrong with the drains, and Mr. Grigblay’s report is very much what I expected. If the servants are told to use the fittings and arrangements as they are intended to be used, the smells you complain of will cease.

  I am very glad to be able to give you this definite assurance. With kind regards,

  Yours sincerely,

  Spinlove so stresses the facts as to overweight them; and it is not tactful in him to triumph over Brash with cock-crows of “I told you so,” and to remind him of his fault by rubbing his nose in it: nor is it tactful in him to appear enormously relieved in being able to give the explanation; for great relief can only be a reaction from great anxiety, and Brash will suppose Spinlove to be concerned for Honeywood’s drains, when it is Honeywood’s brains that are worrying him. This drain-trouble appears to be entirely of Spinlove’s making. If he had written the brief, compact letters of a confident man, instead of the diffuse ones of a man anxious to appear plausible, Brash would have been fortified against his wife’s complainings, and the lady, perhaps, herself assured. He is wrong in supposing that emphasis carries conviction; the opposite is true. “I saw Jones at Brighton” is more conclusive that Jones was there than: ‘I am certain I saw Jones at Brighton,” and much more so than: “I am absolutely positive...”; and it is only fatuous writers of advertisements who suppose otherwise.

  BRASH TO SPINLOVE

  Dear Mr. Spinlove, 13.4.26.

  I am astonished to be informed of the improper neglect observe sanitary amenities on the part of the kitchen staff, and have emphatically directed that it shall cease forthwith. It is scarcely necessary for me to signify that it is not incumbent upon me, as master, to keep myself personally acquainted with the conditions obtaining in the purlieus of the establishment; but I have now expressed my disapproval of past procedure in suitable terms to the person I hold to be responsible, and I confidently anticipate that no repetition of the previous objectionable circumstances will be repeated in the future.

  You must permit me to express, however, that I fail to see how irregularities in the culinary domain can account for consequent olfactory intrusions in the sleeping quarters; nor do I comprehend in what way a down-draught in the chimneys can be applicable to the question of sanitary purity. I desire, therefore, that you will transmit Mr. Grigblay’s report anent the matter of which I am speaking, so that I may be enabled to acquaint myself with the signification of your communication in more exact detail.

  Yours sincerely,

  If Brash saw Grigblay’s letter the fat would, indeed, be in the fire!—which is proof that Spinlove should not allow such letters to be addressed to him. An architect should be able at any moment to lay all correspondence dealing with his client’s business freely before him—in fact, the client has right of access to such correspondence, and also to possession of the whole of it after the work is completed. This follows necessarily from the relation of Agent and Principal which subsists between them. It is clear that Spinlove cannot do what Brash asks, and, even if there were no other reasons, Grigblay’s letter, though it is not so marked, is clearly a private or confidential letter.

  MORE NEWS OF EXTRAS

  GRIGBLAY TO SPINLOVE

  Dear Sir, 14.4.26.

 
We have been pressing on with our Statement of Account as you ask, and are arranging with Mr. Tinge to meet us for the purpose of measuring variations. We find that the total balance of extras on the variations account will be in the neighbourbood of £1,800 and shall be glad if you will pass us a further certificate for £1,000.

  Yours faithfully,

  SPINLOVE TO GRIGBLAY

  Dear Sir, 16.4.26.

  I am astonished to learn that your account will show extras to the amount of perhaps over £1,800. I was quite unprepared for anything of the kind, and I am sure Sir Leslie Brash will be shocked at the figure. I certainly have not authorized extras on any such scale, and have no idea how the figure is made up. I must have a summary of items, showing how the amount is arrived at, before I can consider drawing a further certificate.

  Mr. Tinge has no authority to measure any work except as I may direct, and it is necessary for me to have the summary before I can do this.

  Yours faithfully,

  SPINLOVE TO TINGE, QUANTITY SURVEYOR