Works of E F Benson

by E. F. Benson

  Mrs. Osborne beamed contentedly. She had had a couple of days without any return of pain, and as she said, she had had a better relish for her dinner to-night than for many days.

  “Well, then, let’s hope we shall all be comfortable and happy,” she said. “And I don’t mind telling you now, my dear, that I’ve been out of sorts and not up to my victuals for a fortnight past, but to-day I feel hearty again, though I get tired easily still. But don’t you breathe a word of that, promise me, to Mr. Osborne or Claude, for what with the honour as is going to be done to Mr. O. and the thought of his grandchild getting closer, and him back to work again, which, after all, suits him best, I wouldn’t take the edge off his enjoyment if you were to ask me on your bended knees, which I should do, if he thought I was out of sorts. Lord, there he comes now, arm-in-arm with Claude. I declare he’s like a boy again, with the thought of all as is coming.”

  The evening of the next day, accordingly, saw, with flare of light and blare of band, the beginning of the hospitalities of No. 92 Park Lane, the doors of which, so it appeared to Dora, were never afterward shut day or night, except during the week-ends when the doors of Grote flew open and the scene of hospitality changed to that of the country. Yet cordial though it all was, it was insensate hospitality — hospitality gone mad. Had some hotel announced that anyone of any consequence could dine there without charge, and ask friends to dine on the same easy terms, such an offer would have diverted the crowds of carriages from Park Lane, and sent them to the hotel instead. Full as her programme originally was, Mrs. Osborne could not resist the pleasure of added hospitalities, and little dances, got up in impromptu fashion with much telephoning and leaving of cards, were wedged in between the big ones, and became big themselves before the night arrived. Scores of guests, utterly unknown to their hosts, crowded the rooms, and for them all, known and unknown alike, Mrs. Osborne had the same genial and genuine cordiality of welcome. It was sufficient for her that they had crossed her threshold and would drink Mr. O.’s champagne and eat her capons; she was glad to see them all. She had a shocking memory for faces, but that made no difference, since nothing could exceed the geniality of her greeting to those whom she had never set eyes on before. It was a good moment, too, when, not so long after the beginning of her hospitalities, her secretary, whose duty it was to enter the names of all callers in the immense volume dedicated to that purpose, reported that a second calling book was necessary, since the space allotted to the letters with which the majority of names began was full. She could not have imagined a year ago that this would ever happen, yet here at the beginning of her second season only, more space had to be found. And Dora’s name for the second volume, “Supplement to the Court Guide,” was most gratifying. Alf’s allusion to the “London Directory,” though equally true, would not have been so satisfactory.

  But her brave and cheerful soul needed all its gallantry, for it was an incessant struggle with her to conceal the weariness and discomfort which were always with her, and which she was so afraid she would, in spite of herself, betray to others. There were days of pain, too, not as yet very severe, but of a sort that frightened her, and her appetite failed her. This she could conceal, without difficulty for the most part, since the times were few on which her husband was not sitting at some distance from her, with many guests intervening; but once or twice when they were alone she was afraid he would notice her abstention, and question her. Her high colour also began to fade from her cheeks and lips, and she made one daring but tremulous experiment with rouge and lip-salve to hide this. She sent her maid out of the room before the attempt, and then applied the pigments, but with disastrous results. “Lor, Mr. O. will think it’s some woman of the music halls instead of his wife,” she said to herself, and wiped off again the unusual brilliance.

  But though sometimes her courage faltered, it never gave way. She had determined not to spoil these weeks for her husband. It was to be a blaze of triumph. Afterward she would go to the doctor and learn that she had been frightening herself to no purpose, or that there was something wrong.

  And those endless hospitalities, this stream of people who passed in and out of the house, though they tired her they also served to divert her and take her mind off her discomforts and alarms. She had to be in her place, though Dora took much of the burden of it off her shoulders, to shake hands with streams of people and say — which was perfectly true — how pleased she was to see them. Friends from Sheffield, for she never in her life dropped an old acquaintance, came to stay, and the pleasurable anticipation she had had of letting them see “a bit of real London life” fell short of the reality. Best of all, Sir Thomas and Lady Ewart were in the house when the list of honours appeared in the paper.

  It happened dramatically, and the drama of it was planned and contrived by Claude. He came down rather late to breakfast, having given orders that this morning no papers were to be put in their usual place in the dining room, and went straight up to his father.

  “Good morning, my lord,” he said.

  “Hey, what?” said Mr. Osborne. “Poking your fun at me, are you?”

  “There’s something about you in the papers, my lord.”

  “Well, I never! Let’s see,” said Mr. Osborne.

  He unfolded the paper Claude had brought him. “My lady,” he said across the table to his wife, “this’ll interest you. List of honours. Peerages, Edward Osborne, Esquire, M. P.”

  It was a triumphant success. Sir Thomas actually thought that it was news to them both, and went so far as to lay down his knife and fork.

  “Bless my soul!” he said. “Well, I’m sure there never was an honour more deservedly won, nor what will be more dignifiedly worn.”

  Mr. Osborne could not keep it up.

  “Well, well,” he said, “of course we’ve known all along; but Claude would have his joke and pretend it was news to us. Thank ye, Sir Thomas, I’m sure. Maria, my dear, I’m told your new coronet’s come home. Pass it to my lady, Claude.”

  As if by a conjuring trick, he produced from under the table cloth an all-round tiara of immense diamonds, which had been previously balanced on his knees.

  Mrs. Osborne had had no idea of this; that part of the ceremony had been kept from her.

  “Put it on, Maria, my dear,” he said, “and if there’s a peeress in the land as better deserves her coronet than you, I should be proud to meet her. Let the Honourable Claude settle it comfortable for you, my dear. Claude, my boy, I’m jealous of you because you’re an honourable, which is more than your poor old dad ever was.”

  The deft hands of the Honourable adjusted the tiara for her and she got up to salute the donor.

  “If it isn’t the measure of my head exactly!” she said. “Well, I never, and me not knowing a word about it!”

  Meantime, as June drew to its close, in this whirl of engagements and socialities, the estrangement between Dora and Claude grew (though not more acute in itself) more of a habit, and the very passage of time, instead of softening it, rendered it harder to soften. Had they been alone in their flat, it is probable that some intolerable moment would have come, breaking down that which stood between them, or in any case compelling them to talk it out; or, a thing which would have been better than nothing, bringing this cold alienation up to the hot level of a quarrel, which could have been made up, and which when made up might have carried away with it much of the cause of this growing constraint. As it was, there was no quarrel, and thus there was nothing to make up. Claude, on his side, believed that his wife still rather resented certain remarks he had made to her at Venice and here on the subject of her attitude toward his father, contrasting it unfavourably with the appreciation and kindness which his family had shewn hers. In his rather hard, thoroughly well-meaning and perfectly just manner he examined and re-examined any cause of complaint which she could conceive herself to have on the subject, and entirely acquitted himself of blame. He did not see that he could have done differently: he had not been unkind, only f
irm, and his firmness was based upon his sense of right, But in this examination he, of course, utterly failed to recognize the real ground of the estrangement, which was, as Dora knew, not any one particular speech or action of his, but rather the spirit and the nature which lay behind every speech, every action. This she was incapable of telling him, and even if she had been able to do so, no good end would have been served by it. She had married him, not knowing him, or at the least blinded by superficialities, and now, getting below those, or getting used to them, she found that there were things to which she could not get used, but which, on the contrary, seemed to her to be getting every day more glaringly disagreeable to her. He, not knowing this, did his best to remove what he believed had been the cause of their estrangement by praise and commendation of what he called to himself her altered behaviour. For there was no doubt whatever that now, at any rate, Dora was behaving delightfully to his parents. She took much of the work of entertaining off Mrs. Osborne’s hands; made but few engagements of her own, in order to be more actively useful in the house; and was in every sense the most loyal and dutiful of daughters-in-law. She also very gently and tactfully got leave to revise Mrs. Osborne’s visiting list, and drew a somewhat ruthless lead pencil through a considerable number of the names. For in the early days to leave a card meant, as a matter of course, to be asked to the house. This luxuriant and exotic garden wanted a little weeding.

  All this seemed to Claude to be the happy fruits of his criticism, and the consciousness of it in his mind did not improve the flavour of his speeches to Dora. They were but little alone, owing to the high pressure of their days; but one evening, about a fortnight after they had moved into Park Lane, he found her resting in her sitting room before dressing.

  “There you are, dear,” he said. “How right of you to rest a little. What have you been doing?”

  “There were people to lunch,” said she; “and then I drove down with Dad to the House. He was not there long, so I waited for him, and we had a turn in the Park. Then a whole host of people came to tea, and I — I multiplied myself.”

  “They are ever so pleased with you,” said Claude, “and I’m sure I don’t wonder. Ever since they came up you have simply devoted yourself to them.”

  In his mind was the thought, “Ever since I spoke to you about it.” It was not verbally expressed, but the whole speech rang with it. Dora tried for a moment, following Uncle Alf’s plan, to find something humorous about it, failed dismally, and tried instead to disregard it. “I’m glad,” she said, “that one is of use.”

  Then she made a further effort.

  “I think it was an excellent plan that we should come here,” she added. “It suits us, doesn’t it? and it suits them.”

  Claude smiled at her, leaning over the head of the sofa where she lay.

  “I knew you would find it a success,” he said. “I felt quite certain it would be.”

  Again Dora tried to shut her ears to the personal note —— this ring of “How right I was!”

  “It suits Jim, too,” she said. “It really was kind of you to let him have the flat. May tells me she went to dine there last night. He had a bridge party.”

  Claude laughed.

  “He’s certainly making the most of it,” he said; “just as I meant him to do. I think I’m like Dad in that. Do you remember how he treated us over the Venice house this year? Not a penny for us to pay. Jim’s giving lots of little parties, I’m told, and Parker came round to me yesterday to ask if he should order some more wine, as Jim’s nearly finished it. Also cigars and cigarettes. Of course I told him to order whatever was wanted. I hate doing things by halves. The household books will be something to smile at. But he’s having a rare good time. It’s not much entertaining he has been able to do all his life up till now.”

  Dora sat up.

  “But Claude, do you mean he’s drinking your wine and letting you pay for all the food?” she asked.

  “Yes. It’s my own fault. I ought to have locked up the cellar, and made it clear that he would pay for his own chickens. As a matter of fact, it never struck me that he wouldn’t. But as that hasn’t occurred to him, I can’t remind him of it.”

  “But you must tell him he’s got to pay for things,” said Dora. “Why, he might as well order clothes and, just because he was in your flat, expect you to pay for them!”

  “Oh, I can’t tell him,” said Claude. “It would look as if I grudged him things. I don’t a bit: I like people to have a good time at my expense. Poor devil! he had a rotten Derby week; no wonder he likes living on the cheap. And it must be beastly uncomfortable living on the cheap, if it’s your own cheap, so to speak. I expect you and I would be just the same if we were poor.”

  But the idea was insupportable to Dora, and the more so because of the way in which Claude took it. Generous he was, no one could be more generous, but there was behind it all a sort of patronizing attitude. He gave cordially indeed, but with the cordiality was a self-conscious pleasure in his own open-handedness and a contempt scarcely veiled of what he gave. And the worst of all was that Jim should have taken advantage of this insouciance about money affairs that sprang from the fact that he had no need to worry about money. Claude did not like Jim, Dora felt certain of that, and this made it impossible that Jim should take advantage of his bounty. It was an indebtedness she could not tolerate in her brother.

  “What’s there to fuss about?” Claude went on. “If the whole thing runs into a hundred and fifty pounds, it won’t hurt. And, after all, he’s your brother, dear. I like being good to your kin.”

  Dora was not doing Claude an injustice when she told herself that his irreproachable conduct to her family was in his mind. It was there; he did not mean it to be in evidence, but insensibly and unintentionally it tinged his words. The whole thing was kind, kind, kind, but it was consciously kind. That made the whole difference.

  “But it can’t be,” she said. “If you won’t speak to Jim about it, I will. It is impossible that he should drink your wine and smoke your cigars and have dinner parties at your expense. I can’t let him do that sort of thing, if I can possibly help it. I would much sooner pay myself than that you should pay for him.”

  “My dear, what a fuss about nothing!” said Claude. “It isn’t as if it mattered to me whether I pay for his soup and cutlet—”

  “No, that’s just it,” said Dora quickly. “That’s why you mustn’t. If it cost you something — Oh, Claude, I don’t think I can make you understand,” she said. “Anyhow, I shall tell Jim what I think; and if the poor wretch hasn’t got any money, then I must pay.”

  “Oh, I don’t suppose he’s got any money,” said Claude; “and as for your paying, my dear, what difference does that make? I give you your allowance — and I wish you’d say you wanted more, for Uncle Alf’s always wondering whether you’ve got enough — and you want to pay me out of that. Well, it’s only out of one pocket and into another. Don’t fuss about it, dear. I wish I hadn’t told you.”

  “But it isn’t quite like that,” said Dora. “I could deny myself something in order to pay, if Jim can’t. I can tell them not to send me the dress—”

  And then the hopelessness of it all struck her. She was in the same boat as her husband; she could not deny herself anything she wanted, because there was no need for self-denial. And without that she could not make atonement for Jim’s behaviour. Nor could she say to herself that he had done it without thinking; Jim always thought when there was a question of money, for that he took seriously. It was only his own conduct, his own character, and other little trifles of that sort for which he had so light a touch, so easy a rein. He had been giving little dinners at his flat, instead of dining out, as he usually did. He would never have done that if he thought he was going to pay for the quails and the peaches. That he should do it was the thing that was irremediable —— that, and the contemptuous kindness of “Claude.

  Claude saw there was some feeling in her mind of which he did not grasp
the force. She wanted to pay herself, or to think she paid, for Jim’s hospitalities. It did not make a pennyworth of difference. He would pay a cheque into her account, which would make her square again, and she would never notice it.

  “Just as you like, dear,” he said; “but you mustn’t tell Jim you are doing it. He would think that I was reluctant to pay for his food and drinks; and I’m not. I can’t stand being thought mean. There’s no excuse for a fellow with plenty of shekels being mean.”

  “Oh, you are not that,” said Dora quickly, her voice without volition following the train of thought in her mind.

  “No, dear, I hope not,” said he. “And, believe me, I haven’t got two ill feelings to rub against each other with regard to Jim. It’s only by chance I knew. If there’d been another box of cigars in the flat, and a few more dozen champagne, Parker would never have come to me. As for the household books — why, dear, they’d have been sent up to you, and I bet you’d never have seen. No, it’s just a chance as has put us in the knowledge of it all, and I for one should hate to take advantage of it. So cheer up, dear! Pay me, if it makes you feel easier; but don’t say a word to Jim. I like doing a thing thoroughly, as I’m doing this.”

  He lingered a moment by the door.

  “Perhaps that clears things up a bit, Dora,” he said, with a touch of wistfulness in his voice.

  And Dora tried, tried to think it did. She tried also to put all possible simplicity into her voice as she answered:

  “But what is there to clear up, dear?” she asked.

  “That’s all right, then,” said he, and left her. But once outside the door, he shook his head. Bottled simplicity, so to speak, is not the same as simplicity from the spring. He was quite shrewd enough to know the difference.

  He was shrewd enough also to know that he did not quite understand what had gone wrong. Something certainly had, and after his compliments to her on the subject of the admirable way in which she was behaving to his parents he knew that it was no longer his strictures on that subject that made this barrier. True it was that during these past weeks neither of them had had much leisure or opportunity for intimate conversation; but there were glances, single words, silences even that had passed between them when they were in Venice first that had taken no time if measured by the scale of minutes or seconds, yet which had been enough to fill the whole day with inward sunshine. And he had not changed to her: that he knew quite well; it was not that he was less sensitive now, less receptive of signals of that kind. For his part, he gave them in plenty. Just now he had leaned over her, smiling, when she lay on her sofa, a thing that in early days would have been sufficient to make her glance at him, with perhaps a raised hand that just touched his face, with perhaps an “Oh, Claude!” below her breath. Honestly, as far as any man can be honest with himself, he was as hungry for that as ever; he made his private code just as before, and no answer came. Something was out of tune: the vibrations, wireless, psychical, did not pass from her to him as they had done; and his own messages, so it seemed, throbbed themselves out, and found none to pick them up, but were lost in the unanswering air.