Anglo-Saxon Attitudes (31 page)

But Clarissa was not interested in Lilian. 'Surely,' she cried, 'that can't be true. Even for a young man the presence of the brilliant Gilbert Stokesay must have been a thrill.'

'I'm afraid not for me,' said Gerald. 'I had known Gilbert for many years - since schooldays, to be exact. In any case, I was a scholar, you know, not an intellectual. And then Gilbert kept the two sides of his life very much apart. I knew, of course, indeed I'm afraid I must say he made sure that I knew, of his acquaintance with Wyndham Lewis and T. E. Hulme, but, for the rest, I was completely ignorant. Now that his essays and poems arouse so much interest, I get numerous letters from Ph.D. students and others. I can tell them almost nothing; apart from his admiration for a painter named Wadsworth and his detestation of Roger Fry, I can't recall any of that side of his life. The awful truth is that I've never read his work.'

Clarissa thought for a moment of looking amused, but then she reflected on how little she had learned from her host, how much time she had wasted; she decided to look shocked. 'You're as bad as Dollie,' she said.

Gerald did not reply to the charge. He gave her a cigarette and lit it. Then he asked as casually as he could muster, 'Have you seen her lately?'

'Dollie?'  Clarissa queried without interest. 'Yes, about a fortnight ago.'

'Is she well?'

'Oh, I think so. She doesn't change much, you know.' Clarissa was not prepared to expand to someone who had proved so fruitless.

'Does she go out much?'  Gerald asked. He could not ask directly how much she was drinking now.

'Oh, yes,' Clarissa replied, 'as much as her little hobby allows her.'

Gerald was revolted. He had thought Clarissa affected, but now she seemed heartless also. He could not bring himself to discuss Dollie with such a woman, however much he longed to hear news of her. There was a silence, then Clarissa said, 'I'm sure you're bursting to get away. Actually I've got an appointment. Thank you for the lovely coffee.'

As she moved to the door, her passion to be liked overcame her. 'And I've said nothing of your enchanting room,' she cried. 'For it
is
enchanting. I have known many men who had rooms of great beauty, but a man's room that is beautiful and somehow does not embarrass -
that
is rare!' Gerald did not answer. She felt quite angry at the lack of response, and in a mischievous mood, she said, 'You know, of course, that Dollie's affection for
you
is something quite fantastic still.' She had no idea if this was true. It seemed to her probable that poor old Dollie
would
be unlikely to forget such a Don Juan in her dreary life; in any case it was fun to watch old flames rekindle.

'I too,' said Gerald simply, 'am very fond of her.'

Gerald was very late for luncheon. In his mood of sentimental remorse towards Inge, he had remembered her pleasure whenever the children paid surprise visits and he had given her no warning. He still found it difficult to realize that his wife's reaction towards their children's behaviour was no guide to her response to his. A surprise visit from her husband was only irritating to Inge; a surprise arrival late for luncheon brought a puckering frown to her broad forehead, a sulky pout to her baby mouth.

'No, Gerald, this is too bad!' she cried. She seemed a giant Diana the huntress in her winter tweeds. 'No, everything is finished. No service today! Is that not so, Johnnie? We had a very nice meal, didn't we, Larrie? Steak and béarnaise sauce which I made myself. But that would not have been enough for Gerald, especially as the wine was only an ordinary white table wine - the same that I used for the sauce. Oh! that would not do for your father, Johnnie; that is just peasant food. But we live like peasants. And what about Larwood? Of course, you have not thought of him. Poor Larwood!' She ran from the room and her cooing noises to Larwood could be heard from the drive outside. His embarrassed responses were less audible.

John said, 'I don't think you've met my friend Larrie Rourke, Father. This is my father, Larrie.'

Gerald shook hands and sat down by the table with its remains of pineapple and Brie. Larrie, however, did not resume his seat. He walked about the room excitedly, cracking walnuts and devouring them with evident relish. He was all the excited and shy Irish boy and his eyes gleamed with delight. 'Well, now this is a big day for me,' he cried. 'I've never met a real live professor before. I've heard of them, mind you, I'm not that ignorant. At school they would say to us, "You'll never grow to be a professor". And to be honest I didn't much care. But now that I've seen your father, Johnnie, I see what they mean. There's a grandeur - well, I'll not flatter you, Professor Middleton. Is that right, Johnnie, do I call him that? I'll just say that I can see it's a grand thing to be.'

Gerald sought desperately for something to say to stop this outflow, which embarrassed him so deeply. He tried to tell himself that the embarrassment was not for what he was hearing, but simply because of his new knowledge of his son's life. He saw clearly, however, that John was equally unhappy; his usual cocky manner was replaced by a look of peculiar sadness. He seemed like a small, bedraggled bird.

Larrie's quick eye caught the situation, his expression changed to one of timid thoughtfulness. 'You know, Johnnie, there's a strange thing,' he said, 'I hardly like to say it. Your father doesn't know I'm just ignorant and uneducated. But Johnnie'll tell you, I have strange ideas. I don't know how they come to me and they're daft enough all right, but Johnnie doesn't always think so. Shall I tell you what it seems to me? And there's no disrespect to your father. Yet it seems to me there's a strange power in words. When I saw your father, Johnnie, I won't say I was disappointed, but there was something broke in me. I'd thought of that word "Professor" often and often; it had a kind of magic power for me, and now it has gone. The word and the reality, the dreams we have as children and what comes after - it's a mighty gulf all right. But now Johnnie's ashamed of me - aren't you, Johnnie? - for talking so "daft".'

To Gerald's amazement, John's depressed expression gave way to a look of pride. 'No, I'm not, Larrie,' he said; 'there's a lot in what you say.'

So this, thought Gerald, is the effect of the love that dares not speak its name. He would have expected Inge to respond to such sentimental, insincere nonsense, but John ... He looked at Larrie's immature features, his calculating, boyish smile, with real distaste.

Luckily the tension was relieved by Inge's return. 'Larwood is so happy. He is sharing the maid's meal,' she cried. 'I think he has quite fallen for Trudel.' She gave a 'spooney' look at Larrie and he replied with a wink. 'But what are we to give this big man?'  she continued, looking at Gerald with mock sternness. Her good mood was almost restored. 'I'm not going to disturb the maids at their meal,' she said firmly to Gerald, as though he had requested this piece of tyranny.

Larrie came over and put an arm round her large waist. 'Let me go into the larder, Mrs Middleton. I'm an old hand at scrounging. I'll find something, never you fear. There's sure to be some delicious tongue in your well-stocked pantry.'

'A tongue!' Inge cried, 'but this boy has such good ideas. I will tell Trudel to boil a tongue in some red wine with some onions. No! I must do it myself; she will always put too much onion.'

'A sandwich will do me perfectly,' Gerald intervened. 'There's no need for you to do a lot of cooking.'

'A sandwich,' Inge cried. 'Now isn't that like a man? To cut sandwiches, my dear Gerald, is far more troublesome than to cook tongue.'

'She's right, you know,' Larrie said. 'There's a great deal of trouble in sandwiches,' and he winked at Gerald, who looked the other way in annoyance. 'But don't you worry yourself with it, Mrs Middleton,' Larrie went on. 'Aren't the maids fighting to do things for you, with all your kindness to them? And if it's a bit of charm they're after, I'll go and talk to them.'

When he returned with a plate of cold tongue and salad, Inge was still lecturing Gerald on his selfishness in arriving so late, and announced, 'You're very lucky to get anything at all, Gerald. We have a very sick little invalid in the house who needs a great deal more care than you deserve.'

'And how is the darling little bird?'  Larrie cried.

'Thingy found a little owl in the snow,' John explained. 'She and Larrie have been fussing about it trying to force brandy down its beak all the morning.' His voice showed a certain impatience. 'You know really, darling, you'd much better put it out of its misery. Its wing's injured, and even if you get it to take some food, it can't fly again.'

'Oh no!' Inge cried. 'What a terrible thing to say, Johnnie! It's such a wise little bird.' She rounded her eyes, and called loudly across the room, 'Ee-wik, ee-wik, ee-wik. It goes so, Gerald.' She looked more like a great Scandinavian eagle owl than the little owl. She may have sensed this, for she said very patiently to Gerald, 'Not the big kind that goes Woo-Woo-Woo. The
little
owl.'

'Yes, I had understood, Inge,' he replied. He disliked Inge's sudden animal imitations; before Larrie they seemed intolerable.

'Very well,' John got up from his chair and looked out of the window, 'I wash my hands of it. If you and Larrie want to fuss over the wretched bird, do.' He turned quite savagely upon Larrie, 'Only I hope to God the damned thing isn't still here when I get back tomorrow. I shall have to start soon, by the way, if I'm to get to town in time with these slippery roads.'

Gerald said, 'I can give you a lift back, if you like. Larwood's very reliable, even on roads like glass.'

John was still very short-tempered. 'No, thank you. I shall need the car to come back tomorrow. You rich people always have very inflated ideas of chauffeurs' driving.'

Larrie had been watching John's mood and he seemed to make a sudden decision. He crossed the room and put his hand on Inge's arm. 'Johnnie's right, you know. The poor little thing would be better out of the way.'

Inge turned great frightened doll's eyes upon him. 'Oh! no, you mustn't say so. I couldn't kill anything.'

'Why, Mrs Middleton, who'd wish you to do such a thing? No, it's I'm the one for that.'

John looked round from the window and said abruptly, 'Do it quickly, mind, Larrie.'

'Oh no! no!' Inge was still saying, but Larrie had gone from the room.

Gerald walked over to John. 'Do you think I could have a few words with you, John?'  he asked quietly.

John looked up at him. 'It'll have to be very few words, because I must go,' he said.

'Is there a fire in the morning-room, Inge?'  Gerald asked. 'I wanted to have a short business talk with John on his own.'

'Business that I mustn't hear? What can it be, Gerald? That is not very polite.'

'I'm sorry, my dear, I have no other chance of seeing John. By the way,' he added, 'I've written to Thurstan about that little business of yours. I should have done it before, but I've added a little yearly present which I hope you'll like.'

'Now you are trying to bribe me,' Inge cried, but she was smiling. 'All right. Go along with you. If the central heating is not enough, you can put on the electric heater.'

Before they had left the room, however, Larrie returned. Gerald felt that he could almost hear him purring. All the wistful, orphan lines of his face seemed to have filled out in a fat-cat contentment. 'The poor little thing's out of the way,' he said.

Inge sighed. 'Oh dear! I
never
have anything killed in this house. I do hope you're not going to bring me bad luck, Larrie.'

The boy went up and kissed her. 'How can you say that?'  he asked.

'No, I don't mean it,' Inge smiled. But Gerald, who could see that she was genuinely distressed, said, 'I'm sure the little bird died very quickly, dear.'

'Well now, it did and it didn't' Larrie began, but John broke in abruptly. 'You can spare us the details, Larrie,' he said. He turned to Gerald with a mock schoolboy expression. 'Let's get the pi-jaw over, Father,' he said, 'or is it to be six of the best?'  As they went out of the room, Larrie shouted after them, 'Make it a dozen, Professor.'

As they entered the long morning-room, so grey and empty in the dying February light, Gerald felt desperately that he had bungled the whole thing. He should have contrived the interview by chance; as it was, it reflected exactly the pattern of those few, clumsy, ill-managed 'talks' he had suffered with John in his early boyhood, any effect of which had immediately been undone by Inge's blandishments.

John sat on the arm of a large chair, swinging his legs, boyish once more in the absence of Larrie. 'What on earth is all this, Father?'  he asked; but his careless smile did not entirely hide his annoyance.

Gerald, desperate to avoid the central topic, said, 'I'm worried about your mother, John.'

'Thingy, but why on earth? She seems in cracking form.'

Gerald forced himself to sit down and face John. 'Do you find it cold in here? Shall I turn on one of those heaters?'  and, when John replied with an impatient gesture, he continued, 'Oh yes, she's very well, I think. I'm just worried about her making a fool of herself over your friend, Larrie. You know how fond she gets of people.'

John raised his eyebrows. 'But good heavens!' he cried, 'it's the best thing in the world for her to have someone to be interested in. For one thing, it stops her fussing over her children so much. Surely you know that.' He took out his pipe and began filling it. For the rest of their interview he was busy fighting it, sucking at it and throwing away matches in a manner that doubled Gerald's nervous annoyance.

'We know nothing, at least I know nothing of your friend,' Gerald said.

John roared with laughter. 'I'd like to know when you've ever known anything, about any of our friends,' he said.

Gerald flushed, but he added determinedly, 'They didn't come to live with your mother.'

John stared at Gerald with an ironical smile. 'I could say a lot about your sudden solicitude for Thingy. However, I prefer to behave as though you had the ordinary husband's right to ask questions. Very well. Larrie's an orphan, an institution boy who's been in a lot of trouble; he's had three convictions for petty thieving and he's been to an Approved School. Thingy knows all that and she has welcomed him here as my friend. Do you want to know any more?'