Charles Palliser (49 page)

This was an unfortunate remark for Mr Pentecost snorted angrily at this word:

“Charity is always self-interested and therefore hypocritical.”

I saw my mother gasp at this and turn away.

Miss Quilliam, however, answered calmly: “Charity may arise from the desire to be seen to be charitable, but surely nobody would attempt to deny that hypocrisy is a force for the good in society?”

“I deny it!” cried Mr Silverlight. “I am sworn foe to hypocrisy and all forms of humbug. I care not what it costs to say it.”

“Noble fellow,” said Mr Pentecost, shaking his head. “But you’re a child in these matters.”

Miss Quilliam, however, smiled before going on: “You cannot explain the desire to be seen to be charitable simply from self-interest, Mr Pentecost. And therefore you must grant that some kind of mixture of conscience, divine prompting, instinct and tradition of which one is not fully aware is what determines one’s actions. Each of us finds true happiness — if at all — only in harmony with our society, and the impulse to charity arises from this.”

“My dear young lady,” said Mr Pentecost, appearing to be much moved by these words. “I hardly know where to begin to attempt to set you right. All social and economic life is warfare between individuals and between classes and this is absolutely inevitable. It makes no sense to speak of what ought to be: this is the Law of Necessity.”

Mr Silverlight said nothing but his high forehead gleamed at us from the near-darkness and he was smiling as if asking for understanding for his friend’s absurdities as Mr Pentecost now went on to speak of how everyone hunts and preys upon everyone else or at best feeds on everyone else like parasites on a dog. And this, he insisted, is what we call society.

My mother put her hands over her face, but without noticing this he continued: “And it is right, or at least desirable, that this should be the case, for this parasitical system that makes use of waste operates in a self-regulating way. Nothing is wasted and so society extracts its full value from things and people.”

Miss Quilliam argued against this that society was not parasitical but organic.

Individuals and classes were not at war but dependent each upon the other.

SECRET BENEFACTORS

225

The contentment of each in his proper place was the end of society and was attainable in the future as it had been once in England’s happy past.

Mr Pentecost dismissed this, insisting that misery for the majority was inevitable because, since society was constituted by competition, there must be losers as well as gainers. For this reason the most that could be achieved was the happiness of the largest number and there was a felicific calculus by which this could be calculated. In order to arrive at this estimate of its best interests, society must always ask what use something was, and the best — indeed the only — way to establish the value of something was on the free market. So there must be competition in order that everything and everyone should be bought and sold at its true value which was always the lowest price at which its existence or manufacture could be justified. And the reason for England’s present distress was that this delicate mechanism was being interfered with.

As the evening advanced the two gentlemen responded in opposite ways to the hospitality extended to them, Mr Pentecost flapping his arms in his excitement so that he looked like a duck trying to get into flight and all the while showering himself with snuff, while Mr Silverlight sat gazing dolefully at the two ladies or smiling mournfully at his friend’s impassioned oratory. And when Mr Pentecost was amused by something —

and the strangest things had this effect on him — he threw his head back and laughed in short barking cries, which stopped as suddenly as they started.

I could not smile and neither could my mother for I saw that his words had profoundly depressed her. What Mr Pentecost was saying seemed to me so repellent that I could not square it with his kindly demeanour. How could he believe and say such terrible things? And did he really behave in that immoral way himself ? And yet what he was saying could not be dismissed for it did cast light on Bissett’s motives and those of people like Mrs Marrables and the Isbisters.

“Must everything be bought and sold,” I asked him, following an association of ideas of my own. “Is nothing sacred?”

“Nothing,” he replied. Almost as if he had read my mind, he went on: “Even our laws against cannibalism are the product of mere superstition, and in circumstances where human life depended on their suspension then it would be inevitable — or, as you might say, right — that they should be suspended.”

“Oh no!” my mother exclaimed, covering her ears with her hands. “I cannot listen to any more of this!”

Mr Pentecost looked at her in alarm but his companion rose and said sternly: “Come, Pentecost. It is late. And you have forgotten yourself, my good fellow.” He turned to my mother: “Forgive us. We find ourselves so rarely now in good company.”

He bowed and then almost tugged his friend out of the room.

When the door had closed behind them my mother sighed : “Thank Heavens he has gone! I don’t ever want him here again, Johnnie.”

“To which gentleman do you refer?” asked Miss Quilliam.

“That horrid Mr Pentecost, of course,” she declared with a shudder.

“Why,” Miss Quilliam said, “I believe his worst side is his outside.”

“And that’s quite bad enough,” my mother said and the subject was dropped.

I was also upset by Mr Pentecost’s vision of society as a spiderly, cannibalistic, irrational pursuit of self-interest. I didn’t want to believe that he was right. On the other hand, what Miss Quilliam had said inspired me. Yes, that was the 226 THE

MOMPESSONS

finest thing, to be a great landlord and act benevolently for the sake of one’s dependants!

Miss Quilliam picked up the little green bottle that I saw so often in her hand and shook it. She looked puzzled and shook it again. Then rising she said: “I must go out for a few minutes.”

“But it’s so late!” I objected.

She left and, intrigued, I examined the bottle and saw that it was labelled “The Black Drop”. As I lifted it to my nose my mother called out “Don’t, Johnnie!” It had a sweet, slightly pungent smell that seemed familiar.

Miss Quilliam came back in ten minutes and poured herself a tumbler of gin to which she added a couple of drops from the fresh bottle she had brought.

Noticing that I was watching her, she coloured and then said: “They call it the poor man’s friend for it brings sweet solace when either the body or the mind is in pain. It has saved me often. I take only three or four grains now.”

It was almost with relief that I saw my mother pour herself a tumbler of “Cream o’ the Valley”.

A few days later I happened to be on the landing when Mr Pentecost and his friend came up the stairs. They courteously invited me into their Eastern potentate’s tent in the corner of the Peachments’ room and I found it quite a cozy little arrangement.

“Sit yeself down,” Mr Pentecost said.

As I obeyed I asked: “How long have you and Mr Silverlight known each other?”

“Why, more years than I care to count,” Mr Pentecost answered. “Ten or twelve, I should think, eh, Silverlight? We made our acquaintance in, shall we say, less happy circumstances than these.”

“I was in Equity at that time,” Mr Silverlight said with dignity. “That noblest of man’s achievements in social justice.”

Mr Pentecost snorted.

“In short, I was a lawyer,” Mr Silverlight continued, ignoring his friend.

“And what about you, sir?” I asked the other gentleman.

“I have pursued many avocations,” he replied.

These, I now discovered, included a wide range of things: at various times he had insured in the Lottery, worked as a bill-broker’s agent, copied manuscripts for a theatre, and so on.

“But I have, like my companion, had some experience of that maze of confusion and depredation strangely named the Common Law,” Mr Pentecost went on. “I say

‘strangely’ for in its stupidity and irrationality it exceeds even what is common.”

“There I concur with you my friend,” said Mr Silverlight.

“But, Mr Silverlight, I thought you just praised it!” I protested.

“My good young friend,” Mr Silverlight said superbly, “pray do not make the vulgar error of confusing the Law and Equity.”

The rebuke was so magnificent that I dared not ask for elucidation.

“On occasions,” Mr Pentecost went on in order to help me out of my difficulty, “I have earned my bread as a humble handmaiden to both Law and Equity — that is to say, as a jobbing writer. A very high quality of penmanship is required for Chancery engrossing and law-copying. I can’t do it any longer because I am getting too old and my eyes poor and my hands unsteady.” Here he held out SECRET BENEFACTORS

227

one hand and it was indeed quavering. “But I occasionally engross a common law deed or writ, even now.”

“I too have done a number of things,” Mr Silverlight said. “When I was young I was in commerce, but though I inherited a good connexion, I got into difficulties through no fault of my own. My downfall was that credit was only too easy to obtain.”

“You trusted people too easily?” I asked.

“The reverse,” he said. “Alas, too many trusted me.” He shook his head: “Greed is a terrible thing.”

“Indeed,” his friend said. He turned to me: “You see, greedy tradesmen were only too ready to sell to poor Silverlight and take his notes at a discount in preference to taking bank-paper at face-value. Too much of that goes on.”

Indeed, I reflected, I had better reasons for agreeing with him than he could know of.

“Because of it, we are heading for a smash,” Mr Pentecost went on in words that turned out to be prophetic. “Mark my words, the whole paper kingdom will come tumbling down in a year or two like a house of cards. You see, giving credit implies trust and is therefore — on the present scale — an utter absurdity. For trade is universal cheating and so inherently inimical to the notion of trust. But the mania is being whipped along by the pettifogging attorneys for they make huge fortunes from bankruptcies, insolvencies, compositions, and debtors’ gaols.”

“Well, they made a deal of money out of me,” Mr Silverlight sighed.

“That’s true,” Mr Pentecost said. Then somewhat timidly he added: “But also, Silverlight, you know you rather brought it upon yourself by gaming.”

“Nonsense, I never game,” said Mr Silverlight stiffly. “Though occasionally I have speculated at the game of Hazard.”

Mr Pentecost turned to me: “You see, Silverlight lost a great deal of money by playing in accordance with a mathematical system that assumed a design in the way the numbers come up on the dice.”

“I was not taking a risk for there is such a design,” Mr Silverlight insisted, and I noticed a vein in his prominent forehead beginning to pulse.

“fiddlesticks!” Mr Pentecost said with an affable laugh. “Yet you are right in a manner of speaking, for all of life is a risk. There is no order or rationality.”

“Certainly not in your own conduct,” Mr Silverlight said meaningfully.

Mr Pentecost looked at him gravely: “I have wounded you, my friend, and believe me, I had no intention of doing so.” He reached into a pocket, took out a large watch and consulted it. “But you have reminded me that I must leave you for a while.”

“Where are you going?” Mr Silverlight asked and, receiving no reply, watched his friend curiously as he pulled on his coat and left.

When we were alone Mr Silverlight said: “He disappears like that now and then. I cannot help speculating about his motives. An honourable man for all his queerness, but one never knows. The evening we met you it distressed me to see him offend your charming mother and the other delightful young lady. (Incidentally, how are they? …

Excellent, excellent. Please convey to them my kindest sentiments.) But as for my friend

… I call him Mount Vesuvius for brimstone and rubbish are continually being emitted from his mouth. I must put you right on one or two things he said that evening for I hate to see the bright hopes of Youth blighted by the cynicism of Age. You know, Pentecost is 228 THE

MOMPESSONS

wrong about the notion that ideas are determined by economic circumstances. One must start with abstract principles — Justice, Equality — and condemn society if it falls short when it is measured against them.”

I nodded my agreement and he went on: “Pentecost is quite wrong. There is a Design in every part of our lives if we can but perceive it. I am a Deist and accept the argument from Design as proof of the existence of a Supreme Spirit of Reason. Reason and not self-interest forms the ordering principle upon which society is founded. The whole economic order must be changed to bring it into conformity with rational Justice.”

He was soon in full flight and I listened enraptured. Mr Pentecost was wrong. Society could be better, could be perfect! And yet as I returned to our room I felt deeply confused, for I liked Mr Pentecost and could not understood how he could really believe the views he expressed.

When I entered I found my mother very subdued and a little later she went to bed and slept soundly. This was a rarity, for she was often kept awake by coughing and would then light a tallow-dip and write for hours in her pocket-book.

During the weeks that followed I came to know the two gentlemen better and often stayed to talk to them when I went to the Peachments’ room at the end of the day to buy more dolls for the following morning. My mother continued to refuse to have anything to do with Mr Pentecost and so I kept my visits to them secret from her. As I sat in their tent pretending to sip at a small glass of Cream o’ the Valley, Mr Silverlight told me stories of Mr Wycherley fiennes and his charming mother, My Lady Blennerhasset (who, I recall, had married again after being widowed), who had visited her son occasionally.

Though he excepted her and several other members of the aristocracy from his strictures, he was eager to make clear his general detestation of Old Corruption and the system which permitted placemen to rob decent, talented young fellows of their rightful position. While clarifying for me the precise relation between different members of the nobility, he would consult his copy of Webster’s Royal Red Book, and as the evening warmed, he would often read aloud from this, taking turn and turn about to recite from the scurrilously Radical Black Book long lists of the sinecures and pensions enjoyed by the Establishment. And often and often he would wax eloquent on the subject of Reason and Virtue and their interconnexion as he picked the lice from his linen. And usually by this stage Mr Pentecost would be throwing pinches of snuff in the direction of his nostrils and declaiming about the necessity of suffering while tears rolled down his cheeks.