The Rise of Henry Morcar (35 page)

“Well—you played your ace,” said Morcar to David sourly, sinking back in his corner seat.

“Yes,” said David. He coloured. He was still standing; he looked at Morcar defensively. “It was too soon in the game, you think?”

“What game?” said Morcar in a rough tone.

David did not enlighten him. Instead, he said politely: “Will you excuse me now, Mr. Morcar? I'm afraid I haven't a first-class ticket on this part of the journey.”

“Quite right,” approved Morcar, mollified in spite of himself by this example of sound economy. “Always keep down your overheads. Be off with you to the thirds. I'll see you perhaps at Annotsfield.”

When David had gone Morcar took up his newspaper again. But he found it difficult to concentrate on what he was reading. The figures of the four Oldroyds—the lame colonel defeated by the slump, the silly adoring wife, the naughty kitten Fan, David so exceptionally able and noble—mingled with those of the Haringtons—the snobbish hateful Edward, the ingenuous young Edwin away at sea, the noble handsome Jenny and his own darling, his beautiful beloved Christina. The two Mellors wove in and out of the mazy dance while his mother—for whom he had bought a special kind of deck chair in Southstone on Saturday on Mrs. Oldroyd's recommendation—sat in the background sewing and watching. He felt sorry about that violent but sincere young fool Matthew, vexed that Fan should vex her father, pleased in a sad way that David should travel first where his father could see him and third elsewhere.

“I'm getting cluttered up with people,” thought Morcar savagely, turning his paper with a jerk that tore the sheet. “I must cut them all out except Christina.”

But he knew he could not cut them out; he cared too much for them.

The curtain rose to reveal an extraordinary backcloth, of a kind which Morcar privately designated surrealist, though probably inaccurately. Strange whorls and lobes in clashing crimsons, bold powerful planes in black, a couple of uneven yellow ovals which might or might not be eyes, a hint of a starfish and something
resembling a huge scroll of ribbon, brought to mind uncomfortable words like cosmos and cataclysm, and suggested an action to come which without doubt, reflected Morcar, recalling the Victorian anecdote with amusement, would be quite unlike the home life of the great Queen. He seemed to remember now a remark from David that the décor was meant to suggest a human heart.

“Fan won't like it,” thought Morcar with a grin, as Verchinina entered and with her head held down as if in deep thought whizzed her arms in violent arcs which Fan's expensive boarding-school would certainly regard as unladylike.

The ballet was
Les Présages
; the party—a dinner, Covent Garden, supper and dancing—was an offering to the children by Morcar on the occasion of Fan Oldroyd's birthday. Morcar sat at the end of the row with Christina between himself and her son, who was at home on a brief leave; then came Fan, very silky in close-fitting fashionable white which revealed every curve of her charming little body; Harington was enjoying himself between Fan and his daughter, each so striking of her kind; Jenny also in white looked classically handsome where Fan looked sexually attractive; David at Jenny's left completed the party. Fan, now engaged (more or less) in a secretarial course and installed in a Kensington hostel of Christina's choosing, was sampling the delights of London with avidity as far as (perhaps indeed a little further than) her limited means allowed. She had expressed a desire to see a ballet, but Morcar felt certain she had expected the sort of chorus
ensemble
found in musical comedy, something cheerful, pretty and in the vulgar sense stylish. The dissection of the heart's problems offered her by Massine would probably both puzzle her and excite her derision.

What was it all about anyway, wondered Morcar, as male figures leaped wildly across the back of the stage. He flicked on his lighter and examined the programme.
The subject of the ballet
, he read,
is man's struggle with his destiny.
Quite a big subject, thought Morcar sardonically.
The first scene represents life, with its diversions, desires and temptations.
Ah, thought Morcar—watching the dancers with a keener interest and reading his own interpretation, the meanings of his own life, into the work of art before him—that is very true, that is just like life; one has aims, one has ambitions, one lowers one's head in preoccupation, gazes within, dreams, swings one's arms in a violent effort of thought to reduce the world to understandable patterns; then bevies of sensual images come swirling lightly in, events rush upon one distractingly, the ordered movement breaks and disintegrates. One tries continually to return to one's original aim, the thought, the clear
forward movement, but the other figures continually break in upon it.… What a mess my life is, thought Morcar; nothing is as it should be except Syke Mills and possibly David. I hope to God these four young things here will make a better job of it than I have. He felt moved and troubled, and if he had had the right to do so he would have taken Christina's hand to seek reassurance.

But now the stage was empty for a moment, the music changed to a beautiful slow melody which Morcar found thrilling, passionate and tender. He glanced at the programme again:
In the second scene is revealed love in conflict with the baser passion which shatters the human soul. The beauty of love is imperilled, but prevails
. Morcar looked up quickly at the stage; from the right two dancers entered. Lichine in strange bright green, his arm about the waist of his lover, supporting her: Baronova in strange bright red, on her points, her lovely arms extended upward in hope and aspiration: advancing slowly, with rhythmic pauses, to Tchaikovsky's poignant and romantic music. Their progress was solemn, noble, beautiful; an ardent devotion, a tender respect, seemed to sustain them. Morcar was profoundly moved. Yes, he thought; that is love; that is how I feel towards Christina. The lovers danced together; ah if we only had time, thought Morcar, those noble evolutions would represent the movements of our souls towards each other, not merely of our bodies. But now the
corps de ballet
rush in—they are lovers too, no doubt, thought Morcar irritably, but I wish they would keep away and not confuse the issue. But what is this? Morcar sat up abruptly. A hateful batlike figure in dusty black rushes upon the scene; sinister, agile, hideous, with an effect of malignant glee, he threatens the dancers in powerful ugly gestures. Oh no, this is intolerable, thought Morcar, his heart contracting; the woman is thrown from her lovely poise, her beautiful serenity, by this hateful sordid black-winged destiny; her movements become anguished, exaggerated, contorted; she droops and wavers, her body tosses in anguish like a flower in a storm; destiny seizes her, drags her across the stage, she struggles to escape; the other women suffer the same torturing anguish. The man springs forward to try to rescue his love; he seems to attack the hateful black figure, to batter against it—in vain; he sinks back, defeated, exhausted. The woman—will she be carried quite away, hopelessly imprisoned? No; with a supreme effort which Morcar watched in terror lest her fragile form should be torn apart by the strain, she wrenches herself free, and dancing always, with poignant effort gradually regains her flowerlike grace and balance. The others take courage; the black destiny with a last malignant sneer, a threat to return, leaves them.

And now the lovers are alone. After these terrible ordeals, these devastating changes and chances, at last through the power of their love they struggle upright. They resume their first noble pose; the woman raises her arms once again in steadfast aspiration, the man's arm holds firm about her waist; they support each other. Moving once more in their old stately rhythm, they leave the scene with a tragic dignity, ennobled by the ordeals which have tried them. Their love, for the moment at least, has proved stronger than human destiny.

Morcar's feelings were so intense during this presentation of his own anguish of love that he feared he must have betrayed himself. He glanced along the row of his guests in apprehension. Tears trembled in Christina's blue eyes and she gazed at the dancers with a tragic intensity which matched her lover's. Edwin's fresh young face gaped, soberly intent; Fan looked very young and frightened; Harington's suave mask was wrinkled into keen æsthetic appreciation. What of the two good young souls beyond, wondered Morcar; what of Jenny and David? Their heads bowed slightly towards each other, their candid eyes wide, they gazed entranced at the moving and beautiful parable.

With a shock of surprise and alarm, followed by a strange joy, Morcar saw that Jenny's hand was clasped in David's.

Then it was 1938. In Morcar's life two parallel actions progressed throughout the year. There was a public action: England's descent into the abyss of appeasement and humiliation. There was a private action: the division of all Morcar's acquaintance into parties on opposite sides of this abyss. These actions presented themselves to his memory as a series of three-cornered conversations between himself, Harington and David Oldroyd, with Christina and Jenny as auditors and judges. The conversations were not always conducted in the presence of all five people concerned; Jenny was now up at Oxford, achieving her usual brilliant success in work and games, and David could not often be away from Annotsfield. But across the country by letter and report and talk, from David through Morcar to Harington, from Jenny through David and Christina to Morcar and Harington and back to David and Jenny, the argument raged.

“You talk the most amazingly sentimental claptrap sometimes, Harry,” drawled Harington at dinner on New Year's Day. “I've examined all that modern Jewish-German art pretty carefully, and I can assure you it was thoroughly decadent. Needed
cleaning up. Besides, don't you think Hitler's treatment of the Jews is really rather natural? They'd grabbed all the best jobs in the land.”

“Those who can hold the best jobs are entitled to them,” said Morcar.

“If we acted on Hitler's principle in this country,” said David, grinning: “We should be building concentration camps for Scotsmen.”

Harington, who prided himself on a remote Highland strain in his blood, coloured and told him not to be absurd.

February came; Anthony Eden resigned from the post of Foreign Secretary. It was a little difficult to know what went on behind the scenes, but it seemed clear enough to Morcar that Eden thought Germany and Italy should show some signs of repentance of their ways and give some guarantees of mending them before Great Britain could consent to meet them in friendly fashion at the conference table, while the Prime Minister Chamberlain was ready to take them by the hand without these preliminaries.

“Why should we trust countries which have broken every promise made so far?” said David. “Let them show they mean good faith by keeping, even though belatedly, their promise to get out of Spain.”

“David is prejudiced about Spain,” said Harington when he heard this from Morcar, “because of that preposterous cousin of his who got killed there.”

Jenny attended a protest meeting about the resignation, in Oxford, David a similar meeting in Annotsfield.

“Though why they should protest about an act of purely personal pique I own I cannot understand,” said Harington.

“I don't know the ins and outs of the thing, but I don't think England ought to change her Foreign Secretary to please Germany and Italy,” said Morcar.

“The negotiation is a business matter which must be put through in a business style,” said Harington. “If Eden is an obstacle to the bargain, he must be dropped.”

“I wouldn't do business with firms which never kept their promises to pay,” said Morcar. “Besides, look what a strong bargaining point their presence in Spain gives to the totalitarian powers.”

In March, Germany seized Austria. Liberals and Jews committed suicide; beatings, tortures, concentration camps began.

“And we stand by and do nothing!” raged David.

“What does the young firebrand want us to do?” demanded Harington, when this was reported to him by Jenny.

“He wants us to tell Hitler to stop, in accordance with our previous guarantee to Austria,” wrote Jenny.

“What good would that do? Simply involve us in a war not our own,” contended her father.

“David says it
is
our war,” reported Jenny. “Our respect for international obligations is involved.”

“Besides, from the practical point of view I think he's right,” urged Morcar. “We let the Japs get away with snatching Manchuria, and these totalitarian states have been snatching ever since. If Hitler gets away with the seizure of Austria, he'll just go on to seize something else. Next it will be Czechoslovakia, then Poland, then the small Balkan nations, then when he's got them all under his thumb, it will be the turn of France and England.”

“You're very well informed nowadays, Harry,” sneered Harington.

“Aye—I've taken to reading a book or two.”

“Under David's guidance, I suppose?”

“Something of that sort,” returned Morcar equably.

“You're entitled to your own opinion, Harry, of course,” said the barrister, smiling and looking contemptuously down his nose.

“Yes, I am,” said Morcar.

“He wouldn't be entitled to it in Hitler's Reich. Uncle Harry would be in a concentration camp in Germany,” commented Jenny in her next week's letter.

In April the Anglo-Italian agreement was signed, recognising the Italian conquest of Abyssinia. It was Easter, and the party were together, in a houseboat which Morcar had rented on the Thames. David wore a face of gloom as they listened to Morcar's portable radio on the upper deck. Everything around them was very English and pleasant; the grass was green, the water silver, the willows' graceful branches swayed in the gentle breeze, the swans arched their long white necks proudly. But David's thoughts darkened the landscape.