Delphi Works of Ford Madox Ford (Illustrated) (364 page)

The thin sound of a fiddle had for some time been heard intermittently whilst the Countess and Mr Everard and Luscombe were inspecting the buildings. This, however, had ceased for some time before they came round to the back to look at the recreation grounds. Very tall, painted white, and with a coronal of hoop-staves dancing in the wind, the maypole rose close to where the swings had been erected for the children beyond the tennis lawns and the bowling green. Upon the stone base of the pole the old, blind fiddler, wearing a smock frock and knee-breeches, was seated, his sightless eyes gazing upon the ground. A group of some thirteen or fourteen Lifers stood round him in attitudes of desultory interruption. They held in their hands, or leaned slightly upon long ribbons which descended from the coronal and fluttered and curved in the fresh breeze. They were listening, apparently rather inattentively, to an earnest discussion which was going forward between Ophelia Bransdon and Mrs Lee. Mr Gubb, with what appeared to be ill-success, was acting apparently as intermediary or umpire, and a dark gentleman in an astrakhan cap like a pill-box, a long, black gaberdine, bound round the waist with a leather belt and high black jack boots, gesticulated every now and then and uttered words to which nobody appeared to pay any particular attention. No sooner, however, was Mr Gubb aware of Gerald Luscombe and his companions than either by compulsion or a sudden persuasiveness, he stilled the discussion. The dancers resumed their places in the ring. They joined hands, a ribbon to each pair, and at a signal the old fiddler struck up faintly and reedily the tune of “the Shaking of the Sheets,” a sixteenth century air which Mr Perivale, who lived in the third cottage from the inn, had spent nine months in identifying and three more in teaching to the old man, who was hard of hearing and slow of apprehension. The dancers capered slowly round in a circle; they kept their hands joined together for the body of the melody, but when it changed to the burden or chorus they unclasped their hands and ran slowly round, threading each other in or out. In this way the ribbons running to the top of the mast plaited themselves gradually together. The burden ended. The original melody began again, the dancers joined hands once more in a slightly diminished circle. They were of all heights, dimensions and ages. Three of the men wore the ordinary costume of the Simple Lifers which Mr Hangbird had called the convict’s dress, but three of the younger men had smock frocks, wideawakes and knee-breeches, and a little boy wore the same costume. The costumes of the women were more varied but of them, too, three were dressed in loose, flowing garments of the grey, woollen material that the Colony manufactured. They all of them wore no hats with the exception of Mrs Lee who had a light grey wideawake. She had also a white jersey, and a short skirt which was obviously tailor-made. Ophelia Bransdon wore a jibbeh of green cloth, stitched with silk about the neck in small decorations suggesting or suggested by Catherine wheels and scallop shells. A great strand of her corn-coloured hair had come down and bounced on her shoulder as she danced; she was flushed by her argument and by the exercise that had succeeded it.

The body of the dance finished once more and the intertwining movement had recommenced; the Countess was just exclaiming: “Charming! Perfectly charming!” when the gentleman in the Near Eastern costume who had been capering with his legs very high in the air caught his boots one in the other and pitched in a complicated heap on to his shoulder and head. Mrs Lee, who had just extended her hand to him, became entangled with his legs and fell sideways, her elbow striking him on the cheek. The little boy who was following her fell across the two of them. The dancers stopped but the sightless fiddler continued his melody and a peal of laughter came from Ophelia Bransdon. She laughed without stopping; she laughed to the scandal and wonderment of her mildeyed companions who stood awkwardly, their hands hanging at their sides. The little boy got to his hands and knees and then scampered to a short distance. And then the Near Eastern gentleman, who had been very slightly stunned by Mrs Lee’s elbow, turned over on his elbow and scrambled clumsily to his feet. Mr Gubb and Mr Perivale, who was the official organiser of these dances, were approaching and upon them the Little Russian turned an electric fury. He stamped upon the ground; incomprehensible words poured from his mouth; his arms waved above his head and he spat and hissed like an enraged cat. His right hand fumbled at his belt where generally he carried a formidable dagger or a revolver. Before this outburst in an unknown tongue Mr Gubb and Mr Perivale remained apologetically speechless. But suddenly he came to a stop. He stalked to his head-dress which had rolled some feet away; he dusted it by slapping it upon his leg between the knee and the thigh; he stuck his head out at the extreme length of his throat towards the face of Mr Gubb and he exclaimed in tones of an extreme clearness but vibrating with rage:

“Rotten child’s game! Rotten, old, fat man! Pah!” And smashing his hat on to his head he stamped away over the Green towards the cottages.

The Colonists regarded his back in a sort of bewildered anaemia and suddenly Mrs Lee exclaimed, her windy tones full of bitter hatred:

“It’s disgraceful! It’s shameless! And the poor man a foreigner!”

She shot a glance of a vindictiveness that hardly seemed possible, over her shoulder at Ophelia.

“Oh, I wasn’t laughing at Mr Brandetski!” Ophelia exclaimed with a meaning almost more vindictive than Mrs Lee’s.

Mrs Lee breathed hard through her distended nostrils but she found no expletive which would satisfy her, and she set off at a sharp walk that was almost a trot after the retreating figure of Mr Brandetski, who was Mr Bransdon’s cousin, and who had been stopping in the Colony for the last five weeks. For political reasons, having escaped by the skin of his teeth from the authorities of the Government of Kieff, he had heard in London — the fact had been published in a penny weekly paper — that Simon Bransdon the Novelist and Social Reformer was no other than Simeon Brandetski, his great uncle David’s son. It had not taken him very long to find the address of the Simple Life Limited and to borrow his fare to Oxted Station.

Mr Gubb advanced towards Luscombe and the Countess.

“You understand,” he said, addressing the three of them, “that this is only a rehearsal and Mr Brandetski is very ardent and quite inexperienced, though he dances excellently in the Russian manner.”

Mr Luscombe was introducing the Countess, who was exclaiming that it really had been quite charming. Mr Everard, as his eyes went from figure to figure of the remaining Colonists, expressed by his face a deeper and deeper amusement. He had, indeed, little starts and quakings of his shoulders as if he were repressing desires to burst into a guffaw. Mr Gubb was hot to the point of perspiration, but at the sound of Lady Croydon’s name he suddenly fingered his blue thread tie and had the air of being about to become exceedingly brisk. Mr Luscombe was asking Mr Gubb which of the houses it would be most convenient to take the Countess over, when Mr Everard suddenly exclaimed to one of the young men in smock frocks who was supporting himself by his ribbon:

“Why in the world don’t you stop that fiddler?”

The old, blind man was commencing the tune of “The Shaking of the Sheets” for the fourth time and Mr Everard was approaching a crisis of nervous exasperation. The young man whom Mr Everard had addressed merely let his mouth fall open as if he had not the faintest idea of the English language. But Ophelia Bransdon suddenly clapped her hands three times. The thin sound of the fiddle ceased; the fiddler dropped his fiddle into his lap and reaching for the large pewter pot that — in order that tradition might be fulfilled to the utmost — stood upon the stone base of the maypole at his side, he took a deep draught.

Mr Everard exclaimed:

“Oh, I say!” His eyes had fallen upon Ophelia Bransdon.

“Why,” Mr Gubb answered Mr Luscombe, “you could go over any of the houses, as you know.”

“That means the Johnsons’, I suppose?” Mr Luscombe interjected.

“The Johnsons’ is generally unlocked,” Mr Gubb said. And then he addressed Lady Croydon for the first time.

“Your Ladyship isn’t to understand,” he said, “that any of the doors of the Community would ever be locked if it were not for tramps. Both in theory and in practice the Community hasn’t any property.”

The Countess slightly elevated her eyebrows.

“But how do you find that work out?” she said. “It must be rather awkward if you want to take a cab?” They were moving instinctively away from the maypole towards the cottages, Mr Gubb at the Countess’ side and Mr Luscombe just turning to follow them. Mr Everard, however, touched Gerald on the elbow.

“I say,” he exclaimed, “I’ve been over your old Johnsons’ cottages once already to-day. You just introduce me to that girl and I’ll stop here.”

“Oh, that’s Ophelia Bransdon,” Gerald answered. “The daughter of the great Bransdon. You don’t need an introduction. It isn’t the custom amongst the Simple Lifers. Go and talk to her about her printing-presses.” And he walked after Lady Croydon and Mr Gubb. Mr Gubb immediately handed the Countess over to his care and hurried forward. He was going, he said, to see if the great poet was in a mood to receive visitors.

“
What a charming man!” the Countess exclaimed. “He’s so reasonable! He doesn’t seem to be a bit like a Socialist.”

Gerald Luscombe laughed for the first time.

“Oh, our friend Gubb’s reasonable enough,” he said. “I don’t know how they’d get on without him.”

They crossed the road and entered the little white gateway of the cottage that was next but two from the end of the village. Luscombe explained that the further one was occupied by Mr Gubb and the last by Mr Bransdon, who desired to be at the end of the row because there would be least noise. Noise, Mr Luscombe said, would seriously interfere with Mr Bransdon’s meditations. Mr Luscombe explained, moreover, that the cottage they were going to look over was tenanted by Mr and Mrs Johnson. But Mrs Johnson, having been lately appointed sub-editress of a paper devoted to women’s sports — which was not very much in the line of the Simple Life, but people, Mr Luscombe understood, had to take what they could get — Mrs Johnson being a subeditress and Mr Johnson having been commissioned to write a monumental work upon the majolica ware of Gubbio, the Johnsons were very seldom in Luscombe Green. For of course, majolica was not to be found with any frequency in the wilds of Surrey. The cottage, however, afforded an asylum to an old nurse of Mr Johnson’s who kept it clean and was ready to show it to visitors.

The Countess continued to exclaim: “Charming! Very nice!” at intervals sufficiently appropriate to show that she was not absolutely bored, except when financial questions were being put before her. She said that the little garden was absolutely charming. It contained a bed of white flowering phlox with dwarf roses fixed to trellis-work and pegged to the ground. A small circular green path went round the centre bed. There were two Pyrus Japonica plants not then in flower and against the tiles of the cottage beneath the white-framed window there rose up, stiff and very tidily trimmed, a hedge-like row of periwinkle with the flowers like dark blue five-pointed stars. The cottage, itself, red-tiled all the way up and the roof red-tiled, too, had a garret and that general softness of aspect, that domestic homeliness which so exactly suggests in outlines and curves a pleasant loaf of bread. The door, however, was locked and did not even open to Luscombe’s knocking. When, however, they had retreated as far as the road, Gerald Luscombe, in turning to close the gate, perceived that the door was opening itself and round it a moment later appeared the flushed and indignant features of Mrs Lee. Her blue eyes were sparkling still with rage. Her black hair was tousled. She had ejaculated, before she had taken stock of her visitors: “I won’t have the poor man tormented!”

“I only wanted, you know,” Gerald Luscombe said, “to show Lady Croydon over the cottage. We are generally allowed to show people over it, because it
is
the show cottage.”

Mrs Lee exclaimed: “Oh! Lady Croydon!” And before Luscombe could say more than: “It doesn’t matter!” she appeared to have passed through certain reflections and to be ready to say: “I don’t see why I shouldn’t show you over. The housekeeper’s out,” she added, “but poor Mr Brandetski is so dreadfully sensitive, I thought you were some of those oafs. He’s quartered here to be near his cousin and the housekeeper looks after him. But I think he’s really too nervous to stand it.” The door opened straight into a living room of an extreme white spick and spanness. Upon the duck’s nest grate in the inglenook was a copper kettle, brighter than any the Countess thought she had ever seen. On the oak beam that did duty for a mantel-shelf stood three cheap Delft plates, representing in blue and yellow, Dutchmen in enormous yellow clogs. The chairs were of white wood, with high stiff backs and greenish grey rush seats. The table was of white deal, scrubbed and sand-papered till the hardness of its surface had been eroded. The curtains before the little casement windows were of bright red Turkey twill. There was nothing else whatever in the room except Mr Brandetski who sat in an attitude of passionate dejection, his head almost between his knees, half-in, half-out of the ingle. A scullery was approached by a white door with a large wooden latch that Mrs Lee pulled up with a string through a hole. It contained a sink, a plate-rack, holding white plates, a Windsor chair, over the back of which for the moment was thrown the housekeeper’s grey woollen shawl, a draining-board and a kitchen table, upon which there stood a wooden Swiss clock with a painted face representing a boy shooting at a pigeon, in scarlet and emerald green, and a geranium in a pot. Mrs Lee explained to the Countess that this clock and the pot plant were a concession to the housekeeper’s weakness. They ought not, by rights, to be there. The brick flooring had been brought up to such a pitch of colour with turkey red that the Countess feared for the bottom of her skirt. She stepped nevertheless, gingerly across it.