Delphi Works of Ford Madox Ford (Illustrated) (433 page)

His aunt reflected a moment.

“Yes, yes, that’s what Olympia likes!” she said. “That’s the fascination. You can shock her, and she thinks that you are bold and dashing, and dangerous — and that she’s got you, and can trust you.”

“Well, she has,” the major said. “And, please God, she can.”

Again Mrs. Foster remained reflective for a long minute. And then she asked slowly:

“Then, it
is
true that a man can remain faithful to a woman for a long time — for ten years..

“Eight years, nine months, and a week,” the major said. “And only saw her once for fourteen days. Yes, it’s true enough. But what’s there wonderful in that?”

“It’s what every woman really wants to know,” Mrs. Foster said, “and she hasn’t ever really any chance of knowing.”

“Oh, well,” the major said rather tiredly, “it’s so. It’s certainly so, but, looking at the matter from the inside, as I’ve got to do, I can’t see that it’s anything particularly wonderful or romantic, or even particularly meritorious. It’s something just funny, rather than anything else.”

“I can’t see how it’s funny,” Mrs. Foster said, “you might say that it was sad, or sorrowful, or something.”

“Then that would just make it grotesque,” the major said. “And I daresay it is grotesque — a mixture of the sorrowful and the funny. See here, I don’t mean to say that I spent my whole time sighing about Nancy Savylle, or that I hung for hours over her photograph. I didn’t! I hadn’t got a photograph; I lost it before I got as far as Aden, and I cut a photograph of somebody like her out of an illustrated paper, and it used to stand on my writing-table in quarters, until I got sick of it and chucked it into the Ganges.

No, I didn’t sigh; perhaps I didn’t sigh once in the ten years. I’m not the sighing sort, anyhow. But it was like... it was like.. the major paused and cast about in his mind for an illustration.” It was like being always slightly thirsty, or having a very slight touch of indigestion all the time.”

“Oh, my dear,” Mrs. Foster expostulated.

“Well, that is what it really was mostly like,” the major said, “but I’ll withdraw it if it shocks you. It was something that spoilt everything; that took the edge off everything. I don’t mean to say that I never looked at another woman. There wasn’t even anything in honour to bind me not to. No engagement. It was just broken off. She never even wrote to me, because her confounded old great-uncle said that if she did he would cut off her allowance, which was all she had to live on, and, of course, she wasn’t the sort to do it in secret. I shouldn’t have wanted it. She’d just gone right out of my existence. I never heard from her, I never heard of her. Just gone! Dropped down an infernal deep well. And that’s what I mean by saying that it took the edge off things. Of course, you understand that the only thing that is really interesting to a young man is young women. That is a heart talk, so you needn’t be shocked. And there wasn’t any woman that came along that interested me in the least. Not one that made my pulse beat in the least quicker. Of course I talked to’em; and of course I larked with them. I’m not Irish, I suppose, for nothing. But that was just it — they didn’t interest me. I had to cover up yawns sometimes, in the midst of the larkiest of larks. That sort of thing.”

“That’s what I should call love,” Mrs. Foster said.

“Oh, I don’t know,” the major answered; “of course, if you’re satisfied, you’re satisfied. But I don’t want to pose as a sentimental character. If any other woman had come along that did interest me—”

“But no one could have,” Mrs. Foster said. “There wouldn’t be one in the world.”

“Oh, that’s probably sentimental gap,” the major retorted; “you are a silly, old, sentimental old woman. It’s absurd that in the millions and millions there are, there shouldn’t have been one that couldn’t make me forget a tomboy that I had only seen for three weeks in my whole life, and been engaged to for three days. Supposing that it was the look in the eye that did it, and the high instep, and the swinging walk of the creature that she was — do you mean to tell me — supposing that that was what I was looking for — that I shouldn’t have found the same look and the same voice, and the same way the black hair of her curled, in a thousand others? The doctrine of chances forbids it. If there’s a chance of a million to one against it, aren’t there about five hundred million women in the world?”

“Then you never looked for one,” Mrs. Foster said.

“Oh, you rotten, sentimental old ass,” the major addressed his aunt. “I daresay you’ve got at the truth of it. I never did look for one. But don’t you go running away with the idea that that was love. It wasn’t. It was a sort of selfishness. It was like this. I felt that my job in life was to make myself the sort of career that would fit me to pick up with Nancy again. Don’t you understand? I plodded and stodged for just that, and nothing else. That was why when on the same day the bottom fell out of me, and Nancy jumped up in the social scale as if she’d been a balloon that you’d let go the ropes of, I just proposed right away to Olympia. It wasn’t love; it wasn’t morals or faith; it was just want of interest and selfishness.”

“Now, you can say what you like, my dear Edward,” Mrs. Foster said, “I’m not a very clever woman, but I can tell a great A from a bull’s foot. But that’s the sort of love that any sensible woman would want to get hold of. It isn’t your ramping, tearing, raging, obstreperous sort of young man that any woman in her senses would want, as they say in the poem that I never can remember the words of, but it’s something about the burden of my song, though what that means I haven’t the least idea of. But you’ll want to be getting to bed, and not stopping talking to an old woman like me, who goes on and on talking about one and the same thing. But there’s one thing I would like to tell you, because it was my very own idea. There’ll be lots of people that you know coming down in a day or two — all the people that I told you I’d picked up because they knew you, and your uncle’s cook is famous throughout the City. But what I want to tell you is, sometimes, as I daresay you’ve heard, rather unpleasant things happen in these large country houses.”

“Oh, I’ve heard it all right,” the major said.

“Well,” Mrs. Foster exclaimed triumphantly, “with the help of Miss Jenkins, who knows the house from roof to cellar, I’ve arranged that all the men — the gentlemen — sleep in one wing of the house, and all the ladies in the other.”

Again the major ejaculated:

“My God!”

“Of course it’s a little confusing — the house is,” his aunt continued. “At any rate, there are the dining-room and the breakfast-room, and a whole lot of halls and offices in between the two wings. That is to say, they are not rightly two wings. If I understand the arrangement, they are really back to back. But at any rate the sexes are separated. Don’t you think it’s splendid?”

“Oh, splendid! splendid!” the major said; “and you are the most dangerous old inflammatory I’ve ever come across.”

His aunt smiled rather complacently.

“My dear,” she said, “when a woman comes to my age there’s a certain change comes over her. God knows I’ve been a good wife to your uncle. But when a man’s sixty he looks forward to retiring — so does a woman, and I’m over sixty. I’ve looked after your uncle’s house; I’ve lived up to the standard of your uncle’s requirements, whether in morals or what they call customs — or is it conventions? And precious foolish many of his morals and customs — or if it’s conventions, then conventions — have seemed to me, often and often. But now the time has come when I mean to do what pleases
me
, and what seems right to
me,
I don’t mean to say that I should have done it if you hadn’t introduced that Olympia into this house — but if your uncle can be influenced by one woman, he’s got to do what another wants — and that one’s me — or else he’s got to do without her.” The major said: “Oh dear, I do hope Olympia hasn’t...”

“Oh, I don’t mean anything of that sort,” Mrs. Foster answered. “Your uncle always must have some one to philander with in his silly complimenting maimer, which reminds me of an old sheep trying to make love to a chicken. And when it was a matter of Flossie Delamare, I didn’t mind. For she’s a dear, good, bright little thing, and deserves all she gets, and it’s a great comfort to me to know her, for she does bring a little brightness into my life. And I don’t mind if your uncle builds her a dozen theatres as long as he can afford it. And I wish it was her you were marrying, for I’ve often thought of adopting her. And I don’t really object to Mrs. Kerr Howe, though she has rather pushed her way into the house, and some of her opinoins are... well, I haven’t got any words for them. Still, I don’t object to her, because she does pay me the attention of reading her books to me, and very pretty, if not quite proper, some of them are. But, when it comes to Olympia — why, she treats me all the time as if she were a shopwalker trying to tell me that I don’t know tulle from nun’s veiling — which is the most insulting thing that can happen to one. But there, there, you’ve had enough of me. Good night.”

“I say, wait a minute,” the major said. “Where does that beastly dog of poor Olympia’s sleep?”

Mrs. Foster answered: “On the doormat outside her door. She says that she cannot sleep if the dog isn’t somewhere near, and at the same time, it’s unhealthy to have an animal sleeping in your bedroom.”

“Oh, I know, I know,” the major groaned. “It was like that at Gordon Square. And in the middle of the night the horrid little animal will come whining and scratching at my door, and then poor dear Olympia will discover that her dog isn’t outside
her
door. And she’ll come to find the dog, and I shall have to get up and invent loving speeches through the door at four in the morning.”

“Oh, I don’t think that either the dog or Olympia could find their way through all these dark, old, winding corridors, that I’m almost afraid to go along myself,” Mrs. Foster said, and she shivered a little.

“That only shows,” the major answered, “that you don’t know either of them. They’ll come all right, for all you’ve separated the sexes so neatly.” Mrs. Foster caught at that moment the eye of the fierce, dark man in the panel, and she disappeared quickly into the terrors of the corridors, calling over her shoulder:

“Well, you’ve had enough of
me.”

CHAPTER IV
.

THE major shut his door, and then remained, pottering round his room, making muttering exclamations at what he saw — the fire-dogs, the great fireplace, the immense bed, the walls hung with dark tapestry. Then he came back to the fireplace, and standing before it he quoted aloud: “So that there, in a manner of speaking, we all are.”

He sauntered over to the large mahogany washing-stand, and exclaimed over that:

“Hullo, no hot water! Poor aunt always did have the worst servants in Christendom.” Then he pulled a long strip of embroidery that hung at the side of the fire and sat down to await the servant. He did not even take off his coat, for he supposed the servant would be a woman, and he disliked any woman to see him in his shirt. It seemed to be disrespectful to them. He sat in his arm-chair with his back to the panel, just thinking and thinking. And suddenly he said:

“Well, there aren’t
going
to be any more cakes and ale — that’s flat.” He heard a slight knock from somewhere and sat still looking at the door. And then quite distinctly, but very softly, he heard from behind his back the name: “Teddy
Brent.
” He really jumped quite out of his chair, and seeing just behind his chair the figure of a maid in cap and apron, he exclaimed almost violently:

“Hullo, who the devil are you? What do you mean by springing up like that?”

“I came in through the little door behind the hangings,” the servant said. “That is the door her Ladyship likes us to use, because her Ladyship dislikes seeing us about the corridors, sir.”

She spoke very stiffly and correctly, with her eyes on the floor, and she added: “What did you please to want, sir?”

“Oh, hang it all,” the major said, “you don’t come into a man’s room and startle him out of his seven senses by calling him Teddy Brent, and then ask him what he pleases to want.”

“I’m very sorry, sir,” the maid said. “It slipped out, sir, along of my being her Ladyship’s Own Maid and having served her for so long, sir.” She spoke very low, distinctly, and very levelly, like the most perfect of servants, and the major exclaimed — for he felt confused and stupid:

“Not so many sirs. I know I am your social superior without being reminded of it every three words.”

The maid suddenly laughed, and then she said quickly:

“I beg your pardon, sir, it slipped out, sir. It’s because I’m so glad for her Ladyship, sir, that you’ve conic back, sir. It’s made me a little hysterical. I can’t help it, sir, remembering so well the old days at Holbury, sir, nine years ago and more. What did you please to want, sir?” The major stood looking at her with a puzzled expression. His slight doze in the arm-chair had muddled him. Suddenly he moved up close to her and said:

“What I want, desperately, is to kiss you, and that’s the truth.”

 
She moved precisely two steps back.

“That couldn’t have been what you wanted when you rang, sir.”

The major sank down once again into his chair. “It’s extraordinary,” he said, “but she couldn’t have had the cheek to try it on. No one could.” And then he added regretfully: “Oh, well, I
am
a reformed character, when it’s all said and done.” Her Ladyship’s Own Maid interjected:

“Yes, sir,” interrogatively.

And the major said irritably:

“Oh, drop those sirs. They get on my nerves. It’s enough to make one believe you’re not a servant at all. I never knew one use so many.”

“Well, you’re the odd gentleman,” Miss Jenkins said calmly. “If you would please to tell me what you want.... I’m sure her Ladyship would give me a character as long as her life, pretty nearly, sir.”

“I don’t believe you’re a day older than Lady Savylle,” the major said. “You can’t have been her nurse, so don’t try to make me believe it. What’s your name?”

Miss Jenkins, who had been standing with her hands at her sides, clasped them behind her.

“I was born on the same day as her Ladyship,” she said, “and I’m sure I’ve tried to be a faithful servant to her all my life. My name is Mary Jenkins, called after the Lady Mary Savylle that was her Ladyship’s grandmother.”

The major remained glaring moodily in front of him.

“Oh, I see, I see,” he said at last; “a sort of foster-sister — that’s what they call it, isn’t it?” Miss Jenkins, with her eyes upon the ground, said:

“As you’re pleased to say so.” The major immediately became filled with compunction. “Oh, I really beg your pardon,” he said, “I’m afraid I’ve been too inquisitive. A foster-sister, of course!”

Miss Jenkins said calmly:

“Oh, there’s no occasion at all, sir. It isn’t a painful question at all as far as I know.”

“Then that’s all right, that’s all right,” Major Foster said cheerfully. “I think I understand.” He recovered, indeed, all his usual calmness of demeanour. He remained, however, silent for a moment, and Miss Jenkins remarked:

“Her Ladyship has left me in the house here to see that the tenants don’t break the heirlooms.” The major said:

“Yes, yes, very proper, very proper, I’m sure. So you were at Holbury. And you recognize me! I never noticed you.”

“One doesn’t notice one’s social inferiors very much, sir,” Miss Jenkins said, “but I should have recognized you, sir, anywhere. That’s what startled me a little when I came into the room.” The major said: “Yes, yes; and what about her Ladyship? Has she changed much?”

“You would better know than I, sir,” Miss Jenkins said. “I’m too much with her to be able to notice changes, but I shouldn’t say her Ladyship has changed much.”

The major said:

“Well, when you see her, tell her that I haven’t changed at all. Only tell her that I had the rottenest time any chap ever had, and tell her that I’m having a rotten time now, and that I don’t expect to get any better.”

He was looking full at the girl’s face. Her lips were very red, and he was almost certain that they never moved; nevertheless, he was almost certain that she said, “Poor fellow!” And he exclaimed sharply: “What’s that?”

Miss Jenkins said:

“I didn’t say anything, sir.”

And he added:

“I thought you said, ‘poor fellow.’”

Miss Jenkins said: “I shouldn’t be so familiar, sir. From being so much with her Ladyship I’m perhaps more familiar than I should be, but I shouldn’t be so familiar as that, sir.”

“Oh,” the major said, “I am a poor fellow, so I shouldn’t mind it much. A reformed character, that’s what I am.”

“Oh, I hope not,” Miss Jenkins said. “It would disappoint her Ladyship. And you
did
try to kiss me.”

“Oh, what’s that?” the major said despondently. “It’s almost a duty to kiss a servant. It’s not like trying to kiss your equal, but it’s not likely to be found out. Don’t you see, the whole thing about being a reformed character consists in doing things that aren’t likely to be found out.” Miss Jenkins said:

“Oh, I didn’t know, sir. At any rate, no gentleman has tried to kiss me as a matter of duty. Not since Holbury, sir.”

“Do you and her Ladyship live in an asylum for the blind?” he asked; and she answered:

“Thank you, sir, no sir, I live here with her Ladyship. We don’t see many gentlemen at all, sir.”

“Oh, I say,” Major Foster exclaimed with real concern, “I hope Nancy isn’t a reformed character. I hope she’s had a good time. It would be too rotten if we both of us muffed our lives.”

“Oh, she lives as she pleases,” Miss Jenkins said, “but it doesn’t include men who want to kiss me.”

The major looked at her seriously. “I don’t like to hear that,” he said. “She ought to marry.”

“Ah well, she’s like me,” Miss Jenkins commented. “She doesn’t take much stock in men.” The major stood up in front of the fire. “Ah well,” he said, with a slight sigh, “that’s the different way it takes. She hasn’t run after men — for my sake; and I’ve run after women — for her sake — if you understand me.”

“Yes, yes, I think I understand,” Miss Jenkins said. “You meant to get her out of your head.” Major Foster said quickly: “Oh, it wasn’t only that. It was hardly that at all. I wanted to get myself out of her head. I thought if I came a holy mucker she would come to hear of it, and that would sicken her of me and so she’d forget.” He was not looking at her at that moment, and yet he was perfectly certain that she said, “Poor fellow,” when he accused her of it.

“Why, so I did, sir,” she said. “Don’t you see that if you’d come a hundred and fifty muckers her Ladyship would have understood it was her fault, and only cared for you all the more. Besides, you didn’t come any muckers.”

“Oh, that’s only what they call the grace of God,” the major said.

Miss Jenkins looked at the floor. “If you’d kindly tell me what you pleased to want.”

The major said explosively:

“Oh, shut up! I won’t tell you what I want. I want to kiss you, I want to hear about Nancy, I want...”

“But you’re a reformed character, sir,” Miss Jenkins reminded him. “You’re engaged to Miss Peabody.”

“Oh, poor Olympia!” the major said. “Look here, does Nancy talk about me much?”

Miss Jenkins said briefly:

“Her Ladyship never mentioned your name.”

“Then how do you know—” the major was beginning.

“Oh, I know, if it isn’t presumptuous of me to say so, when her Ladyship is thinking of you.”

“Look here,” the major said suddenly, “I suppose I’m an awful nuisance to you. But if you could find any use for a fiver...”

Miss Jenkins put her hands behind her back She smiled suddenly with a sort of gay malice.

“Her Ladyship doesn’t allow me to take tips But if you give me that half threepenny bit, sir..

The major said” What?” in a really appalled voice. “Give you?... What’s that?”

Miss Jenkins looked him hardly in the eyes. “If you’ll give it me you may kiss me,” she said.

“I am damned if I will,” he said. “I don’t know how you come to know about that. I suppose Lady Savylle told you. But I’m particularly damned if I do anything of the sort.”

“I don’t believe you’ve got it,” Miss Jenkins said. “I believe you’ve given it to Miss Peabody or Miss Delamare or Mrs. Kerr Howe.”

The major fumbled irritably inside his collar.

“You’re a sort of impertinent blackmailer,” he said. “But I suppose if you don’t see it you’ll tell her Ladyship that I’ve given it away.”

“I should certainly be inclined to do so, sir,” Miss Jenkins said calmly. With a sawing sound a little gold chain came up above the major’s collar and, upon the chain, a very small gold locket into which there fitted visibly a threepenny bit. “There!” he exclaimed.

Miss Jenkins leaned forward to look at it. “You may kiss me now, if you like,” she really murmured.

But the major exclaimed: “No, certainly not, certainly not.”

“Well, you may kiss me and think it’s her,” Miss Jenkins said.

“That would be nonsense,” the major answered. “I don’t think I like you at all. I think you’ve a bad character, even for a servant.”

“Then I’d better go,” Miss Jenkins said. “Good night, sir,” and she was turning back towards the little door.

“But,” the major exclaimed, “here, hang it all, wait a minute, I want you to talk about her Ladyship.”

“There is nothing more to tell,” Miss Jenkins said. “Besides, it isn’t right. You’re engaged to Miss Peabody.”