At the villa, Iris Easter for the time being remained installed, reaping an astonishing harvest of press-cuttings, variously indicating surprise, disgust, and admiration at the startling character of “Why, Ben!”
Mr. Douglas Garrett remained in Culmouth and interpreted the press-cuttings to her in his character of “one of we poor literary hacks.”
In the first week of December there took place at the College one of the General Committee meetings so abhorred of Sir Julian.
“There are a great, great many things,” said Edna thoughtfully, “that I want to speak about at the meeting. I have been so little to the College lately, but it is not often out of my thoughts.”
“Bellew is taking the chair” Sir Julian observed, less irrelevantly than might have been supposed.
He was aware, and knew that Edna was aware, that no check or limit would be placed by Alderman Bellew on the College problems that Lady Rossiter might choose to regard as coming within the scope of her influence.
He wondered for the hundredth time whether it would not have been possible to decline the complimentary offer of a position on the general committee of management which had been made to Lady Rossiter as wife of the leading director, and which he knew that she cherished the more from being the only representative of her sex at the meetings.
“By the by” he said suddenly, “the position of Lady Superintendent carries, ipso facto, a place on the General Committee. You will have another lady to keep you in countenance, Edna.”
“What, poor Miss Marchrose?”
“Miss Marchrose,” Julian assented, tacitly refusing the epithet.
Lady Rossiter was silent for a moment and then said quietly, “I’m so glad that I can spare the time to come in to-day. She could never have faced all those men by herself, poor thing, and they would probably have disliked it as much as she would, or more. An unmarried woman is always at a disadvantage’
Julian left undisputed this cardinal article of faith characteristic of the wedded Englishwoman.
In the hall of the College they found Cooper, who said in a congratulatory way, “Sir Julian and Lady Rossiter! You’ve come for the General Meeting. Let me take your coat, Lady Rossiter, and put it here just lay it across the chair-back. We’re going to have a good meeting, I think no absentees. Will you wait in Mr. Fuller’s rooms, Sir Julian? I’ll open the door.”
Mr. Fairfax Fuller greeted his chief with an air of relief that turned into a look of smouldering resentment as Lady Rossiter shook hands with him, which she always did, as she said, on principle, either disregarding or not observing the Superintendent’s strong tendency to entrench himself behind a writing-table and thrust both hands into his pockets.
She did not, however, shake hands with Miss Marchrose, but nodded to her in a very kindly way and said “Good morning “in a pleasant undertone.
Old Alderman Bellew was talking in the window to Mark Easter.
“How are things going, Mr. Fuller?” Edna enquired with grave interest.
“Going right enough,” muttered Fuller, looking at his watch.
“Oh, I’m glad. You know I care so much. What are you putting before the committee to-day?”
Fuller turned his back upon her.
“Miss Marchrose, give Lady Rossiter an agenda.”
“Yes, yes,” Edna cried, barely glancing at it, “but I don’t mean just the headings. For instance, ‘Proposed Saturday afternoon classes.’ Is there really any chance of it? You know the whole question is very, very near my heart, Mr. Fuller.”
“It’s for discussion to-day,” said Mr. Fuller, bending over his writing-table and intently studying the cover of Pitman’s Shorthand Dictionary.
“Oh, yes, but then there’s so much that doesn’t always come up at the big meetings. Le dessous des cartes. In fact,” Edna tactfully amended, “the other side of the cards.”
“Pocket Shorthand Dictionary, Centenary Edition,” was Fuller’s explosive reply, as he traced the words on the book before him with a square, tobacco-stained forefinger.
Julian was vividly reminded of the highly unsuccessful tea-party given in her office by Miss Marchrose. He refrained from glancing at her, feeling intimately convinced that the same thought was in her mind at the moment.
“Shall we make a move, Fuller? It’s just time.”
Fairfax Fuller, with extreme and obvious thankfulness, hastily rose to comply with the suggestion.
Lady Rossiter’s traditional seat was at the right-hand side of the chairman. She placed herself there and glanced round. Miss Marchrose entered just behind Sir Julian. She looked not at all shy, but merely rather doubtful.
Edna half -rose, with benevolent shielding in every line of her admirably-hung coat and skirt, but Mark Easter was before her.
“Here, Miss Marchrose, if you will,” he said quietly, and making way for her at the table as he spoke. She gave him a quick glance of acknowledgment and took the place that he indicated, between young Cooper and himself at the end of the long table furthest from the chair. Julian was seated at the bottom of the table, facing the Alderman.
“Well, ladies and gentlemen,” said the chairman, “I’m happy to tell you that our Commercial and Technical College is doing well, doing very well. I know how much you all have this enterprise at heart, and, indeed, I may say that to the youth of this country, it is an enterprise which cannot which can, rather, or – er- I should say cannot be of anything but inestimable advantage.”
The Alderman’s opening gambit was new to nobody. Cooper put his pencil behind his ear until such time as the minutes of the conference should claim it from inaction, and only began to fidget when old Bellew made allusion to the increased attendance in the evening classes for French, “so ably presided over by Mr. Cooper.”
“The financial statement submitted to the directors by our good friend Mr. Fuller there, is a highly satisfactory one, and the recent audit was conducted to the complete –er-satisfac — to the complete — that is — to the — er — general.”
The Alderman paused again, struggled, was defeated, and ended defiantly, “To the general satisfaction.”
“I will ask Mr. Fuller to read to the meeting those figures which will best serve to put the position clearly before the meeting.”
Fairfax Fuller, standing at attention, his voice impassive, and his face full of triumph, recited a rapid litany, in which the words “two thousand eight hundred and eleven “predominated.
“Bravo,” murmured Mark Easter, thus encouraging the members of the meeting to a general rustle of applause at this indication that something, evidently numbering two thousand eight hundred and eleven parts, had been gained, or saved, or judiciously made use of, for their benefit.
“That, if I may say so, gentlemen,” Mr. Fuller impressively remarked, “is a very remarkable result. When I came here as Supervisor, three years ago, matters were not in this state. Far from it. Mr. Mark Easter here can tell you that, so can Sir Julian Rossiter. The College, if I may say so, has pulled itself together since then. I don’t wish to claim any credit for myself.” (“Liar!” mentally ejaculated Julian.) “But the figures at the end of each year have shown a very marked improvement. I hope next year we may do better still. I may say, that I hope so confidently.”
Fuller sat down again, pulling up the legs of his trousers at the knees, and sufficiently intent upon the operation to miss the smile of congratulation that Lady Rossiter was holding in waiting for him.
The old chairman, breathing heavily, leant across the table and addressed Sir Julian Rossiter.
“Now, Sir Julian, you’re a younger man than I am, and I’m going to ask you to raise the one or two points we have here on the agenda. I think we want the opinion of the meeting on one or two matters, eh?”
Julian spoke rapidly, and as concisely as possible. Cooper’s pencil flew across the pages of his note-book.
“The question has been raised of keeping the College open on Saturday afternoons. There is plenty of evide
nce that, if we did so, we should get quite a number of town pupils. The early closing of the shops would bring us various shop employees, who are only too anxious to give an hour or two of their spare time to learning. That, I believe, applies especially to the shorthand and typewriting classes. The other subjects, of course, have always been in less demand. The number of students is easily covered by the evening classes on Tuesday and Fridays for such subjects as accountancy, for instance, or French. The question is, therefore, whether it would not be worth while to arrange for a later closing on Saturdays, so as to hold a weekly class for beginners in shorthand and typing.”
Sir Julian paused and Fairfax Fuller said eagerly:
“I could engage for our having five pupils, straight off the reel, sir. I actually hold that number of applications.”
“Excellent,” said the Alderman, from the head of the table.
“Ah!” breathed Lady Rossiter. “One would be so glad and proud, I feel that too, very strongly to help lay the foundation of knowledge of that efficiency which is to build up the forces of our Empire. After all, it is the class we are trying to reach that is the very backbone of the country.”
The irrelevant diatribes to which Lady Rossiter was almost invariably moved by a General Committee meeting contributed in no small measure to her husband’s distaste for them.
He looked straight in front of him and addressed the chairman.
“The whole question, of course, hinges on the staff available. Miss Marchrose and Mr. Fuller are of opinion that it could be arranged, but before approaching any of the teachers, it was thought desirable to get the committee’s opinion.”
“The question being,” ponderously repeated the old Alderman, looking round the table, “the question being, whether or not the College is to open on Saturday afternoons for a special shorthand and typing course.”
“I have here a scheme,” began Fuller eagerly, but Lady Rossiter’s clear voice interrupted him.
“Mr. Chairman, I am only a woman, amongst all you men, but I want you to let me speak.”
Edna leant forward in her favourite attitude, her arms folded upon the table, her furs flung back.
“Delighted, Lady Rossiter, delighted to hear your views,” growled the Alderman.
Julian, looking down his nose, saw Fuller thrust his bull-neck forward and jab viciously at the blottingpaper in front of him with a blunt pencil.
Mark Easter was pulling at his moustache, leaning well back in his chair, and Miss Marchrose was gazing at Lady Rossiter. Her dark brows were drawn together in a slight frown, that might have indicated puzzledom or disapproval alike.
“It seems to me,” said Edna, in the time-honoured opening phrase of the amateur, “it seems to me, that we perhaps none of us quite realise what it would mean to ask any of the staff to give up that precious Saturday. I always feel that it must mean so much to them. We, who can wander out into God’s beautiful sunshine at will, can hardly grasp what it must be like to be imprisoned between four walls all the week, without free time, without access to the fresh air, the movement of the world outside. Oh,” cried Edna, in a very impassioned manner indeed, “I think if one only puts oneself into the place of those girl and women prisoners, toiling for their bread and butter all the week, it will become impossible to take away the poor little Saturday half -holiday which is all they have! There is no one, I can confidently say, who has our great national cause more at heart than I have, who would do more to bring the light of education into the drab lives of those poor shop creatures, but it seems to me that, as members of the committee, we must give our first thought, our first consideration, to our own our very own workers. I, personally, have always felt the staff at the College to be my very own.”
Julian dared not glance at the representatives of Lady Rossiter’s very own, so vividly did his imagination set before him the infuriated lowering of Fuller’s dark brow, and the probable line of satire round Miss Marchrose’s curving lips.
He had frequently before heard Lady Rossiter moved to a very similar eloquence, but neither custom nor a resolute avoidance of any eye in the room could prevent him from wincing inwardly while her voice rang out.
“It almost seems to me that we forget sometimes oh, I’m not speaking personally, Heaven knows, I’m weak enough myself but sometimes I think we forget that it’s flesh and blood like our own that we’re dealing with. These men and women who work for a living are human beings like ourselves!”
An electric silence followed the announcement.
Edna’s head was moved slightly backwards, in the manner of one who has flung down the gauntlet fearlessly. Her eyes travelled slowly round the table.
Suddenly she uttered an impulsive “Ah!”
Julian, taken unawares, glanced up quickly. His wife’s eager, ardent gaze had fallen upon Miss Marchrose, motionless in her place.
“My dear!” she exclaimed half under her breath, but entirely audibly, “I forgot you I forgot you were here. Have I hurt you?”
“Good God!” broke from Fairfax Fuller, and almost at the same instant Mark Easter, with ingenious clumsiness, sent an empty chair to the floor.
Sir Julian set his teeth and stood up.
“I am afraid that we have strayed from the subject under discussion. May I suggest that Mr. Fuller should outline the scheme?”
“Certainly, Sir Julian, by all means by all means,” said the chairman, looking harassed.
Fuller’s scheme anticipated the humanitarian doubts raised by Lady Rossiter. The Saturday class should be open from two o’clock to four, and Saturday duty taken weekly in rotation by each one of the three shorthand teachers belonging to the College. The classes of the week should be so rearranged as to enable those members of the staff who had been at work on Saturday afternoon to return to the College at midday only on Monday morning.
“Excellent,” said Mark Easter.
“The Lady Superintendent, who will herself kindly undertake one Saturday class in three, is of opinion that the proposition is entirely practicable and would meet with every response from the teachers concerned.”
He turned enquiringly to Miss Marchrose.
“Yes, certainly,” she said briefly.
“Then if Miss Marchrose will speak to the two lady teachers, Miss Farmer and Miss Sandiloe.”
Mark paused.
“Unless anyone else wishes to raise any further point in that connection,” said the chairman, “I may take it that we are all agreed?”
Sir Julian, half against his will, received the odd impression that everyone was suffering from a strange sensation as of being shattered, so that scarcely any discussion of the point at issue ensued, and the remaining business of the day was disposed of between Mark Easter and Alderman Bellew with unwonted rapidity.
Fairfax Fuller spoke no word, and as soon as the meeting ended left the room with no slightest pretence at the civility of a valediction.
“Poor old Fuller!” said Mark to Julian, with his tolerant laugh.
“My sympathies are with Mr. Fuller,” declared Edna lightly. “He is a misogynist, poor dear. I know he thinks that women at a meeting are a mistake; he was looking at poor Miss Marchrose with such an expression of contempt and fury! However, he carried his point as to the Saturday classes, and his scheme certainly appealed to one. All the same, I’m glad I had the courage to utter my little testimony before you all.”
Julian refrained from looking at Mark Easter.
“I am thinking of resigning from the committee,” he remarked gloomily. “Like Mr. Fuller, I am a misogynist.”
VIII
AFTER this gratifying announcement from her husband, it may be supposed the more readily that Lady Rossiter, on the day following the General Committee meeting, should elect to discover various small items of business requiring her presence in London.
She left Culmhayes on Friday evening, and the following morning saw Julian at Mark Easter’s front door.
“Come out after wild duck, Mark?”
>
“Rather.”
“The keeper tells me there are any amount out Salt Marsh way. Could we raise another gun?”
“There’s that fellow Garrett.”
“Well, bring him along, if he cares to come. Start from here at two o’clock?”
“That’ll do. I have to be at the office this morning.”
“Good Lord, Mark, you live at that office, I believe, when you aren’t at the College. What does your sister say to you?”
“She has other fish to fry,” said Mark drily.
Julian admitted the truth in the implication when he presently encountered Miss Easter loitering along the lane. Her golden head was uncovered, and she wore a curious cockney medley of black fur, silk decollete blouse, tweed skirt, silk stockings, and high-heeled shoes of thin suede.
She said, “Oh, Sir Julian!” with great enthusiasm, and insisted upon tripping along the hard, frozen lane beside him as far as his own gate.
Sir Julian, who thought her pretty, if absurd, was always able to endure her society with equanimity for a short while, and made amiable enquiry after “Why, Ben!”
“Oh, isn’t it too, too wonderful?” said Iris, in slightly awe-stricken tones. “The little tiny seed I tried to sow bearing such wonderful fruit and shedding light in so many dark places!”
“Very wonderful,” Julian agreed, mentally applying the epithet to the phenomenon of any seed possessing the peculiar property of shedding light in dark places.
“It’s perfectly dear of you to say so,” warmly responded the authoress.
“Douglas Garrett, you know, my great friend, he knows the most fearful amount about books, and he says that ‘Why, Ben! ‘has simply gone straight back to earth.”
“Sounds rather like a fox.”
“I always think there’s something so pure and strong and passionate about the soil. That’s why I gave Ben a rural setting. The peasantry are so primitive. I’ll tell you a secret. I’m really down here to study the setting for my next book.”
“Are you writing another one now?”
Collected Works of E M Delafield Page 131