The Middle Age of Mrs Eliot

by Angus Wilson

  Meanwhile she must do penance for her follies longer than she had hoped. Having spoken in anger to Viola, she must stay on at the flat for a while to try to repair her unkindness, must put up with Tom’s presence and with the remembrance of what in her incompetence she had allowed him to say.

  She returned to the flat that evening resolved to pocket her pride, ask Viola’s forgiveness, and accept the dinner with Donald. A telegram awaited her from David announcing Gordon’s death. She sent a telegram in return. She wrote a letter saying no more than that she was ready to do anything that could help David – to come down there, to go abroad with him for a while. She tried to get some comfort from the fact that if he accepted, she would have to give up her cherished course at the Garsington in mid-term, and that she truly knew she would accept this sacrifice gladly if it would assist David in his misery. But she knew that he would not accept, and the realization of her genuine if impotent affection for him was little compensation for not being able to act at once as a successful sister would do – to telephone, to be at Andredaswood that night, to take over all the tiresome chores, to speak from an intimacy that would comfort him. It was this that Viola Pirie would expect if she told her and, unable to face further failure in Viola’s esteem, she suppressed the news. In her distraction, she also found no power to make the resolved apologies. She did, however, sit with Viola after dinner instead of going to her bedroom. She tried to read of Marcel keeping the Guermantes waiting for their dinner. Somehow it only made her annoyed. No wonder he found society an inadequate end in life, she thought. Then she laughed at the Philistinism of her thoughts. It must be Viola’s influence, she decided. All the same Proust could afford to find human relationships insufficient – or at any rate he could make Marcel do so – because he knew that he was to find an answer in his writing. I’ve got to learn to find some end in life itself.

  She put down the book and tried to give herself up to immediate sensation. She needed a rest from thinking. The room was warm, the coal fire – what Viola called her ‘one antisocial indulgence’ – glowed in fiery caves and mountains. Outside, the February snow had already been trampled into dung-brown sludge: this was comfort as great as anyone could hope for. Gazing into the jutting, craggy landscape of the fire that flickered and glowed each instant, she was carried back to the thousand times she had peopled with her thoughts these burning caves and mountains snow-topped with wood-ash – Alice-like, drying her hair, or like Maggie Tulliver, her book fallen to the floor. The dreams then had seemed to have a magical power to command the future; and so she had commanded it with Bill and Lord North Street. Tears came to her eyes; but it was for her house that she was weeping, not this time for Bill. If only she could have relaxed her will, given up her dreams, followed the advice of others, she could be there at Lord North Street now. With lodgers and a pretence, lonely existence. No, the magic had gone from that as from all her other dreams.

  She was roused by Viola’s voice. ‘Meg,’ she said in her kindest, gruffest tones, ‘We’ve got to talk about it, my dear.’

  Meg, pulled from far away, said, ‘I’m very sorry, Viola. I had no right to speak as I did. I’m rather keyed up these days. I expect it’s as you say – I’m overworking.’

  ‘You know best about that. I shouldn’t have interfered. That’s the trouble, Meg, we’re both interfering. I did it for the best. I thought you would be happier here.’

  ‘I have been. You can’t think what a relief it’s been after the wretched bed-sitting room.’

  ‘I’m glad. And I’ve been happy to have you. But I never believe in shutting my eyes when things go wrong. It doesn’t work. I ought to have known it could only be a temporary measure. You can’t have two women in one house, any more than you can have two men.’

  ‘That seems an extravagant sort of statement, Viola. Lots of households do.’

  ‘Yes, poor things! Mothers and daughters, or fathers and sons that can’t get away from one another. But the natural arrangement is a man and a woman. And children.’ She hesitated for a moment. ‘Or just a man and a woman is often enough. But two women or two men they both have the same roles to play. It’s bound to lead to tension. As it has done here. It’s beginning to get Tom down. I can see it.’

  Meg, in her turn, hesitated for a moment, then she said, ‘You thought it would be so good for Tom to have me here. Now you don’t. Why, Viola?’

  Lady Pirie turned in her chair, as though looking round the room for some means of diverting the conversation. Then she burst out.

  ‘Why you wanted to go running around with him at your age, Meg, I can’t think. He’s only a youngster. I give him a comfortable home and, as for what he does outside, he must find his own feet That’s the only way he can become a man. You think I spoil him, but I don’t interfere with his life. A young man, any man must run his own life. I’m sorry, my dear Meg. I imagine he behaved stupidly with you that night you went to that Mrs Poll’s or whatever her name is. I don’t ask to know about it. I don’t want to. But one can sense these things. If it is so, I don’t blame Tom, I’m afraid, I blame you. You should never have got yourself into such a position with a boy of his age.’

  Meg made no attempt to defend herself. She said, ‘I’m afraid I’ve gone down in your opinion a lot, Viola.’

  ‘My opinion’s of no value. I just don’t want to see you waste yourself that’s all.’ She paused for a moment and then said, ‘All this careers business, Meg! I’m surprised to find you so old-fashioned.’ She cocked her cigarette up towards her nose in a jaunty errand-boy sort of way that showed she was very pleased with this phrase. ‘A woman needs a setting and a background that only a husband can provide – especially an attractive, talented sort of woman like you. You know I don’t mean that she should sit at home like some Victorian housewife. When Herbert was alive I entertained for him, and a full time job it would have been in the Islands for most women. It certainly was for old Lady Argles who was there before me. But I still found time for social work. That’s what I admired in you. But now you seem set on a career. It’s only another name for an old maid’s pretence, and widows can become old maids as much as any virgins. Oh! I know I’ve been a fool I’ve pushed Donald Templeton at you far too soon. But he’s got so much to offer to a woman like you.’

  Meg did not know whether to laugh or to be angry; she contented herself with saying, ‘Apart from a thousand other things, Donald doesn’t want to marry me as far as I know.’

  ‘I don’t suppose he’s thought of it yet. But he soon would. Any attractive woman as young as you are who can’t make a man fall in love with her isn’t up to much. But there it is; you don’t like him. And I’ve been an impertinent old fool. Only for heaven’s sake, Meg, don’t put marriage out of your mind. And don’t leave it too late. And don’t be too choosy. You’ve had everything with Bill. You can’t expect that again. A woman isn’t complete without a man.’

  ‘You didn’t marry again, Viola.’

  ‘My dear, plain of face can’t choose. I was lucky to get one husband and such a fine one. In any case, I have Tom to think about And to be honest, Meg, it’s chiefly because of him that I’m forced to say that this arrangement doesn’t work. I’m sorry about it, my dear, but there it is. You’ll take your time finding somewhere else, of course. And I hope there are no hard feelings.’

  There were, but Meg saw no point in voicing them. In Viola’s mind Meg should settle for being a woman, just as Poll thought she should settle for being a down the drain lady. She had no wish to follow the advice of either; if the ‘bohemianism’ Poll suggested was a stale joke to her, Viola’s ‘calculated marriage’ scheme had always ranked among the few things she regarded as immoral – only acceptable even in Jane Austen’s novels as a historical phase. Perhaps she was as narrow-minded in this judgement as she had been in dismissing Poll’s view of life, yet she was even more certain of her feelings. What Viola urged upon her was exactly that side of marriage which was now the most distressing to her; it
was this ‘setting’ as Viola called it, which she had forced upon Bill to his cost. To seek it again with a man she didn’t even love would be as near a calculated wickedness as she could imagine. Nevertheless until she was firmly secure in whatever new life she was to make, neither Viola nor Poll would forgive her for not taking their advice. Apart altogether then from Tom, she must leave the flat. But the prospect of returning each night to a lonely room seemed desperate to her as she lay in bed that night. She hoped that by some freak David would write asking her to go with him for a while abroad, anywhere, so that she would not be alone. Two days later a letter came from David.

  ‘My dear Meg, your letter was good to receive. The only letter that didn’t talk of a merciful release in some circumlocution or other, for which I was especially grateful. For the last days Gordon was seldom conscious which was all I could ask for. There is nothing, as you know so well, to say at these times and alas, vastly too many people here saying a great deal. But that like everything else will be over in time. Gordon has left everything to me. His mother and the others are very good people really, and about this, which I suppose they might well resent, very kind. All the same I wish them all in the Sahara, or anywhere not here. My main task now is to resume the routine of my life as quickly as possible and persuade the others that they will help the most by resuming theirs. Gordon had a great and natural peacefulness and imparted it to others. My spirit is too unquiet to ease others, but that’s what I have to do and at least all these years with him have given me powers of reserve and calm that I must be grateful for. Meanwhile I admit that I find all the noise and clamour of the goodness and the kindness of the people around me hard to bear. Good and kind they really are, but like most of us they need to protest so much to persuade themselves that they exist. Gordon’s mother has some of his inner strength but like so many Quakers – or so I have found – her quietness speaks in so personal a voice. It’s kind of you to suggest being with me, but I don’t think we can help each other – at any rate, at the moment. As for leaving here even for a short while, pleasant as it might be to get away from everyone here, it would solve nothing. But thank you. Please let me know if I can help you in any way. Much love to you and peace of mind. David.’

  *

  The February snow had melted away under an unusually hot spell of winter sunshine. David, muffled in an overcoat it is true, had been able to sit out on the terrace by the south wall of the house. He was preparing an bibliography of the books he would need in writing ‘Africa’. The small south garden by the terrace had been of Gordon’s making – an entirely private garden given up to flowers that they never cultivated for sale. As a result, bulbs and corms abounded. At the moment iris reticulata gleamed purple and gold here and there in the sunshine, and a great mass of mauve iris stylosa still basked in the dusty, rubble-filled soil by the wall. Next there would be knots of crocus, daffodils, and fritillary edging the lawn – in what Gordon had called ‘our very pleasing, vulgar little spring show’. Later the beds were massed with tulips and later still with lilies. There were rose beds with hybrid tea and floribunda – for they were no rose specialists – but in Gordon’s words ‘never a chic shrub rose’. Perennials and annuals were largely banished except for odd species that were not in their sales catalogue. At the far end was a shrubbery unmarred by any azaleas or rhododendrons to recall their trade. At the moment a daphne gleamed with purple flowers.

  David had never happily accepted this concession to their private tastes. His own formal garden at the front of the house was, after all, not purely private, it provided an impressive first view for visitors to the nursery. Although he loved the south garden, he had already determined to let it go gradually to waste. To tend and care for it would be to accept Gordon’s concessions. They had agreed in Gordon’s last weeks that life at Andredaswood must, for the future, be the honest expression only of David’s view of life, inevitably different now from Gordon’s which had been its source of inspiration. Besides, to tend Gordon’s garden would seem a sentimental plan to keep his memory alive, and David believed that memory must persist unaided or die.

  Nevertheless David was glad to bask here for an hour or two today. The house was still beset by people. The nursery routine, to which he looked to give his life the shape inside which he could seek his goal of self-effacement, demanded too little of him at the moment. February, in this respect, was an unfortunate month for Gordon to die in. There was comparatively little work to do. The preparing of the composts for the annual boxes hardly demanded even Tim’s supervision. There were, it was true, late orders for shrubs and perennials to be dispatched; and with them the usual telephone calls from customers, late in ordering, who yet complained that their deliveries had not been early; there were also inevitably complaints of shrubs arriving in the two frost-and snow-bound weeks that had preceded the sunshine. At first David had insisted on dealing with all these customers personally, but to do so had meant either to offend Climbers, or to receive her understanding ‘You do as much of the work as you want, David, if it helps you.’ Climbers could easily cope with the customers and she knew that he knew it.

  Above all he wanted to be alone, but not inactive. The long weeks of Gordon’s dying had given him full, too full, time for thought. He had considered the future, sought to make sense of the hideous present, suffered the involuntary pouring in of the past. Above all he had tried desperately to fuse into an indivisible trinity the three seemingly forever divided persons – David then, David now, David to be without Gordon. ‘Africa’ now seemed the only escape from the senseless recurring cycle of these thoughts.

  Yet ‘Africa’ occasioned the same inconclusive debate in him as everything else connected with his life. There was no need for the money the series brought in. It had started as a pleasure common to them both, and one that in the early uncertain stage of the nursery brought in extra cash. It had served to hide any incompatibilities of interest that might arise in their life together. It had finally cut him off from the distracting remembrance of his academic past. It had seemed too obviously popular and dilettante a work to make any pretentious claim. It was pleasant to compose, quite pleasant to write, and absurd enough not to matter. Yet what could be the point of his going on with it? If it was a matter of filling in time he would choose to listen to music or to try to evolve some system of meditation that would help to loosen the bonds of personal will. But was he not busy with personal assertion in making all these changes after Gordon’s death? He had decided to let the private garden run waste, he had decided to give up the stove house, for the Christmas poinsettia sale could not cover up the fact that they had accepted exotic growing for their own pleasure. He’d decided, he’d decided – and all this in the cause of self-effacement. No, he would work away at ‘Africa’ as a gesture of indifferentism; letting it go on while the daily Martha tasks were few enough to allow it, throwing it over when they pressed.

  A score of problems of conduct, in fact, now faced him to test the practical validity of his ethic; but the truth of what he had come to believe only seemed more striking when he considered the behaviour of the household in the last few days of crisis.

  The funeral itself for a start: what absurdities and wastes of emotion that had brought forth! Mrs B. crying hysterically in the car to Brighton, then shocking Else and Gordon’s mother by announcing that she would take the opportunity to go to Mother Goose on Ice instead of to the funeral ceremony. It was fantastic that intelligent women like Mrs Paget and Else should have let themselves be shocked; but then they had indulged in such an orgy of sentiment over the simple char’s grief that her change of plan had to be seen as of equal significance. How incredibly they had lost all sense of proportion was clear when Mrs Paget, a woman who normally tempered life with an easy sense of humour, had said, ‘Even if it had been an ordinary, old-fashioned pantomime I could have understood it better’ and had not laughed. Nor was Mrs Boniface so simple that her behaviour had not been calculated. She had genuinely gri
eved for Gordon, but she had also felt the need to show everyone that she did so in her own way. ‘I’d no idea I’d upset the old things,’ she had told him, ‘but I’m afraid I can’t help it. Mr Paget wouldn’t have wanted me at the funeral service if I didn’t feel I could take it. He liked people to be natural, and he knew what I was like, a proper cockney, up one minute, down the next.’

  Not that the more intelligent and sensitive had proved less determined on personal demonstration. Mrs Paget, her bony old horse’s face set in obstinate lines that made nonsense of her gentleness, had said in her cracked old woman’s voice, ‘I shan’t come to the Anglican service, David. Gordon always knew that while I respected his faith I did not understand its expression. My presence would be dishonest. I have arranged with the Brighton Friends for a short meeting of remembrance after the burial. I shall be so glad if you will come to it.’