O, These Men, These Men!

by Angela Thirkell

  “I wish I were. There’d be some sense in going to a reasonable place like Russia. No, I have to stick on at the old office with Beaton shoved in over my head. It’s a shame and very unfair, and James quite agrees with me.”

  “James?”

  “Yes, James. I met him somewhere last night and we had a long talk and I got the rights of the case from him. I suppose I was too young to bother about those things then, but I never knew that the divorce was a put up job before.”

  His hearers looked at him in horror.

  “Mind, Caroline, I don’t blame you. I’m broad-minded. But you must admit James had a lot to put up with.”

  “I think, George,” said Wilfred with the new authority that had come to him since he broke his heart at Julia’s feet and mended it in Paris, “you had better say right out what you are hinting at. What did James say exactly? Then we shall know how to deal with it.”

  George, rather disconcerted, began to mumble.

  “Speak up,” said Wilfred sharply.

  “Well, James said Caroline was in love with another chap, so he let her divorce him, and then the other chap turned her down for someone with money.”

  “What names did he mention?” said Caroline in a conversational voice.

  “Oh, I say,” said George.

  “I asked you for the names.”

  “He said you loved Hugh,” mumbled George, “and that Hugh turned you down for Julia.”

  “Would you like me to tell you a few of the things James did to Caroline,” said Anna, beside herself with anger. “Wilfred, take Caroline away while I talk to George.”

  “No,” said Caroline, “George may as well hear the truth. I did love Hugh, but only after James left me. Hugh never knew that I cared for him. He loved Julia the first moment he saw her, long before he met her here. They both were fond enough of me to tell me about their engagement before anyone else knew, and I was overjoyed. And if Hugh were as free as I am, I wouldn’t marry him. There is one man that I would marry, but I am not fit to be his wife. Does that explain it at all?”

  “Do you mean James was telling lies?” said the bewildered George.

  “She does,” said Anna. “He never does anything else. Ask Francis, ask Colonel Beaton, ask your own father.”

  “I say, I’m awfully sorry,” said George, now bitterly repenting his unnecessary intercession on his brothers behalf. “Caroline, I’m awfully sorry.”

  “I am glad,” said Caroline gravely. “Now let us forget it. Only remember that there are two sides to every question. Oh, these men!”

  “And you may care to know,” said Anna, “that after that delightful evening you had with him James didn’t get back to Francis’ house till six o’clock in the morning, and then he was so drunk that Rose had to put him to bed. She also gave him Epsom salts,” said Anna, determined to spare no pains to disabuse George about his hero.

  “Now, George,” said Wilfred, “come and change for dinner and leave the girls alone. You’ve been enough trouble for one night, not to speak of the way you frightened the parents yesterday by blurting out things you had promised not to talk about. And let me tell you,” he added as they went towards their rooms, “that if you weren’t my brother I’d push your face down your throat. If you want to make up to Caroline for believing those damned lies of James’, promise to repeat them when I ask you to.”

  “To whom?”

  “Nevermind. Is it a promise?”

  “Oh, all right,” said George sulkily.

  “By the way, who paid for the drinks last night?” Wilfred shouted from his room to George’s.

  “I did.”

  “And likely to remain so,” said Wilfred cryptically as he dashed into the bathroom and slammed the door in George’s face.

  Chapter XII

  George Makes Amends

  Next day, Wilfred rang Francis up and asked him to lunch.

  Francis said Colonel Beaton was lunching with him at his club and he invited Wilfred to come too.

  “I have been mean enough,” said Colonel Beaton to Wilfred when he arrived, “to tell Francis your news.”

  Francis congratulated Wilfred warmly and spoke of the advantage it would be to him to get experience abroad and the advantage it would be to Mr. Danvers to have an active partner.

  “Of course if you want to come back into the firm, later, my partnership will make no difference,” said Colonel Beaton. “I have no sons and you have first claim to the family business. You would have to start as a junior partner in any case. What did your father say?”

  “He was too tired to talk business last night, sir,” said Wilfred. “I saw him for a few moments this morning and he seemed frightfully pleased at you coming in, but Caroline was just going and we hadn’t time to talk.”

  “Going where?” said Francis.

  “Beechwood. She gave me a letter for you,” said Wilfred, feeling in various pockets. “After yesterday she felt she had better go. I don’t see what else she could do, poor girl!”

  Colonel Beaton and Francis fell upon Wilfred with demands for an explanation. Wilfred said he had gathered from Anna that their mother had been rather resentful of Caroline’s attitude towards James.

  “But that wasn’t the only trouble,” he said. “George had been with James the night before, at some club or somewhere, and James had filled him up with the most outrageous stories about Caroline. George then felt it his duty to come and tell Caroline more or less to go down on her knees and beg James’ pardon. I expect you know the sort of things, Francis.”

  “I do. James sits on my stairs in tears and tells Rose what a bad wife he had, and Rose tells me. She doesn’t believe him. She hasn’t much opinion of men.”

  Francis then hastily opened Caroline’s letter, his heart pounding with fear of her displeasure so that he could hardly read:

  “Dear Francis, I am going to Beechwood to be alone. I have heard what you are doing for James and I choose to think that you are doing it for me. Bless you. Loving Caroline.”

  “I am concerned about George,” Colonel Beaton was saying when Francis emerged to consciousness again. “He is a good boy, but too easily influenced. James has charmed him without any effort. When James goes away – if he does – it will be easier. At any rate I can keep an eye on him at the office and perhaps more closely than your father could. I shall be there every day for the first months and it is always easier for an outsider to pull people up than for a relation.”

  “I expect old George will get on better without me, and I shall certainly get on better without him,” said Wilfred with brotherly candor. “We are awfully fond of one another but we do get on each other’s nerves a bit. And this James business had fairly put the lid on it as far as I am concerned.”

  “I’m afraid we are all in for a difficult time with James,” said Colonel Beaton.

  “The trouble is,” said Wilfred, “that he is such a damn plausible chap. Already he has managed to set Mother and Hugh and George against Caroline. That’s why she thinks she had better clear out.”

  “I am sorry if Hugh believes what James says,” said Colonel Beaton gravely.

  “He can’t help it, sir. People nearly always believe him. But you and Julia don’t. Julia is as straight as they make them and you can’t pull any wool over her eyes.”

  “I get you,” said Colonel Beaton with such seriousness that Wilfred felt more than ever that he was a man of understanding. “Well, I’m glad Caroline is out of it. Beechwood suits her, and she will have Herbert to look after her.”

  “Is there anything wrong with her?” asked Francis, panic in his heart.

  “I don’t think so – nothing serious. But Herbert and his wife are coming up for the wedding, so you can ask him. Till then we three must look after James. I hope he won’t want to follow Caroline.”

  “If that young blighter George can hold his tongue,” Wilfred began angrily, but Francis interrupted him.

  “George has made lots of trouble already,” h
e said, “but I don’t think he will make much more. Besides, if James wants to find where Caroline is, he only has to ask his parents. But I don’t think he wants to give himself the trouble of going after Caroline. It is much more restful for him to stay in town and poison people’s minds against her.”

  “I think you are right, Francis,” said Colonel Beaton. “We mustn’t be over-anxious about Caroline. Even if she did see him she could hold her own, though it would do her no good. I can’t tell you how much I admire her. Next to your sister, Wilfred, she is the most steadfast, lovable woman I know.”

  Francis liked Colonel Beaton more than ever. Not everyone could discern Caroline’s merits, and if Beaton placed Anna above her, why that was just as Francis would have wished. Let others think that Caroline was less than perfect: for him, the joy of knowing her imperfections to be perfection itself.

  As for Wilfred, that evening he gave his sister a resume of the conversation at lunch. When he came to Colonel Beaton’s words, which he repeated verbatim, he felt obliged to apologize for them, apparently on the grounds that the speaker was on the verge of senile decay. Anna, realizing fully how improper any praise of a sister seems to a brother, listened without comment, except to say that it was very nice of William. And though her father looked tired, her mother was inclined to cry, and George was suffering from ostentatious gloom which his family combined to ignore, Anna thought she had seldom passed a more pleasant evening.

  *

  If, as Julia very truly remarked, James had just taken the trouble not to be born, a great deal of trouble would have been saved. Colonel Beaton, Francis and Wilfred were in perpetual anxiety lest some mad folly of James’ should bring notoriety upon his family and irremediable disgrace upon himself. George avoided James, but made it up to himself by being very disagreeable at home. Hugh saw a certain amount of James and continued to think he had been misjudged. James slipped like quicksilver through Francis’ fingers and even baffled Rose. She on her side treated him with scant consideration when he was in the house, refusing to give him anything stronger than a whisky and soda that she had mixed herself and, it was reported by Maud the housemaid, had on two occasions undressed him and put him to bed. Francis did his best to entertain his guest, but he had work to do that could not be neglected and a few engagements that could not be broken. He never put his latch-key into his door without wondering wretchedly what had happened in his absence. Once, he went to see the Danvers’, but did not stay long. James had visited his parents the night before and had arrived in a condition that even Mrs. Danvers could not mistake.

  “He was not violent,” said Mr. Danvers to Francis, “only stupid and half insensible. Wilfred took him back to your house in a taxi and your parlormaid kindly took charge of him. My poor Evelyn had never seen anything of that kind before. The one thing we have to be thankful for is that Caroline is away.”

  “Do you think there is any chance of James taking a job in South America? Beaton is almost sure he can get him one there, right away from the towns, where he might have a chance to pull yy up.

  “I am grateful to Beaton, more grateful than I can say, but I don’t know that it is any good. If the poor boy couldn’t get himself in hand for Caroline, why should he do it in South America? But I hope he will take it. Frankly, I would be thankful for him to be out of the country, away from London where the temptations are so many. We can never thank you enough, Francis, for looking after our poor boy.”

  “That’s all right, sir. I would do anything to help Caroline and all of you.”

  *

  Of all the people in this story, Julia was the least affected by James. Having labeled him as horrid, she abstracted her mind from him altogether, and her father refused to invite him to the hotel again. A few days before the wedding, Hugh had taken James out to lunch. Late in the afternoon, he dropped in to see his Julia, who was sitting with her father and Wilfred.

  “All well?” asked Colonel Beaton, whose anxiety increased as the wedding drew nearer. After that ceremony, he had great faith in his Julia’s powers of choosing her husband’s friends.

  “Quite all right, sir. But don’t worry. You all seem to have an idea that James is going to make a nuisance of himself somehow. I do assure you you are wrong. All he wants is to see Caroline and then go away for good.”

  “I suppose you know he has absolutely refused the offer of a South American job that I found for him,” said Colonel Beaton.

  “Well, sir, he felt he simply couldn’t leave England unless Caroline forgave him. After all he has a lot to put up with. You must admit that. Caroline hardly gave him a fair deal. By the way, Julia, he is rather upset because it appears that he hasn’t been invited to the wedding? Was it a mistake?"

  “Oh, Hugh,” said Julia, “we can’t invite him. He would be troublesome. You don’t want to spoil the only wedding I may ever have. And after all there’s no law about inviting your distant cousin’s divorced husband.”

  “But, darling, he is one of the Danvers’, after all.”

  “He is not being invited,” said Colonel Beaton decisively.

  Hugh was going to make a further protest when Wilfred interrupted him.

  “Colonel Beaton is quite right, Hugh,” he said. “James is my brother, but he can’t come to the wedding, it is out of the question.”

  “It is hardly your business who comes to the wedding,” said Hugh. “No one stands up for James and I really must protest,” he added to his future father-in-law.

  “I’m sorry,” said Wilfred, “if I’m butting in, but you don’t quite understand, Hugh. If you knew that James had been telling lies about Julia, just as he has about Caroline, would you still want him at your wedding?”

  “In that case the affair would concern me,” said Colonel Beaton. “Wilfred, you are making a very serious accusation. Are you prepared to substantiate it?”

  “Yes, sir, if I may ring up George.”

  Permission was given and Wilfred rang up his brother and told him to come round to the Beatons’ hotel as soon as possible. There was an uncomfortable interval, consisting of uneasy small talk punctuated by even more uneasy silences. During one of these silences Julia, whose mind was never idle, suddenly screamed.

  “What is it, darling?” said Hugh.

  “Father, Father,” cried Julia, “do you realize what Hugh’s name is?”

  “Considering that his name will be yours the day after tomorrow, I may say that I do.”

  “Yes, but Father, don’t you see? I shall be Julia Mannering! I had never thought of it before. At least I had thought that I would be Julia Mannering, but I didn’t quite think that I would be Julia Mannering!”

  “Thank heaven you are not as uneducated as I thought,” remarked her father.

  Wilfred and Hugh were all attention though not comprehension.

  “But what is wrong with Julia Mannering?” asked Hugh rather indignantly.

  “Nothing, darling,” shrieked his bride. “It’s perfect. And Father is rather like Colonel Mannering, don’t you think, only his name is William, not Guy. But you aren’t in the least like Vanbeest Brown, Hugh darling.”

  Before Hugh could go quite mad, George came in. He said how do you do to everyone and looked nervously at Wilfred.

  “Sorry to bother you, George,” said his brother, “But you promised me something. George,” he said to the company in general, “spent an evening with James not long ago. James told him a lot of things which he naturally believed. One does believe one’s brother. He came back and told them to Caroline, and after that she went to Beechwood. Now, George, that brother of ours wants to be asked to Julia’s wedding and Hugh thinks he ought to be invited. So I want you to tell us again exactly what James said. I’m sorry, old boy, but it will clear the air a bit, and you promised to make up for Caroline.”

  George looked very uncomfortable, eyed the door as if he contemplated flight, but seeing no means of escape, resigned himself.

  “James said,” George wretchedly
began, “that Caroline divorcing him was a put-up job. He said she cared for another man.”

  “James is horrid,” said Julia. “Don’t let’s hear any more.”

  “Be quiet, Julia,” said her father.

  “I’m sorry, Julia,” said Wilfred, “but you and Hugh and your father had better hear it. If you had rather not listen you can go away till George has finished.”

  “Oh, no, no,” shrieked Julia, composing herself to attention again.

  “Just say the names, George,” continued his implacable brother.

  “James said,” mumbled the unhappy George, “that Caroline was in love with Hugh, so he, I mean James, let her divorce him. And then he said Hugh turned her down for Julia because she had some money, I mean Julia had!”

  There was complete silence while George went bright red and shuffled about.

  “Thanks, George,” said Colonel Beaton at last. “We all apologize to you for asking you to repeat this, and I personally am grateful!”

  “And if Caroline had been in love with Hugh, it would have been very good taste,” said Julia indignantly, and obviously thinking the money consideration entirely below her notice. “In fact I asked her why you hadn’t wanted to marry her, Hugh, and she explained. It was rather complicated, but first she was married to that horrid James, who I dare say was not so horrid then though he must always have been excessively horrid, and then you fell in love with me.”

  “Of course I did, and as for Caroline caring for me,” said Hugh, much embarrassed by the thought, “good lord she never thought of it in her life. Why, we have known each other ever since we were children. If James can’t think of anything better to say, he had better go and tell lies somewhere else. I’m through with him.”

  “And you don’t want him asked to the wedding?” said Wilfred.

  “Certainly not. George, it’s a damned shame to ask you to repeat all that, but I’m glad you did. Now I know what to think of James. I don’t suppose any of us will speak to him again.”

  “George and I shall,” said Wilfred. “He happens to be our brother. But we would prefer him to be a private disgrace, not a public one. I think, George, we’d better go along now.”