A Room with a View

by Edward Morgan Forster

  Sir Harry blushed. Neither he nor Cecil enjoyed these open compliments to their sex. Even the exclusion of the dirty did not leave them much distinction. He suggested that Mrs. Honeychurch, if she had time, should descend from the carriage and inspect "Cissie" for herself. She was delighted. Nature had intended her to be poor and to live in such a house. Domestic arrangements always attracted her, especially when they were on a small scale.

  Cecil pulled Lucy back as she followed her mother.

  "Mrs. Honeychurch," he said, "what if we two walk home and leave you?"

  "Certainly!" was her cordial reply.

  Sir Harry likewise seemed almost too glad to get rid of them. He beamed at them knowingly, said, "Aha! young people, young people!" and then hastened to unlock the house.

  "Hopeless vulgarian!" exclaimed Cecil, almost before they were out of earshot.

  "Oh, Cecil!"

  "I can't help it. It would be wrong not to loathe that man."

  "He isn't clever, but really he is nice."

  "No, Lucy, he stands for all that is bad in country life. In London he would keep his place. He would belong to a brainless club, and his wife would give brainless dinner parties. But down here he acts the little god with his gentility, and his patronage, and his sham aesthetics, and every one—even your mother—is taken in."

  "All that you say is quite true," said Lucy, though she felt discouraged. "I wonder whether—whether it matters so very much."

  "It matters supremely. Sir Harry is the essence of that garden-party. Oh, goodness, how cross I feel! How I do hope he'll get some vulgar tenant in that villa—some woman so really vulgar that he'll notice it. GENTLEFOLKS! Ugh! with his bald head and retreating chin! But let's forget him."

  This Lucy was glad enough to do. If Cecil disliked Sir Harry Otway and Mr. Beebe, what guarantee was there that the people who really mattered to her would escape? For instance, Freddy. Freddy was neither clever, nor subtle, nor beautiful, and what prevented Cecil from saying, any minute, "It would be wrong not to loathe Freddy"? And what would she reply? Further than Freddy she did not go, but he gave her anxiety enough. She could only assure herself that Cecil had known Freddy some time, and that they had always got on pleasantly, except, perhaps, during the last few days, which was an accident, perhaps.

  "Which way shall we go?" she asked him.

  Nature—simplest of topics, she thought—was around them. Summer Street lay deep in the woods, and she had stopped where a footpath diverged from the highroad.

  "Are there two ways?"

  "Perhaps the road is more sensible, as we're got up smart."

  "I'd rather go through the wood," said Cecil, With that subdued irritation that she had noticed in him all the afternoon. "Why is it, Lucy, that you always say the road? Do you know that you have never once been with me in the fields or the wood since we were engaged?"

  "Haven't I? The wood, then," said Lucy, startled at his queerness, but pretty sure that he would explain later; it was not his habit to leave her in doubt as to his meaning.

  She led the way into the whispering pines, and sure enough he did explain before they had gone a dozen yards.

  "I had got an idea—I dare say wrongly—that you feel more at home with me in a room."

  "A room?" she echoed, hopelessly bewildered.

  "Yes. Or, at the most, in a garden, or on a road. Never in the real country like this."

  "Oh, Cecil, whatever do you mean? I have never felt anything of the sort. You talk as if I was a kind of poetess sort of person."

  "I don't know that you aren't. I connect you with a view—a certain type of view. Why shouldn't you connect me with a room?"

  She reflected a moment, and then said, laughing:

  "Do you know that you're right? I do. I must be a poetess after all. When I think of you it's always as in a room. How funny!"

  To her surprise, he seemed annoyed.

  "A drawing-room, pray? With no view?"

  "Yes, with no view, I fancy. Why not?"

  "I'd rather," he said reproachfully, "that connected me with the open air."

  She said again, "Oh, Cecil, whatever do you mean?"

  As no explanation was forthcoming, she shook off the subject as too difficult for a girl, and led him further into the wood, pausing every now and then at some particularly beautiful or familiar combination of the trees. She had known the wood between Summer Street and Windy Corner ever since she could walk alone; she had played at losing Freddy in it, when Freddy was a purple-faced baby; and though she had been to Italy, it had lost none of its charm.

  Presently they came to a little clearing among the pines—another tiny green alp, solitary this time, and holding in its bosom a shallow pool.

  She exclamed, "The Sacred Lake!"

  "Why do you call it that?"

  "I can't remember why. I suppose it comes out of some book. It's only a puddle now, but you see that stream going through it? Well, a good deal of water comes down after heavy rains, and can't get away at once, and the pool becomes quite large and beautiful. Then Freddy used to bathe there. He is very fond of it."

  "And you?"

  He meant, "Are you fond of it?" But she answered dreamily, "I bathed here, too, till I was found out. Then there was a row."

  At another time he might have been shocked, for he had depths of prudishness within him. But now? with his momentary cult of the fresh air, he was delighted at her admirable simplicity. He looked at her as she stood by the pool's edge. She was got up smart, as she phrased it, and she reminded him of some brilliant flower that has no leaves of its own, but blooms abruptly out of a world of green.

  "Who found you out?"

  "Charlotte," she murmured. "She was stopping with us. Charlotte—Charlotte."

  "Poor girl!"

  She smiled gravely. A certain scheme, from which hitherto he had shrank, now appeared practical.

  "Lucy!"

  "Yes, I suppose we ought to be going," was her reply.

  "Lucy, I want to ask something of you that I have never asked before."

  At the serious note in his voice she stepped frankly and kindly towards him.

  "What, Cecil?"

  "Hitherto never—not even that day on the lawn when you agreed to marry me—"

  He became self-conscious and kept glancing round to see if they were observed. His courage had gone.

  "Yes?"

  "Up to now I have never kissed you."

  She was as scarlet as if he had put the thing most indelicately.

  "No—more you have," she stammered.

  "Then I ask you—may I now?"

  "Of course, you may, Cecil. You might before. I can't run at you, you know."

  At that supreme moment he was conscious of nothing but absurdities. Her reply was inadequate. She gave such a business-like lift to her veil. As he approached her he found time to wish that he could recoil. As he touched her, his gold pince-nez became dislodged and was flattened between them.

  Such was the embrace. He considered, with truth, that it had been a failure. Passion should believe itself irresistible. It should forget civility and consideration and all the other curses of a refined nature. Above all, it should never ask for leave where there is a right of way. Why could he not do as any labourer or navvy—nay, as any young man behind the counter would have done? He recast the scene. Lucy was standing flowerlike by the water, he rushed up and took her in his arms; she rebuked him, permitted him and revered him ever after for his manliness. For he believed that women revere men for their manliness.

  They left the pool in silence, after this one salutation. He waited for her to make some remark which should show him her inmost thoughts. At last she spoke, and with fitting gravity.

  "Emerson was the name, not Harris."

  "What name?"

  "The old man's."

  "What old man?"

  "That old man I told you about. The one Mr. Eager was so unkind to."

  He could not know that this was the most int
imate conversation they had ever had.

  Chapter X: Cecil as a Humourist

  The society out of which Cecil proposed to rescue Lucy was perhaps no very splendid affair, yet it was more splendid than her antecedents entitled her to. Her father, a prosperous local solicitor, had built Windy Corner, as a speculation at the time the district was opening up, and, falling in love with his own creation, had ended by living there himself. Soon after his marriage the social atmosphere began to alter. Other houses were built on the brow of that steep southern slope and others, again, among the pine-trees behind, and northward on the chalk barrier of the downs. Most of these houses were larger than Windy Corner, and were filled by people who came, not from the district, but from London, and who mistook the Honeychurches for the remnants of an indigenous aristocracy. He was inclined to be frightened, but his wife accepted the situation without either pride or humility. "I cannot think what people are doing," she would say, "but it is extremely fortunate for the children." She called everywhere; her calls were returned with enthusiasm, and by the time people found out that she was not exactly of their milieu, they liked her, and it did not seem to matter. When Mr. Honeychurch died, he had the satisfaction—which few honest solicitors despise—of leaving his family rooted in the best society obtainable.

  The best obtainable. Certainly many of the immigrants were rather dull, and Lucy realized this more vividly since her return from Italy. Hitherto she had accepted their ideals without questioning—their kindly affluence, their inexplosive religion, their dislike of paper-bags, orange-peel, and broken bottles. A Radical out and out, she learnt to speak with horror of Suburbia. Life, so far as she troubled to conceive it, was a circle of rich, pleasant people, with identical interests and identical foes. In this circle, one thought, married, and died. Outside it were poverty and vulgarity for ever trying to enter, just as the London fog tries to enter the pine-woods pouring through the gaps in the northern hills. But, in Italy, where any one who chooses may warm himself in equality, as in the sun, this conception of life vanished. Her senses expanded; she felt that there was no one whom she might not get to like, that social barriers were irremovable, doubtless, but not particularly high. You jump over them just as you jump into a peasant's olive-yard in the Apennines, and he is glad to see you. She returned with new eyes.

  So did Cecil; but Italy had quickened Cecil, not to tolerance, but to irritation. He saw that the local society was narrow, but, instead of saying, "Does that very much matter?" he rebelled, and tried to substitute for it the society he called broad. He did not realize that Lucy had consecrated her environment by the thousand little civilities that create a tenderness in time, and that though her eyes saw its defects, her heart refused to despise it entirely. Nor did he realize a more important point—that if she was too great for this society, she was too great for all society, and had reached the stage where personal intercourse would alone satisfy her. A rebel she was, but not of the kind he understood—a rebel who desired, not a wider dwelling-room, but equality beside the man she loved. For Italy was offering her the most priceless of all possessions—her own soul.

  Playing bumble-puppy with Minnie Beebe, niece to the rector, and aged thirteen—an ancient and most honourable game, which consists in striking tennis-balls high into the air, so that they fall over the net and immoderately bounce; some hit Mrs. Honeychurch; others are lost. The sentence is confused, but the better illustrates Lucy's state of mind, for she was trying to talk to Mr. Beebe at the same time.

  "Oh, it has been such a nuisance—first he, then they—no one knowing what they wanted, and every one so tiresome."

  "But they really are coming now," said Mr. Beebe. "I wrote to Miss Teresa a few days ago—she was wondering how often the butcher called, and my reply of once a month must have impressed her favourably. They are coming. I heard from them this morning.

  "I shall hate those Miss Alans!" Mrs. Honeychurch cried. "Just because they're old and silly one's expected to say 'How sweet!' I hate their 'if'-ing and 'but'-ing and 'and'-ing. And poor Lucy—serve her right—worn to a shadow."

  Mr. Beebe watched the shadow springing and shouting over the tennis-court. Cecil was absent—one did not play bumble-puppy when he was there.

  "Well, if they are coming—No, Minnie, not Saturn." Saturn was a tennis-ball whose skin was partially unsewn. When in motion his orb was encircled by a ring. "If they are coming, Sir Harry will let them move in before the twenty-ninth, and he will cross out the clause about whitewashing the ceilings, because it made them nervous, and put in the fair wear and tear one.—That doesn't count. I told you not Saturn."

  "Saturn's all right for bumble-puppy," cried Freddy, joining them. "Minnie, don't you listen to her."

  "Saturn doesn't bounce."

  "Saturn bounces enough."

  "No, he doesn't."

  "Well; he bounces better than the Beautiful White Devil."

  "Hush, dear," said Mrs. Honeychurch.

  "But look at Lucy—complaining of Saturn, and all the time's got the Beautiful White Devil in her hand, ready to plug it in. That's right, Minnie, go for her—get her over the shins with the racquet—get her over the shins!"

  Lucy fell, the Beautiful White Devil rolled from her hand.

  Mr. Beebe picked it up, and said: "The name of this ball is Vittoria Corombona, please." But his correction passed unheeded.

  Freddy possessed to a high degree the power of lashing little girls to fury, and in half a minute he had transformed Minnie from a well-mannered child into a howling wilderness. Up in the house Cecil heard them, and, though he was full of entertaining news, he did not come down to impart it, in case he got hurt. He was not a coward and bore necessary pain as well as any man. But he hated the physical violence of the young. How right it was! Sure enough it ended in a cry.

  "I wish the Miss Alans could see this," observed Mr. Beebe, just as Lucy, who was nursing the injured Minnie, was in turn lifted off her feet by her brother.

  "Who are the Miss Alans?" Freddy panted.

  "They have taken Cissie Villa."

  "That wasn't the name—"

  Here his foot slipped, and they all fell most agreeably on to the grass. An interval elapses.

  "Wasn't what name?" asked Lucy, with her brother's head in her lap.

  "Alan wasn't the name of the people Sir Harry's let to."

  "Nonsense, Freddy! You know nothing about it."

  "Nonsense yourself! I've this minute seen him. He said to me: 'Ahem! Honeychurch,'"—Freddy was an indifferent mimic—"'ahem! ahem! I have at last procured really dee-sire-rebel tenants.' I said, 'ooray, old boy!' and slapped him on the back."

  "Exactly. The Miss Alans?"

  "Rather not. More like Anderson."

  "Oh, good gracious, there isn't going to be another muddle!" Mrs. Honeychurch exclaimed. "Do you notice, Lucy, I'm always right? I said don't interfere with Cissie Villa. I'm always right. I'm quite uneasy at being always right so often."

  "It's only another muddle of Freddy's. Freddy doesn't even know the name of the people he pretends have taken it instead."

  "Yes, I do. I've got it. Emerson."

  "What name?"

  "Emerson. I'll bet you anything you like."

  "What a weathercock Sir Harry is," said Lucy quietly. "I wish I had never bothered over it at all."

  Then she lay on her back and gazed at the cloudless sky. Mr. Beebe, whose opinion of her rose daily, whispered to his niece that THAT was the proper way to behave if any little thing went wrong.

  Meanwhile the name of the new tenants had diverted Mrs. Honeychurch from the contemplation of her own abilities.

  "Emerson, Freddy? Do you know what Emersons they are?"

  "I don't know whether they're any Emersons," retorted Freddy, who was democratic. Like his sister and like most young people, he was naturally attracted by the idea of equality, and the undeniable fact that there are different kinds of Emersons annoyed him beyond measure.

  "I trust they are the
right sort of person. All right, Lucy"—she was sitting up again—"I see you looking down your nose and thinking your mother's a snob. But there is a right sort and a wrong sort, and it's affectation to pretend there isn't."

  "Emerson's a common enough name," Lucy remarked.

  She was gazing sideways. Seated on a promontory herself, she could see the pine-clad promontories descending one beyond another into the Weald. The further one descended the garden, the more glorious was this lateral view.

  "I was merely going to remark, Freddy, that I trusted they were no relations of Emerson the philosopher, a most trying man. Pray, does that satisfy you?"

  "Oh, yes," he grumbled. "And you will be satisfied, too, for they're friends of Cecil; so"—elaborate irony—"you and the other country families will be able to call in perfect safety."

  "CECIL?" exclaimed Lucy.

  "Don't be rude, dear," said his mother placidly. "Lucy, don't screech. It's a new bad habit you're getting into."

  "But has Cecil—"

  "Friends of Cecil's," he repeated, "'and so really dee-sire-rebel. Ahem! Honeychurch, I have just telegraphed to them.'"

  She got up from the grass.

  It was hard on Lucy. Mr. Beebe sympathized with her very much. While she believed that her snub about the Miss Alans came from Sir Harry Otway, she had borne it like a good girl. She might well "screech" when she heard that it came partly from her lover. Mr. Vyse was a tease—something worse than a tease: he took a malicious pleasure in thwarting people. The clergyman, knowing this, looked at Miss Honeychurch with more than his usual kindness.

  When she exclaimed, "But Cecil's Emersons—they can't possibly be the same ones—there is that—" he did not consider that the exclamation was strange, but saw in it an opportunity of diverting the conversation while she recovered her composure. He diverted it as follows:

  "The Emersons who were at Florence, do you mean? No, I don't suppose it will prove to be them. It is probably a long cry from them to friends of Mr. Vyse's. Oh, Mrs. Honeychurch, the oddest people! The queerest people! For our part we liked them, didn't we?" He appealed to Lucy. "There was a great scene over some violets. They picked violets and filled all the vases in the room of these very Miss Alans who have failed to come to Cissie Villa. Poor little ladies! So shocked and so pleased. It used to be one of Miss Catharine's great stories. 'My dear sister loves flowers,' it began. They found the whole room a mass of blue—vases and jugs—and the story ends with 'So ungentlemanly and yet so beautiful.' It is all very difficult. Yes, I always connect those Florentine Emersons with violets."