by Angus Wilson
Gerald, on arrival, edged towards the french windows to get some air, but Madame Houdet, seeing him alone, thought, Ah! the poor man, he's old and knows no one, and, as there was a lull for a moment in her surveillance of the servants, she came over to him. 'Ah! you are sad, Mr Middleton,' she said; 'you are thinking of your dear Lilian.' Whereas Yves had attached the most dubious motives to Gerald's visit to Merano, his mother had ascribed it to the flickering embers of an old romance.
Gerald started. He had been watching young Caroline Jevington talking to Timothy and admiring his grandson's taste. A little unripe yet, he was thinking, but she would develop; already she showed none of that ugly, flat-breasted boyish nonsense that spoiled too many of these girls. Oh Lord! he thought, as Madame Houdet talked, what a dirty old man I'm getting to be, but, looking at the dead-pan faces of Marie Hélène's guests, he added, and thank God for it!
'Poor Lilian! she found it hard to die. Mon dieu! comme elle a lutté! She loved the world so much. She would not give up fighting for life. No, never! You and I, we are different, Mr Middleton; we are willing to be old, we are ready to go.'
Gerald thought, I'll be blowed if I am; you speak for yourself, old Madame Sanctimonious.
'But I was so fond of her. Oh! I will not pretend that she was not very difficult and hard. Oh! so hard! It is terrible when suffering make us hard. Et elle a souffert, la pauvre! But we were old, and although she talks and I do not listen, I do not like her to die.'
Gerald looked at the ravaged, old, rouge-flecked face and thought, Good God! the poor old thing's genuine. He said, 'I'm sure it must have been a terrible shock for you. I could see how much the villa meant to you even in the short time I was there.'
It was not the most tactful choice of words. Beads of caked lip-stick trembled on Stéphanie's lips in her agitation. 'Oh, I do not mind, believe me, that Lilian left me nothing. I am old and, after all, a granddaughter is a granddaughter, however little she did for Lilian. But, for Yves, I mind - yes, very much. It was not so nice for a young attractive man to spend his time with an old woman. But he was always willing to stay and give the pleasure of his young company to Lilian. She knew that life had not been kind to my boy. She should have left him something.'
Yves' visits, however painful at the time, had been a source of such pleasurable anticipation and remembrance to Madame Houdet that she truly had come to think that Lilian had been ungrateful for all the pleasure he had given them. Gerald, catching sight of Yves leaning over some woman guest with fatuously self-satisfied gallantry, could hardly believe any longer in Madame Houdet's sincerity. Nevertheless, he made no comment. Despite the vexatious failures of his Melpham quest, despite John and Inge and Robin and Elvira, he felt somehow so light-hearted that evening that he could not bring himself to criticize. His recent adventures into life after his long seclusion had revealed such complicated webs of muddled human activity - the Barkers, Rammage, Mrs Salad, this old woman. And all I feel is, he realized, let them get on with it. I can't praise or blame. It's because I've done my best, he said to himself, and then laughed at the awful priggish words. No, it's not that, but I've had a chance to look at it all a bit from the outside and I'm simply not going back into my own tortured web. I feel free.
He said, 'I say, you've got no champagne,' to Madame Houdet. The words and the accompanying smile came from the behaviour of his youth.
Stéphanie was shut tight within her own web. She did not hear his words. 'Lilian thought too little of others altogether. She saw so little of the poor people who had not got lovely villas. She thought only I am no longer young and beautiful, she did not realize that there were many poor girls - yes, in Merano, at her own door - who have never been beautiful, who were poor and crippled. And it is the same here, Mr Middleton,' she said. 'Only today I have heard of a Miss Rowton-Riversby' - the rolling of r's invested the name with a terrible ferocity - 'Ah! cette pauvre dame! Quand je vous raconte quelle est sœur d'un général, et maintenant...'
Gerald said at the end of her story, 'Yes, that's certainly jolly sad,' and, before he knew where he was, he had given her a cheque for the dispensing of charity. It was an ostentatious gesture connected with his wealth that would normally have horrified him.
Attracted, perhaps, by the sight of the cheque-book, Yves walked over to him. 'Pretty big people here tonight,' he said.
Gerald looked round the crowded room. 'Yes. That woman's enormous,' he said.
Yves was only momentarily disconcerted. 'I'd like a word with you, Middleton.' His tone was strangely sinister.
Gerald smiled. 'If you can make yourself heard above the din, the future is yours.'
Yves slowly lit a cigarette, and then, puffing a cloud of smoke into Gerald's face in a carefully insolent manner, 'Rather a strange meeting that of yours with Mrs Portway, wasn't it?'
Gerald looked at the stupid, conceited face, the flashing dark eyes, and beautiful white teeth. Through his carefreeness he remembered that he had intended to be very angry with Yves. 'Oh! yes. Look here!' he said, 'you've been making a fool of yourself. What's all this nonsense you've been telling Miss Portway about my causing her grandmother's death?' He found it impossible to sound really annoyed.
Yves smiled cynically. 'Is it nonsense? I'm not so sure. There was something pretty strange going on between you and the old lady. Something it seems to me you wouldn't like the world to know.' He paused and smiled again. 'And there is no reason why it should know. Only I shall want persuading that it would be better that way.'
He stopped, for Gerald appeared not to have heard him, so he took out his wallet and produced a sheet of notepaper. 'Perhaps you don't know that I have this,' he said, and handed it to Gerald. 'It was lying on Mrs Portway's desk.'
'My dear friend,' Gerald read the shaky handwriting,' what you and I discussed this afternoon is a terrible thing. And perhaps more terrible still is the fact that we have both kept silent all these years, for I fear that we have both guessed that something was wrong and we have acted very wickedly. ...'
Gerald handed the paper back to Yves. 'You seem to be the prize ass of all time,' he said, using unconsciously the language of the past, of Dollie and Gilbert. He walked away.
As he took a glass of champagne from one of the hired waiters, he saw with horror that Marie Hélène was leading a tall, grey-haired Frenchman towards him. It was as he feared, the distinguished author of Les causes célèbres du moyen âge, Armand Sarthe. Oh, well, he thought, the chap must be a cynical journalist who's written the stuff for money; he may well be quite a pleasant fellow in real life. But when Marie Hélène moved away in grave deference to the esoteric bonds of scholarship that united them, M. Sarthe's first words were not promising.
'Woman,' he said, and he waved his hand towards Marie Hélène's sharp shoulder-blades protruding uglily above the flowing folds of her crimson gown, 'defies the historian's art. We can catch her differences, the change in her art. We can catch for a moment the turn of Aspasia's head as she delights Pericles with her wit. We can bring to life again the harsh note in Xanthippe's scolding voice. We can turn with horror from the cruelty in Messalina's eyes or with shame for ourselves from the innocent love with which Héloïse looks at her lover. We can stand with the Maid as she scorns her judges. But the essential woman - the woman that was there in the caves at Lascaux and is here in this room today - eludes us. Do you agree?'
Gerald had some difficulty in following the rapid French, so he contented himself by saying 'Yes.'
'And you,' M. Sarthe went on, 'the medievalist, have the greatest mystery of all to explain - the world of Sacred and Profane love, the world of Beatrice and Laura, the age that could produce both Isobel of Bavaria and Catherine of Siena....'
It seemed to Gerald that M. Sarthe would never make an end, he had hardly realized that so many Famous Women had passed through History's pages.
'And what strange thing happened,' M. Sarthe asked, 'to bring the Montespan to those sordid rooms, to take part in those revolti
ng rites?'
Gerald gave no answer, for his ear had caught the sound of Kay's voice. 'Yes,' she was saying, 'I thought the success of Donald's last lecture gave us the right to a day off. So we simply parked Baby with the people next door and had a day at Brighton.' Marie Hélène made a sort of shocked sound, though whether at the irresponsibility of parking babies or the choice of Brighton for a day's outing was not clear. Kay took it as the latter, for she said, 'Oh! but Brighton's so beautiful. Especially in midsummer with all the crowds.' She had all the intellectual's reverence for that town.
Marie Hélène turned to Donald. 'I'm glad that your speech was so successful. You've quite found your métier.'
Kay laughed a little annoyed explosion. 'Oh! hardly that, the poor darling. He doesn't want to be chained to industry all his life. But it's all rather fun.'
'Don't make me appear too irresponsible, dear.'
Gerald could just imagine the little prim, deprecating smile with which Donald would accompany this remark.
'She had played so often at being a shepherdess at the Trianon,' M. Sarthe was saying, 'now she was called upon to play a role before a world audience.'
Gerald heard no more, for John's voice sounded in his ear, boyish and triumphant. 'We've won,' he was telling the little family group. 'The report's found against Pelican, and the Minister's told the House that he's to be sent to a branch office at Bangor.'
'Ovid among the Scythians,' said Donald.
Marie Hélène must have seen Robin approaching, for Gerald could hear her voice desperately trying to break up the family knot before he arrived to hear John's bitter news. 'Now, Kay, I want you to meet Bill Stillingfleet, the painter,' she was saying, but it was too late. Robin was greeting his sister with warmth. He spoke no greeting to the males of his family, but Gerald imagined his curt nods.
Robin, in fact, had not looked at Donald at all. He had made up his mind that he would not mention the subject of the lecture at Marie Hélène's party. Even if someone else raised it, he would pass it off as easily as he could. Business was business, and nothing to do with his home. He had treated Marie Hélène badly enough already without intruding his impossible family further upon her.
Passing from group to group at the party, Robin had felt the respect for his wife, which had been surging up since his break with Elvira, burst in one huge wave of reverence. He owed all this genuine culture and elegance, he thought, to his wife - and he had considered leaving her for the neurotic, raffish, 'clever' bohemianism of Elvira! He could never make amends. Seeing Donald in the distance, he had thought, you'll get the push tomorrow, my lad, but you'll not have the satisfaction of spoiling my wife's party. So now, when Kay said, 'Isn't it nice that Donald's won the heart of all your workers?' he simply replied, 'Very.'
'Well, Robin,' John announced, 'your Mr Pelican's got to brush up his Mabinogion.' And when Robin said nothing, he went on, 'He's been severely censured by the Commission and the Minister's transferred him to the Bangor branch.'
Robin's stomach turned. He thought of Mrs Pelican and her wish for the boys to remain at St Paul's. Poor old Pelican! he thought, and his cheeks blushed scarlet as he remembered the promises he could never fulfil.
'If I remember rightly,' said Donald primly, 'they shot an admiral named Byng pour encourager les autres. I doubt if it had that effect.' He smiled at John through his spectacles. 'But I believe Robin has schemes to save Mr Pelican from the firing-squad on the quarter-deck. When are we to hear of the brilliant administrator's adherence to the firm of Middleton, Robin?' he asked.
Robin's head swam. He plunged headlong. 'Never,' he said with violence, 'thanks to your crass tomfoolery.'
Donald started; he had expected an attack, but not at that moment.
Kay asked, 'Whatever do you mean?'
'Only this,' Robin said. 'Your bloody fool of a husband has undone all my work over the last two years. He's alienated the shop stewards, upset the directors, and effectually prevented my offering a job to Pelican.' He was shouting now.
Gerald came over.
'A little quieter, my dear boy,' he said. 'Whatever it is, we don't want all the guests involved. What's Donald been up to?'
Robin mumbled now. He would have given anything to be a small boy once more who, by saying 'Take back what I said' or 'As you were', could erase a whole conversation. 'Parading my confidences made to the family before the whole factory!'
'My dear boy, what dark family secrets could possibly interest the employees of Middleton's?' Gerald tried to give the quarrel a lighter tone without annoying Robin by facetiousness.
Robin noticed nothing of this. 'I told John about the Grimston liquidation in confidence.'
Gerald raised his eyebrows, he had not cared for that story at the time. 'You choose your dirty linen with care,' he said to Donald, and tried once more by his smile to relieve the tension.
Kay turned on him. 'I really don't see that it has anything to do with you, Father,' she said. But John intervened. In view of his Pelican victory he felt the need to be magnanimous to Robin; also he prided himself as a public commentator on never using confidential material.
'That's all very well, Kay,' he said, 'but Robin made it perfectly clear that he was speaking in confidence. Heaven knows Thingy's Christmas occasions are ghastly enough without feeling that what one says may be taken down and used against one.'
Gerald looked at his younger son with surprise when he heard the bitterness with which he spoke Inge's name.
Kay's face showed alarm at this family unity against her husband. 'I'm sure Donald didn't realize the importance of it,' she said.
'I'm not in the habit,' her husband said, 'of making public utterances without weighing their consequences. I chose my material very carefully; if it doesn't put Robin in the benevolent light in which he normally likes to dispense his patronage, that is unfortunate. Egotism tempered with benevolence is likely to break down as an ethic of conduct; and when it does, it's liable to appear as hypocrisy, as the Victorian exponents of so-called individual morality found to their cost.'
'Look here! this is awful balls,' said John. Despite all his enmity to Robin, he had always stood up for him if some other boy at school attacked him.
'What I can't forgive,' said Robin, 'is that you committed this indiscretion quite deliberately.'
'How strange!' Donald replied. 'I should have thought it far more unforgivable if I had blundered into it.' He moved close to Robin and when he spoke his voice came through his thin lips almost as a hiss. 'I fail to see why you should have expected that your arrogance, rudeness, and complete lack of consideration towards me should have gone unanswered.'
Robin was amazed; he simply could not conceive anyone acting with such deliberation. 'But you never showed ...' he began.
'I am not given to the emotional exhibitionism of your family,' Donald said. 'When I act, I act after full consideration.'
'I hope you took into consideration the fact that your services will no longer be required by the firm.'
'Don't let's rush too far, Robin,' Gerald said, but his son brushed his words aside. 'No, Father. I've considered carefully, too. I had every intention of sacking the swine tomorrow. It's only the occasion I regret.'
'There's no need, I think,' Donald said in his most governessy voice, 'for abuse. On my side, I assure you, I'm only too glad to bring to an end a very absurd piece of patronage which, but for Kay's feelings for her mother, I would never have considered accepting. I wish I could bring the whole family connexion to an end as easily.'
'That's not very kind, Donald,' said Gerald.
'Oh, I have no quarrel with you, Professor Middleton.' The remark seemed to reduce Gerald's family status to that of an honoured oid servant.
'It's very unkind to Kay was what I meant,' Gerald replied rather grimly.
'I can look after myself, thank you,' Kay cried. 'Come on, Donald, we'd better go.' As they walked away self-consciously, Kay turned a crimson face on her family. 'I think you
've all behaved abominably,' she said. Nevertheless, as she went out of the door, Gerald could hear her saying to Donald, 'Why did you have to do anything so childish? It's unforgivable.'
Yves was now talking to a cultured stockbroker's wife. 'Did I know Colette?' he was saying. 'I certainly did. What a grand old lady and what a greater writer! Mind you, she had some very funny ways. She certainly embarrassed me once or twice. Not that I'd have minded. When a lady's-a great artist like that, I'm always willing to oblige, no matter if she's a hundred. I just didn't want her to get hurt, that's all. Love can be pretty painful when you're old.'
Madame Houdet, flushed with a few glasses of champagne, had lost much of her shyness of the English. She talked on rapidly to a B.B.C. lady producer, who was under the impression that she was an 'important' French guest.