With Pheasant it was very different. Her thoughts were with her loved first-born. If only Maurice might have married Adeline — Maurice, who had so constantly loved her.…
Little Mary clung to Piers’s hand. She wore a new white dress, with frills and a blue sash. She wished there were not so many voices, talking loudly above her head, which felt hot and rather confused. Her father’s hand, to which she clung, was moist with perspiration. She said “perspiration” several times to herself. She knew it was rude to say “sweat.” Her mother had told her so. Then why did Philip sometimes say he was sweating like a horse? Because Philip was rude, there was no doubt about that.
Dennis was not rude but he was looking at her with eyes that made her uncomfortable. Archer was asking him:
“Been in a fight?”
“No,” said Dennis. “I came home from camp.”
“How did you get that bump on your forehead?”
“I did it myself — with an apple.”
“I hear,” said Archer, “that you’ve been sent home from camp. I’m not going to ask you what you did, but I will say you have the perfect face for a juvenile delinquent.”
“what kind is that?” Dennis asked, interested.
“It’s pale and inscrutable, with somehow the look of a martyr. Your family will be blamed for whatever you do.”
Adeline, overhearing this, said, “Stop it, Archie. He’s conceited enough already.”
Dennis said stiffly, “I came home because I am needed.”
Meg had eyes for no one but her granddaughter, Victoria Bell, who lay on the leather couch in the library with the old knitted afghan that had seen so much service spread over her.
“Oh, the precious lamb!” cried Meg, hovering over her — if one of Meg’s bulk could be said to hover. “I’ve never seen a finer child! whom does she resemble, I wonder?”
“Not me, thank God,” said Humphrey Bell.
“I know,” Meg said, as though inspired. “She looks like Patience’s father. Oh, how proud he would have been!”
The Rector too bent over the baby. “I see no resemblance,” he said, “except in the receding hairline.”
Renny joined them. He blew a whiff of cigarette smoke into the infant’s face, which at once puckered and emitted a tiny sneeze.
“Always like to see them sneeze,” he remarked. “Does them good.”
It was now time to move into the dining room. Little Mary had been given her evening meal before leaving home and she remained with the baby, for she was to be trusted. Therefore sixteen people sat down to table. Alayne, though opposed to this betrothal, had gone to great pains to make the dinner a success. She had decorated the table with old-fashioned, sweet-scented roses. The roast ducks were of the tenderest, the green peas were fresh from the garden, the asparagus succulent and, when it came to the dessert, the Rector declared that the strawberries were at their most perfect — the very hour before they became overripe, when their flavour was at its most seductive. As for the cream from the Jersey cows, it came out of the fat silver jugs in golden blobs. Mrs. Wragge had baked two angel cakes, not the sort out of a package but made with eight large eggs apiece. Renny had, as promised, provided champagne. After a health had been drunk to the young couple, who sat smiling at each other across the table, he proposed another — this to the earlier Philip and Adeline, who looked serenely down at this festive gathering from their massive gilt frames.
The sixteenth member of the family to sit at table was Roma Whiteoak, the niece who lived in New York. She had arrived only that day and had gone straight to the Rectory, for she had lived with Meg for some years. Though she was only two years younger than Adeline, she gave the impression, at first sight, of being almost a child as compared to her, for she was small and her face retained the contours of childhood. Her golden-brown hair waved softly about her cheeks. Yet a closer look into that artless-seeming face would reveal an expression of cool resolve, a bend to the lips that could easily harden into a sneer. At table she had been placed next Archer, who looked her over with a good deal of curiosity.
“Do you like living in New York?” he asked.
“Well, at least, there’s something to do there,” she said. “Not like this place.”
“Have you made friends?”
“As many as I want,” she returned with a shrug.
He inspected her more closely. “You have the face,” he observed, “of the genuine heartbreaker. You don’t even know you are doing it.”
She liked that. Attacking her shrimp cocktail she asked, “How did you find out so much, at your age?”
“Don’t you know you’re talking to a classicist? I have qualified,” he said, “for a Rhodes Scholarship. I have read the classics.”
“Helen of Troy and all that?”
“Mostly all that.”
“I haven’t time for reading,” she said, “except condensations.”
“With all the best parts left out,” he commented.
“You can cover more ground that way,” she said.
“Is it a cause for conceit,” he asked, “to cover more ground?”
Alayne leaned forward a little to overhear this conversation. How these young ones were striving to be grown-up, and how much they had to learn! And possibly with pain. Her heart yearned over her son. She wished, though she would not acknowledge it even to herself, that he had something of the warm, responsive nature of Adeline. Yet when he smiled — which he did so rarely — how sweet was that smile! Now, as she caught his eye with her look of yearning, he returned it with one of frosty condescension.
They sat long at the table, the cool night air blowing gently in at the windows, the leaves of the Virginia creeper, that overlapped in their exuberance of growth, making a scarcely heard murmur. When the family returned to the library they found little Mary fast asleep, her hair falling over her face, while Victoria Bell’s florid countenance was puckered in protest at the delay in her feeding. Their two mothers swept them upstairs, Patience undoing her blouse as she hastened to uncover her flower-white breast. This was attacked by Victoria Bell with infant fury. Pheasant had captured a dish of strawberries and cream for her child before putting her down to sleep.
Alayne, who had come upstairs to tidy her face, glanced in at them. She thought, Women and children always in evidence … They are hopelessly rumpling that bedspread. She said, smiling, “Having a little nourishment, eh?” And saw how Pheasant was feeding Mary, like another baby. The little girl’s eyes were shut but she mechanically opened her pink mouth to receive the luscious red strawberries. Cream trickled down her chin. Alayne thought, One’s own children are enough. Why should one be asked to put up with other people’s?
She turned away to discover Dennis standing behind her. His eyes were fixed on the baby.
“Is that the way I was fed?” he asked, as she reached the door of her own bedroom. There was something in his voice — an unchildlike note — a tone of fierce, contemptuous curiosity.
“what do you mean?”
She turned into her room.
“I mean,” he said, “the way Patience is doing. Was I fed that way?”
“why should it matter to you?” she asked. Her back was to him. She examined her face in the mirror.
He was like a peddlar with his foot in the door who would not budge.
“Because I want to know.”
Alayne tried to think. “I can’t remember,” she said. Then — “No. You were fed from a bottle, I think. Now run along.” She came and closed the door.
He ran down the stairs and out into the languid summer night, heavy with the scent of flowers. The picture of the red-faced infant tugging at its mother’s voluptuous breast haunted him, filled him with disgust. Many a time he had seen animals suckling their young, but this was different. It filled him with angry repulsion. “I hate women,” he said to himself. “They are cows. I hate them.” He saw Adeline and Roma standing together beneath the dark leaves of a maple and turned aside to avoi
d them. Through the window of the dining room he could see the men still sitting about the table. His eyes sought the figure of Finch and he said aloud, but softly:
“I only love my father. My father.” And he kept repeating those words. “Women are cows.”
Standing in the darkness Roma said to Adeline:
“I’ve something to tell you.”
“what?” Adeline asked with mild curiosity.
“I’m engaged.”
“To whom?”
“Guess.”
“Do I know him?”
“You used to. You thought quite a lot of him — once.”
Adeline looked down at Roma, trying to see her face.
“I can guess,” she said. “Is it Maitland?”
“Yes,” breathed Roma. “Do you mind?”
“Not in the least.”
“I thought you’d perhaps be hurt. Or angry.”
“why?”
“Oh, I don’t know.… I thought perhaps you’d feel you still had some claim on him.”
“For heaven’s sake,” Adeline exclaimed, “be reasonable. I couldn’t care less who marries him.”
“I wanted him to come and make our announcement at the party but he wouldn’t.”
“I wonder why,” said Adeline. The thought of such an announcement at that time was shocking, painful — or was it funny? She chose to think of it as funny, and gave a short laugh. “That would have been a good joke,” she added.
Roma was annoyed. “I don’t see anything funny about it,” she said. “If Mait and I choose to fall in love, I don’t see anything funny in it.”
“Of course not,” said Adeline. “when are you to be married?”
“Next fall.”
“Have you told Sylvia?”
“Not yet. There she is coming toward us. I’ll tell her now.”
Sylvia came across the close-cut dark lawn, on which a heavy dew was falling. She had a way of looking strangely alone. There was about her an air of solitariness even as she joined Adeline and Roma.
“what a lovely night,” she said. “Too lovely for staying indoors.”
Adeline put an arm about her. “Prepare yourself for great news,” she said. “Roma has something to tell you.”
“You tell her,” said Roma, suddenly young and shy in manner.
“Is it about my brother and you?” asked Sylvia.
Roma nodded, her hair falling softly about her forehead.
“He has already told me,” said Sylvia. “I had a letter from him two days ago.” She bent to kiss Roma. “I hope you will be very happy,” she said.
The three stood there in silence. The voices of the men came to them, as they emerged from the house. Roma said, “I think I shall go and break the news to Uncle Renny.” She gave a childlike little skip as she crossed the lawn. She tossed her hair and ran and caught Renny by the arm. He smiled down at her.
She said: “I’ve a secret.”
She was like a little girl, he thought, and let himself be led to the path that found its way, through grass and ferns and wild flowers, into the ravine. There the stream was singing in the darkness and there was the smell of moist earth.
“Uncle Renny,” she said, now that she had him there — speaking in an almost matter-of-fact tone, as though the childishness had been but play-acting — “I’m going to be married to Maitland Fitzturgis.”
If her news had not caused the sensation she had expected when she told it to Sylvia and Adeline, certainly there was no disappointment for her in Renny’s reception of it. He had been about to light a cigarette and the flare from the match showed his astonished face.
“Marry Fitzturgis?” he repeated. “why — I can’t believe it! I thought — well, I thought you had no more than a passing fancy for him. Roma, are you sure you care enough about him to marry him?”
“It’s pretty obvious that I do,” she said coolly. She opened a little sequined evening bag and took from it a ring set with small diamonds. She slipped it onto her third finger. “I didn’t want to wear this till I had broken the news,” she said. She put her head on one side to admire the ring, which shone mildly in the moonlight that now drifted through the branches of trees growing so close together that their leaves allowed only narrow shafts of light to penetrate.
Renny Whiteoak reflected on how his daughter had for two years awaited the coming of Fitzturgis from Ireland, had loyally awaited her marriage to him — and now here was Roma, who had wrecked that engagement, primed herself to marry him. Yet always he had appeared to Renny as an unlovable man.
“It’s a pretty ring,” he said. “Fitzturgis seems to be doing well in New York. I hope he’s in a position to keep you properly.”
“We shall manage,” said Roma in a tone that did not invite questioning.
She had told him her news and had little more to say. Voices and laughter came down to them from the lawn above and then the sound of a Chopin waltz played by Finch. Renny took Roma by the hand, kissed her, and led her up the path to the house.
When the guests had gone, he drew Adeline into her own room behind the stairway, the room that had for so many years been occupied by his grandmother. Even today, with the belongings of a young girl scattered about, the atmosphere, the flavour of the room could not be subdued. Renny could not enter it without seeing again the bent figure of the old, old woman, her penetrating gaze beneath the lace frill of her cap, her beringed hands, her mordant grin. He could see again the green plumage of her parrot, perching on the painted bedstead.
“Tired?” he asked Adeline.
“No. It’s been a lovely evening.”
“what do you think of Roma’s engagement?”
“Don’t ask me.”
“why?” he persisted.
“Because I don’t know. My brain is all confused where those two are concerned.”
“Mine isn’t,” he said. “I think they’ll lead each other the devil of a life.”
“I don’t see why. They are, both of them, pretty tolerant — not jealous and quick-tempered — like me.” She took off her dress and, opening the window wider, leaned out toward the night breeze.
Renny dropped a kiss on her shoulder. She was like a fresh flower, he thought, a new-blown rose, set in a rococo vase. “You’re like me,” he said, “and like Gran. How she would have admired you! You and Philip.”
She said over her shoulder, “He’s a nice boy.” In that moment she was remembering Fitzturgis and the wild surge of her love for him.
“Philip has developed tremendously since his engagement to you,” said Renny.
“Has he?” She turned and faced him, as though in mild surprise.
“And so have you.”
Now she gave a little laugh. “That’s funny,” she said, “because I feel younger. Almost a child again.”
“It’s a good way for a woman to feel. Let the men do the planning — and worrying.”
He said goodnight to her; closed the front door, against which the three dogs were leaning. They longed to go to bed and followed him gladly up the stairs and into Archer’s room.
The boy was sitting on the side of his book-littered bed, reading a French novel. “I’m trying to enjoy it,” he said glumly, “because I hear that all Paris is enjoying it.”
“I thought,” said Renny, “that you disliked doing what it is ‘the thing’ to do.”
“Very true,” Archer agreed. “I do. But I shall be going to Paris. I must make some little preparation.”
“Now, look here, Archie,” said Renny, “no one in Oxford or Paris will care what you read or whether you’re able to read.”
Archer laid down the book. “I suppose they’ll ask me questions about Canada — a country in which I’m not particularly interested. I don’t, in fact, know one totem pole from another.”
“You’re a queer egg,” said Renny, to whom his son was a constant source of amusement, while he filled Alayne with a confusion of mingled pride and humiliation.
“Quid de
m? Quid non dem?”mused Archer. “Renuis tu quod jubet alter.”
“Hm,”said Renny, “that’s Greek to me.”
“It was Latin,” Archer said politely, “to the one who wrote it. It’s not a very apt quotation, but the only one I can think of at the moment. These family parties leave me flattened.”
“Better get to bed,” said his father. “It’s late. You should have plenty of sleep before you carouse in Oxford and Paris.”
“Mercy!” said Archer.
The dogs were so eager for bed they yawned and whined in pleasure as Renny turned into his own room. The cairn terrier leapt straight onto the bed, while the bulldog and spaniel went under it. Renny remembered how the room which was now Archer’s had been the bedroom of Uncle Ernest. That dear man — how interested he would have been in Archer, as indeed he had been in all his nephews.
Renny thought of his brothers — his half-brothers they were, but closer to him than many a full brother: Eden, dead this many a year; Piers; Finch; and Wakefield. It was a disappointment that Wakefield had not been able to come to the party because of an engagement in New York. Wake’s love affairs, his delicate health had been a source of anxiety to Renny. He had given Wake a more fatherly affection than ever he had given to Archer. And now Wake was a man of thirty-eight and a successful actor.
As though to crystallize Renny’s thoughts, a letter from New York caught his eye. It lay on the table beside his bed and was addressed in Wakefield’s handwriting — a small scholarly hand, taught him by Uncle Ernest. How proud the family had been of the little boy’s writing, so different from Finch’s scrawl.…
When Renny had opened the letter and read it he went straight to Alayne’s room.
X
The Letter
Alayne was already in bed, graceful in a lace bedjacket. She was reading a book of essays to calm her for the night. She raised her eyes from it to look inquiringly at Renny. He came at once to the foot of the bed.
“I’ve had a letter from Wakefield,” he said. “He’s ill.”
All her married days she had been used to Renny’s periods of anxiety over this youngest brother’s health. He had had a weak heart. He had suffered (often willfully, it had seemed to Alayne) from his nerves. He had been a posthumous child, a precocious child, and the family had shown a solicitude toward him that had been denied Finch. It had been Alayne who had first realized Finch’s talent and had urged music lessons for him. Wakefield was talented too. Eden, Finch, Wakefield — poet, pianist, actor — they were remarkable, these brothers, she had often thought, and what a contrast to Renny and Piers!
The Jalna Saga – Deluxe Edition: All Sixteen Books of the Enduring Classic Series & The Biography of Mazo de la Roche Page 518