The Passing Bells

by Phillip Rock

  “Who?” Martin asked, looking around.

  “Don’t look. Just stand beside me. Perhaps he’ll pass on by.”

  Martin stared at the racks of pipes, the tins of tobacco, and then he sensed someone approaching and looked to his left. A young man was coming toward them, somewhat hesitantly. Martin’s first impression was that it might have been a girl in man’s clothing. The body was slim, almost willowy, and he was more pretty than handsome. Black curly hair framed a narrow high-cheekboned face, with skin of a pale olive-ivory complexion. The man’s nose was thin but prominent, the eyes large, oval, and soft brown, like the eyes of a fawn. But the fawnlike characteristics were negated by the mouth, a wide slash that seemed to be fixed in a permanent sneer.

  “Captain Wood-Lacy, I presume,” the man said. “And companion.”

  “Why, hello, Golden,” Fenton said, doing a poor job of imitating surprise. “Fancy running into you.”

  The man’s lips curled even tighter in derision. “Fancy! And on Bond Street to boot. I never knew you to be taken by pipes.”

  “I’m not, as a matter of fact, but any port in a storm.”

  The man threw his head back and laughed, a rollicking peal of such depth and timbre that it was difficult to associate it with so delicate a throat.

  “Oh, Fenton, I do admire you. You are positively the most candid man I’ve ever known. But mind your manners, introduce me.”

  “Golden . . . Martin Rilke from Chicago. Rilke, Jacob Golden, the Fleet Street gadfly. Rilke is a fellow journalist, by the way.”

  “Oh?” Golden said, peering at Martin intently. “What paper?”

  “Chicago Express.”

  Golden closed his eyes for a second. “Express . . . Republican attitudes . . . hostile to President Wilson . . . distrustful of organized labor—”

  “Hey,” Martin said with a nervous laugh, “lay off. I only write book reviews.”

  “That’s what you should be doing, Golden,” Fenton said dryly. “Might keep you out of mischief.”

  Golden sighed deeply and pulled a long face. “My father feels the same way, I’m afraid. No more reporting on the Ulster farrago or Balkan intrigues. It’s nothing but murders and crimes passionnels for the immediate future. I’m covering the Goodwin case at the moment . . . you know, the Birchington dentist who drilled his sister-in-law to death because God told him to do it. Very nasty business, but I believe God knew what he was saying. The victim was an absolute horror. Everyone in the family is overjoyed that the biddy is gone. The paper is paying for his defense.”

  “And if it wasn’t,” Fenton drawled, “I’m sure you’d be just as enthusiastic over his hanging.”

  “Yes, I dare say I would.” He spread his hands outward in a gesture of helplessness. “But that’s the old newspaper game, isn’t it? One must cater to the public tastes . . . or even create tastes to cater to.” He winked slyly at Martin. “But then I’m sure you know all the devious ramifications of our noble profession. It must be rather pleasant being a soldier. At least one is told who to shoot. No inspired judgments in the thin red line.”

  Fenton faked an exaggerated yawn. “Same old Golden. No wonder your friends duck into shop doorways.” He pulled a watch from his waistcoat pocket and glanced at it. “Time for tea. Let’s hail a taxi and go to the Marlborough.”

  “My dear Fenton,” Golden said, “they don’t like Jews at the Marlborough.”

  “I know. An odious rule. It should merely be certain Jews.” He scowled at his watch. “Bother, we’re a bit late for tea there anyway. Where do you suggest?”

  “A White Manor by all means. The two-shilling de luxe. And speaking of White Manors, have you seen the beautiful Lydia Foxe lately?”

  Fenton appeared preoccupied as he scanned the busy street for a vacant taxi.

  “No . . . not for some time.”

  “I saw her in Paris two months ago. At the opera, clinging to the arm of a major in the cuirassiers. She seems to have a penchant for military men.”

  The captain turned slowly and gazed down into the smaller man’s blithely innocent face.

  “Why in God’s name did I ever befriend you in school, Golden? You are truly the most insufferable—”

  The laugh came again, deeper and louder than before. “It was an act of pure Christian charity, old boy. And like any worthwhile Christian act, it needs to be paid for with a modicum of suffering. Ah,” he cried, dashing suddenly into the street, “there’s one. . . . Taxi! Taxi!”

  Martin arrived back at Abingdon Pryory at ten-thirty that night, taking a rattletrap taxi from Godalming station to the house. The butler informed him that his lordship and the countess had retired early, that Master Charles was not at home, and that Mr. Wood-Lacy had also retired for the night.

  “But if you care for supper, sir . . .”

  “Perhaps a sandwich and a glass of beer, if it’s no trouble.”

  “Not at all, sir.”

  “In my room, if you don’t mind. I’m pretty tired.”

  “Indeed yes, sir,” Mr. Coatsworth said with genuine understanding. “A trip up to London is always most fatiguing.”

  He wasn’t sure if it had been the trip or the company that had been fatiguing. A bewildering day, he decided as he put on his pajamas. A footman brought ham sandwiches and a tankard of pale ale, which Martin wolfed down before getting into bed, placing his attaché case on his knees, and taking from it a notebook, pen, and his eyeglasses.

  Saturday night, June 13, 1914

  Observations and Reflections. The upper-class Englishman’s attitude toward “trade” is an interesting one. Fenton is probably not “upper class,” in the strictest meaning of the term, but as an officer in a socially prestigious regiment, he is entitled to all the prejudices of that class. “Trade” is, loosely speaking, the province of purveyors of services or products—haberdashers, wine merchants, boot makers, tailors, etc. Doctors are not in “trade,” nor are journalists, the military, professional sporting people, et cetera. Upper-class Englishmen rely on “trade” for their comfort and well-being, but consider it proper form to delay paying their bills for as long as possible. Cash, it seems, is vulgar. After tea, Fenton took me to his hatter, where I was measured for a derby; the hat will be ready Wednesday afternoon. I insisted on paying cash in advance, and both Fenton and the hatter appeared slightly nonplussed.

  We had tea at a White Manor on Oxford Street near the Marble Arch. It was a huge multistoried place with several dining rooms, a string orchestra, bakery shop, and Continental delicatessen. The food—small tea sandwiches and a variety of cakes—was both good and inexpensive. The service is first rate: hordes of young women in crisply starched blue uniforms, taking orders and carrying trays, all of them pretty and cheerful. Fenton told me that they are well paid and that they live in hostels owned by the company, are charged very little for their rooms, practically nothing for their meals, the bulk of their wages going into a savings plan. Golden added that this benevolence has resulted in a shortage of maids for the gentry. Girls prefer the short hours and fine working conditions at the White Manors to going into service—like Ivy Thaxton—where they must work long hours and receive practically nothing for their labors. Maids in big houses get one afternoon off a week and are on call twenty-four hours a day. I wonder if Ivy Thaxton has ever heard of the White Manors? Probably must have. Fenton said they are all over England, but not all of them as splendid as the one on Oxford Street. It seems to me that it would be a far better place for a young girl to work. Being a maid in a place like Abingdon Pryory must be grueling. So many rooms to clean, beds to make, chamber pots to empty. I have a horror of that white ceramic bowl under the bed, but I can readily understand why one would use it, especially in the winter. That little room down the hall is as cold as death, and it’s only June! I imagine that if I were living here in December I’d think twice about getting out of a warm bed in the middle of the night and trotting down the hall to that icy cubicle.

  Brief impre
ssions. Jacob Golden is twenty-four, about a year younger than Fenton, a year older than me, but wise beyond his years, as the saying goes. From conversation at tea, and from what Fenton told me about him later, I can piece together a sketchy biography of the man. He’s the only son of Harry Golden, the great Lord Crewe. Crewe is as well known in Chicago as William Randolph Hearst is in London. Publisher of the London Daily Post, largest daily circulation of any newspaper in the world. A rag. Yellow journalism at its most blatant, a paper catering to the lowest common denominator of mass interest—lots of pictures, short texts, stories of murders and other crimes, falls of the mighty from grace, lives and loves of theatrical people and moving-picture performers, scare stories of civil war in Ireland, damnation of the German empire for having the temerity to compete with Britain in the building of a war fleet and the maintaining of colonies. Jingoism and sensationalism in a heady mixture.

  Jacob Golden is amused by the paper his father built up from nothing, but I can detect an air of gravity beneath his cynical posturings. The paper, he says, wields a far greater influence on the masses than the Bible. The Gospel according to St. Crewe. Golden sees the world as being divided into two distinct classes, yahoos and nabobs—a few nabobs who rule, millions upon millions of yahoos who do what they’re told and believe what they read. He can see nothing wrong in this division, provided all of the nabobs are intelligent, compassionate, and enlightened men—which, of course, they are not. The nabobs, he says, are donkeys sprinkled with a few apes. He says all of these outrageous things with a smile; a perverse pixie gleefully watching humanity stream toward the edge of a cliff. Fenton referred to him as an ass several times, and I’m half inclined to second the motion. And yet, I wonder.

  Jacob and Fenton went to school together, a well-known preparatory school near London that sends the vast majority of its pupils on to Eton or Harrow. There were only a couple of Jews in the school, and Jacob had a miserable time until Fenton took him under his wing. From what I could gather, Fenton’s father had designed the Daily Post Building in Whitefriars Lane off Fleet Street and was a good friend of Jacob’s father. Jacob went on to Eton and then to Balliol College, Oxford. Fenton went to Sandhurst and the army, but there has been a tenuous bond between them since their prep-school days.

  Jacob was expelled from Balliol and seems proud of the fact. He didn’t say why he had been “sent down,” but I’m sure the powers at Oxford University didn’t lack for reasons. His father gave him a job on the paper as a roving correspondent, and he has been to a great many places. I felt a pang of envy as he talked about the Balkan wars, tramping along with the Servian Army during its thrust across Albania to the Adriatic in 1912. An interesting anecdote, one that illustrates Jacob’s theory about the nabobs. It seems that Lord Crewe objected to reportage on the “Servian” Army. He felt that the word sounded too much like “servile,” and so he ordered his editors to substitute a b for a v. So Servia became Serbia overnight, at least to the readers of the Daily Post. Nabob power! The changing of a nation’s name by the mere stroke of a blue pencil.

  Reflections. Jacob Golden is a newspaperman. I work on a newspaper. What a gulf separates our occupations! While I was toiling over a review of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s latest novel, Jacob was sending dispatches from Ireland suggesting that Germany was supplying rifles to the Ulster volunteer army. He went a bit too far, I gather, and accused a British general of corresponding with the Germans in order to equip the Protestants with Maxim guns. Lord Crewe wouldn’t print that story, and Jacob was brought home to cover local events. Still, even the reporting of murder trials is far and away more exciting and meaningful than anything I have done on a newspaper. Jacob made a suggestion to me. He said that his paper might be interested in half a dozen articles about England as seen through the eyes of a visiting American—“A Yank’s View of Britain,” he suggested as a lead title. Advised me to make the pieces short and laudatory, although a gently chiding humor would be okay. The paper would pay three to five pounds per article. That won’t pay for my trip, but it will make a slight dent in the tailor’s bill. It will also be good training. The observation and reporting of life around me—people, places. . . .

  A gentle tapping at the door interrupted his train of thought. He assumed it was the footman coming back for the tray and called out for the man to enter. He was surprised when Charles opened the door and stepped into the room, dressed in evening clothes and carrying a bottle of champagne.

  “I hope I’m not disturbing you,” Charles said.

  “No . . . not at all.” He capped the pen and closed the notebook.

  “I saw your light as I came up from the garage. Thought you might enjoy a nightcap.” He held up the bottle. “Found this in the butler’s pantry. Still reasonably chilled, and a truly decent year. My father has impeccable taste.”

  Martin shoved notebook and pen into the attaché case, got out of bed, and put on his robe. Charles found two glasses on the dresser, one of which had a tootbrush resting in it.

  “Just right for swizzing out the bubbles,” Charles remarked as he undid the wire around the cork. There was a tiny, satisfying pop, and then the pale amber wine flowed into the water glasses. “Enjoy your trip up to London?”

  “Yes,” Martin said, taking one of the glasses. “I’m going on a Cook’s tour of England next week. Leave on Thursday morning.”

  “That should be pleasant. You’ll probably see a good deal more of old England than I’ve ever seen. But that’s always the way, isn’t it? The traveler sees more than the native.”

  There was only one chair in the room and Charles sat in it. Martin leaned against the bedpost, feeling self-conscious in his bare feet.

  “Well, here’s how,” he said, raising his glass.

  “Yes, to your health.” Charles sipped the wine, staring moodily into the glass. “Nice and dry, don’t you think? One of the few things the French can do well.”

  It seemed to Martin that something was troubling his cousin and that he had come to the room for more than a friendly night-cap, but what it could be or why he had come was a mystery to him. He endured five minutes of small talk, and then Charles said:

  “Odd, come to think of it. Here we are cousins—blood relatives—and yet I know next to nothing about you. Oh, just a few things that Mother has told me.”

  “I know very little about you,” Martin said.

  “There isn’t that much to know. I went to Eton and Cambridge. Would like to be an historian . . . or teach history. I’ve been to France, Germany, Italy, and Greece. Enjoy good music . . . books . . . used to enjoy hunting. Rather an ordinary, uneventful life.”

  There was a long pause, and Martin struggled to think of something to say.

  “Were you born here?”

  “In this house, do you mean? Yes. You were born in Paris. Is that correct?”

  “In Montparnasse.”

  “Is your mother French?”

  “Was. She died four years ago.”

  “I’m sorry. That’s my point. I should have known that.”

  Martin drained his glass, and Charles stood up quickly to refill it.

  “I don’t know why you should,” Martin said, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Your mother only met mine once. And besides, her death wasn’t really a family matter.”

  “The disinheritance, you mean?”

  So he knows about that, Martin thought without bitterness. The midnight conversation was becoming curiouser and curiouser.

  “Yes . . . the disinheritance. That took place before I was born, so I don’t know too much about it. I never knew my grandfather, but I gather he was a tough old bird . . . very old-fashioned and puritanical.” He paused to drink some more champagne. Charles was watching him, hanging on to every word with taut-faced concentration. “I guess my father was a rebel. He was the second son, five years younger than Uncle Paul and three years older than Aunt Hanna. Paul was in the family business—half a dozen breweries—but my father didn’t want any
part of it. He wanted to paint. I guess my grandfather gave him a choice. It was as simple as that. Anyway, when he died, he’d cut my father out of his will. A dollar. I think he left him that much.” He felt dispassionate about the whole thing. It was like telling the life story of a total stranger.

  Charles wet his lips with champagne. “I wonder what my mother felt about it. She was very fond of your father. At least, I’ve always had that impression . . . that he was her favorite.”

  “I think he was, when they were kids. But my father alienated people. He had a talent for that at least.”

  “Not much of a painter?”

  “I couldn’t say.” Martin shrugged. “He died when I was eight, and I don’t remember his work . . . except that it didn’t sell. My mother was a modiste, and a good one. That’s how we lived. I remember my mother telling me that Aunt Hanna and Uncle Paul used to send Father money from time to time, but he always mailed the checks back—torn into scraps. He cut himself off totally from them . . . getting back at them for being cut off himself, I guess. Although Uncle Paul and your mother had had nothing to do with it. I suppose they gave up trying to help him after a time . . . as did everybody he knew in Paris. He had a terrible reputation, and I don’t think anyone was sorry when he died. I’m sure you know your Conrad. I can’t read Heart of Darkness without thinking of my old man. Paris was his Congo. It found him out early . . . the way the jungle found out all there was to know about Kurtz. ‘It whispered to him things about himself that he did not know’ . . . or hadn’t known in Chicago. I often wondered if he died like Kurtz, whispering, ‘The horror . . . the horror.’ ” His mouth was dry as stone, and he reached down for the bottle, which was on the floor next to the chair. Charles picked it up and handed it to him. His face was pale, and tiny beads of sweat clung to his wide, smooth brow.

  “How did he die?”

  Martin took his time answering. He filled his glass and drank half of it.

  “He cut his wrists. He spared my mother and me the sight, thank God. It was his most noble act. He did it in the apartment of one of his models in Montmartre. My mother believed he was just trying to scare the woman, but he’d been drinking heavily and I guess he lost his sense of caution. Anyway,” he continued in a flat monotone, “he died.”