The Final Hour

by Caldwell, Taylor;

  But Godfrey said, as if the other had not spoken: ‘I have found this strange new thinking, not in the capitals of Europe, but in the scattered and straggling villages of Russia, in the working-class districts of British labourers and mechanics and draymen, in the subdued and desperate towns of France. It seemed to me at one time that I no sooner drew a breath in a little village or town than the Germans exploded into it, and there I was galloping away, remembering I was an Englishman. That’s beside the point, however. I talked to the people for years. I am, by nature, not a lover of the rabble. But you’ll find rabble everywhere, not only in the workman’s cot, but in the middle class, in the salons internationals, and among the great of all Europe. So, when I say, “the people,” I mean those human beings who still have uncorrupted minds, and hearts that can feel and understand.’

  He paused. The silence in the dining-hall was intense. And Godfrey looked at Celeste on an inexplicable impulse. There was a blind and dazzled blaze upon her face, a kind of brilliance that was touching and arresting. And another man looked at her and felt a vice of fury tightening in his breast. He remembered a day very long ago, when Celeste had sat at this very table, opposite Peter Bouchard, just returned from Europe, and that she had listened like this, with the same full and radiant look upon her face, and the same parted lips. Though his arms were still folded on the table, his fists clenched.

  Godfrey said, with penetrating quietness that came back in thin echoes from the stony walls: ‘If I had found this thinking in only a few instances, I would have admired it, regretted that it was not more common, and have forgotten it. But it was universal! Universally, among the most divergent sorts of people, there is a growing and really earnest preoccupation with human welfare and human advancement, not only in material things, but in the ethical field, also. And strange to say, this deep and fumbling preoccupation is sometimes inarticulate, but always passionate and dynamic. If I were a mystic,’ and he smiled briefly, ‘I would say that the people had been permeated by some vast and unknowable Cosmic force. It has nothing to do with religion. In fact, the clergy, as a class almost, were totally unconscious of it, and I have no doubt that when they discover it they’ll invoke hell-fire on it. It is something deeper. It is part of the universal flow and tide of an awakening human spirit.’

  No one moved or spoke. His voice had been so penetrating, so quiet and yet so sincerely emphatic, that it had thrown a kind of enchantment over them, over even the grossest and most cynical and depraved. They were hypnotized by his repressed passion, by the pale set sternness of his features, by the flash of his dark eyes. Antoine’s hooded gaze did not move from him, and a cigarette burned unnoticed in his hand.

  Godfrey drew a deep quiet breath. ‘Herbert Spencer believed, not only in physical evolution, but in the evolution of the human spirit. If he were alive today, he would feel justified in his belief. Evolution is at work in the minds of men, so long sunken in the morass of greed and irresponsbility and hatred and lust.’

  He paused. Now all could see the strain and exhaustion which had temporarily been hidden under his exuberance and light gaiety. He was a sick man, remembering suffering. But in his way, he was as indomitable as Henri. His forehead glistened with dampness, and very simply, he took out his handkerchief and wiped it away.

  Celeste was still gazing at him, with that brilliant light brightening steadily on her face. Her lips were trembling. It was as if she was listening to words of life after long entombment.

  ‘Beautiful, beautiful!’ said the vicious Rosemarie, in a lyrical voice. ‘But it still sounds like the old stuff put out by the fellow-travellers.’

  Godfrey looked at her with a bitter glow of his eye. ‘I think you are flattering Communism too much. It seems that every, hint that the people are awakening to the consciousness of their moral responsibility to one another is called Communism.’ He shook his head. ‘I happen to know Communism, my dear.’

  ‘I confess all this is beyond me,’ said the tawny Hugo, with benign condescension. ‘But then, I’m only a member of the State Department. The Department hasn’t heard anything about this “new spirit” yet. It hasn’t arrived in any diplomatic pouch.’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ said Godfrey, slowly. ‘And it never will.’ He directed his attention to Agnes. ‘My dear, you must forgive me. I’ve been monopolizing the conversation at your table, and that isn’t very polite, is it?’

  Agnes said satirically: ‘I beg of you not to stop. This is the first intelligent conversation I’ve heard at this table in lo! these many years.’

  Godfrey reached for a cigarette from a silver box. A servant, listening in the background, hurried to light it for him. Godfrey glanced up idly. The man, in livery, had a most peculiar expression on his heavy face. It was shining. For a moment or two their eyes held in profound acknowledgment.

  Godfrey spoke again, as if thinking aloud: ‘I understand the Bible speaks of certain men as being the “scourge of God.” Perhaps Hitler is that scourge, today. For if it had not been for Hitler and his bloody violence, I doubt that we would have awakened at this time to a realization of our moral apathy and indifference. It took Hitler to make us understand what man can endure with dignity and fortitude and compassion and selflessness in the face of death and destruction. And I believe, I know, that the people see now to what appalling levels we can descend when moral responsibility is lost, and when every man is concerned only with his own belly. The German people will remain, I hope, an eternal reminder to all the rest of us of man’s potential degradation; they have given us a full view of the other face of all of us: the face we usually keep turned toward darkness. If the Germans only remain as a symbol of man’s complete disgrace and infamy, they will have served their frightful purpose.’

  He waited for someone to speak. But no one did. Antoine played with his cigarette-holder; Christopher smiled slightly behind the thin fingers spread across his mouth; Henri leaned solidly on the table and stared at a point near Godfrey’s head; Annette looked at Godfrey with a gentle and radiant humility in her eyes; Celeste seemed tremulous with life and eagerness; Agnes smiled with wry approval at her strange guest; Francis was grave and thoughtful; Edith was thoughtful. But the others merely regarded their plates glumly, or smoked, their eyes averted.

  Godfrey sighed. He was quite exhausted. He put his lean hands on the table as if to push himself away. ‘You’ve got to learn, all of you, that there is one thing you must hereafter take into consideration at all times: the people’s conscience. If you don’t—’ and he spread out his hands significantly—‘you are done. Completely.’

  Antoine walked beside him as they all left the dining-hall. ‘By the way, do you know Jay Regan—you know, the Wall Street financier?’

  ‘No,’ said Godfrey, laughing. ‘I’m afraid not. Why?’

  ‘I just wondered,’ mused Antoine.

  ‘I wouldn’t mind knowing him,’ said Godfrey, with a grin.

  Antoine gave him a curious glance. But he said nothing.

  CHAPTER LXIX

  The fire was roaring merrily in the vaulted living-room when they returned there. Agnes came to Godfrey, and said, with an affectionate smile: ‘You know, you really are a member of the family. You are as rude as the rest of them. I was brought up to have manners. The Bouchards never acquired them. They aren’t gentlemen. Neither, darling, are you.’

  ‘But I’m an honest man!’ protested Godfrey, laughing. ‘At least, comparatively honest. Can you say that for the rest of them?’

  ‘Some are, in their own mysterious fashion.’ Agnes looked at Henri, who stood at a distance talking to Francois. ‘And one or two are gentlemen. Antoine, for instance, is quite authentic. I’m not sure I like gentlemen, either. They remind me of Inquisitors.’

  Godfrey was suddenly very restless, as well as exhausted. He looked about for Celeste. She was sitting at a distance from the fire, and her brother was sitting beside her. She was talking listlessly. Christopher had his arm across the back of her chair, his
head bent towards her. His attitude expressed weariness, and again she was pale, her small gestures without life. The room was now full of noisy talk and loud laughter. Antoine was standing beside Godfrey, but they did not speak to each other.

  Finally, Godfrey, still not taking his eye from Celeste, said to Antoine: ‘I’ve known Celeste a long time, Tony. She seems to have taken Peter’s death very hard. They were devoted, you know. Are there any signs that she is recovering?’

  He felt Antoine make a slight movement beside him. And then Antoine’s derisive voice said lightly: ‘Celeste consoled herself a long time ago.’

  Godfrey turned to him so quickly that he swayed on his crutches. He looked disturbed and shaken. ‘Yes? Is she expecting to marry again, soon? She didn’t tell me.’

  Antoine studied him with cynical keenness. Ho, ho! he thought to himself. But he said, with that same derisive lightness: ‘Marry? I don’t think so. Perhaps it isn’t possible. Sometimes there are previous commitments, you know.’

  Godfrey looked at him in silence and the fluid lines of his face hardened. And Antoine looked back, darkly smiling. Then Godfrey, without a word, swung himself away.

  He directed his way through clumps of Bouchards, who parted automatically to let him pass. He felt their amused and contemptuous or inimical eyes following him. He didn’t care. They weren’t really his family, he felt. Though he shared, in some measure, their blood, he was an alien. They knew it; he knew it. He would never be part of them. He was suddenly sorry that he had come.

  He was moving towards Celeste, when suddenly he stopped. Henri, apparently without locomotion, had appeared before Celeste and Christopher. He was looking down at both of them, and smiling. Godfrey heard his voice through the noisy clatter:

  ‘Chris, something’s come up. Come in to see me tomorrow. It’s very important.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Christopher.

  There was a pause. But Godfrey saw Celeste’s face, as cold and as expressionless as plaster. She had dropped her eyes. Her hands lay in her lap. And Godfrey saw Henri’s face, also, tight and harsh and brutal, as he looked at her.

  ‘Are you feeling better, Celeste?’ Henri asked, goadingly. ‘We haven’t seen much of you, lately.’

  Celeste lifted her head and looked at him with slow directness. ‘I was not ill,’ she said. Her voice was clear, if without infection. She stood up, and her brother rose with her. Her manner was quiet and composed, but when she glanced about, Godfrey saw the swift blue flash of her eyes. He lifted his hand and signalled to her that he was coming. She smiled, now, and again the immobility of her expression broke into delicate planes of light. He swung towards her rapidly.

  ‘I’m really very tired, Godfrey,’ she said. She put her hand on his arm. ‘And the baby has a feverish cold. Will you take me home?’

  He put his hand over her own, and pressed it. ‘Of course, my dear. At once. I’m tired, too.’

  He turned to Christopher and Henri. The latter was regarding him with that hard and stony ruthlessness of his, now enormously increased. Christopher was smiling, but with a speculative air, not at all pleasant. ‘You will excuse us?’ said Godfrey, courteously.

  Henri said nothing; Christopher inclined his head.

  ‘Yon gave us a very interesting evening,’ Christopher said. ‘Thanks.’ He saw his sister’s eyes, fixed on Godfrey. They were radiant and soft, and her parted lips were smiling, as if preparing to break into eager laughter. Christopher’s brows drew together, uneasily.

  ‘Good-night. I hope we’ll see each other again, soon,’ said Godfrey. Henri did not reply. Christopher replied cordially. The two men stood side by side, watching Godfrey and Celeste as they moved towards Agnes to say good-night. Finally, they had gone.

  There is really something very satisfying in this, thought Christopher. But something very damn familiar, too. Henri was speaking, without the least emphasis: ‘He’s staying up there with Celeste, eh?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Christopher, wryly. ‘I think it’s perfectly proper. She’s not a young girl. She’s a widow.’ He added, innocently: ‘And I think the baby’s quite a chaperon.’ He turned to Henri and offered his platinum case. ‘Cigarette?’

  Henri looked down at the case with distaste, then his broad strong fingers fumbled for a cigarette, and took one. Christopher lit it for him. Henri held it, like all amateurs, between the tips of his thumb and index finger. Also, he held it at quite a distance, as if it was obnoxious.

  He turned a little and regarded the fire. Again he spoke, indifferently, and with a monotonous inflection: ‘Get him out of that house. As soon as possible.’

  Christopher said nothing. He looked at the back of that big head, and suddenly he tasted salt in his mouth, and felt a furious expanding of his heart. All the years of humiliation, of subservience, of fear and appeasement, of hope and selfdisgust and hatred, overwhelmed him. All these years, he had been so cautious, considering whether each little or great matter would hurt him. All these years, he had considered only himself. What had it brought him? He had betrayed his sister; he had watched her later betrayal. He had become a panderer, a lackey. And in the end, he had watched her heart break, and had seen the hopeless anguish in her eyes. If she now had a chance of happiness, she must have it, come hell or destruction.

  He said, almost whisperingly: ‘No. No.’

  He walked away from Henri. He felt a wild exhilaration. His head whirled. He stepped as if moving on clouds. He came to Edith, and took her arm, and she was startled at his look, excited, as mobile as quicksilver. ‘My dear,’ he said. ‘I think I’m drunk!’

  ‘Drunk?’ repeated Edith. She scrutinized him. ‘Nonsense. You aren’t drunk. Something’s happened.’

  ‘Oh, it has, it has!’ he exclaimed, and he pinched her arm gently. ‘It’s a wonderful thing to be free. I ought to have tried it before. Don’t look so confused, pet. It’s just that I’m having the most excellent time.’

  CHAPTER LXX

  Whatever painful suspicions Godfrey now had, they were slowly dispersed and half forgotten during the next days. For Celeste, with a sincerity and pathetic eagerness he could not doubt, urged him to extend his stay. ‘You don’t know how lonely I’ve been,’ she pleaded, with simplicity. So he called his friend, Alfred Milch, and persuaded him that ‘matters of family importance’ made it impossible for him to return to New York now, but that they would meet in Hollywood about two weeks hence.

  Pleasant happy days, bright with sun and blazing winter snow, followed one after the other. Godfrey was invited to the homes of his relatives, with Celeste. Celeste invariably refused. When she explained to Godfrey, he was conscious that she was not being frank with him; her words were evasive and inconclusive. But she urged him to go. ‘It’ll do no harm,’ she would say, wistfully. In politeness, he had to accept. When he returned, no matter how late, he found Celeste waiting for him, reading by the fire, and upon his entrance she would rise, smiling, her hand outstretched.

  ‘You know, they really hate me,’ he told her. ‘They are suspicious of me. I’m an alien. They want to study me more closely, to see whether I have any menace in me. ‘I’ve pretty well convinced them by now that I’m a very harmless, and very penniless, person, so their interest is subsiding. How have you endured them all these years, my dear?’

  ‘I haven’t really,’ she assured him, laughing.

  He would sit down near her, and light a cigarette, and would puff at it thoughtfully. ‘The women are much better, some of them. Edith, especially, and that darling little Annette.’ He turned for agreement to Celeste, but once again, that baffling mask of thick coldness had slipped over her features, and again, he felt that warning uneasiness in him that was so threatening to himself.

  He would talk to her of his ambitions, with such pristine enthusiasm that he fired her, also. When she said: ‘Godfrey, I’m so enormously rich. Do let me back a picture or two,’ he was too realistic, too honest and without hypocrisy, to protest, or pretend to refuse. Instead, h
e expressed his gratitude, joyfully, and immediately called his friend, Al Milch. Coming back from the telephone, he balanced himself on one crutch and hilariously waved the other. Celeste ran to him, exclaiming with fear that he might fall, and they hugged each other in mirthful delight, disposing kisses with the most immense enthusiasm.

  There was an eternally youthful quality about Godfrey which Celeste had met in no one else. It awakened her own buried youth. They drove about the country. They went to the village and bought immense quantities of foodstuffs. Godfrey boasted of his culinary achievement, and invaded the kitchen, and was so charming, so gay, that the cook could not help but be enchanted. They played with the baby, who rolled in the snow, and staggered on his short strong legs like a wool-wrapped cocoon. Sometimes friends of Celeste’s came, and sometimes a few of the family, and everything was informal and high-spirited and careless.

  For the first time, Celeste was playing. The fund of subjects to be discussed between herself and Godfrey was inexhaustible. They talked for hours over dinner; at times, they talked almost till dawn. No matter how worn the subject, Godfrey gave it a special uniqueness and freshness and vitality. He was seldom grave, now. Celeste had been sad too long, he had observed, acutely. He loved to see the laughing sparkle of her eyes, the redness of her laughing lips, and her mirth was the sweetest and most intoxicating sound in the world to him. She followed some of his more subtle arguments with flattering intensity. He had taught her to drink a cocktail or two before dinner, and the bright fillip this gave her loosened the bands in her mind, so that an unsuspected merry and childlike gaiety was released, witty and quite clever.

  Christopher, visiting them, noticed this. So did Edith. She said one night, very casually: ‘Do you know, I think Celeste might fall in love with our gallant adventurer,

  And Christopher said: ‘She might. She might, indeed. I hope so.’