by E. F. Benson
“No, nothing whatever is wrong,” he said. “Excuse me: I must telephone to the bank, to say the cheque is all right. Ah, I’ll telephone from here if you will allow me.”
The telephone was just outside and Jim heard plainly all that passed. The number was rung up, and then Claude spoke.
“Yes, I’m Mr. Claude Osborne. I am speaking to Mr. Grayson, am I? It is the matter that Mr. Humby came to speak to me about this morning. Yes, yes: the cheque for £500. I find I have made a complete error. The cheque was drawn by me and is perfectly correct. Yes. It was very stupid of me. Please let Mr. Humby know as soon as he gets back. Yes. Thank you. Good morning.”
Claude paused a moment with the receiver in his hand. Then he called to Jim.
“Can’t stop a moment,” he said. “I’ve the devil of a lot to do. Good-bye.”
He walked back again at once to Park Lane, still thinking intently, still wondering if he could have done better in any way. Honest all through, he hated with a physical repulsion the thought of what he felt sure Jim had done, but oddly enough, instead of feeling a crescendo of dislike to Jim himself, he was conscious only of a puzzled sort of pity. By instinct he separated the deed from the doer, instead of bracketting them both in one clause of disgusted condemnation. And then he ceased to wonder at that: it seemed natural, after all.
He went straight up to Dora’s room, and found her still at her table with letters round her. But when he entered she was not writing: she was staring out of the window with a sort of terror on her face. Claude guessed what it was that perhaps had put it there, and what lurked behind that look of agonized appeal that she turned on him.
“I’m sorry for being so long, dear,” he said, “but I’ve been making a fool of myself. That cheque I spoke to you about is quite all right. I found the counterfoil in my old book at the flat. I drew it right enough. Mr. Humby expects a fellow to carry in his head the memory of every half-crown he spends.”
Dora gave one great sobbing sigh of relief, which she could not check.
“I’m glad,” she said. “I hated to think that Parker perhaps had gone wrong. One — one hates suspicion, and its atmosphere.”
Claude heard, could not help hearing the relief in the voice, could not help seeing that the smile she gave him struggled like mist-ridden sunlight to shine through his dispelled clouds of nameless apprehension. Nor could his secret mind avoid guessing what that apprehension was, for it was no stranger to him; he had been sharer in it till he had seen Jim, when it deepened into a certainty which was the opposite to that which at this moment brought such relief to his wife. The other certainty, his own, must of course be kept sealed and locked from her, and Claude hastened to convey it away from her presence, so to speak, by talking of something else, for fear that it might, in despite of him, betray some hint of its existence.
“But there was something you wanted to speak to me about,” he said.
“Yes. It is about your mother. Do you think she is well?”
“No, I haven’t thought so for the last three or four days,” said he. “What have you noticed?”
“I went into her room just now,” said Dora, “and she was sitting and doing nothing. And she was crying.” Claude paused in astonishment.
“Crying,” he said. “The mater crying?”
“Yes. She clearly did not wish me to see it, and so I pretended not to. I had thought she wasn’t well before now. We must do something, Claude; make her see a doctor.”
“But why hasn’t she been to see a doctor all these days?” he asked. “The governor goes to a doctor if his nails want cutting.”
“I don’t know why she hasn’t been. There might be several reasons. But I thought I would speak to you first and then if you approved I would go to her and try to find out what is the matter.”
“I wish you would,” he said.
Dora got up, but her mind went back to that which she had been brooding over in his absence, that which frightened her.
“Did you see Jim?” she asked.
“Yes: he came in when I was there.”
“How was he?” she asked negligently.
“Oh, much as usual. I couldn’t stop because I wanted to get back to you. Will you come and tell me about the mater, after you have seen her?”
Dora went back to Lady Osborne’s room, and knocked before she entered. The apparition of her sitting and crying all alone had frightened her more than she had let Claude see, for as a rule her mother-in-law’s cheerfulness was of a quality that seemed to be proof against all the minor accidents of life, and Dora remembered how, one day in Italy, when they had missed a train at Padua, and had to wait three hours, Lady Osborne’s only comment had been, “Well, now, that will give us time to look about us.” She was afraid therefore that the cause of her tears was not trivial.
And now, when she went in again, receiving a rather indistinct answer to her knock, she found Lady Osborne hastily snatching up the day’s paper, so as to pretend to be occupied. But her face wore an expression extraordinarily contorted, as if her habitual geniality found it a hard task to struggle to the surface.
“And I’m sure the paper gets more and more interesting every day,” said she, “though it’s seldom I find time to have a glance at all the curious things that are going on in the world. What a dreadful place Morocco must be; I couldn’t sleep quiet in my bed if I was there! What is it, my dear?”
On her face and in her voice the trace of tears bravely suppressed still lingered, and a great wave of pity suddenly swept over Dora. Something was wrong, something which at present Lady Osborne was bearing in secret, for it was quite clear that her husband, whose cheerfulness at breakfast had bordered on the boisterous, knew nothing, nor did Claude know. Her mother-in-law, as Dora was well aware, was not a woman of complicated or subtle emotion, who could grieve over an imagined sorrow, or could admit to a personal relation with herself the woe of the world, for with more practical wisdom she gave subscriptions to those whose task it was to alleviate any particular branch of it. Her family, her hospitalities, her comfortable though busy life had been sufficient up till now to minister to her happiness, and if something disturbed that, Dora rightly thought that it must be something tangible and personal. So she went to the sofa, and sat down by her, and did not seek to be subtle.
“What is it?” she said. “Is there anything the matter?”
The simplicity was not calculated; it was perfectly natural, and had its effect. Lady Osborne held the paper in front of her a moment longer, but it was shaken with the trembling of her hands. Then she dropped it.
“My dear, I am a selfish old woman,” she said, “but I can’t bear it any longer. I’ve not been well this long time, but I’ve tried to tell myself it was my imagination, and not bother anybody. And I could have held on, my dear, a little longer, if you hadn’t come to me like this. I warrant you, there would have been plenty of laughing and chaff at Grote this week-end, as always. But the pain this morning was so bad that I just thought I would have a bit of a cry all to myself.”
“But why have you told nobody?” said Dora. “Not Claude, nor Dad nor me?”
Lady Osborne mopped her eyes.
“Bless your heart, haven’t we all got things to bear, and best not to trouble others?” she said. “I know well enough how you’d all spend your time in looking after me, and having the doctor and what not, and I thought I could get through to the end of the season and then go and rest, and see what was the matter. And, my dearie, I’m a dreadful coward you know, and I couldn’t a bear the thought of being pulled about by the doctor, and maybe worse than that. Anyhow, I’ve not given in at once. Some days my colour has been awful and no appetite, but I’ve kept my spirits up before you all. And I can’t bear to think now that I must give in, and have to take doctor’s stuff, and lie up, spoiling all your pleasure. But I don’t think as I can go on much longer like this. Perhaps it’s best that you know. Poor Eddie! Him and his jokes this morning at breakfast, chaffing me abo
ut Sir Thomas!
Lor’, my dear, what spirits he has! I declare he quite took my thoughts off. And about Claude and Lizzie too, as if Claude ever gave a thought to anyone but yourself.”
Lady Osborne patted Dora’s hand a moment in silence. She was not sure that Dora had “relished” her husband’s fun at breakfast; now was the time to set it right.
“But then, Eddie knew that, else he’d never have made a joke of it,” she said. “And you, my dearie, have been so sweet to me these weeks, not that you haven’t been that always, as if you was my own daughter. Indeed, not that I complain of Lizzie, for I don’t, often and often she’s behaved high to Mr. O. and me, when you, who have excuse enough, have never done such a thing. Often I’ve said to him, ‘It’s as if Dora was an Osborne herself.’ Thank you, my dearie, for that, and for all you’ve done and been. I daresay it’s been difficult for you at times, but there! I daresay you think I’ve not noticed, but I have, my dear, and you’ve behaved beautiful always. I wanted just to say that, and you’re behaving sweet and kind to me still.”
Somehow, deep down, this cut Dora like a knife. There was a wounding pathos about it, that made those efforts she had put forth to behave decently, appear infinitely trivial, humiliatingly cheap. And the gentle patting on her hand continued.
“And now, dearie, I’m going to ask you to do another thing yet,” said Lady Osborne, “and that is to take my place down at Grote this Sunday, and let me stay up here and see my doctor this afternoon. If you hadn’t such quick and loving eyes, I should have gone through with it and held on, my dear, even if there was more mornings like this in store. But with you knowing, my dear, I’ll not wait longer, and maybe make matters worse, though perhaps it’s me as has been making a fuss about nothing, and a bottle of medicine will make me as fit as a flea again, as Mr. O. used to say. Now we must put our heads together and contrive, so that he may think it’s just a touch of the liver and nothing to be alarmed for, else he’ll never go and leave me. He’s gone off already to some committee, and the car is to call for him at twelve and drive him straight down, so that he’ll find himself at Grote before he knows anything is wrong. And then, my dear, you must do your best to make him think it’s nothing, as, please God, it isn’t. What a trouble our insides are, though, to be sure, mine’s given me little enough to complain of all these years. I’ve always eaten my dinner and got a good night’s rest until this began.”
They talked long, “contriving,” as Lady Osborne had said, the sole point of the contrivance being that her husband should enjoy his day or two at Grote, and have everything to his liking, and not fret about her. Once and again and again once, Dora tried to lead the conversation back to Lady Osborne herself, to get from her some inkling of what her indisposition might be, what its symptoms were, with a view of encouraging her to face the doctor with equanimity, for this was clearly an ordeal she dreaded. And on Dora’s third attempt she put an end to further questions.
“I think, dearie, we’ll not talk about that,” she said, “because, as I told you, I’m such a coward as never was, and the more I think about it, the more coward I shall be when I get to the doctor’s door. It was just the same with me about my teeth before I lost them all: if one had to come out, I had such a shrinking from a bit of pain, that if I thought about it, I knew I shouldn’t go to the dentist at all. So I used to busy myself with other things, and plan a treat, maybe, for the working folk, or an extra good dinner for Mr. O., or a surprise for Per or Claude; and it’s a similar to that what I’ll do now, if you don’t mind. And I assure you I’m so bothered over the thought of you and Dad being at Grote without me that I’ve little desire to think about anything else. Thirty-five years it is last May, my dear, since we took each other for better or worse, and it’s always been better, and not a night since then, I assure you, have we not slept under the same roof, and in the same room save when I had a cold and feared to give it him. And he’s got to depend on me, Gold bless him, and knows that I shall see he has a biscuit or two on a plate by his bedside and a glass of milk, against he wakes the night. Servants are never to be trusted, my dear, though I’m sure it’s a shame to say it, when ours are so attentive. But he’s got a new valet just of late, and if you could peep in at my lord’s bedroom door when you went up to bed, and see as all was prepared, and that his slippers was put where he can see them in his dressing room, else he’ll walk to bed in his bare feet and step on a pin or a tack someday, which I always dread for him. And if he comes in hot, as he’s taken to do in this weather from his walk, just you behave as if you was me, and say to him, ‘Mr. O., you go and change your vest and your socks, else I don’t pour out your cup of tea,’ and knowing as you’ll do that will take a load off my mind, and I shall go to the doctor this afternoon, knowing as you are looking after him as if I was there, as comfortable as if I was going to have a cheque cashed for me. And, my dear, if you’d sit next him in church, and just nudge him if he attempts to follow the lesson without putting his glasses on. It’s small print in his Bible, and never another one will he let me give him, just because it was that one he used to read out of to me when we were in Cornwall on our wedding trip, and sometimes no church within distance. But be sure be changes his underwear, my dear, when he comes in, for he catches cold easy, and his skin acts so well that it’s as if he’d had a bath. And give him plenty of milk in his coffee at breakfast, not that he likes it, but he will have the coffee made so strong that it’s enough to rasp the coats of the stomach, as they say, unless you drown it in milk. And you’ll cheer him up, I know, my dear, if he gets anxious, and just say to him ‘Stuff and nonsense, Dad, Mrs. O.’s had a bit of an upset, same as you have times without number, and she’s always nervous about herself, and has gone to see the doctor, and as like as not will come down to-morrow afternoon with a couple of pills in her pocket, and ready to be laughed at to your heart’s content.’ That’s what I want you to say, my dear, though you’ll put it in your own words, and much better I’m sure. But to-day it’s as if I feel I couldn’t go and look after my friends, now that I know you’ll take my place, for when there’s a multitude in the house, sometimes the mistress can’t get to bed till it maybe is one o’clock or worse, and I want a good long night. I shall try to see Sir Henry as soon as may be, and after that I don’t doubt I shall just get to bed and sleep the clock round. I’m so tired, my dear, and there’s something —— Well, I make no doubt that before many hours are out, we shall all be laughing together over my silliness, and Mr. O. will be asking if I have taken enough phosphorus jelly, or what not. Lor’, he’ll never let me hear the last of it!”
That was a triumphant conclusion. The whole speech punctuated by silences, punctuated by a little dropping of tears and by a little laughter, was hardly less triumphant. Once, ages ago, so it seemed to Dora, Claude had held up his father and mother as examples of the ideal antidote against the gray-business of middle age, and it had failed to satisfy her then. She would have thought it comical, had not there been some very keen sense of disappointment about it, that a lover should speak to his beloved in such language. But now, with rekindled meaning, she remembered the incident and its setting. She had asked him for consolation with regard to the gray-business that awaited everybody, hoping to hear words of glowing romance, and had found it half comical, half tragic, that he refuted her doubts by the visible example of his father and mother. He had said that she “was his best girl still.” But now Dora did not feel either the comedy or the tragedy of his reply; she felt only the truth of it. And she did not wonder that her mother-in-law was Dad’s best girl still.
But for herself, though there was heartache in much that had been said, there was the beginning of understanding also, or, at any rate, the awakening of the sense that there was something to understand. Lady Osborne had called herself a coward, and reiterated that charge, with regard to seeing a doctor only. But love — a golden barrier of solid defence, no filagree work — had come between her and her fear; yet it was scarcely true
to say that it had come there: it was always there. Once Dora had thought that, compared to romance, any relation that could exist between Claude’s parents, must necessarily be of an ash-cold quality. But was it? She herself had known the romantic, but in comparison with all that she had been conscious of with regard to Claude for the last few weeks she could not call Lady Osborne ash-cold. In her there was some glow, some authentic fire that had never known quenching. It might have altered in superficials, for flames there might have been substituted the glowing heart of the fire. But it was the same fire. There had not been ashes at any time: the fire always burned, unconsumed, with no waste of cinder; it was immortal, radium-like.
Then for the first time the beauty of it struck her. Before this moment she had seen something that appeared comical; then, with better vision, she had seen something that struck her as pathetic. Now with true vision she saw all she had missed before — Beauty. It was that she had worshipped all her life, thinking that she would always recognize and adore. But she had missed it altogether in that which was so constantly under her eyes. She had been too quick in seeing all that was obvious: wealth, indiscriminate hospitality, vulgarity (since she had chosen to call it so); but the big thing, that which was the essential, she had missed altogether. Once before, when Mr and Mrs. Osborne shared a hymn-book in church, she had seen, and thought she understood. Now she was beginning to understand. She began to want to take other hearts into her own. The desire was there. The beauty she had at last seen attracted her, drew her to it. Strangely had it been unveiled, by tale of slippers and biscuits and underwear. She never had expected to find it in such garb. But Claude had known it was there; he had not been diverted by superficial things, but had seen always that “the mater was the governor’s best girl still.”