The Forsyte saga - Complete
was the motto of the middle-class; now, what _had_ he meant by
that? Of course, it might be what middle-class people
believed—she didn’t know; what did Soames think?
He answered abstractedly: “How should I know? Scoles is a humbug,
though, isn’t he?” For Bosinney was looking round the table, as
if pointing out the peculiarities of the guests, and Soames
wondered what he was saying. By her smile Irene was evidently
agreeing with his remarks. She seemed always to agree with other
people.
Her eyes were turned on himself; Soames dropped his glance at
once. The smile had died off her lips.
A humbug? But what did Soames mean? If Mr. Scoles was a humbug, a
clergyman—then anybody might be—it was frightful!
“Well, and so they are!” said Soames.
During Aunt Juley’s momentary and horrified silence he caught
some words of Irene’s that sounded like: “Abandon hope, all ye
who enter here!”
But Swithin had finished his ham.
“Where do you go for your mushrooms?” he was saying to Irene in a
voice like a courtier’s; “you ought to go to Smileybob’s—he’ll
give ’em you fresh. These _little_ men, they won’t take the
trouble!”
Irene turned to answer him, and Soames saw Bosinney watching her
and smiling to himself. A curious smile the fellow had. A
half-simple arrangement, like a child who smiles when he is
pleased. As for George’s nickname—“The Buccaneer”—he did not
think much of that. And, seeing Bosinney turn to June, Soames
smiled too, but sardonically—he did not like June, who was not
looking too pleased.
This was not surprising, for she had just held the following
conversation with James:
“I stayed on the river on my way home, Uncle James, and saw a
beautiful site for a house.”
James, a slow and thorough eater, stopped the process of
mastication.
“Eh?” he said. “Now, where was that?”
“Close to Pangbourne.”
James placed a piece of ham in his mouth, and June waited.
“I suppose you wouldn’t know whether the land about there was
freehold?” he asked at last. “_You_ wouldn’t know anything about
the price of land about there?”
“Yes,” said June; “I made inquiries.” Her little resolute face
under its copper crown was suspiciously eager and aglow.
James regarded her with the air of an inquisitor.
“What? You’re not thinking of buying land!” he ejaculated,
dropping his fork.
June was greatly encouraged by his interest. It had long been her
pet plan that her uncles should benefit themselves and Bosinney
by building country-houses.
“Of course not,” she said. “I thought it would be such a splendid
place for—you or—someone to build a country-house!”
James looked at her sideways, and placed a second piece of ham in
his mouth....
“Land ought to be very dear about there,” he said.
What June had taken for personal interest was only the impersonal
excitement of every Forsyte who hears of something eligible in
danger of passing into other hands. But she refused to see the
disappearance of her chance, and continued to press her point.
“You ought to go into the country, Uncle James. I wish I had a
lot of money, I wouldn’t live another day in London.”
James was stirred to the depths of his long thin figure; he had
no idea his niece held such downright views.
“Why don’t you go into the country?” repeated June; “it would do
you a lot of good.”
“Why?” began James in a fluster. “Buying land—what good d’you
suppose I can do buying land, building houses?—I couldn’t get
four per cent. for my money!”
“What does that matter? You’d get fresh air.”
“Fresh air!” exclaimed James; “what should I do with fresh air,”
“I should have thought anybody liked to have fresh air,” said
June scornfully.
James wiped his napkin all over his mouth.
“You don’t know the value of money,” he said, avoiding her eye.
“No! and I hope I never shall!” and, biting her lip with
inexpressible mortification, poor June was silent.
Why were her own relations so rich, and Phil never knew where the
money was coming from for to-morrow’s tobacco. Why couldn’t they
do something for him? But they were so selfish. Why couldn’t they
build country-houses? She had all that naive dogmatism which is
so pathetic, and sometimes achieves such great results. Bosinney,
to whom she turned in her discomfiture, was talking to Irene, and
a chill fell on Jun’s spirit. Her eyes grew steady with anger,
like old Jolyon’s when his will was crossed.
James, too, was much disturbed. He felt as though someone had
threatened his right to invest his money at five per cent. Jolyon
had spoiled her. None of _his_ girls would have said such a
thing. James had always been exceedingly liberal to his children,
and the consciousness of this made him feel it all the more
deeply. He trifled moodily with his strawberries, then, deluging
them with cream, he ate them quickly; they, at all events, should
not escape him.
No wonder he was upset. Engaged for fifty-four years (he had been
admitted a solicitor on the earliest day sanctioned by the law)
in arranging mortgages, preserving investments at a dead level of
high and safe interest, conducting negotiations on the principle
of securing the utmost possible out of other people compatible
with safety to his clients and himself, in calculations as to the
exact pecuniary possibilities of all the relations of life, he
had come at last to think purely in terms of money. Money was now
his light, his medium for seeing, that without which he was
really unable to see, really not cognisant of phenomena; and to
have this thing, “I hope I shall never know the value of money!”
said to his face, saddened and exasperated him. He knew it to be
nonsense, or it would have frightened him. What was the world
coming to! Suddenly recollecting the story of young Jolyon,
however, he felt a little comforted, for what could you expect
with a father like that! This turned his thoughts into a channel
still less pleasant. What was all this talk about Soames and
Irene?
As in all self-respecting families, an emporium had been
established where family secrets were bartered, and family stock
priced. It was known on Forsyte ’Change that Irene regretted her
marriage. Her regret was disapproved of. She ought to have known
her own mind; no dependable woman made these mistakes.
James reflected sourly that they had a nice house (rather small)
in an excellent position, no children, and no money troubles.
Soames was reserved about his affairs, but he must be getting a
very warm man. He had a capital income from the business—for
Soames, like his father, was a member of that well-known firm of
solicitors, Forsyte, Bustard and Forsyte—and had always been very
careful. He had done quite unusually well with some mortgages he
had taken up, too—a little timely foreclosure—most lucky hits!
There was no reason why Irene should not be happy, yet they said
she’d been asking for a separate room. He knew where that ended.
It wasn’t as if Soames drank.
James looked at his daughter-in-law. That unseen glance of his
was cold and dubious. Appeal and fear were in it, and a sense of
personal grievance. Why should he be worried like this? It was
very likely all nonsense; women were funny things! They
exaggerated so, you didn’t know what to believe; and then, nobody
told him anything, he had to find out everything for himself.
Again he looked furtively at Irene, and across from her to
Soames. The latter, listening to Aunt Juley, was looking up,
under his brows in the direction of Bosinney.
“He’s fond of her, I know,” thought James. “Look at the way he’s
always giving her things.”
And the extraordinary unreasonableness of her disaffection struck
him with increased force. It was a pity, too, she was a taking
little thing, and he, James, would be really quite fond of her if
she’d only let him. She had taken up lately with June; _that_ was
doing her no good, that was certainly doing her no good. She was
getting to have opinions of her own. He didn’t know what she
wanted with anything of the sort. She’d a good home, and
everything she could wish for. He felt that her friends ought to
be chosen for her. To go on like this was dangerous.
June, indeed, with her habit of championing the unfortunate, had
dragged from Irene a confession, and, in return, had preached the
necessity of facing the evil, by separation, if need be. But in
the face of these exhortations, Irene had kept a brooding
silence, as though she found terrible the thought of this
struggle carried through in cold blood. He would never give her
up, she had said to June.
“Who cares?” June cried; “let him do what he likes—you’ve only to
stick to it!” And she had not scrupled to say something of this
sort at Timothy’s; James, when he heard of it, had felt a natural
indignation and horror.
What if Irene were to take it into her head to—he could hardly
frame the thought—to leave Soames? But he felt this thought so
unbearable that he at once put it away; the shady visions it
conjured up, the sound of family tongues buzzing in his ears, the
horror of the conspicuous happening so close to him, to one of
his own children! Luckily, she had no money—a beggarly fifty
pound a year! And he thought of the deceased Heron, who had had
nothing to leave her, with contempt. Brooding over his glass, his
long legs twisted under the table, he quite omitted to rise when
the ladies left the room. He would have to speak to Soames—would
have to put him on his guard; they could not go on like this, now
that such a contingency had occurred to him. And he noticed with
sour disfavour that June had left her wine-glasses full of wine.
“That little, thing’s at the bottom of it all,” he mused;
“Irene’d never have thought of it herself.” James was a man of
imagination.
The voice of Swithin roused him from his reverie.
“I gave four hundred pounds for it,” he was saying. “Of course
it’s a regular work of art.”
“Four hundred! H’m! that’s a lot of money!” chimed in Nicholas.
The object alluded to was an elaborate group of statuary in
Italian marble, which, placed upon a lofty stand (also of
marble), diffused an atmosphere of culture throughout the room.
The subsidiary figures, of which there were six, female, nude,
and of highly ornate workmanship, were all pointing towards the
central figure, also nude, and female, who was pointing at
herself; and all this gave the observer a very pleasant sense of
her extreme value. Aunt Juley, nearly opposite, had had the
greatest difficulty in not looking at it all the evening.
Old Jolyon spoke; it was he who had started the discussion.
“Four hundred fiddlesticks! Don’t tell me you gave four hundred
for _that?_”