The Forsyte saga - Complete
perhaps would have caught—stopped the words bubbling up in him.
Could fear go with a smile? If so, there was fear in her face.
And out of Jon tumbled quite other words, about farming, Holly,
and the Downs. Talking fast, he waited for her to come back to
Fleur. But she did not. Nor did his father mention her, though of
course he, too, must know. What deprivation, and killing of
reality was in his silence about Fleur—when he was so full of
her; when his mother was so full of Jon, and his father so full
of his mother! And so the trio spent the evening of that
Saturday.
After dinner his mother played; she seemed to play all the things
he liked best, and he sat with one knee clasped, and his hair
standing up where his fingers had run through it. He gazed at his
mother while she played, but he saw Fleur—Fleur in the moonlit
orchard, Fleur in the sunlit gravel-pit, Fleur in that fancy
dress, swaying, whispering, stooping, kissing his forehead. Once,
while he listened, he forgot himself and glanced at his father in
that other easy chair. What was Dad looking like that for? The
expression on his face was so sad and puzzling. It filled him
with a sort of remorse, so that he got up and went and sat on the
arm of his father's chair. From there he could not see his face;
and again he saw Fleur—in his mother's hands, slim and white on
the keys, in the profile of her face and her powdery hair; and
down the long room in the open window where the May night walked
outside.
When he went up to bed his mother came into his room. She stood
at the window, and said:
“Those cypresses your grandfather planted down there have done
wonderfully. I always think they look beautiful under a dropping
moon. I wish you had known your grandfather, Jon.”
“Were you married to father when he was alive?” asked Jon
suddenly.
“No, dear; he died in '92—very old—eighty-five, I think.”
“Is Father like him?”
“A little, but more subtle, and not quite so solid.”
“I know, from grandfather's portrait; who painted that?”
“One of June's 'lame ducks.' But it's quite good.”
Jon slipped his hand through his mother's arm. “Tell me about the
family quarrel, Mum.”
He felt her arm quivering. “No, dear; that's for your Father some
day, if he thinks fit.”
“Then it was serious,” said Jon, with a catch in his breath.
“Yes.” And there was a silence, during which neither knew whether
the arm or the hand within it were quivering most.
“Some people,” said Irene softly, “think the moon on her back is
evil; to me she's always lovely. Look at those cypress shadows!
Jon, Father says we may go to Italy, you and I, for two months.
Would you like?”
Jon took his hand from under her arm; his sensation was so sharp
and so confused. Italy with his mother! A fortnight ago it would
have been perfection; now it filled him with dismay; he felt that
the sudden suggestion had to do with Fleur. He stammered out:
“Oh! yes; only—I don't know. Ought I—now I've just begun? I'd
like to think it over.”
Her voice answered, cool and gentle:
“Yes, dear; think it over. But better now than when you've begun
farming seriously. Italy with you! It would be nice!”
Jon put his arm round her waist, still slim and firm as a girl's.
“Do you think you ought to leave Father?” he said feebly, feeling
very mean.
“Father suggested it; he thinks you ought to see Italy at least
before you settle down to anything.”
The sense of meanness died in Jon; he knew, yes—he knew—that his
father and his mother were not speaking frankly, no more than he
himself. They wanted to keep him from Fleur. His heart hardened.
And, as if she felt that process going on, his mother said:
“Good-night, darling. Have a good sleep and think it over. But it
would be lovely!”
She pressed him to her so quickly that he did not see her face.
Jon stood feeling exactly as he used to when he was a naughty
little boy; sore because he was not loving, and because he was
justified in his own eyes.
But Irene, after she had stood a moment in her own room, passed
through the dressing-room between it and her husband's.
“Well?”
“He will think it over, Jolyon.”
Watching her lips that wore a little drawn smile, Jolyon said
quietly:
“You had better let me tell him, and have done with it. After
all, Jon has the instincts of a gentleman. He has only to
understand—”
“Only! He can't understand; that's impossible.”
“I believe I could have at his age.”
Irene caught his hand. “You were always more of a realist than
Jon; and never so innocent.”
“That's true,” said Jolyon. “It's queer, isn't it? You and I
would tell our stories to the world without a particle of shame;
but our own boy stumps us.”
“We've never cared whether the world approves or not.”
“Jon would not disapprove of us!”
“Oh! Jolyon, yes. He's in love, I feel he's in love. And he'd
say: 'My mother once married without love! How could she have!'
It'll seem to him a crime! And so it was!”
Jolyon took her hand, and said with a wry smile:
“Ah! why on earth are we born young? Now, if only we were born
old and grew younger year by year, we should understand how
things happen, and drop all our cursed intolerance. But you know
if the boy is really in love, he won't forget, even if he goes to
Italy. We're a tenacious breed; and he'll know by instinct why
he's being sent. Nothing will really cure him but the shock of
being told.”
“Let me try, anyway.”
Jolyon stood a moment without speaking. Between this devil and
this deep sea—the pain of a dreaded disclosure and the grief of
losing his wife for two months—he secretly hoped for the devil;
yet if she wished for the deep sea he must put up with it. After
all, it would be training for that departure from which there
would be no return. And, taking her in his arms, he kissed her
eyes, and said:
“As you will, my love.”
XI.—DUET
That “small” emotion, love, grows amazingly when threatened with
extinction. Jon reached Paddington station half an hour before
his time and a full week after, as it seemed to him. He stood at
the appointed bookstall, amid a crowd of Sunday travellers, in a
Harris tweed suit exhaling, as it were, the emotion of his
thumping heart. He read the names of the novels on the
book-stall, and bought one at last, to avoid being regarded with
suspicion by the book-stall clerk. It was called “The Heart of
the Trail!” which must mean something, though it did not seem to.
He also bought “The Lady's Mirror” and “The Landsman.” Every
minute was an hour long, and full of horrid imaginings. After
nineteen had passed, he saw her with a bag and a porter wheeling
her luggage. She came swiftly; she came cool. She greeted him as
if he were a brother.
“First class,” she said to the porter, “corner seats; opposite.”
Jon admired her frightful self-possession.
“Can't we get a carriage to ourselves,” he whispered.
“No good; it's a stopping train. After Maidenhead perhaps. Look
natural, Jon.”
Jon screwed his features into a scowl. They got in—with two other
beasts!—oh! heaven! He tipped the porter unnaturally, in his
confusion. The brute deserved nothing for putting them in there,
and looking as if he knew all about it into the bargain.
Fleur hid herself behind “The Lady's Mirror.” Jon imitated her
behind “The Landsman.” The train started. Fleur let “The Lady's
Mirror” fall and leaned forward.
“Well?” she said.
“It's seemed about fifteen days.”
She nodded, and Jon's face lighted up at once.
“Look natural,” murmured Fleur, and went off into a bubble of
laughter. It hurt him. How could he look natural with Italy
hanging over him? He had meant to break it to her gently, but now
he blurted it out.
“They want me to go to Italy with Mother for two months.”
Fleur drooped her eyelids; turned a little pale, and bit her
lips. “Oh!” she said. It was all, but it was much.
That “Oh!” was like the quick drawback of the wrist in fencing
ready for riposte. It came.
“You must go!”
“Go?” said Jon in a strangled voice.
“Of course.”
“But—two months—it's ghastly.”
“No,” said Fleur, “six weeks. You'll have forgotten me by then.
We'll meet in the National Gallery the day after you get back.”
Jon laughed.
“But suppose you've forgotten me,” he muttered into the noise of
the train.
Fleur shook her head.
“Some other beast—” murmured Jon.
Her foot touched his.
“No other beast,” she said, lifting “The Lady's Mirror.”
The train stopped; two passengers got out, and one got in.
'I shall die,' thought Jon, 'if we're not alone at all.'
The train went on; and again Fleur leaned forward.
“I never let go,” she said; “do you?”
Jon shook his head vehemently.
“Never!” he said. “Will you write to me?”
“No; but you can—to my Club.”
She had a Club; she was wonderful!
“Did you pump Holly?” he muttered.
“Yes, but I got nothing. I didn't dare pump hard.”
“What can it be?” cried Jon.
“I shall find out all right.”
A long silence followed till Fleur said: “This is Maidenhead;
stand by, Jon!”
The train stopped. The remaining passenger got out. Fleur drew
down her blind.
“Quick!” she cried. “Hang out! Look as much of a beast as you
can.”
Jon blew his nose, and scowled; never in all his life had he
scowled like that! An old lady recoiled, a young one tried the
handle. It turned, but the door would not open. The train moved,
the young lady darted to another carriage.
“What luck!” cried Jon. “It Jammed.”
“Yes,” said Fleur; “I was holding it.”
The train moved out, and Jon fell on his knees.
“Look out for the corridor,” she whispered; “and—quick!”
Her lips met his. And though their kiss only lasted perhaps ten
seconds, Jon's soul left his body and went so far beyond, that,
when he was again sitting opposite that demure figure, he was
pale as death. He heard her sigh, and the sound seemed to him the
most precious he had ever heard—an exquisite declaration that he
meant something to her.
“Six weeks isn't really long,” she said; “and you can easily make
it six if you keep your head out there, and never seem to think
of me.”
Jon gasped.
“This is just what's really wanted, Jon, to convince them, don't
you see? If we're just as bad when you come back they'll stop
being ridiculous about it. Only, I'm sorry it's not Spain;
there's a girl in a Goya picture at Madrid who's like me, Father
says. Only she isn't—we've got a copy of her.”
It was to Jon like a ray of sunshine piercing through a fog.
“I'll make it Spain,” he said, “Mother won't mind; she's never
been there. And my Father thinks a lot of Goya.”