The Forsyte saga - Complete
kneeling before the old armchair, and his father was lying back
quite white, his head on his breast, one of his hands resting on
an open book, with a pencil clutched in it—more strangely still
than anything he had ever seen. She looked round wildly, and
said:
“Oh! Jon—he's dead—he's dead!”
Jon flung himself down, and reaching over the arm of the chair,
where he had lately been sitting, put his lips to the forehead.
Icy cold! How could—how could Dad be dead, when only an hour
ago—! His mother's arms were round the knees; pressing her breast
against them. “Why—why wasn't I with him?” he heard her whisper.
Then he saw the tottering word “Irene” pencilled on the open
page, and broke down himself. It was his first sight of human
death, and its unutterable stillness blotted from him all other
emotion; all else, then, was but preliminary to this! All love
and life, and joy, anxiety, and sorrow, all movement, light and
beauty, but a beginning to this terrible white stillness. It made
a dreadful mark on him; all seemed suddenly little, futile,
short. He mastered himself at last, got up, and raised her.
“Mother! don't cry—Mother!”
Some hours later, when all was done that had to be, and his
mother was lying down, he saw his father alone, on the bed,
covered with a white sheet. He stood for a long time gazing at
that face which had never looked angry—always whimsical, and
kind. “To be kind and keep your end up—there's nothing else in
it,” he had once heard his father say. How wonderfully Dad had
acted up to that philosophy! He understood now that his father
had known for a long time past that this would come
suddenly—known, and not said a word. He gazed with an awed and
passionate reverence. The loneliness of it—just to spare his
mother and himself! His own trouble seemed small while he was
looking at that face. The word scribbled on the page! The
farewell word! Now his mother had no one but himself! He went up
close to the dead face—not changed at all, and yet completely
changed. He had heard his father say once that he did not believe
in consciousness surviving death, or that if it did it might be
just survival till the natural age limit of the body had been
reached—the natural term of its inherent vitality; so that if the
body were broken by accident, excess, violent disease,
consciousness might still persist till, in the course of Nature
uninterfered with, it would naturally have faded out. It had
struck him because he had never heard any one else suggest it.
When the heart failed like this—surely it was not quite natural!
Perhaps his father's consciousness was in the room with him.
Above the bed hung a picture of his father's father. Perhaps his
consciousness, too, was still alive; and his brother's—his
half-brother, who had died in the Transvaal. Were they all
gathered round this bed? Jon kissed the forehead, and stole back
to his own room. The door between it and his mother's was ajar;
she had evidently been in—everything was ready for him, even some
biscuits and hot milk, and the letter no longer on the floor. He
ate and drank, watching the last light fade. He did not try to
see into the future—just stared at the dark branches of the
oak-tree, level with his window, and felt as if life had stopped.
Once in the night, turning in his heavy sleep, he was conscious
of something white and still, beside his bed, and started up.
His mother's voice said:
“It's only I, Jon dear!” Her hand pressed his forehead gently
back; her white figure disappeared.
Alone! He fell heavily asleep again, and dreamed he saw his
mother's name crawling on his bed.
IV.—SOAMES COGITATES
The announcement in The Times of his cousin Jolyon's death
affected Soames quite simply. So that chap was gone! There had
never been a time in their two lives when love had not been lost
between them. That quick-blooded sentiment hatred had run its
course long since in Soames' heart, and he had refused to allow
any recrudescence, but he considered this early decease a piece
of poetic justice. For twenty years the fellow had enjoyed the
reversion of his wife and house, and—he was dead! The obituary
notice, which appeared a little later, paid Jolyon—he thought—too
much attention. It spoke of that “diligent and agreeable painter
whose work we have come to look on as typical of the best
late-Victorian water-colour art.” Soames, who had almost
mechanically preferred Mole, Morpin, and Caswell Baye, and had
always sniffed quite audibly when he came to one of his cousin's
on the line, turned The Times with a crackle.
He had to go up to Town that morning on Forsyte affairs, and was
fully conscious of Gradman's glance sidelong over his spectacles.
The old clerk had about him an aura of regretful congratulation.
He smelled, as it were, of old days. One could almost hear him
thinking: “Mr. Jolyon, ye-es—just my age, and gone—dear, dear! I
dare say she feels it. She was a nice-lookin' woman. Flesh is
flesh! They've given 'im a notice in the papers. Fancy!” His
atmosphere in fact caused Soames to handle certain leases and
conversions with exceptional swiftness.
“About that settlement on Miss Fleur, Mr. Soames?”
“I've thought better of that,” answered Soames shortly.
“Ah! I'm glad of that. I thought you were a little hasty. The
times do change.”
How this death would affect Fleur had begun to trouble Soames. He
was not certain that she knew of it—she seldom looked at the
paper, never at the births, marriages, and deaths.
He pressed matters on, and made his way to Green Street for
lunch. Winifred was almost doleful. Jack Cardigan had broken a
splashboard, so far as one could make out, and would not be “fit”
for some time. She could not get used to the idea.
“Did Profond ever get off?” he said suddenly.
“He got off,” replied Winifred, “but where—I don't know.”
Yes, there it was—impossible to tell anything! Not that he wanted
to know. Letters from Annette were coming from Dieppe, where she
and her mother were staying.
“You saw that fellow's death, I suppose?”
“Yes,” said Winifred. “I'm sorry for—for his children. He was
very amiable.” Soames uttered a rather queer sound. A suspicion
of the old deep truth—that men were judged in this world rather
by what they were than by what they did—crept and knocked
resentfully at the back doors of his mind.
“I know there was a superstition to that effect,” he muttered.
“One must do him justice now he's dead.”
“I should like to have done him justice before,” said Soames;
“but I never had the chance. Have you got a 'Baronetage' here?”
“Yes; in that bottom row.”
Soames took out a fat red book, and ran over the leaves.
“Mont-Sir Lawrence, 9th Bt., cr. 1620, e. s. of Geoffrey, 8th
Bt., and Lavinia, daur. of Sir Charles Muskham, Bt., of Muskham
Hall, Shrops: marr. 1890 Emily, daur. of Conway Charwell, Esq.,
of Condaford Grange, co. Oxon; 1 son, heir Michael Conway, b.
1895, 2 daurs. Residence: Lippinghall Manor, Folwell, Bucks.
Clubs: Snooks'. Coffee House: Aeroplane. See Bidicott.”
“H'm!” he said. “Did you ever know a publisher?”
“Uncle Timothy.”
“Alive, I mean.”
“Monty knew one at his Club. He brought him here to dinner once.
Monty was always thinking of writing a book, you know, about how
to make money on the turf. He tried to interest that man.”
“Well?”
“He put him on to a horse—for the Two Thousand. We didn't see him
again. He was rather smart, if I remember.”
“Did it win?”
“No; it ran last, I think. You know Monty really was quite clever
in his way.”
“Was he?” said Soames. “Can you see any connection between a
sucking baronet and publishing?”
“People do all sorts of things nowadays,” replied Winifred. “The
great stunt seems not to be idle—so different from our time. To
do nothing was the thing then. But I suppose it'll come again.”
“This young Mont that I'm speaking of is very sweet on Fleur. If
it would put an end to that other affair I might encourage it.”
“Has he got style?” asked Winifred.
“He's no beauty; pleasant enough, with some scattered brains.
There's a good deal of land, I believe. He seems genuinely
attached. But I don't know.”
“No,” murmured Winifred; “it's—very difficult. I always found it
best to do nothing. It is such a bore about Jack; now we shan't
get away till after Bank Holiday. Well, the people are always
amusing, I shall go into the Park and watch them.”
“If I were you,” said Soames, “I should have a country cottage,
and be out of the way of holidays and strikes when you want.”
“The country bores me,” answered Winifred, “and I found the
railway strike quite exciting.”
Winifred had always been noted for sang-froid.
Soames took his leave. All the way down to Reading he debated
whether he should tell Fleur of that boy's father's death. It did
not alter the situation except that he would be independent now,
and only have his mother's opposition to encounter. He would come
into a lot of money, no doubt, and perhaps the house—the house
built for Irene and himself—the house whose architect had wrought
his domestic ruin. His daughter—mistress of that house! That
would be poetic justice! Soames uttered a little mirthless laugh.
He had designed that house to re-establish his failing union,
meant it for the seat of his descendants, if he could have
induced Irene to give him one! Her son and Fleur! Their children
would be, in some sort, offspring of the union between himself
and her!
The theatricality in that thought was repulsive to his sober
sense. And yet—it would be the easiest and wealthiest way out of
the impasse, now that Jolyon was gone. The juncture of two
Forsyte fortunes had a kind of conservative charm. And
she—Irene-would be linked to him once more. Nonsense! Absurd! He
put the notion from his head.
On arriving home he heard the click of billiard-balls, and
through the window saw young Mont sprawling over the table.
Fleur, with her cue akimbo, was watching with a smile. How pretty
she looked! No wonder that young fellow was out of his mind about
her. A title—land! There was little enough in land, these days;
perhaps less in a title. The old Forsytes had always had a kind
of contempt for titles, rather remote and artificial things—not
worth the money they cost, and having to do with the Court. They
had all had that feeling in differing measure—Soames remembered.
Swithin, indeed, in his most expansive days had once attended a
Levee. He had come away saying he shouldn't go again—“all that
small fry.” It was suspected that he had looked too big in
knee-breeches. Soames remembered how his own mother had wished to
be presented because of the fashionable nature of the