Part 6

MR. VOYSEY. [_his anger rising._] Have you studied these two accounts or have you not?

EDWARD. Yes, sir.

MR. VOYSEY. Well, where's the deficiency in Mrs. Murberry's income . . has she ever gone without a shilling? What has young Hatherley lost?

EDWARD. He stands to lose--

MR. VOYSEY. He stands to lose nothing if I'm spared for a little, and you will only bring a little common sense to bear and try to understand the difficulties of my position.

EDWARD. Father, I'm not thinking ill of you . . that is, I'm trying not to. But won't you explain how you're justified--?

MR. VOYSEY. In putting our affairs in order.

EDWARD. Are you doing that?

MR. VOYSEY. What else?

EDWARD. [_starting patiently to examine the matter._] How bad were things when you first came to control them?

MR. VOYSEY. Oh, I forget.

EDWARD. You can't forget.

MR. VOYSEY. Well . . pretty bad.

EDWARD. Do you know how it was my grandfather began to--

MR. VOYSEY. Muddlement, muddlement! Then the money went and what was he to do. He'd no capital, no credit, and was in terror of his life. My dear Edward, if I hadn't found it out, he'd have confessed to the first man who came and asked for a balance sheet.

EDWARD. Well, what exact sum was he to the bad then?

MR. VOYSEY. I forget. Several thousands.

EDWARD. But surely it has not taken all these years to pay off--

MR. VOYSEY. Oh, hasn't it!

EDWARD. [_making his point._] But how does it happen, sir, that such a comparatively recent trust as young Hatherley's had been broken into?

MR. VOYSEY. Well, what could be safer than to use that money? There's a Consol investment and not a sight wanted of either capital or interest for five years.

EDWARD. [_utterly beaten._] Father, are you mad?

MR. VOYSEY. Certainly not. My practice is to reinvest my clients' money when it is entirely under my control. The difference between the income this money has to bring to them and the income it is actually bringing to me I utilise in my endeavour to fill up the deficit in the firm's accounts . . in fact to try and put things straight. Doesn't it follow that the more low interest bearing capital I can use the better . . the less risky things I have to put it into. Most of young Hatherley's Consol capital is out on mortgage at four and a half and five . . safe as safe can be.

EDWARD. But he should have the benefit.

MR. VOYSEY. He has the amount of his consol interest.

EDWARD. Are the mortgages in his name?

MR. VOYSEY. Some of them . . some of them. That's a technical matter. With regard to Mrs. Murberry . . those Fretworthy Bonds at my bank . . I've raised five thousand on them. I can release her Bonds to-morrow if she wants them.

EDWARD. Where's the five thousand?

MR. VOYSEY. I don't know . . it was paid into my private account. Yes, I do remember. Some of it went to complete a purchase . . that and two thousand more out of the Skipworth fund.

EDWARD. But, my dear father--

MR. VOYSEY. Well?

EDWARD. [_summing it all up very simply._] It's not right.

MR. VOYSEY _considers his son for a moment with a pitying shake of the head_.

MR. VOYSEY. Oh . . why is it so hard for a man to see clearly beyond the letter of the law! Will you consider a moment, Edward, the position in which I found myself? Was I to see my father ruined and disgraced without lifting a finger to help him? . . not to mention the interest of the clients. I paid back to the man who would have lost most by my father's mistakes every penny of his money. He never knew the danger he'd been in . . never passed an uneasy moment about it. It was I who lay awake. I have now somewhere a letter from that man to my father thanking him effusively for the way in which he'd conducted some matter. It comforted my poor father. Well, Edward, I stepped outside the letter of the law to do that. Was that right or wrong?

EDWARD. In its result, sir, right.

MR. VOYSEY. Judge me by the result. I took the risk of failure . . I should have suffered. I could have kept clear of the danger if I'd liked.

EDWARD. But that's all past. The thing that concerns me is what you are doing now.

MR. VOYSEY. [_gently reproachful now._] My boy, you must trust me a little. It's all very well for you to come in at the end of the day and criticise. But I who have done the day's work know how that work had to be done. And here's our firm, prosperous, respected and without a stain on its honour. That's the main point, isn't it? And I think that achievement should earn me the right to be trusted a little . . shouldn't it?

EDWARD. [_quite irresponsive to this pathetic appeal._] Look here, sir, I'm dismissing from my mind all prejudice about speaking the truth . . acting upon one's instructions, behaving as any honest firm of solicitors must behave . .

MR. VOYSEY. You need not, I tell no unnecessary lies. If a man of any business ability gives me definite instructions about his property, I follow them.

EDWARD. Father, no unnecessary lies!

MR. VOYSEY. Well, my friend, go and tell Mrs. Murberry that four hundred and twenty pounds of her income hasn't for the last eight years come from the place she thinks it's come from and see how happy you'll make her.

EDWARD. But is that four hundred and twenty a year as safe to come to her as it was before you meddled with the capital?

MR. VOYSEY. I see no reason why--

EDWARD. What's the security?

MR. VOYSEY. [_putting his coping stone on the argument._] My financial ability.

EDWARD. [_really not knowing whether to laugh or cry._] Why, it seems as if you were satisfied with this state of things.

MR. VOYSEY. Edward, you really are most unsympathetic and unreasonable. I give all I have to the firm's work . . my brain . . my energies . . my whole life. I can't turn my abilities into hard cash at par . . I wish I could. Do you suppose that if I could establish every one of these people with a separate and consistent bank balance to-morrow that I shouldn't do it? Do you suppose that it's a pleasure . . that it's relaxation to have these matters continually on one's mind? Do you suppose--?

EDWARD. [_thankfully able to meet anger with anger._] I find it impossible to believe that you couldn't somehow have put things right by now.

MR. VOYSEY. Oh, do you? Somehow!

EDWARD. In thirty years the whole system must either have come hopelessly to grief . . or during that time there must have been opportunities--

MR. VOYSEY. Well, if you're so sure, I hope that when I'm under ground, you may find them.

EDWARD. I!

MR. VOYSEY. And put everything right with a stroke of the pen, if it's so easy!

EDWARD. I!

MR. VOYSEY. You're my partner and my son, and you'll inherit the business.

EDWARD. [_realizing at last that he has been led to the edge of this abyss._] Oh no, father.

MR. VOYSEY. Why else have I had to tell you all this?

EDWARD. [_very simply._] Father, I can't. I can't possibly. I don't think you've any right to ask me.

MR. VOYSEY. Why not, pray?

EDWARD. It's perpetuating the dishonesty.

MR. VOYSEY _hardens at the unpleasant word_.

MR. VOYSEY. You don't believe that I've told you the truth.

EDWARD. I wish to believe it.

MR. VOYSEY. It's no proof . . that I've earned these twenty or thirty people their incomes for the last--how many years?

EDWARD. Whether what you have done and are doing is wrong or right . . I can't meddle in it.

_For the moment_ MR. VOYSEY _looks a little dangerous_.

MR. VOYSEY. Very well. Forget all I've said. Go back to your room. Get back to your own mean drudgery. My life's work--my splendid life's work--ruined! What does that matter?

EDWARD. Whatever did you expect of me?

MR. VOYSEY. [_making a feint at his papers._] Oh, nothing, nothing. [_Then he slams them down with great effect._] Here's a great edifice built up by years of labour and devotion and self sacrifice . . a great arch you may call it . . a bridge which is to carry our firm to safety with honour. [_This variation of Disraeli passes unnoticed._] My work! And now, as I near the end of my life, it still lacks the key-stone. Perhaps I am to die with my work just incomplete. Then is there nothing that a son might do? Do you think I shouldn't be proud of you, Edward . . that I shouldn't bless you from--wherever I may be, when you completed my life's work . . with perhaps just one kindly thought of your father?

_In spite of this oratory, the situation is gradually impressing_ EDWARD.

EDWARD. What will happen if I . . if I desert you?

MR. VOYSEY. I'll protect you as best I can.

EDWARD. I wasn't thinking of myself, sir.

MR. VOYSEY. [_with great nonchalance_.] Well, I shan't mind the exposure, you know. It won't make me blush in my coffin . . and you're not so foolish I hope as to be thinking of the feelings of your brothers and sisters. Considering how simple it would have been for me to go to my grave in peace and quiet and let you discover the whole thing afterwards, the fact that I didn't, that I have taken some thought for the future of all of you might perhaps have convinced you that I . . ! But there . . consult your own safety.

EDWARD _has begun to pace the room; indecision growing upon him_.

EDWARD. This is a queer thing to have to make up one's mind about, isn't it, father?

MR. VOYSEY. [_watching him closely and modulating his voice._] My dear boy, I understand the shock to your feelings that this disclosure must have been.

EDWARD. Yes, I thought this morning that next week would see us in the dock together.

MR. VOYSEY. And I suppose if I'd broken down and begged your pardon for my folly, you'd have done anything for me, gone to prison smiling, eh?

EDWARD. I suppose so.

MR. VOYSEY. Yes, it's easy enough to forgive. I'm sorry I can't go in sack cloth and ashes to oblige you. [_Now he begins to rally his son; easy in his strength._] My dear Edward, you've lived a quiet humdrum life up to now, with your books and your philosophy and your agnosticism and your ethics of this and your ethics of that . . dear me, these are the sort of garden oats which young men seem to sow now-a-days! . . and you've never before been brought face to face with any really vital question. Now don't make a fool of yourself just through inexperience. Try and give your mind freely and unprejudicedly to the consideration of this very serious matter. I'm not angry at what you've said to me. I'm quite willing to forget it. And it's for your own sake and not for mine, Edward, that I do beg you to--to--to be a man and try and take a practical common sense view of the position you find yourself in. It's not a pleasant position I know, but it's unavoidable.

EDWARD. You should have told me before you took me into partnership. [_Oddly enough it is this last flicker of rebellion which breaks down_ MR. VOYSEY'S _caution. Now he lets fly with a vengeance._]

MR. VOYSEY. Should I be telling you at all if I could possibly help it? Don't I know that you're about as fit for this job as a babe unborn? Haven't I been worrying over that for these last three years? But I'm in a corner . . and I won't see all this work of mine come to smash simply because of your scruples. If you're a son of mine you'll do as I tell you. Hadn't I the same choice to make? . . and this is a safer game for you than it was for me then. D'you suppose I didn't have scruples? If you run away from this, Edward, you're a coward. My father was a coward and he suffered for it to the end of his days. I was sick-nurse to him here more than partner. Good lord! . . of course it's pleasant and comfortable to keep within the law . . then the law will look after you. Otherwise you have to look pretty sharp after yourself. You have to cultivate your own sense of right and wrong; deal your own justice. But that makes a bigger man of you, let me tell you. How easily . . how easily could I have walked out of my father's office and left him to his fate; no one would have blamed me! But I didn't. I thought it my better duty to stay and . . yes, I say it with all reverence . . to take up my cross. Well, I've carried that cross pretty successfully. And what's more, it's made a happy man of me . . a better, stronger man than skulking about in shame and in fear of his life ever made of my poor dear father. [_Relieved at having let out the truth, but doubtful of his wisdom in doing so, he changes his tone._] I don't want what I've been saying to influence you, Edward. You are a free agent . . and you must decide upon your own course of action. Now don't let's discuss the matter any more for the moment.

EDWARD _looks at his father with clear eyes_.

EDWARD. Don't forget to put these papers away.

_He restores them to their bundles and hands them back: it is his only comment._ MR. VOYSEY _takes them and his meaning in silence_.

MR. VOYSEY. Are you coming down to Chislehurst soon? We've got Hugh and his wife, and Booth and Emily, and Christopher for two or three days, till he goes back to school.

EDWARD. How is Chris?

MR. VOYSEY. All right again now . . grows more like his father. Booth's very proud of him. So am I.

EDWARD. I think I can't face them all just at present.

MR. VOYSEY. Nonsense.

EDWARD. [_a little wave of emotion going through him._] I feel as if this thing were written on my face. How I shall get through business I don't know!

MR. VOYSEY. You're weaker than I thought, Edward.

EDWARD. [_a little ironically._] A disappointment to you, father?

MR. VOYSEY. No, no.

EDWARD. You should have brought one of the others into the firm . . Trenchard or Booth.

MR. VOYSEY. [_hardening._] Trenchard! [_he dismisses that._] Well, you're a better man than Booth. Edward, you mustn't imagine that the whole world is standing on its head merely because you've had an unpleasant piece of news. You come down to Chislehurst to-night . . well, say to-morrow night. It'll be good for you . . stop your brooding . . that's your worst vice, Edward. You'll find the household as if nothing had happened. Then you'll remember that nothing really has happened. And presently you'll get to see that nothing need happen, if you keep your head. I remember times, when things have seemed at their worst, what a relief it's been to me . . my romp with you all in the nursery just before your bed time. Do you remember?

EDWARD. Yes. I cut your head open once with that gun.

MR. VOYSEY. [_in a full glow of fine feeling._] And, my dear boy, if I knew that you were going to inform the next client you met of what I've just told you . .

EDWARD. [_with a shudder._] Oh, father!

MR. VOYSEY. . . And that I should find myself in prison to-morrow, I wouldn't wish a single thing I've ever done undone. I have never wilfully harmed man or woman. My life's been a happy one. Your dear mother has been spared to me. You're most of you good children and a credit to what I've done for you.

EDWARD. [_the deadly humour of this too much for him._] Father!

MR. VOYSEY. Run along now, run along. I must finish my letters and get into the City.

_He might be scolding a schoolboy for some trifling fault._ EDWARD _turns to have a look at the keen unembarrassed face_. MR. VOYSEY _smiles at him and proceeds to select from the bowl a rose for his buttonhole_.

EDWARD. I'll think it over, sir.

MR. VOYSEY. Of course, you will. And don't brood, Edward, don't brood.

_So_ EDWARD _leaves him; and having fixed the rose to his satisfaction, he rings his table telephone and calls through it to the listening clerk_.

Send Atkinson to me, please. [_Then he gets up, keys in hand to lock away Mrs. Murberry's and the Hatherley trust papers._]

THE SECOND ACT

_The_ VOYSEY _dining-room at Chislehurst, when children and grandchildren are visiting, is dining table and very little else. And at this moment in the evening when five or six men are sprawling back in their chairs, and the air is clouded with smoke, it is a very typical specimen of the middle-class English domestic temple; the daily sacrifice consummated, the acolytes dismissed, the women safely in the drawing room, and the chief priests of it taking their surfeited ease round the dessert-piled altar. It has the usual red-papered walls, (like a refection, they are, of the underdone beef so much consumed within them) the usual varnished woodwork which is known as grained oak; there is the usual, hot, mahogany furniture; and, commanding point of the whole room, there is the usual black-marble sarcophagus of a fireplace. Above this hangs one of the two or three oil paintings, which are all that break the red pattern of the walls, the portrait painted in 1880 of an undistinguished looking gentleman aged sixty; he is shown sitting in a more graceful attitude than it could ever have been comfortable for him to assume._ MR. VOYSEY'S _father it is, and the brass plate at the bottom of the frame tells us that the portrait was a presentation one. On the mantelpiece stands, of course, a clock; at either end a china vase filled with paper spills. And in front of the fire,--since that is the post of vantage, stands at this moment_ MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. _He is the second son, of the age that it is necessary for a Major to be, and of an appearance that many ordinary Majors in ordinary regiments are. He went into the army because he thought it would be like a schoolboy's idea of it; and, being there, he does his little all to keep it so. He stands astride, hands in pockets, coat-tails through his arms, cigar in mouth, moustache bristling. On either side of him sits at the table an old gentleman; the one is_ MR. EVAN COLPUS, _the vicar of their parish, the other_ MR. GEORGE BOOTH, _a friend of long standing, and the Major's godfather. Mr. Colpus is a harmless enough anachronism, except for the waste of L400 a year in which his stipend involves the community. Leaving most of his parochial work to an energetic curate, he devotes his serious attention to the composition of two sermons a week. They deal with the difficulties of living the christian life as experienced by people who have nothing else to do. Published in series from time to time, these form suitable presents for bedridden parishioners._ MR. GEORGE BOOTH, _on the contrary, is as gay an old gentleman as can be found in Chislehurst. An only son; his father left him at the age of twenty-five a fortune of a hundred thousand pounds (a plum, as he called it). At the same time he had the good sense to dispose of his father's business, into which he had been most unwillingly introduced five years earlier, for a like sum before he was able to depreciate its value. It was_ MR. VOYSEY'S _invaluable assistance in this transaction which first bound the two together in great friendship. Since that time Mr. Booth has been bent on nothing but enjoying himself. He has even remained a bachelor with that object. Money has given him all he wants, therefore he loves and reverences money; while his imagination may be estimated by the fact that he has now reached the age of sixty-five, still possessing more of it than he knows what to do with. At the head of the table, meditatively cracking walnuts, sits_ MR. VOYSEY. _He has his back there to the conservatory door--you know it is the conservatory door because there is a curtain to pull over it, and because half of it is frosted glass with a purple key pattern round the edge. On_ MR. VOYSEY'S _left is_ DENIS TREGONING, _a nice enough young man. And at the other end of the table sits_ EDWARD, _not smoking, not talking, hardly listening, very depressed. Behind him is the ordinary door of the room, which leads out into the dismal draughty hall. The Major's voice is like the sound of a cannon through the tobacco smoke._

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. Of course I'm hot and strong for conscription . .

MR. GEORGE BOOTH. My dear boy, the country'd never stand it. No Englishman--

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. [_dropping the phrase heavily upon the poor old gentleman._] I beg your pardon. If we . . the Army . . say to the country . . Upon our honour conscription is necessary for your safety . . what answer has the country? What? [_he pauses defiantly._] There you are . . none!

TREGONING. Booth will imagine because one doesn't argue that one has nothing to say. You ask the country.

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. Perhaps I will. Perhaps I'll chuck the Service and go into the House. [_then falling into the sing song of a favourite phrase._] I'm not a conceited man . . but I believe that if I speak out upon a subject I understand and only upon that subject the House will listen . . and if others followed my example we should be a far more business-like and go-ahead community.

_He pauses for breath and_ MR. BOOTH _seizes the opportunity_.

MR. GEORGE BOOTH. If you think the gentlemen of England will allow themselves to be herded with a lot of low fellers and made to carry guns--!

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. [_obliterating him once more._] Just one moment. Have you thought of the physical improvement which conscription would bring about in the manhood of the country? What England wants is Chest! [_he generously inflates his own._] Chest and Discipline. I don't care how it's obtained. Why, we suffer from a lack of it in our homes--

MR. VOYSEY. [_with the crack of a nut._] Your godson talks a deal, don't he? You know, when Booth gets into a club, he gets on the committee . . gets on any committee to enquire into anything . . and then goes on at 'em just like this. Don't you, Booth?

BOOTH _knuckles under easily enough to his father's sarcasm_.

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. Well, sir, people tell me I'm a useful man on committees.

MR. VOYSEY. I don't doubt it . . your voice must drown all discussion.

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. You can't say I don't listen to you, sir.

MR. VOYSEY. I don't . . and I'm not blaming you. But I must say I often think what a devil of a time the family will have with you when I'm gone. Fortunately for your poor mother, she's deaf.

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. And wouldn't you wish me, sir, as eldest son . . . Trenchard not counting . . .

MR. VOYSEY. [_with the crack of another nut._] Trenchard not counting. By all means, bully them. Get up your subjects a bit better, and then bully them. I don't manage things that way myself, but I think it's your best chance . . if there weren't other people present I'd say your only chance, Booth.

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. [_with some discomfort._] Ha! If I were a conceited man, sir, I could trust you to take it out of me.

MR. VOYSEY. [_as he taps_ MR. BOOTH _with the nut crackers_.] Help yourself, George, and drink to your godson's health. Long may he keep his chest notes! Never heard him on parade, have you?

TREGONING. I notice military men must display themselves . . that's why Booth acts as a firescreen. I believe that after mess that position is positively rushed.

MAJOR BOOTH VOYSEY. [_cheering to find an opponent he can tackle._] If you want a bit of fire, say so, you sucking Lord Chancellor. Because I mean to allow you to be my brother-in-law, you think you can be impertinent.

_So_ TREGONING _moves to the fire and that changes the conversation_.

MR. VOYSEY. By the bye, Vicar, you were at Lady Mary's yesterday. Is she giving us anything towards that window?

MR. COLPUS. Five pounds more; she has promised me five pounds.

MR. VOYSEY. Then how will the debt stand?

MR. COLPUS. Thirty-three . . no, thirty-two pounds.

MR. VOYSEY. We're a long time clearing it off.

MR. COLPUS. [_gently querulous._] Yes, now that the window is up, people don't seem so ready to contribute as they were.

TREGONING. We must mention that to Hugh!

MR. COLPUS. [_tactful at once._] Not that the work is not universally admired. I have heard Hugh's design praised by quite competent judges. But certainly I feel now it might have been wiser to have delayed the unveiling until the money was forthcoming.

TREGONING. Never deliver goods to the Church on credit.

MR. COLPUS. Eh? [TREGONING _knows he is a little hard of hearing_.]