CHAPTER VIII

THE DISCIPLE

“Christmas comes but once a year, When it comes it brings good cheer!”

Granpa Cubitt’s sally was received with hearty cheers. And Luke whispered to Jinny: “He’s only starting now; you don’t know Granpa. He can make verses about anybody, jump up and make ’em. You’ll see.”

“_Does_ it, though?” questioned Tommy Cox, à propos of Christmas and good cheer. The invited guests, complete in number, had been waiting in the drawing-room since five minutes to four,--and now it was eight minutes past, and no dinner had as yet been announced. “I tell you what,” continued Tommy disconsolately; “I believe Mrs. J. has humbugged us over turkey and plum-pudding; and brought us all here to starve us to death, just to show there’s no ill-feeling. Oooo! Muvver! Don’t want to be a skelington!” And he plumped himself down on the sofa, and with knuckles screwed into his eyes, pretended to floods of bitter weeping.

Granpa whispered to Letty: “What is that young man’s name, my dear?”

“Tommy Cox, Granpa.”

Rising to his feet, Granpa pointed with one finger towards the blubbering youth; and, lifting the other hand to enjoin silence, delivered himself of his first impromptu of the evening:

“Little Tommy Cox-o Crying for his Oxo! What shall we give him? A Xmas box-o!”

“Now then, you young ladies, there’s a chance for you!”

Amid shouts of laughter, and “Bravo, Granpa!” Jinny ran forward, and with all her strength, smote Tommy upon the ear.

“A Xmas box-o!” she chanted triumphantly. And was only delivered from Tommy’s vengeance, by the timely appearance of Mrs. Johnson in the doorway. With quiet exaltation, she trumpeted forth the single word:

“Dinner.”

At once a hush fell upon the company. A hush of relief and expectation and a sense of the solemn rite unto which they were summoned. Mr. Johnson led the way to the dining-room, Aunt Lou panting upon his arm. Granpa followed with Mrs. Baker; and there ensued a real difficulty in getting them past the threshold, above which dangled a large bunch of mistletoe. Mrs. Johnson had purposely thrown the two together, as Milly Baker never took offence at a bit of fun, “and really, with father, you never know what he’ll be up to!” The next pair, Tommy Cox and Vi Baker, were a carefully-thought-out blend of merriment and sorrow; Vi had taken to drooping her head and refusing comfort, since she had given Ernie the chuck, and--“If Tommy can’t cheer her up, I don’t know who can!” reflected the hostess of the occasion. Sebastian and Letty were coupled as a matter of course; and Luke and Jinny. Mrs. Johnson herself brought up the rear with Balaam Atkins, who under a neatly dressed and well-bred exterior, concealed a heart that still beat faithfully for Letty. He did not know yet that she was formally betrothed to another; and Mrs. Johnson was sorry for him, aware that the blow would descend within the hour; she determined to make it her business that he should eat a good meal, believing that trouble always falls hardest on an empty stomach.

A thrill and a gasp ran round the assembly at first sight of the festive board, decorated profusely with holly and evergreens, and connected with the chandelier by trails of smilax. Red and blue and green crackers glittered in upright threes, like small bivouac fires; or lay scattered flat between the plentiful dishes of almonds and raisins and chocolates. On every lady’s name-card, Letty had tastefully painted a spray of holly, with a suitable sentiment attached; and on every gentleman’s, a robin redbreast. The glistening napkins were folded into boat-shapes, each beside a formidable array of glasses and tumblers, expressive of much conviviality to come. A miniature fir tree occupied the proud position of centre-piece, gaily bedecked with flags. Mrs. Johnson had spent much care and time on the arrangement of her table, and wore an expression of majestic geniality while her guests applauded, and, still with that touch of awe upon them, slid into their appointed places.

The soup was brought in, and doled out. Then arose a squeal from Jinny:

“Oo-er! my shoe!” she had been attempting to attract the attention of Luke, who, through some shuffling of seats, sat opposite instead of beside her. In an instant, Tommy Cox was underneath the table, disporting himself mightily among the slippers easily detachable, and continually bringing one up in his mouth, for Jinny’s inspection--“No, Tommy, no; mine’s a bronze one; that’s Vi’s!” And giggles from a rapidly brightening Violet Baker: “Well, I never! You have a sauce! Put it back where you found it, this very minute.”

Granpa cleared his throat impressively:

“Young man, you are much too bold, You’ll have the lady catching cold!”

“How you do it, all of a sudden like that, beats me,” said Mrs. Baker admiringly. “Why, you’re quite a poet.”

Bang! went the first cracker, between Aunt Lou and her brother-in-law Mr. Johnson. And “Hooray!” cried Luke and Jinny in unison, taking this for permission to demolish the bivouacs, and start pulling across the table.

“Not till dessert, Luke. Put those crackers back at once. Matthew, I’m ashamed of you, setting such an example.”

“I can’t wait! I can’t wait!” bellowed Tommy the Humorist, holding a cracker to each eye, and squinting through, to find out what was inside.

“There’s beef for whoever wants it,” announced the carver, flourishing the knife over a prime large turkey.

Half-way through his portion of the bird--and a well-heaped-up portion too,--Granpa thought it about time that Sebastian and Letty should be brought into prominence. Enjoining silence, as he always did before casting his pearls, he sipped his claret, coughed and choked several times, waggled an arch and shining head, and spouted:

“I can see a red-haired lover Who’s squeezing his best girl’s hand under the table cover. I do not think I’ve need to name him, And all I can say is: I don’t blame him.”

“Granpa! how can you?” cried Letty, confused and blushing; “I wasn’t,--I mean, he wasn’t.”

“Bless them ... dear innocent things ...” murmured Mrs. Baker, smoothing down the front of her prune-coloured silk wrappings and excrescences and fermentations. She was fearfully and wonderfully clad, this Xmas Day. Aunt Lou eyed her with suspicion. Aunt Lou considered Granpa not too old to make an old fool of himself. She was the only spinster daughter, a rosy bouncing lady, who wasn’t likely to stand a stepmother being put over _her_.

Sebastian laughed hilariously at Granpa’s joke; and continued laughing, even after the general mirth had died down. Letty thought she’d never seen him so lively; no, nor yet so handsome, dark eyes flaming in a dead-white face, lips wine-red and feverish, hair a ruffled auburn halo. “He’s like a god; he’s glorious,” thought Letty; and turned, girl-like, to Balaam Atkins on her other side, that she might compare him disparagingly with Sebastian.

Mr. Atkins murmured: “I don’t blame him either, Miss Letty,”--and suddenly she felt sorry for her discarded swain, who really was just the sort of man to have made her happy, with his neat normal ideas, and neat clothes, and neat bank-balance, and neat fair features. Sebastian might have resembled a god, but Balaam Atkins was simply a cut-out model of a good husband ... and did not contrast so very unfavourably after all.

With the entrance of the lit plum pudding, flanked on one side by the mince-pies, on the other by a very yellow trifle (not free from a faint suspicion of Bird’s custard powder), the last traces of restraint disappeared from the party. Jinny, quite forgetting such everyday things as manners, quite forgetting she wore her best pink dress with the Irish lace collar, sprang on to her chair, waved her spoon, and clamoured to be served first, before the leaping fires went out. Indulgently, because she was the youngest present, her wish was granted.

“Greedy pig!” cried Luke. And: “Jea-lous!” sang back Jinny, emulating the fire-eater’s celebrated act.

A few minutes later: “Mrs. Baker’s got the _twins_!” shrieked Tommy Cox, in an ecstasy of delight, snatching from that lady’s plate the linked china dolls, and dangling them aloft for the world to see.

“I believe she did it on purpose,” muttered Aunt Lou disgustedly. While Granpa chanted amorously to his giggling wriggling neighbour:

“Pat-a-cake, pat-a-cake, Baker’s twins! It ain’t no use tryin’ to gobble up your sins! We all can spot ’em, And wonder how you got ’em!”

“Father!!!” Mrs. Johnson had overheard, and was shocked beyond measure at her wicked old parent.

Jinny had the wedding-ring; and would much have preferred the threepenny-bit, which fell to Mr. Johnson’s share; wiping and pocketing the coin, he remarked waggishly that it would help pay for this dinner, which, as it was, had left him a Ruined Man. And then Aunt Lou took offence, and said there were plenty of invitations just as good that she and her father might have accepted if they’d known Matthew grudged them a morsel of bird and a fragment of pudding; and even if he only said it in fun, it wasn’t at all funny to make one’s guests feel uncomfortable, especially at Yuletide, which ought to be a season of peace-on-earth goodwill-to-men. Then Mr. Johnson apologized; and Aunt Lou, softened, wept a little, was pressed to a second helping of plum-pudding, and all was harmony again.

Violet Baker had found the old maid’s thimble under her spoon, but managed to conceal it; Tommy Cox was being very attentive, and there was no sense in putting him off from the start, so to speak.

At last, when the pudding-plates were removed, and replaced by mounds of oranges and figs and dates; when port gleamed duskily in every glass, and the nut-crackers were freely circulating, Mrs. Johnson gave the anxiously awaited signal for the crackers to be pulled. Then indeed, pandemonium reached its height; then indeed, every head, old and young, was drunkenly crowned by paper cap or bonnet; and: bang! bang! bang! the squibs exploded up and down the table. The cloth was one glittering litter of green and red transparency, all mixed up with the orange-peel and silver paper. Luke and Jinny had each a musical instrument at their lips, and squeaked and squawked ceaselessly, their cheeks blown out and purple with the exertion. Vi Baker and Tommy Cox had their heads very close together over a finger-bowl, in which they were experimenting with those Japanese puzzles that open out in water; his arm was around her waist; and she, transported by the hectic screaming excitement of Xmas, was content to leave it there. Granpa, who had donned a rakish gilt crown, between whose spikes one could glimpse the gas-light reflected in the naked polish of his cranium, was busy making a collection of mottoes, riddles and sentimental verse, from the crackers, and reading them aloud. From the kitchen below, quavered the third repetition of “Good King Wenceslas.” Balaam Atkins whispered to Letty, in a tone pregnant of mournful meaning: “I wonder--if I might venture--to ask you--to pull with me, Miss Letty?”--Then, utterly abashed, realized what construction might have been put upon his innocent demand; and dropped the cracker, and went down after it, and remained obliterated for quite a period of time. And Mrs. Baker, wearing a washer-woman’s bonnet, which had an air strangely and horribly appropriate, was dancing,--yes, actually dancing, with Aunt Lou Cubitt; all enmity forgotten in the sudden discovery that forty years ago they had met at the same terpsichorean school, where little girls in frilled pantaloons learnt to jig and reel and polka.--And: “Do you remember the Bluebell Schottische?” cried Aunt Lou; which led to the pleasing exhibition just mentioned, of two middle-aged ladies gathering up their skirts, and prancing and twirling down the narrow space of the room between the wall and the row of chairs.

“I used to be light as a fairy,” panted Mrs. Baker, regaining her seat.

Mr. and Mrs. Johnson exchanged a mute dialogue of glances, which might be curtly translated as: “When?” “Now.” And Mr. Johnson, glass in hand, rose to his feet.

“Speech! Speech!” cried Tommy Cox, thumping on the table.

“Ladies and gentlemen--and friends,” began Mr. Johnson, making a fine distinction. “I must hurry up with what I’m going to say, because I can see the gas is goin’ down, and I haven’t got a penny for the metre--leave alone for the meat!” Here he made a great show of being terrified of Aunt Lou’s disapproval; but she, mellowed by port, merely smiled benignly; and he went on: “And I wouldn’t like to talk to you in the dark, my friends, and lose sight of your beaming faces wreathed in happy smiles, as my pal Will Shakespeare once said,--or was it Granpa Cubitt? ’Pon my word, I’m getting mixed with all these poets.”

Whereat there was great applause, and Granpa was patted vigorously on the back.

“Who has added so richly to the evening’s entertainment,” said Mr. Johnson, in an inspired sentence all by itself. Then he recommenced:

“I think I can say, in which my wife joins me,” (cheers) “that nowhere in England, no, nor yet anywhere else, has a merrier party sat round any table, nor had a merrier Xmas.” (Chorus of assent.) “So may you all enjoy the best of luck till we meet over our next plum-pudding.”

--A groan from Jinny, to whom the thought was agony. And, amid the cheering and tattoo of feet which followed the host’s oratory, Balaam Atkins, suddenly coming to the fore, begged to propose a toast to The Ladies. Leave being vociferously given, he gave utterance, in precise, rather lugubrious tones, to the following rollicking bit of sentiment:

“Your eyes! My eyes! Your lips! My lips! Our eyes have met! Our lip--not yet! Here’s hoping!”

Then he sat down again.

“Here’s hoping!” cried Tommy Cox, clinking glasses with Vi Baker, and then with every other lady present. The rest of the gentlemen gallantly followed suit.

Mr. Johnson had remained on his feet, to intimate that he had not yet finished what he had to say. A meaning smile signified that something of importance lay behind his silence. So, by unanimous consent, voices were hushed to allow him to proceed.

“I am profiting of the festive occasion,” spoke Mr. Johnson, “and may I be propheting truly” (interval for laughter; and for the pun to be explained to Aunt Lou, who was almost asleep), “to make an announcement that to some of you will be a surprise, and to some won’t. It’s this: Ladies and gentlemen, I ask you to fill your glasses and drink to the engagement of my only daughter with Mr. Sebastian Levi, here present.”

The enthusiasm was tremendous. Vi Baker came round the table to embrace her friend; Aunt Lou collapsed from sheer astonishment, and was heard vociferating that she had never dreamt of such a thing. Granpa composed an appropriate rhyme--threw it off with no trouble at all--which was forever lost to the world, because Jinny and Tommy Cox were relieving their overcharged feelings in a prolonged bout of hip-pip-pip-hurrahs! And Balaam Atkins took the news like the gentleman he was, and with a terrific effort, managed to ejaculate: “I hope you will be very, very happy, Miss Letty.” But Letty unfortunately did not hear him, in the general hubbub surrounding her.

“Before calling on my future son-in-law for a reply,” shouted Mr. Johnson, over the tumult, “I want to make him a little Christmas-box. I want to make it here, in front of you all. It’s the custom of the country, and I speak of the best country in the world, which is England” (“Rule Britannia!” yelled Tommy), “that the lady shall name the day. Well, I’m going to reverse that process. I’m a bold man, and I’m going to give Mrs. Grundy a rouser. Me and my wife and my daughter are going to sit mum, while the bridegroom now fixes the date of the wedding. It may be that he’ll say in a month; or it may be that he’ll get scared of the noose of matrimony--or shall I call it the noose-ance?” (loud laughter) “and plead for six months’ extension of liberty. Or it may be he’ll say to-morrow,--one never can tell with these fiery-headed young chaps how much delay they can stand!” (more laughter) “I just hope he’ll remember that young ladies need a little time to get together their frillies,--at least, so I’ve been told.” (“Go on! as if you didn’t know!” from Mrs. Baker, rather over-excited.) “Sebastian, my boy, it’s up to you.” Mr. Johnson sat down.

Amid acclamation, Sebastian was hauled to his feet. Letty gave his hand an encouraging squeeze.

“For he’s a jolly good fel-low!”

started Tommy Cox; in a burst of gruff enthusiasm, Luke joined in; and then the rest of the company.

“--And so say all of us!”

... They were silent now, waiting for Sebastian.

* * * * *

Past the heat and the uproar and the odour of food, past the coarse laughter and good-humoured jokes, the grinning capped faces, and the disorderly table, Sebastian glimpsed it clearly, his Vision ... never before as clearly: a lean stripped figure, striving, battling, forcing itself against the rushing winds of earth; hands clenched, jaw pushed forward ... yes, surely it was Stuart’s face he saw!

--These others should share the vision with him. He was about to sacrifice to it--these others should understand why. He knew now to what point he had been goaded through all the sweetness of the past weeks, through all the gabble and gobble of the past hour. He knew. He wasn’t going to flinch. Boring a hole in the wind with the thrust of one’s own body.... If Stuart could do it, he could.

* * * * *

The first notes of his voice startled his hearers; it seemed pitched somehow in the wrong key; neither jocular nor embarrassed:

“I can’t fix a day for the wedding, as Mr. Johnson has asked me to. I--there won’t be a wedding. My engagement with Letty is broken off.”

* * * * *

--Suddenly he wanted to laugh. Granpa’s face, just opposite, looked so funny in its dropped amazement, the gilt crown at a crooked angle on the shining poll.... Everyone’s face was funny--staring--staring--round eyes and open mouths wherever he looked--like waxworks. Letty ... well, Letty was beside him. He need not see her unless he turned his head....

* * * * *

“You all think me quite mad,” Sebastian went on, after a pause. “Well, and I think you mad, all of you. I’ve been thinking so all through dinner. Because you can’t see anything beyond the dining-room table, and what’s on it. If I married Letty, I should have to sit for the rest of my life at a dining-room table, looking at the food. It would be warm and comfortable and satisfying, and in time I should grow as mad as you. I very nearly did. But I’m sane now--and I’m bitten with the horror of getting all one wants, and going on getting it, and not wanting any more. Giving up Letty now, I shall want her my whole life long ... for I love her--do you understand that? Of course, you think one shouldn’t speak of love except to be funny about it--but you’ve got to realize that I love her, every bit of her; that I love her, and I’m giving her up--and oh, God! how it hurts.... How good that it should hurt....”

He bowed his face on to his hands, unable for an instant to grapple with the swift salt cruelty of self-torment. From beside him, came the sound of soft weeping. There was to be no splendid help from Letty, in his renunciation; quite simply, she laid her head down on her arms and sobbed, because she didn’t know what was the matter with Sebastian,--oh, what was the matter with him, that he should be so unkind?

Luke was gazing, wide-eyed, mouth gaping; he had not understood a single word of Sebastian’s discourse, but, nevertheless, his soul was one flame of admiration. A half-fearful hope of happiness was stiffening the limp spirit of Balaam Atkins. But Mr. Johnson, on whose brow a ponderous wrath had gathered, burst out, almost apoplectic with rage:

“Let me tell you, sir, that if you’re not a lunatic, you’re a blackguard. You’re behaving like a blackguard!”

Sebastian raised his head: “I’ve told you that I want her,” he cried fiercely; “is that behaving like a blackguard, not to take what you want?--But you’re thick, every one of you; thick with food and drink. Can’t you get clear of your flesh for a moment, and get a grip of--of---- Look here, this is neither my creed nor my credit: it’s another man’s ... he’s _done_ it, I tell you--stripped himself of love, because it’s better to desire than to possess. If you’re strong enough.... If you’re strong enough. I gave up my solid income, and my solid position in the world,--didn’t that show you I must have had some keener leaner ideal than just welfare? Or did you merely think me possessed?... But it’s splendid, I tell you, to be possessed; possessed by the truth; driven by it--hounded--tortured--till you cast away all goods, all ties,--run a race against your own luck--outstrip your own luck--just for the fun of it--throw off the bondage ... bondage of great deeds....”

He was repeating Stuart’s catch-phrases now; flinging them out mechanically, hoping they would sting some blind understanding, where his own eloquence had failed.

And then his mood changed, as he discovered it didn’t matter if these people understood or not; he had done his part; done what Stuart Heron had done before him: cut away love....

--“That the memory of love shall be like a sword-blade,” he muttered half-aloud; but the words meant nothing--they tasted dry. Letty’s sobs were each a separate pang in his heart. The Vision, having spurred him to the culminating burst of exaltation, now deserted him altogether. He did not know any more for what strange reasons he had performed this strange act. But since the master knew, that was sufficient; the disciple was content to follow blindly. He would go now and lay his shattered world as a tribute at Stuart’s feet ... where he had already laid his father’s disappointment ... his own ambitions. His shattered world at Stuart’s feet.

He pushed back his chair, and stumbled to the door. Nobody tried to stop him. He had paralysed the happy Christmas party, so that no sound broke through the leaden silence ... even Letty was quiet now. Sebastian groped among the overcoats hanging from the hall rack--so many overcoats--he was quite incapable of recognizing his own. Did it matter, after all? But still he took down first one and then another from their pegs, and replaced them, stifled by the musty folds. A wreath of holly, which encircled the mirror set in the rack, tumbled to the ground. Sebastian picked it up, stood in a dazed fashion, the thorns pricking his fingers: was there no end to the damage he was doing these people’s Yule?

Mrs. Johnson led her weeping daughter from the dining-room, and up the stairs. They passed Sebastian as if he did not exist.

... “Oh, mother, how could he, in front of them all, say that he didn’t love me any more?”...

So much for Letty’s comprehension of motive. Sebastian laughed hysterically, and banged the hall door behind him. Half-way up the road, he looked back, and saw Luke signalling to him from the gate. He went on. Could not be bothered with the boy. Stuart--he was going to Stuart.

* * * * *

Disappointedly, Luke turned back into the house. On the threshold he was met by Jinny:

“Everybody’s so horrid. Wasn’t he a beast to spoil all our fun? Luke, do let’s get away from everybody for a bit, till they’ve calmed down. I’ve bagged some chocs from the table.” She displayed them, moist and brown, clenched in her hot hands. She looked very pretty, in her bright pink dress and coral beads. Luke surveyed her a moment. Then he said:

“I don’t want any chocs. And I’m not ever going to see you again, Jinny, old girl. At least, not if I can help it”; he remembered the proximity of her dwelling.

Jinny dropped her spoils; and, crimson with anger and surprise, gasped out:

“Well I never! You potty _too_!”

“No,” retorted Luke, kicking with his foot against the top step, “I’m not potty, and nor’s he. You girls don’t understand, that’s all. There are things we can do better without you. Things!” he repeated darkly, wondering the while what they were. “Girls are soft----”

“We’re not soft. Soft yourself!”

“I don’t mean that sort of soft. And the more we care for you, the finer it is of us to break with you.” He had grasped this much from Sebastian’s outburst. “So you see, Jinny----”

But Jinny was neither as submissive as Letty, nor as responsive as Peter, under similar treatment.

“Break with me, indeed!” tossing her curls indignantly, while the big pink satin bow at the nape of her neck, perked out in aggressive sympathy; “well, you _have_ got a cheek on you, Luke Johnson. Got to be on with a girl before you’re off with her, _I_’ve always heard. And you were never on with me, that I’m jolly well sure. No, nor likely to be,--a great gawky lumpy-faced boy!”

She picked up her coat, which was lying in a crumpled heap at the foot of the hall-stand, and flouncing past her stricken sweetheart, marched down the four steps of Town House, and up the four steps of Arcadia, next door.

--Luke made a sudden forward dive over the stone parapet that divided them, and caught Jinny awkwardly by her skirt:

“Let me go!” she twisted round, that he might not see the tears which scalded her eyes.

“Jinny,” his voice was low; “it’s--I was only joking, y’know. It’s all right about the panto to-morrow, isn’t it?”

“Not so sure.”

“Jinny!”

“Oh,--I suppose so!” she detached herself from his grasp, and vanished indoors.

* * * * *

Luke had not been able to pull it off, after all. Not quite.