Part 6

To-day’s poem:—

O World, be nobler, for her sake! If she but knew thee what thou art, What wrongs are borne, what deeds are done In thee, beneath thy daily sun, Know’st thou not that her tender heart For pain and very shame would break? O World, be nobler, for her sake!

LXXI

ANTOINETTE ROSSITER TO HER MOTHER

DEAREST MUMMIE,—A man has been here to cut wood and we watched him. He said that every time the clock ticks some one dies and some one is born. He said that the best food for rabbits is Hog-weed and he is going to give us two baby rabbits. He said that jays suck pheasant’s eggs. I can’t remember anything else, but he is one of the nicest men who have ever been here. Oh yes, he said that when he was a boy he and the other boys used to put little teeny-weeny frogs on their tongues and make them jump down their froats, but don’t be alarmed, I don’t mean to try this, not till we see what happens to Cyril. Do come home soon.—Your lovingest

TONY

x x x x x x x x

Love to Lobbie.

LXXII

ROY BARRANCE TO VERENA RABY

DEAR AUNT VERENA,—It is extraordinary how things happen for the best, and I am sure that I am being looked after by fate in some strange particular way. I never have gone in much for religion, but that there is a kind of guardian spirit for people who behave decently I am convinced. You remember about Trixie? Well, for quite a long time I was heart-broken and couldn’t enjoy food or anything. But I see now that it had to happen, it was all done for my good, because it gave me more depth and maturity so as to be ready to meet Stella on level terms.

Stella is the loveliest girl you ever saw and quite the best partner I have yet danced with, almost my own height and so extraordinarily light and supple without being too thin. She also has a tremendous sense of humour, which I consider most important in a perfect marriage. Lots of marriages, I am convinced, have gone wrong because the husband and wife had different ideas of a joke. Poor mother, for instance, never sees that father is pulling her leg, and it makes her querulous where she ought to laugh.

I wish I could bring Stella to see you. She sings divinely and can play all the latest things by ear after hearing them only once; which is, I think, a wonderful gift and makes her the life and soul of parties. She would do you a world of good. On a houseboat at Hampton last week-end she never stopped. It was smashing.

Her people are very well off, her father being on the Stock Exchange. They live at Wimbledon and have a full-sized table. Do write and send me your congratulations. I have not seen her father yet, but my idea is to make him take to me so much that he finds a place for me in his office. As there are no sons, he will probably want someone to carry on the business and I don’t doubt my ability to pick up the threads very quickly. I wish it was Lloyd’s, because I am told that is child’s play, but I don’t doubt I could cut a figure on the Stock Exchange too.

Stella has a retroussé nose and the most adorable smile. We have thousands of things in common, besides a love of dancing. She says she doesn’t want an engagement ring, she would much rather have a deer-hound, so I am trying to get one. I wonder if anybody breeds them in your neighbourhood?

Father wants me to go to Oxford, just as if there had been no War, but I don’t feel that I could possibly endure the restrictions there. Besides, what would Stella do? During the War she worked too, for all kinds of Charities. She was splendid. When you feel well enough, you must let me bring her down to play and sing to you.—Your affectionate nephew,

ROY

LXXIII

VERENA RABY TO RICHARD HAVEN

DEAR RICHARD,—Some of your special privileges seem to be coming my way, for I am now largely occupied in writing letters of counsel, chiefly to nephews and nieces in whom the fever of love burns or does not burn. Theodore’s girl is the last—so very much a child of the moment as to think that wanting a thing and having it should be synonymous. I am feeling very grateful I am not a mother and I felicitate with you on your non-paternity. Parents just now are anything but enviable. None the less....

It’s funny how the young people come to me for help, just as though I were a flitting Cupid instead of a weary stationary horizontal middle-aged female, whose only traffic in the emotions occurred in the dim and distant past and is for ever buried.—Good night,

V.

LXXIV

NICHOLAS DEVOSE TO VERENA RABY

MY DEAR SERENA,—If I may call you again by that name, which to me, in spite of everything, is sacred still—I have only just had, from my sister, the news of your illness, having in this far spot few letters from home, and I write at once to say that I am deeply grieved and hope that already you are better.

If you can bring yourself to write, or to send a message by another hand, I implore you to do so. You may think it hard that it needed a serious injury to occur to you before I wrote again, but that would not necessarily convict me of callousness. I swear to you, Serena, that not a day has passed without my thinking of you—and always with the tenderest devotion to you and always with self-reproach and regret that, so largely through my fault, or, even more, my own impossible temperament, your life may have been circumscribed and rendered less happy.

I know, through various channels, certain things about your life to-day, but of course only externals. I know, for instance, that you have not married; but whether that is because of me (as my own singleness is certainly associated with you, or rather with us), I do not know. I know by how many years you are my junior, and I am forty-nine next week. If you are conscious of loneliness and it is my influence that has kept you from marrying, I am sorry; but there are worse things than celibacy and it is probable that both of us are best suited to that state. I certainly am. The common notion that every one ought to marry is as wrong-headed as that every one ought to be an employer of labour. Very few persons are really fitted to live intimately with others; and the senseless heroic way in which the effort is made or the compromise sustained is among the chief of those human tragedies which must most entertain the ironical gods peering through the opera-glasses of Heaven.

I must not suggest too much melancholy. I don’t pretend that life has nothing in it but wistful memories and regrets. On the contrary, I taste many moments of pleasure. But—even while enjoying my own somewhat anti-social nature—I should, were I asked to stand as fairy godfather beside cradles, wish for no child a sufficient income to indulge impulses, nor too emphatic a desire to be sincere, nor, above all, any hypertrophied fastidiousness. In a world constructed not for units but for millions, such gifts must necessarily isolate their possessor.

When the War broke out I was in Korea. Since last we met I have been all over the world and at the present moment am in Fez. I have thousands of sketches stored away, some of which might be worth showing, but I can’t bring myself to the task of selection and all the other arrangements; I can’t sometimes bear the thought that anyone else should see them, so you will gather that I am very little more reasonable than of old and probably even less fitted to take a place in the daily world.

If it would be any kind of pleasure to you to see me—if I could help you in any way—you have but to let me know. I shall be in Madrid, at the Grand Hotel, till the end of next month and will do as you tell me.

N. D.

LXXV

JOSEY RABY TO VINCENT FRANK

DARLING VIN.,—Every one is against me and therefore I must act alone. Will you be at Euston with two tickets on Saturday evening and we will be married in Scotland. It is the only way. After I am married they will all understand and be reasonable.

If you would rather fly to Scotland, let me know and I will meet you anywhere.

I have got a wedding ring.—Your devoted

J.

LXXVI

VINCENT FRANK TO JOSEY RABY

[_Telegram_]

Impossible. Writing.

VINCENT.

LXXVII

RICHARD HAVEN TO VERENA RABY

MY DEAR VERENA, to return to the great money problem, I think you ought to know that the papers print particulars of the will of a Hastings innkeeper who set apart the interest on £300 for an annual supper to sixty Hastings newsboys. And a little while ago I cut from the _Times_ a will in which the testator, a fellmonger and a gunner, killed during the War, left “£1000 in trust during the life of his wife to apply the income for a treat for the children of the Chelsea and District Schools, Banstead, such treat to consist of sweets, strawberries, or a visit to the pantomime, and to be in the nature of a surprise.”

Well, there would be no difficulty in arranging for little things like that. All you want is a good almoner and perhaps Miss Power would take the post. And here again you could see the fun going on, which the dead cannot. At least we used to think they couldn’t, but the evidence on the other side is accumulating. There is a conspiracy afoot to make us think that the dead “carry on” too much as we do.

All you need is to ask yourself which kind of worker is least rewarded, or you are most sorry for, and go ahead. Lamb’s friend, James White, would have chosen chimney-sweeps. The late landlord of the Royal Oak at Hastings would have replied “Newsboys.” Miss Rhoda Broughton would reply, “Overworked horses.” On my own list would occur railway porters. Also compositors. And what about the little girls who carry gentlemen’s new garments all about Savile Row and the tailors’ quarters—is anything done for them? And the window-cleaners—they can’t have much fun. And oyster-openers—what a life! And carpet-beaters—Heavens! And the little telegraph girls, in couples, with the grubby hands. No, the list would not be hard to compile.

There are possibilities of social regeneration in it, too. Certain horrible imperfections—due to haste and false economy and a want of thoroughness—are allowed year after year to persist, to the serious impairing of the nation’s nerves, which might be removed, or at any rate reduced in number, if some warm-hearted living hand, like yours now, or wise dead hand, like yours in the distant future, were outstretched. For example, a legacy of a thousand pounds would not be thrown away if the interest on it were offered every year as a prize to the maker of chests-of-drawers which would open most easily, or the maker of looking-glasses which remained at the desired angle without having to be wedged. The details would have to be worked out, perhaps through some furniture trade paper, but what a heightening of effort and what a saving of temper might result! And if a prize were offered to the firm of haberdashers whose buttons were most securely sewn on, what a wave of comfort might be started! I bought some soft collars at a first-class shop only last week and the buttons were all loose and some of the button-holes were too small; and it was I who suffered, not the haberdasher. All he did was to spread his hands and complain about post-war carelessness; whereas he might just as well have supervised the things before they were sent home as not. One of the most infuriating things in Peace-time is the impossibility of punishing anybody—except oneself. The world is so prosperous that one can’t touch it. Once one could set a tradesman’s knees shaking by merely expressing the intention of going elsewhere in future; but it is so no longer.

But this is dull reading for Herefordshire. Are not these lines on the toilet table of Marie Antoinette poignant?—

This was her table, these her trim outspread Brushes and trays and porcelain cups for red; Here sate she, while her women tired and curled The most unhappy head in all the world.

R. H.

LXXVIII

VINCENT FRANK TO JOSEY RABY

DARLING JOSEY,—I hated having to telegraph, but there was nothing else to do.

You know, my sweet, that part of a man’s job is to look after his woman, and I can’t feel that we should be playing the game to go off like this. The more I think about it the more convinced I am that your father knows what he is saying and that we ought to wait. After all, impossible though they are, fathers have got some kind of right to put their damned old trotters down now and then, and especially when one is still eating from their hands. Besides, I don’t know from day to day what I am going to do—the whole force is in such a muddle with Winston tinkering at it—and it wouldn’t be playing the game to marry now. Three years isn’t such a terrible long time and I may be an Air-Marshal by then, who knows? After all, we must live, and I haven’t got a bean beyond my rotten pay, and if your father turns us down, where are we? Echo answers where. Especially as my people have always set their hearts on my marrying that red-headed horror I showed you in the distance at the Russian Ballet.

No, my angel darling sphinx, the sweetest thing ever made or dreamt of, let us be sensible, much as it goes against the grain, and wait. I’ve got my eye on an absolutely topping engagement ring in Regent Street, which shall be yours in a fortnight from to-day and we’ll have the most gorgeous fun.—Your grovelling lover,

VIN.

LXXIX

CLEMENCY POWER TO THE HON. MRS. POWER

DEAR MOTHER,—Things go along very comfortably here, so comfortably that I have a guilty feeling that I am not earning my salary at all, but spending a happy visit. I now have a weekly journey to Hereford to do any extra shopping that may be needed. I go in a car in state in the morning and have lunch at the Green Dragon while the things are being packed up.

We are now reading nothing but the _Times_ and Thackeray. Having just finished _Esmond_ we are beginning _The Virginians_. Miss Raby’s father used to read it to them all and she says it brings old times back: but I should prefer a change now and then. I find that I can manage reading aloud now with much less fatigue. Don’t you think girls at school ought to be trained in it?

Did I tell you that my employer, Mr. Haven, had a wonderful Solitaire board made on which Miss Raby can play while lying at full length on her back? The cards have holes in them at the top, and are hung on instead of being laid down, as on a table. She is able to sit up better now and can use a table, but she keeps this for times when she is tired. Don’t you think it is the very thing for Grannie? I think I shall get one made and send it to her.

I have even taken on a class in the school—teaching what is called daily sense. It is the idea of my employer, Mr. Haven, and consists of showing the little beggars how wrong it is, for instance, to stand on the middle of the cane seat of a chair, instead of on the wooden edges, and things like that. The schoolmaster was very ratty about it at first, but I did some of my blarneying and now he’s a lamb.

It’s wonderful what an effect a little brogue has on these Sassenachs. I noticed it among the soldiers in France, officers and men, and it’s the same here; and I swear I never really try. But doesn’t it look as if all that poor old Ireland needed to get her way was to send out an army of Norahs and Bridgets just to talk and so convince?

Mr. Haven was here the other day. He is very nice—tall, with very soft quite white hair, prematurely white. He did Miss Raby a world of good—Your dutiful truant,

CLEMENTIA

LXXX

VERENA RABY TO NICHOLAS DEVOSE

DEAR,—Your letter was indeed a voice from the past—almost from the grave. It was kind of you—it was like you—to write, but I almost wish you had not. I have a long memory. Come back if you will, but do not come here without letting me first know that you are in England. But for your own sake I think you ought to return now and then and challenge criticism. It is not fair, either to yourself or to others, to bury all those beautiful pictures—for I am sure they are beautiful. You could not do anything that was not beautiful or distinguished. I am growing stronger every day and the doctors are hopeful about my being able to be active again, almost if not quite as before. Nicholas, believe this, I have no quarrel with fate, my life has been happier far than not.

SERENA

LXXXI

JOSEY RABY TO VERENA RABY

MY DEAR AUNT V.,—This is just to tell you that it is all over. Vincent, when the time came, had no courage, so we have parted. I am now unable to eat, and expect and hope shortly to go into a decline and die. This is a world of the poorest spirit and I have no wish to continue in it. Think of me always as your loving

J.

LXXXII

RICHARD HAVEN TO VERENA RABY

Well, the Great Day has nearly passed, and Peace having now been formally celebrated we must look out for squalls. I saw the procession from a window, the owner of which—my old friend Mrs. Kershaw—is paying her rent out of the money she made by letting the rest of the rooms. The caprice which decided that the route should embrace her house she looks upon as a direct answer to prayer.

This reminds me of a true story, told me by Mrs. Northgate-Grove, of their page-boy, who has been very carefully brought up. At the local Peace sports he was entered for the 100-yard race, which, he said, would be an absolutely sure thing for him, provided the telegraph boy didn’t run. On the night before Peace Day, one of the family passing his bedroom door heard him on his knees imploring Divine interference. “O God, I pray Thee that some important message may prevent the telegraph boy from being able to compete.” And here’s another nice prayer story. A small girl was overheard by her mother asking God to “Graciously make Rome the capital of Turkey.” “But why do you pray for that, darling?” “Because that’s how I put it in the examination paper to-day.”

My head aches from this overture to the millennium and I wish we were a year on. We are settling down so perilously slowly. In fact, here in London you would think it a perpetual Bank Holiday, whereas never in our history ought we to have been working harder than since the Armistice. But who is to tell the people how serious it all is? The statesmen’s “grave warnings” and the newspapers’ constant chidings equally are usually cancelled by parallel pages of incitements to frivolity and expense. England, for the greatest nation in the world, can be singularly free from _esprit de corps_.

But these are gloomy Peace-Day reflections—possibly due to the fact that it has begun to rain and the fireworks will be spoiled. I am to see them from a roof in Park Lane. I would much rather spend the evening in the bosom of some nice family and watch a baby being bathed and put to bed. That is the prettiest sight in the world; but I don’t know any babies any more. Where are they all? Every one—particularly as he gets older and more disposed to saturninity—should know a baby and now and then see it being put to bed.

Well, here goes for the fireworks.—Yours,

R. H.

_P.S._—Here is the poem—foreshadowing joys beyond all the dreams of Oliver Lodge:—

Within the streams, Pausanias saith, That down Cocytus’ valley flow, Girdling the grey domain of Death, The spectral fishes come and go; The ghosts of trout flit to and fro. Persephone, fulfil my wish, And grant that in the shades below My ghost may land the ghosts of fish!

LXXXIII

VERENA RABY TO RICHARD HAVEN

DEAR RICHARD,—The Peace Celebrations here, they tell me, were very quiet. I am glad that they are over at last and we can now all begin....

Your long letter about the benefactions has given me plenty to think about for some days. I had not thought of the distribution of money as being so full of amusing possibilities: almost too full. I should like to do something of the kind, but to confine it to my own neighbourhood. But then one’s name would be certain to leak out, and it is so dreadful to be thanked.

Meanwhile, I wonder what you will think of this idea. You remember Blanche Povey who used to live at Pangbourne? She married a doctor, a very nice man, Dr. Else, and they live at Malvern. Malvern is of course a happy hunting ground for medical men, because invalids go there, mostly rich ones, and Dr. Else would be doing very well, only for an infirmity. The usual one—he drinks. Blanche tells me that he is getting worse, and she sees nothing but disaster, and every time he goes to a patient she fears he may have over-stepped the mark and be found out. It seems to me that if a man in his position, a really nice man, could be promised anonymously a good sum of money on the condition that he did not touch alcohol for a year, much good might be done. How does it strike you? Or am I becoming that hateful thing, a busy-body? With the best intentions, no doubt, but a busy-body none the less.—Yours,

V.

LXXXIV

ROY BARRANCE TO VERENA RABY

DEAR AUNT VERENA,—You must not think I’m just a mere rotter when I tell you that Stella and I have parted. I know it looks silly to be in love with different girls so often, but then how is one to discover which is the real one unless one tries? Besides, at the time each is the only one. I liked Stella in many ways and I like her still, but I can see that we are not perfectly suited. Her nature makes her pick up new friends, chiefly men, too easily. My nature is not like that—I want one and one only. Although of course all this is Greek to you, perhaps you can sympathize.

Margot is much more like me and she shares my keenness for the country. Stella hated being away from London or excitement, while Margot loves walking among the heather and all that sort of thing. She knows a fearful lot about natural history too, and only yesterday, when we were on Box Hill, she corrected me when I said “There goes a wood-pigeon” because it was really a ring-dove. Pretty good, that, for a girl!

Don’t think I am flirting with her, because it would be no use as she doesn’t intend ever to marry, but I find her an A.1. pal and she is teaching me lots of things and making me much more observant. You would like her, I’m sure. Her father is a retired brewer with oceans of Bradburies, who wants her to marry a cousin.—Your affectionate nephew,

ROY

_P.S._—By the way, I saw Josey the other night at the Ritz, with a very gay party. She is the prettiest little thing.

LXXXV

RICHARD HAVEN TO VERENA RABY

MY DEAR, your question about the tippling medico is not an easy one to answer. How could he take money if he is a man with any pride? The thing becomes a bribe, and bribes are rather offensive. It is also on the cards that what he needs to pull him together is not your money, but just the jolt which expulsion from Malvern would give him. He might then make an effort and start afresh among patients who are really ill and in need of a doctor—panel work, for example. Somehow, I don’t like interference in this kind of case. There is always the chance, too, that teetotalism might make him self-righteous and injure his character in other ways, perhaps more undesirably than alcohol. That’s how I feel.

On the other hand, expulsion from Malvern might be the means of sending him wholly to the devil. His self-respect would be lost and he would sink lower and lower. In this case the burden would fall chiefly on his wife, for with the complete loss of self-respect there can come to the loser a certain peace of mind; the struggle is over; whereas she would suffer in two ways—through grief and through poverty. There’s no fairness in the world. The Gods may, as Edgar says, be just in making of our pleasant vices whips to scourge us, but there is no justice in including the innocent in this castigation—as always happens.

Your best way is to be ready to do what you can for the wife.