Delphi Works of Ford Madox Ford (Illustrated) (320 page)

“I’m the chap who did look after his estates,” Robert Grimshaw said. “I’m not saying that I wouldn’t have influenced Dudley Leicester against you; I didn’t, as a matter of fact. I never said a word against you in my life; but it’s possible, of course, that my taking up his land business, out of sheer meddlesomeness, may have influenced him against you. Dudley’s got more in him than appears on the surface. Or, at least, he can stick straight in a way if he is put into it, and just about that time Dudley got it into his head that he
had
a duty to his county and his country, and so on...”

Etta Stackpole’s fingers moved convulsively.

“Oh, my man,” she said, “what the deuce’s business was it of yours? Why couldn’t you have let him alone?”

“I’m telling you the worst of what I did to you,” Robert Grimshaw said. “I didn’t take Dudley Leicester from you. I’ve never said a word against you, but I probably kept him from coming back to you once he had thrown you over. I don’t mean to say that I did it by persuasions; he was dogged enough not to come back, but I dare say he would have returned to you if he hadn’t had his mind occupied — if I hadn’t occupied his mind with barn-roofs and rents and field-draining, and the healthy sort of things that keep a man off women.”

“Oh, you devil!” Etta Hudson said. “Who’d have thought you had it in you? Where do you get it from? You look just like any other Park loafer.”

“I suppose,” Robert Grimshaw said speculatively, “it’s because I’m really Greek. My name’s English, and my training’s been English, and I look it, and smell it, and talk it, and dress the part; but underneath I should think I’m really a Dago. You see, I’m much more my mother’s child than my father’s. She was a Lascarides, and that’s a clan name. Belonging to a clan makes you have what no Englishman has — a sense of responsibility. I can’t bear to see chaps of my class — of my clan and my country — going wrong. I’m not preaching; it’s my private preference. I can’t bear it because I can’t bear it. I don’t say that you ought to feel like me. That’s your business.”

“My
word!
” Etta Hudson said with a bitter irony, “we English are a lost race, then!”

“I never said so,” Robert Grimshaw answered. “I said you were an irresponsible one. You’ve other qualities, but not that one. But that’s why I’ve been a sort of Dutch uncle to numbers of young men of our class. Dudley’s not the only one, but he
is
the chief of them.”

“And so you took him up, and dry-nursed him, and preached to him...”

“Oh, I never preached to him,” Grimshaw said; “he had the intelligence to see...”

“To see that I’m an undesirable woman?” she asked ironically.

“To see, if it’s held under his nose, that it’s profitable and interesting and healthy to do the best for the people that Chance, Providence, whatever it is, has put under him in this world. It helps them; it helps him. He’s got a desire by now to be a good landlord. It’s a languid desire, but it’s as much a part of him as his desire to dress well.”

Etta Stackpole said:

“By gum!”

They were dodging between a huge electric tram and the kerb of a narrow street beside a grim and squalid brewery; they dipped down under a railway arch; they mounted a rise, and ran beside a green, gay with white painted posts and rails, and surrounded by little houses. Etta looked meditatively in front of her with an air as if she were chewing tobacco.

“By thunder, as Clemmy van Husum says,” she brought out at last, “you dry-nursed him till he’s good enough for marrying a little person you’ve kept in a nursery, and she—”

“She takes charge!” Robert Grimshaw said. “She’ll give him personal ambition, or if she doesn’t do that she’ll make him act just as if he had it, in order to please her. He’d kiss the dust off her feet.”

“Thanks,” she said spitefully. “
Rub
it in.”

The cab swayed along in the gay weather.

“What a father-protector you are,” she said, “according to your own account, and all because you’re a — what is it? — a Dago? Well, well! you’ve got all the virtues of Greece and all the virtues of us too. Well, well, well!”

“Oh, come, come,” Robert Grimshaw said. “I’ve given you your opening; you’re quite right to take it. But I’ve not the least doubt that I’ve got the Dago vices if any pressure came to bring ‘em out. I dare say I shouldn’t be straight about money if I were hard up. Fortunately, I’m not. I dare say I should be untruthful if I ever had occasion to be. I should be rather too tender-hearted and too slack to get on in the world if I had to do it — at least, I suppose so.”

She said:

“Well,
well! Here s
a joke! Here we have — what is it? — a Dago — a blamed Dago, as Clement P. would say.”

“You know the Van Husums?” Grimshaw interrupted her.

“Oh, I thought I’d tickle you,” she said. “Yes, I know the Van Husums, and your Katya Lascarides was in their employment, wasn’t she? But I’m not going to talk of your other flame, Mr. Robert Hurstlett Grimshaw. You don’t play your Oriental harem trick in this taxi-cab. One man one girl’s the motto here. I only introduced Clement P.’s name to stir you up; you’re so
damn
calm.”

“This is a fight,” Grimshaw said. “You score one and go on.”

“What are we fighting for?” she asked.

“Ah! that’s telling,” he said.

“If you only want to tell me I’m a bad, bad girl,” she said, “I know it already. I’m rather proud of it.”

“You ought to be,” he said; “you play up to it well. But it’s not that that would have brought me here. I’ve got an object.”

“Want to make me promise to leave your adopted nephew in peace?” she asked.

“Oh, Pauline’s taken hold again,” Grimshaw said. “You aren’t going to have another look in.”

“Oh, I’ve had all I want of him,” she said. “She can have the dregs.”

“That’s a pretty appropriate word at present,” he said. “A good word for Dudley — dregs.”

“What the deuce do you mean?” she asked. “Anything happened to Dudley?”

“You’ll hear when we get to Bushey,” he said. “I’ll tell you when we pass the fifth chestnut of the avenue.”

“What the deuce is it?” she asked.

He answered merely: “Ah!”

Her hard eyes gazed straight forward through the screen of glass.

“Something happened to Dudley?” she said. “And it’s not that his wife’s lamning into him about me.”

“Oh, Pauline takes it as the negligible thing that it was,” Grimshaw said.

She uttered:

“Thanks!” still absently. Then “Dregs?” she repeated. Suddenly she turned upon him and caught hold of his hand.

“It’s not...” she began.

“You’ll hear when we get to Bushey,” he said. “It’s ten minutes still.”

“Oh, you devil!” she said—” you tormenting devil!”

He just lifted up one hand in token of assent.

“Yes, it’s the function of the devil to torment the damned. You’ve had what you wanted in Dudley Leicester’s case; now you’ve got to take what you get for it — from his best friend.”

“His wife’s best friend,” she said.

“And his wife’s best friend,” Grimshaw repeated calmly. They were shooting fast over bad roads between villas. Etta Stack- pole may have shaken with laughter, or it may have been merely a “Thankee, marm” in the road.

“Well, it’s a damn funny thing,” she said. “Here’s our Dago God Almighty splitting himself to set up a bright and beautiful English family upon its respectable legs. What a lark! I suppose it’s out of gratitude to the land that gives him hospitality. He picks up a chap without a backbone and turns him into a good landlord. Then, when he’s made (I suppose you
have
made) perfectly sure of his morals, he hands him over to a bright and beautiful English girl ‘of good family and antecedents’ (that’s the phrase, ain’t it?), and she’s to run the dummy along till it turns into a representative Cabinet Minister — not brilliant, but a good household article. That’s the ticket, isn’t it?”

Grimshaw nodded his head slowly.

“And so the good old bachelor makes a little family for himself — a little harem that doesn’t go farther than the tea-table — with what he can get of Katya Lascarides for Sultana No. 1 and Ellida Langham and child for No. 2. No. 2’s more platonic, but it’s all the same little dilly-dally, Oriental, father- benefactor game; and No. 3’s Pauline — little pretty Pauline. Oh, my eye!”

She regarded the gates of the Park flying towards them.

“What is it the Orientals allowed? Four wives and forty of the other sort? Well, I suppose you’ve plenty of lesser favourites. Why not take me on, too?”

“Oh, you!” Grimshaw laid good-humouredly—” you’d always be upsetting the apple-cart. You’d have to be bow-stringed.”

“I believe a sort of Sultan father-confessor would be good for me,” she said, as she gathered her skirts together.

The car had stopped near the dingy yellow Park wall, whose high gates showed the bourgeoning avenue and the broad, sandy road.

“Well, this has been what you might call a
conversation galante
so far.”

CHAPTER VI
.

They passed the little weather-beaten and discoloured lodge, waited for half a dozen deer that with delicate and nonchalant footsteps passed from the light of the broad road into the shade of the avenue; then they followed them into the aisle between the columnar trunks, the vista stretching to an infinite distance. The deep silence of the place seemed to render them both speechless. She walked, holding her long skirts held high.

Suddenly Grimshaw said: “Here’s the fifth tree.”

She answered: I don’t want to hear what’s happened to him.”

“Ah, but you’ve got to.”

She averted her face.

“I know,” she said.

“You’ve heard?”

Her voice was rather muffled when she said:

“No. I prophesied it. He’s had a panic. Perhaps he’s cut his throat. I don’t want to know. It serves him right.”

“He is mad,” Grimshaw said slowly.

She stood quite still with her back to him. Her broad shoulders heaved.

“All right, it’s my fault,” she said. “You needn’t rub it in. Go away.”

“I’m not saying it’s your fault,” he said. “The point is whether he’s curable or not. You might possibly help us.”

She stood quite still.

“Why should I want to help you?” she said.

He looked at her statuesque limbs. Beyond her the level grass stretched out. The little company of deer wandered from a patch of cloud shadow into a patch of sunlight. The boughs of a small enclosure, heightened by vivid greens, shook in the April wind.

“Oh, don’t take it too hard,” he said. “I know what it’s like.”

She faced suddenly round upon him, her eyes rather staring.

“Who’s taking it hard?” she said. “Let him rot.” She added: “You devil, to tell me not to take it hard! What do you know about it? Go and give someone else hell. I’ve done with you.”

She began to walk away between the trees. After a while he followed her.

“Look here,” he said, “if...”

She turned violently upon him, her eyes staring, her mouth drawn into a straight line.

“By God!” she threw out, “if you follow me, I’ll throttle you!”

“Listen,” he said. He called after her: “I don’t believe it’s really your fault. I’ll wait here and tell you why when you’re ready to hear.”

She walked away fast, and then, finding that he did not pursue her, she wandered slowly and aimlessly between the tree-trunks. Close to him a bole of one of the great trees formed a table about knee-high. He took off his silk hat, and, holding it in his hand, sat down. His face was an ashy white, and slowly little drops of sweat came out upon his high forehead. He rose and went into the road, looking upwards along the avenue. At a little distance she stood leaning one hand against a tree-trunk, her head bowed down, her long skirt falling all around her feet, a tall and motionless figure, shadowy and grey amongst the young green.

He returned to his bole. After a long time another small company of deer passed quite close at hand. Suddenly they quickened their pace, their feet rustling on the turf.

“Well,” Etta Hudson said from close beside him, “what is it you want?”

He said: “It’s like this: three days ago Dudley Leicester seemed to go mad. He assaulted a man after asking him an apparently senseless question. We have had him under observation ever since. And he’s twice stopped strangers in the street and asked them the same question. When they’ve answered ‘No’ he attempts to assault them. He’s got an attendant now, and if he’s headed off before he can ask the question he’s calm enough; but he won’t speak a word.”

Etta said: “You might let me sit down there; I can’t stand.” And when she was on the bole she asked expressionlessly: “What’s the question he asks?”

“It’s always,” Grimshaw said, “whether the man — a perfect stranger — rang up your telephone number.”

Etta Stackpole said: “Ah!...”

She sat silent for a long time, looking down at the ground, Grimshaw standing before her and looking musingly at her face.

“Well, what is it you want to know?”

“I want to know,” he said,” what happened on the night he saw you home.”

“I didn’t think,” she said expressionlessly, “that you could play the cad as well as the private detective.”

Robert Grimshaw uttered sharply the one word, “Rot!”

“Well, it’s a cad’s question, and you must have played the private detective to know that he saw me home.”

“My dear woman,” he said, “don’t the Phyllis Trevors know it, and Mme. de Mauve- sine, and Mme. de Bogota, and half London. I am not making any accusations.”

“I don’t care a pin if you are,” she said.

“It’s merely a question of this sort,” he went on. “The doctor who’s in charge of the case wants to know whether he had any shock on that night. He wasn’t by any chance knocked down at a crossing? He didn’t fall? The cab horse hadn’t been down?” She shook her head minutely. “There wasn’t any violent scene? Your husband...”

“Oh, he...” she said. “Besides, he was in Paris.” Suddenly she broke out: “Look here, you don’t know what this means to me. I don’t mean to say that Leicester’s very much to me, but still, it’s pretty sickening to have it happen to him.”

“Well” — Grimshaw conceded a point—”I’m not saying that it’s your fault.”

“Oh, I’m not worrying about whose fault it is,” she said. “It’s him. It’s the thought of him, poor harmless devil!” She looked up at Grimshaw. “What doctor have you got? What does he say?”

“We’ve got a man called Wells,” he answered. “He doesn’t say much either way. He says he can’t tell till he knows what happened.’’

She scrutinized his face.

“Look here,” she said, “this
is
true? You aren’t merely telling me a tale to get things out of me?” Grimshaw did not even answer her before she looked desolately down again. “Of course it’s true,” she said; “you aren’t that sort.”

“And you knew I knew already that he saw you home and that he stayed two hours,” Grimshaw said. “What I want to know is what gave him a shock.”

“Ah!... you’d get that from his servant,” she said. “He’d be sitting up for Dudley. Well, I don’t care about that; I’d fight any case on that.”

“Oh, don’t worry,” Grimshaw said. “I promise you that Pauline...”

“Don’t you,” she said suddenly, and clenching her hands, “don’t you mention that little pink toad to me, if you want to get anything out of me. I hate her and I hate you! You got Dudley away from me together. Why, it’s been like devils and angels fighting for a man’s soul. That’s what it’s
been
. I’m a religious woman, though you mayn’t believe it. I believe in angels and the devil, too.” She pulled her skirt a little up from the ground. “I expect you’ll say,” she began again, “that you’re on the side of the angels. Well, see what you’ve made of him, poor dear! This wouldn’t have happened if you’d left him to me. It’s you that are responsible for it all — you, poking your nose into what doesn’t concern you.”

“Ah!” he said slowly and rather mournfully, “perhaps it has turned out like that if we get outside and look on. But as to which of us is which — angel and devil — I should not care to say.”

She looked up at him.

“You wouldn’t?” she said.

“You see,” he said, and he shook his head slowly, “perhaps it’s only a case of a square peg and a round hole. 1 don’t know. If you’d had him you’d have let him be a loafer all his life. Perhaps that’s all he’s really fitted for. Possibly, by shoving him on to do things, Pauline and I — or I principally — have brought this sort of thing on. Englishmen haven’t any sense of responsibility. Perhaps it’s bad for them to have it aroused in them. They can work; they can fight; they can do things; but it’s for themselves alone. They’re individualists. But there is a class that’s got the sense of duty to the whole. They’ve got a rudimentary sense of it — a tradition, at least, if not a sense. And Leicester comes of that class. But the tradition’s dying out. I suppose it was never native to them. It was forced on them because
someone
had to do the public work and it was worth their while. But now that’s changing, it isn’t worth while. So no doubt Dudley hadn’t got it in his blood.... And yet 1 don’t know,” he said; “he’s shaped so well. I would have sworn he had it in him to do it with careful nursing. And Pauline had it in her — the sense of the whole, of the clan, the class, the county, and all the rest of it. Women have it much more often than men. That’s why she isn’t going for you. Only the other day she said to me: ‘I’m not the sort of girl to give ourselves away.’”

“Now, look here,” she said, “what right have you, a confounded foreigner, to run us down? We take you up; we let you be one of us, and then you gas. There’s a great deal too many of you in the country. Taken as you are, on your own showing, poor dear Dudley, that you patronize — damn you — is worth a score of you. If you’re so set on the public service why isn’t it you who’s standing for 1 Parliament instead of him? You’re ten times as rich. You’ve a hundred times more the gift of the gab...” and she broke off, to begin again.

“Whatever you can say of him,” she said “he doesn’t go nosing out secrets and peeping and prying. He is straight and clear, and as innocent as a baby, and as honest as a die—”

“If he’s as honest as a die,” Robert Grimshaw said, “why was he carrying on an intrigue with you all that time? He must have been pretty deep to keep it concealed from me.”

She looked up at him with pale fury.

“Oh, you horrible-minded man!” she said. “How dare you! How dare you! You may kick me as much as you like. I am down. But you let Dudley Leicester alone. He’s too decent to be jumped on by a man like you.”

Grimshaw displayed a sudden and incomprehensible agitation.

“Then he hadn’t been carrying on with you?” he said.

“Carrying on with me?” she mocked him, but with a bitter scorn. “Do you mean to say that you suspected him of that? I suppose you suspected him of fooling about with me before he was married to his Pauline, and after {

What an unspeakable toad of a mind you’ve got!”

Robert Grimshaw said, “Good God!”

She struck her hip with her clenched hand. “I see it,” she said, “you thought Dudley Leicester had seized the chance of his wife’s mother being ill to monkey about with me. You thought he’d been doing it before. You thought he was going to go on doing it. You thought he’d managed to conceal it from you. You thought he was a deep, dark ne’er-do- well like yourself or any other man. But I tell you this: Dudley Leicester’s a man in a thousand. I’m the only person that’s to blame. I tell you Dudley Leicester hasn’t spoken a word to me since the day we parted. I tell you I got him just that one night to show myself what I could do. He couldn’t help being with me; he had to see me home. We were all at the Esmeralda together, and all the rest of us were married, or engaged or coupled up somehow. He
had
to see me home as we lived next door. He did it with the worst grace in the world. He tried to get out of it. It was because he behaved so like an oaf that I set myself to get him. I swear that it is true. I swear as 1 am a religious woman. I believe in God and things.”

Again Robert Grimshaw said, “Good God!” and his agitation grew on him.

“Well,” Etta Stackpole said, “what is there to get so upset about? It doesn’t count in Dudley for dissoluteness. There isn’t a man in the world, not even yourself, Robert Grimshaw, could get out of my having him if I set myself to it at that time of night and after that sort of evening. I’m not boasting about it. It’s the nature of the beast that you men are. I set myself to do it because I knew it would mortify him; because it would make him feel he was a dirty sort of dog next morning. What are you in such a stew about?” she said. ‘It wasn’t anything to do with Dudley’s real nature. I tell you he’s as pure-minded as a sucking-lamb.”