Parents and Children (15 page)

‘Honor, tell Hatton to see that Nevill does not choke,' said Eleanor.

‘Is that what Hatton does?' said Hope. ‘And the other nurse and Miss Mitford and Miss Pilbeam all do their own things. Suppose something unforeseen should arise? I suppose you would have someone else. I am so glad this was not unforeseen.'

‘Civilization has its weaker side,' said Fulbert.

‘It seems a strong side, so well supported,' said Graham.

‘It is more difficult to make other people do things than to do them yourself,' said Eleanor.

‘It seems a foolish way of arranging matters,' said Daniel.

‘What a family for liking difficult things!' said Hope. ‘Always choosing the harder part.'

‘You would not suggest, Daniel, that your mother should be a slave to all the departments of her house?' said Ridley, in some consternation.

‘Yes, I would, if it would save her any trouble.'

‘Isn't anyone going up with Nevill?' said Eleanor. ‘I am so afraid he will choke.'

‘Are you really?' said Hope. ‘I do sympathize with you. You make me very anxious, myself. Can't we send for the person who deals with it? You would want to get that off your mind.'

Sounds came from the hall that disposed of the question, and Venice hastened to her brother's aid.

‘That is a good sister,' said Eleanor, as her daughter returned,
leading Nevill, who capered forward in open relief. ‘Is there anything to be done out there?'

‘Mullet heard and came down,' said Venice.

‘It was Mullet, was it?' said Hope. ‘Not Hatton; you were wrong, Eleanor; but it is a good deal to keep in your head.'

‘You are laughing at us as a family, Mrs Cranmer,' said Luce.

‘I am only jealous of you for being one, dear.'

Nevill ran up to Regan.

‘He ate it all at once,' he said, looking at the table. ‘But not do it another time.'

‘No, no more today,' said Eleanor. ‘People who are sick have had enough.'

Nevill turned and ran to the door, the purpose of his presence being over. A maid opened it and he went out.

‘You should say, “Thank you”,' called Eleanor, who though providing attendance as a matter of course for her children, did not approve of their accepting it in the corresponding spirit.

Nevill ran back and up to the maid, and taking her apron, looked up into her face.

‘Thank you,' he said, and dragged her from the room.

‘He did want someone else,' said Hope. ‘And they say that children left to scramble up anyhow, do better.'

‘Honor and Gavin can run away too,' said Eleanor. ‘The elder ones at the table can stay.'

‘Why don't they all do the same?' said Hope. ‘Because it would be easier?'

‘They would not like it. The same things are not suited to them.'

‘Do you understand them like that? And I thought that parents always misunderstood their children.'

‘The very strength and possessiveness of a parent's feelings may prevent easy understanding,' said Luce.

‘Is that what I said?' said Hope. ‘I am glad. It sounded like something not so nice.'

‘Is James at home today?' said Eleanor, looking at her son.

‘Do a parent's feelings render a child actually invisible?' said Graham.

‘But is he at home? You know what I mean. Is he not well?'

‘It seems that children understand their parents,' said Paul, laughing.

‘Sons understand their mothers, we know,' said Hope. ‘But is it a thing we talk about?'

‘There is a holiday at the school,' said Isabel, while Faith gave a glance at her stepmother.

‘Oh, that is what it is,' said Eleanor, as if this were a more venial circumstance than indisposition. ‘But the holidays seem to come rather often. It is early in the term.'

‘It is the schoolmaster's wife's birthday,' said James.

‘Is it?' said Paul. ‘Or is it out of the Bible or the grammar?'

‘Either is very suitable for a school,' said his wife.

Faith gave another glance at her.

‘Would the master give a holiday for his own birthday?' said Daniel.

‘He never does,' said James.

‘It seems a reversal of the usual theories with regard to ladies' birthdays,' said Ridley.

‘It is nice of him to choose his wife's,' said Hope. ‘It makes him seem so glad that she was born.'

‘I don't know why the rest of us should rejoice,' said Regan.

‘It is James who is doing so, and he knows her,' said Hope. ‘One sees what the master means, and I think it is very nice.'

‘I never see her,' said James.

‘Well, that does make him seem rather absorbed in his own point of view. But it is pleasant to keep birthdays, Lady Sullivan, and he will give James a holiday on yours, if you wish.'

‘James takes a holiday on mine anyhow,' said Regan, smiling.

‘Well, that is the birthday to be kept,' said Sir Jesse. ‘That, if no other.'

His wife looked deeply moved.

‘I think you are even better than the schoolmaster, Sir Jesse,' said Hope.

‘Now, Isabel and Venice, let us hear your voices,' said Eleanor.

For a moment no sound at all was heard.

‘Do you have a holiday on Miss Mitford's birthday?' said Paul.

‘We don't even know when it is,' said Venice.

‘An unjust distinction between educationists,' said Daniel.

‘We should not despise people who are employed in the house,' said Hope.

‘Miss Mitford is a very well-read woman,' said Faith.

‘Yes, that is not at all like despising her, dear.'

‘Books seem to come for her by every post,' said Regan.

‘I think that is rather like it,' said Paul.

‘Miss Mitford has been with us for seventeen years,' said Luce.

‘I hope it is not a tragedy in a phrase,' said Graham, his tone not betraying that he really hoped it.

‘She would be well-read by now,' said Isabel. ‘The books do come twice a week.'

‘Grandma was not exaggerating as much as I thought,' said Daniel.

‘Ninety-six times a year, if we do not count her holidays,' said Isabel.

‘I do not wonder you wanted them to talk, Eleanor,' said Hope. ‘It would have been a great pity to miss it.'

‘Now we know the length of Miss Mitford's holidays,' said Daniel.

‘I do not,' said Paul, while Fulbert rapidly and openly calculated on his fingers.

‘Four weeks,' said Faith, in a slightly breathless tone, outstripping him by a tense and covert effort.

‘You see I did have her educated,' said Hope.

‘Now I think Miss Mitford will be expecting you,' said Eleanor to the children.

‘Let them stay for a while,' said Fulbert. ‘I will have them while I can.'

‘Yes, I am to lose my son, Cranmer,' said Sir Jesse, who was inclined to refer any subject to himself, and to address his words to men. ‘I ought to say I may never see him again. But somehow I feel I should not mean it.'

‘People would think you did,' said Regan.

‘I should not,' said Hope; ‘I am sure he is immortal.'

‘I am seventy-nine,' said Sir Jesse.

‘There, I said you were.'

Regan laughed.

‘But I must not depend on my father,' said Fulbert. ‘And I
should make my plans to meet the event of anything's happening to me. The one thing's happening, of course I mean. I only have the normal chance.'

‘I daresay there are plenty of risks out there,' said Regan.

‘Someone must break it to my mother and my wife,' went on Fulbert, with the faint unction that marked his utterance of anything that bore on himself. ‘Someone must share the guardianship of my infant children. My sons are young, and younger to my wife than they are. I am dependent on someone outside. Paul, will you face the risk of another man's burdens?'

‘I am no good at other people's affairs. I don't take as much trouble with them as I do with my own. I don't even take enough trouble with those.'

‘Then, Ridley, I must turn to you,' said Fulbert, doing as he said. ‘We have never been close, or even perhaps congenial friends; but I depend on your character; you have our affairs in your hands; you would work well with my wife. Will you undertake the trust?'

Ridley rose to his feet.

‘I will undertake it, Fulbert. And from the bottom of my heart will I regard it as a trust.'

‘It is not as if it would ever happen,' said Regan.

‘Lady Sullivan,' said Ridley, turning quickly to her, ‘do you think we should be calmly discussing it, if we thought it would?'

‘I don't know what else you could do.'

Ridley looked round, allowed his face to relax into a smile and resumed his seat.

‘Well, there is an end of that,' said Fulbert. ‘I can return to my own character. There is something unnatural in making plans for one's own end.'

‘It is too necessary for us to like it,' said Regan.

‘It is very brave,' said Graham. ‘But people think so, and that is something.'

‘I think we ought to go, Mother,' said Faith.

‘You mean we are constraining their last hours?'

‘I have not seen any sign of constraint.'

‘We are happy to be helped over them,' said Sir Jesse. ‘It is hard to talk to my son, with this in front. And most of what I
have to say can wait for his return. He must have heard it many times.'

‘He will not be in the same position, Sir Jesse,' said Ridley, speaking with easy confidence in the future. ‘He will have much to relate, that is entirely unfamiliar.'

‘We know he will come back, if he is alive,' said Regan. ‘It will be a good thing when he is gone now.'

‘What are you children doing, listening to grown-up talk?' said Eleanor.

‘You have stated our occupation,' said Isabel. ‘And it is hard to see our alternative.'

‘You can all run away to the schoolroom.'

‘You do mix the sexes,' said Hope. ‘I was wondering if I had been wrong in keeping Ridley and Faith together.'

‘Brothers and sisters are separated soon enough.'

‘Ridley and Faith were not. We only found it out when they were.'

‘Ridley was always a very masculine type,' said Faith. ‘And he was some years older than I was, and I think more developed for his age.'

‘You must remember you are speaking of your brother, dear,' said Hope.

‘I said nothing against him, Mother.'

‘You were damning him with faint praise; I think with almost no praise at all. I believe you were just damning him.'

‘I am not always thinking of praising people or not praising them.'

‘It would be nice to think of the first, dear.'

‘You don't often do it yourself, Mother.'

‘Well, I so seldom see any cause for praise. And when I do, I am so often upset about it. So it is not very easy for me.'

‘I shall be quite an important person for the next months,' said Fulbert. ‘I daresay you all think it will be a change.'

‘It had not crossed my mind, Father,' said Luce, with a smile.

‘Other things will be that, my boy,' said Sir Jesse. ‘My advice is to make the most of them.'

‘Away, away, you children,' said Luce, gently clapping her hands.

‘Yes, Miss Mitford will be expecting them,' said Eleanor.

‘Miss Mitford's heart must grow sick with hope deferred,' said Graham.

‘You have taken a weight off my mind, Ridley,' said Fulbert.

‘There is happily no need to regard it as transferred to mine.'

‘I wish I could sometimes meet a mark of confidence,' said Hope.

‘Different people are suited to different things,' said Faith.

‘I don't think that is a better way of putting it, dear, or anyhow not nicer. I ought to go away like Fulbert, and let absence make the heart grow fond.'

‘Such a step would be fraught with danger for many of us,' said Ridley, shaking his head.

‘I don't mean I should dare to go.'

‘Ridley does not mean in Mr Sullivan's case,' said Faith. ‘He was thinking of ordinary people like ourselves.'

‘Being coupled with you, dear, makes up for everything,' said Hope.

‘I think the gap must tend to get a little narrower,' said Fulbert, in an unflinching tone.

‘It is a good thing if it does,' said Regan; ‘I am sure I hope it will.'

‘What should we talk about, if it disappeared?' said Graham.

‘Do you think you will miss your father less, as time goes on, Graham?' said Eleanor.

‘I hope my elders are right. I want to be saved all I can.'

‘Do you, Daniel?'

‘I will take Grandma's word for it.'

Eleanor looked round in an instinct to pass on to James, but realized that he was gone.

‘You ought to bear your own testimony, my dear,' said Fulbert, ‘if you require it of other people.'

‘I think you ought, Mother,' said Luce.

‘I shall miss your father more with every day.'

‘I am sure that is the truth, Mother. And very few people could say it unflinchingly like that.'

‘I am glad Grandma set the fashion, and not Mother,' said Graham.

‘This is excellent for the gap,' said Daniel. ‘Father may have been getting anxious about it.'

‘How wonderful heroism is!' said Hope.

‘I think we ought to leave them, Mother,' said Faith.

‘To wallow in our family miseries,' said Regan, in a tone of contempt for the prospect.

‘I have never seen the courage of despair before,' said Hope.

‘I can quite understand it,' said Faith. It does not show any lack of feeling.'

‘We shall be outstaying our welcome,' said Paul.

‘And doing other things to it,' said his wife. ‘Good-bye, Fulbert; we shall meet you again before you go, and again when you come back; it will be nothing but meeting. I am hiding everything under a cheerful exterior, as that seems to be the kind that is always used.'