The Empire Trilogy (54 page)

“It's quite a relief to hear you say it. I'd begun to imagine things.”

“You haven't a thing to worry about. Take my word for it.” And Mr Delahunty, with a smile, indulged the Major by going with him, even so, to take a look at the crack behind the tapestry in the writing-room. Nothing structural, he declared, simply an “easing of the brickwork.” Happened in all old places. But the upper storeys? The dry rot? The place the Major had put his foot through?

“You're bound to find that some of your woodwork doesn't come up to scratch. 'Tis the damp in the air that does it. Any old house in Wicklow or Wexford will be the same. But that's not to say they're going to fall down. Far from it. When you feel like it, Major, do a bit of re-timbering. Take your time. There's no hurry. The old Majestic will still be here long after you and I are dead and gone.”

“There's no need to take a look upstairs then?” Mr Delahunty laughed out loud at this. Taking the Major's arm he said: “Look here, Major, you can say what you like against me but I know my buildings. Take it from me, this one will last another couple of hundred years if it lasts a month. There it is. Say what you like against me...” He hesitated, as if he half expected a denunciation from the Major. As none came, however, he added quickly: “Now let's go and have some of that lovely tea you mentioned.”

The Major had gone to some pains to organize tea for himself and Mr Delahunty in the privacy of the writing-room, which he had taken the precaution of locking earlier in the afternoon.

Curiously, however, after his first cup of tea Mr Delahunty's conversation languished, his amiable barks of laughter became intermittent. He even failed to respond to one or two, admittedly rather dull, anecdotes the Major found himself recounting.

“Tea all right?”

“Oh, splendid. Absolutely top-hole.”

The Major attempted several topics, regretting that he knew so little about architecture. Finally he tried to inter-est Mr Delahunty in the situation in Ireland today, a subject on which he surely had a great deal to say. But although he smiled and murmured vague replies he seemed preoccupied. His eyes roved absently around the walls and the ceiling. He appeared to be listening for something. When the maid, coming for the tea-tray, slammed the door he jumped violently.

Presently he looked at his watch and held out his hand to the surprised Major.

“But I thought you were staying to supper?”

“Appointment I forgot about, old chap. Maybe another time.”

As they took leave of each other in the foyer Mr Delahunty's eyes continued to rove absently here and there.

“Well, I'm glad to hear there's nothing to worry about. You've taken a load off my mind.”

“Oh yes, you haven't a thing to worry about,” murmured Delahunty and once more before leaving, though rather cautiously, rapped the wall with his chubby knuckles.

Now that the Major's mind had been set at rest about the structure of the Majestic it seemed less important to him that the guests should be encouraged to leave. However, the collapse of the building itself was not the only factor involved. There was also the increasing violence in the countryside, where the Majestic stood in vulnerable isolation. There was the simple absurdity of continuing to run the place as a hotel when it had long since ceased to resemble one. Above all, there was the deterioration in Edward's state of mind (not to mention the suspicion that he'd gone clean out of his wits) since the slaughter of the piglets. Bacon off the menu for ever, so the cook had been instructed. Revolvers to be laid out with the knives and forks in case of emergency at mealtimes. Clearly the fewer strains on him the better. Sooner or later, in any case, the guests would have to be got rid of. The Major was still haunted by the harsh laughter that had echoed over the rooftops.

But some of the ladies had been there for a very long time indeed. They had lasted through the winter; they had a right to stay through the summer as well. Of course they had no real rights at all. They had simply been there for so long that they seemed to have acquired the right to stay for ever—that is to say, until they died, which they would presumably do eventually. But the process might still take a considerable time.

The Major went amongst them and intimated vaguely, nothing definite yet, of course, that one of these days it mightn't be such a bad idea if they gave a little thought to where they would be moving on to after...well, after what? After Edward went completely off his head, perhaps...After the I.R.A. established their headquarters at the Majestic (and good luck to them!)...After the unforeseen, whatever it turned out to be, had happened...What could the Major say that would not be unsuitable?

He was so vague that he succeeded only in alarming them. They listened unsympathetically. Gradually they became indignant. The Major fell to a lower point in their esteem than he had reached since the day he had put an end to their punitive shopping expeditions. First they found themselves having to “fight it out” with the servants for the use of the bathrooms (the axiom that the servants “never washed” and at home kept coal or potatoes in the bathtub seemed to have proved faulty). First that and now this. It was intolerable. They had a jolly good mind to leave! The Major, eyes on his shoes, nodded miserably and looked chastened, having forgotten for the moment that this was precisely what he wanted them to do anyway.

“All I really meant was that Mr Spencer has decided against taking in any new guests—with a view to closing the place down eventually.”

But the ladies were not soothed, particularly as Murphy chose this moment to shamble forward and announce that a party of young gentlemen had arrived.

“But that's impossible!” cried the Major, dismayed by the speed with which he had been unmasked. “Tell them they can't stay.”

“But the master does be saying they can,” countered Murphy with relish.

The Major hurried off to find Edward and remonstrate with him. But Edward had already welcomed the party, half a dozen young undergraduates from Oxford spending their vacation in Ireland in order to get to the bottom of the Irish question. He was full of enthusiasm. They were Oxford men! At last a chance for some intellectual discussion...They had chosen to make a special study of Ireland and discuss matters with various strata of society, a real attempt to get to grips with the feelings of the Irish people, not just the Shinners! There was no gainsaying the fact, young people today took a more direct, more sensible and generally less hypocritical approach to politics than the older generation. They were imbued by a new sense of social justice...“No, no, Brendan, I can see you smiling but it's true. We can learn from the young if we keep our ears open. Besides, they're only here for a night or two.” And Edward went on to describe how, long before the war, he had eaten a splendid dinner in All Souls... Ah, the quotations from Aristotle and St Thomas Aquinas! The shellfish, too, had been magnificent. And the port peerless.

There was nothing to be done about it. The Major was turning away when Edward added: “By the way, a parcel didn't arrive for me from London, did it?”

“Not that I know of. Something from Fortnum's?”

“No, as a matter of fact. I wrote away for one of these things I saw advertised in the paper.” He fumbled in his pocket and at last located a newspaper clipping which he handed to the Major. With raised eyebrows he read that Messrs Wilkinson's Sword Company was offering bullet-proof waistcoats—steel within silk, weighing only five pounds. “Send us the following particulars and we guarantee you a perfectly fitting garment. Waist and chest measurements, sloping or square shoulders, hollow or round back. Five guineas well spent would be the means of preventing a fatality.”

“Would you say I have a round back?”

“Oh, I shouldn't have thought so.”

“Ah, well, thanks...D'you suppose they're any good?”

“Afraid I never met anyone who wore them.”

“Just thought I'd ask. It's not that I'm getting the wind up or anything like that. It's foolish, though, to risk a fatality for a ha'porth of tar. That's the first thing they teach you in the army.”

Five of the undergraduates had been correctly identified by Murphy as young gentlemen, rather noisy and talkative ones. From a first-floor window the Major watched them dubiously as they sauntered out on to the lawn where Seán Murphy had been instructed to set up croquet hoops. The sixth, however, was an older man, taciturn and rather self-conscious. He sometimes laughed when the others laughed but not quite so spontaneously. If he cried: “Good shot, Maitland!” or “Your turn, Bunny!” or “Bravo, Hall-Smith!” it was usually to echo one of the others who, for the most part, addressed him with distant politeness or ignored him altogether. Later, when they came in for a specially arranged tea with cucumber sandwiches (served in the gun room to inhibit the ladies) the Major learned that this older man's name was Captain Roberts and that, yes, he had been “up” when the war broke out. And yes, it was a bit hard getting back to one's studies—at least, he added with an agonized smile, he'd found it so at first anyway. But now, of course...And his sad, shocked eyes returned to the faces of his high-spirited companions.

Presently, the latter having drunk their tea and eaten their sandwiches as unconcernedly as if such things were an everyday occurrence in their lives (as no doubt they were), they returned to their game on the lawn and Captain Roberts trailed after them, a walking reminder of the follies of the older generation if his young companions had needed a reminder (which of course they did not).

The Major viewed dinner that evening with foreboding. There was a faint possibility that Edward, who seldom appeared for meals these days, might forget to attend. Before anyone else arrived, however, he was standing at his chair in the dining-room. On each side of his own seat three empty places had been reserved for the young men: the places of honour, a fact which did little to mollify the indignant old ladies.

The undergraduates arrived late and somewhat out of breath after ragging through the corridors while changing for dinner. There had been an attempted debagging of Maitland, who was the elected butt of the party. Then someone had pinched one of his socks and thrown it out of the window, so that when he followed the others into the dining-room he was wearing odd socks and looking so humorously aggrieved that the others could hardly suppress their laughter.

But Maitland was promptly forgotten when the impatient Edward showed them to their places. In fact they positively goggled with amazement. Laid out at each place beside the silver cutlery was a...revolver! Amazing! Everything people said about Ireland was true! The Irish were completely mad! They hardly dared catch each other's eye.

Only Captain Roberts, gloomily eyeing the dim and distant contours of the room, seemed to have noticed nothing unusual. While they were waiting for soup to be served he absently picked up the revolver set at his place, spun the empty chamber, hefted it for a moment in his palm, then put it down again, picking up a silver fork instead. Having twirled it briefly between finger and thumb, he replaced it carefully, peering in a worried fashion across the table at the three bright and gleeful faces of his companions opposite. What on earth was the joke
this
time? Not for the first time since the vacation had begun he wondered uneasily whether he might not have lost his sense of humour.

“Pass the word along,” Bob Danby on his left whispered, groaning with pain, into his ear. “What can the last course possibly
be
?”

So it was the revolvers set out with the cutlery that was arousing the mirth of his companions! As he passed Danby's joke on to Bunny Burdock on his right he reproved himself for not having noticed—though, as a matter of fact, he
had
noticed, assuming merely that the hotel had rats. In the mess dug-outs in France they had been in the habit of blazing away throughout the meal at any rats scampering by—otherwise the beggars would have eaten the food off your fork. He cleared his throat, on the point of describing all this to young Hall-Smith opposite, but then he thought better of it. These young chaps listened politely, of course, when he talked about the war. On one occasion, however, while he was describ-ing some “show” or other, Maitland had said: “Oh, give the bloody war a rest will you, Roberts? It's been over for three years!” Of course Maitland had had a few beers and no doubt he had been egged on by his desire to please the others. Still, it was all past history now, all that; no reason why they should be interested.

Meanwhile an argument had started between the huge craggy-faced individual at the end of the table who must be the owner of the place (he was hardly obsequious enough to be the manager) and Bob Danby, who was their spokesman for political and intellectual matters (and was strongly fancied as the next President of the Union). And Danby seemed to be in particularly splendid form this evening.

“But what you're saying isn't the least bit logical,” he was now protesting. “Although I agree that the Irish people may not be the most intelligent in the world I simply can't believe that they would
voluntarily
choose to elect bandits and murderers, as you call them, to handle their affairs...Come now, that really
is
a bit steep, sir!”

“Tell me then what they've done except ambush unarmed men from behind hedges, shoot innocent people, drive cattle and plunder farms and generally bring the country to her knees, eh? Tell me!”

“You're missing the point,” groaned Danby, throwing up his hands in mock despair while the others watched him with amusement (old Danby was off again!). “The point is
democracy
, plain and simple. Only a few days ago Sinn Fein swept the country in the elections as they did in 1919. For every seat in the Southern Parliament except the four from Trinity they were elected without opposition. Look, sir, I'd even go as far as to say that if the majority of the people actually
want
to be governed by murderers (though I don't agree that they are for a minute) rather than by us British then they have a perfect right...after all, it's their business. I mean, have you even read Rousseau's
Le Contrat social
? The fact is that in 1919 the Irish people elected the people they presumably wanted...Why should they elect people they didn't want? The result was that Sinn Fein won seventy-three seats and the Unionists only won twenty-six...Now if that isn't a clear expression of the will of the people frankly I don't know what
is
!”