The Conscience of the Rich

39: Waiting in the Drawing-Room

Through each of those days when no one knew whether Ann would live, the sun shone into the great bedroom at Bryanston Square.

It was a warm and glowing autumn, and she lay in the mellow sunshine, not conscious for many minutes together. But I suspected that, while she was conscious, she had made a request to Charles. All of a sudden he gave orders that no one but the nurses was to visit her room, unless he specially asked them. He told his father so, giving no reason. Mr March knew that it was he himself who had to be kept from her sight.

Charles spent most of each night by her bed. After the fourth night, he rang me up and said she had had a long lucid interval, in which she was worried that she had not made herself clear to me. ‘She’s worrying about everything that occurs to her. If I can satisfy her about one thing, there’s another on her mind before she’s stopped thanking me. This Note affair is the worst.’ As he mentioned it, his voice became harsher. ‘I should be grateful if you’d tell her that you understood exactly what she meant.’

When I went into her room that afternoon, however, she scarcely recognized me. Her breathing seemed faster and her skin very hot. The rash on her lip was now full out, and her face was angrily flushed. She coughed and muttered. I waited for some time in the hope she would know me, but, though once she said something, her eyes stared at me unseeing and opaque.

I joined Mr March in the drawing-room, as I had done each day of her illness. He could not bring himself to go to the club; he was deserted, with no one to speak to. He spoke little to me, but we had tea together. He was listening for any movement of the nurses on the stairs so that he could rush outside and ask for the latest news. Occasionally he talked to me, and appeared glad of my presence.

He wanted her to die. He wanted her to die for a practical reason. He believed — he had not discovered the precise situation — that, if she were out of the way, it would not take long to stop the Note. He believed, quite correctly, that the means of stopping it would pass to Charles. His family would be left in peace. He took it for granted that there would be a temporary breach with his son. But nothing would come out. In the end they would be reconciled, and he would be left in peace for the rest of his life.

He knew that he wanted it. He was not an introspective man, but he was a completely candid one. Only a man much more dishonest with himself than Mr March could have resisted realizing what his feelings meant. As soon as he knew she was ill, he imagined what the benefit would be if she were dead. He could no more pretend the desire had not risen within him than he could deny a dream from which he had just woken. It was there.

He was too realistic to cover it with self-deceptions. He could not console himself that he was not the first man to watch a sickbed and find his longings uncomfortable to face. He did not think — how many of us have wished, not even for good or tragic reasons, but simply to make our own lives easier, that someone else, someone whom we may be fond of, should just be blotted out? Mr March would not console himself. He wanted Ann to die, whom his son passionately loved, whom he had himself once come near to loving.

It was on this account that he fretted so continuously. He could not suppress his thoughts: but anything he could do to help her he did with as much intensity as if her life had been precious to him. He had, on the second day, made his ‘practitioners’ bring in the consultant of whom Charles thought most highly; he had sent for the most expensive nurses; he could not have exerted himself more, if this had been Charles ill as a child.

He followed the illness minute by minute. Each time he could get a word with a nurse, he pressed her for the news. They were all astonished, as were the whole March family, by how violently he felt.

Meanwhile, Mr March thought often about death. He thought of her death and his own. He hated the thought of his death with all his robust, turbulent, healthy vigour.

Realistic as he was, he could not face it starkly in his own heart. On the outside, he could appear stoical, he could refer, to the fact, as he did to me several times on those afternoons, that in the nature of things his death must come before long. But, left alone, he did not think of it so.

Death to him meant the silence and the dark. It meant that he, who had been so much alive, would have been annihilated. Other lives would go on, busy, violent and content, ecstatic and anguished, comfortable and full of anxiety, and utterly indifferent to what he had been. Other people would eat in this house, talk in this room, love and get married and have their children, walk through the square, quarrel and come together; and he would be gone from it for ever. Any life, he cried to himself, any life, however stricken with pain, racked by conflict, beaten in all its hopes, is better than the nothingness. It would be better to be a shadow in the darkness, to be able to watch without taking part, than to be struck into that state for which all images are more consoling than the truth — just this world of human beings living out their lives, and oneself not there.

Those thoughts visited him as he waited day by day for news of Ann, never seeing her, forbidden by his son to see her. One afternoon I found him reading the current issue of the Note. He read it word by word. ‘Pernicious nonsense,’ he said. ‘But there is naturally nothing further about my brother Philip.’

Reports of Ann’s illness went round the March family, and the telephone in Bryanston Square rang many times a day. Sir Philip enquired daily: I wondered whether he too faced his thoughts. There were whispers, rumours, hopes, and alarms. So far as I knew, Katherine put through only one call. But Porson rang me up often, sometimes at Bryanston Square and often at night in my own house. ‘How is she?’ his voice came, booming, assertive, drunken, distressed. ‘I insist that she’s always wanted someone to look after her. How is she? You’re not keeping anything from me?’ Each day he sent flowers, more lavish even than Mr March’s. One evening, going home, I thought I saw him watching in the square: but, if it were he, he did not want to be seen, and hurried away out of sight.

Charles paid no attention to any of these incidents. He spoke very little to anyone in the house, and scarcely at all to his father. He was grey with fatigue, so tired that once in the drawing-room he went to sleep in his chair. He was entirely concentrated in Ann. Her sickroom was the only place where he seemed alive.

On the seventh day of her illness, the crisis came. Charles was in the house all that day; his partner had taken charge of his cases for the last forty-eight hours. After tea, Charles came down and said to me, in a hard, uninflected voice: ‘She would like to see you again. I must warn you, she is looking much better. You’ll probably think the danger has gone. That isn’t true.’

Despite his warning, I could not help thinking she was better. She was weak, she could not talk much; but her breathing was quiet now, the fever had gone, and she spoke almost in her ordinary voice.

‘You’ve got it clear, have you? I don’t want to force Charles’ hand. I’ve been worrying whether I made that clear. If anything happens to me, he must make a free choice.’

‘I’ve got it clear,’ I replied.

‘Thank you,’ she said. She gave a friendly matter-of-fact smile and said faintly: ‘I hope it won’t be necessary.’

Charles returned to take me away. He stood by the bedside, looking down at Ann; he made an attempt to smile at her.

With the clumsiness of fatigue, she interleaved her fingers into those of the hand he had rested on her pillow.

‘I’ve been giving Lewis instructions about the Note,’ she whispered. ‘That isn’t finished, you know. Had you forgotten it?’

‘Not quite,’ said Charles. ‘Not quite.’

For two days after, Charles was ravaged by a suspense and apprehension greater than he had yet known. The consultant had been called in again. They thought she had no resilience left. Mr March’s doctor told Charles that no one now could be certain of the end. Then she seemed to be infused by a faint glow of vitality, when they thought it had all gone.

In the afternoon of the ninth day, a warm and cloudless autumn afternoon, we knew that she had been a long time asleep. Mr March and Charles were sitting opposite to each other in the drawing-room, and I was on the sofa. The clock ticked on the mantelpiece, and each quarter of an hour there came its chime, sweet, monotonous, and maddening. It was beyond any one of us to go outside into the sunshine. It would have seemed like tempting fate.

Mr March’s face was an old man’s that afternoon. The skin beneath his eyes was dark sepia; his head was sunk down, the veins on his temples were blue. Charles was leaning forward, his hands locked together; his position did not change for half an hour at a time. Often when he was anxious he smoked in chains: that afternoon he did not smoke. There was no tinge of colour in his face. His eyes shone bright, bloodshot, and intent.

Mr March stared at him and once, with a grinding effort, broke the silence: ‘I believe that this sleep may be a good sign. They informed me before luncheon that they had considerably more hope.’

Charles made no sign that he had heard.

At last, it was well after four o’clock, we heard footsteps down the stairs, and a tap on the door. A nurse entered and beckoned Charles. He was out of the room at once. The nurse’s manner had not been specially grave, and I felt a touch of relief. Mr March and I exchanged a few words, and then fell silent again. The quarters chimed — half past, a quarter to. Suddenly Mr March sprang up and stopped the clock.

Then there was noise on the stairs, and the sound of a loud, unmuted, orotund voice: ‘I think she’ll do, March. If we look after her properly, I think she’ll do.’

Charles came into the room. He spoke directly to his father for the first time for many hours.

‘Did you hear that?’ he cried triumphantly. ‘Did you hear that?’

40: By Himself

Ann’s convalescence was a slow one, and she could not be moved from Mr March’s house. I ceased calling when the danger was past, but heard of her each day from Charles. She had asked Mr March to visit her in her room; it seemed that she had apologized for the inconvenience she had caused him by falling ill; she promised to go as soon as the doctors would let her. From what she told Charles, it had been an interview formal and cool on the surface. After it, Mr March had not spoken to Charles about her.

One afternoon soon after, Charles rang me up.

‘You remember when Ann was ill? She gave you a message for me?’

I said yes.

‘She said this morning that I could ask you about it. She’d rather you told me than tell me herself.’

I was taken aback, so much so that I did not want to speak over the telephone. I arranged to call at his house. As I walked there along the reach from Chelsea, the river oily in the misty sunshine, the chimneys quivering in the languid Indian summer, I was seized by a sense of strangeness. This new wish of Ann’s — for she had, while in danger, said that if she recovered she would tell Charles herself — this wish to have her message given him at second hand seemed bizarre. But it was not really that wish which struck so strange. It was the comfort of the senses, the warmth of the air and the smell of the autumn trees, assuring one that life might be undisturbed.

Charles was in his surgery. He was not pleased to see me. He did not want to be reminded of what I had come to tell him. He was looking better than when I had last seen him: he had made up sleep, the colour had come back to his face. But he was not rested. In a tone brittle and harsh, he began: ‘I’d better hear what she said. I suppose it’s about this wretched paper, isn’t it? I’d better hear it.’

I was sure that, since she got better, he had not been able to put the choice out of his mind. I gave him her message, as I should have been obliged to if she had died.

‘So she left it to me,’ Charles said.

He did not ask for any explanation at all. With a deliberate effort — it was the habit I had got used to when he was a younger man — he talked of things which prevented me saying any more.

‘I’ve been writing a letter,’ he said. ‘Would you like to read it? Do you think you would?’

I did not know what to expect. It was, in fact, a letter to the Lancet. In August, just before Ann’s illness, one of Charles’ cases had been a child of three ill with a form of diphtheria, in such a way that the ordinary feeding-tube could not be used. Charles had improvised a kind of two-way tube which had worked well. In the last fortnight, since he knew Ann would recover, he had discovered another case in a hospital, and persuaded them to use the same technique. It had worked again, and now he thought it worthwhile to publish the method.

‘You see, no one has ever been worse with his hands than I am,’ said Charles. ‘So if I can use this trick, anyone else certainly can. I can’t understand why some practical man hasn’t thought of it long ago. Still, it’s remarkably satisfying. You can believe that, can’t you?’

He put the letter on his desk, ready to be typed.

‘It’s all very odd,’ he said. ‘When I was very young, I used to think that I might write something. I imagined I might write something on a simply enormous scale. I should have been extremely surprised to be told that my first published work would be a note on a minor device to make life slightly more comfortable for very small children suffering from a rather uncommon disease.’

He was talking to keep me at a distance: but the sarcasm pleased him. He was genuinely gratified by what he had done. It was good to have aroused a bit of professional envy, to receive a bit of professional praise. It was good to have something definite to one’s credit. Concentrated and undiffuse as he was, he had been distracted for a few hours, even at this time, by getting a result.

But I was frightened, because he would not talk about the Note. I tried to get him to.

We had been intimate so long: not thinking it out as a technique to soften him, but just because I did not want to leave him quite alone, I confided something about my own marriage — something I had not told him before, nor anyone else. His eyes became sharp with insight, he gave me the support with which he had never failed me. But I did not get any other response.

At last I said: ‘Charles, will you let me ask you about something else?’

‘What is it?’

‘I don’t want to add to your trouble. You know that.’

‘I know that,’ he said.

‘Can you tell me what you propose to do? About stopping this paper?’

There was a silence.

‘No,’ he said. His eyes were steady. He went on: ‘I don’t know. It’s no use talking about it.’

The words were slow, dragged out. Looking at him, I believed he had spoken the precise truth. What his decision would be, he just did not know. But he was by himself, and nothing that anyone said could affect it now.

We went on talking. We even talked politics. I knew by his tone, what I already knew, that whatever he chose, politics would not move him either way.

As I sat with him, I believed that, whatever he chose, he was asking himself — I remembered, with a trace of superstition, the night in Bryanston Square after I had taken Ann to the concert — how much he could bear to dominate another. He had gone through too much in order to be free himself: it was harder for him to choose that she should not be.

Late that night I happened to see him again. I had been dining in Dolphin Square, and was walking home along the Embankment in the moonlight. I saw Charles coming very slowly towards me on the opposite side of the road. His head was bent, he was wearing no overcoat or hat; he might have been out at a case. As he came nearer, he did not look up. Soon I could see his face in the bright moonlight: I did not cross the road, I did not say good night.

41: Family Gathering

Three days later, I was surprised to be rung up by Charles. He told me that Katherine, her children, and Francis had arrived the evening before at Bryanston Square. I was surprised again; it was only a month since the baby was born; then I realized from Charles’ tone that they had come for a purpose.

They were pressing him to go to Bryanston Square for tea that afternoon: would I pick him up and go with him?

As soon as I saw him, I thought he looked transformed. He was still pale and tired: he was tired but not restless, tired but easy, as though he had just finished playing a game.

At once he asked me, in a relaxed, affectionate voice: ‘I’m sorry to be a nuisance, but just tell me again exactly what Ann said to you, will you, Lewis?’

At that moment I knew he had made up his mind.

When I had finished, he was quiet for a few seconds. Then he said, almost as though he were making fun of her: ‘I suppose she is much braver than you or me, isn’t she? I’ve always thought she was, haven’t you? Yet she didn’t want to tell it me herself. She was glad to get out of that.’

He smiled.

‘She’s been incomparably nearer to me than any other human being ever has, or could be again,’ he said. ‘She thinks I know her. But I was astonished when she wanted to get out of telling me. Sometimes I think that I don’t know her at all.’

On the way to Bryanston Square he asked me if I had ever felt the same, if I had ever felt that someone I knew and loved had for the moment become a stranger — utterly mysterious, utterly unknown. It was like the talks we used to have when we were younger.

Katherine and Francis were waiting in the drawing-room. Charles embraced his sister, held her in his arms, asked about the child. She told him how the delivery had been quick and easy. Charles showed a doctor’s interest as he questioned her. She replied with zest; she was physically happier, and more unreticent, than anyone there. She looked blooming with health, radiant as though she had just come from a holiday. The next hour was preying on her mind, she was heavy-hearted, but still she gave out happiness. It set her apart from Charles, or even from her husband, in whom one could see already the signs of strain.

Charles said: ‘I must run up and see Ann for five minutes.’

‘I suppose,’ said Francis, ‘that she can’t come down for tea?’

‘It wouldn’t be a good idea,’ said Charles. ‘Don’t you admit that it wouldn’t be a good idea?’

There was a sarcastic edge to his tone, and Francis flushed. When Charles had gone, Francis said to me: ‘This is intolerable whatever happens.’

He had become more than ever used to getting his own way: but his feelings had stayed delicate. He was still colouring from Charles’ snub, and a vein showed in his forehead. He would go through with what he had come to say, just as he went through with any job he set himself. But it cost him an effort which would have deterred a good many of us.

Katherine wanted to begin talking of Charles and Ann, but he stopped her. ‘We shall have enough of it soon,’ he said. I asked about his work; he was trying a major problem, but had struck a snag. We exchanged some college gossip.

We were beginning tea when Charles came down.

‘How is Ann now?’ said Francis, with a difficult friendliness.

‘She’ll be able to leave here next week,’ said Charles.

‘Good work,’ said Francis.

There was a pause. A spoon tinkled in a saucer.

‘As a matter of fact,’ said Francis, ‘it was about her, of course, that we wanted to talk.’

‘Yes,’ said Charles. His eyes gleamed.

‘I think we’re bound to ask you,’ Francis went on, ‘what the present position is about the Note. Has Ann stopped that affair?’

Charles answered: ‘I shouldn’t think so for a minute.’

‘What is the position then?’ said Katherine.

‘I imagine it’s exactly the same as when she fell ill,’ Charles said.

‘You mean, everything’s coming down on our heads, that’s what you mean, don’t you?’ she cried.

Francis asked: ‘I take it we’re right to gather that the only certain way of stopping this business is to get the Note suppressed?’

‘You’re quite right,’ said Charles.

‘And we’re right to gather that it’s in Ann’s power to do it?’

‘You’re quite right,’ said Charles.

‘She would do it if you told her?’

‘Certainly.’

‘Have you tried?’

For the first time, Charles did not answer immediately. He might have been considering telling them that by now the choice was his. At last he just said: ‘No.’

‘We must ask you to.’ Francis’ temper was rising. ‘You ought to know that I dislike interfering, but this is too serious to let go by. We must ask you to tell her.’

‘I absolutely agree with Francis,’ said Katherine loudly. ‘It would be gross to interfere between you and Ann, but this is an occasion which we simply can’t shut our eyes to, surely you admit that? We must ask you to tell her.’

Charles’ voice was quiet, level, self-possessed after theirs.

‘I haven’t the slightest intention of doing so.’

He looked from one set face to the other. Unexpectedly he smiled.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘You know how fond I am of both of you. Nothing will affect that, so far as I am concerned, don’t you know that? I would do anything for you both.’

‘Then for God’s sake do this,’ cried Katherine.

Charles shook his head. ‘I gave you my answer more unpleasantly than I ought to have done. But it’s still my answer.’

Francis tried to control himself, to subdue his tone in response to Charles’. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘we can’t leave it there. You know, Charles, I feel responsible to some extent. If it hadn’t been for my brother Herbert, we might never have got into this mess. He seems to have covered his tracks somehow—’

‘You needn’t worry about Herbert,’ I said.

‘Are you sure?’ said Francis.

‘Quite sure,’ I said. ‘He’s still got a chance of finishing up as a judge.’

‘I shouldn’t be surprised by anything he did. Not even that,’ said Francis. He turned to Charles again. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘you understand that we can’t leave it there.’

‘I know it’s difficult for you. And I’m sorry.’

Francis went on: ‘I want to make one point clear. Before I go on. We’re not prejudiced by Ann’s political motives you know that, but I want to tell you. I think she over-simplifies it all: but if it comes to two sides, we are on the same side as she is. It’s the only side one could possibly be on. I’m also prepared to admit that the Note has its uses. By and large it’s making a contribution. I should just say that it’s not such a major contribution — it’s not such a major contribution that she’s justified in driving on whoever is getting hurt. It is certainly not worth disgracing your family and breaking up Mr L.’

‘You must agree with that,’ said Katherine. Her voice was angry and menacing: unlike Francis, she was making no attempt to conciliate Charles. ‘Anyone in their senses must agree with that.’

‘I agree with you politically much more than I do with Ann,’ said Charles to Francis. ‘In fact, I’ve always been less committed than you, don’t you realize that?’

It was true. Of us in that room, Francis was the furthest to the left. ‘I’m much more sceptical than you, I suspect,’ said Charles, ‘about what Ann and her friends can possibly achieve. You think this paper of theirs has some value. I must say I doubt it. It’s different for her. She doesn’t doubt it in the slightest. If you’re going to lead that kind of life, you must believe from the start that every little action is important—’

Katherine was frowning, but Francis nodded his head.

‘For myself,’ said Charles, ‘I don’t think any of that matters.’

‘What does matter?’ said Katherine.

‘Simply that this is something Ann believes in. The suggestion is that I should force her to betray it.’

‘You must be mad,’ said Katherine. ‘You can’t give us a better reason than that for getting Uncle Philip into the newspapers?’

‘What reason would you like me to give?’

‘It’s not good enough,’ said Francis.

‘It won’t do her any harm to be forced,’ said Katherine. ‘If you’d done more of it earlier, this would never have happened. Don’t you see that you’ve been wrong since the day you met her?’

‘No,’ said Charles. ‘I don’t see that.’

‘We mustn’t criticize your marriage,’ said Francis.

Katherine interrupted him: ‘If your marriage is worth anything at all, this can’t make any difference. Don’t you see that you can’t afford to be too considerate? And we can’t afford to let you be. Could anyone in the world think the reason you’ve given is enough excuse for ruining Mr L’s peace of mind for the rest of his life?’

Charles said: ‘There was a time when you were prepared to take a risk like that.’ Katherine looked at him. Her bitter indignation lessened, for he had spoken, for the first time that afternoon, with sadness.

‘There was a time,’ he repeated, ‘when you were prepared to take a risk like that. And that time I was on your side, you know.’

‘It was the easy side for you.’ Her tone was stern and accusing again.

‘I should have taken your side whether it was easy or hard,’ said Charles. ‘I’ve always loved you, don’t you know that?’

Katherine was near to tears. He had spoken with a warmth and freedom such as she had scarcely heard. She said: ‘I can’t take your side now. I can’t take your side.’

She burst out: ‘Don’t you see that I can’t? Do you think that I don’t know you at all? You’ve never forgiven Mr L for being in power over you. You’ve never forgiven him for trying to stop your marriage. And he was absolutely right. Since you married this woman, you’ve never cared for the rest of us. You’ve been ready to destroy everything in the family because of her. You’re not sorry now, are you? You’re not sorry for anything you’ve done? I believe you’re glad.’

Charles had stood up. He leant by the fireplace and spoke with a fierce release of energy:

‘I repeat, you were ready to do all these things to marry Francis. I would have done anything on earth to help you. I would still.’

‘You won’t say this one word which would cost you nothing,’ Katherine cried furiously. ‘You won’t stop your wife finishing off a piece of wickedness she should never have thought of. I know you won’t think twice about what this means for Mr L. You’ve always been capable of being cruel. But is it possible for you to think twice of what it means to us?’

‘Yes,’ said Francis. ‘Can you bring yourself to do that?’

Charles replied: ‘You have said some hard things of me. Many of them are true. You have said hard things of Ann. Those you should have kept to yourselves. I won’t trouble to tell you how untrue they are. Are you sure that in all this concern of yours you’re not thinking of your own convenience? Are you sure that your motives are as pure as you seem to think? It will be a nuisance for you to have a scandal in the family. Aren’t you both so comfortable that you’d like to prevent that — whatever else is lost in the process?’

Francis and Katherine sat silent, looking up at him as he stood. Francis, who in much of the quarrel had shown sympathy, was dark with anger, the vein prominent in his forehead. Katherine said, as a last resort: ‘You won’t trust us. Perhaps you’ll trust Lewis. He’s got nothing at stake. Lewis, will you tell him what you think?’

They all waited for me.

I said: ‘I’ve already said what I think — to Ann.’

‘What did you say?’ cried Katherine.

‘I said she ought to go to Charles and tell him she wanted to call it off.’

I spoke directly to Charles: ‘I should like to ask you something. Will you and Ann talk the whole matter over for the last time?’

He smiled at me and said, without hesitation: ‘No, Lewis.’ He added, for my benefit alone: ‘She did that through you.’

Katherine and Francis exchanged a glance. Francis said: ‘There it is. It’s no use going on. But we must say this. If Ann doesn’t stop this business, we shan’t be able to meet her. Obviously, we shan’t want to create any embarrassment. If we meet socially, we shall put a decent face on it. But we shall not be able to meet her in private.’

‘You know that must include me,’ said Charles.

‘I was afraid you would take it that way,’ said Francis.

Charles said: ‘There’s no other way to take it.’

‘No,’ said Francis.

‘I think you are being just,’ Charles said in a level and passionless voice. ‘All I can say is this: from you both I hoped for something different from justice. Once, if I had been in your place, I should have done as you are doing. I think perhaps I shouldn’t now.’

He added: ‘It is hard to lose you. It always will be.’

His energy had ebbed away for a moment.

He sat down. We made some kind of conversation. Ten minutes passed before Mr March came in.

‘I should be obliged,’ he said, ‘if I could have a word with my daughter.’

‘I’m afraid that I’ve given her my answer,’ said Charles.

42: An Answer

‘I assumed that you knew what she was asking me,’ said Charles. ‘I’m afraid that I’ve given her my answer.’

He had risen as Mr March came in, and they stood face to face by the window, away from the fireplace and the small tea-table, round which the rest of us were still sitting. They stood face to face, Charles some inches taller than his father, his hair catching the sunlight as it had done years before in the examination hall. Against him his father stood, his head less erect, his whole bearing in some way unprepared.

‘I don’t want to hear it,’ said Mr March.

‘You’ll hear it from Katherine as soon as I’ve gone. Don’t you admit that you will? Isn’t it better for me to tell you myself?’

‘I refuse to hear anything further until your wife has completely recovered,’ said Mr March. ‘I don’t regard you as in a fit state to make a decision.’

‘I should make the same decision whether she’s ill or well,’ said Charles. ‘I shan’t change my mind.’

‘What is it?’ said Mr March, in despair.

‘You don’t want me to say much, do you? Katherine has heard it all. All I need say is that, now she’s heard it, she and Francis don’t wish to meet me again.’

‘I knew it,’ said Mr March. They looked at each other.

‘You can endure being lonely?’ Mr March said at last, still in a subdued voice.

‘I can endure that kind of loneliness.’

‘Then it’s useless to ask you to consider mine.’

Charles did not reply at once, and Mr March for the first time raised his voice.

‘It’s useless to ask you to consider my loneliness. I suppose I had better be prepared to take the only steps which are open to me.’

‘I’m afraid that is for you to decide.’

‘You know,’ cried Mr March, ‘I’m not telling you anything original. You know the position you are placing me in. You’re forcing me to deprive myself of my son.’

We each knew that this quarrel was different from those in the past. Always before, Mr March had a power over his son. Now it had gone. Mr March knew: he could not admit it, and his anger rose at random, wildly, without aim.

‘You’re forcing me,’ he shouted, ‘to deprive myself of my son. If this outrage happens’ — he was clinging to a last vestige of hope — ‘if this outrage happens, I shall be compelled to take a step which you will recognize.’

‘It won’t matter to me, don’t you realize that?’

‘Nothing that I possess will come to you. You will be compelled to recognize what you’ve done after my death,’ said Mr March.

‘I’m sorry, but that doesn’t matter.’

Suddenly Katherine cried out: ‘Father, why ever didn’t you make him independent? When he wanted to marry? I told you at the time it wouldn’t be the same between you. Do you remember?’

Mr March turned towards the fireplace, and rounded on her with fury: ‘I only consider it necessary to remind you of what my Uncle Justin said to his daughter.’ For a second all his anger was diverted to her. ‘I reproach myself that I allowed you to make representations between myself and my son.’

‘She did her best,’ said Charles. ‘She tried to bring us together. She tried her best to keep me in your will.’

‘Charles!’ Katherine cried. He had spoken with indifference: but she cried out as though he had been brutal. Mr March ignored her, and returned to face Charles.

‘I should never have spoken of money,’ he said, ‘if I could have relied on your affection.’

For the first time, as they stood there, Charles’ face softened.

‘My affection was greater than you were ever ready to admit,’ he said. ‘Did you hear me speak to you, the night Ann was taken ill? That was true.’

Mr March’s voice rang in our ears: ‘There’s only one thing you can say that I’m prepared to hear.’

Charles had not recovered himself. He said: ‘That’s impossible for me.’

‘Do you consider it more impossible than destroying my family? And showing your utter ingratitude as a son? And condemning yourself to squalor now and after I am dead? And leaving me with nothing to live for in the last years of my life?’

Charles did not answer. Mr March went on: ‘Do you consider it is more impossible than what you’re bringing about?’

‘I’m afraid it is,’ said Charles.

The tone of that reply affected Mr March. Since he appealed to Charles’ affection, he had reached his son. As though interpreting Charles’ reply, which was loaded with remorse, Mr March spoke of Ann.

‘If you hadn’t married your wife,’ Mr March said, ‘you would have given a different answer. She is responsible for your unnatural attitude.’

Immediately Charles’ manner reverted to that in which he had begun; he became hard again, passionate, almost gay.

‘I am responsible for everything I’ve done,’ he said. ‘You know that. Don’t you know that?’

‘I refuse to accept your assurance.’

‘You know that it’s true,’ said Charles.

‘If she hadn’t begun this outrage, you would never have believed it possible,’ Mr March exclaimed. ‘If she had desisted, you would have been relieved and—’

‘If she had died, you mean. If she had died.’ The word crashed out. ‘That’s what you mean.’

Mr March’s head was sunk down.

‘You were wrong. You’ve never been so wrong,’ said Charles. ‘I tell you this. If she had died, I wouldn’t have raised a finger to save you trouble. I should have let it happen.’

The sound died away. The room rested in silence. Charles turned from his father, and glanced indifferently, slackly, across the room, as though he were exhausted by his outburst, as though it had left him without anger or interest.

As Charles turned away, Mr March walked from the window towards us by the fireplace. His face looked suddenly without feeling or expression.

He settled in an armchair; as he did so, his foot touched the tea-table, and I noticed the Tinker-Bell reflections, set dancing on the far wall.

Mr March said, in a low voice: ‘Why was it necessary to act as you have done? You seem to have been compelled to break every connection with the family.’

Charles, still standing by the window, did not move or speak.

‘You seem to have been compelled to break off at my expense. It was different with Herbert and my father. But you’ve had to cut yourself off through me.’

Mr March was speaking as though the pain was too recent to feel; he did not know all that had happened to him, he was light-headed with bereavement and defeat. He spoke like a man baffled, in doubt, still unaware of what he was going to feel, groping and mystified. He forgot Ann, and asked Charles why this conflict must come between them, just because they were themselves. A little time before, he had spoken as though he believed that, without Ann, he and his son would have been at peace. It was inconsistent in terms of logic, but it carried the sense of a father’s excessive love, of a love which, in the phrase that the old Japanese used to describe the love of parents for their children, was a darkness of the heart.

‘Yes,’ said Mr March, ‘you found it necessary to act against me. I never expected to have my son needing to act against me. I never contemplated living without my son.’

‘Believe what I said to you at that last party,’ said Charles quietly. ‘I want you to believe that. As well as what I’ve said today.’

Mr March asked, not angrily, but as though he could not believe what had happened: ‘You’ve counted the cost of this intention of yours? You’ve asked people what it’s like to be penniless?’

‘Yes,’ said Charles.

‘You’re ready to put yourself in the shameful position of living on your wife’s money?’

Charles had been answering listlessly. He gave a faint smile.

‘I may even earn a little myself.’

‘Pocket-money. I disregard that,’ said Mr March. ‘You’re prepared to live on your wife?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’re not deterred by my disgrace in seeing you in such a position?’

‘No,’ said Charles.

‘You’re not deterred by the disgrace your wife’s action will inflict upon my brother and my family?’

‘I thought I’d made myself clear,’ said Charles with a revival of energy.

‘You’re not deterred by the misery you’re bringing upon me?’

‘I don’t want to repeat what I’ve said.’

Without looking at Charles again, Mr March said: ‘So, if this calamity happens, you’re requiring me to decide on my own actions?’

Even now he was hoping. He could still ask a question about the future.

‘Yes,’ said Charles.

Charles came into the middle of the room, and said: ‘I might as well go now. I told Ann I would see her before I left.’

We heard him run upstairs. Katherine spoke to her father: ‘It’s no use. I wish I could say something, Mr L, but it’s no use. There’s nothing to do.’ Her mouth was trembling. She added: ‘I’ve never seen him like that before.’

Though she was supporting her father, there was something else in her voice. It dwelt more gently on Charles than any word she had said while he was there. She had made her choice; she could not help but take her father’s side. But that remark was brimming with regret, with admiration, with the idolatrous love she bore Charles when she was a girl.

43: Red Box on the Table

During most of October there was no more news. I saw Francis regularly in Cambridge, but he and Katherine knew no more than I. Charles had already cut himself away from them. We heard a number of rumours — that Sir Philip had seen Charles and threatened a libel action whatever the consequences, that Mr March had visited Ann, convalescing by the sea, that Ronald Porson had visited her, that Charles would not have her back unless she broke with the Note.

There were many more rumours, most of them fantasies; but it was true that Sir Philip had seen Charles. Charles mentioned it himself, when I was dining with him on one of my nights in London. He mentioned it with indifference, as though it were a perfectly ordinary occurrence, as though his concerns were as pedestrian as anyone else’s. He wanted to regard them as settled; he did not want to see that there was a part of his nature, even yet, after all he had said and done, waiting in trepidation, just as the rest of us were waiting.

The final article in the Note was published in the fourth week of October. I did not subscribe to the Note, but a colleague of mine used to send it round to me; it was brought to my rooms in college by the messenger, on his last delivery, at ten o’clock on a Friday night. For two Fridays past I had raced my eyes over it, before looking at my letters. On this Friday night I did the same; and, as soon as I had unfolded the sheet, I knew this was it. Though I was prepared, I felt the prick of sweat at my temples.

It was the second item on the first page (the first was a three-line report of a meeting between Edward VIII and the Prime Minister, and it read:

Note can now give final dope about scandal of Ministers, Ministers’ stooges, lurkmen in Whitehall, Inns of Court, official circles, making profits from prior knowledge of armaments programme. Back references (Note May 26, August 10, August 24, for background, see also…). In ’29 Tory Government laid contract of £3,000,000, engine development, with Howard & Hazlehurst (Chairman Sir Horace (Cartel-spokesman) Timberlake; on board of Howard & Hazlehurst is Viscount Talland, cousin of Alex Hawtin). Alex (Britain First) Hawtin, Under-Secretary of…, rising hope Tory party, groomed for cabinet in immediate future, bought £20,000 — approx. — Enlibar shares. Enlibar subsidiary of Howard & Hazlehurst. Sir Philip March, Parliamentary Secretary, Ministry of…, ex-banker, ex-director 17 companies, ex-President Jewish Board of Guardians, bought £15,000 Enlibar shares. Shares in parent firm — quantities not known to nearest pound but over £10,000 — bought by G L and F E Paul, brothers-in-law of Herbert Getliffe, KC, legal consultant Hawtin’s ministry. Shares also bought by S…, H… Profits on these transactions (approx.):

’35, aircraft programme, same story, contract laid with aircraft firms… Details of investments not to hand, but Hawtin and March repeated gambit. G L and F E Paul not concerned this round — Getliffe no longer consultant to ministry. S…, H… took a rake-off, possibly cat’s-paws for bigger players, but Note not in position to confirm this. Hawtin, March still in Government. Hawtin due for promotion. ‘Friend of Franco’ speech, Oct. 16, Liverpool; ‘Franco is at any rate a Christian’ speech, Oct. 23, Birmingham.

That was all.

The effects did not come at once. Mr March referred to it in his weekly letter to Katherine, but briefly and without comment. She went to comfort him, but on her return reported that he was composed, strangely passive, almost glad that the words were down on paper; there was nothing to imagine now. He showed no sign at all of taking action. He seemed to have feared that, the instant the words appeared, he would be surrounded by violence and disgrace: but no one except Sir Philip spoke to him about the article for several days. In that time-lag, he had a last hope, strong and comforting, that it would all be forgotten: if he stayed in his house, hid away from gossip, this would pass over, as everything else had done.

We had, in fact, all expected that there would be a blaze of publicity from the beginning. That did not happen; partly because there was another scandal going round the clubs, and people were not to be distracted from Mrs Simpson and the King. The Note attack had gone off half-cock. A member of the extreme left asked a question in the House, and demanded a select committee. A few eccentric liberals and malcontents of various kinds (including a conservative anti-semite) occupied a committee room for some hours, but could not agree on a plan of action. There was a leader, so stately and stuffed that it was incomprehensible unless one knew the story, in one of the conservative papers.

Some of the column writers made references. One or two weekly papers, on the extreme right as well as the left, let themselves go. It did not seem to amount to much.

About three weeks after the article came out, however, there were rumours of changes in the government. The political correspondents began tipping their fancies. No one suggested that the changes had anything to do with the Note’s article; it was not even explicitly denied. In private the gossips were speculating whether Hawtin would be ‘out’ or whether he would lose his promotion. He was disliked, he was cold and self-righteous; but to put him out now, after his stand on Spain, would look like a concession to the left. As for Sir Philip, his name was not canvassed much. He had never been a figure in politics; he was old and had no future. The only flicker of interest in him, apart from the scandal, was because he was a Jew.

Meanwhile, Herbert Getliffe was showing the resource and pertinacity that most people missed unless they knew him well. He had a streak of revengefulness, and he was determined that his enemies should pay. He knew that neither Hawtin nor Philip March would bring an action; nor could the Pauls without more damage to himself. So Getliffe concentrated on the minor figures, S…, H… He worked out that there was a good chance of one of them bringing an action which need involve no one else.

He wrote to Sir Philip, suggesting that they should promote an action in H…’s name. Sir Philip replied curtly that the less said or done, the better. Despite the rebuff, Getliffe approached Mr March, to persuade him to influence his brother; and, leaving nothing to chance, he sent me the outline of the case.

Mr March and Sir Philip each snubbed him again. Getliffe, suggestible as he was when one met him face to face, was utterly impervious when on the make. He wrote to them in detail; he added that I should be familiar with the legal side, if they wanted an opinion; he wrote to me twice, begging me to do my best.

The March brothers were not weak characters, but, like most men, they could be hypnotized by persistence. Ill-temperedly Mr March arranged for me to meet him one morning at Sir Philip’s office — ‘to discuss the proposals which Getliffe is misguidedly advancing and which are, in my view, profoundly to be regretted at the present juncture’.

That morning when I was due to meet them, a drizzling November day, I opened The Times and saw, above a column in the centre page, ‘Changes in the Government’. Sir Philip’s name was not among them. Hawtin was promoted to full cabinet rank; to make room for him, someone was sent to the Lords. A Parliamentary Secretary and an Under-Secretary were shelved, in favour of two backbenchers. It was difficult to read any meaning into the changes. Hawtin’s promotion might be a brushing-off of the scandal, a gesture of confidence, or a move to the right. The other appointments were neutral. At the end of the official statement, there was a comment that more changes would be announced shortly.

I arrived at the room of Sir Philip’s secretary a little before my time. He was pretending to work, as I sat looking out at the park. The rain seeped gently down; after the brilliant autumn, the leaves had not yet fallen and shone dazzlingly out of the grey, mournful, misty morning. I heard the rain seep down, and the nervous, restless movements of the young man behind me. He was on edge with nerves: Sir Philip’s fate did not matter to him, but he had become infected by the tension. He was expecting a telephone call from Downing Street. Soon he stopped work, and in his formal, throaty, sententious voice (the voice of a man who was going to enjoy every bit of pomp and circumstance in his official life) asked me whether I had studied the government changes, and what significance I gave them. He was earnest, ambitious, self-important: yet each time the telephone rang his face was screwed up with excitement, like that of a boy who is being let into an adult’s secret. As each call turned out to be a routine enquiry, his voice went flat with anti-climax. As soon as Mr March came in, Williams showed us into Sir Philip’s room. Before we entered, Mr March had time only to shake hands and say that he was obliged to me for coming — but even in that time I could see his face painful with hope, his resignation broken, every hope and desire for happiness evoked again by the news that Hawtin was safe. Sir Philip’s first words were, after greeting us both:

‘I suppose you saw in the papers that Hawtin’s still in? They’ve given him a leg-up.’

‘I was considering what effect it would have on your prospects,’ said Mr March.

‘It won’t be long before I know. This means they’re not going to execute us, anyway,’ said Sir Philip, with a cackle which did not conceal that he too felt relief, felt active hope. ‘As for Alex Hawtin, he’s doing better for himself than he deserves. Still, he can’t be worse than old…’ Sir Philip broke off, and looked at us across his desk. He had dressed with special care that day, and with a new morning suit was wearing a light-blue, flowing silk tie. It was incongruous, against the aged yellow skin. Yet, even about his face, there was something jaunty still.

‘Well,’ he said, ‘I wanted to consult you about this fellow Getliffe. He’s got hold of someone called Huff or Hough — who must be a shady lot himself, judging from the book of words — and they want to bring a libel action if they can get financial support — I needn’t go over the ground again. You’ve seen it for yourselves, I gather.’

‘I received another effusion from Herbert Getliffe yesterday,’ said Mr March, ‘which I regret to say I have omitted to bring. It did not add anything substantial to his previous lucubrations.’

‘And you’re familiar with it, Eliot?’

‘Yes,’ I said.

Sir Philip suddenly snapped: ‘I don’t want to have anything to do with the fellow. No good can come of it. I won’t touch anything he’s concerned with.’

Anxiety and hope had made his temper less equable.

‘I concur in your judgement,’ said Mr March. ‘The fellow is a pestilential nuisance.’

‘I want to stop his damned suggestions,’ said Sir Philip. ‘Where are they? Why isn’t the file here?’

He pushed the button on his desk, and the secretary entered. Sir Philip was just asking for the Getliffe file when in the outer office the telephone rang. ‘Will you excuse me while I answer it, sir?’ said Williams officiously, once more excited. After he went away, we could hear his voice through the open door. ‘Yes, this is Sir Philip March’s secretary… Yes… Yes, I will give him that message… Yes, he will be ready to receive the letter.’

Williams came in, and said with formality: ‘It was a message from the Prime Minister’s principal private secretary, sir. It was to say that a letter from the Prime Minister is on its way.’

Sir Philip nodded. ‘Do you wish me to stay, sir?’ said Williams hopefully.

‘No,’ said Sir Philip in an absent tone. ‘Leave the Getliffe file. I’ll ring if I need you.’

As soon as the door was closed, Mr March cried: ‘What does it mean? What does it mean?’

‘It may mean the sack,’ said Sir Philip. ‘Or it may mean they’re offering me another job.’

At that instant Mr March lost the last particle of hope.

Sir Philip, meeting his brother’s despairing gaze, went on stubbornly: ‘If he is offering me another job, I shall have to decide whether to turn it down or not. I should like a rest, of course, but after this brouhaha I should probably consider it my duty to accept it. I should want your advice, Leonard, before I let him have his answer.’

Mr March uttered a sound, half-assent, half-groan.

The morning had grown darker, and Sir Philip switched on the reading lamp above his desk. The minutes passed; he looked at the clock and talked in agitation; Mr March was possessed by his thoughts. Sir Philip looked at the clock again, and said irritably: ‘Whatever happens to me, I won’t have this fellow Getliffe putting a foot in. I won’t find a penny for his wretched case and I want to warn him off the business altogether.’

Mr March, as though he had scarcely heard, said yes. Knowing Getliffe better than they did, I said the only method was to prove to him that any conceivable case had a finite risk of involving the Pauls, and in the end himself. I thought that that was so, and that I could convince Getliffe of it. Sir Philip at once gave me the file, and Mr March asked me to go home with him shortly and pick up the last letter. They were tired of trouble. They forgot this last nuisance as soon as the file was in my hand.

The minutes ticked on. Sir Philip complained: ‘It can’t take a fellow all this time to walk round from Downing Street. These messengers have been slackers ever since I’ve known them.’

At length we heard a shuffle, a mutter of voices, in the secretary’s room. A tap on the door, and Williams came in, carrying a red oblong despatch box.

‘This has just come from the Prime Minister, sir.’ He placed it on the table in front of Sir Philip. The red lid glowed under the lamp.

Sir Philip said sharply: ‘Well, well, where is the key?’

‘Surely you have it, sir?’

‘Never, man, I’ve never had it. I remember giving it to you the last time a box arrived. After I opened it, I remember giving it to you perfectly well.’

‘I’m certain that I remember your keeping the key after you opened that box, sir. I’m almost certain you put it on your key ring—’

‘I tell you I’ve never had the key in my possession for a single moment. You’ve been in charge of it ever since you’ve been in that office. I want you to find it now—’

Williams had blushed to his neck and ears. For him that was the intolerable moment of the morning. He went out. Sir Philip and Mr March were left to look at the red box glowing under the light. Sir Philip swore bitterly.

It was some minutes before Williams returned. ‘I’ve borrowed this’ — he said, giving a small key to Sir Philip — ‘from Sir —’ (the Cabinet Minister).

‘Very well, very well. Now you’d better go and find mine.’ Williams left before Sir Philip had opened the box and the envelope inside. As soon as he began to read, his expression gave the answer.

‘It’s the sack, of course,’ he said.

He spoke slowly: ‘He’s pretty civil to me. He says that I shan’t mind giving up my job to a younger man.’

He added: ‘I didn’t bank on going out like this.’

Mr March said: ‘Nor did I ever think you would.’

Then Sir Philip spoke as though he were recalling his old, resilient tone. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ve got a good deal to clear up today. I want to leave things shipshape. You’ll look after that fellow Getliffe, Eliot? We don’t want any more talk. This will be in the papers tonight. After that they’ll forget about me soon enough.’

In the middle of this new active response, he seemed to feel back to his brother’s remark. He said to Mr March with brotherly, almost protective kindness: ‘Don’t take it too much to heart, Leonard. It might be worse.’

‘I’m grateful for your consideration,’ cried Mr March. ‘But it would never have happened but for my connections.’

‘That’s as may be,’ said Sir Philip. ‘That’s as may be.’

He spoke again to his brother, stiffly but kindly: ‘I know you feel responsible because of Charles’ wife. That young woman’s dangerous, and we shan’t be able to see much of her in the family after this. But I shouldn’t like you to do anything about Charles on my account. It can’t be any use.’

Mr March said: ‘Nothing can be any use now.’

Sir Philip said: ‘Well, then. Leave it alone.’

Mr March replied, in a voice firm, resonant, and strong: ‘No. I must do what I have to do.’

44: Compensation

As soon as we left the office, Mr March reminded me that I was to come home with him to get Getliffe’s last letter. He was quick and energetic in his movements; the slowness of despair seemed to have left him; outside in the street, he called for a taxi at the top of his voice, and set off in chase of it like a young man.

We drove down Whitehall. Mr March remarked: ‘I presume this is the last occasion when I shall go inside those particular mausoleums. I cannot pretend that will be a hardship for me personally. Though for anyone like my brother Philip, who had ambitions in this direction, it must be an unpleasant wrench to leave.’

I was amazed at his matter-of-fact tone, at the infusion of cheerfulness and heartiness which I had not heard in him for many weeks. He had spoken of his brother with his old mixture of admiration, envy, sense of unworthiness, and detached incredulity, incredulity that a man should choose such a life. He had spoken as he might have done in untroubled days. It was hard to remember his silent anguish an hour before in Sir Philip’s room. He said: ‘I shall want to speak to my son Charles this morning.’

His tone was still matter-of-fact. He said that he would ring Charles up as soon as he got home. Then he talked of other things, all the way to Bryanston Square. The end had come and he was released. He was flooded by a rush of power. He could go through with it, he knew. He could act as though of his own free will. It set him speaking cheerfully and heartily.

He took me into his study. He gave me Getliffe’s letter and said casually: ‘I hope you will be able to settle the fellow for us.’ Then he asked: ‘Are you sufficiently familiar with my son’s efforts as a practitioner to know where he is to be found at this time in the morning?’ It was ten past twelve.

‘He’s usually back from his rounds about half past,’ I said.

‘I will telephone him shortly,’ said Mr March. ‘I shall require to see him before luncheon.’

He asked me to excuse him, and rang up, not Charles, but the family solicitor. Mr March said that he needed to transact some business in the early afternoon. The solicitor tried to put off the appointment until later in the day, but Mr March insisted that it must be at half past two. ‘I shall be having luncheon alone,’ he said on the telephone. ‘I propose to come directly afterwards to your office. My business may occupy a considerable portion of the afternoon.’

When that was settled, Mr March talked to me for a few minutes. He enquired, with his usual consideration, about my career, but for the most part he wanted to talk of Charles. What would his future be? What society was he intending to move in? Would he make any headway as a practitioner? I told him about the letter to the Lancet. Even at that moment, he was full of pride. ‘Not that I expect for a minute it is of any value,’ he said. ‘But nevertheless it shows that he may not be prepared to vegetate.’ He sat and considered, on his lips a sad but genuine smile, with no trace of rancour.

‘It would be a singular circumstance,’ said Mr March, ‘if he contributed something after all.’

It was time for him to ring up Charles. When he got an answer, his expression suddenly became fixed. I guessed that he was hearing Ann’s voice. ‘This is Leonard March,’ he said, not greeting her. ‘I wish urgently to speak to my son.’ There was a pause before he spoke to Charles. ‘If it is not inconvenient for you, I should like you to come here without delay.’ Mr March did not say any more to Charles. To me he said: ‘No doubt it is inconvenient for him, my requiring his presence in this manner.’ He paused. ‘But I shall make no further demands upon his time.’

Mr March stood up, shook my hand, and said: ‘I hope you will forgive me, Lewis, for not inviting you to stay to luncheon. I shall have certain matters to attend to for the remainder of the day.’

He added: ‘If you wish to stay in order to see my son, I hope you will not be deterred from doing so. I think you are familiar enough with my house to make yourself at home. I should be sorry if you ceased to be familiar with my house. I shall be obliged if you find it possible to visit me occasionally.’

45: ‘I Suppose I Don’t Know Yet’

I went into the drawing-room, affected by the other times I had waited there. I sat by the fire, picked up a biography, and tried to read. The soft rain fell in the square outside. The light of the wet autumn day was diffuse and gentle, and the fire burned high in the chimney. I heard Charles’ car drive up, and the sound of the butler’s voice greeting him in the hall.

Again I tried to read. But, within a few minutes, far sooner than I expected, Charles joined me. He said: ‘Mr L told me that I should find you here.’

He sat down, and looked at me with a tired, composed smile.

He said: ‘He did it with great dignity.’

He said no more of their last meeting.

He began to talk, practically, about his financial condition. Ann’s income would go down now that her father had retired. Charles himself was earning about £900 a year from his practice. ‘It ought to mount up in the next two or three years,’ he said. ‘But I shall be lucky if I work it up to £1,000. Altogether, it will be slightly different from the scale of life I was brought up to expect.’

He smiled. ‘I suppose it doesn’t matter much,’ he said. ‘It may be a nuisance sometimes not to have a private income — you used to say what a difference it made, didn’t you? I don’t mean for luxuries. I mean there are times when it’s valuable for a doctor to be independent of his job. He can do things and say things that otherwise he wouldn’t dare. Some of us ought to be able to say things without being frightened for our livelihood, don’t you agree? Well, I shan’t be able to. I don’t know how much difference it will make.’

He was showing the kind of realistic worry that I had seen in him so often. It was genuine; for most of his life he had expected that when Mr March died he would become a rich man; he had always lived in comfort, even since his marriage.

He did not restrain his worry. He was not in a hurry to leave his father’s house. He spoke about Mr March with a concern so strong and steady that one could not miss it.

‘He mustn’t be left alone more than anyone can help,’ said Charles. ‘I’ve done this, so I can’t do anything for him now. But everyone must see that he’s got plenty to catch his interest. He finds it hard to be desperately unhappy when there are people round him, you know that, don’t you? Even though—’ Charles paused. ‘Even though he’s lost something. He can’t be swallowed up by unhappiness while there are people round him. He has to expend himself on them.’

His face was tired, kind. He went on: ‘I know it’s a different story when he is alone at night.’

He reiterated his concern: ‘They mustn’t be frightened to intrude on him. When he’s unhappy, I mean. It’s easy to be too delicate. Sometimes it’s right. I assure you it isn’t right with Mr L I think Katherine will know that by instinct. If she doesn’t, you must tell her, Lewis. Will you promise to tell her?’

‘I’m cut off from them,’ he added. ‘I can’t tell them what to do. But I think I know him better than they do.’

Behind his worry, behind his concern, he was thinking of what he had done.

‘I’ve done this,’ he said, repeating the phrase he had used as he gave me messages about his father. ‘I’ve done this. Sometimes I can’t believe it. It sounds ridiculous, but I feel I’ve done nothing.’ He gave a smile, completely open, unguarded, and candid. I had never seen his face so brilliant and innocent.

‘At other times,’ he said, ‘I feel remorse.’

The words weighed down. I said: ‘I know what you mean. I’ve told you, once I did something more unforgivable than you’ve done. I know what you mean.’

Charles said eagerly: Sometimes it seems the most natural thing in the world to do what one did, isn’t that true? Didn’t you feel that? And sometimes you felt you wouldn’t forget it, you wouldn’t be free of the memory, for the rest of your life?’

‘I’m not free yet,’ I said.

We smiled. There was great intimacy between us.

‘Did yours seem like mine? Did it seem you were bound to make a choice? Did it seem you had to hurt one or two people, whatever you did?’

‘I hadn’t any justification at all,’ I said.

‘With me,’ said Charles, ‘it seemed to be wrapped up with everything in my life.’

He waited for some time before he spoke again. His expression was heavy, but not harassed. ‘Until it happened, I didn’t know what I should have to live with. Live with in myself, I mean: you must have faced that too, haven’t you?’ He looked at me with simplicity, with a kind of brotherly directness. He said: ‘I suppose I don’t know yet.’

Did it make nonsense to him of what he had tried to do with his life? More than any of us, I was thinking, he had searched into his own nature, and had distrusted it more. Did this make nonsense of what he had tried to do? To him the answer would sometimes, and perhaps often, be yes.

Sitting with him in the drawing-room, I could not feel it so. Not that I was trying to judge him: all I had was a sense of expectancy, curiously irrelevant, but reassuring as though the heart were beating strongly, about what the future held.

46: His Own Company

Some weeks later I went to dinner at Bryanston Square. As I heard from Katherine, Mr March was inventing excuses to keep his house full; that night he had chosen to celebrate what he regarded as a success of mine. The ‘success’ was nothing but a formality: I had just been confirmed in my college job and now, if I wanted, could stay there for life. For Mr March it was a pretext for a party; as he greeted me it seemed to be something more.

When the butler showed me into the drawing-room, cosy after the cold night outside, Mr March had already come down, and was standing among Francis and Katherine and a dozen or more of our contemporaries. It was the biggest party I had seen there since his seventieth birthday. He came across to me, swinging his arm, and the instant he shook hands, said without any introduction: ‘I always viewed your intention to support yourself by legal practice as misguided.’

It sounded brusque. It sounded unemollient. Taken aback, Katherine said: ‘He was doing well in it, after all, Mr L.’

‘No! No!’ He brushed her aside, and spoke straight to me: ‘I didn’t regard legal practice as a suitable career for someone with other burdens.’

He spoke with understanding. Although he had not once referred to it, he knew what my marriage meant: this was his way of telling me so. How much time — he broke off shyly — did I intend to devote to my London job? Three days a week, I told him: and I could feel him thinking that that was the amount of time I spent with my wife in the Chelsea house. ‘Oh well,’ he remarked, ‘so long as that brings in sufficient for your requirements.’

As with Francis, so with me, Mr March ignored any earnings from academic life. His tone had not altered; apart from the burst of sympathy, which no one else in the room recognized, he was talking as he used to do. At dinner he went on addressing us round the table, just as he had done on my earliest visits there. The only difference that I should have noticed, if I had not known what had happened, was a curious one: the food, which had always been good, was now luxurious. Mr March, living alone in Bryanston Square, was doing himself better than ever in the past.

He spread himself on anecdotes: his talent for total recall was in good working order: there was plenty of laughter. I looked at Francis. It happened that just at that time there was a disagreement between us: we had been divided by a piece of college politics. But still, as our glances met, we had a fellow-feeling. In that sumptuous dinner party, we should have been hard put to it to say why we were so uncomfortable, when Mr March himself was not. Perhaps we had counted on giving him support, which he would not take.

Towards the end of dinner, Mr March drank my health, and, still holding his glass, got into spate: ‘On the occasion of Lewis Eliot first giving me the pleasure of his company in this house, I observed to my daughter Katherine that no proper preparations had been taken for the eventuality that he might prove to be a teetotaller. I failed to observe to my daughter Katherine on the identical anniversary that no proper precautions had been taken for the eventuality that Leonard might not be disposed to welcome a four-foot-high teddy-bear.’

‘Who mightn’t like a teddy-bear?’ someone cried, apparently nervous in case Mr March was talking of himself.

‘My grandson Leonard, of course,’ shouted Mr March. ‘The anniversary of whose birth, which took place last week, coincides as to day and month, but not however as to year, with that of the first visit of Lewis Eliot to my house. Of course, the opposite mistake used to be made with even more distressing consequences, though naturally not by my daughter Katherine.’

‘What mistake?’

‘Of teetotallers not making adequate provision for non-teetotallers, as opposed to the hypothetical reception of Lewis Eliot, as previously mentioned. On accepting hospitality from my second cousin Archibald Waley I constantly found myself in an intolerable dilemma. Not owing to his extraordinary habit of gnashing his teeth which was owing to a physiological peculiarity and unconnected with any defects of temperament which he nevertheless possessed, and demonstrated by his lamentable behaviour over his expulsion from Alfred Hart’s club during a certain disagreement. My intolerable dilemma was of a different nature. I used to present myself at his house — Philip used to say that it was the most inconvenient house in Kensington — and we used to make our entrance into the dining-room in a perfectly orthodox manner that I could see no reason for objecting to. Then however we were confronted as we sat down in our places with a printed card which I have always regarded as the height of bad form, and which did not improve the situation by informing us that we were required to assimilate nine courses. It is perhaps common fairness to point out that at the relevant period it was customary to provide more elaborate refreshments than the fork-suppers we’ve all taken to fobbing off on our guests.’

‘Was this a fork supper, Mr L?’ asked a niece, waving at the plates.

‘I don’t know what else you’d call it,’ said Mr March. ‘The over-ostentation of the provender was nevertheless not the main point at issue. One could possibly have contemplated nine courses until one was discouraged by hearing the footman ask “What would you like to drink, sir?” One then enquired for possible alternatives and was given the choice “Orangeade, lemonade, lemon squash, lime juice, ginger beer, ginger ale, barley water…” It was always said that when Herbert dined there he put a flask of brandy in his trouser pocket and made an excuse to go to the lavatory at least twice during the proceedings.’ Mr March raised his voice above questions, comments, grins:

‘The presumed discomfort to Lewis Eliot as a teetotaller entering this, a non-teetotal house, was in my judgement less than that experienced by myself at Archibald Waley’s.’ He added: ‘In practice, Lewis Eliot turned out not to be a teetotaller at all. As could have been ascertained from the person instrumental in giving me the pleasure of his company. That person being my son Charles.’

No one said anything. Mr March went on: ‘At that time there was nothing to prevent me communicating with my son Charles. However, I did not, at least upon the point under discussion.’

He said it with absolute stoicism. It was a stoicism which stopped any of us taking up the reference to Charles, or mentioning him again.

I left early, before any of the others. In the square it was cold enough to take one’s breath, and in the wind the stars flashed and quivered above the tossing trees. Trying to find a taxi, I walked along the pavement, across the end of the square, as I had walked with Charles after my first visit to the house, listening to him talk about his father. I was not thinking of them, though: my thoughts had gone to my own house. Just for a random instant, I recalled our housekeeper running down the local doctors, and then admitting, in a querulous, patronizing fashion, that some people in Pimlico spoke of Charles March as a good doctor, and seemed to trust him now. That thought did not last: it drifted into others of our housekeeper, my own home.

Standing at the corner, I stamped my feet, waiting for a taxi. Through the bare trees of the garden, I could see a beam of light, as the door of Mr March’s house opened, letting out some more of his guests. Soon the party would be over. He would test the latches and switch off the lights: then he would be left in his own company.

35: The Future of Two Old Men

Since the first instalment in the Note, Charles and Mr March had not met nor spoken to each other. Charles had, however, telephoned to Katherine after the visit to Seymour. He had told her, so I gathered, that Ann had done her best to call the paper off. Whether either Katherine or Mr March believed this, I had no means of judging. But they knew I had been present. Within a few days I received a letter from Mr March, telling me that he needed my ‘friendly assistance’: would I lunch with him at his club, so that we could go together to Sir Philip’s office afterwards.

The club servants were surprised to see Mr March there in the month of August, having got used to the clockwork regularity of his life; he had not left Haslingfield during his summer stay for twenty years. Just as, though he went to the club for tea each day he was in London, he had not lunched there since Charles was a child. He did not know where or how to write his order, and had to be helped by the servants. They teased him for it: he, usually so uncondescending, was gruff with them.

He said little at the meal. We had a table to ourselves, but those round us were soon filled. I saw one or two faces I knew, all of civil servants from the departments close by. I felt that Mr March, unable to talk of the bitter anxiety in his mind, was also depressed because he recognized so few. There were only two men he nodded to, and they were very old.

In Pall Mall, on our way to Sir Philip’s ministry, he tried to rouse himself from his gloom. We turned into St James’s Park towards Whitehall, and Mr March looked over the trees at the dome of the India Office, the roofs and towers, all soft and opal grey in the moist sunlight.

‘I must say,’ he remarked, ‘that it looks comparatively presentable. But I have never been able to understand the fascination which makes my brother Philip and others wish to spend their entire lives in this neighbourhood. I once said as much to Hannah, and she replied that it was sour grapes on my part. No doubt I was envious on account of my failure to cut any kind of figure in the world. Nevertheless, Lewis, if I hadn’t been a failure, and had been given my choice of where to have a reasonable success, I should not have chosen this particular neighbourhood.’

His face darkened in a scowl of misery and anger. ‘But my brother Philip did. I cannot endure the thought that, because of these happenings, he may find it harder to continue here.’

In the ministry we were led down the corridors to the office of Sir Philip’s secretary, who was a youngish man called Williams, smooth-faced, spectacled, dressed for his job in black coat and striped trousers, and full of self-importance in it. ‘I will go and find out when the Parliamentary Secretary will be free,’ he said, enjoying the chance to bring out his master’s appellation. He came back promptly and announced: ‘The Parliamentary Secretary will be glad to see you at once.’

We went through the inside door, and Sir Philip came across his room to meet us. He shook hands with Mr March, then said ‘How do you do?’ to me with his stiff, furrowed smile. As he sat down at his desk by the window which overlooked the park, I saw that his skin had taken on a yellowness, a matt texture, such as one sometimes sees in ageing men. He was seventy-three, only three years older than Mr March, but in the bright summer light the difference looked much greater.

‘I expect you’re dying of drought as usual at Haslingfield,’ Sir Philip began their ritual of brotherly baiting. ‘The country is under water everywhere else.’

‘I regard the rainfall as having been reasonable for once,’ said Mr March. ‘And I am pleased to report that I have sufficient water for my requirements.’

These exchanges went on for a few moments. They had made them for so many years, and Sir Philip at least could not let go of them now: Mr March’s replies were forced and mechanical. Sir Philip was, as the afternoon began, by far the less perturbed of the two. Soon he said: ‘I suppose we must get down to business. I should like to say, Eliot, that I am obliged to you for giving me your time. I should be glad to regard it as a professional service, of course, but my brother informs me that you are certain to prefer it otherwise. I appreciate your feelings and, as I say, I am obliged to you. I think you know some of the facts of this affair. In May there was some gossip about myself and some of my colleagues. We were alleged to have used our official knowledge during the past twelve months to buy holdings in companies where government contracts were soon going to be laid. This gossip also included some names outside the government, one of them being that fellow Getliffe. It has now been published, or at least a first instalment has. I believe you’ve seen it?’

I nodded.

‘I can answer for myself and my colleagues,’ Sir Philip went on. ‘So far as we are concerned, there’s not a word of truth in it. When I came back into the Government last year, I decided to spend the rest of my life being as useful to the country as I could, if they wanted me. It was a sacrifice, but I believe that some of us have got to accept responsibility. These aren’t easy years to hold responsibility: I needn’t tell you that.’

Even Sir Philip, I was thinking, could not avoid the expressions of convention, talked about ‘sacrifice’, perhaps used the word to himself — even Sir Philip, who was not a humbug but a hard and realistic man, who loved office and power and knew that he loved it.

‘I was prepared to make the sacrifice,’ Sir Philip went on. ‘I had to resign my directorships when I became a minister, naturally. I also decided to finish with all speculation. I’ve already told Leonard this.’ He glanced at Mr March.

‘I acknowledged your assurance,’ said Mr March, ‘on hearing it at your bedside during your period of incapacity owing to gout.’

‘I finished with it,’ said Sir Philip. ‘I am not a rich man, of course, but I can get along. I have not taken part in any single transaction since I entered the government last November. I cannot make such a categorical statement for my colleagues whose names have been bandied about, but I’m completely satisfied that they are clear.’

‘You mentioned people outside the government,’ I broke in. ‘I’m also satisfied in the same way about Getliffe.’

‘You mean he’s bought nothing in the last twelve months?’

‘Nothing that could be thought suspicious.’

‘What evidence are you going on?’

‘Nothing as definite as yours,’ I said. ‘But I’ve talked to him on this actual point, and I know him well.’

‘I reported Lewis Eliot’s observations on this matter,’ said Mr March.

Sir Philip’s eyes were bright and alert. ‘You’re convinced about this fellow Getliffe?’

‘Quite convinced,’ I said.

‘I accept that,’ said Sir Philip. ‘And it makes me certain that the whole campaign is a put-up job and there’s no backing to it at all.’

Mr March, who had been listening with painful attention, showed no relief as he heard these words. He looked at his brother, with an expression stupefied, harassed, distressed.

‘That being so,’ I said, ‘your solicitors are telling you to go ahead with a libel action, aren’t they?’

‘It’s not quite so easy,’ Sir Philip replied without hesitation, in a tone as authoritative as before. I admired his hard competence. Professionally, I thought, he would have been an ideal client. ‘They’ve tied up this affair with certain other transactions. The other transactions are supposed to have happened when I was in the government in 1929. You will notice that, in the case of Getliffe, they have taken care to tie these two allegations together. It is clever of them. I detest their politics, I’ve no use for their general attitude, and if I can put them in their place, I shall — but we mustn’t imagine that we are dealing with fools.’

‘I have never thought so,’ said Mr March.

‘If they go ahead with these allegations about last year, I should win a libel action, shouldn’t I?’ Sir Philip asked me.

‘Without the slightest doubt,’ I said.

‘I should also do myself more harm than good,’ he went on.

I was thinking how precisely Seymour had calculated the risk.

‘There happens to be some substance in what they say about 1929,’ said Sir Philip.

We waited for him to go on.

‘I may say at once that I’ve done nothing which men of decent judgement could think improper. But one step I took in good faith which these people may twist against me. I am very much to blame for giving them such a handle. I’ve always thought it was not only essential to be honest: it was also essential to seem honest. I take all the blame for not seeing further than my nose. That is the only blame I am disposed to take.’

He paused, and gave a sardonic chuckle.

‘I should like to distinguish my actions from Getliffe’s quite sharply. In 1929 Getliffe made a disgraceful use of information he had acquired professionally. In my judgement, there is no question of it. He knew the government were giving a contract to Howard & Hazlehurst. He used catspaws to buy a fair-sized block of shares. He must have done very well out of it. Howard & Hazlehurst were down to 9s. in 1929: they stand at 36s. today.’

‘Thirty-six and sixpence,’ said Mr March, as though by sheer habit.

‘Getliffe is a twister and I shouldn’t have the faintest compunction about going ahead with a libel action if it only meant involving him. If he were disbarred, I should simply consider that he had brought it on himself. He’s downright dishonest, and I was sorry that you’ — he turned to Mr March — ‘permitted Katherine to marry into the fellow’s family. Though I’ve always liked Francis from the little I’ve seen of him.’

Mr March burst out, in violent and excessive anger: ‘I refuse to accept that criticism at the present juncture. My son-in-law has made an excellent husband for my daughter Katherine in all respects. I refused at the time to penalize them on account of his regrettable connections, and I still refuse, despite the fact that Herbert Getliffe’s name is linked with yours in these deplorable circumstances. I refuse to accept this preposterous criticism. If other marriages in my family had been as sound as my daughter’s, we should not be troubled with the discussion on which we are supposed to be engaged.’

Sir Philip seemed to understand his brother’s rage.

‘Yes, Leonard,’ he said, with an awkward, constrained affection. ‘But you can appreciate that Getliffe isn’t my favourite character just at present, can’t you?’ His tone became once more efficient, organized, businesslike. ‘My own activities were considerably different from that fellow’s. I only spent a few months in the government in 1929, you may remember, but of course I knew of the Howard & Hazlehurst contract, and of course I knew of the trend of policy about armaments. Naturally I thought over the implications, which appeared to suggest that, even at the height of disarmament, certain types of weapon would still have to be developed. So certain firms connected with those types of weapon would flourish for the next few years. That wasn’t a foolish piece of reasoning, and I felt entitled to act on it. If one struck lucky, one had a good buy. I looked round at various firms. I found one which was in fairly low water, and I backed my guess. The shares were down somewhere that didn’t matter, and I put in a fairish sum of money. My guess came off, but I should have preferred it otherwise. For this firm was bought by Howard & Hazlehurst three months after I had put my money in. I had no conceivable foreknowledge of that transaction. I did very well out of it, from the nature of the case. So did one or two of my colleagues, who sometimes follow my guidance in financial matters. It’s apparent that an ugly construction would be put on our actions — and these people are putting it. The facts are as I have stated them.’

He looked at Mr March and me in turn.

‘I know there are silly persons who, without imputing motives, would still think that what Getliffe and I did were very much the same. I find those silly persons both tiresome and stupid. The point is that Getliffe acted in a way which the rules don’t permit, while I kept strictly inside them. That is the only point. There are no absolute principles in these matters. There are simply rules on which all financial dealings depend. If you upset them, you upset the whole structure. If the rules go, then confidence and stability go. That is why I should show no mercy to anyone who breaks them. I should be sorry to see Getliffe escape scot-free.’

He added: ‘It would not have occurred to me to break the rules. I blame myself for giving the appearance of having done so. I have had a long life in these matters, and I have never taken part in a transaction of which I am ashamed. The only thing left is to stop this business before it goes further. I want to ask you whether that is in our power.’

His conscience was clear, his self-respect untouched. Mr March had reported, after visiting him when ill, that his brother was ‘sick in mind’; but it was not through any inner conflict. He was certain of his integrity. Yet he was desperately taxed. He was an old man, threatened with humiliation. In his hard, simple, strong-willed fashion he had coiled himself up to meet the danger. Throughout the afternoon he had kept his authority. But as he asked ‘whether that is in our power’ his face was shrunken: he still controlled his tone, but he looked imploring.

I saw that Mr March was stricken by this change. All through the afternoon, he had been torn by a sorrow his brother did not know; but even without that, he would still have flinched from the sight of Philip turning to him for pity and help. It had been painful to him to see the first traces of Philip’s anxiety, when he was ill: it was worse now. For Philip had been the hero of his childhood, the brother who did all that he would have liked to do, the brother who had none of his timidities, who was self-sufficient, undiffident, effective: it was intolerable to see him weak. It filled Mr March with revulsion, even with anger against Philip.

Mr March said in a low voice to his brother: ‘As I’ve already told you, whether it is in our power or not depends on my son’s wife.’

‘I still don’t believe it,’ said Sir Philip.

‘Will you tell my brother whether she’s responsible for this, or not?’ said Mr March to me.

‘How much do you know about this?’ Sir Philip asked me.

‘Have you told Sir Philip,’ I asked Mr March, ‘that she’s tried to set it right?’

‘I remain to be convinced of that,’ said Mr March.

‘I assure you.’

‘All I can do,’ said Mr March, ‘is acknowledge your remark.’

‘Why are you making it worse than it need be?’ I cried. I explained as much as I was free to do of her share in the story, and of how she had made her plea to Seymour and been refused. As I was speaking, Sir Philip’s face was lighter, more ready to credit what I said, than his brother’s, which was set in an obstinate, incredulous frown. Yet at last Mr March said, as though reluctantly:

‘Apparently she has expressed some concern.’

I repeated part of what I had said. All of a sudden he shouted: ‘Do you deny that if she wished she could still stop this abomination?’

I hesitated. Yes, she could inform against the Note. She could finish it for good. The loyalties that she would have to betray went through my mind, inhibiting my answer. The hesitation made me seem less straightforward than I was really being. Mr March shouted: ‘Do you deny it?’

‘It’s possible, but—’

‘Lewis Eliot knows very well,’ Mr March said to Sir Philip, ‘that it’s more than possible.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘It’s only possible by a way that no one would like to use. I don’t think many people could do it.’

‘Can you explain yourself?’ said Sir Philip.

I had to shake my head.

‘I should be breaking a confidence,’ I said.

‘At any rate,’ said Sir Philip, ‘I can take it that this is all part and parcel of her cranky behaviour?’

‘In a sense, yes.’ I said I could not add to that answer.

Sir Philip became brisk, almost relieved. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘that is the best news I’ve heard today. Charles must bring her to heel. I’ve always thought it was scandalous for him to let her indulge in this nonsense. Particularly a young woman as good-looking as she is. He ought to keep her busier himself.’ Into the yellowing parchment face there came a smile, appreciative and salacious. It might have been a flicker of himself as a younger man, the Philip who had an eye for the women, the Philip who, so the family gossip said, had kept a string of mistresses.

‘I cannot let you delude yourself,’ said Mr March.

‘What do you mean?’

‘You are inclined to think the position is less dangerous because my son’s wife is responsible for it.’

The weight of Mr March’s words told on Sir Philip.

He replied irritably: ‘I don’t understand what you’re getting at. I’ve always heard that the young woman is devoted to Charles.’

‘I have no reason to believe the contrary.’

‘Then she’ll do what he tells her, in the end.’

There was a silence, Mr March cried: ‘I cannot answer for what my son will tell her.’

‘You’re not being reasonable.’ Sir Philip’s tone was harassed and sharp. ‘Charles has always had decent feelings for me, hasn’t he? You’ve only got to let him know that this is serious for me. If they go on far enough, they may make it impossible for me to stay in public life. Well then. Be as considerate as you can, and tell him none of us would interfere with his wife’s activities as a general rule, though he might take it from me that she should have something better to do with her time. But tell him this is too important for me and the family for us to be delicate. We must ask him to’ assert himself.’

‘You don’t know how much you’re asking,’ I broke out.

‘If the thing’s possible, it’s got to be done,’ said Sir Philip.

‘I will make those representations,’ said Mr March. ‘But I cannot answer for the consequences.’

‘If you prefer it,’ said Sir Philip, ‘I am quite prepared to speak to Charles.’

‘No, Philip,’ Mr March said. ‘I must do it myself.’

Sir Philip stared at him, and then said: ‘I’m not willing to leave anything to chance. I expect Charles to act immediately.’

He looked at his brother for agreement, but Mr March barely moved his head in acquiescence.

‘I shouldn’t like to go out under a cloud,’ said Sir Philip. ‘Of course, we’ve all got to go some time, but no one likes being forced out.’ Suddenly his tone altered, and he said quickly: ‘Mind you, I’m not ready to admit that my usefulness is over yet. I’ve some pieces of work in this department I want to carry through, and after that—’

Inexplicably his mood had changed, and he began to talk of his expectations. He hoped to keep his office for six months, until there was a reshuffle in the government; he speculated on the reshuffle name by name, knowing this kind of politics just as he knew the March family. If one combination came off, he might still get a minor ministry for himself. For that he was hoping.

It was strange to hear him that afternoon. It was stranger still to hear Mr March, after a time, join in. Preoccupied, with occasional silences, he nevertheless joined in, and they forecast the chances of Sir Philip’s acquaintances, among them Holford’s son. Lord Holford — to whose party Charles had taken me years before — had a son whom he was trying to manoeuvre into a political success. Both Sir Philip and Mr March were anxious to secure that he did not get so much as a parliamentary private secretaryship.

It was strange to listen to them. No one, it seemed to me, had the power continuously to feel old. There were moments, many of them, when a man as realistic as Mr March was menaced by the grave — as in the club that afternoon, when he saw that his contemporaries were decrepit men. But those moments did not last. There were others, as now, when Sir Philip and Mr March could fear, could hope, just as they would have feared and hoped thirty years before. They were making plans at that moment: Sir Philip at seventy-three was still hoping for a ministry. There was no incongruity to himself: he hoped for it exactly as a young man would. The griefs and hopes of Mr March or Sir Philip might seem to an outsider softened and pathetic, because of the man’s age: but to the man himself, age did not matter, they were simply the griefs and hopes of his own timeless self.