IV
I always regarded Loring as the possessor of one sterling quality. Selfish he might be, or indolent, or inconsiderate, an old maid in his fussy little rules of everyday existence and an incurable romantic in his attitude to the life of the twentieth century. With it all he was a man of his word. Under blackmail he had pledged himself to entertain my French journalists, and when the time came for fulfilling the pledge he smiled welcome on them in the hall of House of Steynes.
Indeed, so admirable was his manner that I retired unreluctantly from competition. Raney's messenger, the self-styled "James Morris," had called on me in June; the evangelists of Universal Brotherhood arrived in July, and for more sweltering weeks than I like to count, mine was the privilege of giving them tea and speeches on the Terrace, escorting them in unsuitable clothes to Goodwood and more speeches and misinforming them on subjects of historical interest in Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's—a course which afforded them opportunity of correcting me in further speeches, to the sluggish perplexity of the vergers.
In August, the hoarse, limp mass of us repaired to Euston and House of Steynes. Old Lady Loring was, perhaps fortunately, with Amy at Baden-Baden, though four days can be interminably long even in a bachelor party. Our host, however, put his heart into the work; with a grim thoroughness we visited Holyrood and Arthur's Seat, the Highlands and Islands and dismissed our guests fraternally with the clang of Clyde hammers resounding in their ears and an obstinate conviction that they had enjoyed themselves.
"And now," said Loring to my uncle as we walked out of the Waverley Station, "now for an All-British holiday. You can stay another week, sir? No women till my mother comes back—I thought that would appeal to you. You, George? Then the only thing to do is to find a telegraph office and invite everybody we can think of."
Two days later, by persuasion on our part and perjury on theirs, we had snatched a dozen men from the same number of protesting hostesses. Tom Dainton was on his honeymoon—surely the least romantic of its kind for anyone who knew Tom or could imagine an ox-eyed wife yet more silent than himself!—but Sam came up to say good-bye before sailing for India with his regiment, and we had the luck to catch Mayhew on leave from Budapest. Summertown escaped the vigilance of his Colonel for half the time, and Arden telegraphed at some expense: "One resents these short notices but if one can be assured that the Waterloo brandy is not yet finished one may perhaps sacrifice oneself for one's friends but one cannot allow ones' acceptance to be taken as establishing a precedent."
The party was a rare antidote for anyone suffering from too much House of Commons and general propaganda. We bathed and lay about in long chairs and bathed again and enjoyed the delicious, lazy conversation wherein the speakers fall half asleep between the drawling sentences, and nobody makes epigrams or debating points, and nothing matters. Valentine Arden, exquisite, precious and inscrutable as ever, would unbend from time to time and speak as though he no longer feared a charge of enthusiasm. His books were attracting considerable attention with their sparkle and passionless satire, and his talk left the impression on my mind that for all his youth the satire was not wholly cheap effect.
He analysed contemporary literature with the eyes of a man whose profession is to study technique, emphasizing the essentially derivative character of modern writing with its sex psychology borrowed from France, its Pottery School and Dartmoor School imitating Hardy, its intensive vision applied by the admirers of James. His final judgement was depressing, for there was nothing new except Wells and Conrad and little that was good. We were too much obsessed by our environment to produce or care for great books. Nothing was worth achieving or describing, unless it were an invitation to dine with royalty or a treatise on sexual pathology.
The childlike preoccupation of grown men and women in the infinite littleness of social life was an irresistible mark for the satire of a man whose deliberate and effective pose was to exaggerate the fastidious artificiality of his generation. Valentine Arden had a courageous and altogether scornful soul. I have seen him enter the Ritz, thin and white as an Aubrey Beardsley pierrot, in a black coat lined with heliotrope silk. I have watched strong-minded young women humbling themselves before him because they knew his indifference to their charms, and I have marked the haughtiest of nervous hostesses exerting themselves to secure his comfort. In his early days no man of my time was so successful in getting taken at his own valuation. Later when his position was assured, half London was civil in the expectation of appearing in his next book; the other half in hopes of being left out.
Mayhew's riotous fancy was little subdued by twelve months in a foreign capital devoted to special correspondence by day and the study of Austro-Hungary's myriad tongues by night. He was hardly less omniscient than in the old Fleet Street days when he dined with me at the Eclectic and prefaced preposterous stories with "The Prime Minister said to me in the Lobby only this afternoon, 'My dear Mayhew, I don't want this to go any further, but ...'" I remember the late absorption of Bosnia and Herzegovina left him tolerably sagacious.
"I don't think people in this country realize what a near thing it was," he said, with a grave shake of the head. "It's a diplomatic triumph for the old Emperor, but he'd better not try to repeat it. Russia's got a long memory. At present she's recovering slowly from the Japanese War and wasn't equal to taking on Austria and Germany at the same time. Devil of it is, you never know where the thing'll stop. Russia brings in France, France may bring us in.... It's a great pity someone can't hold the Balkans under the sea for five minutes."
I have a fairly long memory, and five years later I quoted Mayhew's words to him. He was honest enough to say that he had forgotten them and that the two Balkan wars had converted him to my own belief that a European war was too big a thing for any power to begin.
House of Steynes was an asylum from the House of Commons, but we could not keep altogether free from politics. No one who remembers the 1909 Session will be surprised. I believe my record for divisions under the famous Budget was equalled by two men and beaten by three. It was the great fight of our time. I had been getting a bad name with the Whips, and observant eyes on the opposite side were already marking me down a possible renegade. That wicked old wire-puller, the Duchess of Ross, on ten minutes' acquaintance at a Foreign Office reception invited me to stay at Herrig Castle to complete the conversion. I would have accepted in a spirit of adventure had it not been for the Budget; but any man with one drop of Radical blood in his veins felt, as I did, that Democracy was fighting for its life.
I shall not revive the old battle that we fought in the House and refought with Loring. I only allude to it because of the change that controversy wrought in his life, a change he was already beginning resignedly to contemplate.
"There is good in all things, even your Budget," he told my uncle ironically. "One irresponsible, hereditary legislator will be able to retire with dignity."
"Our whole democratic development for fifty years is based on the financial monopoly of the Commons," Bertrand answered.
To my mind the saddest effect of political life is the ease with which even considerable intellects come to live by catch-phrases.
"That's little recommendation in my eyes, sir," Loring answered. "Come! Come! Let's die fighting! If we let this through—to the tune of the Land Song—there's nothing you won't be able to pass as a Money Bill. And there's always the chance that the country may support us."
"And you'd make every future Budget fight for its life like this one—against an irresponsible House?"
Not lightly did my uncle forget his all-night sittings and endless perambulations through the lobbies.
"If you choose to call us irresponsible," said Loring, with a shrug of the shoulders. "I submit there's still room for a long view, a patience, an aloofness from the heated quarrel of the moment. Tradition should be represented, sir—as it's represented by college Fellows or Benchers——"
"The two most reactionary, uncontrolled, mediaeval-minded bodies you could have chosen," my uncle commented in one hurried breath.
"And aren't you proud of them both, sir?" Loring flashed back. "As they were and are and always will be? Aren't you proud to be a T.C.D. man and a member of the Inner Temple?"
"No!" said Bertrand contemptuously.
"Your hand on your heart, sir?" Loring persisted.
My uncle laughed and made no reply.
When the Budget went to the Lords, Loring voted for its rejection. When the Parliament Bill was presented, he continued his opposition; not even the threat of five hundred new creations shook his consistency. I sometimes think his whole life was symbolized by his struggle in the dwindling ranks of the "Die Hards." His last words—"This is the appeal I make to your Lordships. It is unlikely that I shall have the honour again to address your Lordships' House...."—were characteristic of his refusal to compromise with modernity. When the Parliament Bill secured its final reading, Loring left the House of Lords for ever.
After the rest of the party was dispersed I stayed on for a couple of days until Lady Loring and Amy arrived. One of the two days was Loring's birthday, and I found him in a state of altogether ridiculous depression when we met after breakfast.
"Twenty-nine!" he exclaimed in acknowledgement of my good wishes. "It's the devil of an age, George."
"Not for a confirmed pessimist," I said. "Every hour brings release nearer."
"I shall have to get married, you know," he observed reflectively.
"As one goes misère in Nap?" I inquired.
He was really thinking aloud and quite properly ignored my question.
"I suppose it's the right thing to do," he said. "The Cardinal's my heir at present, and after him there's no one to succeed. George, it must be a damned uncomfortable state, in spite of the novelists. Think of having a woman always living with you——"
"According to the modern novelists," I said, "they always live with someone else."
"Well, even that seems uncomfortable."
"For you or the other man? It depends on the wife, and in any case I don't know that you need consider him except on broad humanitarian principles. Jim, if I may advise you, don't be glamoured by the idea of being faithful to one woman all your life. You have formed certain habits——"
"My dear George, don't rub it in! I don't envy the woman who marries me. But I'm not likely to grow more domesticated by remaining a bachelor."
"Have you anyone in mind?" I asked, as I poured myself out a cup of tea.
"Several," he answered vaguely.
"Then why not leave it at that?" I suggested.
When Amy arrived the following day I found her alone in the morning-room and asked whether she was responsible for turning her brother's thoughts into this channel. For answer she frowned slightly and brushed the curls away from her forehead.
"In other words, you don't approve of her?" I said.
"I approve of anyone Jim marries," she replied, with a touch of loyal defiance. "That doesn't mean I shan't do all I can to prevent a great mistake being made."
"It would simplify things enormously," I observed, "if I knew who was being discussed."
"There are two of them. You must learn to use your eyes, George."
"But till a fortnight ago I hadn't seen Jim for years."
"Well, if you stay here another fortnight—— You're not really going to-morrow, are you?"
"I'll stay a week to save Jim from bigamy," I said.
"Oh, it isn't that." She walked over to the writing-table and came back with a sheet of paper containing the names of the following day's party. "He wants to marry one of them, and I want him to marry the other."
I glanced at the list, and "Miss Hunter-Oakleigh" caught my eye.
"Violet's one," I said. Then I observed another name and handed the sheet back to Amy. "Thanks. I have seen indications."
Amy fretted the paper with her fingers.
"I haven't a word against Sonia," she said. "If Jim marries her, I—all of us, mother and I and everybody—shall try to make a success of it." She stopped, and shook her head with misgiving. "I'm sure it's a mistake, though. She's got very little heart, and Jim's nothing like brutal enough to keep her in order. And I'm afraid he'll find she's got nothing but her looks. That's what's attracted him. Violet's pretty enough, Heaven knows, but Sonia——" She shrugged her shoulders helplessly. "I can understand any man being mad about her. And she knows it, and expects men to go mad about her. I don't think she'll be content with one man's devotion. Someone will come along.... George, I hate to talk like this, but a lioness and her cub aren't in it with me where Jim's concerned. He and mother are all I've got in the world, and if anyone came along and spoiled his life ... I should be quite capable of murder."
"Who invited Violet?" I asked. Before leaving London I had dined with her and her young brother. She had said nothing about coming to Scotland.
"I did," Amy answered. "I wrote to her from Baden-Baden."
"I suppose she would marry Jim?"
"That's one of the questions you musn't put to a woman," Amy answered, with a laugh.
The following day brought Violet and the Daintons, as well as a number of other people in whom I was not so immediately interested.
There was a certain want of ease about our meeting, for I fancy Sir Roger was as frightened of his host as I was of Lady Dainton. The two of us withdrew without prearrangement to the smoking-room and exchanged quiet confidences till it was time to dress for dinner. I sat next to Sonia at that meal and was sensible of an agreeable change in her manner. We had not met since her rupture with Crabtree, and I imagine that two years' retirement had given her leisure for salutary reflection. She was subdued and polite to people older than herself—cordial even to members of her own sex; and so little attention had she received in her exile that she was gracious to quite inconsequential men whose function in the old days would have been to hover deferentially around her, awaiting orders.
"I'm so glad its you and not a stranger," she was good enough to tell me as we went in. "How's everybody and what have you all been doing?"
I dealt with the comprehensive question through three courses, and at the end she asked with a momentary heightening of colour whether I had heard anything of O'Rane.
"I'm glad he's doing well," she remarked indifferently, when I had sketched his career from the Imperial Hapsburg cells by way of Mombasa to Mexico. "George, I suppose you thought I treated him very badly?"
"Even if I thought so, I shouldn't say so," I answered. "I imagine there are easier and more restful things in life than to be loved by Raney. Not that his devotion has aged you noticeably."
"My dear, I'm twenty-two!" She studied her own reflection in the silver plate before her. "When you see him, tell him to shed a tear over my remains," she went on mournfully.
"He's twenty-six himself," I said. "And Jim and I are twenty-nine, which is far more important, though I may say I now look on thirty without a tremor."
"Oh, age doesn't matter for a man," she answered, with a touch of impatience. "You've got work to do. When you're simply waiting for someone to take compassion on you ..."
"There is still hope even at twenty-two," I said.
"But when twenty-two becomes twenty-three, and then twenty-four, and then twenty-five.... It's rot being a girl, George!" she exclaimed, with something of the old fire in her brown eyes. "I always think—I'm not a Suffragette, of course—I always think if we could look forward to any kind of career——"
"But there are scores," I said.
"Not for—for us," she answered. "Talk to mother about it. Girls like Amy or Violet or me, you understand."
Lady Dainton was sitting on my left, and when opportunity offered I opened with a platitude on the economic position of woman. It took her a moment to get her bearings, for she and Loring had been discussing the misdeeds of the Apaches. A very pretty quarrel in their ranks had been extensively reported for some months, starting from the night when Erckmann charged Crabtree's vaunted cousin, Lord Beaumorris, with cheating at baccarat. Beaumorris, whose bankruptcy discharge had been suspended in consequence of a technicality concerned with undisclosed assets, had frankly joined the Apaches for what he could make out of them. Erckmann felt that rules must be observed even in baccarat, even as played by Beaumorris. "Ve vos all chentlemens here, yes, no," as Summertown, who had witnessed the scene, informed me.
Not content with the verbal charge, Erckmann laid indiscreet pen to paper and was in immediate receipt of a writ for libel. The jury disagreed, and Beaumorris, venting his feelings in the Press, took occasion to call Erckmann an Illicit Diamond Buyer. Proceedings were promptly taken for criminal libel aggravated by attempted blackmail. The jury again disagreed, and, though both Erckmann and Beaumorris now left the court with equally tarnished records, nothing would satisfy Beaumorris but an action for malicious prosecution.
It required the time of one judge sitting six days a week to keep abreast of Apache litigation. As a taxpayer, I sometimes wondered whether either reputation was worth five thousand pounds a year of public money.
"The position of women?" Lady Dainton repeated in answer to my question. "It depends so much on the woman, don't you think? If a girl's young and pretty and has a little money and goes about in Society, don't you know? she usually makes a good match." Her eyes looked past me for a moment and rested on Sonia. "As for the others...."
I really forget what their fate was to be. No doubt their prospects, too, depended on the possession of a determined mother. Evil associations corrupt good manners, and I heard Lady Dainton issue herself an invitation at Loring's expense in a way Crabtree himself could not have bettered. We were discussing plans for the winter, and Loring mentioned the possibility of taking his yacht for a three or four months' cruise in the Mediterranean. I was invited, but had to refuse, because a general election was impending; Lady Dainton invited herself and Sonia, leaving Sir Roger behind to recapture the Melton seat; despite the superhuman efforts of Amy Loring, my cousin Violet was not approached.
"That absolutely decides it," Amy said ruefully. "I shan't give in. I shall go too and do everything in my power to stop it, but I'm afraid he's caught."
"'There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip,'" I announced, in my more banal manner.