The Osbornes

by E. F. Benson

“Well, the less we know about our insides the better, to my way of thinking,” said her husband, “until there’s some call to see what’s going on. Eat your dinner and drink your wine and get your sleep of nights, and you’ve done what you can to keep it contented.”

“And I’m sure none’s got a better right to tell us how to keep well than you, my dear,” said Lady Osborne appreciatively, “for bar a bit of gout now and then, as it isn’t reasonable you should be spared, there’s not an hour’s anxiety your health’s given me since first we met, Mr. O., and here’s the boys ready for their tea, I’ll be bound. Old Alf, and his saying that he wondered at me allowing them to go horseback!”

All this, these quiet ordinary domestic conversations, as well as things of far greater import, had entirely changed in character for Dora. But it was for her only that they had changed; in themselves they were exactly as they had been before there came those days which, so she put it to herself, had opened her eyes and given sight to them. For she had labelled them trivial or tiresome, according as her own mood had varied, and though discussion on subjects of high artistic or spiritual import was not rare but unknown among the Osbornes, she had now the sense to see that the kindly utterances of simple people possibly illustrated though they did not allude to qualities that were not at all trivial. For she saw now the personalities that lay behind these details of their life, the hearts out of which the mouths spoke. It was that which gave its tone to what had become music: and if Lord Osborne lingered in his cellar to find a bottle of wine that Sir Thomas appreciated, it was no longer Sir Thomas’s undoubted greediness that concerned her, but his host’s desire that his guest should enjoy himself. And she knew now that the spirit which did not think it trivial to see that the dinner was good, or that the wine was plentiful, was perfectly capable of rising to higher levels than these. When there was a call for courage, courage of a very wonderful sort had answered; when endurance was needed, endurance was there; when charity, as in the case of Jim, the charity that met the difficult and disgraceful situation was complete, and had all the fineness and delicacy which only perfect simplicity can give. How Claude had done it she did not know; there seemed no question of finesse or of diplomatic behaviour. He had merely behaved without difficulty, like Claude, and but a few weeks afterward there was Jim, sensitive and highly strung as he always was, staying with them all, not like a guest, but as one of the family, as Lady Osborne loved to think. And it was not that he was lacking in the sense of shame that made his friendship with Claude possible: it was that he, like Dora, had had his eyes opened. A heart as kind as Claude’s counted for something after all: they both, it must be supposed, had taken it for granted until it was shown them. But the sight of it, the practical knowledge of it, worked the miracle, worked it easily, as if there was no miracle about it.

Dora had gone to her room shortly after tea to rest, on the diplomatic prompting of her mother-in-law. With so many gentlemen present, Lady Osborne would never have said, “Dora, the doctor told you to rest for a couple of hours before dinner,” but she had reminded her that she had several letters to write for the post. And Dora, secretly and kindly smiling, had remembered at once, though (like the almug trees) there were no such letters. And with her to her room she took up the parcel of thought that has been indicated, for she wanted to examine its contents a little more closely before Claude came up, as he always did, to read to her for a while before she dressed. Right at the bottom of the packet, she knew, there lay something very precious. She would look at that by and by, with him perhaps.

But in spite of the preponderance that qualities of the heart had now gained in her mind compared to what must be called qualities of the surface, to which belonged such things as beauty and breeding, she found that the latter had not at all lost their value. But she saw such things differently. They had assumed, so it seemed to her, not a truer value, but the true value. She loved Claude’s beauty more than even in those enchanted days of honeymoon in Venice, not only now because it was beauty, but because it was Claude’s, while such superficial failings as were undoubtedly his she laughed at still, but now without bitterness or irritation. They were funny: to say a “handsome lady” was still ludicrous, but now, since it was Claude who said it, it could not help being lovable. Indeed she and Jim had invented what they called “The Claude Catechism,” which began, “Are you a handsome lady? No, but I am a perfect gentleman.” And then Claude would throw whatever was handiest at Jim’s head.

And how, like Pharaoh, had she at one time hardened her heart, refusing to give admittance, so it seemed to her now, to that sunshine of beautiful qualities that was always ready to stream in upon her. He had never failed her, he had always been patient, waiting for the door to open, for the closed windows to be unbarred. True, in the early days he thought they had been unbarred, that he had full admittance, but in the weeks that followed, when it was clear to him that ingress was given him no longer, he had waited, waited without bitter thought of her. She had made him, after their reconciliation, try to explain what he had felt to her, and he had done it, unwillingly, but not failing to answer her questions.

“You see it was like this, darling,” he had said. “I saw something was wrong, and I tried to find out if I had done anything, or how I could set things right. But it didn’t seem to me that I had altered at all—at least I knew I hadn’t—toward you, from the time that you said you loved me, and so the best thing I could do was just to keep on at that. I thought of all sorts of things, tried to wonder at your reasons for not being pleased with me. But that was no use: I’d always been myself to you, and—and I thought you might care for me again later on. Of course—I suppose it was in a selfish way—I was glad when poor old Jim made such a mistake, because that gave me an opportunity, you see, to—well, treat him decently. Not that I ever thought it would get to your ears. However, it did: Jim was a trump over that, going and telling you. I didn’t mean him to, but when it happened like that, I couldn’t help being pleased. You had been a bit hard on me, you know: thank God you were, for it makes it better now that you are not. Lord, what a jaw!”

This was the outcome of her talk with him, but the “jaw” was punctuated by questions of hers. It was another Claude catechism. But this one was not funny, nor had Jim any part in it.

Yes: she had separated this man who loved her into packets: there was her mistake. First she had loved his beauty, and then had taken that for granted. Next she had felt growingly irritated with all in him that did not correspond to the particular little tricks of conversation and life in which she had been brought up. Then she had got accustomed to those sterling qualities which she had taken for granted from the first. And then had come “the little more,” and how much it was. He had but shown, in practical demonstration, that he was kind and brave and reliable, all that she had thought she had given him credit for at first. But the effect was immense: she fell in love, at first real sight, with his qualities.

That fused the whole: at last she was in love with the man, not with his face, not with his character taken by itself, but with him as a whole. That splendid body was his, his too were the greater splendours of character, and if his also were the things dealt with in the public Claude catechism, they were no longer rejected, they were no longer even accepted, they were welcomed and hugged. The reason for this was plain: it was Claude who said and did all that which was symbolized under the title of “handsome lady,” and since it was Claude, it was a thing to be kissed, though laughter came too. He was no longer packets: they were fused into one dear whole, the thought of which and the presence of which made her heart ache with tenderness.