The Osbornes

by E. F. Benson

Once more she faced the situation as she conceived it to be. The time of romance, those months in the autumn were over: the red and gold of the autumn were withered from the trees. Brief had been their glory, which should have shed its light over many years yet; but, as far as she was concerned, what had made their flame was just the personal beauty of her husband. And out of them should already have sprung a deep and tender affection, the friendship which is not only the true and noble sequel of love, but is an integral part of love itself, perhaps even love’s heart. But was it there? It seemed to her rather that something bitter had come out of it, something in which regret for the past was mingled with the gall of disillusionment. And even regret had but small part in it; those months of gold seemed already unreal to her: she felt that she was regretting a dream. It was the same in little things too, for the little things all took their colour from what had been to her then the one great reality. He had referred to himself, for instance, that very afternoon as “Claudius Imperator,” and it was with a sense of unreality that she remembered the genesis of that very microscopic joke. She had bought a Roman coin in Venice with that inscription on it, and had given it to him, saying it was his label in case he was lost. To-day she could not conceive doing such a thing: she could not recapture the state of mind in which she did it, the impulse even that made such a trifle conceivable. In any case, the thing was one that might be said once and then be forgotten. But Claude had the retentive Osborne sense of humour. With him it was “Once a joke, always a joke,” and from time to time, as to-day, he brought out the “Claudius Imperator” again. The Osborne humour had a heavy tread—a slow, heavy, slouching rustic tread—and a guffaw of a laugh.

There is a Spectator within each of us who for ever watches our thoughts and words, and criticises them. It may be called conscience, or guidance, or the devil, as the case may be; for some folk are gifted with a Spectator that is their best self, others with a Spectator which is but a parody of themselves. Dora’s Spectator was above the average; he was optimistic anyhow, and kindly, and at this point he came to her aid with, so to speak, several smart raps over her knuckles. Whatever was the truth of the whole matter—if, indeed, there is any absolute truth to be arrived at in the fluid and ever-varying adjustments of our relationships with others—only one attitude is compatible with self-respect; namely, to find out and hoard like grains of gold all that is fine and generous and lovable in others, and do our best to find something in ourselves worthy of being matched with it. Instead of this, so said Dora’s Spectator to her now, she had, with acute and avid eye, been picking out all that in Claude seemed to her to be trivial or ludicrous or tiresome, and been finding in herself, to match it, intolerance and want of charity. There had been no difficulty, so said her Spectator, in laying hands on plenty of those.

She had but one word to say in self-defence, and the moment it was said she perceived that it amounted to self-accusation. She had fallen in love with his beauty: how could she not despond when she found that she was in love with it—like that—no longer? It had blinded her to all else: she had seen his vulgarities but dimly, if at all, even as she had seen his panoply of excellent qualities but dimly. Now she saw only the vulgarities, or at any rate she saw them right in the foreground, big and blinding; while behind, in the distance, so to speak, sat the rest of him. Was it not reasonable that her outlook, which must take its colour from the past, should be pessimistic? And then even that piece of self-defence was turned into self-accusation. If that was the case, the fault had been hers from the beginning. But that was what she had done; she had separated him, the man, into packets: she had fallen in love with one packet, and now she was spreading in front of her another that only irritated and almost disgusted her. She had yet to learn the true and the wider outlook, to feel that fire of love that fuses all things together, and loves though it can tenderly laugh, and is gentle always, and rejoices in the weaknesses and imperfections and faults of the beloved, simply because they are his. For though there are many ways of love, the spirit that animates them all is just that; they are all swayed by one magical tune. But that Dora did not yet know, she had not heard a note of it, she did not even know the region of the soul where it made melody all day long. All that she had learned in the last few minutes was that she had with considerable acuteness been spying out causes for complaint, excuses for dissatisfaction. She could do a little better than that.

By this time she had arrived at Uncle Alf’s and though the severe remarks of the Spectator had partially braced her again, after the rather sloppy abandonment of self-pity and dejection into which her introspection had brought her, it must be confessed that there was something about Uncle Alf, caustic and malicious though he was, that restored her more efficaciously. For out of all the weapons with which it is fair to fight the disappointments and despondencies that are incidental to human life, there is none sharper or more rapier-like in attack or defence than the sense of humour. And Uncle Alf was well equipped there: not even the picture dealer whom he habitually worsted would have denied that he had that. It was lambent and ill-natured; it twinkled and stung; but it had the enviable trick of perceiving what was ludicrous.

“And I hear poor old Eddie has been out with you and Claude in Venice, my dear,” he said; “and I can’t say which I’m the most sorry for—you, or him, or Claude, or Venice.”

“Oh, why Claude?” asked she, for she had not thought of being sorry for Claude.

“Because you had taught him probably to admire Tintoret—or say he did—and Eddie would want him to admire the railway station. He would have to trim. A very funny party you must have been, my dear.”

Dora laughed; till this moment she had thought of them all as a rather tragic party, and the other aspect had not occurred to her.

“Do you know, I expect we were,” she said; “and all the time I took it seriously. I wonder if that was a mistake, Uncle Alf.”

“To be sure it was. There’s many things in this world that will depress you, and make you good for nothing, if you take them seriously, and that cheer you up if you don’t.”