“He’s certainly making the most of it,” he said; “just as I meant him to do. I think I’m like Dad in that. Do you remember how he treated us over the Venice house this year? Not a penny for us to pay. Jim’s giving lots of little parties, I’m told, and Parker came round to me yesterday to ask if he should order some more wine, as Jim’s nearly finished it. Also cigars and cigarettes. Of course I told him to order whatever was wanted. I hate doing things by halves. The household books will be something to smile at. But he’s having a rare good time. It’s not much entertaining he has been able to do all his life up till now.”
Dora sat up.
“But Claude, do you mean he’s drinking your wine and letting you pay for all the food?” she asked.
“Yes. It’s my own fault. I ought to have locked up the cellar, and made it clear that he would pay for his own chickens. As a matter of fact, it never struck me that he wouldn’t. But as that hasn’t occurred to him, I can’t remind him of it.”
“But you must tell him he’s got to pay for things,” said Dora. “Why, he might as well order clothes and, just because he was in your flat, expect you to pay for them!”
“Oh, I can’t tell him,” said Claude. “It would look as if I grudged him things. I don’t a bit: I like people to have a good time at my expense. Poor devil! he had a rotten Derby week; no wonder he likes living on the cheap. And it must be beastly uncomfortable living on the cheap, if it’s your own cheap, so to speak. I expect you and I would be just the same if we were poor.”
But the idea was insupportable to Dora, and the more so because of the way in which Claude took it. Generous he was, no one could be more generous, but there was behind it all a sort of patronizing attitude. He gave cordially indeed, but with the cordiality was a selfconscious pleasure in his own open-handedness and a contempt scarcely veiled of what he gave. And the worst of all was that Jim should have taken advantage of this insouciance about money affairs that sprang from the fact that he had no need to worry about money. Claude did not like Jim, Dora felt certain of that, and this made it impossible that Jim should take advantage of his bounty. It was an indebtedness she could not tolerate in her brother.
“What’s there to fuss about?” Claude went on. “If the whole thing runs into a hundred and fifty pounds, it won’t hurt. And, after all, he’s your brother, dear. I like being good to your kin.”
Dora was not doing Claude an injustice when she told herself that his irreproachable conduct to her family was in his mind. It was there; he did not mean it to be in evidence, but insensibly and unintentionally it tinged his words. The whole thing was kind, kind, kind, but it was consciously kind. That made the whole difference.
“But it can’t be,” she said. “If you won’t speak to Jim about it, I will. It is impossible that he should drink your wine and smoke your cigars and have dinner parties at your expense. I can’t let him do that sort of thing, if I can possibly help it. I would much sooner pay myself than that you should pay for him.”