To that old mountain—given confidence in a supreme order of things he had long been a stranger.
He knew himself to be old, yet he felt young; and this troubled him. It troubled and puzzled him, too, to think that he, who had always been so careful, should be father and grandfather to such as seemed born to disaster. He had nothing to say against Jo—who could say anything against the boy, an amiable chap?—but his position was deplorable, and this business of Jun’s nearly as bad. It seemed like a fatality, and a fatality was one of those things no man of his character could either understand or put up with.
In writing to his son he did not really hope that anything would come of it. Since the ball at Roger’s he had seen too clearly how the land lay—he could put two and two together quicker than most men—and, with the example of his own son before his eyes, knew better than any Forsyte of them all that the pale flame singes men’s wings whether they will or no.
In the days before Jun’s engagement, when she and Mrs. Soames were always together, he had seen enough of Irene to feel the spell she cast over men. She was not a flirt, not even a coquette—words dear to the heart of his generation, which loved to define things by a good, broad, inadequate word—but she was dangerous. He could not say why. Tell him of a quality innate in some women—a seductive power beyond their own control! He would but answer: “Humbug!” She was dangerous, and there was an end of it. He wanted to close his eyes to that affair. If it was, it was; he did not want to hear any more about it—he only wanted to save Jun’s position and her peace of mind. He still hoped she might once more become a comfort to himself.
And so he had written. He got little enough out of the answer. As to what young Jolyon had made of the interview, there was practically only the queer sentence: “I gather that he’s in the stream.” The stream! What stream? What was this new-fangled way of talking?
He sighed, and folded the last of the papers under the flap of the bag; he knew well enough what was meant.
June came out of the dining-room, and helped him on with his summer coat. From her costume, and the expression of her little resolute face, he saw at once what was coming.
“I’m going with you,” she said.
“Nonsense, my dear; I go straight into the City. I can’t have you racketting about!”
“I must see old Mrs. Smeech.”