Gilbert was becoming annoyed, and made no reply. After all, his mother was only a woman, and women never could argue. It jarred on his manhood that she should take him to task, and his voice was a little cold as he inquired what she would take to drink.
“You know I always take one glass of claret.” The tone somehow implied that a woman like Sybil Iverson might reprehensibly vary her drink with lunch, but she had regular habits. Then she returned to the attack.
“Claudia is not the woman that we—your dear father and I—would have chosen for you.”
“Doesn’t every mother say that about her son’s choice?”
His mother sighed and waited while Gilbert ordered the wine. “What sort of bringing-up has she had? What sort of a wife and mother will such a girl make? Her mother’s only god was pleasure, her only commandment ‘Enjoy the fleeting hour.’ Do you mean to tell me that the daughter of such a woman has proper ideas about life? Would you care to be the complaisant husband of a Circe?”
But here Gilbert put his foot down. His mother must be made to see that he knew quite well what he was about, that he had not run haphazard into this engagement. Not on any account would he let her see that curious mixture of surprise and annoyance at the back of his mind when he thought of the proposal scene. He had an undefined feeling that he had been hurried into it, though how he had been hurried, by whom or by what, he did not seek to explain even to himself. To Gilbert’s cast of mind vague feelings were best ignored as symptoms of a weak and illogical brain, much the same as vague symptoms may denote an illness of the body. Still the feeling was there, behind many stacks of docketed and pigeonholed pieces of information. Yet he had almost made up his mind to propose to Claudia—oh! yes—only—that particular night?
“Mother, I cannot hear you say such ridiculous things about Claudia. You do not know her. You might as well say that the children of murderers will all grow up murderers.”
“You might commit murder in a sudden fit of passion, but such a warped, degraded nature as Sybil Iverson’s is another story. Besides—the sons of a murderer have probably seen him hanged or punished—the law steps in; but who punishes a woman like Sybil Iverson? Society, nowadays, is too lax to such creatures, and virtuous women have to mix with them and take them by the hand, or else be dubbed ridiculous or old-fashioned. Well,” with a sudden little gust of passion like a disturbance in a tea-cup, “thank God, I am old-fashioned and absurd. I can say my prayers every night and lie down in peace.... No, Gilbert, you know I only take one glass of claret.”
“They say Mrs. Iverson has given up her wicked, siren-like ways and gone in for spiritualism.” He wished his mother realized that she was keeping him from his work and would hurry up with her lunch. The leisurely ways of the country were not those of town. But Lady Currey was doing her duty.
“Such women never give up their wicked ways, they take them to the grave with them.” Both Gilbert and his mother had very little sense of humour, with the distinction that Gilbert knew when things were ridiculous. “I know Sybil’s mother died of a broken heart.” This was quite untrue, she had died of fatty degeneration of the liver. “But there, the Psalms say that the wicked flourish like green bay-trees, and if they did in King David’s time there is no doubt they do now. But their punishment awaits them, Gilbert; always remember that.”