Eddy smiled disagreement, and she remembered that they would be shocked at the Deanery, doubtless.
“Ah well,” she said, “have it your own way. The nicest, then, as well as the least nice, because none of them know any better, poor dears. For that matter, Bridget said she’d be shocked herself if we went alone. Bridget has moods, you know, when she prides herself on being proper—the British female guarding the conventions. She’s in one of them now.... Well, go and see Hugh to-morrow, will you, and talk about the Settlement. He’ll have a lot to say, but don’t have him excited. It’s wonderful what a trust he has in you, Eddy, since you left St. Gregory’s.”
“An inadequate reason,” said Eddy, “but leading to a very proper conclusion. Yes, I’ll go and see him, then.”
He did so, next day. He found Datcherd at the writing-table in his library. It was a large and beautiful library in a large and beautiful house. The Datcherds were rich (or would have been had not Datcherd spent much too much money on building houses for the poor, and Lady Dorothy Datcherd rather too much on cards and clothes and other luxuries), and there was about their belongings that air of caste, of inherited culture, of transmitted intelligence and recognition of social and political responsibilities, that is perhaps only to be found in families with a political tradition of several generations. Datcherd wasn’t a clever literary free-lance; he was a hereditary Whig; that was why he couldn’t be detached, why, about his breaking with custom and convention, there would always be a wrench and strain, a bitterness of hostility, instead of the light ease of Eileen Le Moine’s set, that could gently mock at the heavy-handed world because it had never been under its dominance, never conceived anything but freedom. That, and because of their finer sense of responsibility, is why it is aristocrats who will always make the best social revolutionaries. They know that life is real, life is earnest; they are bound up with the established status by innumerable ties, which either to keep or to break means purpose. They are, in fact, heavily involved, all round; they cannot escape their liabilities; they are the grown-up people in a light-hearted world of children. Surely, then, they should have more of the reins in their hands, less jerking of them from below.... Such, at least, were Eddy’s reflections in Datcherd’s library, while he waited for Datcherd to finish a letter and thought how ill he looked.
Their ensuing conversation need not be detailed. Datcherd told Eddy about arranging lectures at the Club House whenever he could, about the reading-room, the gymnasium, the billiard-room, the woodwork, and the other diversions and educational enterprises which flourish in such institutions. Eddy was familiar with them already, having sometimes been down to the Club House. It was in its main purpose educational. To it came youths between the ages of fifteen and five and twenty, and gave their evenings to acquiring instruction in political economy, sociology, history, art, physical exercises, science, and other branches of learning. They had regular instructors; and besides these, irregular lecturers came down once or twice a week, friends of Datcherd’s, politicians, social workers, writers, anyone who would come and was considered by Datcherd suitable. The Fabian Society, it seemed, throve still among the Club members, and was given occasional indulgences such as Mr. Shaw or Mr. Sidney Webb, and lesser treats frequently. They had debates, and other habits such as will be readily imagined. Having indicated these, Datcherd proceeded to tell Eddy something about his assistant workers, in what ways each needed firm or tender handling.
While they were talking, Billy Raymond came in, to tell Datcherd about a new poet he had found, who wrote verse that seemed suitable for Further. Billy Raymond, a generous and appreciative person, was given to finding new poets, usually in cellars, attics, or workmen’s flats. It was commonly said that he less found them than made them, by some transmuting magic of his own touch. Anyhow they quite often produced poetry, for longer or shorter periods. This latest one was a Socialist in conviction and expression; hence his suitability for Further. Eddy wasn’t sure that they ought to talk of Further; it obviously had Hugh excited.
He and Billy Raymond came away together, which rather pleased Eddy, as he liked Billy better than most people of his acquaintance, which was saying much. There was a breadth about Billy, a large and gentle tolerance, a courtesy towards all sorts and conditions of men and views, that made him restful, as compared, for instance, with the intolerant Arnold Denison. Perhaps the difference was partly that Billy was a poet, with the artist’s vision, which takes in, and Arnold only a critic, whose function it is to select and exclude. Billy, in short, was a producer, and Arnold a publisher; and publishers have to be for ever saying that things won’t do, aren’t good enough. If they can’t say that, they are poor publishers indeed. Billy, in Eddy’s view, approached more nearly than most people to that synthesis which, Eddy believed, unites all factions and all sections of truth.
Billy said, “Poor dear Hugh. I am extraordinarily sorry for him. I am glad you are going to help in the Settlement. He hates leaving it so much. I’m sure I couldn’t worry about my work or anything else if I was going to walk about Greece for a month; but he’s so—so ascetic. I think I respect Datcherd more than almost anyone; he’s so absolutely single-minded. He won’t enjoy Greece a bit, I believe, because of all the people in slums who can’t be there, and wouldn’t if they could. It will seem to him wicked waste of money. Waste, you know! My word!”
“Perhaps,” said Eddy, “he’ll learn how to enjoy life more now his wife has left him. She must have been a weight on his mind.”
“Oh, well,” said Billy, “I don’t know. Perhaps so.... One never really felt that she quite existed, and I daresay he didn’t either, so I don’t suppose her being gone will make so very much difference. She was a sort of unreal thing—a shadow. I always got on with her pretty well; in fact, I rather liked her in a way; but I never felt she was actually there.”