The Forsyte Saga, Volume 2 (104 page)

The bishop leaned forward:

‘Might we rather word it like this? “The signatories much
regret that those persons who own slum property are not more alive to their responsibilities to the community at large.” '

‘Good Lord!' burst from Sir Timothy.

‘I think we might pitch it stronger than that, Bishop,' said Sir Lawrence: ‘But we ought to have a lawyer here, to tell us exactly how far we can go.'

Michael turned to the chairman:

‘I've got one in the house, sir. My father-in-law – I saw him come in just now. I daresay he'd advise us.'

‘Old Forsyte!' said Sir Lawrence. ‘The very man. We ought to have him on the committee, Squire. He's well up in the law of libel.'

‘Ah!' said the Marquess: ‘Mr Forsyte! By all means – a steady head.'

‘Let's co-opt him, then,' said the Squire; ‘a lawyer's always useful.'

Michael went out.

Having drawn the Fragonard blank, he went up to his study, and was greeted by Soames's ‘What's this?'

‘Pretty good, sir, don't you think? It's Fleur's – got feeling.'

‘Yes,' muttered Soames; ‘too much, I shouldn't wonder.'

‘You saw the hats in the hall, no doubt. My Slum Conversion Committee are just drafting their appeal, and they'd be most frightfully obliged to you, sir, as a lawyer, if you'd come down and cast your eye over one or two of the allusions to slum landlords. They want to go just far enough, you know. In fact, if it wouldn't bore you terribly, they'd like to co-opt you on the committee.'

‘Would they?' said Soames: ‘And who are
they
?'

Michael ran over the names.

Soames drew up a nostril. ‘Lot of titles! Is this a wildcat thing?'

‘Oh! no, sir. Our wish to have you on is a guarantee against that. Besides, our chairman, Wilfred Bentworth, has refused a title three times.'

‘Well,' said Soames, ‘I don't know. I'll come and have a look at them.'

‘That's very good of you. I think you'll find them thoroughly respectable,' and he preceded Soames downstairs.

‘This is quite out of my line,' said Soames on the threshold. He was greeted with a number of little silent bows and nods. It was his impression that they'd been having a scrap.

‘Mr – Mr Forsyte,' said what he supposed was this Bent-worth, ‘we want you as a lawyer to come on this committee and keep us – er – straight – check our fire-eaters, like Fanfield there, if you know what I mean;' and he looked over his tortoiseshell spectacles at Sir Timothy. ‘Just cast your eye over this, will you be so good?' He passed a sheet of paper to Soames, who had sat down on a chair slipped under him by the young woman. Soames began to read:

‘ “While we suppose that there may be circumstances which justify the possession of slum property, we nevertheless regret profoundly the apparent indifference of most slum owners to this great national evil. With the hearty cooperation of slum property owners, much might be done which at present cannot be done. We do not wish to hold them up to the execration of anyone, but we want them to realize that they must at least co-operate in getting rid of this blot on our civilization.” '

He read it twice, holding the end of his nose between his thumb and finger: then said: ‘ “We don't wish to hold them up to the execration of anyone.” If you don't you don't; then why say so? The word “execration”! H'm!'

‘Exactly!' said the chairman: ‘Most valuable to have you on the committee, Mr – Forsyte.'

‘Not at all,' said Soames, staring round him: ‘I don't know that I'm coming on.'

‘Look here, sir!' And Soames saw a fellow who looked like a general in a story-book, leaning towards him: ‘D'you mean to say we can't use a mild word like “execration”, when we know they ought to be shot?'

Soames gave a pale smile: if there was a thing he couldn't stand, it was militarism.

‘You can use it if you like,' he said, ‘but not with me or any other man of judgement on the committee.'

At his words at least four members of the committee burst into speech. Had he said anything too strong?

‘We'll pass that without those words, then,' said the chairman. ‘Now for your clause about the kitchens, Shropshire. That's important.'

The Marquess began reading; Soames looked at him almost with benevolence. They had hit it off very well over the Morland. No one objected to the addition, and it was adopted.

‘That's that, then. I don't think there's anything more. I want to get off.'

‘A minute, Mr Chairman.' Soames saw that the words were issuing from behind a walrus-like moustache. ‘I know more of these people than any of you here. I started life in the slums, and I want to tell you something. Suppose you get some money, suppose you convert some streets, will you convert those people? No, gentlemen; you won't.'

‘Their children, Mr Montross, their children,' said a man whom Soames recognized as one of those who had married Michael to his daughter.

‘I'm not against the appeal, Mr Charwell, but I'm a self-made man and a realist, and I know what we're up against. I'm going to put some money into this, gentlemen, but I want you to know that I do so with my eyes open.'

Soames saw the eyes, melancholy and brown, fixed on himself, and had a longing to say: ‘You bet!' But, looking at Sir Lawrence, he saw that ‘Old Mont' had the longing too, and closed his lips firmly.

‘Capital!' said the chairman. ‘Well, Mr Forsyte, are you joining us?'

Soames looked round the table.

‘I'll go into the matter,' he said, ‘and let you know.'

Almost instantly the committee broke towards their hats, and he was left opposite the Goya with the Marquess.

‘A Goya, Mr Forsyte, I think, and a good one. Am I mistaken, or didn't it once belong to Burlingford?'

‘Yes,' said Soames, astonished. ‘I bought it when Lord Burlingford sold his pictures in 1910.'

‘I thought so. Poor Burlingford! He got very rattled, I remember, over the House of Lords. But, you see, they've done nothing since. How English it all was!'

‘They're a dilatory lot,' murmured Soames, whose political recollections were of the vaguest.

‘Fortunately, perhaps,' said the Marquess; ‘there is so much leisure for repentance.'

‘I can show you another picture or two, here, if you care for them,' said Soames.

‘Do,' said the Marquess; and Soames led him across the hall, now evacuated by the hats.

‘Watteau, Fragonard, Pater, Chardin,' said Soames.

The Marquess was gazing from picture to picture with his head a little on one side.

‘Delightful!' he said. ‘What a pleasant, and what a worthless age that was! After all, the French are the only people that can make vice attractive, except perhaps the Japanese, before they were spoiled. Tell me, Mr. Forsyte, do you know any Englishman who has done it?'

Soames, who had never studied the question and was hampered by not knowing whether he wanted an Englishman to do it, was hesitating when the Marquess added:

‘And yet no such domestic people as the French.'

‘My wife's French,' said Soames, looking round his nose.

‘Indeed!' said the Marquess; ‘How pleasant!'

Soames was again about to answer, when the Marquess continued:

‘To see them go out on Sundays – the whole family, with their bread and cheese, their sausage and wine! A truly remarkable people!'

‘I prefer ourselves,' said Soames, bluntly. ‘Less ornamental, perhaps, but –' he stopped short of his country's virtues.

‘The first of my family, Mr Forsyte, was undoubtedly a Frenchman – not even a Norman Frenchman. There's a tradition that he was engaged to keep William Rufus's hair red, when it was on the turn. They gave him lands, so he must have been successful. We've had a red streak in the family ever since.
My granddaughter –' He regarded Soames with a bird-like eye – ‘But she and your daughter hardly got on, I remember.'

‘No,' said Soames, grimly, ‘they hardly got on.'

‘I'm told they've made it up.'

‘I don't think so,' said Soames; ‘but that's ancient history.'

In the stress of his present uneasiness he could have wished it were modern.

‘Well, Mr Forsyte, I'm delighted to have seen these pictures. Your son-in-law tells me he's going to electrify the kitchen here. Believe me, there's nothing more conducive to a quiet stomach than a cook who never gets heated. Do tell Mrs Forsyte that!'

‘I will,' said Soames; ‘but the French are conservative.'

‘Lamentably so,' replied the Marquess, holding out his hand: ‘Good-bye to you!'

‘Good-bye!' said Soames, and remained at the window, gazing after the old man's short, quick figure in its grey-green tweeds, with a feeling of having been slightly electrified.

DELICIOUS NIGHT

F
LEUR
sat under a groyne at Loring. There were few things with which she had less patience than the sea. It was not in her blood. The sea, with its reputation for never being in the same mood, blue, wet, unceasing, had for her a distressing sameness. And, though she sat with her face to it, she turned to it the back of her mind. She had been there a week without seeing Jon again. They knew where she was, yet only Holly had been over; and her quick instinct apprehended the cause – Anne must have become aware of her. And now, as Holly had told her, there was no longer even Goodwood to look forward to. Everywhere she was baulked and with all her heart resented it! She was indeed in a wretched state of indecision. If she had known
precisely the end she wished to attain, she could have possessed her soul; but she knew it not. Even the care of Kit was no longer important. He was robust again, and employed all day, with spade and bucket.

‘I can't stand it,' she thought; ‘I shall go up to town. Michael will be glad of me.'

She went up after an early lunch, reading in the train a book of reminiscences which took away the reputations of various dead persons. Quite in the mode, it distracted her thoughts more than she had hoped from its title: and her spirits rose as the scent of oysters died out of the air. She had letters from her father and Michael in her bag, and got them out to read again.

D
EAR
H
EART
(ran Michael's – yes, she supposed she
was
still his dear heart) –

I hope this finds you and Kit as it leaves me ‘at the present time of speaking'. But I miss you horribly as usual, and intend to descend on you before long, unless you descend on me first. I don't know if you saw our appeal in the papers on Monday. People are already beginning to take bonds. The committee weighed in well for a send-off. The walrus put down five thousand of the best, the Marquess sent your father's Morland cheque for six hundred, and your Dad and Bart each gave two-fifty. The Squire gave five hundred; Bedwin and Sir Timothy a hundred apiece, and the bishop gave us twenty and his blessing. So we opened with six thousand eight hundred and twenty from the committee alone – none so dusty. I believe the thing will go. The appeal has been reprinted, and is going out to everybody who ever gives to anything; and amongst other propaganda, we've got the Polytheum to promise to show a slum film if we can get one made. My Uncle Hilary is very bucked. It was funny to see your Dad – he was a long time making up his mind, and he actually went down to look at the Meads. He came back saying – he didn't know, it was a tumble-down neighbourhood, he didn't think it could be done for five hundred a house. I had my uncle to him that evening, and he knocked under to Hilary's charm. But next morning he was very grumpy – said his name would be in the papers as signing the appeal, and seemed to think it would do him harm. ‘They'll think I've taken leave of my senses,' was his way of putting it. However, there he is, on the committee, and he'll get used to it in time. They're a rum team, and but for the bugs! don't think they'd hold together. We
had another meeting today. Old Blythe's nose is properly out of joint; he says I've gone back on him and Foggartism. I haven't, of course – but, dash it, one must have something real to do!

All my love to you and Kit.

M
ICHAEL

I've got your drawing framed and hung above my bureau, and very jolly it looks. Your Dad was quite struck. M.

Above his bureau – ‘The golden apple! ' How ironical! Poor Michael – if he knew –!

Her father's letter was short – she had never had a long one from him.

M
Y
D
EAR
C
HILD
,

Your mother has gone back to ‘The Shelter', but I am staying on at Green Street about this thing of Michael's. I don't know, I'm sure, whether there's anything in it; there's a lot of gammon talked about the slums; still, for a parson, I find his uncle Hilary an amiable fellow, and there are some goodish names on the committee. We shall see.