Ford Madox Ford - The Parade's End Tetralogy - Some Do Not, No More Parades, A Man Could Stand Up & Last Post

‘But that’s not right ,’ Port Scatho said, ‘it’s not the right way to look at it. You can’t pocket . . . I’m simply bewildered . . . ’

‘You’ve no right to be bewildered,’ Sylvia said. ‘You’re worrying your mind for expedients to save the reputation of your bank. We know your bank is more to you than a baby. You should look after it better, then.’

Port Scatho, who had already fallen two paces away from the table, now fell two paces back, almost on top of it. Sylvia’s nostrils were dilated.

She said:

‘Tietjens shall not resign from your beastly club. He shall not! Your committee will request him formally to withdraw his resignation. You understand? He will withdraw it. Then he will resign for good. He is too good to mix with people like you . . . ’ She paused, her chest working fast. ‘Do you understand what you’ve got to do?’ she asked.

An appalling shadow of a thought went through Tietjens’ mind: he would not let it come into words.

‘I don’t know . . . ’ the banker said. ‘I don’t know that I can get the committee . . . ’

‘You’ve got to,’ Sylvia answered. ‘I’ll tell you why . . . Christopher was never overdrawn. Last Thursday I instructed your people to pay a thousand pounds to my husband’s account. I repeated the instruction by letter, and I kept a copy of the letter, witnessed by my confidential maid. I also registered the letter and have the receipt for it . . . You can see them.’

Port Scatho mumbled from over the letter:

‘It’s to Brownlie . . . Yes, a receipt for a letter to Brown-lie . . .? She examined the little green slip on both sides. He said: ‘Last Thursday . . . To-day’s Monday . . . An instruction to sell North-Western stock to the amount of one thousand pounds and place to the account of . . . Then . . . ’

Sylvia said:

‘That’ll do . . . You can’t angle for time any more . . . Your nephew has been in an affair of this sort before . . . I’ll tell you. Last Thursday at lunch your nephew told me that Christopher’s brother’s solicitors had withdrawn all the permissions for overdrafts on the books of the Groby estate. There were several to members of the family. Your nephew said that he intended to catch Christopher on the hop—that’s his own expression—and dishonour the next cheque of his that came in. He said he had been waiting for the chance ever since the war and the brother’s withdrawal had given it him. I begged him not to . . . ’

‘But, good God,’ the banker said, ‘this is unheard of . . . ’

‘It isn’t,’ Sylvia said. ‘Christopher has had five snotty, little, miserable subalterns to defend at courts-martial for exactly similar cases. One was an exact reproduction of this . . . ’

‘But, good God,’ the banker exclaimed again, ‘men giving their lives for their country . . . Do you mean to say Brownlie did this out of revenge for Tietjens’ defending at courts-martial . . . And then . . . your thousand pounds is not shown in your husband’s pass-book . . . ’

‘Of course it’s not,’ Sylvia said. ‘It has never been paid in. On Friday I had a formal letter from your people pointing out that North-Westerns were likely to rise and asked me to reconsider my position. The same day I sent an express telling them explicitly to do as I said . . . Ever since then your nephew has been on the ‘phone begging me not to save my husband. He was there, just now, when I went out of the room. He was also beseeching me to fly with him.’

Tietjens said:

‘Isn’t that enough, Sylvia? It’s rather torturing.’

‘Let them be tortured,’ Sylvia said. ‘But it appears to be enough.’

Port Scatho had covered his face with both his pink hands. He had exclaimed:

‘Oh, my God! Brownlie again . . . ’

Tietjens’ brother Mark was in the room. He was smaller, browner, and harder than Tietjens and his blue eyes protruded more. He had in one hand a bowler hat, in the other an umbrella, wore a pepper-and-salt suit and had race-glasses slung across him. He disliked Port Scatho, who detested him. He had lately been knighted. He said:

‘Hullo, Port Scatho,’ neglecting to salute his sister-in-law. His eyes, whilst he stood motionless, rolled a look round the room and rested on a miniature bureau that stood on a writing-table, in a recess, under and between bookshelves.

‘I see you’ve still got that cabinet,’ he said to Tietjens. Tietjens said:

‘I haven’t. I’ve sold it to Sir John Robertson. He’s waiting to take it away till he has room in his collection.’

Port Scatho walked, rather unsteadily, round the lunch-table and stood looking down from one of the long windows. Sylvia sat down on her chair beside the fireplace. The two brothers stood facing each other, Christopher suggesting wheat-sacks, Mark carved wood. All round them, except for the mirror that reflected bluenesses, the gilt backs of books. Hullo Central was clearing the table.

‘I hear you’re going out again to-morrow,’ Mark said. ‘I want to settle some things with you.’

‘I’m going at nine from Waterloo,’ Christopher said. ‘I’ve not much time. You can walk with me to the War Office if you like.’

Mark’s eyes followed the black and white of the maid round the table. She went out with the tray. Christopher suddenly was reminded of Valentine Wannop clearing the table in her mother’s cottage. Hullo Central was no faster about it. Mark said:

‘Port Scatho! As you’re there we may as well finish one point. I have cancelled my father’s security for my brother’s overdraft.’

Port Scatho said, to the window, but loud enough: ‘We all know it. To our cost.’

‘I wish you, however,’ Mark Tietjens went on, ‘to make over from my own account a thousand a year to my brother as he needs it. Not more than a thousand in any one year.’

Port Scatho said:

‘Write a letter to the bank. I don’t look after clients’ accounts on social occasions.’

‘I don’t see why you don’t,’ Mark Tietjens said. ‘It’s the way you make your bread and butter, isn’t it?’ Tietjens said:

‘You may save yourself all this trouble, Mark. I am closing my account, in any case.’

Port Scatho spun round on his heel.

‘I beg that you won’t,’ he exclaimed. ‘I beg that we . . . that we may have the honour of continuing to have you draw upon us.’ He had the trick of convulsively working jaws: his head against the light was like the top of a rounded gatepost. He said to Mark Tietjens: ‘You may tell your friend, Mr Ruggles, that your brother is empowered by me to draw on my private account . . . on my personal and private account up to any amount he needs. I say that to show my estimate of your brother; because I know he will incur no obligations he cannot discharge.’

Mark Tietjens stood motionless; leaning slightly on the crook of his umbrella on the one side; on the other displaying, at arm’s length, the white silk lining of his bowler hat, the lining being the brightest object in the room.

‘That’s your affair,’ he said to Port Scatho. ‘All I’m concerned with is to have a thousand a year paid to my brother’s account till further notice.’