Джеймс Хилтон: So Well Remembered

“Oh, fairly—when I can find the time.”

“Aye, that’s the worst of being in public life.” At least they had THAT bond in common. “You know, sir, there’s only one reason I’d ever wish to be young again—REALLY young, I mean,” he added, as he saw Winslow smile, —“and that’s to have summat I missed years ago—a right-down good education… I’ll never forget when I visited Oxford and saw all those lucky lads in the colleges…” A sincere emotion entered his voice. “And the professors in their libraries—I tell you frankly, I…” He saw that Winslow was still smiling. “Well, I’ll put it this way—there’s only one thing I’d rather be than in politics, and that’s one of those university dons, as they call ‘em.”

“Yet I doubt if many of them are doing any better work than you are here —judging by what I’ve seen today.”

George was pleased again, but also slightly shocked by the comparison; he could not believe that Winslow really meant it, and he was surprised that such a distinguished man should stoop to mere flattery. “Oh, come now, sir, I’ll never swallow that. After all, think of the books they write— I’ve got shelves of ‘em here—heavy stuff, I admit, but grand training for the mind.”

“Yes, books are all right.” Winslow gave a little sigh. “Though it’s remarkable how little help they offer in some of the more curious problems of life.” George was thinking this a rather strange remark when an even stranger one followed it. “Look here, Boswell, I’m going to do something I wasn’t sure about before I met you—partly because I wasn’t sure you were the right man, and partly because even if you were, I couldn’t be positive how you’d take it.”

George looked up with a puzzled expression. There flashed through his mind the intoxicating possibility that Winslow might be going to ask his advice about some matter of departmental policy—low- rent housing, say, or an extension of the school leaving age.

But Winslow continued: “Quite a coincidence meeting you like this. Several months ago when I promised to speak at your ceremony today I hadn’t even heard of you—but when quite recently I did, I decided it might be a good chance to—to approach you—if—if you seemed the sort of man who might be approachable. You see, it’s a somewhat unusual and delicate matter, and there aren’t any rules of etiquette to proceed by.”

And then there flashed through George’s already puzzled mind another though less welcome possibility—that Winslow was an emissary of the Government deputed to find out in advance whether George would accept a title in recognition of his ‘public services’ to the town of Browdley. It was highly unlikely, of course, since he was a mere town councillor and did not belong to the Government party, but still, anything could happen when parties and politics were fluid and Lloyd George was reputed to cast a discerning eye upon foes as well as friends. Anyhow, George’s reply would be a straight ‘no’, because he very simply though a trifle truculently did not believe in titles.

He saw that Winslow was waiting for a remark, so he called his thoughts to order and said guardedly: “I’m afraid I don’t quite catch on so far, but whatever it is, if there’s any way I can help—”

“Thanks, that’s very kind of you. I hope there is. So if you’ll just let me go ahead and explain…”

George nodded, now more puzzled than ever; he could not help thinking that Winslow was terribly slow in getting to the point, whatever it was. Meanwhile the great man had opened up into an account of a semi-official tour he had lately undertaken to inspect housing projects, mostly on paper, in some of the Continental countries. At this George nodded with enthusiastic comprehension, and to show that, even without foreign travel, he kept himself well abreast of such matters, he reached for a book that happened to be to hand. “You’ll have seen it, I daresay,” he interrupted eagerly. “I got the architect of our local scheme to adopt several of this fellow’s ideas— I’ve always said we should all pool our post-war experience—Allies and ex-enemies alike. Take Vienna, for instance, where the Socialists are very strong—”

“Yes, yes indeed,” Winslow agreed, though with a note in his voice to check all chatter. However, he seemed willing enough to take Vienna, for he continued: “That was one of the cities I visited recently. Apart from business, I had a special reason because my son Jeff happens to be there too. He has a job—er—connected with the Embassy.” He paused and pulled out a small pocket-book; in it he found a snapshot which he passed to George. It showed a smiling young man in ski-costume in company with several pretty girls against a background panorama of snow-covered mountains. “Taken at Kitzbühl,” he added.

George had not heard of Kitzbühl, but he knew a fine-looking fellow when he saw one, and now quite sincerely expressed his admiration. To reciprocate the intimacy he pointed to one of a number of photographs on top of a revolving bookcase of encyclopćdias. “Reminds me a bit of the lad just behind you.”

Winslow turned to look and confirmed after scrutiny: “Yes, quite a resemblance. Your SON? I wouldn’t have thought you were old enough—”

“I’m not… That’s one of my brothers—killed on the Somme on July First, Nineteen-Sixteen. Fifty thousand killed with him the same day— according to the records. Something for folks to remember when they attack disarmament.”

“And THIS?” said Winslow, still seemingly preoccupied with the photographs.

“That’s my wife.”

“Ah, yes.”

George then felt it was time to relieve his guest of any further obligation to appear interested in his family, so he returned the snapshot with the comment: “Aye, he’s a bonny lad—and brainy too, by the look of him.”

“They seemed to think so at Oxford.”

“He did well there?”

“Pretty well.”

“What did he get?”

“GET? Oh, a Rowing Blue, and he was also President of the Union—”

“And a good degree? A First, I suppose?”

“Er… yes, I think so.”

“DOUBLE First?”

Winslow smiled. “I believe he took several Firsts in various subjects, but they don’t seem to use the term ‘Double First’ any more.”

“Gladstone got it.”

“Did he? You seem to know a good deal about these matters, Boswell…”

“Aye, as an outsider. Though it was my father who told me about Gladstone. I think he was the only man except Bible characters whom my father really admired… But go on about your boy.”

“Well, as I said, Jeff did pretty well at Oxford till the war cut into his career. Then he served in Egypt and got a D.S.O., and soon after the Armistice he went to France and Germany for languages, because he was entering the Diplomatic Service and the usual thing is to get attached for a few years to one of the embassies or legations. He’s only twenty-five.”

“Sounds like a future in front of him.”

“That—er—is what I have hoped. We’ve always got on excellently together—good friends, I mean, as well as father and son. When I arrived in Vienna recently the first thing he did was to take me off to some restaurant where we could talk—because I hadn’t seen him for six months, and that’s a long time for family gossip to accumulate.” Winslow began to smile again. “I thought from the outset he didn’t seem exactly himself—he was preoccupied, somehow, in the way he behaved and talked —and later I asked if there’d been any trouble at the Embassy, but he said no, nothing like that. At last I got out of him what HAD caused the change.” The smile became suddenly forced and wan. “Perfectly natural, you may think.”