Ivy Compton-Burnett - Men and Wives

“Now, Doctor, I beseech you to bring home to my wife that she is building troubles out of air. She will give an ear to you, when she won’t flicker an eyelid in my direction. I shouldn’t think there are more prosperous people in the world than we are; I don’t mean in any crude sense; I mean more fortunate in human affection, in family good fellowship, in the things that make life worth living. I should feel more fortunate still if my sons were laying the foundations for future usefulness.”

“Research doesn’t often promise usefulness,” said Dufferin, “though you put it with a simplicity. But why shouldn’t Matthew have an innocent occupation that he fancies himself? Other people don’t give so much sign of thinking of him. His attitude is more benevolent than theirs.”

“Yes, now, you are right, Doctor,” said Godfrey. “Harriet, you see the force of his words. That is the thought that has been in my own mind, though I couldn’t have put it better. I mean, we did well in asking him to sum things up for us.”

“Matthew is serving himself first,” said Harriet.

“Well, that is a true word of all of us,” said Dufferin.

“Ah, so it is,” said Godfrey with a chuckle. “I admit that I think of myself before anyone else comes into my head. I mean with a few exceptions, with the one exception of course; I am a married man.” He looked towards the window, but Harriet did not glance at him.

“A doctor’s life has great opportunities,” she said. “We are serious people, Antony, and should take great pride in the serious success of our son.”

“Plenty of preaching to be given in any life. People don’t often want it, and they never take it. They don’t even need it. If it was any good to them, they would be the first to give it to themselves. Matthew can use his own opportunities. He won’t want a profession when he comes after his father here, and what he has chosen will take him to his end. Come and see me out, Haslam.”

Godfrey followed his friend into the hall, and stood as if in doubt.

“What of my poor girl in there?” he said.

“I must be careful of my eyes. You see more with yours than you used. I see you have had to. I think it will be well enough, if she does not come under a real strain. I wouldn’t answer for things then: this fighting with everything is strain enough. But I don’t see how she can do that, with you all on the watch for her.”

“No, no. We will all watch for her indeed,” said Godfrey in a rather empty voice. “Matthew, here is the doctor waiting for you. Have you said good-bye to your mother, my boy?”

“No, there is no occasion, Father. I shall see her later in the day.”

“But go in and say good-bye to her, my son,” said Godfrey in a coaxing, deprecating tone. “Give her a word to take with her through the day. A word from you is a great stand-by for her. You know that.”

“I haven’t observed it,” said Matthew, going down the steps. “Good-bye, Father.”

“Good-bye, my boy, good-bye,” said Godfrey, with cordial appreciation of this farewell. “My blessing goes with you.”

Having uttered these last words in a tone too low to be heard, Godfrey retraced his steps to the dining-room, giving them especial force in case they should falter. Harriet was walking on the gravel outside the house, with Gregory holding her arm and stooping over her, and her face was happy and almost young.

Her husband threw back his shoulders and laid hold of the lapels of his coat, and walked about, swishing his feet on the carpet and breaking into snatches of talk and song. Buttermere entered and conveyed in silence his view of anyone engaged, or perhaps surprised in audible soliloquy.

“Well, Buttermere, so you have caught me in the act. You never talk to yourself, do you? You would be ashamed?”

Buttermere looked as if he could not but allow this to pass.

“You never do things you are ashamed of, do you, Buttermere?” said Godfrey, suggesting the truth, for Buttermere never talked to himself, did a woman’s work as distinct from his own kindred duties, addressed his subordinates except with peremptory direction, or committed tangible dishonesty. Of taking pleasure in any human discomfiture, especially in that of the family he served, he was not ashamed, reserving this feeling for such things as threatened his manhood.

Gregory was pacing with his mother on the path.

“I am asking you a question I have never asked before. What do you think about when you are treading the passages at night? Tell me at once and truly. Do you get into a habit of going over the same things?”

“My darling, what do I think about? I ought not to tell you. I feel sometimes as if the curse were hanging over you, as if only your father were free of it. Yes, I go over the same things. That seems to be my weakness, almost my disease; I believe it is nearly that. I feel I must get something just as it was, and I don’t quite reach it, and begin again; and each time something is missed, and never the same thing. And it goes on through the night; and I feel it hanging over me in the day; and the future stretches before me with all the nights. And when I differ from Matthew and Jermyn — and it is not what I want for them, Gregory, what they are doing — and when your father and I are not of one mind, I go over what they have suffered, and what remains in their thoughts. And I feel that if I could once come up with the thoughts, I should not mind what they were; that I could face them, if they were not hanging over me with threat; and they can never be overtaken. And I ought not to tell all this to you, who may be going to suffer it yourself. I never ought to have married, Gregory. But I am easier now you know it, and I am not living alone. It does not seem it ought to be what it is, and yet it is always the same. You could never understand, and yet there is nothing you cannot understand, my dear, dear boy.”

“How clever of you it was to marry Father, when you were both of you as you were!”

“Well, my child, perhaps it was clever. Perhaps he was the right man for me, your dear, good father, my generous, forbearing husband. I may not be the right woman for anyone. But he is stronger than I am, just as he is weaker. I don’t think it has hurt him, unless it is that I will not think so. I trust he is happy. How I pray that he is! For I cannot help myself, Gregory.”

“Oh, yes, he is happy, doing such lovely things, shooting and riding and reading prayers,” said Gregory.

“Gregory, you know what our family service represents to your father and me, that it is the visible sign of the deepest things within us?”

“Yes. You are so fortunate to have them represented. Most of us don’t get them attended to at all.”

The mother was silent, a complex expression on her face.

“There are Jermyn and Griselda setting off for the moors,” said Gregory.

“Come, come, my darlings,” said Harriet in a passionate, crooning voice, beckoning with a large, maternal gesture. “Come and say good-bye to your mother. Go out into the sun and beauty, and leave uneasiness behind. It is I who have caused it. Leave me and be at peace.”

The intenseness of Harriet’s tone brought a change to her children’s faces, and Gregory took his arm from hers and sauntered by her side with the eagerness fading from his eyes.

Godfrey, who tended to pair with Matthew, as Jermyn did with Griselda, and Harriet with Gregory, stepped out alone on to the gravel, shading his face.

“Well, my Harriet. Well, my dear, I heard you talking in a way that reminded me of our youth. I said to myself, ‘Why, there is my Harriet chattering like a girl!’ This is a brave morning for you.”

“Godfrey,” said Harriet, shrinking back in a manner that made her husband do the same, “I wish you would not comment upon any action of mine that happens to be natural. What would you do, if you could not be yourself for a moment without creating a storm of comment? How can I avoid being unlike other people, if I am to produce stupefaction when I am as they are?”