Ivy Compton-Burnett - Men and Wives

“Well, Mother, you have spent a day out of doors?” said Matthew.

“Yes, my boy,” said Harriet, raising her hands to his shoulders. “I have been feeling more my old self, and relied rather rashly on it, and let myself get over-tired. Have you had a satisfying day’s work?”

“Yes, he has; I can tell you that, Harriet,” said Godfrey eagerly. “He has had a day of great scientific interest, he tells me. He came home and came up to me quite full of it. Didn’t you, Matthew?”

“I shouldn’t put it quite in that way, Father,” said Matthew, his face darkening in imitation of his mother’s.

“Well, well, I will leave you to each other,” said Godfrey, falling back on the only solution. “You will like to have a word together after your day apart. I was glad myself of my word with you, Matthew, and I’ll wager that your mother will be. Ah, I know just how her heart yearns over you…”

“Here is Gregory coming out with a note,” said Matthew, making a diversion in time.

“Ah, there is Gregory. Yes, it is Gregory,” said Godfrey, shading his eyes. “Yes, he is bringing a note to us. Now I wonder what that can be. I don’t know who should be sending us a note by hand at this hour. It quite beats me. I can’t guess at all.”

“We need not guess. We shall know in a moment,” said Harriet, taking the note from Gregory, with her different smile for him. “Did you find this in the hall, my dear?”

“It has just been left. Buttermere was coming out with it. I think it must be from Mr. Spong. Mrs. Calkin told me that Mrs. Spong died last night. She had had a letter from him. No doubt this is to tell you the same thing.”

“Yes, yes, that would be it,” said Godfrey. “That is what it must be. Well, poor Lucy Spong! I was afraid of it. I had a misgiving, you know, when I heard that the illness was thought to be mortal. But one never knows. Many of us are alive to-day who have no right to be, and many of us will be dead to-morrow who haven’t an inkling of it to-day.”

“Godfrey, stop talking for a moment and let me read the note. Yes, it is as Gregory says. It was last night at nine o’clock. These things are always a shock when they come. I must write to Mr. Spong.”

“Yes, yes, you must, Harriet. That is what you must do. And you will do it well. Ah, you are the one to be set to a job of that description. It is a ticklish thing for some of us, but you will be up to it. Now, if I were to try to write that sort of letter, I should get a pen and ink, and I should sit down, and I should fidget and fume, and I should be thinking all the right things in my heart, I daresay, but as for getting them down …”

“Godfrey, are you not ever going to stop?” said Harriet, smiling, but her hands to her head.

“Oh, yes, yes, my dear; I was only saying a word about your being so up to this sort of thing, even above other things. Yes, we must leave it to you to write. Well, shall I have a look at Spong’s letter? Yes, poor Spong! It will be a great loss to him, the greatest loss a man can suffer. When the end comes, then is the time to see that loss is not all gain.”

“’My dear Lady Haslam’”—Godfrey held the letter at arm’s length, and, less delayed by scruples than Agatha, read in a full, deep monotone—”’My beloved wife passed peacefully away yesterday evening at nine o’clock. I feel as I write to you, that I may depend upon the sympathy of true friends. I am a broken man. Yours most sincerely, Dominic Spong.’ Yes, yes, poor Spong! He is a broken man. Well, I am sure I should be in his place. All the little jars and differences he had with his wife will come back to him and crush him to the ground. The great loss he has sustained will sweep over him.” Godfrey’s eyes went down as if in sympathy with his metaphor. “I am glad he finds us true friends; I shouldn’t like to fail him at this moment. You will say a word from me in your letter, my dear?”

“Yes, I will write it from us both,” said his wife.

Gregory followed his mother into the house.

“Father is a delicate piece of work,” he said, bringing his face down to hers.

“Yes, dear,” said Harriet, her voice trembling with different feelings. “I can’t say I don’t know what you mean. But it is better for you and me to look at his fine qualities, as he has so many. Your father is a good man, Gregory.”

“I spend my whole life in contemplation of his fine qualities. Of course he is a good man,” said Gregory.

“My dear, of course he is,” said Harriet with instant self-reproach. “He is, indeed, my dear, generous husband. Try to let him see how you feel to him.”

“Well, Buttermere,” said Gregory, strolling into the dining-room, “so there you are, as always, at your duty?”

“I have not had great opportunity to sit down to-day, sir.”

“And do you like sitting down?”

“I can do with a respite, sir.”

“Yes, I suppose we all can.”

“That is, we all could, sir.”

“You did not know that Mrs. Spong was dead?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Jermyn and Grisel!” Gregory called, as his brother and sister passed through the hall. “You did not know that Mrs. Spong died last night?”

“No,” said the two together, while a nervous tendency to smile appeared on Griselda’s face.

“Buttermere knew,” said Gregory. “He takes great interest in his fellow creatures, don’t you, Buttermere?”

“Well, not to say that, sir. Mrs. Spong was a Miss Dufferin, as I understood.”

“You don’t take any interest in Smithson, your lieutenant?” said Jermyn.

“I have seen no reason to remark any cause of interest in him, sir.”

“No? Well, I believe neither have I,” said Jermyn.

“Does it command your sympathy, that two of us have visited Sir Percy?” said Gregory.

“He is a gentleman I always like to have a glimpse of, sir.”

“Do you like to have a glimpse of his clothes?” said Gregory.

“’Manners makyth man,’ I believe, sir.”

“Has Sir Percy any particular manners?” said Griselda.

“It is that point to which I was referring, miss,” said Buttermere.

“Well, what do you think of the resurrection of my old suit?” said Godfrey, striding into the room. “Renovation I mean, of course, not resurrection. Do you think it does me for ordinary nights? Your mother was for sending it to the charity sale, but I said I could do better with it than that. I am not much of a one for clothes for myself; and my new suit would only get to be the same if I took it for every evening; and there should I be with nothing for an occasion when people expect you to lead the way, to be of those conforming to a standard. Don’t gape and grin, Gregory. What do you think of it, Buttermere?”

“Her ladyship has gone into the drawing-room, Sir Godfrey.”

“Oh yes, has she? Then we will go in. Don’t sound the gong for a minute, Buttermere. Hold back until we have got across the hall. Don’t hurry us into a nervous illness, I tell you. If her ladyship is in the drawing-room, we have to get in to her, haven’t we? Didn’t you say so yourself? Gregory, you little, unbelievable blackguard! That is a fit way to appear before ladies in the evening! I wonder Griselda can look at you; I can hardly look at you myself.”

“Well, my three men and one girl,” said Harriet, who was standing with Matthew on the hearth. “My Grisel is looking very sweet to-night. Gregory, I think that is going a little far.”

“By taking no steps at all,” said Jermyn.

“Yes, so I told him, Harriet. I hope you will keep your eyes off him. I have just begged Griselda to. Gregory, I ask you not to let this occur again. It implies an attitude to your mother that you do not intend. Why does not Buttermere sound that gong?” Godfrey retraced his steps and raised his voice. “Buttermere, sound the gong at once.”