Ivy Compton-Burnett - Elders and Betters

“I do hope you will find a house quite near,” said Jenney.

“Terence would like to keep in touch with his family. And I have similar leanings with regard to mine,” said Anna, turning her eyes to her brothers with rough affection. “We have no idea of starting life in the classic self-centredness of the newly wed.”

“Starting a new life,” said Esmond.

“Well, it seems to me that my life has hardly begun until now. I daresay people do have that feeling, when their affairs take this particular turn. No disrespect meant to the old tasks and the familiar round, but one must feel that one’s life emerges from twilight into daylight sometimes.”

“I wish I could know that the new life will be as safe as the old one,” said Benjamin.

“I don’t think it will be fraught with any particular danger, Father. I don’t somehow see Terence letting it take that line for me. As for his lack of worldly goods, you will find that he regrets it as much as you do. About a thousand times more would be a truer estimate, I expect.”

“He has arranged to suffer from it as little as possible,” said Esmond.

“Well, I do not want him to suffer,” said Anna, allowing a note of feeling to escape into her tone. “And I am not a person used to so much affluence, after all.”

“There is Terence coming up the drive,” said Reuben. “And Uncle Thomas and Tullia are with him.”

“Oh, I do think he might have come alone, and done his first duty towards me in the accepted way,” said Anna, with open ruefulness. “I call it a most unromantic way of presenting himself in his new character. No one is at his best with his relations, and I think it applies to him more than to most people. No one knows him, who has only seen him with his family.”

“How did you manage to see him without them?” said Esmond.

“Terence contrived it. It was not left to me.”

“And does the same rule apply to you?”

“Well, yes, I expect it does, in the measure that it must to everyone. There is something in us all, that does not come out in family life, or is suppressed by it, or rejected by it, or something. But I daresay it keeps the better and fresher for its own purposes.”

“We deplore our relationship to you,” said Claribel, “and regret that we can do nothing about it.”

“Oh, I don’t suppose my own best qualities have exactly blossomed and flourished in their native soil.”

“You may exaggerate the place of mating in the scheme of things,” said Esmond.

“Well, it is natural to do that at this juncture. And after all, a good deal does depend on it. The course of life would soon be held up without it.”

“Of course one owes one’s existence to a mating,” said Claribel, as if struck by this for the first time. “And one sees it as such a primitive and common thing. We are very ungrateful to it.”

“Things are none the less deep for being primitive,” said Anna.

The Calderons were shown into the room by Ethel, whose manner accepted Terence as a member of the family. She had known of Anna’s hopes before Anna herself, and known of their fulfilment but little later.

“Well, this is storming the citadel with a strong force,” said Anna to Terence, in the conscious tone of private intimacy. “I rather expected you to appear alone.”

“I did not dare to do that. I brought everyone I had left to bring. I hope Uncle Benjamin will not take advantage of my being motherless. A father is not his son’s natural protector.”

“Have you come to see me?” said Benjamin.

“Well, a man does come to see his future father-in-law at these times, or is it an honourable man? He has to tell him what he can do for his daughter.”

“And what can you do for mine?”

“I can go at her side on the pilgrimage to the grave.”

“And you are satisfied with that?”

“Well, it is a great deal. It almost sounds as if we could face death together. And I suppose I have your consent to the marriage, as you talk like such a near relation.”

“I meant to speak merely as an uncle. Do you intend to live on my daughter’s income?”

“I did not mean to call you Father,” said Terence, “but if you go on like this, I shall have to. Anything else would be absurd.”

“Can you not contribute your own expenses?”

“Thank you for saying the words for me. They are not easy to say.”

“Do you feel that you are giving enough?”

“Well, I am givingmyself. So that is hardly for me to say.”

“My daughter is also doing that. I was talking of material things.”

“We ought not to dwell on those too much, Uncle.”

“Do you feel that you can live under these conditions, and keep your self-respect?”

“I am sure I can. I could not ever lose it. I should not have thought anyone could. I never know what people mean when they talk about people’s doing so. I think they must mean that they have lost their respect.”

“Well, could you live without the respect of your fellows?”

“Yes, I am sure I could. I don’t think people’s respect is as nice as they think. And they so often have to do without mine.”

“Terence, I hope my daughter will be safe with you. You do not feel that you are making a provision for yourself?”

“I think it is you who feel that. I feel that Anna is a person from whom I can take anything. I seem to be a person of nicer feeling than you are.”

“Perhaps I am one of the people who do without your respect,” said Benjamin, allowing himself to smile. “Are there many of them?”

“Yes, a great many; I do think so little of people.”

“And what do they think of you?”

“Better than I deserve, Uncle Benjamin.”

“And you cannot return the compliment?”

“No, they deserve too much. They are so industrious and persevering and easily satisfied. And those are qualities that I cannot help despising.”

“What do they think of your lack of them?”

“Did they say that I lacked them? Then I despise them also for carping criticism and speaking against people behind their backs. I thought they would know that I breathed a rarer air than they did.”

“But you did not feel grateful to them?”

“It is foolish to talk about feeling gratitude to such people.”

“I don’t want to interrupt the catechism, Father,” said Anna, “but have you not got off the point?”

“I have said all the same things,” said Thomas.

“It is true,” said Terence, looking round and nodding. “And they are only brothers by marriage.”

“What do you think of the adjustment of relationships?” said Bernard to Tullia.

“Well, I don’t know why they require so much attention. They seemed to be enough in themselves. I should not have thought of tampering with them, though people do say that Father and I might be husband and wife.”

“But the marriage of cousins is lawful,” said Reuben. “A man can’t put away his wife, because she is his cousin.”

“No, the marriage is for better, for worse, like any other,” said his sister.

“And yet it seems to be so different,” said Tullia.

“Yes, I feel we are being cheated,” said Claribel. “A marriage in both our families, and no fresh member for either!”

“When did you have the news broken to you, Tullia?” said Anna.

“Well, I suppose Terence must have said things about it. But I don’t think I took it in until to-day. Not to be clear about it anyhow.”

“No one knew about it until to-day.”

“Oh, well, then I did not fall short in any way.”

“It is good of you to yield him up without a protest.”

“You are not going to leave the place, are you?” said Tullia, with a note of surprise.