Ivy Compton-Burnett - The Mighty and Their Fall

“It is for you to say the word to him.”

“Yes, it is from me it must come. Anything else would harm us both, And I begin to feel it has always been there and unsaid. That is the thing that can hardly be helped. But we will not say so, as it has not been said. I think I shall be glad it has not. Yes, take the word to him from me. He has chosen to hear it from you. And there is no one else. Father would like to say it, but he would like it too much.”

“What would Father like too much?” said Ninian, as he passed through the room. “There is little he can like at all in these days.”

“Telling Hugo that he and I will not be married,” said Lavinia in a clear tone. “It is late to make the change, but it comes in time. You and Grandma and Egbert were wise. But I don’t want to hear any self-praise. I should take the current view of it.”

“My dear one, it is praise of you that we should hear,” said Ninian, coming forward. “You show yourself indeed. The self your father has seen in you. We are not to lose you. The shadow is lifted from the future. The true light is shed. How much you and I will do with our forces joined! I hope Hugo does not make it hard for you?”

“I am to tell him for her,” said Egbert. “There are reasons why that is best.”

“As she will. It is for her to say. And for you to help her, as you always have. And a thing that has to be done, is better done soon. It will be well to get it behind.”

Egbert smiled at his father’s tone and suppressed any impulse to delay. He returned to Hugo and waited until he spoke.

“Is this the eternal silence? That comes to us all in the end?”

“It is certainly a long one,” said Egbert.

“Pray do not speak to me in a distant tone. You know what I am steeling myself to face. I cannot believe I am asking the question. But what did Lavinia say?”

“What we knew she would. That she would break off everything and forget it. And be to you as she was before. She came to the decision at once.”

“Egbert, I hope you did not misrepresent me?”

“No, I am sure I did not.”

“Did she express any regret that she was not to spend her life with me?”

“No, she did not speak of it.”

“And you expressed none that I was not to be your brother?”

“No, I wanted no sympathy.”

“You are both your father’s children. I can only find it a shock. It is not what I have thought.”

“We were not as bad as he was,” said Egbert, smiling at last. “He came out as himself.”

“He surely hid his feelings?”

“No, he exhibited them. And they were of a definite kind. You do not need to ask what they were.”

“And he might have had the authority of a father! I wonder I ever faced it. It was for Lavinia’s sake. I would have done more than that for her.”

“Go and meet her in an easy spirit. That is what you can do for her now. Father is with her, in a panic lest the matter be delayed. Go and put him out of his suspense.”

“But this is almost too much for me. I am not a generous enemy. Enmity in me has nothing generous about it. But I suppose I am not an enemy, now I am not to be his son. I shall be his friend again, almost his brother. I have to be very adaptable. I hardly know what I am.”

They went to the library, and Hugo did not delay.

“Lavinia, you did your best. You tried to see me as worthy of you. I shall always remember your courage. I will not appeal to pity. That is a thing I have never been without. But there is something you can do for me. Do not allow your father to refer to me as your uncle. Things can carry their own sting.”

“Then Hugo to both of us,” said Ninian, in an almost genial tone. “ Hugo to all of us here. Uncle only to the children.”

“So there will be a sign of what is past. One little proof that it existed. It will have to be my stay.”

“Well, now, you will be wanting a change,” said Ninian. “One change must lead to others. And now you can do as you will.”

“Why should I want one? Surely this one is enough. My place amongst you is what remains to me. Would you take from me what I have left?”

“So you are remaining in the family?”

“Ninian, have you no welcome for me? The old days are to return. I am to be an unchosen, single man, the character in which I have not failed. And now I can afford to be it. It is odd that it takes so much to be so little.”

Lavinia moved to the door, and Ninian went with her, seeming to guard against anyone else’s following. In the hall he paused and turned towards her.

“Well, now I must save you everything. You have faced enough. Our resources can be joined to ease your way. I have always seen it as best. It will be a simple transition, and will be made simple for you. You can put all such things from your mind.”

“I have thought of them, as you have, Father. They are not nothing to me. They can be as my uncle would have left them, if he had been alone. I will transfer half the money to you, and you can use the rest for the time. I mean the interest on it, as long as I am with you.”

“Does she mean that? The interest and for the time! Is that how she has come to think? No, I don’t feel it is. It will go with what has gone.”

“We cannot look forward. This change may foreshadow others. It shows there is a future. If I am favoured above my family, I am only glad of it. I am not different from other people. I don’t know why it was thought I was. I am not sorry that I am myself.”

“And neither am I,” said her father, after a pause. “It is a normal, healthy self, and puts me at ease about you. If you were different from other people, there might be the other difference. Perhaps I have been afraid of it. I have no fear now.”

“I don’t want you to have it, Father. I have no wish to be a person apart. And I am giving up half of what is mine. My thinking of that and saying it shows how little apart I am.”

“So it does. You are my honest, ordinary girl. I must be grateful for you, and not put you too high. If I have done so, I must forget it.”

“You forgot it, Father. Some time ago and easily. We do not all forget. There again I prove I am not apart.”

Ninian smiled and moved to the stairs, and they mounted them together. Lavinia left him and entered her room, and went on to the schoolroom.

“I have brought you some news. Lavinia is not to leave us. She is not going to be married. What do you say to it?”

There was a pause.

“It is really something less than news,” said Leah.

“I could not have better, Mr. Middleton,” said Miss Starkie. “I will ask no questions. I can guess how it was. Lavinia faced the truth. How I trusted she would have the courage!”

“It did not fail her. I think it could not. And her brother came to her help. Those two are sure of each other. And so we are not to lose her. Surely that is news.”

“We should not have lost her,” said Agnes. “We were often to go to her house. And now she is not to have one.”

“She will share this one with me. We shall do a great deal together.”

“She has always shared it,” said Leah. “Didn’t Uncle Hugo want to marry her?”

“You know he did. The change has come from her. She felt it was wise to make it. And she knew it was my wish.”

“She knew that all the time. It must have been something different.”

“It takes two to make a quarrel,” said Hengist. “I suppose that is what it was.”

“You are wrong,” said Ninian. “They will always be good friends.”

“But they always are,” said Leah. “This not news. It is nothing.”

“It is not to me. And so it should not be to you.”

“Were you jealous of Uncle Hugo?” said Hengist.