Charles Snow - Time of Hope

With delight I accepted his invitation to take me to the next of Martineau’s ‘Friday nights’ — ‘To carry out our plan, which I regard as settled, in principle,’ said George complacently. Yet there might be other ways for me. Even that evening, with the excitement still hot upon me, I found time to ask some questions about a barrister’s career. Not that I was contemplating it for a moment myself, I said. Becoming a solicitor might be practicable: this was not. But, just as a matter of interest, how well should I cope with the Bar examinations? George thought the question trivial and irrelevant, but said again that, with three or four years’ work, I should sail through them.

He might not be worldly, but he was a fine lawyer, whose own record in examinations was of the highest class. Decisions are taken before we realize them ourselves: above all, perhaps, with those that matter to us most. I did not know it, but my mind may have been made up from that moment.

I set out to win the support of Martineau and Eden. Whichever way I moved, I should need them. I could not afford to fail. When George took me, first to Martineau’s house, then to Eden’s office, I was nervous; but it was a pleasurable nervousness that sharpened my attention and my wits. Unlike George, who was embarrassed at any social occasion, I was enjoying myself.

I got airy encouragement from Martineau, but no more. Although none of us realized it then, he was losing all interest in his profession. He welcomed me to his ‘Friday night’ parties; it was the first salon I had ever attended, and knowing no others I did not realize how eccentric it was. I enjoyed being inside a comfortable middle-class house for the first time. I could not persuade him to attend to my career, though he made half-promises, chiefly I thought because he was so fond of George.

It was quite different with Eden. Before ever George introduced me, I knew that the meeting was critical, for Eden was the senior partner. I guessed that I had disadvantages to overcome. Before I had been in Eden’s office three minutes, I felt with an extra tightening of the nerves that I had more than a disadvantage against me: I was struggling with Eden’s unshakeable dislike of George.

The office was warm and comfortable, with a fire in an old-fashioned grate, leather-covered armchairs, sets of heavy volumes round the walls. Eden sat back in his chair, smoking a pipe, when George awkwardly presented me; and then George stood for a time, not knowing whether to leave us or stay, with me still standing also. Eden was just going to speak, but George chose that moment to say that he did not agree with Eden’s general line of instructions about a new case.

Eden was bald and frog-faced, substantial in body, comfortably and pleasantly ugly. His manner was amiable, but he ceased to be so bland when he replied to George. They had a short altercation, each of them trying hard to be courteous, Eden repressing his irritation, George insisting on his opinion and his rights. Soon Eden said ‘Well, well, Passant, this isn’t the best time to discuss it. Perhaps you might leave me with this young man.’

‘If you prefer it, Mr Eden,’ said George, and backed away.

Eden might have been designed to extract the last ounce of misunderstanding out of George. He was a solid, indolent, equable, good-humoured man, modest about everything but his judgement. He was often pleased with his own tolerance and moderation. He respected George’s intellect and professional competence — it was comfortable for him to respect the latter, for Eden was not overfond of work, and, having once assured himself of George’s skill, was content to let that dynamo-like energy dispose of most of the firm’s business. But everything else about George repelled him. George’s ‘wildness’, formality, passion for argument, lack of ease — they infuriated Eden. In his private heart he could not abide George. Before he spoke to me, when George at last left us alone, I knew that I was under the same suspicion. Some of George’s aura surrounded me also, in Eden’s eyes. I had to please right in the teeth of a prejudice.

‘Well, young man,’ said Eden with a stiff, courteous but not over-amiable smile, ‘what can I do for you?’ I replied that above all things I needed the guidance of a man of judgement. And I continued in that vein.

My brashness and spasms of pride with George were not much like me, or at least not like the self that in years to come got on easily with various kinds of men and women. Even in the months between my meetings with George and Eden, I was learning. In casual human contacts, I was already more practised than George, who stayed all his life something like most of us at eighteen. I was much more confident than George that I should get along with Eden or with anyone that I met; and that confidence made me more ready to please, more unashamed about pleasing.

Eden became much less suspicious. He went out of his way to be affable. He did not make up his mind quickly about people, but he was very genial, pleased with himself for being so impartial, satisfied that one of Passant’s friends could — unlike that man Passant — make so favourable an impression. Eden liked being fair. Passant made it so difficult to be fair — it was one of his major sins.

Eden did not promise anything on the spot, as Martineau had done. He told me indulgently enough that I should have to ‘sober down’, whatever career I took up. In a local paper he had noticed a few violent words from a speech of mine. The identical words would have damned George in Eden’s mind, but did not damn me. At first sight he felt he could advise me, as he could never have advised George. ‘Ah well! Young men can’t help making nuisances of themselves,’ he said amiably. ‘As long as you know where to draw the line.’

It would have offended Eden’s sense of decorum to form an impression in haste, or to make a promise without weighing it. He believed in taking his time, in gathering other people’s opinions, in distrusting impulse and first impressions, and in ruminating over his own preliminary judgement. He spoke, so I heard, to Darby and the director. He had a word with my old headmaster. It was a fortnight or more before he sent across to the education office a note asking me if I would make it convenient to call on him.

When I did so, he still took his time. He sat solidly back in his chair. He was satisfied now that the investigation was complete and the ceremony of forming a judgement properly performed. He was satisfied to have me there, on tenterhooks, waiting on his words. ‘I don’t believe in jumping to conclusions, Eliot,’ he said. ‘I’m not clever enough to hurry. But I’ve thought round your position long enough now to feel at home.’ Methodically he filled his pipe. At last he came to the point.

‘Do you know, young man,’ said Eden, ‘I don’t see why you shouldn’t make a job of it.’

Unlike Martineau, he made a definite offer. If I wanted to serve my articles as a solicitor, he would accept me on the usual footing, I paying my fee of two hundred and fifty guineas. It was entirely fair: it was exactly as he had treated any other of the articled clerks who had gone through the firm. He explained that he was not making any concessions to partiality or to the fact that I was so poor. ‘If we started that, young man, we should never know when to stop. Pay your way like everyone else, and we shall all be better friends,’ said Eden, with the broad judgement-exuding smile that lapped up the corners of his mouth. But he knew that, when I had paid the fee, I should not have enough to live on. So he was prepared to allow me thirty shillings a week while I served my time. With his usual temperateness he warned me that, before I took articles in the firm, I ought to be reminded that there was not likely to be a future for me there ‘when you become qualified, all being well’. For George Passant was not, so far as Eden knew, likely to move, and the firm did not need another qualified assistant.