Clayhanger Part 85

Mrs Orgreave absently and in somewhat stiff silence handed over the pince-nez! She was now quite an old woman, small, shapeless, and delightfully easy-going, whose sense of humour had not developed with age. She could never see a joke which turned upon her relations with her grandchildren, and in fact the jocular members of the family had almost ceased to employ this subject of humour. She was undoubtedly rather foolish about her grandchildren--'fond,' as they say down there.

The parents of the grandchildren did not object to this foolishness-- that is, they only pretended to object. The task of preventing a pardonable weakness from degenerating into a tedious and mischievous mania fell solely upon Janet. Janet was ready to admit that the health of the grandchildren was a matter which could fairly be left to their fathers and mothers, and she stood pa.s.sive when Mrs Orgreave's grandmotherly indulgences seemed inimical to their health; but Mrs Orgreave was apt to endanger her own health in her devotion to the profession of grandmother--for example by sitting up to unchristian hours with a needle. Then there would be a struggle of wills, in which of course Mrs Orgreave, being the weaker, was defeated; though her belief survived that she and she alone, by watchfulness, advice, sagacity, and energy, kept her children's children out of the grave. On all other questions the harmony between Janet and her mother was complete, and Mrs Orgreave undoubtedly considered that no mother had ever had a daughter who combined so many virtues and charms.

TWO.

Mr Orgreave, forgetful of the company, was deciphering the "British Medical Journal" in the twilight of the afternoon. His doctor had lent him this esoteric periodical because there was an article therein on influenza, and Mr Orgreave was very much interested in influenza.

"You remember the influenza of '89, Edwin?" he asked suddenly, looking over the top of the paper.

"Do I?" said Edwin. "Yes, I fancy I do remember a sort of epidemic."

"I should think so indeed!" Janet murmured.

"Well," continued Mr Orgreave, "I'm like you. I thought it was an epidemic. But it seems it wasn't. It was a pandemic. What's a pandemic, now?"

"Give it up," said Edwin.

"You might just look in the dictionary--Ogilvie there," and while Edwin ferreted in the bookcase, Mr Orgreave proceeded, reading: "'The pandemic of 1889 has been followed by epidemics, and by endemic prevalence in some areas!' So you see how many demics there are! I suppose they'd call it an epidemic we've got in the town now."

His voice had changed on the last sentence. He had meant to be a little facetious about the Greek words; but it was the slowly prepared and rather exasperating facetiousness of an ageing man, and he had dropped it listlessly, as though he himself had perceived this. Influenza had weakened and depressed him; he looked worn, and even outworn. But not influenza alone was responsible for his appearance. The incredible had happened: Osmond Orgreave was getting older. His bald head was not the worst sign of his declension, nor the thickened veins in his hands, nor the deliberation of his gestures, nor even the unsprightliness of his wit. The worst sign was that he was losing his terrific zest in life; his palate for the intense savour of it was dulled. In this last attack of influenza he had not fought against the onset of the disease. He had been wise; he had obeyed his doctor, and laid down his arms at once; and he showed no imprudent anxiety to resume them. Yes, a changed Osmond!

He was still one of the most industrious professional men in Bursley; but he worked from habit, not from pa.s.sion.

When Edwin had found 'pandemic' in Ogilvie, Mr Orgreave wanted to see the dictionary for himself, and then he wanted the Greek dictionary, which could not be discovered, and then he began to quote further from the "British Medical Journal."

"'It may be said that there are three well-marked types of the disease, attacking respectively the respiratory, the digestive, and the nervous system.' Well, I should say I'd had 'em all three. 'As a rule the attack--'"

Thus he went on. Janet made a moue at Edwin, who returned the signal.

These youngsters were united in good-natured forbearing condescension towards Mr Orgreave. The excellent old fellow was p.r.o.ne to be tedious; they would accept his tediousness, but they would not disguise from each other their perception of it.

"I hear the Vicar of Saint Peter's is very ill indeed," said Mrs Orgreave, blandly interrupting her husband.

"What? Heve? With influenza?"

"Yes. I wouldn't tell you before because I thought it might pull you down again."

Mr Orgreave, in silence, stared at the immense fire.

"What about this tea, Janet?" he demanded.

Janet rang the bell.

"Oh! I'd have done that!" said Edwin, as soon as she had done it.

THREE.

While Janet was pouring out the tea, Edwin restored Ogilvie to his place in the bookcase, feeling that he had had enough of Ogilvie.

"Not so many books here now as there used to be!" he said, vacuously amiable, as he shut the gla.s.s door which had once protected the treasures of Tom Orgreave.

For a man who had been specially summoned to the task of cheering up, it was not a felicitous remark. In the first place it recalled the days when the house, which was now a hushed retreat where settled and precise habits sheltered themselves from a changing world, had been an arena for the jolly, exciting combats of outspread individualities. And in the second place it recalled a slight difficulty between Tom and his father.

Osmond Orgreave was a most reasonable father, but no father is perfect in reasonableness, and Osmond had quite inexcusably resented that Tom on his marriage should take away all Tom's precious books. Osmond's att.i.tude had been that Tom might in decency have left, at any rate, some of the books. It was not that Osmond had a taste for book-collecting: it was merely that he did not care to see his house depleted and bookcases empty. But Tom had shown no compa.s.sion. He had removed not merely every sc.r.a.p of a book belonging to himself, but also two bookcases which he happened to have paid for. The weight of public opinion was decidedly against Mr Orgreave, who had to yield and affect pleasantness. Nevertheless books had become a topic which was avoided between father and son.

"Ah!" muttered Mr Orgreave, satirical, in response to Edwin's clumsiness.

"Suppose we have another gas lighted," Janet suggested. The servant had already lighted several burners and drawn the blinds and curtains.

Edwin comprehended that he had been a blundering fool, and that Janet's object was to create a diversion. He lit the extra burner above her head. She sat there rather straight and rather prim between her parents, sticking to them, smoothing creases for them, bearing their weight, living for them. She was the kindliest, the most dignified, the most capable creature; but she was now an old maid. You saw it even in the way she poured tea and dropped pieces of sugar into the cups. Her youth was gone; her complexion was nearly gone. And though in one aspect she seemed indispensable, in another the chief characteristic of her existence seemed to be a tragic futility. Whenever she came seriously into Edwin's thoughts she saddened him. Useless for him to attempt to be gay and frivolous in that house!

FOUR.

With the inevitable pa.s.sionate egotism of his humanity he almost at once withdrew his aroused pity from her to himself. Look at himself! Was he not also to be sympathised with? What was the object or the use of his being alive? He worked, saved, improved his mind, voted right, practised philosophy, and was generally benevolent; but to what end?

Was not his existence miserable and his career a respectable fiasco? He too had lost zest. He had diligently studied both Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus; he was enthusiastic, to others, about the merit of these two expert daily philosophers; but what had they done for him? a.s.suredly they had not enabled him to keep the one treasure of this world-zest.

The year was scarcely a week old, and he was still young enough to have begun the year with resolutions and fresh hopes and aspirations, but already the New Year sensation had left him, and the year might have been dying in his heart.

And yet what could he have done that he had not done? With what could he reproach himself? Ought he to have continued to run after a married woman? Ought he to have set himself t.i.tanically against the conventions amid which he lived, and devoted himself either to secret intrigue or to the outraging of the susceptibilities which environed him? There was only one answer. He could not have acted otherwise than he had acted.

His was not the temperament of a rebel, nor was he the slave of his desires. He could sympathise with rebels and with slaves, but he could not join them; he regarded himself as spiritually their superior.

And then the disaster of Hilda's career! He felt, more than ever, that he had failed in sympathy with her overwhelming misfortune. In the secrecy of his heart a full imaginative sympathy had been lacking. He had not realised, as he seemed to realise then, in front of the fire in the drawing-room of the Orgreaves, what it must be to be the wife of a convict. Janet, sitting there as innocent as a doe, knew that Hilda was the wife of a convict. But did her parents know? And was she aware that he knew? He wondered, drinking his tea.

FIVE.

Then the servant--not the Martha who had been privileged to smile on duty if she felt so inclined--came with a tawny gold telegram on a silver plate, and hesitated a moment as to where she should bestow it.

"Give it to me, Selina," said Janet.

Selina impa.s.sively obeyed, imitating as well as she could the deportment of an automaton; and went away.

"That's my telegram," said Mr Orgreave. "How is it addressed?"

"Orgreave, Bleakridge, Bursley."

"Then it's mine."

"Oh no, it isn't!" Janet archly protested. "If you have your business telegrams sent here you must take the consequences. I always open all telegrams that come here, don't I, mother?"

Mrs Orgreave made no reply, but waited with candid and fretful impatience, thinking of her five absent children, and her ten grandchildren, for the telegram to be opened.

Janet opened it.

Her lips parted to speak, and remained so in silent astonishment. "Just read that!" she said to Edwin, pa.s.sing the telegram to him; and she added to her father: "It was for me, after all."