Complete Works of Ford Madox Ford, page 629
That boy, Mark thought, was a very curious problem. He seemed to be a good, straight boy. A little loquacious: still that was to be excused since he had to do all the talking himself. From time to time he had paused in his speech as if, deferentially, he wished to have Mark’s opinion. That was proper. He, Mark, could not stand hobbledehoys – particularly the hobbledehoys of that age who appeared to be opinionative and emotional beyond the normal in hobbledehoys. Anyhow, he could not stand the Young once they were beyond the age of childhood. But he was aware that, if you want to conduct a scientific investigation, if you want to arrive, for yourself, at the truth of an individual’s parentage – you must set aside your likes and dislikes.
Heaven knew, he had found Christopher, when he had been only one of the younger ones in his father’s – he had found him irritating enough ... a rather moony, fair brat, interested mostly in mathematics, with a trick of standing with those goggle eyes gazing bluely at you – years ago in and around, at first the nursery, then the stables at Groby. Then, if this lad irritated him it was rather an argument in favour of his being Christopher’s son than Sylvia’s by-blow by another man ... What was the fellow’s name? A rank bad hat, anyhow.
The probability was that he was the other fellow’s son. That woman would not have trepanned Christopher into the marriage if she hadn’t at least thought that she was with child. There was nothing to be said against any wench’s tricking any man into marrying her if she were in that condition. But once having got a man to a give a name to your bastard you ought to treat him with some loyalty: it is a biggish service he has done you. That Sylvia had never done ... They had got this young springald into their – the Tietjenses’ – family. There he was, with his fingers on Groby already ... That was all right. As great families as Tietjens’ had had that happen to them.
But what made Sylvia pestilential was that she should afterwards have developed this sex-madness for his unfortunate brother.
There was no other way to look at it. She had undoubtedly lured Christopher on to marry her because she thought rightly or wrongly that she was with child by another man. They would never know – she herself probably did not know! -whether this boy was Christopher’s son or the other’s. English women are so untidy – shamefaced – about these things. That was excusable. But every other action of hers from that date had been inexcusable – except regarded as actions perpetrated under the impulsion of sex-viciousness.
It is perfectly proper – it is a mother’s duty to give an unborn child a name and a father. But afterwards to blast the name of that father is more discreditable than to leave the child nameless. This boy was now Tietjens of Groby – but he was also the legal son of a father who had behaved unspeakably according to the mother ... And the son of a mother who had been unable to attract her man! ... Who advertised the fact to the estate carpenter! If we say that the good of the breed is the supreme law, what sort of virtue was this?
It was all very well to say that every one of Sylvia’s eccentricities had in view the sole aim of getting her boy’s father to return to her. No doubt they might be. He, Mark, was perfectly ready to concede that even her infidelities, notorious as they had been, might have been merely ways of calling his unfortunate brother’s attention back to her – of keeping herself in his mind. After the marriage Christopher, finding out that he had been a mere catspaw, probably treated her pretty coldly or ignored her – maritally ... And he was a pretty attractive fellow, Christopher. He, Mark, was bound nowadays to acknowledge that. A regular saint and Christian martyr and all that ... Enough to drive a woman wild if she had to live beside him and be ignored.
It is obvious that women must be allowed what means they can make use of to maintain – to arouse – their sex attraction for their men. That is what the bitches are for in the scale of things. They have to perpetuate the breed. To do that they have to call attention to themselves and to use what devices they see fit to use, each one according to her own temperament. That cruelty was an excitant he was quite ready, too, to concede. He was ready to concede anything to the woman. To be cruel is to draw attention to yourself; you cannot expect to be courted by a man whom you allow to forget you. But there probably ought to be a limit to things. You probably ought in this, as in all other things, to know what you can do and what you can’t – and the proof of this particular pudding, as of all others, was in the eating. Sylvia had left no stone unturned in the determination to keep herself in her man’s mind and she had certainly irretrievably lost her man: to another girl. Then she was just a nuisance.
A woman intent on getting a man back ought to have some system, some sort of scheme at the very least. But Sylvia – he knew it from the interminable talk that he had had with Christopher on Armistice night – Sylvia delighted most in doing what she called pulling the strings of shower-baths. She did extravagant things, mostly of a cruel kind, for the fun of seeing what would happen. Well, you cannot allow yourself fun when you are on a campaign. Not as to the subject matter of the campaign itself! If then you do what you want rather than what is expedient you damn well have to take what you get for it. Damn well!
What would have justified Sylvia, no matter what she did, would have been if she had succeeded in having another child by his brother. She hadn’t. The breed of Tietjens was not enriched. Then she was just a nuisance ...
An infernal nuisance ... For what was she up to now? It was perfectly obvious that both Mrs de Bray Pape and this boy were here because she had had another outbreak of ... practically Sadism. They were here so that Christopher might be hurt some more and she not forgotten. What then was the reason for this visit? What the deuce was it?
The boy had been silent for some time. He was gazing at Mark with the goggle-eyed gasping that had been so irritating in his father – particularly on Armistice Day ... Well, he, Mark, was apparently now conceding that this boy was probably his brother’s son. A real Tietjens after all was to reign over the enormously long, grey house behind the fantastic cedar. The tallest cedar in Yorkshire; in – England; in the Empire ... He didn’t care. He who lets a tree overhang his roof calls the doctor in daily ... The boy’s lips began to move. No sound came out. He was presumably in a great state!
He was undoubtedly like his father. Darker ... Brown hair, brown eyes, high-coloured cheeks all flushed now; straight nose, marked brown eyebrows. A sort of ... scared, puzzled ... what was it? ... expression. Well, Sylvia was fair; Christopher was dark-haired with silver streaks, but fair-complexioned ... Damn it; this boy was more attractive than Christopher had been at his age and earlier ... Christopher hanging round the schoolroom door in Groby, puzzled over the mathematical theory of waves. He, Mark, hadn’t been able to stand him or indeed any of the other children. There was sister Effie – born to be a curate’s wife ... Puzzled! That was it! ... That bothering woman, his father’s second wife – the Saint! – had introduced the puzzlement strain into the Tietjenses ... This was Christopher’s boy, saintly strain and all. Christopher was probably born to be a rural dean in a fat living, writing treatises on the integral calculus all the time except on Saturday afternoons. With a great reputation for saintliness. Well he wasn’t the one and hadn’t the other. He was an old-furniture dealer who made a stink in virtuous nostrils ... Provvy works in a mysterious way. The boy was saying now:
‘The tree ... the great tree ... It darkens the windows ...’
Mark said: ‘Aha!’ to himself. Groby Great Tree was the symbol of Tietjens. For thirty miles round Groby they made their marriage vows by Groby Great Tree. In the other Ridings they said that Groby Tree and Groby Well were equal in height and depth one to the other. When they were really imaginatively drunk Cleveland villagers would declare – would knock you down if you denied – that Groby Great Tree was 365 foot high and Groby Well 365 feet deep. A foot for every day of the year ... On special occasions – he could not himself be bothered to remember what – they would ask permission to hang rags and things from the boughs. Christopher said that one of the chief indictments against Joan of Arc had been that she and the other village girls of Domrèmy had hung rags and trinkets from the boughs of a cedar. Or maybe a thorn? Offering to fairies ... Christopher set great store by the tree. He was a romantic ass. Probably he set more store by the tree than by anything else at Groby. He would pull the house down if he thought it incommoded the tree.
Young Mark was bleating, positively bleating:
‘The Italians have a proverb ... He who lets a tree overhang his house invites a daily call from the doctor ... I agree myself ... In principle of course ...’
Well, that was that! Sylvia, then, was proposing to threaten to ask to have Groby Great Tree cut down. Only to threaten to ask. But that would be enough to agonise the miserable Christopher. You couldn’t cut down Groby Great Tree. But the thought that the tree was under the guardianship of unsympathetic people would be enough to drive Christopher almost dotty – for years and years.
‘Mrs de Bray Pape,’ the boy was stammering, ‘is extremely keen on the tree’s being ... I agree in principle ... My mother wished you to see that – oh, in modern days – a house is practically unlettable if ... So she got Mrs de Bray Pape ... She hasn’t had the courage though she swore she had ...’
He continued to stammer. Then he started and stopped, crimson. A woman’s voice had called:
‘Mr Tietjens ... Mr Mark ... Hi ... hup!’
A small woman, all in white, white breeches, white coat, white wide-awake, was slipping down from a tall bay with a white star on the forehead – a bay with large nostrils and an intelligent head. She waved her hand obviously at the boy and then caressed the horse’s nostrils. Obviously at the boy... for it was impossible that Mark, Senior, would know a woman who could make a sound like ‘Hi, hup!’ to attract his attention.
Lord Fittleworth, in a square, hard hat, sat on an immense, coffin-headed dapple-grey. He had bristling, close-cropped moustaches and sat like a limpet. He waved his crop in the direction of Mark – they were such old friends – and went on talking to Gunning, who was at his stirrup. The coffin-headed beast started forward and reared a foot or so; a wild, brazen, yelping sound had disturbed it. The boy was more and more scarlet and as emotion grew on him, more and more like Christopher on that beastly day ... Christopher with a piece of furniture under his arm, in Marie Léonie’s room, his eyes goggling out at the foot of the bed.
Mark swore painfully to himself. He hated to be reminded of that day. Now this lad and that infernal bugle that the younger children of Cramp had got hold of from their bugler-brother, had put it back damnably in his mind. It went on. At intervals. One child had another try, then another. Obviously then Cramp, the eldest, took it. It blared out ... Ta ... Ta ... Ta ... Ta, ti . . ta-ta-ti ... Ta ... The Last Post. The B — y infernal Last Post ... Well, Christopher, as that day Mark had predicted, had got himself, with his raw sensibilities, into a pretty bloody infernal mess while some drunken ass had played the Last Post under the window ... Mark meant that whilst that farewell was being played he had had that foresight. And he hated the bugle for reminding him of it. He hated it more than he had imagined. He could not have imagined himself using profanity even to himself. He must have been profoundly moved. Deucedly and profoundly moved at that beastly noise. It had come over the day like a disaster. He saw every detail of Marie Léonie’s room as it was on that day. There was, on the marble mantel-shelf under an immense engraving of the Sistine Madonna a feeding-cup over a night-light in which Marie Léonie had been keeping some sort of pap warm for him. Probably the last food to which he had ever helped himself ...
CHAPTER V
But no ... that must have been about twelve or earlier or later on that infernal day. In any case he could not remember any subsequent meal he had had then; but he remembered an almost infinitely long period of intense vexation. Of mortification insofar as he could accuse himself of ever having felt mortified. He could still remember the fierce intaking of his breath through his nostrils that had come when Christopher had announced what had seemed to him then his ruinous intentions ... It had not been till probably four in the morning that Lord Wolstonemark had rung him up to ask him to countermand the transport that was to have gone out from Harwich ... At four in the morning, the idiotic brutes. His substitute had disappeared in the rejoicings in the sy — and Lord Wolstonemark had wanted to know what code they used for Harwich because transport must at all costs be stopped. There was going to be no advance into Germany ... He had never spoken after that!
His brother was done for; the country finished; he was as good as down and out, as the phrase was, himself. Already in his deep mortification – yes – mortification! – he had said to Christopher that morning – the 11th November, 1918 – that he would never speak to him again. He hadn’t at that moment meant to say that he would never speak to Christopher at all again – merely that he was never going to speak to him about the affairs of Groby! Christopher might take that immense, far-spreading, grey, bothersome house and the tree and the well and the moors and all the John Peel outfit. Or he might leave them. He, Mark, was never going to speak about the matter any more.
He remembered thinking that Christopher might have taken him to mean that he intended to withdraw, for what it was worth, the light of his countenance from the Christopher Tietjens ménage. Nothing had been further from his thoughts. He had a soft corner in his heart for Valentine Wannop. He had had it ever since sitting, feeling like a fool, in the ante-room of the War Office, beside her – gnawing at the handle of his umbrella. But, then, he had recommended her to become Christopher’s mistress; he had at any rate begged her to look after his mutton chops and his buttons. So that it wasn’t likely that when, a year or so later, Christopher announced that he really was at last going to take up with the young woman and to chance what came of it – it wasn’t likely that he intended to dissociate himself from the two of them.
The idea had worried him so much that he had written a rough note – the last time that his hand had ever held a pen – to Christopher. He had said that a brother’s backing was not of great use to a woman, but in the special circumstances of the case, he being Tietjens of Groby for what it was worth, and Lady Tietjens – Marie Léonie – being perfectly willing to be seen on all occasions with Valentine and her man it might be worth something, at any rate with tenantry and such like.
Well, he hadn’t gone back on that! But once the idea had come into his head it had grown and grown, on top of his mortification and his weariness. Because he could not conceal from himself that he was weary to death – of the office, of the nation, of the world and people ... People ... he was tired of them! And of the streets, and the grass, and the sky and the moors! He had done his job. That was before Wolstonemark had telephoned and he still thought that he had done his job of getting things here and there about the world to some purpose.
A man is in the world to do his duty by his nation and his family ... By his own people first. Well, he had to acknowledge that he had let his own people down pretty badly – beginning with Christopher. Chiefly Christopher; but that reacted on the tenantry.
He had always been tired of the tenantry and Groby. He had been born tired of them. That happens. It happens particularly in old and prominent families. It was odd that Groby and the whole Groby business should so tire him; he supposed he had been born with some kink. All the Tietjenses were born with some sort of kink. It came from the solitude maybe, on the moors, the hard climate, the rough neighbours – possibly even from the fact that Groby Great Tree overshadowed the house. You could not look out of the school-room windows at all for its great, ragged trunk and all the children’s wing was darkened by its branches. Black ... funeral plumes. The Hapsburgs were said to hate their palaces – that was no doubt why so many of them, beginning with Juan Ort, had come muckers. At any rate they had chucked the royalty business.
And at a very early age he had decided that he would chuck the country-gentleman business. He didn’t see that he was the one to bother with those confounded, hard-headed beggars or with those confounded wind-swept moors and valley bottoms. One owed the blighters a duty, but one did not have to live among them or see that they aired their bedrooms. It had been mostly swank that, always; and since the Corn Laws it had been almost entirely swank. Still, it is obvious that a landlord owes something to the estate from which he and his fathers have drawn their income for generations and generations.
Well, he had never intended to do it because he had been born tired of it. He liked racing and talking about racing to fellows who liked racing. He had intended to do that to the end.
He hadn’t been able to.
He had intended to go on living between the office, his chambers, Marie Léonie’s and week-ends with race-horse owners of good family until his eyes closed ... Of course God disposes in the end, even of the Tietjenses of Groby! He had intended to give over Groby, on the death of his father, to whichever of his brothers had heirs and seemed likely to run the estate well. That for a long time had seemed quite satisfactory. Ted, his next brother, had had his head screwed on all right. If he had had children he would have filled the bill. So would the next brother ... But neither of them had had children and both had managed to get killed in Gallipoli. Even sister Mary who was actually, next to him, a maîtresse femme if ever there was one, had managed to get killed as a Red Cross matron. She would have run Groby well enough – the great, blowsy, grey woman with a bit of a moustache.
