The Forsyte Saga - Complete

CHAPTER VII — JUNE’S VICTORY

June had waited for her chance, scanning the duller columns of the journals, morning and evening with an assiduity which at first puzzled old Jolyon; and when her chance came, she took it with all the promptitude and resolute tenacity of her character.

She will always remember best in her life that morning when at last she saw amongst the reliable Cause List of the Times newspaper, under the heading of Court XIII, Mr. Justice Bentham, the case of Forsyte v. Bosinney.

Like a gambler who stakes his last piece of money, she had prepared to hazard her all upon this throw; it was not her nature to contemplate defeat. How, unless with the instinct of a woman in love, she knew that Bosinney’s discomfiture in this action was assured, cannot be told — on this assumption, however, she laid her plans, as upon a certainty.

Half past eleven found her at watch in the gallery of Court XIII., and there she remained till the case of Forsyte v. Bosinney was over. Bosinney’s absence did not disquiet her; she had felt instinctively that he would not defend himself. At the end of the judgment she hastened down, and took a cab to his rooms.

She passed the open street-door and the offices on the three lower floors without attracting notice; not till she reached the top did her difficulties begin.

Her ring was not answered; she had now to make up her mind whether she would go down and ask the caretaker in the basement to let her in to await Mr. Bosinney’s return, or remain patiently outside the door, trusting that no one would come up. She decided on the latter course.

A quarter of an hour had passed in freezing vigil on the landing, before it occurred to her that Bosinney had been used to leave the key of his rooms under the door-mat. She looked and found it there. For some minutes she could not decide to make use of it; at last she let herself in and left the door open that anyone who came might see she was there on business.

This was not the same June who had paid the trembling visit five months ago; those months of suffering and restraint had made her less sensitive; she had dwelt on this visit so long, with such minuteness, that its terrors were discounted beforehand. She was not there to fail this time, for if she failed no one could help her.

Like some mother beast on the watch over her young, her little quick figure never stood still in that room, but wandered from wall to wall, from window to door, fingering now one thing, now another. There was dust everywhere, the room could not have been cleaned for weeks, and June, quick to catch at anything that should buoy up her hope, saw in it a sign that he had been obliged, for economy’s sake, to give up his servant.

She looked into the bedroom; the bed was roughly made, as though by the hand of man. Listening intently, she darted in, and peered into his cupboards. A few shirts and collars, a pair of muddy boots — the room was bare even of garments.

She stole back to the sitting-room, and now she noticed the absence of all the little things he had set store by. The clock that had been his mother’s, the field-glasses that had hung over the sofa; two really valuable old prints of Harrow, where his father had been at school, and last, not least, the piece of Japanese pottery she herself had given him. All were gone; and in spite of the rage roused within her championing soul at the thought that the world should treat him thus, their disappearance augured happily for the success of her plan.

It was while looking at the spot where the piece of Japanese pottery had stood that she felt a strange certainty of being watched, and, turning, saw Irene in the open doorway.

The two stood gazing at each other for a minute in silence; then June walked forward and held out her hand. Irene did not take it.

When her hand was refused, June put it behind her. Her eyes grew steady with anger; she waited for Irene to speak; and thus waiting, took in, with who-knows-what rage of jealousy, suspicion, and curiosity, every detail of her friend’s face and dress and figure.

Irene was clothed in her long grey fur; the travelling cap on her head left a wave of gold hair visible above her forehead. The soft fullness of the coat made her face as small as a child’s.

Unlike June’s cheeks, her cheeks had no colour in them, but were ivory white and pinched as if with cold. Dark circles lay round her eyes. In one hand she held a bunch of violets.

She looked back at June, no smile on her lips; and with those great dark eyes fastened on her, the girl, for all her startled anger, felt something of the old spell.

She spoke first, after all.

“What have you come for?” But the feeling that she herself was being asked the same question, made her add: “This horrible case. I came to tell him — he has lost it.”

Irene did not speak, her eyes never moved from June’s face, and the girl cried:

“Don’t stand there as if you were made of stone!”

Irene laughed: “I wish to God I were!”

But June turned away: “Stop!” she cried, “don’t tell me! I don’t want to hear! I don’t want to hear what you’ve come for. I don’t want to hear!” And like some uneasy spirit, she began swiftly walking to and fro. Suddenly she broke out:

“I was here first. We can’t both stay here together!”

On Irene’s face a smile wandered up, and died out like a flicker of firelight. She did not move. And then it was that June perceived under the softness and immobility of this figure something desperate and resolved; something not to be turned away, something dangerous. She tore off her hat, and, putting both hands to her brow, pressed back the bronze mass of her hair.

“You have no right here!” she cried defiantly.

Irene answered: “I have no right anywhere!

“What do you mean?”

“I have left Soames. You always wanted me to!”

June put her hands over her ears.

“Don’t! I don’t want to hear anything — I don’t want to know anything. It’s impossible to fight with you! What makes you stand like that? Why don’t you go?”

Irene’s lips moved; she seemed to be saying: “Where should I go?”

June turned to the window. She could see the face of a clock down in the street. It was nearly four. At any moment he might come! She looked back across her shoulder, and her face was distorted with anger.

But Irene had not moved; in her gloved hands she ceaselessly turned and twisted the little bunch of violets.

The tears of rage and disappointment rolled down June’s cheeks.

“How could you come?” she said. “You have been a false friend to me!”

Again Irene laughed. June saw that she had played a wrong card, and broke down.

“Why have you come?” she sobbed. “You’ve ruined my life, and now you want to ruin his!”

Irene’s mouth quivered; her eyes met June’s with a look so mournful that the girl cried out in the midst of her sobbing, “No, no!”

But Irene’s head bent till it touched her breast. She turned, and went quickly out, hiding her lips with the little bunch of violets.

June ran to the door. She heard the footsteps going down and down. She called out: “Come back, Irene! Come back!”

The footsteps died away...

Bewildered and torn, the girl stood at the top of the stairs. Why had Irene gone, leaving her mistress of the field? What did it mean? Had she really given him up to her? Or had she...? And she was the prey of a gnawing uncertainty... Bosinney did not come...

About six o’clock that afternoon old Jolyon returned from Wistaria Avenue, where now almost every day he spent some hours, and asked if his grand-daughter were upstairs. On being told that she had just come in, he sent up to her room to request her to come down and speak to him.

He had made up his mind to tell her that he was reconciled with her father. In future bygones must be bygones. He would no longer live alone, or practically alone, in this great house; he was going to give it up, and take one in the country for his son, where they could all go and live together. If June did not like this, she could have an allowance and live by herself. It wouldn’t make much difference to her, for it was a long time since she had shown him any affection.

But when June came down, her face was pinched and piteous; there was a strained, pathetic look in her eyes. She snuggled up in her old attitude on the arm of his chair, and what he said compared but poorly with the clear, authoritative, injured statement he had thought out with much care. His heart felt sore, as the great heart of a mother-bird feels sore when its youngling flies and bruises its wing. His words halted, as though he were apologizing for having at last deviated from the path of virtue, and succumbed, in defiance of sounder principles, to his more natural instincts.

He seemed nervous lest, in thus announcing his intentions, he should be setting his granddaughter a bad example; and now that he came to the point, his way of putting the suggestion that, if she didn’t like it, she could live by herself and lump it, was delicate in the extreme.’

“And if, by any chance, my darling,” he said, “you found you didn’t get on — with them, why, I could make that all right. You could have what you liked. We could find a little flat in London where you could set up, and I could be running to continually. But the children,” he added, “are dear little things!”

Then, in the midst of this grave, rather transparent, explanation of changed policy, his eyes twinkled. “This’ll astonish Timothy’s weak nerves. That precious young thing will have something to say about this, or I’m a Dutchman!”

June had not yet spoken. Perched thus on the arm of his chair, with her head above him, her face was invisible. But presently he felt her warm cheek against his own, and knew that, at all events, there was nothing very alarming in her attitude towards his news. He began to take courage.

“You’ll like your father,” he said — “an amiable chap. Never was much push about him, but easy to get on with. You’ll find him artistic and all that.”

And old Jolyon bethought him of the dozen or so water-colour drawings all carefully locked up in his bedroom; for now that his son was going to become a man of property he did not think them quite such poor things as heretofore.

“As to your — your stepmother,” he said, using the word with some little difficulty, “I call her a refined woman — a bit of a Mrs. Gummidge, I shouldn’t wonder — but very fond of Jo. And the children,” he repeated — indeed, this sentence ran like music through all his solemn self-justification — “are sweet little things!”

If June had known, those words but reincarnated that tender love for little children, for the young and weak, which in the past had made him desert his son for her tiny self, and now, as the cycle rolled, was taking him from her.

But he began to get alarmed at her silence, and asked impatiently: “Well, what do you say?”

June slid down to his knee, and she in her turn began her tale. She thought it would all go splendidly; she did not see any difficulty, and she did not care a bit what people thought.

Old Jolyon wriggled. H’m! then people would think! He had thought that after all these years perhaps they wouldn’t! Well, he couldn’t help it! Nevertheless, he could not approve of his granddaughter’s way of putting it — she ought to mind what people thought!

Yet he said nothing. His feelings were too mixed, too inconsistent for expression.

No — went on June — she did not care; what business was it of theirs? There was only one thing — and with her cheek pressing against his knee, old Jolyon knew at once that this something was no trifle: As he was going to buy a house in the country, would he not — to please her — buy that splendid house of Soames’ at Robin Hill? It was finished, it was perfectly beautiful, and no one would live in it now. They would all be so happy there.

Old Jolyon was on the alert at once. Wasn’t the ‘man of property’ going to live in his new house, then? He never alluded to Soames now but under this title.

“No” — June said — “he was not; she knew that he was not!”

How did she know?

She could not tell him, but she knew. She knew nearly for certain! It was most unlikely; circumstances had changed! Irene’s words still rang in her head: “I have left Soames. Where should I go?”

But she kept silence about that.

If her grandfather would only buy it and settle that wretched claim that ought never to have been made on Phil! It would be the very best thing for everybody, and everything — everything might come straight.

And June put her lips to his forehead, and pressed them close.

But old Jolyon freed himself from her caress, his face wore the judicial look which came upon it when he dealt with affairs. He asked: What did she mean? There was something behind all this — had she been seeing Bosinney?

June answered: “No; but I have been to his rooms.”

“Been to his rooms? Who took you there?”

June faced him steadily. “I went alone. He has lost that case. I don’t care whether it was right or wrong. I want to help him; and I will!”

Old Jolyon asked again: “Have you seen him?” His glance seemed to pierce right through the girl’s eyes into her soul.

Again June answered: “No; he was not there. I waited, but he did not come.”

Old Jolyon made a movement of relief. She had risen and looked down at him; so slight, and light, and young, but so fixed, and so determined; and disturbed, vexed, as he was, he could not frown away that fixed look. The feeling of being beaten, of the reins having slipped, of being old and tired, mastered him.

“Ah!” he said at last, “you’ll get yourself into a mess one of these days, I can see. You want your own way in everything.”

Visited by one of his strange bursts of philosophy, he added: “Like that you were born; and like that you’ll stay until you die!”

And he, who in his dealings with men of business, with Boards, with Forsytes of all descriptions, with such as were not Forsytes, had always had his own way, looked at his indomitable grandchild sadly — for he felt in her that quality which above all others he unconsciously admired.

“Do you know what they say is going on?” he said slowly.

June crimsoned.

“Yes — no! I know — and I don’t know — I don’t care!” and she stamped her foot.

“I believe,” said old Jolyon, dropping his eyes, “that you’d have him if he were dead!”

There was a long silence before he spoke again.

“But as to buying this house — you don’t know what you’re talking about!”

June said that she did. She knew that he could get it if he wanted. He would only have to give what it cost.

“What it cost! You know nothing about it. I won’t go to Soames — I’ll have nothing more to do with that young man.”

“But you needn’t; you can go to Uncle James. If you can’t buy the house, will you pay his lawsuit claim? I know he is terribly hard up — I’ve seen it. You can stop it out of my money!”

A twinkle came into old Jolyon’s eyes.

“Stop it out of your money! A pretty way. And what will you do, pray, without your money?”

But secretly, the idea of wresting the house from James and his son had begun to take hold of him. He had heard on Forsyte ‘Change much comment, much rather doubtful praise of this house. It was ‘too artistic,’ but a fine place. To take from the ‘man of property’ that on which he had set his heart, would be a crowning triumph over James, practical proof that he was going to make a man of property of Jo, to put him back in his proper position, and there to keep him secure. Justice once for all on those who had chosen to regard his son as a poor, penniless outcast.

He would see, he would see! It might be out of the question; he was not going to pay a fancy price, but if it could be done, why, perhaps he would do it!

And still more secretly he knew that he could not refuse her.

But he did not commit himself. He would think it over — he said to June.

CHAPTER VIII — BOSINNEY’S DEPARTURE

Old Jolyon was not given to hasty decisions; it is probable that he would have continued to think over the purchase of the house at Robin Hill, had not June’s face told him that he would have no peace until he acted.

At breakfast next morning she asked him what time she should order the carriage.

“Carriage!” he said, with some appearance of innocence; “what for? I’m not going out!”

She answered: “If you don’t go early, you won’t catch Uncle James before he goes into the City.”

“James! what about your Uncle James?”

“The house,” she replied, in such a voice that he no longer pretended ignorance.

“I’ve not made up my mind,” he said.

“You must! You must! Oh! Gran — think of me!”

Old Jolyon grumbled out: “Think of you — I’m always thinking of you, but you don’t think of yourself; you don’t think what you’re letting yourself in for. Well, order the carriage at ten!”

At a quarter past he was placing his umbrella in the stand at Park Lane — he did not choose to relinquish his hat and coat; telling Warmson that he wanted to see his master, he went, without being announced, into the study, and sat down.

James was still in the dining-room talking to Soames, who had come round again before breakfast. On hearing who his visitor was, he muttered nervously: “Now, what’s he want, I wonder?”

He then got up.

“Well,” he said to Soames, “don’t you go doing anything in a hurry. The first thing is to find out where she is — I should go to Stainer’s about it; they’re the best men, if they can’t find her, nobody can.” And suddenly moved to strange softness, he muttered to himself, “Poor little thing, I can’t tell what she was thinking about!” and went out blowing his nose.

Old Jolyon did not rise on seeing his brother, but held out his hand, and exchanged with him the clasp of a Forsyte.

James took another chair by the table, and leaned his head on his hand.

“Well,” he said, “how are you? We don’t see much of you nowadays!”

Old Jolyon paid no attention to the remark.

“How’s Emily?” he asked; and waiting for no reply, went on “I’ve come to see you about this affair of young Bosinney’s. I’m told that new house of his is a white elephant.”

“I don’t know anything about a white elephant,” said James, “I know he’s lost his case, and I should say he’ll go bankrupt.”

Old Jolyon was not slow to seize the opportunity this gave him.

“I shouldn’t wonder a bit!” he agreed; “and if he goes bankrupt, the ‘man of property’ — that is, Soames’ll be out of pocket. Now, what I was thinking was this: If he’s not going to live there...”

Seeing both surprise and suspicion in James’ eye, he quickly went on: “I don’t want to know anything; I suppose Irene’s put her foot down — it’s not material to me. But I’m thinking of a house in the country myself, not too far from London, and if it suited me I don’t say that I mightn’t look at it, at a price.”

James listened to this statement with a strange mixture of doubt, suspicion, and relief, merging into a dread of something behind, and tinged with the remains of his old undoubted reliance upon his elder brother’s good faith and judgment. There was anxiety, too, as to what old Jolyon could have heard and how he had heard it; and a sort of hopefulness arising from the thought that if June’s connection with Bosinney were completely at an end, her grandfather would hardly seem anxious to help the young fellow. Altogether he was puzzled; as he did not like either to show this, or to commit himself in any way, he said:

“They tell me you’re altering your Will in favour of your son.”

He had not been told this; he had merely added the fact of having seen old Jolyon with his son and grandchildren to the fact that he had taken his Will away from Forsyte, Bustard and Forsyte. The shot went home.

“Who told you that?” asked old Jolyon.

“I’m sure I don’t know,” said James; “I can’t remember names — I know somebody told me Soames spent a lot of money on this house; he’s not likely to part with it except at a good price.”

“Well,” said old Jolyon, “if, he thinks I’m going to pay a fancy price, he’s mistaken. I’ve not got the money to throw away that he seems to have. Let him try and sell it at a forced sale, and see what he’ll get. It’s not every man’s house, I hear!”

James, who was secretly also of this opinion, answered: “It’s a gentleman’s house. Soames is here now if you’d like to see him.”

“No,” said old Jolyon, “I haven’t got as far as that; and I’m not likely to, I can see that very well if I’m met in this manner!”

James was a little cowed; when it came to the actual figures of a commercial transaction he was sure of himself, for then he was dealing with facts, not with men; but preliminary negotiations such as these made him nervous — he never knew quite how far he could go.

“Well,” he said, “I know nothing about it. Soames, he tells me nothing; I should think he’d entertain it — it’s a question of price.”

“Oh!” said old Jolyon, “don’t let him make a favour of it!” He placed his hat on his head in dudgeon.

The door was opened and Soames came in.

“There’s a policeman out here,” he said with his half smile, “for Uncle Jolyon.”

Old Jolyon looked at him angrily, and James said: “A policeman? I don’t know anything about a policeman. But I suppose you know something about him,” he added to old Jolyon with a look of suspicion: “I suppose you’d better see him!”

In the hall an Inspector of Police stood stolidly regarding with heavy-lidded pale-blue eyes the fine old English furniture picked up by James at the famous Mavrojano sale in Portman Square. “You’ll find my brother in there,” said James.

The Inspector raised his fingers respectfully to his peaked cap, and entered the study.

James saw him go in with a strange sensation.

“Well,” he said to Soames, “I suppose we must wait and see what he wants. Your uncle’s been here about the house!”

He returned with Soames into the dining-room, but could not rest.

“Now what does he want?” he murmured again.

“Who?” replied Soames: “the Inspector? They sent him round from Stanhope Gate, that’s all I know. That ‘nonconformist’ of Uncle Jolyon’s has been pilfering, I shouldn’t wonder!”

But in spite of his calmness, he too was ill at ease.

At the end of ten minutes old Jolyon came in. He walked up to the table, and stood there perfectly silent pulling at his long white moustaches. James gazed up at him with opening mouth; he had never seen his brother look like this.

Old Jolyon raised his hand, and said slowly:

“Young Bosinney has been run over in the fog and killed.”

Then standing above his brother and his nephew, and looking down at him with his deep eyes:

“There’s — some — talk — of — suicide,” he said.

James’ jaw dropped. “Suicide! What should he do that for?”

Old Jolyon answered sternly: “God knows, if you and your son don’t!”

But James did not reply.

For all men of great age, even for all Forsytes, life has had bitter experiences. The passer-by, who sees them wrapped in cloaks of custom, wealth, and comfort, would never suspect that such black shadows had fallen on their roads. To every man of great age — to Sir Walter Bentham himself — the idea of suicide has once at least been present in the ante-room of his soul; on the threshold, waiting to enter, held out from the inmost chamber by some chance reality, some vague fear, some painful hope. To Forsytes that final renunciation of property is hard. Oh! it is hard! Seldom — perhaps never — can they achieve, it; and yet, how near have they not sometimes been!

So even with James! Then in the medley of his thoughts, he broke out: “Why I saw it in the paper yesterday: ‘Run over in the fog!’ They didn’t know his name!” He turned from one face to the other in his confusion of soul; but instinctively all the time he was rejecting that rumour of suicide. He dared not entertain this thought, so against his interest, against the interest of his son, of every Forsyte. He strove against it; and as his nature ever unconsciously rejected that which it could not with safety accept, so gradually he overcame this fear. It was an accident! It must have been!

Old Jolyon broke in on his reverie.

“Death was instantaneous. He lay all day yesterday at the hospital. There was nothing to tell them who he was. I am going there now; you and your son had better come too.”

No one opposing this command he led the way from the room.

The day was still and clear and bright, and driving over to Park Lane from Stanhope Gate, old Jolyon had had the carriage open. Sitting back on the padded cushions, finishing his cigar, he had noticed with pleasure the keen crispness of the air, the bustle of the cabs and people; the strange, almost Parisian, alacrity that the first fine day will bring into London streets after a spell of fog or rain. And he had felt so happy; he had not felt like it for months. His confession to June was off his mind; he had the prospect of his son’s, above all, of his grandchildren’s company in the future — (he had appointed to meet young Jolyon at the Hotch Potch that very manning to — discuss it again); and there was the pleasurable excitement of a coming encounter, a coming victory, over James and the ‘man of property’ in the matter of the house.

He had the carriage closed now; he had no heart to look on gaiety; nor was it right that Forsytes should be seen driving with an Inspector of Police.

In that carriage the Inspector spoke again of the death:

“It was not so very thick — Just there. The driver says the gentleman must have had time to see what he was about, he seemed to walk right into it. It appears that he was very hard up, we found several pawn tickets at his rooms, his account at the bank is overdrawn, and there’s this case in to-day’s papers;” his cold blue eyes travelled from one to another of the three Forsytes in the carriage.

Old Jolyon watching from his corner saw his brother’s face change, and the brooding, worried, look deepen on it. At the Inspector’s words, indeed, all James’ doubts and fears revived. Hard-up — pawn-tickets — an overdrawn account! These words that had all his life been a far-off nightmare to him, seemed to make uncannily real that suspicion of suicide which must on no account be entertained. He sought his son’s eye; but lynx-eyed, taciturn, immovable, Soames gave no answering look. And to old Jolyon watching, divining the league of mutual defence between them, there came an overmastering desire to have his own son at his side, as though this visit to the dead man’s body was a battle in which otherwise he must single-handed meet those two. And the thought of how to keep June’s name out of the business kept whirring in his brain. James had his son to support him! Why should he not send for Jo?

Taking out his card-case, he pencilled the following message:

‘Come round at once. I’ve sent the carriage for you.’

On getting out he gave this card to his coachman, telling him to drive — as fast as possible to the Hotch Potch Club, and if Mr. Jolyon Forsyte were there to give him the card and bring him at once. If not there yet, he was to wait till he came.

He followed the others slowly up the steps, leaning on his umbrella, and stood a moment to get his breath. The Inspector said: “This is the mortuary, sir. But take your time.”

In the bare, white-walled room, empty of all but a streak of sunshine smeared along the dustless floor, lay a form covered by a sheet. With a huge steady hand the Inspector took the hem and turned it back. A sightless face gazed up at them, and on either side of that sightless defiant face the three Forsytes gazed down; in each one of them the secret emotions, fears, and pity of his own nature rose and fell like the rising, falling waves of life, whose wash those white walls barred out now for ever from Bosinney. And in each one of them the trend of his nature, the odd essential spring, which moved him in fashions minutely, unalterably different from those of every other human being, forced him to a different attitude of thought. Far from the others, yet inscrutably close, each stood thus, alone with death, silent, his eyes lowered.

The Inspector asked softly:

“You identify the gentleman, sir?”

Old Jolyon raised his head and nodded. He looked at his brother opposite, at that long lean figure brooding over the dead man, with face dusky red, and strained grey eyes; and at the figure of Soames white and still by his father’s side. And all that he had felt against those two was gone like smoke in the long white presence of Death. Whence comes it, how comes it — Death? Sudden reverse of all that goes before; blind setting forth on a path that leads to where? Dark quenching of the fire! The heavy, brutal crushing — out that all men must go through, keeping their eyes clear and brave unto the end! Small and of no import, insects though they are! And across old Jolyon’s face there flitted a gleam, for Soames, murmuring to the Inspector, crept noiselessly away.