Читать книгу This Above All - Eric Knight - Страница 6

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Old General Cathaway watched his son bend over, slowly, and strike the match on the holder as he spoke.

“And how’s mother?”

“Oh, well. Never changes.”

He was thinking: Roger’s the soundest of the three. But he’s the hardest one to get at. Never get behind his mind. Wonder how he stands Diane. She must weary him to death—she does me. But probably she can’t get at him really any more than I can.

Roger Cathaway lit the cigar carefully, holding the match well away from his beard.

“You shouldn’t smoke another before dinner,” Diane said, plaintively.

“I shouldn’t, should I?” Roger said pleasantly. He held the cigar in his hands, clasped behind his back.

That was it, Old Hamish thought. You couldn’t tell whether he had let Diane bully him into not smoking now, or whether he was going to ignore her politely. You couldn’t get at him.

Roger rocked on his toes.

“I suppose you know Prentiss Saintby’s gone to America?”

“Why, no.”

“Yes,” Roger said. “Think it’s buying airplanes or something.”

Old Hamish nodded. It would be like Saintby to get a bombproof job. The thought of the Saintbys took his mind to Young Hamish.

“I wonder where Hamish is,” he said. “Didn’t he say ...”

“Oh, he’ll get here,” Roger said. “Blackout—it’s hard getting around London now, you know.”

They were silent in the awkward way of people whose minds cannot be free until the awaited person has come.

“You saw General Bullyer?” Diane said.

Old Hamish coughed.

“No, not exactly. I’m seeing him later—in a week.”

“Oh.”

There was silence. Then Roger put down his cigar, carefully.

“That sounds like Hamish now,” he said. “I’ll go.”

Old Hamish cleared his throat.

“It’s been a beautiful summer, hasn’t it?”

“Hasn’t it?” Diane said.

She was listening with almost pained concentration to the sounds below. Old Hamish heard the voice of his youngest son. He went forward gladly.

“Father! Well, well. How’s mother?”

“Oh, fit. Perfectly fit. Never changes, you know. None of us change in Yorkshire. It’s the good air.”

“I think dinner ...” Diane said.

They edged to the dining room.

Old Hamish felt suddenly depressed. Why was it so depressing to eat at the home of one’s own children? Children! Roger looked nearly as old as he did. At any rate, he looked every bit of fifty, Roger did. By God, he was getting to the fifty side.

“Did you hear Iris’ brother’s in America?” Young Hamish said.

“Yes—Roger just told me.”

“Purchasing steel.”

“Steel? I thought it was planes.”

“Oh? No, steel, I understand.”

Old Hamish thought: Soup incredibly hot—Roger seems to have removed himself in spirit.

“You came in to see Bullyer?” Young Hamish said.

“Yes. I’m coming in again next week. He—he sent me out a note begging my pardon, asking me to make it next week.”

“Oh.”

Roger was carving the roast, carving with incredible skill. But then a surgeon—he ought to be able to carve with all the practice he got.

Old Hamish felt cheerful for the first time at his own thought. Then his face fell.

Mutton—it shouldn’t be rare. Beef—rare as you could get it. Mutton—well done. Pork—done to a crisp. But Diane——

“Bad about Somaliland, isn’t it?” Young Hamish said. “What’s going on down there?”

Old Hamish warmed up.

“Some damnable mixup. By God, by my very God, if I had two divisions there—just two divisions! I don’t know what the idiots are doing.”

“Well, the French Near East army was part of the tactical scheme, wasn’t it? And when they dropped out ...”

“That’s it. We shouldn’t rely on any other nation,” Old Hamish boomed. “Rely on ourselves—we always did before.”

Young Hamish bent over his food.

“Anyhow, it looks as if we’re going to have to get out.”

They were silent.

“Don’t you like the mutton?” Diane asked.

“Oh, yes—yes,” Old Hamish said.

There was no chance to avoid eating it now.

“It’s very good,” he said.

If you had to eat it, might as well throw in a few words to boot.

“I’m glad someone appreciates it,” Diane said, sorrowfully. “It’s so hard trying to get good food now—and you go to all that trouble and ...”

Old Hamish thought: I wonder how Roger stands it. He’s built up calluses, that’s it. He just lives in some other part of him where she can’t go.

He let his own mind drift away, until he saw Diane holding the coffee pot and speaking to him.

“Don’t you think this is a beautiful design? I just got it ...”

“Yes, yes. It’s a coffee pot that looks like a coffee pot.”

He knew his words should have been kinder. The affair was a beautiful piece of simply conceived silverware. Diane had that, at least. Taste.

“Functional,” Young Hamish said.

Old Hamish seized it gladly.

“Yes. Functionalism in architecture and everything else these days.”

“At least we’ve got through the terrors of Victorian overdecoration,” Diane said.

Old Hamish considered it, tempted to disagree with Diane for the sake of disagreeing.

“Decoration, functionalism,” he said. “That’s got nothing to do with it. Art and everything else goes bad the moment it becomes consciously something—consciously anything.”

Diane stirred.

“Should we have coffee in ...”

The chairs were moving back. They were going to Roger’s library.

Gloomy place, Old Hamish thought. Doctors seemed to gather gloom around them in their homes.

“What time did Will say he was coming, Roger?”

Young Hamish was saying that.

“Oh, after dinner.”

“It’s after dinner now,” Old Hamish said, petulantly.

Waiting for someone always kept everyone else at such a sort of tentative stage.

“Oh, he really is busy,” Young Hamish said.

“Willfred’s quite on the uprise, isn’t he?” Roger said, gently.

“Yes. He’s going up with his party.”

“The party!” Old Hamish said. “His party. Luck—that’s all.”

Young Hamish smiled.

“Well, he backed an outside shot, and it’s in the running. It’s a Conservative Government now, but God knows what it’ll be before this war’s over.”

“Willfred,” Old Hamish said, slowly, “is as cold as a piece of beef liver—and always was.”

There was a silence, and then Diane rose.

“I must—I should see ...”

She drifted away.

What nicety, Old Hamish thought. What outrageous nicety! And she’s the kind who’d listen at the door as soon as not. By God, by my very God, why don’t I like my sons’ wives? Who’s wrong—me, or them?

Well, Willfred was as cold as beef liver—and he had a right to say so. Always had been—even when he was a little chap.

“Willfred was always hard to understand—even when he was little,” he said. “Hard for me to understand.”

Willfred always had that sort of hard possessiveness—a sureness in knowing what he wanted. The other two didn’t have it. Roger, the oldest—he was too gentle. Hamish, the youngest, was too generous. Both the kind that get stepped on by the world. But Roger built defenses against the stepping-on, and shut himself away in a deep world of his own. Young Hamish hadn’t learned that. He would go on giving himself generously.

The givers. And Iris was a taker. She was like something—a female spider or whatever it was—battening on Hamish’s generosity of self, consuming his kindness. Some day she’d exhaust the supply, and then ...

“You look well, father,” Young Hamish said.

Old Hamish brushed his gray mustache.

“I feel well. I feel well.”

At that moment he did—and then he remembered the shortness of breath. Shortness of breath when he hurried too much. Perhaps heart! Heart failure. Pop off—like that.

He wanted to ask Roger about it, but he couldn’t now. If he could get Roger alone ...

“That sounds like Will now,” Roger said.

He went from the room, and the other two stood, watching the door. At last they heard Willfred’s voice. He came in, speaking sedately.

“Father—good to see you. How’s the mater?”

“Oh, very fit. She always is.”

“Well, the family gathering,” Willfred said. “Let’s see—it’s two years—three, since we all ... how’s Iris?”

Young Hamish nodded.

“She’s—well.”

“Where is she?”

“Leaford—South Coast.”

“Indeed!”

Willfred looked around.

“Oh, that reminds me, I suppose you know her brother’s in America?”

Old Hamish smiled, grimly.

“Oh, yes,” he said. “Buying steel.”

“No, not steel,” Willfred said. “Something else.”

Well, why doesn’t he say what it is, Old Hamish thought. Damned fool, going on as if he were carrying deep Government secrets. Superior ass. They were talking now of Somaliland, Roger listening, smiling; Hamish eagerly, Willfred superiorly. Willfred, at last, finished his speech. He had beaten Hamish down. He looked at his father.

“Did you see Bullyer?” Willfred asked.

“Why—er—I’m seeing him next week.”

Willfred came closer to him, and shut the other two out from the conversation.

“Bullyer,” he said.

He took off his pince-nez and regarded them. His long, sharp nose now seemed to jump out in bolder acuteness. Old Hamish saw that his hair was sanding over thinly.

“What’s wrong with Bullyer?”

“Oh, nothing,” he said, airily. “Only ...” He dropped his voice. “... You know, I don’t think Bullyer’s quite the man—not after Dunkirk, you know. I rather think Condout’s the coming man. Now, would you like me to—put out a feeler to Condout?”

Old Hamish drew himself up. A father could do favors for his son—but not the son for the father. Not without saying: Here is an end to a phase of life.

Not from Willfred.

“Bullyer’s my friend,” he said. “We were lieutenants together.”

“I don’t doubt that,” Willfred said, complacently. “But now, it’s a case of what you want and who has it. Just what—do you want?”

“By God, what do I want?” Old Hamish roared. He saw the other two look up. “It isn’t what you want at a time like this. It’s how can you help. God knows they haven’t done so well thus far—their new command ideas, and new tactics—the invulnerability of defense over attack! Pah! The young ones haven’t done so well. We’re in a hole. We’re facing invasion. There’s lots of us with a lifetime of experience. We’re waiting to do what we can. Work to do—and experienced men ready to do it. A division—a brigade—anything. But do you think we can even get a chance to serve?”

Young Hamish saw Willfred opening his mouth, and spoke quickly to drown any chance of the words, “too old.”

“But undoubtedly they’re in a fearful jam of work, father. It’ll take some time to get around organizing men in retirement.”

Old Hamish’s anger at Willfred still burned.

“Then they’d better hurry—for if they don’t use us chaps—there doesn’t seem to be any mad rush on the part of young ones to serve.”

The moment he said it he realized that in his lashing out at Willfred he had struck Hamish.

He thought: Now eternally damn—you can’t strike the thick-skinned ones.

Young Hamish was passing a hand over his reddening face.

“Yes,” he said. “I suppose it wouldn’t do to have a war without a Cathaway in it.”

“Now, Hamish,” his father said. “You know what I mean.”

“No,” Hamish said, almost angrily. “We’ve all secretly given a snort over Prentiss Saintby. And here’s a war, and father the only Cathaway ready to get into it.”

“Now, Hamish, I didn’t mean ...”

“But there is a Cathaway in it,” Willfred said.

They stared at him.

“Roger’s girl’s in the Waffs, isn’t she? That’s one in uniform.”

Willfred said it so smugly, that Old Hamish couldn’t stop himself.

“That’s what I mean,” he boomed. “Women—girls going to war—and men standing around waiting. I don’t see how you allowed it, Roger. That’s one thing I wanted to talk to you about. I don’t like it. Prudence is my granddaughter and ...”

“And she’s my daughter,” Roger said, quietly.

“But—but good God, man. You don’t know what sort of things come off in those women’s camps. I don’t trust ’em—women in uniforms and—and—what does she do?”

“She’s a sergeant,” Roger said. “And I don’t think ...”

“In the ranks,” Willfred said. “Oh, why didn’t you get in touch with me and ...”

“But she did it herself, not I, Willfred.”

“Then, goodness me, let me look into it. I can get in touch with someone and see that Prudence gets a rank compatible with ...”

“No,” Old Hamish said. “She’s a right to stand on her own feet.”

“But, father, I don’t know which side you’re on. First you say ...”

“I’m against women in uniform—and I’m against politicians pulling strings in military matters,” Old Hamish said.

He felt he had said it well.

“Just a moment, both of you,” Roger said. “It’s my girl—and let me explain it. When you have a child—an only child—you bring her up first with a basic feeling of security in her home. Then, next, you teach her to find security in a very complex world. You do that, not by protecting her and forbidding her to go into the world, but by letting her go out boldly, learning to stand on her feet, held up with the knowledge that there’s home security to fall back on if she needs it.

“It’s no use trying to protect girls from the world, because—some day you won’t be here to protect them—and then they’d be out in the world without even an anchor to windward.

“I’ve—thought a lot about being a parent. I’m—I’ve thought a lot about it.”

He stood, cracking his finger joints, as if embarrassed at his own speech.

They were silent. Then Young Hamish moved.

“I ought to be—be running,” he said. “I have some stuff to clean up—this dinner was short notice and I’d planned to do it tonight.”

“Righto,” Old Hamish said. “I’ll toddle with you. You’ll drop me off.”

“You won’t stay here?” Roger said, mildly.

“Why—no. Put up at the club, and get away bright and early in the morning if I feel like it.”

“You’re not staying in town?”

“Can’t say. Perhaps I’ll run up home and come in again next week.”

“I still think Condout ...” Willfred began.

“No, no,” Old Hamish said. He made his voice more amiable as befitting a farewell. “Nice of you—but I’ll play along with Bullyer.”

They began moving from the room.

When they were in the cab, Old Hamish began framing the words in his mind. He was startled when his son spoke first.

“It’s the devil, being too young for the last one, and feeling foolishly a little too old for this. You know ...”

“Pooh!” Old Hamish said. “Old at thirty-four?”

He felt this was too near to openly persuading Hamish. So he let his words race on.

“But then, I dare say we need barristers in war as in peace—law suits never stop, worse luck. You know, it’s funny!”

His laugh boomed in the dark space of the cab, trundling along.

“I shall never forget when I came back from Egypt with the one over my kidneys. No—the one over the kidneys was at Ladysmith. It was the Boer War, that was it. Well, when I got home your mother was—well, very distant. And finally I twigged it. It was being wounded in the back. You know, the funny old romantic idea that a soldier always kept his face to the foe, and if he got wounded in the back it was a mark of cowardice—he’d been running away. I had quite a time explaining to her how shrap bursts. In fact, I don’t think she’s got past the old idea yet. Has no conception of what an H.E. does. Still has the idea, privately, I think, that it’s all like Omdurman—and I’m on a horse, charging into every battle.”

He laughed appreciatively.

“Now what on earth made me think of that? I’ve never told anybody.”

Young Hamish thought:

He did that for me—to make me stop thinking about not going. Once he was abler with his tongue and mind. It’s sad to see a parent pass the peak of capabilities.

“It’s a good way to be,” he said. “Mother lives at peace with her ideas. I wish more of us could.”

Old Hamish’s mind jumped several moves in the gambit.

“What the devil is Iris doing at the seaside—what is it—Leaford? I thought Arthur was at—where’s the damned place they went?”

“Oh, they moved the school right next to an airdrome—or someone put an airdrome next to the school. So Iris took him away. Planes all day. She thinks its bad for children to get impressions of so much—so much militarism.”

“Ah, foolishness! It’s better than all this chuckle-headed, panicky running around. Where is she now? Leaford? For the love of heaven. Right smack across the Channel from him ...”

“It’s temporary,” Hamish said. “I’ve got to—I’ll dig up some other place—it’ll all iron out.”

Old Hamish made a grimace in the darkness.

“Well, you know my feelings,” he said, in a slightly aggrieved tone. “But I’m not going to put my foot in it. I’ll be damned!”

“Oh, don’t look at it that way.”

Old Hamish licked his lips. Then the words got past him.

“Damn it all to hell, I don’t see why she won’t bring them to Oddale. Of all the places on this island that’re isolated and safe ...”

He felt his son’s stony silence, and puffed out his breath. In for a penny, in for a pound, he thought.

“Damn my eyes, Iris is a good woman,” he said. “Of all things on this earth, God save me from a good woman. You know, some day, someone will tell her what kennel she was whelped in.”

“Now, father.”

“Her father, Old Saintby! What a saint! By God, at least I never left any by-blows to get by on bastardy rates. And he did! I have proof. He was in court for it! And then she raves about me. Me, if you please!”

Hamish thought he had never before heard his father sound so gladly and maliciously gossipy. Probably another mark of age.

“She never says a word about it,” he reproved.

“Oh, stick up for her,” Old Hamish said. “Of course she doesn’t. But she won’t bring my grandchildren to Oddale—not if it were the only single place left in Britain where they’d be safe. She’ll risk their lives ...”

“Nonsense. I want to get them all back to London. They’ll be safe ...”

“The very devil they will.”

“Oh, I don’t think he’ll bomb London. Why, the very effect on the civilized world would ...”

“Poppycock. He bombed it last war, didn’t he? What makes you think he won’t again?”

“Well—this is different. We’ve anti-aircraft defenses and ...”

“Before he’s through he’ll blast the daylights out of this place. Mark my words!”

Young Hamish moved the conversation away.

“Willfred looked well, didn’t you think? Flourishing—like the green bay tree these days.”

“You know—it would be fun to get Iris and Willfred together,” the old general said.

He was thinking: Willfred and Iris over a clothesline with their tails tied together like a pair of Kilkenny cats. Two of a kind. Greek meeting Greek. Hard, capable people.

But his son’s mind had moved simply.

“Oh, they get along quite well together,” he said, mildly.

“Ah, yes. But now. Willfred going up in the Government—and everyone knows Iris is an out-and-out Nazi.”

“Oh, come. That’s not so. She’s a peace supporter, that’s all.”

“I’ve heard her argue ...”

“Not since the war.”

“Ah, now they’re keeping quieter. But it’d be dreadfully embarrassing for Willfred right now with an out-and-out Nazi sister-in-law.”

“Anyone has a right to march to the music of the drum he hears,” Hamish said.

“Yes. And talking of drums ...”

The cab was slowing down.

“Here’s the club,” Young Hamish said. “Don’t ring off, cabby.”

Old Hamish was standing on the curb in the blackness, leaning forward into the cab. A good thought had come, and now it was eluding him.

“Er—I’m sorry I popped off about Old Saintby,” he said. “I shouldn’t have told you ...”

“I knew it,” Young Hamish said. “Will told me once.”

“Ah,” Old Hamish said. He felt his sails fall, flopping, windless. Then his mind warmed. Drums—that was the good thought.

“You know, Hamish. I don’t want to poke in—but between you and Iris—you’ve got to stand up and fight. I’ll give you some advice. I’m older than you, and ... well, a woman and a drum ...”

“Should be beaten regularly,” Young Hamish said. “I know, but just at this particular year of grace, the accent’s on the drum. Good night.”

Old Hamish shook his head, watching the cab creep away from the blackout lines on the curb. He shook his head and went into the club.