Читать книгу The Well of Loneliness - Radclyffe Hall - Страница 39

Soon after the departure of Mademoiselle Duphot, there occurred two distinct innovations at Morton. Miss Puddleton arrived to take possession of the schoolroom, and Sir Philip bought himself a motor-car. The motor was a Panhard, and it caused much excitement in the neighbourhood of Upton-on-Severn. Conservative, suspicious of all innovations, people had abstained from motors in the Midlands, and, incredible as it now seems to look back on, Sir Philip was regarded as a kind of pioneer. The Panhard was a high-shouldered, snub-nosed abortion with a loud, vulgar voice and an uncertain temper. It suffered from frequent fits of dyspepsia, brought about by an unhealthy spark-plug. Its seats were the very acme of discomfort, its primitive gears unhandy and noisy, but nevertheless it could manage to attain to a speed of about fifteen miles per hour—given always that, by God’s good grace and the chauffeur’s, it was not in the throes of indigestion.

Anna felt doubtful regarding this new purchase. She was one of those women who, having passed forty, were content to go on placidly driving in their broughams, or, in summer, in their charming little French victorias. She detested the look of herself in large goggles, detested being forced to tie on her hat, detested the heavy, mannish coat of rough tweed that Sir Philip insisted she must wear when motoring. Such things were not of her; they offended her sense of the seemly, her preference for soft, clinging garments, her instinct for quiet, rather slow, gentle movements, her love of the feminine and comely. For Anna at forty-four was still slender, and her dark hair, as yet, was untouched with grey, and her blue Irish eyes were as clear and candid as when she had come as a bride to Morton. She was beautiful still, and this fact rejoiced her in secret, because of her husband. Yet Anna did not ignore middle age; she met it half-way with dignity and courage; and now her soft dresses were of reticent colours, and her movements a little more careful than they had been, and her mind more severely disciplined and guarded—too much guarded these days, she was gradually growing less tolerant as her interests narrowed. And the motor, an unimportant thing in itself, served nevertheless to crystallize in Anna a certain tendency towards retrogression, a certain instinctive dislike of the unusual, a certain deep-rooted fear of the unknown.

Old Williams was openly disgusted and hostile; he considered the car to be an outrage to his stables—those immaculate stables with their spacious coach-houses, their wide plaits of straw neatly interwoven with yards of red and blue saddler’s tape, and their fine stable-yard hitherto kept so spotless. Came the Panhard, and behold, pools of oil on the flagstones, greenish, bad-smelling oil that defied even scouring; and a medley of odd-looking tools in the coach-house, all greasy, all soiling your hands when you touched them; and large tins of what looked like black vaseline; and spare tyres for which nails had been knocked into the woodwork; and a bench with a vice for the motor’s insides which were frequently being dissected. From this coach-house the dog-cart had been ruthlessly expelled, and now it must stand chock-a-block with the phaeton, so that room might be made for the garish intruder together with its young bodyservant. The young bodyservant was known as a chauffeur—he had come down from London and wore clothes made of leather. He talked Cockney, and openly spat before Williams in the coach-house, then rubbed his foot over the spittle.

‘I’ll ’ave none of yer expectoration ’ere in me coach-house, I tells ee!’ bawled Williams, apoplectic with temper.

‘Oh, come orf it, do, Grandpa; we’re not in the ark!’ was how the new blood answered Williams.

There was war to the knife between Williams and Burton—Burton who expressed large disdain of the horses.

‘Yer time’s up now, Grandpa,’ he was constantly remarking; ‘it’s all up with the gees—better learn to be a shovver!’

‘ ’Opes I’ll die afore ever I demean meself that way, you young blight!’ bawled the outraged Williams. Very angry he grew, and his dinner fermented, dilating his stomach and causing discomfort, so that his wife became anxious about him.

‘Now don’t ee go worryin’, Arth-thur,’ she coaxed; ‘us be old, me and you, and the world be progressin’.’

‘It be goin’ to the devil, that’s what it be doin’!’ groaned Williams, rubbing his stomach.

To make matters worse, Sir Philip’s behaviour was that of a schoolboy with some horrid new contraption. He was caught by his stud-groom lying flat on his back with his feet sticking out beneath the bonnet of the motor, and when he emerged there was soot on his cheek-bones, on his hair, and even on the tip of his nose. He looked terribly sheepish, and as Williams said later to his wife:

‘It were somethin’ aw-ful to see ’im all mucked up, and ’im such a neat gentleman, and ’im in a filthy old coat of that Burton’s, and that Burton agrinnin’ at me and just pointin’, silent, because the master couldn’t see ’im, and the master a-callin’ up familiar-like to Burton: “I say! She’s got somethin’ all wrong with ’er exhaust pipe!” and Burton acontradictin’ the master: “It’s that piston,” says ’e, as cool as yer please.’

Nor was Stephen less thrilled by the car than was her father. Stephen made friends with the execrable Burton, and Burton, who was only too anxious to gain allies, soon started to teach her the parts of the engine; he taught her to drive too, Sir Philip being willing, and off they would go, the three of them together, leaving Williams to glare at the disappearing motor.

‘And ’er such a fine ’orse-woman and all!’ he would grumble, rubbing a disconsolate chin.

It is not too much to say that Williams felt heart-broken, he was like a very unhappy old baby; quite infantile he was in his fits of bad temper, in his mouthings and his grindings of toothless gums. And all about nothing, for Sir Philip and his daughter had the lure of horseflesh in their very bones—and then there was Raftery, and Raftery loved Stephen, and Stephen loved Raftery.