Part 38 (1/2)
”He was very much taken with her. But how can he think about marrying, Arthur? You do say the strangest things. And after Dagnall's behaviour too.”
”_Raison de plus!_ That girl has money, my dear, and will have more, when the old aunts depart this life. If you want Duggy still to go into Parliament, and to be able to do anything for the younger ones, you'll keep an eye on her.”
Lady Laura, however, was too depressed to welcome the subject. The gong rang for dinner, and as they were leaving the room, Sir Arthur said--
”There are two men coming down to-morrow to see the pictures, Laura. If I were you, I should keep out of the way.”
She gave him a startled look. But they were already on the threshold of the dining-room, where a butler and two footmen waited. The husband and wife took their places opposite each other in the stately panelled room, which contained six famous pictures. Over the mantelpiece was a half-length Gainsborough, one of the loveliest portraits in the world, a miracle of s.h.i.+ning colour and languid grace, the almond eyes with their intensely black pupils and black eyebrows looking down, as it seemed, contemptuously upon this after generation, so incurably lacking in its own supreme refinement. Opposite Lady Laura was a full-length Van Dyck of the Genoese period, a mother in stiff brocade and ruff, with an adorable child at her knee; and behind her chair was the great t.i.tian of the house, a man in armour, subtle and ruthless as the age which bred him, his hawk's eye brooding on battles past, and battles to come, while behind him stretched the Venetian lagoon, covered dimly with the fleet of the great republic which had employed him. Facing the Gainsborough hung one of Cuyp's few masterpieces--a ma.s.s of s.h.i.+pping on the Scheldt, with Dordrecht in the background. For play and interplay of everything that delights the eye--light and distance, transparent water, and hovering clouds, the l.u.s.trous brown of fis.h.i.+ng boats, the beauty of patched sails and fluttering flags--for both literary and historic suggestion, Dutch art had never done better. Impressionists and post-impressionists came down occasionally to stay at Flood--for Sir Arthur liked to play Maecenas--and were allowed to deal quite frankly with the pictures, as they wandered round the room at dessert, cigarette in hand, pointing out the absurdities of the Cuyp and the t.i.tian. Their host, who knew that he possessed in that room what the collectors of two continents desired, who felt them buzzing outside like wasps against a closed window, took a special pleasure in the scoffs of the advanced crew. They supplied an agreeable acid amid a general adulation that bored him.
To-night the presence of the pictures merely increased the excitement which was the background of his mind. He talked about them a good deal at dinner, wondering secretly all the time, what it would be like to do without them--without Flood--without his old butler there--without everything.
Douglas came down late, and was very silent and irresponsive. He too was morbidly conscious of the pictures, though he wished his father wouldn't talk about them. He was conscious of everything that meant money--of his mother's pearls for instance, which she wore every evening without thinking about them. If he did well with the pictures on the morrow she might, perhaps, justly keep them, as a dowry for Nelly. But if not--He found himself secretly watching his mother, wondering how she would take it all when she really understood--what sort of person she would turn out to be in the new life to which they were all helplessly tending.
After dinner, he followed his father into the smoking room.
”Where is the catalogue of the pictures, father?”
”In the library, Duggy, to the right hand of the fire-place. I paid a fellow a very handsome sum for making it--a fellow who knew a lot--a real expert. But, of course, when we published it, all the other experts tore it to pieces.”
”If I bring it, will you go through it with me?”
Sir Arthur shrugged his shoulders.
”I don't think I will, Duggy. The catalogue--there are a great many marginal notes on it which the published copies haven't got--will tell you all I know about them, and a great deal more. And you'll find a loose paper at the beginning, on which I've noted down the prices people have offered me for them from time to time. Like their impudence, I used to think! I leave it to you, old boy. I know it's a great responsibility for a young fellow like you. But the fact is--I'm pumped. Besides, when they make their offer, we can talk it over. I think I'll go and play a game of backgammon with your mother.”
He threw away his cigar, and Douglas, angry at what seemed to him his father's s.h.i.+rking, stood stiffly aside to let him pa.s.s. Sir Arthur opened the door. He seemed to walk uncertainly, and he stooped a great deal. From the hall outside, he looked back at his son.
”I think I shall see M'Clintock next time I'm in town, Duggy. I've had some queer pains across my chest lately.”
”Indigestion?” said Douglas. His tone was casual.
”Perhaps. Oh, they're nothing. But it's best to take things in time.”
He walked away, leaving his son in a state of seething irritation.
Extraordinary that a man could think of trumpery ailments at such a time! It was unlike his father too, whose personal fitness and soundness, whether on the moors, in the hunting field, or in any other sort of test, had always been triumphantly a.s.sumed by his family, as part of the general brilliance of Sir Arthur's role in life.
Douglas sombrely set himself to study the picture catalogue, and sat smoking and making notes till nearly midnight. Having by that time acc.u.mulated a number of queries to which answers were required, he went in search of his father. He found him in the drawing-room, still playing backgammon with Lady Laura.
”Oh Duggy, I'm so tired!” cried his mother plaintively, as soon as he appeared. ”And your father will go on. Do come and take my place.”
Sir Arthur rose.
”No, no, dear--we've had enough. Many thanks. If you only understood its points, backgammon is really an excellent game. Well, Duggy, ready to go to bed?”
”When I've asked you a few questions, father.”
Lady Laura escaped, having first kissed her son with tearful eyes. Sir Arthur checked a yawn, and tried to answer Douglas's enquiries. But very soon he declared that he had no more to say, and couldn't keep awake.
Douglas watched him mounting the famous staircase of the house, with its marvellous _rampe_, bought under the Bourbon Restoration from one of the historic chateaux of France; and, suddenly, the young man felt his heart gripped. Was that shrunken, stooping figure really his father? Of course they must have M'Clintock at once--and get him away--to Scotland or abroad.