第11章 CHAPTER V(1)

The day after the little conference at John's, Felix had indeed received the following note:

"DEAR FELIX:

"When you go down to see old Tod, why not put up with us at Becket?

Any time will suit, and the car can take you over to Joyfields when you like. Give the pen a rest. Clara joins in hoping you'll come, and Mother is still here. No use, I suppose, to ask Flora.

"Yours ever, "STANLEY."

During the twenty years of his brother's sojourn there Felix had been down to Becket perhaps once a year, and latterly alone; for Flora, having accompanied him the first few times, had taken a firm stand.

"My dear," she said, "I feel all body there."

Felix had rejoined:

"No bad thing, once in a way."

But Flora had remained firm. Life was too short! She did not get on well with Clara. Neither did Felix feel too happy in his sister-in-law's presence; but the gray top-hat instinct had kept him going there, for one ought to keep in touch with one's brothers.

He replied to Stanley:

"DEAR STANLEY:

"Delighted; if I may bring my two youngsters. We'll arrive to-morrow at four-fifty.

"Yours affectionately, "FELIX."

Travelling with Nedda was always jolly; one could watch her eyes noting, inquiring, and when occasion served, have one's little finger hooked in and squeezed. Travelling with Alan was convenient, the young man having a way with railways which Felix himself had long despaired of acquiring. Neither of the children had ever been at Becket, and though Alan was seldom curious, and Nedda too curious about everything to be specially so about this, yet Felix experienced in their company the sensations of a new adventure.

Arrived at Transham, that little town upon a hill which the Morton Plough Works had created, they were soon in Stanley's car, whirling into the sleepy peace of a Worcestershire afternoon. Would this young bird nestling up against him echo Flora's verdict: 'I feel all body there!' or would she take to its fatted luxury as a duck to water? And he said: "By the way, your aunt's 'Bigwigs' set in on a Saturday. Are you for staying and seeing the lions feed, or do we cut back?"

From Alan he got the answer he expected:

"If there's golf or something, I suppose we can make out all right." From Nedda: "What sort of Bigwigs are they, Dad?"

"A sort you've never seen, my dear."

"Then I should like to stay. Only, about dresses?"

"What war paint have you?"

"Only two white evenings. And Mums gave me her Mechlin."

"'Twill serve."

To Felix, Nedda in white 'evenings' was starry and all that man could desire.

"Only, Dad, do tell me about them, beforehand."

"My dear, I will. And God be with you. This is where Becket begins."

The car had swerved into a long drive between trees not yet full-grown, but decorously trying to look more than their twenty years.

To the right, about a group of older elms, rooks were in commotion, for Stanley's three keepers' wives had just baked their annual rook pies, and the birds were not yet happy again. Those elms had stood there when the old Moretons walked past them through corn-fields to church of a Sunday. Away on the left above the lake, the little walled mound had come in view. Something in Felix always stirred at sight of it, and, squeezing Nedda's arm, he said:

"See that silly wall? Behind there Granny's ancients lived. Gone now--new house--new lake--new trees--new everything."

But he saw from his little daughter's calm eyes that the sentiment in him was not in her.

"I like the lake," she said. "There's Granny--oh, and a peacock!"

His mother's embrace, with its frail energy, and the pressure of her soft, dry lips, filled Felix always with remorse. Why could he not give the simple and direct expression to his feeling that she gave to hers? He watched those lips transferred to Nedda, heard her say: "Oh, my darling, how lovely to see you! Do you know this for midge-bites?" A hand, diving deep into a pocket, returned with a little silver-coated stick having a bluish end. Felix saw it rise and hover about Nedda's forehead, and descend with two little swift dabs. "It takes them away at once."

"Oh, but Granny, they're not midge-bites; they're only from my hat!"

"It doesn't matter, darling; it takes away anything like that."

And he thought: 'Mother is really wonderful!'

At the house the car had already disgorged their luggage. Only one man, but he absolutely the butler, awaited them, and they entered, at once conscious of Clara's special pot-pourri. Its fragrance steamed from blue china, in every nook and crevice, a sort of baptism into luxury. Clara herself, in the outer morning-room, smelled a little of it. Quick and dark of eye, capable, comely, perfectly buttoned, one of those women who know exactly how not to be superior to the general taste of the period. In addition to that great quality she was endowed with a fine nose, an instinct for co-ordination not to be excelled, and a genuine love of making people comfortable; so that it was no wonder that she had risen in the ranks of hostesses, till her house was celebrated for its ease, even among those who at their week-ends liked to feel 'all body.'

In regard to that characteristic of Becket, not even Felix in his ironies had ever stood up to Clara; the matter was too delicate.

Frances Freeland, indeed--not because she had any philosophic preconceptions on the matter, but because it was 'not nice, dear, to be wasteful' even if it were only of rose-leaves, or to 'have too much decoration,' such as Japanese prints in places where they hum--sometimes told her daughter-in-law frankly what was wrong, without, however, making the faintest impression upon Clara, for she was not sensitive, and, as she said to Stanley, it was 'only Mother.'