Part 36

Once Captain Brentham took up the affairs of the Silchester estates--which he did definitely in October, 1889, he went very thoroughly into their condition and their possibilities of development. He was not, of course, a trained, professional land agent, which was why his shrewd and original ideas of enhancing the value and productivity of land made the Institute of Land Agents so angry. But he knew something of surveying, and had been accustomed to value countries by the eye, to judge of soils, espy defects in farming, by his boyish life at Farleigh and his experiences in India and Africa.

Lord Silchester in his fondness for landscape beauty had preferred a lovely, unkempt, autumn-wistful wilderness to a possible brick-field, though to a geologist the clay was almost crying out to be turned to the service of man. He liked great spaces without a sign of man's habitation to mar the poem. Roger, though he had a strongly developed sense of the beautiful in Nature, yet combined with it a realization that much waste land in the England of latter days, and even in Scotland, is an offence and a temptation to discontent on the part of the landless. Another charm can be contributed to landscapes by the handiwork of man, provided the cottage is tastefully and soundly built, the manufactory--even the brick-kilns and chimneys--are of the right material for the neighbourhood, of harmonious colour and appropriate design.

In the Berkshire and Hampshire estates woodlands required thinning, cattle wanted new blood and better breeding. The lobster fishery at Sporran Bay should certainly be developed. A proportion of the deer in Scotland and at Engledene might with advantage be sold. The farmer tenants generally wanted shaking up. Some of them could well afford to pay twice their present rent and let him out of the increased rent-roll rebuild their houses, barns, granaries, pigsties and cow-sheds. Why, the dairy business alone might be trebled in value with this proximity of a milk-hungry London. Farmer Josling, a right-down superior man with much self-given education, should help him in this. Incidentally, with Sibyl's consent, he had given his father-in-law a life-lease of his farm as some acknowledgment of his excellent use of it, and his progressive influence on the other farmers.

The bracing outdoor life and constant riding, the hunting and shooting did his health a world of good. He had never looked so well, so set up and robust as he did at the age of thirty-two, as Sibyl's factotum. The worst of this was that he seemed more desirable than ever in Sibyl's eyes, as she admitted with her disarming frankness. "What a pity it is, Roger, the silly laws of this sanctimonious country will not permit polygamy. We are just in the prime of life, you and I. I am much better looking than I was ten years ago--I shudder at my old photographs--I wore a fringe then and a bustle, and a lot of hair down my back, and a terrible simper when I faced the camera. It's a crime against Nature that we can't marry. We should have the handsomest children and we could easily arrange matters with Lucy. She's not exacting."

Roger laughed at these speeches, but they made him a little uncomfortable. Had Sibyl been a complete stranger to him he might have succumbed long before to her wiles; few men of his build, his time, his complexion were Josephs. But the slight relationship between them acted as a barrier to concupiscence. It permitted a familiarity in speech and address which made any closer intimacy repellent to his sense of decency....

Sibyl it must be admitted, was shameless when they were together. She would study his features attentively; admire the curl of his eyelashes, the outline of his profile, even the not quite classical prominence of the cheek bones, the virile twist upwards of his moustache, the firm chin and strong white teeth, the well-set ear and close-cropped hair at the back of his head: the while she pretended, pen in hand, to be considering his propositions. Thought-transference told him what this scrutiny meant, and he would colour a little in shame and become abrupt in manner--even say to himself, "This can't go on--I wish she'd think of something else...."

He was conscientiously attentive to Lucy at this time and she was really happy during this phase in Roger's life. In the spring she took up her residence in the Lodge at Englefield and made a comfortable home for her devoted husband, who seemed resolved to show her how happy he was in his marriage. Maud, from Farleigh, was a constant visitor, stayed weeks together with Lucy and Roger and served as a trait d'union with Sibyl, who allowed Maud to chaff her and scold her as she would no one else. Sibyl was quite civil to Lucy, did not bother her, left her alone except for an occasional greeting and the showing of some curiosity as to little John. "You may call him John as much as you like, but he's certainly Roger's child."

Clithy and his nurse were often sent down to the Lodge to be with Lucy; Sibyl deigning to say that her influence over children was a good one and Clithy was never fretful with her. In her mocking moods she called her little son "The Prince with the Nose" and declared he was under an enchantment. He had for a child of three a preternaturally large nose, and as she said to Roger, there could be no doubt as to his paternity. "How pleased Francis would have been! He was always so proud of the Mallard nose. Said it could be traced back in pictures to Charles I's reign--Anne of Denmark, who was rather larky after she had been married ten years, had a side-slip--you know what a tipsy court they were!--and bore a daughter to the Lord Chamberlain, who was particularly active in the revels. James overlooked her breach of good manners and ultimately gave the large-nosed little girl in marriage with Silchester Manor to a favourite, who founded the House of Mallard. Francis was going to have put this into his Memoirs, but he died, poor dear, leaving them three-quarters finished. I think I shall finish them for a lark. Will you help me?"

One reason why Lucy was dreamily happy at Englefield Lodge was that she seemed there to link up with the life of her girlhood. She had so often strolled round the precincts of Engledene with John Tilehurst, she dared not revisit for fear of meeting Mrs. Barnes. But she would sometimes walk over the same path she had traced with John on that Sunday in June, 1886. She would sit on the seat at The View and go over once more in memory, and with a sad little smile her naive and petulant questions and answers on that Sunday walk. How she had told John her desire to encounter lions, and yet when a lion had visited their camp, what abject terror she had shown! Hangodi! That name was first uttered to her in Engledene Park and she remembered John saying it meant "The Place of Firewood."

One day Roger brought over to see her in the dog-cart old Mr. Baines--as he was beginning to be called. They both shed a few tears, but he told her with more sincerity than he usually put into his husky voice that he exonerated her from all blame in the catastrophe which had overtaken his son (Lucy herself was not so sure). "Mother's taken it awfully bad, Lucy. She's goin' out of her mind, I'm fearin'. First she was writin' an' writin' to Lord Wiltshire, him as is Prime Minister, don't you know, to give your husband the sack as bein' the real cause of John's death. Then next she'd bother our member, wantin' 'im to ask questions in the 'Ouse of Commons, till at last they give up answerin' them. Then she set to and slanged that Missionary Society that John belonged to, sayin' they wasn't 'alf careful enough about 'is precious life. Now this spring, blessed if she ain't cut our Connexion! She won't go to Salem Chapel; goes to Church instead ... St. Michael's. Shouldn't wonder if she ended up a papist! ... S'pose you know Ann's in England? They're makin' a lot of fuss about 'er in Reading and London. Call her a Heroine. She's bin down with 'er 'usband--rather a half-baked feller--to see us; but 'er talk with Mother ain't done Mother much good, partly 'cos Ann wouldn't join 'er in abusin' you. She says to Mother: 'I just told you the plain truth in that letter. I'm not goin' to add nor subtract one word, an' you've gone and put into it much more than I ever said. Just leave Lucy alone to God's judgment. At any rate, John loved her and died believin' her true; and I dessay she was. Africa's a funny country and you must put down a lot to the climate.' ... Ann's going back to Africa next autumn, with three more recruits and a lot of money to spend on the Mission School. Old Mrs. Doland sent for 'er and give 'er five hundred pounds. I tell 'er she ought to come and see you before she goes. P'raps she will, p'raps she won't. I told 'er you called your baby 'John,' and the tears reg'lar came into 'er eyes...."

Roger owned to Maud he felt a bit restless in the spring and early summer of 1890. He couldn't get Africa out of his mind, somehow. There was first the fuss about Stanley and the return of the Emin Pasha Relief Expedition--surely one of the most wasted feats of heroism and brave endeavour in the history of Africa. Then came the 1890 Agreement with Germany. This left the Happy Valley pretty much where it had lain--unmarked as yet--on the map, but by approximate latitude and longitude entirely German, as Roger knew. But the discussion of frontiers in Africa caused him to feel fretful and resentful at being "out of it." Sir Mulberry Hawk, who had negotiated the treaty, might surely have turned to him for enlightenment on this point and that? Even though he had left the African Service, there were his reports of 1884-5 and -6, and of 1887-9. He felt impelled to go and see Broadmead, always accessible to men of worth. Broadmead said it was a beastly shame--spite perhaps on the part of Molyneux--but every one now was thinking of the Recess.... London was becoming awfully stale.... He and Roger should meet in the early autumn. Broadmead would perhaps come down to Engledene and shoot Sibyl's pheasants, and talk over Africa.... If Roger was still hankering after East Africa, why didn't he suck up to "Wully MacNaughten?" He had a show place somewhere up in the Highlands, not an immeasurable distance from Glen Sporran.

"Who was Wully? Didn't Brentham know? Why, he had begun life as a small grocer in some Scotch town, and bankrupted through giving credit to the crofters. Not to be bested by Fate, he went out to China as a clerk and in twenty years had made quite a respectable fortune. Friends said out of tea, enemies out of opium, smuggled into India; probable cause, the great coolie traffic between China and the rest of the world, which prompted him to found a navy of tramp steamers to carry the coolies, many of them over to Africa. Then he nibbled at East Africa; began with missionary stations, sort of atonement, don't you know, for anything naughty he'd done--Chaps in China used to call him 'MacNaughty-naughty'--s'posed to have had a half-caste family. Not a word of truth in it. However, there it was, and he couldn't go on refreshing Brentham's memory. Brentham had been in East Africa and must know all about MacNaughten there?..."

"Why, yes, I know, of course, he's the Chairman of the Chartered Company of Ibea--Mvita, you know."

"Well, they are going to extend their operations inland to the Victoria Nyanza and they want a go-ahead man as Governor. The chap at present out there is---- However, nothing can be done now. See you later on, give you a letter to him.... Tata."

If Roger was restless with unavowed hankerings after his first mistress, Africa, Sibyl, unconscious that he ever dreamed of release from her Circe toils, was radiant in the spring and summer of that particularly radiant year, 1890. Her prescribed mourning was over, so that the "horrid old Queen" could have no ground of objection to her entertaining like any other opulent peeress.

Roger had worked wonders with the estates, and before long the revenues, over which she would have control till her son's majority, would be increased by at least one-third. Her choice of him from a business point of view was amply justified. Her pulse quickened and her eyes grew brighter than their ordinary at the thought he might some day be her lover. If only that tiresome Lucy died in one of her confinements, he might even be her husband. Of course, she would most carefully avoid any foolishness which might give the least ground for scandal. If she did that, she could take life as pleasantly as Lady Ramsgate (the ridiculous one, called "Popsy"), or Lady Ann Vizor. Every one knew that Popsy Ramsgate had had a child by her farm bailiff and kept it at the farm, and no one thought the worse of her. Ramsgate was dead. Lady Ann's stockbroker was obviously her lover, but he was very gentlemanly and no one would have guessed unless they had been specially told.

Even if Roger were free, she was not sure she wanted exactly to marry him. She would then lose her title or, at any rate, her social rights as a peeress. And Roger as husband might be too masterful. She wanted to "queen it" as a rich woman with intelligence and taste might do in those days. Now her mourning was over she would commence at once to give parties at 6A, Carlton House Terrace, which should put those of Suzanne Feenix quite in the shade. She would create a salon, to which should be attracted the younger bloods, the rebels of the Conservative Party. She would revivify Lord Randolph, join hands with Mary March, who had a wonderful flair for inveigling millionaires. She and a few other clever women--the Tennants, perhaps--should create a young and intellectual Conservative Party--or Unionist Party, if you liked. They would get hold of Choselwhit--perhaps Rhodes, if he came to England.

Lord Wiltshire should rue the day that he had snubbed her at a Chapelmead week-end--the last time poor Francis went out anywhere--and cut her at two Foreign Office receptions. The Brinsleys should be shown their reign was over.

Her initiates--she really founded the half-legendary "Souls"--should include the smartest writers and the most daring painters, the weirdest poets of the day. They would have their own press, if it wasn't too expensive, but Mary March's millionaires might manage that ... hadn't she been introduced at one of Mary's theatre parties to an enormously rich and humble person called Tooley? Lady Tarrington had asked him if he owned Tooley Street and the stupid creature had said: "Beg pardon, me lady?" Well, Tooley should be ensorcelled--perhaps an invitation up to Glen Sporran--and buy their newspaper for them.

And then she had an idea of starting a monthly Review which she would edit herself and which should tell the naked truth. No squeamishness.... Praed, the architect, should send them one or two of his queer storiettes....

As to mother and father, they would spoil any circles with their banalities and old-fashioned ideas ... and father's stories would never be followed to their finish by the modern young man or woman. They would devastate her circle. No. They must stop in the country. Mother seemed to be developing some internal complaint--probably indigestion or something which could be cured at Aix or Homburg--and she was becoming very strait-laced and anxious-eyed. Sibyl would take Roger's advice: buy up father's three hundred acres; it could be made a most profitable milk farm. Father should stay on as tenant at a nominal rent, with a bailiff to manage--perhaps that young Harden, the cricketer, who had married Lucy's sister.

Sibyl resolved to send mother to Aix at her expense and have Aunt Christabel to stay with her indefinitely as long as she wanted a chaperon.

As to her sisters: thank goodness, they were off her hands. They had married and gone away with their husbands to those blessed colonies, Clara to New Zealand and Juliet to British Columbia. Long might they remain there! Relations--unless very distant--were like reproaches or bad replicas of one's self. They sapped all one's originality....

These were some of the musings of Sibyl when having her hair brushed by Sophie, or when undergoing Swedish massage under the firm but soothing hands of a blonde giantess; when breakfasting in bed; or undergoing a long train journey in a first-class compartment with a defective lamp.

There was no question in this year of Lucy's accompanying her husband to Glen Sporran. She was starting another baby and was firm about not wishing to go. Sibyl took this decision most amiably; said Lucy was quite wise, and further proposed that she should have Maud with her and care-take for Sibyl at Engledene House. Clitheroe was likewise to be left behind. His life in the Highlands was one long succession of dangerous colds and there wasn't enough accommodation for his retinue of nurses; especially as every one you asked nowadays must have with them a maid or a valet. Clithy had grown so absurdly fond of Lucy that Sibyl suggested jocosely they should change babies. She thought little John a perfect darling--so like Roger--why hadn't Lucy chosen her as god-mother instead of Maud? No doubt Clithy would grow up more like a normal boy when the rest of his features balanced Anne of Denmark's nose.... Meantime, it was very fortunate things were as they were. And Lucy would oblige her enormously by looking after her boy while she was entertaining all those horrid people in the North.

Not that the house-party was to be a large one. It ran away with so much money, and people were never grateful. There would just be Stacy Bream; the Honble. Victoria Masham, the Maid of Honour--old Vicky Long-i'-the-tooth, Sibyl called her behind her back, and never imagined the nickname could be repeated and counteract the expense of a month's hospitality. Must have Vicky to keep in touch, you know, with what the old Queen was saying and doing--and an acolyte of Stacy's named Reggie, something in the Colonial Office--he could flirt with Vicky--and p'raps Arthur Broadmead. Then--for a day or two--that insufferable cad, Elijah Tooley--"but he's so frightfully, frightfully rich and might be useful." Aunt Christabel, of course, would come, to keep order, and Aggie Freebooter and Gertie Wentworth would make up the house-party. Aggie Freebooter was that tiresome Lady Towcester's daughter--"one of six girls, my dear"--but when she was away from her mother's eye she was deliciously larky and awfully plucky, and didn't mind what you played at; while Gertie Wentworth--or the Honble. Gertrude--thirty-five, lots of money, dresses like a man, whisky and cigars, takes the bank at Roulette and loses everything but her temper.

"Well, at any rate," said Maud, "I'm glad Willowby Patterne is not in the party, this time...."

"My dear!..." said Sibyl with a scream. "I've absolutely dropped him, after that row in the City and that extraordinary case in the courts which was compromised and hushed up. He's gone out to East Africa. Haven't you heard?"