The House of Defence. Volume 1

“If you are nervous,” she said, “let us cross the Park, and put you down at Paddington. You can take the train.”

“That is absurd,” he said shortly.

They went on in silence for a little, and Thurso made an immense effort to pull himself together, or, at any rate, the effort seemed to him to be immense. But he knew that lately the effort to do anything he did not feel inclined to do had been enormously increased. Those moments of quickened consciousness which were his seemed to make his brain in the intervals more lethargic, less able to give orders. He knew quite well that his nerves were out of order, and though it was true that, since coming to town, as he had just told his wife, he had had no return of his neuralgia, he had for the last ten days always silenced its threatenings, sometimes even before such threatening was really perceptible, by a liberal use of that divine drug which never failed. He believed, too, if he thought about it, that he was taking larger doses than those prescribed, and knew that he was intentionally absent-minded when he poured out his draught. Nor had he taken it only for anodynic purposes; more than once or twice – he could not say how many times, but certainly less than fifty – he had taken it for the pure pleasure of its effects. He knew he had begun to be dragged into the habit, as a man whose clothes are caught between revolving cogwheels is dragged in, unless by a superhuman effort he can break loose. It was not that he did not struggle against it, but he struggled with mental reservations. Two days ago, for instance, he had resolved not to touch it for forty-eight hours, promising himself, as a reward for his abstinence, a pleasant hour or two when he got down to Bray. After that, so he had planned, he would continue to break free from it by a carefully graduated course. His next treat should be three days afterwards; after that there should be abstention for four days. For he was rather frightened already at his previous indulgence, and at the greed with which he longed for it. During the last week in Scotland he had taken it every day, and sometimes twice. Sometimes he said to himself that it suited him. Perhaps he was abnormal, but it made him feel so well, so alive. Then, again, he would recognise the danger that lay in front of him, and vowed to set about the task of breaking from the habit. But it must be done by degrees; he already could make no larger resolve than that. But that he did resolve. The interval between his treats should become longer and longer, until he craved no more. Craved! How he craved now! It was that which made him so nervous and irritable. But he must have that one full dose when he got down to Bray. He had promised himself that, and he felt as if it were almost a duty to perform that promise.

Meantime, whatever in his brain was lethargic and inert, some sense of cunning and precaution was always strong, and he knew that it was most important that Catherine should not think that there was anything wrong. So before the pause after his last rather snappish reply had made it impossible to refer back, he spoke again in a different tone.

“You must forgive me for speaking rudely just now,” he said, “and I am sure that Marcel is really careful. But I had the most dreadfully trying time up in Scotland, and those horrible headaches did not make things easier. As a matter of fact, I saw Dr. Symes when I was there, and he told me I was on edge. But he did not attach the least importance to it. He said the best thing I could do was to come down here and amuse myself, and forget all about the typhoid.”

That, again, was true as far as it went, but no further. Dr. Symes had said these things with regard to his neuralgia: he had not pronounced on the cure for it.

“But there’s no harm in seeing a doctor,” she said, “and telling him all you feel and all you do. Then he tells you to avoid curried prawns, and you pay only two guineas.”

He laughed.

“I have better uses for even so small a sum,” he said, while his mind said to itself: “Two guineas’ worth of laudanum! Two guineas’ worth of laudanum!”

“But it’s so much better to be told if there’s anything wrong,” she said, “and so nice to be told that there isn’t.”

“But I am sure of that, without being told,” said he.

The house at Bray was long and low and rambling, straggling down at one point to the very edge of the river, but for the most part standing in the middle of flower-beds and short-turfed lawn and stiff yew-hedges cut into fantastic shapes, which screened the customs of its inhabitants from the population in boats, so that the Sunday afternoon crowd could not, as in most of the river-side houses, see exactly who was there, what they had for tea, who smoked and slept, who read, and who played croquet. Indeed, had it not been for this impenetrable barrier of thick-set foliage, what they had for breakfast, lunch, and dinner would have been equally public property; for Lady Thurso had built a big open pavilion on the terrace just above the river, where, when the day was hot, her party took all their meals. Another pavilion nearer the house served as a drawing-room, card-room, or smoking-room, and on a fine Sunday nobody more than set foot in the house itself from breakfast till bed-time. A dozen guests or so were all that the house would hold, but if, as often happened, people proposed themselves when the sleeping accommodation was already commanded, it was possible to get beds for them at a neighbouring hotel. To-day, however, there was to be no sleeping out; it was doubtful, indeed, whether the house itself would be full. Maud was certainly coming; Count Villars, Alice Yardly, and her husband, were also certainties, as were Jim Raynham and Ruby Majendie, who had proposed to each other – Lady Thurso never could find out who “began“ – on the night of her ball; and a couple of American cousins brought their number up to ten.

Catherine hardly knew whether or no she was glad that she had so small a party. For once, it is true, she would have a fairly quiet Sunday; but, worried as she was, not only about this private emotional history of her own, but also (though she told herself this was causeless) about her husband, she was not sure whether it would not have been a greater rest to have plenty of superficial arrangements to make, and plenty of people who did not touch her inner life to amuse. She did not at all believe in thinking about things unless some practical step was to be the outcome of thought, in which case you got an instant dividend for your investment; but if thought was to end in nothing, your dividend was composed of worry only. However, even with these few people in the house, she could manage to keep herself fairly well occupied. The American cousins, too, a plain and elderly millionaire, very dyspeptic and intensely mournful, with his wife, who was young, voluble, and carried about with her pails, as it were, of gross and fulsome flattery, with which she industriously daubed everybody who was in the least worth daubing, would certainly want – especially in view of Thurso’s irritability – a little careful management. She almost wished she had not invited them, but she inherited from her mother that idea of American hospitality which makes all other hospitality appear niggardly in comparison, and did not consider she had done her duty by even the most undesirable cousins if she only asked them to dinner. “Cousins must be asked to stay, even if crossing-sweepers,” was the line on which she went. These particular cousins, she acknowledged to herself, were rather trying, but she acknowledged it to nobody else.

In spite of the desirability of arriving before your guests, Silas P. Morton and Theodosia, whom her husband always addressed in full as “Theodosia,” giving each syllable its due value, had arrived before them, and met them hospitably at the front-door.

“Why, if this doesn’t tickle me to death!” exclaimed Theodosia, “to receive you at your own house, Catherine! And how are you, Lord Thurso?”

Thurso stifled a wish that something would tickle Theodosia to death, and she proceeded.

“My! what a beautiful motor! Why, if it isn’t cunning! Silas and I got here just half an hour ago, and your servants brought us tea right away out on the lawn, and made us ever so much at home. But, as I’m for ever saying to everybody, ‘Catherine is just perfect, and everything she has is just perfect – her husband, her servants, her motor-car, and her crackers.’ You should have seen Silas tackle the crackers! Don’t I tell everybody so, Silas?”

When Theodosia was present there was never any fear of awkward silences – awkward speeches were the only possibilities; but she covered up every awkward speech so quickly with another that none of them mattered much. She was usually talking when somebody else was talking, and always when nobody else was.

“Don’t you tell everybody what, Theodosia?” inquired her husband.

“Why, that Catherine is just perfect. But Englishmen are so perfect, too, that I guess it’s right for perfect American girls to marry them. Why, your ball the other night! I thought I knew something about balls, but Catherine’s ahead of me there, though we’ve had some bright evenings in New York. I guess you’re proud of your wife, Lord Thurso, and I guess she’s proud of you.”

This was all very pleasant, and it was not only a salute-explosion of geniality on the part of Theodosia; she exploded all the time like a quick-firing gun. She was never sick or sorry, or tired or silent; she was always bright, and a contemplative mind might seriously wonder whether anything known to occur in this uncertain world would make her stop talking. She talked all the time that she was in a dentist’s chair, even though her speech was impeded by pads and gags and creosote; and she had once talked without intermission through a railway accident, not even stopping to scream. At intervals the voice of her husband said “Theodosia!” like a clock striking, but the ticking went on all the same.

“And if that isn’t the cunningest yew-hedge I ever saw,” she said, “with a door cut right through the middle of it as if it was a wall; and there’s the river just beyond with the boats, like people on the side-walk. Lord Thurso, can you see the river from where you are sitting? Silas, change places with Lord Thurso, because I want him to see the river through the door in the yew-hedge. My! look at that bug – what do you call it? Oh yes, butterfly – sitting right here on the arm of my chair! Isn’t it tame! The bugs in America aren’t half so tame as that: they hustle more; but I think it’s English not to hustle so much. You eat your tea without hustling, too, Lord Thurso. I call that the true British tranquillity, and I just adore it. Don’t I, Silas?”

Catherine, however, distinctly hustled over her tea, and got up. It was she who had asked Theodosia here, and she did not for a moment repent having done so; but she began to foresee that it would be necessary to provide Theodosia with relays of companions who should take her for a series of walks, and “rides” in the punt (as Theodosia would say), and other rides in motors, if she wanted to save her Saturday to Monday from utter shipwreck. She thanked Heaven Maud was coming, who handled loquacious people so serenely, and listened, or appeared to, to their impossible conversation with an interest that was quite marvellous. Clearly, also, it was by a direct dispensation of Providence that Alice Yardly was to be of this party, for Alice also asked for nothing more than to be allowed to talk without intermission. Theodosia talked of things she saw – the river, the road, the bug, the yew-hedge; her eyes supplied unfailing topics of conversation to her tongue. While Alice talked with the same incessantness of things you could not see – faith and healing, and false claims of mortal mind. Between them they would cover the whole ground. And both of them were perfectly happy sitting opposite anybody else who might talk simultaneously, as long as he asked no question which interrupted the flow of their volubility. Clearly, then, Providence intended that Alice and Theodosia should be paired, like blessed sirens, and keep up a perpetual flow of conversation to which nobody else need listen.

But at present Maud had not arrived, so she took Theodosia down to the river, and “punted her around,” as that lady’s phrase went. Catherine punted around, so she felt, as she had never punted before; she would have punted to Oxford, if necessary, to keep this appreciative lady away from the house till Maud or Alice Yardly arrived, either of whom were capable of tackling her. Protective instincts governed those unusual physical activities. She was responsible for the advent of Theodosia; she was therefore responsible for keeping Theodosia away from Thurso.

So it was not till seven had clanged from the church tower at Maidenhead that she turned the punt homewards, and found on arrival that everybody had come, and that everybody had gone to dress. She herself was a dresser of abnormal quickness, and found she had still nearly half an hour to spare after she had seen Theodosia safely to her room. So, instead of wasting it alone, she went to talk to Maud. The latter was betwixt and between, with a hovering maid, and a river of hair making Pactolus down her back. The highest geniality flowed on the other side.

“Dearest Catherine,” she said, “I know it was too awful of me, but, of course, you didn’t wait. Everything has been late to-day – at least, I have – and I was late for lunch, and things were amusing, and as I had told my maid to take my traps, and other people were going down to Taplow, I came down with them, and was dropped here. Isn’t the country looking too divine! Of course, Thurso came with you. We broke down – you never heard such a bang – and serve me right. Do stop and talk to me for five minutes, because I know you dress like summer lightning. How many maids surround you? Three, is it? What fun it was all last week! You do give your relations and connections a good time. Please wear your smartest to-night – jewels and all. It is so chic to be smart in the country and shabby in London. And it’s an old-established custom for you to smoke a cigarette while I am dressing, before it’s time for you to dress. There’s half an hour yet.”

Catherine lit a cigarette, and, catching Maud’s eye, nodded in the direction of her maid and spoke in French.

“Send her away for a few minutes,” she said.

Maud gave a giggle of laughter.

“What a bad language to choose,” she said, “because Hortense is French – aren’t you, Hortense? Will you go away, please, and come back when her ladyship goes away?”

Then Maud turned to her sister-in-law.

“Now, Catherine, what is it?” she asked.

“Well, first, do be very kind to me, Maud, and take Theodosia away on all possible occasions, so that she gets on Thurso’s nerves as little as may be.”

Maud brought a long plait of hair round her shoulder and held it in her mouth for a moment.

“Then I know what you want to talk about,” she said. “Theodosia first: I’m on; and afterwards?”

“Of course you know. Thurso’s nerves. He was fearfully jumpy all the way down. He made efforts, but you don’t have to make efforts if you are well, do you? He was rather rude, too, which is so unlike him. He is not rude when he is well. You told me he had bad attacks of neuralgia up in Scotland.”

“Yes, day after day,” said Maud.

She paused a moment, wondering whether she had better say that which was on the tip of her tongue. Then she decided to do so. After all, it was her brother’s wife to whom she was talking, and the matter was one that clearly concerned her. Even more than that, she was talking to Catherine, to whose wisdom, above that of, perhaps, all others, she felt it natural to confide perplexity or trouble.

“He had got to get through the day’s work,” she said, “and to enable him to do so, to get relief from this horrible pain, he took laudanum, which had been prescribed for him, rather freely. I allow that before the end I was more anxious about that than about his neuralgia. I think he ought to get the limits laid down by a doctor. It can’t be right for anybody to take that sort of drug absolutely at his own discretion.”

“Ah! but his headaches have ceased,” said Catherine. “He told me there had been no return of them since he came to town.”

“I am very glad,” said Maud, “because – well, it can’t be a good thing to get in the habit of taking that stuff, though while he was up in Scotland and the neuralgia was so bad he had to get relief somehow. But if his headaches have ceased, I suppose one need not be anxious any more.”

Catherine heard a certain hesitation in her voice, and saw the same in her face.

“You are not telling me quite all,” she said. “I think you had better. You are afraid of something more. If your fears are groundless, there is no harm done; if they have foundation, it is best for me to know. Of course I guess what it is.”

Maud put down her brush, and turned to her sister-in-law.

“Yes; I expect you guess quite correctly. It is this: He has begun to take it for its own sake – for the sake of its effects. Coming up in the train he thought I was asleep, and I saw him – yes, I spied on him if you like – I saw him go to his bag, take out the bottle, and have a dose. He had no headache; he was never better. He wanted the effects of it. It was a big dose, too – double the ordinary one, I should say. He did not measure it. I think he did the same thing up in Scotland.”

Catherine got up, and looked out of the window in silence for awhile.

“You did perfectly right to tell me, Maud. Thank you,” she said. “But it is hell – damnation, you know. What do you advise?”

“Get him to see a doctor.”

“He won’t. I suggested it to-day. And one doesn’t want to lose any time; the pace accelerates so quickly on that awful road. Poor Thurso! Of course it is desirable that I should appear to find out what you have told me for myself – find out, that is to say, that he is taking this drug.”

“You may say I told you, if necessary,” said Maud. “What are you going to do?”

“I can’t make any plan yet. I must see.”

Catherine left the room, and went down the passage to her own. Outside her husband’s dressing-room, next hers, was standing his valet, and a sudden thought occurred to her.

“Is his lordship dressed, do you know?” she asked.

“No, my lady. His lordship told me he would call me when he began,” said the man.

She went to the door, tapped, and entered.

“Flynn told me you were not dressing yet,” she said, “though both you and I will be late if we don’t begin.”

“I waited till I heard you come to your room,” he said. “What is it?”

“Only I am afraid you must take in Alice Yardly and have Theodosia next you. I am sorry: it is the upper and nether millstones. But we’ll change about to-morrow.”

Thurso was lying on his sofa, doing nothing, and with no book or paper near him; nor did he look as if he had been sleeping. His eyes were bright and alert. He looked radiantly happy and cheerful; it was not the same man who had frowned and started all the way down in the car.

“Why should we change about to-morrow?” he said. “I delight in Theodosia and I adore Alice. Her extraordinary silliness makes me feel wise in my own conceit, and conceited in my own wisdom. Is it really dressing-time? How tiresome! Don’t let us dine till nine to-morrow. It is absurd dining before in the summer. One oughtn’t to lose a minute of this heavenly twilight hour by doing anything in it.”

Catherine had walked to the open window by which his sofa was drawn up; and was observing him closely. He stretched himself with the luxuriousness of some basking animal as he spoke, and she saw he had a cigarette in each hand, both of which were burning.

“Is that a new plan?” she said, “smoking two cigarettes at once?”

“Yes, so far as I am concerned; but it’s not original. Don’t you remember the Pirate King in ‘Peter Pan’ smokes two – or was it three? – cigars together, because he is such an astounding swell? My God! what a play! It put the clock back thirty years. The moral is that you can’t have too much of a good thing. You should lay your pleasures on thick, not thin; butter your cake on both sides, and put jam on the top. I am awfully happy to-night. It was an excellent idea of yours to come down here. How wonderful the light is! how good everything smells!”

He was speaking with a sort of purr of sensuous enjoyment, though the words were clear and unblurred. She had seen him like this once before, when in the spring he had sought relief from an attack of pain with laudanum. She thought then that it was the mere cessation of it which caused that ecstasy; now she knew what it was, and her heart sank.

His long, lazy stretch turned him a little on the sofa, so that he faced her as she stood by the window, with the rosy evening light flooding her face.

“And, my God! how beautiful you are, Catherine!” he said. “You are made for worship and immortality. There never was a woman so wonderful as you.”

Catherine pulled herself together, called up her courage. Something must be done.

“Thurso, let us leave my charms for a moment,” she said. “Tell me, have you had any headache to-day? I hope not.”

“Headache! No. I’ve forgotten what headaches are like.”

“Then, why have you been taking that stuff – laudanum, opium, whatever it is? Oh, it’s so dangerous!”

“I – I haven’t. What do you mean?” he said, stumbling over the words.

She caught sight of a small medicine-glass on his washing-stand, and took it up and smelled it.

“Where is the use of saying that?” she asked, holding it out to him.

He got up quickly, ashamed for a moment of having lied to her, but more ashamed of his stupidity in not being more careful; but when she came in he was so uplifted and vivified by the drug that he had been off his guard. But his shame was infinitesimal compared to his anger with her. She had spoiled, smashed up all his happiness by her interference. Instead of that wonderful sense of well-being and complete physical and mental contentment, he felt now only furiously angry with her. What right had she to break in upon him like this, making him lie to her, which he hated, and making his lie instantly detected?

“And where is the use of your interfering like this?” he cried. “You have spoiled it all now: you have robbed me of it, and it was mine! It would serve you right if I took another dose now, straight away, and did not come down. You know nothing at all about it. I was an absolute martyr to that neuralgia up in Scotland, and I began – yes, I did begin – to get into the habit of taking this. But I am breaking myself of it; you didn’t know that. Till this evening I had not taken any for two days, and after that I was not going to take any more for three days, and after that not for four. You seem to think… I don’t know what you think.”

She felt at that moment more tenderly towards him than she had felt for years. His weakness – his voluble, incoherent weakness – his childish excuses, touched her. There was something almost woundingly pathetic, too, in his graduated resolves, as if a habit could be cured that way. His anger roused no resentment in her, and she spoke appealingly, full of pity.

“Oh, Thurso, you don’t know what a dangerous thing you are doing,” she said – “indeed, you don’t. The very fact that you do it makes you unable to see what you do. Be a man, and don’t think about two days, or three days, or four days, but stop it now at once. The longer it goes on, the more difficult it will be to break it. Give me the bottle, or whatever it is, like a good fellow, and let me throw it away. You will be glad you have done so every day of your life afterwards. Please, I entreat you.”

His anger died out as she spoke, for the effect of the drug was still on him, enhancing his enjoyment of the light and the country fragrance, and enhancing the glory of her superb beauty as she pleaded with him. She had not resented the angry things he had said to her: that was fine of her, and fine she always was, and she was not contemptuous of the lie he had babbled and stuttered over. She seemed not to remember it, and that was generous. Above all, his craving for the drug was satisfied for the moment, and, so he added somewhere very secretly, he could always get some more. Nor was his will yet entirely enslaved, and all his best self told him that she was right beyond any question or possibility of argument.