VII

“Miss Basden, just come and put a stop to all this, will you? Here is Mother, getting all into a state, with nobody thought of coming! I wish this dinner-party was at the bottom of the sea. Just see that she gets a breathing space, Miss Basden, will you?”

“Yes, I will, Mr. Merry. I have got fairly tidy myself betimes, on purpose to prevent such naughtiness,” said Miss Basden, who wore a remote expression, for which her toilet was responsible.

“Yes, Miss Basden, how we depend on you! And what a thing, all of this! All this fuss and change, and nobody coming who can do any good to the school! All this pretending that we do not live as we do, but in different rooms, and in a different way, as if the ordinary way did not make work enough! A second rate kind of thing, I call it, for all of us to be doing. And it isn’t as if Miss Herrick will not give us away, so that all of it is as good as nothing⁠—Ah, Miss Herrick! Ah, I did not see you, Miss Herrick. We were just saying how you would give us away, you know, and talk as you will to us, so that our guests would see through all our little changes. Ah, Miss Herrick, you and I both have our way of talking, haven’t we?”

“Yes, I am sure we have everything due to us. And it is so suitable for you not to like the second rate. But I am afraid the basement dining-room is that. I believe Mr. Bentley would think so. We ought to be going to the study, which is the drawing-room tonight. We have honestly left that as it is.”

Miss Basden hurried across the hall to open the door for Emily, and Mr. Merry followed as if too cast down to take this natural office upon himself.

“What a lovely family group!” said Emily, as the Fletchers came in. “An uncle and a nephew, and a brother and a sister and an aunt, and a husband and a wife, and I think some more, all in four people! I wish Nicholas and I were something to Mr. and Mrs. Merry and Miss Basden.”

“Ah, you are, Miss Herrick, you are,” said Mr. Merry.

“And am I to be left out? That is very lonely for me,” said Mr. Burgess.

“Yes, yes, Mr. Burgess,” said Mr. Merry. “Why, Mr. Bentley! How are you, Mr. Bentley? Why, how nice it is to have one of the fathers of our laddies here among us, like this!”

“Let us go up to the fire, Miss Bentley,” said Mrs. Merry, “and leave the men to talk about the newspapers in the cold.”

“Why, what a way for your wife to talk in your presence, Mr. Merry!” said Delia.

“I don’t suppose wives ought to talk at all in their husbands’ presence,” said Herrick.

“Civilized countries are so artificial,” said Emily. “But you should not speak true words in jest, Nicholas. It is not open of you.”

“Well, what about us single women, Miss Herrick?” said Miss Basden.

“Well, I don’t suppose we ought to talk at all. I expect we ought to be exposed at birth, or something like that.”

“How would it be known at birth which of us were going to be single?” said Delia.

“That is really clever of you,” said Emily. “Though people exposed at birth would be single, wouldn’t they?”

“Well, we were certainly classed by the state with paupers and idiots and children, before we had the vote,” said Miss Basden. “I mean we women were.”

“And no nice children, or paupers either, and no really sensible idiots, would talk in people’s presence,” said Bumpus.

“Do we go in to dinner now, and pair off like the ark?” said Emily. “I think that is so useful. How clever of you, Nicholas, to have told everybody to take in everybody else, without telling them anything! But then men are clever.”

“Do you really think, Miss Herrick,” said Francis, as the seats were taken, “that men are clever in such little ways, compared to ladies? I think many people would grant the ladies the palm.”

“I won’t answer for my sister, Fletcher,” said Herrick. “She will be leading you into danger. You would soon find yourself in her power.”

“I should never be anything but glad, Mr. Herrick,” said Francis, leaning forward, “to find myself in any lady’s power.”

“That is rather a rash statement,” said Mr. Burgess. “I haven’t lived so long as many of the people here, but I should hardly say that.”

“Ah, Mr. Burgess, so you have seen life, have you?” said Mr. Merry.

“I have seen life, Merry,” said Bumpus. “Do please believe me.”

“We won’t talk about that, Richard,” said Herrick.

“Nicholas is going to be a bright host!” said Emily. “Isn’t he wonderful?”

“How are your little fellows tonight, Miss Bentley?” said Mr. Merry. “They are growing, you know. We can’t stop that; and we don’t want to; but we have to keep an eye on them.”

“Francis, listen,” said Bumpus. “You are the only possible future parent in the room. Bentley’s boys are here.”

Mr. Merry faintly sighed, as if he had indeed been working merely from habit; and Mr. Bentley looked up, as though he could see no occasion for himself to speak.

“It must be so nice to have a houseful of boys,” said Miss Lydia. “Boys and men are my province. Now, your woman is a complex creature. I don’t seem to get any hold upon her. It is just meant to show us, that we are all meant for different parts of what has to be done.”

“I gather, Miss Basden, that I am not on what you would call the side of the chosen,” said Francis, with his careful laugh. “I plead guilty to disagreeing with you on the woman’s suffrage question.”

“I think that these changes in the divorce laws will do a great deal towards equalizing the position of women,” said Miss Basden, with terseness and rising colour.

“Miss Basden,” said Francis, after a startled pause, “I should think any man unworthy of the name, who did not feel the old laws a crying disgrace to a civilized country; as you are brave enough to face these subjects. But I confess I should sympathize with you, if you preferred to turn your eyes from them.”

“Well, I should not sympathize with myself. I don’t think that, because people are safe from the married dangers, they should turn their eyes from others who are not.”

“You will all have your patience tried, if you go on,” said Herrick.

“But I expect they would all keep it,” said Delia, implying that this was a grave necessity.

“I do not know that, Miss Bentley,” said Francis. “I am afraid I must confess that I yield rather easily to impatience.”

“Well, well, it is the same thing,” said Herrick. “The one is a condensed form of the other. Patience contains more impatience than anything else, as I judge.”

“You judge well,” said Bumpus.

“How profound you are, Nicholas!” said Emily. “I have always thought that. Though I have never known that I thought it. Think how it is with everything; how tolerance, for example, is only condensed intolerance, and how it holds more intolerance than anything else. It is just a case for intolerance to be kept in. And think how religion holds more dislike of religion than anything else!”

“Now, Uncle Peter, put them right,” said Francis.

“Well, well, I think myself,” said Mr. Fletcher, “that the old, simple views are the right ones; that patience is as far as can be from impatience, tolerance from intolerance, in a word, good from bad. I think we all think that.”

“Yes, I think we do,” said Delia, gravely.

“I do not think so,” said Emily. “I think that good is bad condensed. I think so, because my brother has told me so. I think a woman ought to think what the men of her family think. You think that too, do you not, Francis? It is right of me to think that good is bad condensed, and holds more bad than anything else, when my brother thinks so, isn’t it?”

“Ah! Miss Herrick,” said Francis, slowly shaking his head.

“Mother, you are not eating,” said Mr. Merry.

“Look, what is that?” said Herrick, hurriedly, pointing to a brooch which Miss Lydia wore. “A most curious thing! A most beautiful piece of old work! Let me see it. Be so very kind to me as to take it off, and pass it to me. Yes; a most exquisite thing of art, a possession for whoever owns it.”

“Oh, my brooch! Yes, I am very fond of my brooch. My dear brooch, that was given me by my sailor-man, who came back to me, so shy and awkward, dear, nice thing, to tell me that he had thought of me! Oh, I would not part with my brooch.”

“How beautiful it must be to have sailor-men and brooches, and not feel that one’s deathbed must be so remorseful!” said Emily.

“Ah, they are my children,” said Miss Lydia.

“You have no children, have you, Mr. Fletcher?” said Delia, smiling.

“Not living,” said Mr. Fletcher. “We have had two sons.”

Theresa gazed fiercely in front of her.

“Yes, there is not much good in rearing up children, when they are to be killed off one by one.”

“It is the valuable lives that must be used,” murmured Miss Lydia. “That is why they are so precious. Ah! how precious they were!”

Mr. Fletcher looked at his women simply with solicitude. He had no thought that strangers might not have the knowledge of them, that a lifetime had given himself.

“Mrs. Fletcher is very sensitive, is she not?” said Delia to Francis.

“Yes, yes, she is,” said Francis. “She is the most sensitive creature. My uncle has had great trouble with her; to save her all that she could be saved, I mean.” Francis hastened to contradict what might be read into his words. “It is a great responsibility to marry a good woman, and find that she is so wrought upon by things.”

“But she has been the very wife for him, I should think?” said Delia.

“Miss Bentley,” said Francis, leaning forward, “she has been an angel to him.”

“Rather a substantial angel,” said Theresa.

“If that quality, Aunt Theresa, is not possible in angels, I am afraid that we can none of us besides Uncle Peter claim to have anything angelic about us,” said Francis.

“Well, well, if we are as well as may be, as men and women, that is enough,” said Mr. Fletcher, implying that certain comparisons were not of a kind to be made.

“Uncle Peter,” said Francis, “I thank you for your rebuke. One is so prone to get into the way of using lightly words that are to be used in a different spirit. Any check on that is very wholesome, and to me, very welcome.”

“I should not have thought that so many perfect people would be allowed to live together in one house,” said Bumpus.

“Yes, we have been allowed to live together for a long time,” said Miss Lydia, her voice dwelling on the agency. “It has been a happy, happy time. But the end of all good things will come. We must look for it. It is that, that makes them so good. But we shall go on being happy. We have all so much work to do.”

“We shall go on being happy, too,” said Miss Basden. “We have plenty of work to do here as well.”

“Yes, you have, Miss Basden,” said Mr. Merry.

“Miss Basden, it is a thing to be so thankful for,” said Francis, his tone correcting possible regret and shame in Miss Basden, in earning her bread.

“Yes, yes, of course,” said Herrick. “We all feel that in this house, I am sure. Why, I work from early morning to late at night. And I never take a holiday. I can’t see what people want with holidays myself.”

“What do you say to that, Mr. Burgess?” said Mr. Merry.

“Well, I was expecting that, Mr. Merry. We have discussed that question, and understand each other now on it, I think.”

Mr. Burgess opened the door for the women.

“Mr. Burgess is a beautiful advertisement,” said Emily, as they reached the study. “He shows almost an arrogance. Fancy having that for boys!”

“He has his points,” said Miss Basden.

“You are a martyr, Miss Basden,” said Emily. “The worst of a beautiful advertisement is, that it does need that.”

“Let us talk quickly about servants,” said Mrs. Merry, smiling, “before the men come in.”

“It must be so dreadful to be a servant,” said Emily, “and do the important work of the world. That sort of work, so ill paid and degrading.”

“Well, well, it depends upon others. And women vary so, vary so,” said Miss Lydia.

“Well, I do not really think it would be such a bad life,” said Delia. “If I belonged to the working class, I would rather be a servant than many other things.”

“And yet you don’t think it is a bad life,” said Emily; “putting it like that! Fancy having to be of nice appearance; and quick and willing and trustworthy; and not wear spectacles waiting at table, as if one’s sight would alter then!” Emily put up her glass. “It must be very bad to be all that, or anything except the first. And I have never met people of that quality, except Peter and William. And they are neither of them quick. And I am not sure of Peter’s appearance.”

Theresa laughed.

“Well, now, Mr. Herrick, we have all been remiss in not asking you when your book is coming out,” said Francis, as the men came in. “A novel? Is that what they call it? But when is your book coming out, if I may put it in a safe way?”

“Oh, well, I believe very likely not at all. Perhaps I have come to your implied view of it,” said Herrick.

“Oh, well, I shouldn’t perhaps have put it in the way I did. And what does my view have to do with it? But I will confess that it did strike me as not a quite expected thing, that you should give your time to writing a book, that any lady might have written. I don’t mean that a lady could write your book. You won’t take me to mean what I don’t mean?”

“Mr. Fletcher, you are not blind, surely, to the fact that women often equal and surpass men in literary achievement?” said Miss Basden.

“Well, Miss Basden, I plead guilty to being old-fashioned in these matters. It is my inclination to put women on a plane of their own, and to regard them as coming down from it, when they take upon themselves the things that have been held fitter for men. And that perhaps leads to my implying that they do not do so well in those things. But I was meaning quite the opposite of disrespect to them, I assure you.”

“Oh, I see. There is the usual kind of contempt in that sentimental exaltation of women.”

“Miss Basden, believe me, it never has been so with me,” said Francis, earnestly.

“If Francis should marry Miss Basden,” said Emily to Theresa, “the school would go down just as Nicholas begins to need the comforts of old age. Unless he would live here with her.”

“He is good at living in other people’s houses,” said Theresa.

“I suppose living with him would embitter one,” said Emily.

“Suppose Merry should be embittered!” said Bumpus. “His personality would go to pieces.”

“Miss Basden apologizes for being a spinster rather more often than is necessary,” said Emily. “Of course I don’t mean it is not necessary, up to a point.”

“And his marrying her would put a stop to her being self-supporting,” said Bumpus. “That is what he does not like about her.”

“Where is my wife?” said Mr. Merry.

“She has run away and deserted us,” said Delia.

“She has gone up to sit for a few minutes in her room, I think, Mr. Merry,” said Miss Basden, stooping over the fire.

“Is she not well?” said Herrick, loudly. “Allow me, allow me, Miss Basden.”

“Yes, I think so, Mr. Herrick,” said Miss Basden. “She just wanted a few minutes to herself, as she does sometimes.”

“Not when she has guests!” said Herrick, still rather loudly.

“Hers is a solitary nature, I suppose,” said Miss Lydia, looking up.

“I think we owe this coffee to her,” said Masson, as a tray was brought in, followed by Mrs. Merry.

“William, what a charming first word of the evening for you to speak!” said Bumpus. “Giving someone her due.”

“We are very grateful to her for it,” said Miss Basden. “Coffee is a thing I never take on myself. I plead guilty to managing it much less well than Mrs. Merry.”

“I should like there to be no such thing as food, myself,” said Mrs. Merry, leaning back in her chair.

“Yes, Mother,” said Mr. Merry.

Francis looked at Mrs. Merry with long and almost inquiring sympathy.

“We must not ask our friends to dinner again, must we, Merry?” said Herrick in a low tone, breathing deeply.

“Oh, Mr. Herrick!” said Mr. Merry, leaning towards him. “Oh, you are not right, you know. Not if you take us up seriously, just when we are just feeling a little for you, in this little disturbance. No, no, not a disturbance, a pleasure for us all. Yes, yes, we all know.”

“I never can remember to eat, myself,” said Miss Basden, in a tone that addressed the company. “If I can remember, I always do, because I think one can do so much more, if one eats.”

“Ah, Miss Basden,” said Mr. Merry, his voice somehow dying away.

“Ah, the pleasures of our bodies!” said Miss Lydia, with the last word lower. “They are given to us as things that are right for us. If they are used rightly. If they are used rightly.”

“Charles, have you finished your coffee, dear?” said Mrs. Merry.

“Charles?” said Masson. “Oh, it is Merry’s Christian name.”

“How simple and kindly of him it seems to have one!” said Emily.

“A king’s name, too,” said Bumpus.

“Mrs. Merry, have you a name, apart from the maternal one by which we hear you designated?” said Mr. Burgess.

Mr. Merry’s eyes went to Mr. Burgess.

“Yes. My name is Emily,” said Mrs. Merry.

“My third name is Emily,” said Miss Basden. “What a lot of namesakes we are!”

“Yes, Miss Basden; very nice,” said Mr. Merry, his voice just avoiding a note of deprecation.

“And, Miss Basden, if I may ask, what are your other two names?” said Francis.

Miss Basden repeated two names; and there was a faint titter from one of the maids who were removing the coffee table.

“Mother,” said Mr. Merry, throwing a fierce glance from habit towards the titter, and rapidly withdrawing it; “what is it you were saying?”

“I hope Mrs. Merry will be quick, before Miss Basden has a fourth name,” said Bumpus. “Francis’ mind is working towards it. She did not say she stopped at three.”

“Oh, didn’t she imply it?” said Emily. “The kitchenmaid, who is second parlourmaid tonight, must find it too much.”

“Isn’t it too much?” said Theresa.

“How good we all are at talking without ever saying anything we think!” said Bumpus.

“It is not always politic to say what we think,” said Miss Basden.

“It is not so easy,” said Masson.

“Sometimes I suppose it is right to say it, whether or no we like it, and whether or no it is liked,” said Delia.

“Yes, yes; the thing to be done,” said Miss Lydia, sighing.

“Oh, just possibly. Once or twice in a lifetime,” said Mr. Bentley to his daughter.

“Nearer once than twice,” said Bumpus.

“Oh, everyone is not a man,” said Theresa.

“No, that would be a queer state of things,” said Miss Basden.

“Yes,” said Bumpus. “Suppose there had to be two under masters instead of you and Burgess!”

“Oh, Mr. Bumpus!” said Miss Basden.

“Well, would two under mistresses do instead of the two of us?” said Mr. Burgess, not feeling self-suppression a duty in this case. “Or is prejudice the one thing regarded in this school?”

“No, no, Mr. Burgess. Come, you know it is not,” said Mr. Merry. “You are the only sop to it. I mean⁠ ⁠… what I meant was, Mr. Burgess, that if it didn’t matter about having a man on the staff, we should still have been glad to have you, you know. That is what I meant, Mr. Burgess.”

“I meant that, too,” said Bumpus.

“Oh, well, Mr. Merry, you are very kind. But it doesn’t sound as if you would have been much good to me, much compensation to me, in the event of my not being a man.”

Mr. Burgess noted Miss Basden’s expression, and relapsed into peace.

“I should think you are all great readers, Fletcher,” said Herrick. “Miss Fletcher, now, are you not a great person for books?”

“Oh, my books! Yes, I am very fond of my books,” said Miss Lydia. “My dear books, that live in my special case! I love them very much. I am always excited when I have a new companion for them. Yes, I am a great person for my books.”

“Have you a particular kind?” said Herrick.

“Yes,” said Miss Lydia, raising her eyes without lifting her head. “History! Nearly all my books are historical; or if not, biographical. I should think I have not read a novel for thirty years.”

“What books do you read most, Mr. Fletcher?” said Delia, to Francis.

“Miss Bentley, the book I read the most, is, I am thankful to say, the Old Book. My life is largely made up of what must be called the sordid things of the world. But I have the one great privilege.”

“Yes, yes, we can all do with that book. A very good book!” said Herrick.

“Miss Basden, what do you read?” said Emily. “Only the Bible or not?”

“Well, I read a good deal of French, Miss Herrick. I do not know how it is, but I always enjoy books so much more, when they are in French. I feel so much more at home in the language, somehow. Now I very seldom read an English book.”

“How wonderful and educational for the boys of you! But what kind of books do you read?”

“Oh, all kinds. I really do not mind, as long as they are French. Or if not French, Italian or German. What I do not like to read, is an English book.”

“Well, Miss Basden, we can very few of us say that,” said Francis.

“I believe I really read the Bible the most, too,” said Delia.

“It is a good thing we did not all live in the time when the Bibles were chained up in the churches,” said Bumpus. “It would have been so lonely.”

“Well, but it is a good thing to read the Bible,” said Francis.

“Of course it is the most beautiful book,” said Emily. “And now we are modern, and only read about wickedness, it is so nice to have it unchained, isn’t it? It really ought to be chained, I think.”

“Ah, you try to get at us, Miss Herrick,” said Francis, not quite checking a laugh.

“Ah, there is much warning in it for us,” said Miss Lydia.

“In all great pictures,” said Francis, firmly pulling himself together, and finding the effort inspiring; “we are shown the dreadful as well as the beautiful. We are surely not given only one side of the lesson.”

“I am one of the greatest readers alive,” said Herrick. “I have read all European modern literature, the enormous bulk of it. And I have read as much medieval literature as any man living. And I know my Greek and Latin. They were taught us well when I was a boy.”

“But you need not imply how they are taught now,” said Bumpus.

“What do you read, Mr. Masson?” said Mrs. Merry.

“Very little off my own line, Mrs. Merry. Miss Austen is the novelist I read the most.”

“What do you think of her books, Mr. Fletcher?” said Delia to Francis.

“I am afraid, Miss Bentley, that I have very little use for books written by ladies for ladies, if I may so express myself; though I dare say I should be the better for them.”

“Oh, no, you would not. You could not be,” said Bumpus.

“It is the other way round,” said Masson.

“Personally, I can’t get over the littleness in her books,” said Miss Basden.

“Ah, we are not small enough, not small enough,” said Miss Lydia.

“The best goods are done up in a certain way,” said Mr. Fletcher, smiling.

“It is my great regret that Jane Austen died so young,” said Masson.

“And one used to think that forty odd was not so young after all,” said Herrick.

“I never think about my age,” said Miss Basden.

“Ah, but we are in progress,” breathed Miss Lydia, “simply in progress.”

“To what may be big enough in the end for us,” said Theresa.

“One is really a hero for not committing suicide, I suppose,” said Mr. Burgess.

“Now, Mr. Burgess, none of that sort of talk with the boys,” said Mr. Merry.

“Oh, I very seldom talk to the boys, Mr. Merry.”

“I hope no one has seen me talking to my undergraduates,” said Bumpus.

“No one has. Don’t boast, Dickie,” said Emily.

“We must be going,” said Theresa.

“So must we,” said Delia. “We ought to be quite ashamed of staying so long, oughtn’t we, Father?”

“It has been too great a pleasure for us to feel compunction about seeming to appreciate it,” said Mr. Bentley, his voice falling with an unfamiliar sound.

“Thank you for coming and bearing it all,” said Emily. “It has been a great thing for us to have such glimpses of family life. My brother and I are orphans, you know.”

“And I am half an orphan,” said Mr. Burgess. “So it is very suitable all round.”

“Now, look here, Mr. Burgess,” said Mr. Merry, in a low tone, “there is no need for you to be standing about, saying goodbye to everyone, you know. Now suppose you go off somewhere to have a smoke, you know.”

“Goodbye, Mr. Fletcher.” Mr. Merry took upon himself the duties of host. “No more prizes yet for you to give away. The lads like to work for their rewards, bless them. And Mr. Bentley. Ah, the two boys! I won’t tell you now what we think of them, because that must be kept for a day when we have had less pleasure.”

Mr. Merry returned to the sitting-room, rubbing his hands, and looking about him with much fondness, as if using up the residue of the feelings gathered for his guests.

“Well, we shall start off work tomorrow with quite a spurt,” said Miss Basden.

“Yes, Miss Basden,” said Mr. Merry. “Not that you are in much need of that.”

“Well, but it is an opportunity for you to get a hit at me, Mr. Merry,” said Mr. Burgess, strolling back into the room.

“Oh, Mr. Burgess! Get a hit at you! Why, you try to misunderstand me, unless you like to be treated as if you were seventy. Good night, Miss Herrick. And Mr. Herrick. Yes, Mr. Burgess. Are you coming up with us? Such a pleasure to us all. Not at all a trouble. I mean, what a pleasure in proportion to the little arranging, you know.”

Mr. Merry hastened after his wife, as if fearing to break his impression.

“Well, I have not much to boast of,” said Herrick, sitting down by the fire. “Seventy years old, and nothing before me, and nothing behind to count! Why, I could almost envy Merry, for being only fifty, and wanting nothing more than he has.”

“You should not talk about ‘almost envying’ Mr. Merry, as if he belonged to people like that,” said Emily. “And I don’t know about his not wanting more than he has. I don’t think he wants that much. And fifty isn’t such a good age as all that. And not much to boast of! With seventy years of safe life behind you, when most people have the risk of having so much less! And all the life in front of you, that people of seventy always have!”

“Yes, yes, Emily. I dare say I shall have a time yet. Time to do something in. It sometimes happens that the end of a man’s life sums him up. There is no great wrong about being an exception. Exceptions are more worthy of interest in a way. I don’t think I have ever been quite on the ordinary line.”

“No, I am sure you have not. It would have been dreadful of you.”