The Confessions of a Well-Meaning Woman/Chapter 4

by Stephen McKenna

IV

LADY ANN SPENWORTH IS CONTENT WITH A LITTLE MUSIC

LADY ANN (to a friend of proved discretion): I am easily satisfied, I ask for nothing better than a little music after dinner. If only the rising generation were rather less self-conscious. . . When I was a girl, it was a law of the Medes and Persians that, if any one asked us to play or sing, we at once complied. None of this modern absurdity of not playing in public, insisting on the hush of the grave, looking round the room first to see if by chance there is some great maestro present. . . When I tell you that I once sang before Jenny Lind, being too young and ignorant to know who she was. . . And no one could have been sweeter. . .

I am not a musician in any sense of the word. (I am almost tempted to add: “Thank goodness!”) When one sees and hears the devotees at Covent Garden, talking a language of their own which I am quite sure half of them don’t understand, ready to set one right in a moment if one presumes to offer an opinion. . . If any one said to me: “I want to be a social success and I don’t know how to begin,” I should answer: “Learn the musical jargon and use it rudely, especially to people who for one reason or another have not had to fight their way into any little niche that they may occupy.” I won’t mention names. . . But I see you have guessed ! And do you not agree? That man, for all his millions, would be received nowhere but for his alleged love of music; but take a double box at the opera, go every night, allow yourself to be seen at all the concerts, give immense parties of your own, support and bring out three new geniuses a month—everything is forgiven you!

I did not know him before the war . . . when, by the way, I understand he passed by the name of Sir Adolf Erckmann. One saw, indeed, his not very prepossessing beard and bald head protruding from his box—a red, anxious face and single eye-glass, positively scattering bows right and left at the people he had succeeded in getting to know in his upward progress. Originally, I believe, a German-Jewish banker, with immense interests of all kinds in every part of the world and a very unsavoury domestic reputation. He was nothing to me, nor I to him; and it would have been no true kindness for me to “take him up,” as Connie Maitland was always urging me to do. No doubt we should have been surfeited with invitations to Westbourne Terrace and Rock Hill; but we are not yet reduced to scouring London for free meals, like some people we could think of, and, without being cynical, I always felt that the Erckmanns would try to use us as a means of getting to know Spenworth and Brackenbury so that in time their triumphal progress might carry them to Cheniston and the Hall. If I could have done any good, it would have been a different matter; but you remember the Erckmanns were a test-case before the war, in the days when the energy of Christine Malleson and my Lady Maitland and the rest had broken down so many barriers which hitherto had been at least a convenience. Not only Spenworth and Brackenbury, but a dozen more as good as said that they could not continue to know me if I consented to know Erckmann. . .

When the war came, things materially altered. The Erckmanns vanished—in every sense of the word. The old friends, who had plagued me to receive him, now denied with cursing and swearing, as it were, saying: “I know not the man.” One or two of the radical papers made a bitter personal attack on him because harmless German hair-dressers and waiters were being interned while this wealthy international financier, who was in a position to collect information and influence opinion, was left at large, thanks to highly-placed friends and a title. They said that some of the Cabinet were absolutely dependent on him. . . Though I saw nothing of the man, I could not help hearing of him, for the mob broke his windows in Westbourne Terrace whenever there was an air-raid; they said he was shewing lights to guide the Zeppelins to Paddington. Whether there was a word of truth in it I can’t say. . . And, when he erected an enormous hospital at Rock Hill, even this was not accounted to him for righteousness: the men there held him to ransom, his own patients. Some one would whisper that he had a secret wireless apparatus on his roof; and immediately Sir Adolf would build another ward or a recreation-room or a picture theatre. . .

And in another sense they disappeared: as Will said, “Plant an Erckmann in England, and up comes an Erskine.” Poor souls, if they had changed their names before the war and if some one could have performed an operation to rid Sir Adolphus of that appalling guttural accent. . . I really began to feel sorry for them when all their friends—led, if you please, by my Lady Maitland—turned the cold shoulder. “Satisfy me,” I said to Arthur, “that he is a truly loyal subject, and I should like to see if I could not shew him a little kindness.”

“He’s a noxious creature,” said Arthur with his usual intolerance, “but all these stories of spying and of blackmailing ministers are sheer flumdiddle. It isn’t worth his while. Whoever wins, Erskine will make money. He’s technically loyal; but he’s a man without patriotism, because the whole world is his country. For the Lord’s sake, don’t throw your mantle over him; as long as there are national distinctions, I object to the way these international Jew financiers settle in England for their own convenience.”

“I am not,” I said, “concerned with that. You may be right. Perhaps we should all of us have done better to hold aloof and offer him no welcome at the outset. But, do you know, I feel a certain responsibility? Having been received here, having poured money like water into the pockets of his so-called friends, will he not form a low view of our sincerity and goodwill if every one abandons him at a time like this? I am disinterested: we have accepted nothing from him, we can look to him for nothing; but there is a reproach which I feel it my duty to remove.”

I could not make Arthur see that people like Connie Maitland, liée with the poor man one moment and throwing him to the wolves the next. . . We are not all of us like that in England.

“Well, for Heaven’s sake, don’t ask him when I’m here,” was the utmost encouragement I got from my husband.

Truly honestly, I think this stubborn oppoition drove me perhaps farther than I had first intended to go. A day or two later I found myself in the same house as Sir Adolphus and I spoke to him. . .

“You,” I said, “do not know me; and I only know you by sight, though I have long been acquainted with your record of generous support to the cause of music. Will you allow a total stranger to tell you her disgust with the venomous attacks which have been made on you since the beginning of the war?”

Little enough, you may think; but I believe those were the first kind words that he had heard for three or four years. The man is not prepossessing, but we formed quite a friendship. . .

“Will not you and Lady Erskine,” I said, “come and dine with me some night? I am not in a position to entertain in any sense of the word; my boy is at the front, my husband is away on business; but perhaps, if a family party would not bore you. . .”

Though I called myself a total stranger, he knew very well who I was; indeed he told me that he had always wanted to meet Brackenbury and Spenworth (the Cheniston Romneys were, of course, his excuse). . . We arranged a night . . . though, when the time came, there was not more than the three of us. My relations with Spenworth are not so cordial that I derive the least pleasure from seeing him at my table; and one truly honestly never knows how he is going to behave. Brackenbury. . . If you do not want to accept an invitation, it is surely possible to decline it civilly. . .

“That fellow!,” cried Brackenbury. “He ought to be interned.”

“You really must not talk such nonsense,” I said. “He is as loyal as you are.”

“I wouldn’t touch him with a pole before the war,” said Brackenbury with his wonted elegance. “But now, when even his best friends refuse to meet him—”

“Exactly,” I interrupted. “You would like him to feel that that is our standard of sincerity and good-will.”

“But how is it your concern?,” he asked. “You’ve kept clear of that gang in the past, so why dirty your hands with it now? If you fancy you’re going to get money out of him, or a job for Will, I warn you that you’re no match for him. He’ll use you readily enough, but he never does anything for anybody without looking for a return. We don’t want these gentry in England.”

“I met him,” I answered. “I liked him, I was sorry for him. And, if I try to shew him a little kindness, I really cannot allow you, Brackenbury, to make yourself a ruler and a judge. Do I gather that you and Ruth would prefer not to dine?”

“If it’s money you want, I’d almost pay you not to meet him. That’s how I feel about it.”

All this, you understand, about a man he hardly knew by sight! . . . I found it in my heart to wish that Brackenbury had been present when the Erskines dined. Nothing could have been more charming. He talked too wonderfully about music; I asked him a little about himself, he asked me about myself—that delightful first exchange when you are laying the foundations of friendship. Having no children himself, he was of course most anxious to hear about Will—what he had done before the war, where he was in France at present, what he proposed to do when the war was over. . . As he had introduced the subject, I told him frankly that I found great difficulty in making up my mind and should be truly grateful if he would tell me, from his very wide experience, what he considered most hopeful. He promised to let me know; and, a few days later, when I was dining with him, he asked whether I expected Will home any time soon on leave, as he always had a certain number of openings in his own various businesses. This from the man who never did anything for anybody unless he expected a rich return, the man who used people but never allowed any one to use him. . . I had asked for nothing; in my haste I had told Arthur that we could look to him for nothing. And if you knew the long agony of anxiety that I have endured. . . I may say, ever since we took Will away from Eton. I have seen my darling home in Mount Street threatened. . . The war was a god-send: something to keep him occupied, a little pocket-money; and, so long as he was not in danger, I prayed for it to go on. . .

“My dear Sir Adolphus,” I said, “the first time he comes home you shall meet him.”

That was in October. Suddenly, lo and behold! the armistice was upon us, and the whole world was looking out for jobs. I laboured and strove to bring Will home; and, the moment he arrived, I invited Sir Adolphus to dine. He telegraphed that he was at Rock Hill, but could we not spend a few days with him there? My maid was out. I began to pack with trembling fingers. . .

Is it not curious that difficulties always seem to come from the least expected quarter? Here was Will’s whole future secured; he had woken up, as it were, with a golden spoon in his mouth. My dear, I had the utmost difficulty in persuading him to come at all. What he wanted was a holiday, he said; after all he had gone through, he was entitled to a good time. And, though he had never met the Erskines, he had formed an unreasoning prejudice against them which was incomprehensible in any one of his breadth of mind. . . I do assure you that we reached a deadlock.

“Will,” I said very firmly, “I ask you to come.”

“And I refuse point-blank,” he answered.

“You will be sorry for it later,” I warned him, “when the opportunity has slipped beyond recall.”

“Something will turn up,” he predicted. Then, perhaps, he saw how his refusal was paining me, for he added: “I’ve fixed up with some fellows weeks ago that we’d all meet and see life.” . . .

I had already begun a letter to Lady Erskine, asking if we might postpone our visit for a day or two, when Will came in—very much upset—to say that his friends had broken faith with him; one had already gone to the country, the other two were busy presenting letters of introduction and arranging interviews. . . As if I had not known all along that, the moment war was over, the whole world would begin looking for jobs. . .

“Now,” I said, “you can have no objection to accepting the Erskines’ invitation.”

“Barring that I don’t want to go,” Will rejoined. “I draw the line at Jews at all times and I don’t in the least want to start work till I’ve had a holiday.”

“But others are already in the field,” I urged. Lady Maitland shewed the sublime assurance to reestablish communications and to ask Sir Adolphus, in the name of their old friendship, to find an opening for her second boy! “You can have all the holidays you want later.”

To my delight I saw Will weakening.

“What’s the management like?,” he asked.

“Oh, my dear, everything is incredibly perfect. The house, the food, the music—”

“You may ’ave the music—fer me,” said Will. (It was some allusion which I did not understand.) “Oh, all right! I’ll come. But I intend to have my fun out of it.”

You have stayed at Rock Hill? No? Well, I am not exaggerating when I use the word “perfection.” A seventeenth-century Italian palace with gardens that put Cheniston and my brother-in-law Spenworth to shame; pictures that one somehow always thought were in the National Gallery. . . And, if you care for material comfort, as—I am not ashamed to say—I do, not having enjoyed enough of it to become blasée. . . “If you cannot be rich yourself, know plenty of rich people,” as Will said the first night. . . In jest, of course. . .

If I wanted to make a criticism, I should say that Lady Erskine might have chosen her party on less catholic lines. As patron of the arts, Sir Adolphus is of course brought into contact with an entire world of artists, musicians, actors and the like which is outside my ken. He confessed that he liked “mixing people up” and trying to break down the very rigid barriers which separate the artistic people from the rest of us. I have not the slightest objection to that on principle, but, when it necessitates meeting a number of half-naked young actresses who truly honestly have no place in the artistic or any other world. . . And when they are allowed to set the tone of the house. . .

I reminded myself that, with the exception of Brackenbury Hall, I had not stayed in a country-house for I don’t know how long. Nothing, I determined, should surprise me; in Rome. . . And so forth and so on. We arrived in time for dinner, and almost the first thing I knew was that Sir Adolphus was pressing upon me something which I think he called a “Maiden’s Sigh”, which of course I imagined was the well-known hock of that name. Why hock before dinner? Sherry, if you like. . . But I had determined that nothing should surprise me. I drank it—what it contained, I do not know, but it was cold and, I suppose, very strong, for it went straight to my head! I could drink nothing at dinner until I had consumed an entire tumbler of cold water. Indeed, I hardly knew what I was saying, but Sir Adolphus was talking so interestingly about Rossini that I only wanted to listen. . . Later, when I had proved myself a good listener, it would be my turn to talk about Will. . .

Now, you dine out very much more than I do. On those rare occasions when you meet somebody who can talk, is it not heart-breaking to have the conversation interrupted before you have half finished it? In the old days, when one turned like an automaton to one’s other-hand neighbour half-way through dinner, it was sufficiently exasperating; but one did hope that, if one had not wearied one’s companion too unwarrantably, he would come up in the drawing-room and resume what he had been saying. Nowadays dinner is little more than a bribe offered to so many women and men to induce them to play bridge with you rather than with some one else. The tables were already set, when we left the dining-room; Lady Erskine’s last words were: “You won’t be long, will you?”

I do not play. Even in old days I never mastered whist. And I hope you will not cry “Sour grapes”, if I say that I do not wish to learn. I ask nothing better than a little music after dinner. If not too modern, it does not interfere with conversation, whereas the sight of a card-table freezes the most eloquent lips. . .

“What about a rubber before the others come up?,” asked one of these young actresses. I had not caught her name and perhaps I am doing her a grave injustice; but, if I had not Lady Erskine’s implied guarantee, I should have considered her. . . Well, let me say I should have been very much surprised at being asked to meet her. . .

“I am afraid you must not count on me,” I said.

The young woman reckoned up the numbers present and asked:

“What about poker, then?”

Here, I am thankful to say. Lady Erskine came to my rescue, and we contrived to exist with nothing more exciting than conversation until the men joined us. Then, I think, something must have been whispered to Sir Adolphus, for he said:

“I don’t think we’ll have any cards to-night; they’re so unsociable.”

Now, I wanted, above all things, to draw Will and Sir Adolphus together and allow them to become better acquainted. And Sir Adolphus, I knew, wished to talk to me, for he had begun to ask at dinner whether I thought it would interest Spenworth to see his pictures. I therefore suggested that, if I might express a wish, it would be for a little music. Sir Adolphus assented at once and asked one of these rather ambiguous young women to play, while I made room for him on the sofa and beckoned to Will. The Maitland boy—it was not very tactful of the Erskines—had been invited for the same week-end, but he was mooning about like a lost soul, looking at the pictures and talking to Lady Erskine. . .

“You asked me,” I began, “to contrive a meeting—”

“Won’t you wait until this is over?,” suggested Sir Adolphus, with a nod towards the piano.

“I don’t mind it,” I said. “Now, Will has been away at the war since the beginning of 1916. . .” I won’t weary you, but I gave him a little account of my boy’s work on the staff, what were his tastes and ambitions . . . and so on and so forth. I really don’t know what this girl had begun to play, but she must have changed suddenly, for the noise became deafening. . . “I really can’t talk against that,” I protested.

Sir Adolphus went to the piano and whispered something, but the noise only increased.

“And she can’t play against your talking,” shouted Will. “That’s Elsie Creyne, in case you don’t know, and I’ll bet she doesn’t much care about people talking when she’s playing. I’ve been watching her to see what would happen.”

“Then I think, in ordinary kindness, you might have warned me,” I said. “I have no wish to hurt the young woman’s feelings.”

“I thought it might be rather a rag,” was all Will would say. “I’m rather bored with this place. I kept going at dinner because there was plenty of champagne; nbt, if somebody doesn’t do something, I shall have to brighten things up by pulling old Herr von Erckmann’s leg. He had the cheek to criticize the staff at the end of dinner; I switched the conversation on to repatriation of aliens, but I haven’t done with him yet.”

It is this boyish irresponsibility that may be Will’s undoing! Mere high spirits. . . Before I could utter a word of warning, the music had changed again, every one was dancing and Will had jumped up to join them. I looked on—and marvelled; I had not seen any of these modern dances. And, when I could bear it no longer, I turned my back and began reading a paper. . .

That did in time have an effect; or perhaps they merely tired of their revels. But truly honestly, if I had not made a protest, no one would. Nothing was said, but there was what I can only call an atmosphere of guilt. Then Sir Adolphus discovered that dancing, too, was “unsociable” and enquired whether there was not something that we could all do. . .

Goodness me, are we so bankrupt in intelligence that we need to be given childish games to help us kill time? Has conversation died out in England? And you will remember that I was being invited to meet “artists” of every shape and size, who are never so happy as when they are sneering at the uncultured Philistines. These “artists”, apparently, unless you encouraged them to dance or gave them rattles, would have sat down and cried. The others—including, I am sorry to say, Will, who was quite carried away by them—walked about saying very loudly “What I want is a drink.” . . .

And I had not had a word alone with Sir Adolphus. . .

“What about Consequences?,” asked some one.

We live and learn, as they say. I have discovered from my experience that week-end that a certain class cannot make a suggestion or ask a question without introducing it with the words “What about.” . . . They put me on my guard now; I feel, when I hear them, that I know where I am. . . But can you imagine a greater confession of failure than to propose such a game to fifteen or twenty grown men and women, all—presumably—in possession of their faculties?

“What about Characters?,” asked some one else. “That knocks spots off Consequences.”

I give you their argot in all its native elegance. You surely would not have me paint the lily. . .

Before one had time to enquire or protest, one had been set at a table and furnished with a pencil while the rules were explained. A list of qualities, characteristics, whatever you like to call them, was written down; a name was chosen, and we had each of us to award marks. Thus: you might choose the Prime Minister and set out your qualities—statesmanship, force, honesty, courage, eloquence, amiability, good looks, personal charm and so on and so forth; each of us had ten marks for each quality, and, if you liked, you might give two for statesmanship and four for eloquence and ten for courage; then, when we had all expressed our opinion—it was in secret, and no one saw what marks any one else was allotting—the totals were added and read out. That was the man’s “character.” . . .

An absurd game! But, as they were too unintelligent to talk and too disobliging to play or sing. . . Will was writing down the questions, and there seems no limit to the number that may be asked.

“And what is to be the first name?” I enquired.

“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” he said. “You must take the whole lot in turn. Begin with me, if you like.”

Then indeed I had to make a protest. I had never imagined that we were to play with the names of the people actually in the room at that moment! More execrable taste. . . I was only thankful that Will had not proposed so detestable a game and was sorry to see him taking such a lead in it. Personalities of all kinds I abominate; there is a new school of humour which fancies that it has been very clever when people of better breeding would only say that it had been unpardonably rude. Spenworth? Exactly! You could not have chosen a better example. And games of this kind always end in one way. . .

“Surely,” I pleaded, “we need not run the risk of hurting any one’s feelings. If you take people who are known to us all by reputation. . .”

“Oh, it’s much more fun this way,” I was assured by Will. “And there’s no need for any one to be offended; all the questions are about good qualities—charm and eloquence and so forth. If you think I have no charm, shove down a nought; that’s much better than having ‘Bad temper’ and being given ten marks for it by everybody. I’ll start, anyway, to give you all confidence.”

I ought to have resisted more strongly, but I could not let them feel that I was what Will calls a “wet blanket” to everything they proposed. Already they had abandoned cards and interrupted their dancing out of deference to me. . . We began to play, and I confess that I found the game mercilessly tiresome. Imagine! A list of thirty or forty questions, which you had to answer fourteen or fifteen times over! Then a pause, while the papers were collected and the marks added; then the totals and a great deal of discussion and laughter and sometimes rather ill-natured facetiousness. And then the whole thing over again!

It would have been wearisome enough if they had played conscientiously; but, when the game was treated as a joke or a means of being malicious in secret, it was sheer waste of time. When my turn came, I was let off with quite a good character; but I am not vain enough to attribute this to anything more than luck or carelessness. I was not one of the intimates; they were in a hurry to put down any marks anywhere and move on to their next victim. At the same time I found it exceedingly unpleasant when the totals were read out—or, let me say, it would have been unpleasant if the whole game had not been so ridiculous. A hundred and fifty marks was the maximum; and, when “Love of Music” was given, I found that I had been accorded—twenty! I, who had been clamouring for music when every one else wanted to gamble or indulge in negro dances. . . And I have no doubt that I am indebted for the princely total of twenty to the chivalry of my host and hostess, who could not very well criticize a guest—at least on that score. . . Will? You think that Will came to my support? I do not know what had overtaken him that night; his surroundings reacted on him until he was unrecognizable. When we reached “Sense of Humour”, he called out:

“Oh, I say, here’s a lark! ‘Sense of Humour; grand total, nought.’ ”

All I can say is, I was glad to have enough humour to see the absurdity and to join in the general laugh. But I was furious with Will. . .

You might have thought that, after I had been pilloried and held up to the scorn of young women whom I would not allow to enter my back-door, artists or no artists, I might have been suffered to go to bed. But no! That would upset the totals! I must stay to the bitter end, though my head was aching with fatigue and I could see that the game was growing more and more ill-natured. . .

I heaved a sigh when we reached Sir Adolf, for his name completed the circle. I don’t know whether the others were even trying to give an honest opinion, but I did my best according to my lights. “Good looks”? I really think he would be the first to admit that he is not prepossessing. “Moral character”? I’m not a scandal-monger, I hope, but he has been twice divorced. “Loyalty”? I gave him full marks for that; otherwise I should not have been staying in his house. “Hospitality”? He meant well, but a guest has certain moral claims ; I could only give him two for hospitality. “Love of Music”? Five for that, so far as I remember. “Sense of Humour”? Nought! I couldn’t give him any marks for humour. “Amiability”? . . . But I cannot recall the questions; there were nearly forty of them.

I sighed again when Will collected the papers and added the totals. Then came the reading. My dear, I had been led to suppose that what we had written was all in secret, but I felt that Sir Adolphus was guessing how we had marked him. “Good looks”? He received nothing for that, not a single mark from the fifteen of us who were eating his food and drinking his wine. “Amiability”? About twenty, obviously given him by his wife and the Maitland boy, who was very busy ingratiating himself; or perhaps by one of those ambiguous young women who seemed to be on terms of such extraordinary freedom with him. . . “Humour”? Four or five. “Honesty”? Not more than fifteen or twenty. It was too terrible! He tried to laugh it off; but, when he got no marks, we were all exposed, and I saw him glaring at one after another. And there was one question—“Personal Charm”, I think—when Will read out “Minus ten.” . . .

I knew it would happen. There always is some kind of unpleasantness when you begin playing with personalities and taking risks with other people’s feelings. I don’t think I have ever spent a more distressing quarter of an hour. Oh, I was thankful when he said:

“Well, so that’s what you all think of me, hein? We-ell, what about a drink, what?”

I felt—we all felt—that he was really taking it in very good part. . . The men trooped off to a side-table. I made my way to Will in the hope of whispering just a word. . . He had rather taken the lead in this ridiculous game, and I wished him to be extra sweet to the Erskines for the rest of our visit. . .

“Well, I call it rather a frost,” I heard him say, as I drew near. “I’d back ‘Characters’ to break up any house-party in England, but everybody’s taken it lying down to-night. . .”

I was distressed, for I really thought we had narrowly escaped some great unpleasantness. And then I found that we had not escaped it after all. Sir Adolphus came up to see that the others were looking after me properly and asked if he might have back the pencil that he had lent me. I surrendered it, he looked at it, pocketed it—and passed on. The others surrendered theirs, he looked at them. . . Then he came to Will. . .

“I was just wondering,” I heard him say.

“Wondering what?,” asked Will.

“Who gave me minus ten for—‘Personal Charm’, wasn’t it? And nought for ‘Loyalty’, nought for ‘Honesty’, nought even for ‘Hospitality’ . . . Just wondering.”

“It’s a secret ballot,” said Will.

“Some one gave me nought for everything except ‘Personal Charm’, and there I received minus ten. . . I was wondering who it was.”

“D’you suggest I did it?,” asked Will.

“Oh, I respect the secrecy of the ballot,” answered Sir Adolf. “But I noticed that you were using an indelible-ink pencil and I was clumsy enough to spill some soda-water over some of the papers, including the only one written with an indelible-ink pencil. . . But it is all a game, is it not?”

I have never felt so uncomfortable. Sir Adolphus said nothing more; he and Lady Erskine were too sweet for the rest of the time we were at Rock Hill. But I felt—perhaps quite wrongly—that I could not place myself under an obligation to him, I could not invite a rebuff. . .

Will was in no sense of the word to blame. It was entirely my fault for not protesting more vigorously against a game in which there would inevitably be some unpleasantness, some one’s feelings hurt. If we had been treated as rational beings and allowed to talk. . . Or music. I am easily satisfied, I ask for nothing better than a little music. . . If only the rising generation were rather less self-conscious. . .