Brideshead Revisited

  ‘…At first I used to stay away with Rex in his friends’ houses. He doesn’t make me any more. He was ashamed of me when he found I didn’t cut the kind of figure he wanted, ashamed of himself for having been taken in. I wasn’t at all the article he’d bargained for. He can’t see the point of me, but whenever he’s made up his mind there isn’t a point and he’s begun to feel comfortable, he gets a surprise — some man, or even woman, he respects, takes a fancy to me and he suddenly sees that there is a whole world of things we understand and he doesn’t … he was upset when I went away. He’ll be delighted to have me back. I was faithful to’ him until this last thing came along. There’s nothing like a good upbringing. Do you know last year, when I thought I was going to have a child, I’d decided to have it brought up a Catholic? I hadn’t thought about religion before; I haven’t since; but just at that time, when I was waiting for the birth, I thought, “That’s one thing I can give her. It doesn’t seem to have done me much good, but my child shall have it.” It was odd, wanting to give something one had — lost oneself. Then, in the end, I couldn’t even give that: I couldn’t even give her life. I never saw her; I was too ill to know what was going on, and afterwards, for a long time, until now, I didn’t want to speak about her — she was a daughter, so Rex didn’t so much mind her being dead.

  ‘I’ve been punished a little for marrying Rex. You see, I can’t get all that sort of thing out of my mind, quite — Death, Judgement, Heaven, Hell, Nanny Hawkins, and the catechism. It becomes part of oneself, if they give it one early enough. And yet I wanted my child to have it…now I suppose I shall be punished for what I’ve just done. Perhaps that is why you and I are here together like this…part of a plan.’

  That was almost the last thing she said to me — ‘part of a plan’ — before we went below and I left her at the cabin door.

  Next day the wind had again dropped, and again we were wallowing in the swell. The talk was less of seasickness now than of broken bones; people had been thrown about in the night, and there had been many nasty accidents on bathroom floors.

  That day, because we had talked so much the day before and because what we had to say needed few words, we spoke little. We had books; Julia found a game she liked. When after long silences we spoke, our thoughts, we found, had kept pace together side by side.

  Once I said, ‘You are standing guard over your sadness.’

  ‘It’s all I have earned. You said yesterday. My wages.’

  ‘An I.O.U. from life. A promise to pay on demand.’

  Rain ceased at midday; at evening the clouds dispersed and the sun, astern of us, suddenly broke into the lounge where we sat, putting all the lights to shame.

  ‘Sunset,’ said Julia, ‘the end of our day.’

  She rose And, though the roll and pitch of the ship seemed unabated, led me up to the boat-deck. She put her arm through mine and her hand into mine, in my great-coat pocket. The deck was dry and empty, swept only by the wind of the ship’s speed. As we made our halting, laborious way forward, away from the flying smuts of the smokestack, we were alternately jostled together, then strained, nearly sundered, arms and fingers interlocked as I held the rail and Julia clung to me, thrust together again, drawn apart; then, in a plunge deeper than the rest, I found myself flung across her, pressing her against the rail, warding myself off her with the arms that held her prisoner on either side, and as the ship paused at the end of its drop as though gathering strength for the ascent, we stood thus embraced, in the open, cheek against cheek, her hair blowing across my eyes; the dark horizon of tumbling water, flashing now with gold, stood still above us, then came sweeping down till I was staring through Julia’s dark hair into a wide and golden sky, and she was thrown forward on my heart, held up by my hands on the rail, her face still pressed to mine.

  In that minute, with her lips to my ear and her breath warm in the salt wind, Julia said, though. I had not spoken, ‘Yes, now,’ and as the ship righted herself and for the moment ran into calmer waters, Julia led me below.

  It was no time for the sweets of luxury; they would come, in their season, with the swallow and the lime flowers. Now on the rough water there was a formality to be observed, no more. It was as though a deed of conveyance of her narrow loins had been drawn and sealed. I was making my first entry as the freeholder of a property I would enjoy and develop at leisure.

  We dined that night high up in the ship, in the restaurant, and saw through the bow windows the stars come out and sweep across the sky as once, I remembered, I had seen them sweep across the sky as once, I remembered, I had seen them sweep above the towers and gables of Oxford. The stewards promised that tomorrow night the band would play again and the place be full. We had better book now, they said, if we wanted a good table’.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Julia, ‘where can we hide in fair weather, we orphans of the storm?’

  I could not leave her that night, but early next morning, as once again I made my way back along the corridor, I found I could walk without difficulty; the ship rode easily on a smooth sea, and I knew that our solitude was broken.

  My wife called joyously from her cabin: ‘Charles, Charles, I feel so well. What do you think I am having for breakfast?’

  I went to see. She was eating a beef-steak.

  ‘I’ve fixed up for a visit to the hairdresser — do you know they couldn’t take me till four o’clock this afternoon, they’re so busy suddenly? So I shan’t appear till the evening, but lots of people are coming in to see us this morning, and I’ve asked Miles and Janet to lunch with us in our sitting-room. I’m afraid I’ve been a worthless wife to you the last two days. What have you been up to?’

  ‘One gay evening,’ I said, ‘we played roulette till two o’clock, next door in the sitting-room, and our host passed out.’

  ‘Goodness. It sounds very disreputable. Have you been behaving, Charles? You haven’t been picking up sirens?’

  ‘There was scarcely a woman about. I spent most of the time with Julia.’

  ‘Oh, good. I always wanted to bring you together. She’s one of my friends I knew you’d like. I expect you were a godsend to her. She’s had rather a gloomy time lately. I don’t expect she mentioned it, but…’ my wife proceeded to relate a current version of Julia’s journey to New York. ‘I’ll ask her to cocktails this morning,’ she concluded.

  Julia came among the others, and it was happiness enough, now merely to be near her.

  ‘I hear you’ve been looking after my husband for me,’ my wife said.

  ‘Yes, we’ve become very matey. He and I and a man whose name we don’t know.’

  ‘Mr Kramm, what have you done to your arm?’

  ‘It was the bathroom floor,’ said Mr Kramm, and explained at length how he had fallen.

  That night the captain dined at his table and the circle was complete, for claimants came to the chairs on the Bishop’s right, two Japanese who expressed deep interest in his projects for world-brotherhood. The captain was full of chaff at Julia’s endurance in the storm, offering to engage her as a seaman; years of sea-going had given him jokes for every occasion. My wife, fresh from the beauty parlour, was unmarked by her three days of distress, and in the eyes of many seemed to outshine Julia, whose sadness had gone and been replaced by an incommunicable content and tranquillity; incommunicable save to me; she and I, separated by the crowd, sat alone together close enwrapped, as we had lain in each other’s arms the night before.

  ‘There was a gala spirit in the ship that night. Though it meant rising at dawn to pack, everyone was determined that for this one night he would enjoy the luxury the storm had denied him. There was no solitude. Every corner of the ship was thronged; dance music and high, excited chatter, stewards darting everywhere with trays of glasses, the voice of the officer in charge of tombola — ‘Kelly’s eye — number one; legs, eleven; and we’ll Shake the Bag’ — Mrs Stuyvesant Oglander in a paper cap, Mr Kramm and his bandages, the two Japanese decorously throwing paper streame
rs and hissing like geese.

  I did not speak to Julia, alone, all that evening.

  We met for a minute next day on the starboard side of the ship while everyone else crowded to port to see the officials come aboard and to gaze at the green coastline of Devon.

  ‘What are your plans?’

  ‘London for a bit,’ she said.

  ‘Celia’s going straight home. She wants to see the children.’

  ‘You too?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘In London then.’

  ‘Charles, the little red-haired man Foulenough. Did you see? Two plain clothes police have taken him off.’

  ‘I missed it. There was such a crowd on that side of the ship.’

  ‘I found out the trains and sent a telegram. We shall be home by dinner. The children will be asleep. Perhaps we might wake Johnjohn up, just for once.’

  ‘You go down,’ I said. ‘I shall have to stay in London.’

  ‘Oh, but Charles, you must come. You haven’t seen Caroline.’

  ‘Will she change much in a week or two?’

  ‘Darling, she changes every day.’

  ‘Then what’s the point of seeing her now? I’m sorry, my dear, but I must get the pictures unpacked and see how they’ve travelled. I must fix up for the exhibition right away.’

  ‘Must you?’ she said, but I knew that her resistance ended when I appealed to the mysteries of my trade. ‘It’s very disappointing. Besides, I don’t know if Andrew and Cynthia will be out of the flat. They took it till the end of the month.’

  ‘I can go to an hotel.’

  ‘But that’s so grim. I can’t bear you to be alone your first night home. I’ll stay and go down tomorrow.’

  ‘You mustn’t disappoint the children.’

  ‘No.’ Her children, my art, the two mysteries of our trades.

  ‘Will you come for the week-end?’

  ‘If I can.’

  ‘All British passports to the smoking-room, please,’ said a steward.

  ‘I’ve arranged with that sweet Foreign Office man at our table to get us off early with him,’ said my wife.

  CHAPTER 2

  Private view — Rex Mottram at home

  IT was my wife’s idea to hold the private view on Friday.

  ‘We are out to catch the critics this time, I she said. ‘It’s high time they began to take you seriously, and they know it. This is their chance. If you open on Monday, they’ll most of them have just come up from the country, and they’ll dash off a few paragraphs before dinner — I’m only worrying about the weeklies of course. If we give them the week-end to think about it, we shall have them in an urbane Sunday-in-the-country mood. They’ll settle down after a good luncheon, tuck up their cuffs, and turn out a nice, leisurely full-length essay, which they’ll reprint later in a nice little book. Nothing less will do this time.’

  She was up and down from the Old Rectory several times during the month of preparation, revising the list of invitations and helping with the hanging.

  On the morning of the private view I telephoned to Julia and said: ‘I’m sick of the pictures already and never want to see them again, but I suppose I shall have to put in an appearance.’

  ‘D’you want me to come?’

  ‘I’d much rather you didn’t.’

  ‘Celia sent a card with “Bring everyone” written across it in green ink. When do we meet?’

  ‘In the train. You might pick up my luggage.’

  ‘If you’ll have it packed soon I’ll pick you up, too, and drop you at the gallery. I’ve got a fitting next door at twelve.’

  When I reached the gallery my wife was standing looking through the window to the street. Behind her half a dozen unknown picture-lovers were moving from canvas to canvas, catalogue in hand; they were people who had once bought a wood: cut and were consequently on the gallery’s list of patrons.

  ‘No one has come yet,’ said my wife. ‘I’ve been here since ten and it’s been very dull. Whose car was that you came in?’

  ‘Julia’s.’

  ‘Julia’s? Why didn’t, you bring her in? Oddly enough, I’ve just been talking about Brideshead to a funny little man who seemed to know us very well. He said he was called Mr Samgrass. Apparently he’s one of Lord Copper’s middle-aged young men on the Daily Beast. I tried to feed him some paragraphs, but he seemed to know more about you than I do. He said he’d met me years ago at Brideshead. I wish Julia had come in; then we could have asked her about him.’

  ‘I remember him well. He’s a crook.’

  ‘Yes, that stuck out a mile. He’s been talking all about what he calls the “‘Brideshead set”, Apparently Rex Mottram has made the place a nest of party mutiny. Did you know? What would Teresa Marchmain have thought?’

  ‘I’m going there tonight.’

  ‘Not tonight, Charles; you can’t go there tonight. You’re expected at home. You promised, as soon as the exhibition was ready, you’d come home. Johnjohn and Nanny have made a banner with “Welcome” on it. And you haven’t seen Caroline yet.’

  ‘I’m sorry, it’s all settled.’

  ‘Besides, Daddy will think it so odd. And Boy is home for Sunday. And you haven’t seen the new studio. You can’t go tonight. Did they ask me?’

  ‘Of course; but I knew you wouldn’t be able to come.’

  ‘I can’t now. I could have, if you’d let me know earlier. I should adore to see the “Brideshead set” at home. I do think you’re perfectly beastly, but this is no time for a family rumpus. The Clarences promised to come in before luncheon; they may be here any minute.’

  We were interrupted, however, not by royalty, but by a woman reporter from one of the dailies, whom the manager of the gallery now led up to us. She had not come to see the pictures but to get a “human story” of the dangers of my journey. I left her to my wife, and next day read in her paper: ‘Charles “Stately Homes” Ryder steps off the map. That the snakes and vampires of the jungle have nothing on Mayfair is the opinion of socialite artist Ryder, who has, abandoned the houses of the great for the ruins of equatorial Africa…’

  The rooms began to fill and I was soon busy being civil. My wife was everywhere, greeting people, introducing people, deftly transforming the crowd into a party. I saw her lead friends forward one after another to the subscription list that had been opened for the book of Ryder’s Latin America I heard her say: ‘No, darling, I’m not at all surprised, but you wouldn’t expect me to be, would you? You see Charles lives for one thing — Beauty. I think he got bored with finding it ready-made in England; he had to go and create it for himself. He wanted new worlds to conquer. After all, he has said the last word about country houses, hasn’t he? Not, I mean, that he’s given that up altogether. I’m sure he’ll always do one or two more for friends.’

  A photographer brought us together, flashed a lamp in our faces, and let us part.

  Presently there was the slight hush and edging away which follows the entry of a royal party. I saw my wife curtsey and heard her say: ‘Oh, sir, you are sweet’; then I was led into the clearing and the Duke of Clarence said: ‘Pretty hot out there I should think.’

  ‘It was, sir.’

  ‘Awfully clever the way you’ve hit off the impression of heat. Makes me feel quite uncomfortable in my greatcoat.’

  ‘Ha, ha.’

  When they had gone my wife said: ‘Goodness, we’re late for lunch. Margot’s giving a party in your honour, and in the taxi she said: ‘I’ve just thought of something. Why don’t you write and ask the Duchess of Clarence’s permission to dedicate Latin-America to her?’

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘She’d love it so.’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking of dedicating it to anyone.’

  ‘There you are; that’s typical of you, Charles. Why miss an opportunity to give pleasure?’

  There were a dozen at luncheon, and though it pleased my hostess and my wife to say that they were there in my honour, it was plain to me that hal
f of them did not know of my exhibition and had come because they had been invited and had no other engagement. Throughout luncheon they talked, without stopping, of Mrs Simpson, but they all, or nearly all, came back with us to the gallery.

  The hour after luncheon was the busiest time. There were representatives of the Tate Gallery and the National Art Collections Fund, who all promised to return shortly with colleagues and, in the meantime, reserved certain pictures for further consideration. The most influential critic, who in the past had dismissed me with a few wounding commendations, peered out at me from between his slouch hat and woollen muffler, gripped my arm, and said: ‘I knew you had it. I saw it there. I’ve been waiting for it.’

  From fashionable and unfashionable lips alike I heard fragments of praise. ‘If you’d asked me to guess,’ I overheard, ‘Ryder’s is the last name would have occurred to me. They’re so virile, so passionate.’

  They all thought they had found something new. It had not been thus at my last exhibition in these same rooms, shortly before my going abroad. Then there had been an unmistakable note of weariness. Then the talk had been less of me than of the houses, anecdotes of their owners. That same woman, it came back to me, who now applauded my virility and passion, had stood quite near me, before a painfully laboured canvas, and said, ‘So facile.’

  I remembered the exhibition, too, for another reason; it was the week I detected my wife in adultery. Then, as now, she was, a tireless hostess, and I heard her say: ‘Whenever I see anything lovely nowadays — a building or a piece of scenery — I think to myself, “that’s by Charles”. I see everything through his eyes. He is England to me.’

  I heard her say that; it was the sort of thing she had the habit of saying. Throughout our married life, again and again, I had felt my bowels shrivel within me at the things she said. But that day, in this gallery, I heard her unmoved, and suddenly realized that she was powerless to hurt me any more; I was a free man; she had given me my manumission in that brief, sly lapse of hers; my cuckold’s horns made me lord of the forest.