Chapter XIX.

by Aldous Huxley

　　Henry Wimbush's long cigar burned aromatically. The "History ofCrome" lay on his knee; slowly he turned over the pages."I can't decide what episode to read you to-night," he saidthoughtfully. "Sir Ferdinando's voyages are not withoutinterest. Then, of course, there's his son, Sir Julius. It washe who suffered from the delusion that his perspirationengendered flies; it drove him finally to suicide. Or there'sSir Cyprian." He turned the pages more rapidly. "Or Sir Henry.Or Sir George...No, I'm inclined to think I won't read about anyof these.""But you must read something," insisted Mr. Scogan, taking hispipe out of his mouth."I think I shall read about my grandfather," said Henry Wimbush,"and the events that led up to his marriage with the eldestdaughter of the last Sir Ferdinando.""Good," said Mr. Scogan. "We are listening.""Before I begin reading," said Henry Wimbush, looking up from thebook and taking off the pince-nez which he had just fitted to hisnose--"before their begin, I must say a few preliminary wordsabout Sir Ferdinando, the last of the Lapiths. At the death ofthe virtuous and unfortunate Sir Hercules, Ferdinando foundhimself in possession of the family fortune, not a littleincreased by his father's temperance and thrift; he appliedhimself forthwith to the task of spending it, which he did in anample and jovial fashion. By the time he was forty he had eatenand, above all, drunk and loved away about half his capital, andwould infallibly have soon got rid of the rest in the samemanner, if he had not had the good fortune to become so madlyenamoured of the Rector's daughter as to make a proposal ofmarriage. The young lady accepted him, and in less than a yearhad become the absolute mistress of Crome and her husband. Anextraordinary reformation made itself apparent in SirFerdinando's character. He grew regular and economical in hishabits; he even became temperate, rarely drinking more than abottle and a half of port at a sitting. The waning fortune ofthe Lapiths began once more to wax, and that in despite of thehard times (for Sir Ferdinando married in 1809 in the height ofthe Napoleonic Wars). A prosperous and dignified old age,cheered by the spectacle of his children's growth and happiness--for Lady Lapith had already borne him three daughters, and thereseemed no good reason why she should not bear many more of them,and sons as well--a patriarchal decline into the family vault,seemed now to be Sir Ferdinando's enviable destiny. ButProvidence willed otherwise. To Napoleon, cause already of suchinfinite mischief, was due, though perhaps indirectly, theuntimely and violent death which put a period to this reformedexistence."Sir Ferdinando, who was above all things a patriot, had adopted,from the earliest days of the conflict with the French, his ownpeculiar method of celebrating our victories. When the happynews reached London, it was his custom to purchase immediately alarge store of liquor and, taking a place on whichever of theoutgoing coaches he happened to light on first, to drive throughthe country proclaiming the good news to all he met on the roadand dispensing it, along with the liquor, at every stopping-placeto all who cared to listen or drink. Thus, after the Nile, hehad driven as far as Edinburgh; and later, when the coaches,wreathed with laurel for triumph, with cypress for mourning, weresetting out with the news of Nelson's victory and death, he satthrough all a chilly October night on the box of the Norwich"Meteor" with a nautical keg of rum on his knees and two cases ofold brandy under the seat. This genial custom was one of themany habits which he abandoned on his marriage. The victories inthe Peninsula, the retreat from Moscow, Leipzig, and theabdication of the tyrant all went uncelebrated. It so happened,however, that in the summer of 1815 Sir Ferdinando was stayingfor a few weeks in the capital. There had been a succession ofanxious, doubtful days; then came the glorious news of Waterloo.It was too much for Sir Ferdinando; his joyous youth awoke againwithin him. He hurried to his wine merchant and bought a dozenbottles of 1760 brandy. The Bath coach was on the point ofstarting; he bribed his way on to the box and, seated in glorybeside the driver, proclaimed aloud the downfall of the Corsicanbandit and passed about the warm liquid joy. They clatteredthrough Uxbridge, Slough, Maidenhead. Sleeping Reading wasawakened by the great news. At Didcot one of the ostlers was somuch overcome by patriotic emotions and the 1760 brandy that hefound it impossible to do up the buckles of the harness. Thenight began to grow chilly, and Sir Ferdinando found that it wasnot enough to take a nip at every stage: to keep up his vitalwarmth he was compelled to drink between the stages as well.They were approaching Swindon. The coach was travelling at adizzy speed--six miles in the last half-hour--when, withouthaving manifested the slightest premonitory symptom ofunsteadiness, Sir Ferdinando suddenly toppled sideways off hisseat and fell, head foremost, into the road. An unpleasant joltawakened the slumbering passengers. The coach was brought to astandstill; the guard ran back with a light. He found SirFerdinando still alive, but unconscious; blood was oozing fromhis mouth. The back wheels of the coach had passed over hisbody, breaking most of his ribs and both arms. His skull wasfractured in two places. They picked him up, but he was deadbefore they reached the next stage. So perished Sir Ferdinando,a victim to his own patriotism. Lady Lapith did not marry again,but determined to devote the rest of her life to the well-beingof her three children--Georgiana, now five years old, andEmmeline and Caroline, twins of two."Henry Wimbush paused, and once more put on his pince-nez. "Somuch by way of introduction," he said. "Now I can begin to readabout my grandfather.""One moment," said Mr. Scogan, "till I've refilled my pipe."Mr. Wimbush waited. Seated apart in a corner of the room, Ivorwas showing Mary his sketches of Spirit Life. They spoketogether in whispers.Mr. Scogan had lighted his pipe again. "Fire away," he said.Henry Wimbush fired away."It was in the spring of 1833 that my grandfather, GeorgeWimbush, first made the acquaintance of the 'three lovelyLapiths,' as they were always called. He was then a young man oftwenty-two, with curly yellow hair and a smooth pink face thatwas the mirror of his youthful and ingenuous mind. He had beeneducated at Harrow and Christ Church, he enjoyed hunting and allother field sports, and, though his circumstances werecomfortable to the verge of affluence, his pleasures weretemperate and innocent. His father, an East Indian merchant, haddestined him for a political career, and had gone to considerableexpense in acquiring a pleasant little Cornish borough as atwenty-first birthday gift for his son. He was justly indignantwhen, on the very eve of George's majority, the Reform Bill of1832 swept the borough out of existence. The inauguration ofGeorge's political career had to be postponed. At the time hegot to know the lovely Lapiths he was waiting; he was not at allimpatient."The lovely Lapiths did not fail to impress him. Georgiana, theeldest, with her black ringlets, her flashing eyes, her nobleaquiline profile, her swan-like neck, and sloping shoulders, wasorientally dazzling; and the twins, with their delicately turned-up noses, their blue eyes, and chestnut hair, were an identicalpair of ravishingly English charmers."Their conversation at this first meeting proved, however, to beso forbidding that, but for the invincible attraction exercisedby their beauty, George would never have had the courage tofollow up the acquaintance. The twins, looking up their noses athim with an air of languid superiority, asked him what he thoughtof the latest French poetry and whether he liked the "Indiana" ofGeorge Sand. But what was almost worse was the question withwhich Georgiana opened her conversation with him. 'In music,'she asked, leaning forward and fixing him with her large darkeyes, 'are you a classicist or a transcendentalist?' George didnot lose his presence of mind. He had enough appreciation ofmusic to know that he hated anything classical, and so, with apromptitude which did him credit, he replied, 'I am atranscendentalist.' Georgiana smiled bewitchingly. 'I am glad,'she said; 'so am I. You went to hear Paganini last week, ofcourse. "The prayer of Moses"--ah!' She closed her eyes. 'Doyou know anything more transcendental than that?' 'No,' saidGeorge, 'I don't.' He hesitated, was about to go on speaking,and then decided that after all it would be wiser not to say--what was in fact true--that he had enjoyed above all Paganini'sFarmyard Imitations. The man had made his fiddle bray like anass, cluck like a hen, grunt, squeal, bark, neigh, quack, bellow,and growl; that last item, in George's estimation, had almostcompensated for the tediousness of the rest of the concert. Hesmiled with pleasure at the thought of it. Yes, decidedly, hewas no classicist in music; he was a thoroughgoingtranscendentalist."George followed up this first introduction by paying a call onthe young ladies and their mother, who occupied, during theseason, a small but elegant house in the neighbourhood ofBerkeley Square. Lady Lapith made a few discreet inquiries, andhaving found that George's financial position, character, andfamily were all passably good, she asked him to dine. She hopedand expected that her daughters would all marry into the peerage;but, being a prudent woman, she knew it was advisable to preparefor all contingencies. George Wimbush, she thought, would makean excellent second string for one of the twins."At this first dinner, George's partner was Emmeline. Theytalked of Nature. Emmeline protested that to her high mountainswere a feeling and the hum of human cities torture. Georgeagreed that the country was very agreeable, but held that Londonduring the season also had its charms. He noticed with surpriseand a certain solicitous distress that Miss Emmeline's appetitewas poor, that it didn't, in fact, exist. Two spoonfuls of soup,a morsel of fish, no bird, no meat, and three grapes--that washer whole dinner. He looked from time to time at her twosisters; Georgiana and Caroline seemed to be quite as abstemious.They waved away whatever was offered them with an expression ofdelicate disgust, shutting their eyes and averting their facesfrom the proffered dish, as though the lemon sole, the duck, theloin of veal, the trifle, were objects revolting to the sight andsmell. George, who thought the dinner capital, ventured tocomment on the sisters' lack of appetite."'Pray, don't talk to me of eating,' said Emmeline, drooping likea sensitive plant. 'We find it so coarse, so unspiritual, mysisters and I. One can't think of one's soul while one iseating.'"George agreed; one couldn't. 'But one must live,' he said."'Alas!' Emmeline sighed. 'One must. Death is very beautiful,don't you think?' She broke a corner off a piece of toast andbegan to nibble at it languidly. 'But since, as you say, onemust live...' She made a little gesture of resignation.'Luckily a very little suffices to keep one alive.' She put downher corner of toast half eaten."George regarded her with some surprise. She was pale, but shelooked extraordinarily healthy, he thought; so did her sisters.Perhaps if you were really spiritual you needed less food. He,clearly, was not spiritual."After this he saw them frequently. They all liked him, fromLady Lapith downwards. True, he was not very romantic orpoetical; but he was such a pleasant, unpretentious, kind-heartedyoung man, that one couldn't help liking him. For his part, hethought them wonderful, wonderful, especially Georgiana. Heenveloped them all in a warm, protective affection. For theyneeded protection; they were altogether too frail, too spiritualfor this world. They never ate, they were always pale, theyoften complained of fever, they talked much and lovingly ofdeath, they frequently swooned. Georgiana was the most etherealof all; of the three she ate least, swooned most often, talkedmost of death, and was the palest--with a pallor that was sostartling as to appear positively artificial. At any moment, itseemed, she might loose her precarious hold on this materialworld and become all spirit. To George the thought was acontinual agony. If she were to die..."She contrived, however, to live through the season, and that inspite of the numerous balls, routs, and other parties of pleasurewhich, in company with the rest of the lovely trio, she neverfailed to attend. In the middle of July the whole householdmoved down to the country. George was invited to spend the monthof August at Crome."The house-party was distinguished; in the list of visitorsfigured the names of two marriageable young men of title. Georgehad hoped that country air, repose, and natural surroundingsmight have restored to the three sisters their appetites and theroses of their cheeks. He was mistaken. For dinner, the firstevening, Georgiana ate only an olive, two or three saltedalmonds, and half a peach. She was as pale as ever. During themeal she spoke of love."'True love,' she said, 'being infinite and eternal, can only beconsummated in eternity. Indiana and Sir Rodolphe celebrated themystic wedding of their souls by jumping into Niagara. Love isincompatible with life. The wish of two people who truly loveone another is not to live together but to die together.'"'Come, come, my dear,' said Lady Lapith, stout and practical.'What would become of the next generation, pray, if all the worldacted on your principles?'"'Mamma!...' Georgiana protested, and dropped her eyes."'In my young days,' Lady Lapith went on, 'I should have beenlaughed out of countenance if I'd said a thing like that. Butthen in my young days souls weren't as fashionable as they arenow and we didn't think death was at all poetical. It was justunpleasant.'"'Mamma!...' Emmeline and Caroline implored in unison."'In my young days--' Lady Lapith was launched into her subject;nothing, it seemed, could stop her now. 'In my young days, ifyou didn't eat, people told you you needed a dose of rhubarb.Nowadays...'"There was a cry; Georgiana had swooned sideways on to LordTimpany's shoulder. It was a desperate expedient; but it wassuccessful. Lady Lapith was stopped."The days passed in an uneventful round of pleasures. Of all thegay party George alone was unhappy. Lord Timpany was paying hiscourt to Georgiana, and it was clear that he was not unfavourablyreceived. George looked on, and his soul was a hell of jealousyand despair. The boisterous company of the young men becameintolerable to him; he shrank from them, seeking gloom andsolitude. One morning, having broken away from them on somevague pretext, he returned to the house alone. The young menwere bathing in the pool below; their cries and laughter floatedup to him, making the quiet house seem lonelier and more silent.The lovely sisters and their mamma still kept their chambers;they did not customarily make their appearance till luncheon, sothat the male guests had the morning to themselves. George satdown in the hall and abandoned himself to thought."At any moment she might die; at any moment she might become LadyTimpany. It was terrible, terrible. If she died, then he woulddie too; he would go to seek her beyond the grave. If she becameLady Timpany...ah, then! The solution of the problem would notbe so simple. If she became Lady Timpany: it was a horriblethought. But then suppose she were in love with Timpany--thoughit seemed incredible that anyone could be in love with Timpany--suppose her life depended on Timpany, suppose she couldn't livewithout him? He was fumbling his way along this cluelesslabyrinth of suppositions when the clock struck twelve. On thelast stroke, like an automaton released by the turning clockwork,a little maid, holding a large covered tray, popped out of thedoor that led from the kitchen regions into the hall. From hisdeep arm-chair George watched her (himself, it was evident,unobserved) with an idle curiosity. She pattered across the roomand came to a halt in front of what seemed a blank expense ofpanelling. She reached out her hand and, to George's extremeastonishment, a little door swung open, revealing the foot of awinding staircase. Turning sideways in order to get her traythrough the narrow opening, the little maid darted in with arapid crab-like motion. The door closed behind her with a click.A minute later it opened again and the maid, without her tray,hurried back across the hall and disappeared in the direction ofthe kitchen. George tried to recompose his thoughts, but aninvincible curiosity drew his mind towards the hidden door, thestaircase, the little maid. It was in vain he told himself thatthe matter was none of his business, that to explore the secretsof that surprising door, that mysterious staircase within, wouldbe a piece of unforgivable rudeness and indiscretion. It was invain; for five minutes he struggled heroically with hiscuriosity, but at the end of that time he found himself standingin front of the innocent sheet of panelling through which thelittle maid had disappeared. A glance sufficed to show him theposition of the secret door--secret, he perceived, only to thosewho looked with a careless eye. It was just an ordinary door letin flush with the panelling. No latch nor handle betrayed itsposition, but an unobtrusive catch sunk in the wood invited thethumb. George was astonished that he had not noticed it before;now he had seen it, it was so obvious, almost as obvious as thecupboard door in the library with its lines of imitation shelvesand its dummy books. He pulled back the catch and peeped inside.The staircase, of which the degrees were made not of stone but ofblocks of ancient oak, wound up and out of sight. A slit-likewindow admitted the daylight; he was at the foot of the centraltower, and the little window looked out over the terrace; theywere still shouting and splashing in the pool below."George closed the door and went back to his seat. But hiscuriosity was not satisfied. Indeed, this partial satisfactionhad but whetted its appetite. Where did the staircase lead?What was the errand of the little maid? It was no business ofhis, he kept repeating--no business of his. He tried to read,but his attention wandered. A quarter-past twelve sounded on theharmonious clock. Suddenly determined, George rose, crossed theroom, opened the hidden door, and began to ascend the stairs. Hepassed the first window, corkscrewed round, and came to another.He paused for a moment to look out; his heart beat uncomfortably,as though he were affronting some unknown danger. What he wasdoing, he told himself, was extremely ungentlemanly, horriblyunderbred. He tiptoed onward and upward. One turn more, thenhalf a turn, and a door confronted him. He halted before it,listened; he could hear no sound. Putting his eye to thekeyhole, he saw nothing but a stretch of white sunlit wall.Emboldened, he turned the handle and stepped across thethreshold. There he halted, petrified by what he saw, mutelygaping."In the middle of a pleasantly sunny little room--'it is nowPriscilla's boudoir,' Mr. Wimbush remarked parenthetically--stooda small circular table of mahogany. Crystal, porcelain, andsilver,--all the shining apparatus of an elegant meal--weremirrored in its polished depths. The carcase of a cold chicken,a bowl of fruit, a great ham, deeply gashed to its heart oftenderest white and pink, the brown cannon ball of a cold plum-pudding, a slender Hock bottle, and a decanter of claret jostledone another for a place on this festive board. And round thetable sat the three sisters, the three lovely Lapiths--eating!"At George's sudden entrance they had all looked towards thedoor, and now they sat, petrified by the same astonishment whichkept George fixed and staring. Georgiana, who sat immediatelyfacing the door, gazed at him with dark, enormous eyes. Betweenthe thumb and forefinger of her right hand she was holding adrumstick of the dismembered chicken; her little finger,elegantly crooked, stood apart from the rest of her hand. Hermouth was open, but the drumstick had never reached itsdestination; it remained, suspended, frozen, in mid-air. Theother two sisters had turned round to look at the intruder.Caroline still grasped her knife and fork; Emmeline's fingerswere round the stem of her claret glass. For what seemed a verylong time, George and the three sisters stared at one another insilence. They were a group of statues. Then suddenly there wasmovement. Georgiana dropped her chicken bone, Caroline's knifeand fork clattered on her plate. The movement propagated itself,grew more decisive; Emmeline sprang to her feet, uttering a cry.The wave of panic reached George; he turned and, mumblingsomething unintelligible as he went, rushed out of the room anddown the winding stairs. He came to a standstill in the hall,and there, all by himself in the quiet house, he began to laugh."At luncheon it was noticed that the sisters ate a little morethan usual. Georgiana toyed with some French beans and aspoonful of calves'-foot jelly. 'I feel a little stronger to-day,' she said to Lord Timpany, when he congratulated her on thisincrease of appetite; 'a little more material,' she added, with anervous laugh. Looking up, she caught George's eye; a blushsuffused her cheeks and she looked hastily away."In the garden that afternoon they found themselves for a momentalone."You won't tell anyone, George? Promise you won't tell anyone,'she implored. 'It would make us look so ridiculous. Andbesides, eating is unspiritual, isn't it? Say you won't tellanyone.'"'I will,' said George brutally. 'I'll tell everyone, unless...'"'It's blackmail.'"'I don't care, said George. 'I'll give you twenty-four hours todecide.'"Lady Lapith was disappointed, of course; she had hoped forbetter things--for Timpany and a coronet. But George, after all,wasn't so bad. They were married at the New Year."My poor grandfather!" Mr. Wimbush added, as he closed his bookand put away his pince-nez. "Whenever I read in the papers aboutoppressed nationalities, I think of him." He relighted hiscigar. "It was a maternal government, highly centralised, andthere were no representative institutions."Henry Wimbush ceased speaking. In the silence that ensued Ivor'swhispered commentary on the spirit sketches once more becameaudible. Priscilla, who had been dozing, suddenly woke up."What?" she said in the startled tones of one newly returned toconsciousness; "what?"Jenny caught the words. She looked up, smiled, noddedreassuringly. "It's about a ham," she said."What's about a ham?""What Henry has been reading." She closed the red notebook lyingon her knees and slipped a rubber band round it. "I'm going tobed," she announced, and got up."So am I," said Anne, yawning. But she lacked the energy to risefrom her arm-chair.The night was hot and oppressive. Round the open windows thecurtains hung unmoving. Ivor, fanning himself with the portraitof an Astral Being, looked out into the darkness and drew abreath."The air's like wool," he declared."It will get cooler after midnight," said Henry Wimbush, andcautiously added, "perhaps.""I shan't sleep, I know."Priscilla turned her head in his direction; the monumentalcoiffure nodded exorbitantly at her slightest movement. "Youmust make an effort," she said. "When I can't sleep, Iconcentrate my will: I say, 'I will sleep, I am asleep!' Andpop! off I go. That's the power of thought.""But does it work on stuffy nights?" Ivor inquired. "I simplycannot sleep on a stuffy night.""Nor can I," said Mary, "except out of doors.""Out of doors! What a wonderful idea!" In the end they decidedto sleep on the towers--Mary on the western tower, Ivor on theeastern. There was a flat expanse of leads on each of thetowers, and you could get a mattress through the trap doors thatopened on to them. Under the stars, under the gibbous moon,assuredly they would sleep. The mattresses were hauled up,sheets and blankets were spread, and an hour later the twoinsomniasts, each on his separate tower, were crying their good-nights across the dividing gulf.On Mary the sleep-compelling charm of the open air did not workwith its expected magic. Even through the mattress one could notfail to be aware that the leads were extremely hard. Then therewere noises: the owls screeched tirelessly, and once, roused bysome unknown terror, all the geese of the farmyard burst into asudden frenzy of cackling. The stars and the gibbous moondemanded to be looked at, and when one meteorite had streakedacross the sky, you could not help waiting, open-eyed and alert,for the next. Time passed; the moon climbed higher and higher inthe sky. Mary felt less sleepy than she had when she first cameout. She sat up and looked over the parapet. Had Ivor been ableto sleep? she wondered. And as though in answer to her mentalquestion, from behind the chimney-stack at the farther end of theroof a white form noiselessly emerged--a form that, in themoonlight, was recognisably Ivor's. Spreading his arms to rightand left, like a tight-rope dancer, he began to walk forwardalong the roof-tree of the house. He swayed terrifyingly as headvanced. Mary looked on speechlessly; perhaps he was walking inhis sleep! Suppose he were to wake up suddenly, now! If shespoke or moved it might mean his death. She dared look no more,but sank back on her pillows. She listened intently. For whatseemed an immensely long time there was no sound. Then there wasa patter of feet on the tiles, followed by a scrabbling noise anda whispered "Damn!" And suddenly Ivor's head and shouldersappeared above the parapet. One leg followed, then the other.He was on the leads. Mary pretended to wake up with a start."Oh!" she said. "What are you doing here?""I couldn't sleep," he explained, "so I came along to see if youcouldn't. One gets bored by oneself on a tower. Don't you findit so?"It was light before five. Long, narrow clouds barred the east,their edges bright with orange fire. The sky was pale andwatery. With the mournful scream of a soul in pain, a monstrouspeacock, flying heavily up from below, alighted on the parapet ofthe tower. Ivor and Mary started broad awake."Catch him!" cried Ivor, jumping up. "We'll have a feather."The frightened peacock ran up and down the parapet in an absurddistress, curtseying and bobbing and clucking; his long tailswung ponderously back and forth as he turned and turned again.Then with a flap and swish he launched himself upon the air andsailed magnificently earthward, with a recovered dignity. But hehad left a trophy. Ivor had his feather, a long-lashed eye ofpurple and green, of blue and gold. He handed it to hiscompanion."An angel's feather," he said.Mary looked at it for a moment, gravely and intently. Her purplepyjamas clothed her with an ampleness that hid the lines of herbody; she looked like some large, comfortable, unjointed toy, asort of Teddy-bear--but a Teddy bear with an angel's head, pinkcheeks, and hair like a bell of gold. An angel's face, thefeather of an angel's wing...Somehow the whole atmosphere of thissunrise was rather angelic."It's extraordinary to think of sexual selection," she said atlast, looking up from her contemplation of the miraculousfeather."Extraordinary!" Ivor echoed. "I select you, you select me.What luck!"He put his arm round her shoulders and they stood lookingeastward. The first sunlight had begun to warm and colour thepale light of the dawn. Mauve pyjamas and white pyjamas; theywere a young and charming couple. The rising sun touched theirfaces. It was all extremely symbolic; but then, if you choose tothink so, nothing in this world is not symbolical. Profound andbeautiful truth!"I must be getting back to my tower," said Ivor at last."Already?""I'm afraid so. The varletry will soon be up and about.""Ivor..." There was a prolonged and silent farewell."And now," said Ivor, "I repeat my tight-rope stunt."Mary threw her arms round his neck. "You mustn't, Ivor. It'sdangerous. Please."He had to yield at last to her entreaties. "All right," he said,"I'll go down through the house and up at the other end."He vanished through the trap door into the darkness that stilllurked within the shuttered house. A minute later he hadreappeared on the farther tower; he waved his hand, and then sankdown, out of sight, behind the parapet. From below, in thehouse, came the thin wasp-like buzzing of an alarum-clock. Hehad gone back just in time.